“Sorry, it’s just me. I couldn’t find you. Do you want a drink? Did you like the show?” Shit, slow down, buddy.
She sank back into the booth that she’d been sitting at. He slid in opposite her. “What are you doing?”
“The blog already posted to the site. It’s kinda pathetic really. I’m going to have to write a whole other piece to make up for how…bland this one is. I wrote it before I saw the show.”
“You what? Seriously? You just posted about something before it happened?” He frowned at her. Journalism didn’t work that way, right?
Anya dropped her head to the table and banged it gently. Once, twice, and she was obviously going for a third time, so he slipped his hand between her forehead and the tabletop, cushioning her despair.
She let her head rest on his hand, and something in him slid. Something changed.
He lifted her head and scrambled out of the booth, his hand still on her face. He crouched beside her, lowered his mouth to her cherry-red lips, and kissed her. He teased her lips open under his. She moaned into his mouth as his tongue touched hers. Heat flickered through his body, igniting a fuse in him that he couldn’t tamp down.
Except she shoved him away. Like, hard. He toppled over onto his ass, and she jumped up, pacing the short carpet between the galley kitchen and the booths.
“What was that? What the hell was that? You can’t just go around kissing random people without notice. It’s rude. You’re rude.” She paced more, and he smiled. She was as jacked as he was.
He sprung up. “Sorry. I’m flying on adrenaline. I…don’t know what came over me. But whatever it was, it’s catching.” He paused as she stalked up and down the bus. “Are you fixing to wear a hole in the rug?”
She stopped in front of him, a look of utter bewilderment in her eyes. Hell, he wanted to kiss her again. Instead he held out his hand. “Let’s get out of here. We need some air.”
Without speaking, she swiped some strands of hair off her face and nodded. She looked at his hand for a good three seconds, and he was about to drop it when she took it. When she gazed into his eyes for an instant, he slipped further into…what? He’d been around the block with his share of girls, but he’d never felt something like this.
He lowered his eyes, scared that she would see something in them that he didn’t have a name for, and swallowed. Then he raised his head, forced a grin, and ran out of the bus, dragging her behind him.
They rushed back into the building, but as soon as they got through the door, he took a sharp right, up the backstage emergency exit stairs. He ran with her until they reached the very top and he pushed through the door.
“Wow,” Anya breathed, still panting from the exertion.
“I love roofs. So close to the stars. So far above everyone else.” He laughed as he sat, shimmying forward until his legs dangled off the roof, and his arms hung over the metal guardrail. She sat next to him, threading her arms around the rail, too. “Don’t fall, I’m not sure our insurance will cover it.”
“I’ll try not to,” she said in a dry tone.
He caught her eye, relieved to see she was smiling.
He lay back so he was looking up at the stars. Will was lucky to have this. It had been an amazing experience for Matt, and if Will came back and looked after his career properly, he would always have this. And that made Matt happy he’d agreed to cover for him. Not that he had much choice. But still. It had been so cool so far to live the life a little, along with the option to fade away, back to being “brother of the star.”
“Penny for your thoughts?” Anya said, lying back next to him.
“I wish I knew what all the stars were. I feel like it would be a good pickup line right now if I could name them all.”
She raised her arm and pointed to a cluster of stars. “See that one? That’s Orion. He’s a warrior. You can see his armor, and his belt, and if you look at his shoulder, in your peripheral vision you can see the dagger hanging from his belt.”
Was she serious? “That’s awesome. Show me another.” How cool was she anyway?
“That one, shaped like a cooking pan is called the Great Bear, or the Big Dipper. The sides of the pan…there”—she pointed straight up—they point directly to the North Star, the star by which all the ancient sailors navigated.”
Huh. He rolled onto one elbow. “I was right.”
“What do you mean? Right about what?”
“It’s an awesome pickup line.”
…
Anya’s heart hadn’t stopped thumping through her chest since he’d kissed her. She didn’t know what had made him do that. But she wanted to make him do it again. Her first kiss. That is if you didn’t count Jimmy Madden in fifth grade, and she didn’t. She used to, but not now. Not as of ten minutes ago. Now she knew what a real kiss was like.
She rolled up onto her side, too, and searched his eyes for something, she didn’t know what. But it was so dark up there, she couldn’t really see anything other than the outline of him.
He spoke first. “Sorry about kissing you before. It was the adrenaline after the show. It’s still in me. But when I get off the stage, I feel like I can fly. Like my body isn’t big enough to hold everything inside me. Like I’m going to explode.” He paused and flung himself on his back again and reached his arms up toward the sky and stretched. “Hey, we can just be thankful that it was you there, and not LJ, right?”
Her heart rolled over and curled into a dry ball of what-the-hell. So he would have kissed an old man if she hadn’t been there? What a jerk! There she had been, basking in her first kiss, and she could have been anyone at all. Anyone that just happened to be in reach. What a—
“That is, if you hated it and never want me to kiss you again. If, by a complete shot in the dark, you actually liked it, then I have to say…” He rolled over again and poked her kind of hard in the ribs. “I’d certainly prefer to kiss you than LJ. Well, almost certainly.”
Jerk!
“Whaaat?” Relief and outrage spiked together and she jumped on top of him, making him “Ooof.” She jabbed her fingers into his ribs as he tried in vain to catch her hands. “I’m interchangeable with LJ, am I? Maybe I should kiss him and let you know what it’s like, huh?”
He grabbed her wrists and levered himself so he was sitting again, leaving her astride his lap. “Stop. Come here,” he whispered, leaning in to her.
She met him halfway, her eyes fluttering shut as his mouth caressed her jaw. She stretched her neck to allow him better access. The breeze fluttering across the roof mimicked his lips grazing over her face. He pulled away slightly and, after a second, she opened her eyes to see him staring at her. He slowly tucked a piece of hair behind her ear. “You’re beautiful,” he said simply.
She looked away from him, unwilling to accept that he was being truthful. Fingers tipped her chin back up, and his lips slowly sunk to hers. She felt as if she were melting, from her legs, to her stomach, to her brain that no longer held a thought. For a few minutes, her whole world became Will, and his kiss.
He pulled away and moaned, “LJ,” against her cheek. He ducked away, laughing before she could reach him with her poking fingers again.
She giggled, rolling off his lap and jumping to her feet. They were so alone up here, it was as if they were in their own world. She leaned over the railing. “Look. People are still down there.” They seemed as much like specks as the stars above them.
He joined her and looked down. “There are always some stragglers.” He pointed at some men on the stage. “They’ll be breaking down the set for about five hours, and then they’ll transport it to our next stop. Come seven a.m., it’ll be like we were never here. Sometimes it feels as if we’re a mirage. Not really anywhere.”
There was silence for a moment as they watched the people below them, while she was blissfully aware that one of the most famous boys in the world was watching them. With her. A homeless girl with nothing. She waited for the familiar anxiety to prod its way
back inside her, but she felt nothing except the excitement of being with Will, and having him kiss her like that.
“So. I have something important to tell you.” He turned so his back was leaning against the metal barrier, his face solemn. “I watched you during the show, and I counted five times that you weren’t dancing. Which means you owe me five dares.”
Something twisted in her stomach as she wondered what he might ask her to do. Still no anxiety. “Well maybe I’ll just ask for my money back, because obviously if there were a whole five times that I wasn’t dancing, you can’t have been that good.”
“That argument would hold a lot more water if you’d, you know, actually paid for your ticket.” He crossed his arms and nudged her.
“True,” she allowed.
“You did like it though, right?” He sounded a tiny bit unsure.
Something loud clanged from the stage, echoing around the stadium and up toward them. They both turned toward the sound, and Anya jumped as he slipped his arm around her.
“How did you ever get the reputation of being the shy one of the band? You could be the least shy person I’ve ever met,” she said, smiling to herself. Maybe she had found out something about him. Not really a scoop, though.
His arm fell away and he took a step back. He didn’t say anything for a moment and she looked at him kicking the dirt and hanging his head. “Okay, so you’re painfully shy.” She laughed at his pathetic playacting. “So what’s my first dare?”
“I haven’t decided yet, but the night is still young, isn’t it?”
“I don’t know, I don’t have a watch,” she replied, wondering what the time was.
“Well I’m going to keep you up until the sun rises. We’ll sleep when we’re dead.” He threw his arms up like he’d just scored a goal and spun around looking up at the sky.
She shook her head. “What are we going to do?” She wondered what exactly he had in mind. Drinking? More kissing? More than that? What if he used his dares to get her to do something…sexy?
“First of all, we’re going to play Uno. Do you know how to play?”
What? “Um, maybe? I think I last played when I was maybe seven?”
“That’s awesome. You’ll be easy to beat. Stay here. I’ll be back in ten minutes. Don’t go anywhere.” He ran for the exit door, hesitated with his hand on the handle, turned around, and ran back to her. He grabbed her around the waist and planted a kiss on her lips. “Ten minutes, okay? Don’t forget me.” He ran off again.
“Don’t forget me,” she said to the swinging door.
Chapter Ten
Twenty minutes later, Matt was already bored with playing Uno. He was pacing the roof. “You want to go back to my bus?” he asked. Did that sound bad? That sounded bad.
“No. You told me that wasn’t allowed.”
“That’s true.” He continued to pace.
“Can I ask you some stuff? For my posts?” She stood up and tried to keep in step with him. “Why don’t we go down and walk around the arena? Do you think that might help?”
Eh. Couldn’t hurt. “Sure. I guess. Everyone’s probably gone by now anyway.”
They went back down the stairs and hit the parking lot that surrounded the venue. They slipped into a pace halfway between stopped dead and an amble.
Anya broke the silence. “So what kind of gifts do girls send you? I got a comment on the post saying that you never replied to this girl who sent you presents and letters.”
“Oh my God. Anya. You should know better than to read the comments. For the same reason that we don’t get shown the letters and gifts unless they’re from people we know. No good comes of it.” He slowed down a bit, suddenly worried. “What else did they say?”
“Someone threatened to kill me if I laid a hand on Will Fray.”
That brought him to a stop. “What?”
“They said that they know where I live.” She smiled as if she didn’t care.
“Is there a chance they do know where you live?” he asked. “Should I get Beau on this?”
“Who’s Beau?” she asked, continuing to walk. He stayed still.
“He leads our security detail. Hey. Come back.”
She stopped then and realized how far behind her he was. She returned and stood so close to him that the tips of her toes were touching his. In the light of the parking lot’s floodlights, her hair looked navy blue, it was so black. And her eyes sparkled with a lighter blue. She took his breath away. Literally. She tipped her head to one side.
“What’s the matter? Don’t you get death threats from crazy girls all the time? I’m not scared of a girl on a computer. I’d be scared of a girl without a computer, someone with nothing to lose.”
Suddenly he realized he didn’t know her at all. Like, at all. “Who are you, Anya?” he asked as he tucked her floating hair behind her ear. Every time she was within reach, he wanted to touch her hair. Her eyes widened very slightly.
“I’m just me.” Her tongue darted out and licked a tiny place on her bottom lip. Jesus, she was sexy. He’d literally never met anyone so…interesting. Except he had no idea if she was interesting. Maybe she was completely boring.
“Tell me something about you. Why do you always wear your hair up? Why haven’t I ever seen you with a cell phone? Where do you live? Where are you from originally? Cats or dogs? Homebody or wanderluster?” He was kind of aware that he sounded desperate, and he wasn’t sure why.
“Wow.” She took a step away. “Where would you like me to start?”
He swallowed and tried to cover it with a laugh. “Your first dare. Take your hair out of its…whatever keeps it up there.”
A frown briefly touched her beautiful face. Then she shrugged and smiled. “Good thing I washed it this morning.” She drew some long pins from her hair and stuffed them in her pocket. Her hair was shoulder length, choppy. Probably an expensive hairdresser made it look as if it had been hacked off on a desert island.
He reclaimed the step she had taken backward and touched her hair with his finger first. Just one finger on one shiny lock. Her eyes closed and he realized that he’d shoved his whole hand into her hair and was smoothing it from her head to the ends. It felt like silk. Heavy cool silk. “It feels incredible.”
He tightened his grasp on it, tugging her hair ever so lightly, pulling her head to one side. Her eyes fluttered closed, and he kissed her. Because he could. Because there was no way he couldn’t. And then his other hand was on her head, bringing her closer. He needed her closer. Every kiss they had made him want her more. Need her presence. Her stillness.
“Will? Is that you, Will?” He heard the words, but they just didn’t register. Anya pulled away, ducking her head as if embarrassed to be caught kissing him.
“Will?” Yeah. He was Will.
“Mrs. Carlisle?”
“I think it’s time for this young lady to say good night, don’t you? The buses will be leaving in about an hour.”
Shoot me now. “Yes ma’am. Just taking her back.”
“Okay then. Have a good night.” She went off toward the buses.
“Who was that?” Anya asked as he slipped his hand in hers and followed Miles’s mom.
“She’s one of the parents. She acts as a chaperone. Everyone under the age of eighteen has to have a raft of them on tour to keep us on the straight and narrow.”
“That makes sense, I guess,” she replied.
“It’s a pain in the ass,” he mumbled.
She didn’t reply. He walked her to the Hanging On bus and kissed her hand like some idiot knight of the roundtable. What was the matter with him? But the smile that spread across her face as she turned to go…maybe he should try to be more knightly? She disappeared into the bus, and he kicked himself. This wasn’t a relationship. This was…a means to an end or something. He was distracting her from her interviews. That was all.
That was all.
…
Natasha was still out, so Anya had the bus to herself. May
be she was with her relatives in that swanky hotel she’d mentioned. So it would be just her and the driver going to New Orleans? That felt weird to be alone with a man at night. Maybe she should try to stay awake. She should be used to staying awake in the night, but this schedule was messing up her usual routine.
She extracted her notebook from under her pillow and went to the section on Will, finding it quickly as it was the most worn page.
Likes high places. Likes roofs.
Not really shy, but doesn’t like it being pointed out.
Instead of getting in her bunk, she booted up the tablet. It did indeed have a camera. She experimented with taking photos and took one of the driver getting on the bus. He acted like a pilot. He attached a see-through map to his visor and called in over a radio to all the other buses doing a radio check.
“The One. Loud and clear.”
“Not Tonight. Loud and clear.”
And so it went on down to the ones that didn’t have song names, just numbers. She counted fifteen. Suddenly she didn’t feel so alone.
Her last, slightly premature, blog post had over three hundred comments already. As she read one, she realized she was going to have to put out another post right now.
Really? The concert was “pretty good”? What are you even doing there if you’re not a fan?
Whoever Anon98 was, they were right. She had to be a fan here. She had to let the commenters feel as if they were experiencing what she was experiencing. And she had experienced a lot over the past day. He mind wandered to the first time Will kissed her, the first time she’d been kissed. The first time she’d felt anything other than fear and anxiety in years. And it was knee-wobblingly good. Her heart pumped faster even just thinking about it.
The blog post came flying out of her fingers. Everything she’d felt during the concert, everything she wanted to know about them, and everything she vowed to find out for the fans who read WowSounds.
Once it had been posted, she sat back and allowed herself to think about Will again. She promised herself she would try to find out more about him. He seemed very good at evading questions and not talking about himself. Clearly that wasn’t going to cut it if she was going to get some kind of scoop. Mind you, even the money she was getting as her per diem would help. But not if she wanted to get Jude off the streets, too. And she really did. She’d only really realized how much she needed to help him when she’d lost him.
Anya and the Shy Guy (Backstage Pass) Page 9
