But that didn’t stop his reputation getting wilder and wilder. He was the epitome of a rock star. His agent made sure of it. With every Number One hit Jed released, the stories of his excesses and extravagances grew.
Some of them were true.
Most of them.
Some of them haunted him…
Through the writhing throng of partygoers, Jed watched Chloe kiss her brother on the cheek, her smile warm.
He saw her lips—just as luscious as the first time he’d seen them—form the words I’m heading off.
Jed’s gut knotted.
They’d circled each other all night, never speaking, but finding each other’s gazes often.
Enough for Jed to now find himself in a permanent state of semi-arousal. Enough for his date—some rom-com starlet his agent had suggested he take—to ask if he and Chloe wanted to get a room. “I’ll go down on her, if you like,” she’d offered.
Going. Chloe was going. Leaving.
And he hadn’t—
She turned away from her brother and looked at him.
Straight at him.
Eyes the colour of the ocean during a storm regarded him, an undeniable question in their grey depths: Well?
The knot in his gut twisted. His balls throbbed. His cock did the same.
Jesus fucking Christ, was Chloe Blackthorne giving him the—
A throaty laugh fell from Chloe’s curled lips, making its way to where Jed stood. She arched an eyebrow, raked a slow inspection over him, from head to toe and back to head again, and then turned to her right and began weaving her way through the party.
She didn’t look back at him. Not once.
Jed swallowed.
A prickling sensation razed his face; an unerring sensation someone stared at him.
Dragging his gaze from Chloe, he looked back to where her brother stood.
Josh Blackthorne, lead singer of Synergy, four-time Grammy winner, studied him for a long moment and then, face as close to calm menace as Jed had ever seen, slowly shook his head.
Jed sucked in a sharp breath.
Like his father, Josh had a lot of pull in the industry. He was well respected, had contacts everywhere, and knew everyone.
Including Jed’s agent and manager.
Josh wasn’t someone you wanted to piss off.
Drawing in another breath, Jed tapped the brim of an invisible hat on his head, flashed Josh a grin, and made his way through the party. In the opposite direction Chloe had headed.
Fuck, what was he doing?
He wanted her so much his balls ached. So why was he not going after her?
Because she is the Untouchable.
He bit back a growl and kept weaving through the crowd, his cock—now fully engorged—straining against his jeans at an uncomfortable angle.
The Untouchable.
Named as such by the media due to her unparalleled, incomparable talent on the cello. Named so in Jed’s mind due to Nick’s threat to destroy his career if he even looked at her.
The Untouchable.
He wanted to do more than touch her.
He wanted to bury himself between her—
Warm, slim fingers curled around his wrist, tugging him to a halt.
Fuck. The starlet. I forgot. What’s her name again? Jed thought as he turned, fake smile in place.
“I think we’ve waited long enough,” Chloe Blackthorne said, closing the small distance between them in a single graceful step. “Don’t you?”
Hot lust flooded Jed, a heartbeat before she threaded her fingers into the hair at his nape and pulled his lips down to hers.
The kiss didn’t last long, barely a few seconds, but it was long enough to completely steal Jed’s sanity. And sense of decorum.
With a savage, hungry growl—fueled not just by his long-suppressed desire for Chloe, but shock at her unexpected action—he grabbed her arse and yanked her hard to his hips, taking full possession of her mouth.
He felt her laugh against his lips, felt her roll the curve of her sex against his trapped erection, and then she was pulling away from him.
Putting space between them.
Breath far choppier than it had been for quite some time, Jed studied her. “That’s it? After all this time?”
Her lips curled at his goading question. “I think we can firmly say no.”
He narrowed his eyes. His groin had turned into a throbbing world of impatient agony. “So, what makes tonight different? Why have we been waiting for four years?”
“Since the first time we first saw each other on the Sydney Opera House steps, you mean?”
“Since then, yes.”
Her smile grew wider. “At the big shindig to celebrate the awesomeness of my father?”
Jed nodded. Around them, the wild party continued. A part of him wanted to slide a look towards where her brother had last been standing, but the rest of him feared when he returned his attention to Chloe, she’d be gone.
“I was a good girl then,” she answered, a gleam in her eyes he suspected the devil would be jealous of.
“Then?”
It was her turn to nod.
Pulling in a slow breath, he deliberately raked a long, slow inspection over her. Turned the gaze into a visual, debauched undressing.
Let’s see if she’s still a good girl.
She didn’t squirm or fidget, despite the hungry way he looked at her.
His pulse kicked up a notch. His breath grew quicker. His balls…fuck, could they be any more swollen?
“And now?” he asked, closing the distance between them in a single step.
“Now I’m not.”
Jed held her stare. She didn’t blink.
“You’re playing with fire, Chloe,” he murmured.
She’s playing with fire? What happens if Josh sees this? If her father hears of it?
“I’m sure you’ve heard of my reputation,” he continued, drawing closer still. “And I’ve never been a good boy.”
That devilish glint danced in her stormy eyes again. “I call bullshit on your reputation. And I think good is the perfect word to describe you.”
Jed clenched his jaw. His pulse pounded in his throat.
Was she calling his bluff? Or did Chloe, a woman he’d never spoken to but whom he’d desired from afar, know him better than every other person in his life?
What the fuck?
Her low, throaty laugh played with his senses. “The Beverly Wilshire,” she said, slowly pivoting away from him, even as she still held his gaze. “Room 442. I’m checked in as Jessica Rabbit.”
Before Jed could raise his eyebrows at the name, she turned her back completely on him and walked away, her sublime hips undulating with sensuous rhythm.
He watched the party devour her, heart banging in his chest faster than any beat his drummer could pound out.
Fuck.
Did he…did he—
A hard hand clamped down on his shoulder and, much to his embarrassment, he let out a stunned shout.
“Don’t be fooled into thinking,” a familiar male voice sounded as he jerked around to the owner of the hand, “my sister is on the menu, Brody.”
Josh Blackthorne met Jed’s stare, his expression deceivingly relaxed. “Otherwise, I may have to show you what happens to those who are that stupid.”
Jed arched an eyebrow. A charged energy thrummed through him, an animalistic need to…to…crush anything standing in his way. “What happens, Blackthorne?” he asked, looking directly into Josh’s eyes. “You’ll challenge me to a rock-off? Write an insulting song about me?”
Josh threw back his head and laughed. It was so like his sister’s—a male version of the same sound, with the same level of devilment—it messed with Jed’s already messed-with head. “Dude, we’re both Aussie. Y’know what I’ll do.”
“Beat the crap out of me.”
Josh grinned at Jed’s statement. “Nah, better than that. I’ll ring up the Daily Telegraph, the Sydney Morning Her
ald, Who Weekly, and Zoo and tell them you’ve got a prick the size of a toothpick.”
Jed blinked.
Josh’s grip on his shoulder tightened. He drew his head closer to Jed’s, his grin growing wider. “And then I’ll beat the crap out of you. My sister is off-limits.”
“To anyone?” Jed gave him a curious look, one that—he hoped—conveyed a pray tell, what does one think of the current daisy crop attitude. “Or just me?”
Josh laughed again. Slapped Jed on the back and began to walk away. “Let’s just say I’ve got issues with a guy who has your issues sniffing around her.”
And just like Chloe, he was consumed by the party, gone from Jed’s sight.
Jed stood motionless and scanned the crowd. There were people in here he admired, people he hated, people he’d performed with, people he idolized. Josh Blackthorne fell firmly into two of those categories. During Jed’s meteoric rise, he’d cited Josh—and his father—as an influence more than once.
Now, all he could ponder was what it would be like to have one or both of his idols destroy him.
Issues. His issues. Issues that had helped his bad-boy rep take hold. Issues that helped cement his rock-star status in the early days of his career.
His issues.
Fuck.
Room 442. Beverly Wilshire hotel. Jessica Rabbit.
Fuck it.
He spun on his heel and made his way from the party.
People tried to stop him more than once. The various members of Broken, his band—a motley crew of Aussies who really did earn their reputations as bad boys—called out to him as he passed them.
He didn’t slow.
Five years he’d been at the top of the rock scene. Five years of having the world at his feet for doing something he loved to do.
Five incredible, amazing, awesome years.
And for four of those five years, he’d longed for Chloe Blackthorne from afar.
Well, tonight afar could go fuck itself.
Tonight, he was destroying afar. It might mean the destruction of his career as well, but hey, five years as a mega rock star was a good run. He couldn’t complain about that.
And if the God of Bad Boy Rock Stars was kind, Nick and Josh would never, ever learn of what was about to happen in Room 442 at the Beverly Wilshire.
Jed doubted, however, that the God of Bad Boy Rock Stars was ever kind.
If He was, Jed highly suspected he himself probably fell way down the list of those the deity favoured. Right at the fucking top, however…what were the odds Nick Blackthorne sat at the top? Or his son Josh?
“Be nice to me, dude,” he murmured to the heavens as he exited the party and flagged down a taxi. “Be nice.”
Chapter 2
Chloe licked strawberry juice from her bottom lip as she gently bounced her right leg on her left knee.
Trawling through the insane number of channels on the hotel room’s television with the remote control and a disconnected interest, she drew an image of Jed Brody into her mind.
Of every man she’d ever shown any interest in, Jed was the only one her father had declared off-limits.
She loved her father to bits. More than she could explain or comprehend. He was perfect in every way. Even his over-protectiveness was perfect. It had kept her grounded in a world of possible excesses and indulgences. She’d grown up not the spoilt-brat daughter of a mega celebrity, but the well-adjusted daughter of a man who didn’t care how much money was in his bank account. When he said no to a request for a horse, or a new phone, or a sixteenth birthday party in Paris, he meant no.
She loved him for that. She would be grateful forever for that.
But when it came to her love life, Nick freaking Blackthorne had no right sticking his nose in.
Neither did her brother.
Sure, when she was a teenager, they’d had a say. And to be honest, that was a good thing. As a teenager, she’d had a thing for jocks with no brains and big muscles.
As a late teenager, jocks with no brains and big muscles had become bad boys with big muscles and even bigger motorbikes.
Her early twenties—when she was still a student at the Sydney Music Conservatory and her skill on the cello was garnering attention with startling strength and reach—her taste in men had mellowed somewhat. Muscles were still important, but she found she actually enjoyed having a conversation after all the activities that required muscles, or at least one particular muscle.
Musical nerds became her thing. It was during that time the nickname The Untouchable started to appear in articles and reports written about her.
Most people nowadays thought it came from her phenomenal skill playing the cello. Chloe knew it’d come from her ex-boyfriend—a double bass player—during her first year at the conservatory. He’d called her The Untouchable because, during a performance at the State Theatre when he’d tried to feel her up on stage between pieces, she’d shut him down with a withering look and a dismissive sniff and called an end to their relationship.
From that point onward, he’d attached #TheUntouchable to every Twitter and Instagram post he made that included her. It didn’t take long for the name to stick.
The irony of the intended slur was that, to the media, the fans (it still blew her mind she had fans) and her fellow musicians, Chloe Blackthorne came to be viewed as a talented, demure, sacrosanct virtuoso.
She’d been happy to let the reputation propagate. Men and dating ate into her practice time anyway.
And then, at a gala event celebrating her father, she’d locked eyes with Jed Brody.
Something had happened to her that night. Something…carnal. Something profound.
In the four years since then, her career had become ridiculous. She was a millionaire numerous times over, thanks to her love of the cello. She’d traveled the world just as many times, performing in sold-out concert after sold-out concert, and she’d released three albums that had all gone to Number One on iTunes before they were even available to download. Like her father and her brother, she’d become a cultural phenomenon.
And the whole time, she’d fantasized about Jed.
Every guy she took to her bed—always hers, never theirs, and never more than once—she imagined was the bad boy rock star.
Jed Brody, whom her father had asked that she stay away from. Asked, not told. Nick was not a prick, after all. Just overprotective.
Jed Brody, who favoured faded denim jeans and Game of Thrones T-shirts on stage, who had allegedly slept his way through a list of famous women longer than Chloe’s leg (an impressive thirty-one inches) and who was the epitome of sexual sin.
She’d yearned for him, fantasized about him, dreamed about him, and, according to her mother, talked about him in her sleep. That one was a tad embarrassing. Thank God it had been her mum and not her dad who’d overheard whatever she’d been mumbling. Her mother wouldn’t tell her exactly what she’d said while asleep, but whatever it was, Lauren’s cheeks had filled with pink heat at the recollection.
How debauched must it have been to embarrass a woman who had been in the decadent rock world with Nick for almost her entire life?
Four years and finally, finally, Chloe had pinned Jed down.
At Josh’s party, no less.
The second their eyes had met, Chloe knew everything she’d read about Jed was a lie.
He wasn’t anywhere near as immoral as the world, as her father and brother, thought he was. Which made her want him even more.
She wanted to filthy him up.
A lot.
If only the bastard would hurry up and get here.
Plucking another strawberry from the plate beside her on the table, she bit into it, bouncing her right leg some more as she stared at the suite’s door.
If Josh had stopped Jed from following her, she was going to show her big brother exactly how painful a nipple-cripple could—
The suite’s phone rang.
Chloe launched herself from the chair, ran to it, snat
ched up the receiver, and pressed it to her ear. “Yep?”
“There is a gentleman here to see you, Ms. Rabbit. He says you invited him.”
Chloe wriggled about, her grin stretching wide. “What’s his name?”
The receptionist cleared his throat. “He says his name is Jedidiah Fucking Rabbit.”
Chloe closed her eyes and danced on the spot. Booyah.
“Please let Mr. Fucking Rabbit up,” she said, failing to make her voice sound as prim and proper as possible.
He was here. Jed Brody was here.
Now.
And there were no disapproving glowers from her father, no threatening glares from her brother. No bodyguards like the ones paid for by Nick or Josh to intervene at public events. No concert manager wanting her attention…
It was just her and Jed, and a luxurious hotel room with a massive four-poster bed.
“Booyah,” she murmured.
Knowing he was going to arrive at any moment, she ran to the suite’s bathroom and got herself ready. A spritz of No. 5 on her neck, tops of her shoulders, below her belly button. A quick swoosh of mouthwash. A quicker slick of gloss on her lips.
She risked the few seconds it took to freshen up her mascara. Thickened it until her eyes were framed by sooty blackness, making her grey pupils almost luminescent.
She was mussing up her hair when the knock came at the door.
Chloe stood motionless, studying herself in the mirror.
Hair, face, smell. All perfect.
Body…
She half-turned, checking out her reflection.
Her arse looked fucking awesome in her low-rise, cherry-red hot pants. The little tattoo of a treble clef that turned into a red heart at the base of her spine looked sexy. There wasn’t a sign of a zit on her back, left bare by the loose black halter top she wore.
Facing the mirror again, she pulled in a slow breath, ran her hands down her body, and smiled. “It’s time.”
Jed knocked on the door just as she reached it.
She curled her fingers around the doorknob, and then stopped, drew a slow, deep breath, held it as she counted to ten, and then exhaled just as slowly.
“Now it’s time,” she whispered, before opening the door.
The Old Fashioned - Wallbanger 2 Page 7
