“What do the numbers look like?”
Julian looked up from his phone to see Andrew standing next to him, as things were finally quietening down backstage.
“The—?”
“The numbers… on YouTube,” Andrew prompted.
“Uh… looks like… thirty-four thousand and something on this one…” he wasn’t sure if it was best to round up or round down on the figures—whether Andrew wanted a big number or not judging by his face.
“Thirty-four… are you kidding me?” the tour manager’s face was like thunder for a few moments.
Then he broke into a huge great smile. “That’s great!” he said.
“I thought Josie said…” Julian was confused.
Andrew shook his bald head. “No… she’s wrong. We need all the attention we can get, I swear. All these people whipping out their phones… they’re telling other people what a wild time they’re having here…”
“Great,” Julian said, unsure if this was real, or if Andrew was looking for some silver lining.
Andrew stomped off, and Julian found himself suddenly remarkably alone—it felt as though he shouldn’t really be there. Nobody was monitoring him, no one making sure he didn’t suddenly run out onto the stage or something. Well, he was a trusted family member, he supposed.
He could hear the sound of Alyssa and Raj warming up their bass guitars, and the crowd certainly sounded expectant. The music was about to get going again. But then just before he darted out of there to return back to the main floor to catch the rest of the show, he leaned back to look out onto the stage from the wings—and he saw a couple just off-stage, clinched in a passionate kiss.
It was Kat and Daryl.
Julian’s heart started thumping, hard. Hard enough to make him question whether his diet included too much cholesterol. Wow. He’d seen the two of them kissing before via a mobile phone, but this was real, just yards away. His cock was suddenly granite-hard.
The guy was handsome, even as a heterosexual male, he could appreciate why his wife might have a crush on the drummer. But the way they held each other, their bodies somehow fitting together perfectly like they were made for each other—it was both beautiful and terrifying for Julian.
Was this how it looked when he kissed his wife? He couldn’t help but feel that when he kissed her, it wasn’t quite as intense as this.
Was the guy hard for her? Could she feel it pressing against her?
Then they parted, offering each other dazzling smiles before they finally broke out into the lights of the stage and full public view. Julian watched Daryl taking his place behind the drum set, while Kat returned to her place next to Paul-from-Blue Tonic and picked up her guitar. And it was as though nothing odd had just happened at all.
But Julian could feel it. He could feel the inevitability of Kat wanting to be with Daryl later that night, and it both thrilled him immensely and terrified him to his bones.
Chapter Twenty
The second half was even better than the first half, if that was even possible. At least as far as Kat was concerned, anyway. And it was only partly due to that incredible kiss she’d stolen from Daryl just before they’d gone back on stage.
He was just incredible. As a drummer, and as a kisser. He made her feel all melty and syrupy inside. He gave her those light-and-airy butterflies in her stomach, the fluttering of their wings sending little pulses of energy to her stiff nipples, and down between her legs.
It was like she’d felt when she’d first met her husband. Or when she’d first properly discovered boys back in school.
Back on stage again after the break, that oh-so-brief taste of Daryl had her feeling all buzzing and fizzing—but beyond just being horny as usual, somehow it turned the playing of the music into a sexual thing for her. She wasn’t just turned on, she was being sexually pleasured while in the middle of all that music, the lights, the vibrations underfoot, the adulation of the fans. She’d never quite known anything like it.
And there were even couple of minor orgasms in there—once at the bombastic peak of Everything’s About You, and then once again at the very end as she wrapped up the show with the band’s most famous guitar solo as part of their biggest hit of all.
She caught sight of Julian in the audience, seemingly having a fantastic time himself, and somehow felt so connected to him just then. She felt such a strong bond, and had no doubt that part of it was the fact that he had given her all this—not just by allowing her to take time away from her day job to attempt a band revival, but also by insisting she enjoy herself with Daryl, and whoever happened to come after him on tour.
This sexual pleasure might have been drawn out by Daryl, but it was ultimately sparked by Julian.
And at the end of the day, she knew—or strongly expected considering what he had been saying over and over—that after she had been with Daryl, she’d go back to her husband and he would be ecstatic about her adventure with another man. His one big sexual fantasy would be coming real.
It was the thought of going with Daryl—and then afterward, of seeing Julian—that meant that when the show finally came to a close, Kat was still buzzing as though it was still only the beginning of the night. She came offstage and there was a whirl of energy around all the people there, the friends and relatives, the tour crew, all totally delirious about how everything had gone.
Even Josie was happy, with Andrew bounding over her to tell her about all the social media buzz they’d been getting already. The YouTube clips weren’t causing spoilers, it seemed. They were encouraging people to buy tickets for the next show, the one after, the one after that. They were translating directly into sales on iTunes of their available songs and albums.
“The Blue Tonic fans are in melt-down,” Andrew was laughing. “They’re all coming out of mourning after what happened to Billy, because their guys are right up here on stage all the same. With you girls!”
The funny little man was dancing around like some kind of Persian leprechaun.
Meanwhile, everything was whirling around Kat, and she almost missed Daryl coming right up to her and grabbing her and kissing her as though there wasn’t a care in the world and the two of them were a couple. As much as she enjoyed it, she had to warn him off—they weren’t a couple, not in public.
Daryl simply chuckled, “After the party, gorgeous,” he said with a glimmer of fire in his baby blue eyes, and she nearly came there and then again, just from the look of pure lust he gave her.
Then Julian was there again, and her heart melted a little bit again, and she so wanted to be with him, and yet there was the promise of Daryl…
“Hey, honey!”
“Hey, sweetie. That was just fantastic. You guys… just amazing.”
“Thanks, honey. You enjoyed it?”
“Words could not describe…”
They hugged, they kissed, and it was so nice and familiar and more than a little sexy considering how horny she was, and the fact that she could feel how hard he was when she pressed herself against him. Was he expecting her to go with Daryl that night? If he wasn’t, he surely wouldn’t be that hard already…
But she felt bad, that she might end up abandoning him that night, after he’d made all that effort to fly in to see her. Oh, she’d do her utmost to see him after Daryl, but all the same, Daryl had plenty of time during the rest of the tour…
“Honey, there’s some kind of party we’re all going to afterward…” she said to him.
“Of course,” he said. “You’ve all got to celebrate, right?”
She smiled, “I just… I mean… you’re coming as well, right?”
Julian shrugged, “Sure. If you want me to.”
“Of course I do.”
She felt glad he was coming to the party. Of course she did. It just suddenly started feeling complicated. Daryl would be there. She both wanted her husband there, and yet also wanted to be free of him, so that she could just have uncomplicated fun with the hot drummer.
It was like how she’d felt at the start of college, when her parents had dropped her off a month or two into Freshman year. She loved them intensely, and she missed them horribly while she was at college, but now she was there, she wanted them gone so she could really let her hair down and just enjoy the experience of college.
“You know, I am feeling pretty tired,” he said suddenly. As though he was reading her thoughts.
“Just come for a little while,” she said, though under the skin she started wondering if it would be easier for him to just go back to the hotel, not be there.
They both had this strong sense that she was going to be with Daryl that night. She could see it in Julian’s eyes now. It was so unbelievably exciting, and yet at the same time frightening like she could never have believed it would. What if she liked Daryl too much? What if Julian suddenly decided he hated the idea of her being with the other man?
What if, finally when it happened, she went back to her husband and he could no longer bring himself to even look at her?
She would be crushed.
“You could have a few drinks, see how you feel,” she suggested, suddenly afraid that if he didn’t come to the party he would think she was happy about it, that she was relieved he wasn’t there—that she was, under the surface, rejecting him in favor of someone else.
“I could,” Julian nodded. “If you really needed me there. If it would mean… you know… you feel supported…”
“I already feel supported,” she smiled warmly. “Just that you flew out here. That you were here. That you saw the show.”
He smiled, “Well, that’s the important thing. But maybe… you need to be with your band right now. You know, first night and everything? You don’t want to be babysitting your husband—you want to be knocking back shots with the Ponytails. And Blue Tonic.”
The way he added that last part, the name of the other band, suddenly made it clear what he was referring to. He wanted her to let her hair down and just have fun with Daryl.
“And I’ll see you later anyway,” he said, sounding casual, relaxed, breezy. “I mean… whenever you’re ready, right? Tomorrow morning, right? Or tomorrow afternoon. We haven’t got any fixed plans—and you’re flying out on Monday as well, right?”
“Right,” she said. Funny to think that they had another city to get to. Another show to prepare for. This one had seemed so massive, so monumental, and now that it was over it was tempting to think that was it, the end of the world was now here and nobody had to worry about anything further.
Jesus. She felt some kind of explosion detonating between her thighs. Heat, energy just radiated out like some kind of blast wave from an atomic bomb. Julian was voluntarily stepping away to leave her in Daryl’s hands. Just like that.
Somehow, she loved him even more intensely than she had before. The way he was looking at her… the way he was talking to her… the way he now stepped forward and hugged her again… so affectionate, so warm, so loving. Adoring.
It both pained her and thrilled her that he was leaving.
“I’m really not good with different time zones,” he said, even if this was only a three-hour difference. She figured he was at least partially telling the truth—it would be rolling on toward 4am for his body right now.
“You sure you don’t want… you know, a drink or two?”
He shook his head, apologetic, and yet not completely. He could read her well enough. Like her parents dropping her off at college Freshman year, he knew that underneath it all, she was better off going and enjoying herself, with him leaving her to this other sphere to some degree.
“You enjoy yourself,” he said, kissing her again. “Tell me all about it afterward.”
“I will,” she promised. “I’ll tell you everything.”
He smiled, leaned in to kiss her neck, breathing in deeply as though sampling her aroma like that of a fine wine. “Everything,” he said. “Can’t wait.”
Then she was looking him in the eye, earnestly. Asking him for the final time: “Are you sure about this, honey? Are you completely sure?”
Both of them under no illusions, now, what she was referring to with her question.
“Completely sure,” he said firmly. Not even wavering a little bit. But then she needed him to be firm, she needed him to be certain.
One last sweet little kiss, not much more than a warm peck on the lips. And then he was gone.
*
The party was wild. Andrew had organized it at some nightclub just off Melrose Avenue on the way toward Beverly Hills. There was free booze at the bar and pounding music on the dance floor—but also comfy leather couches on which to collapse and talk.
But while there was a very celebratory atmosphere, early on there was also a feeling that there was networking to be done before they could all truly let their hair down.
A few reporters were in the crowd, apparently. A reviewer or two.
“There’s a photographer over there,” Renee told Kat in a loud whisper as she slumped down next to her while she had been on a couch chatting to Alyssa and Raj and someone’s cousin, she wasn’t sure who.
“So?”
Renee gave her a wicked grin, “So stop staring at your young stud for just a while, will you?”
Kat giggled. She hadn’t even realized she was staring at Daryl, who was mingling a little more successfully than she was on the other side of the club, with a little more energy. She had been allowing her eyes to drift over toward his direction a little too much, perhaps. Checking out his broad shoulders, the hint of his toned body under his fashionably torn t-shirt and skinny black jeans.
“I’m not staring,” she insisted.
“You are too!” Renee laughed. “God, I would be. Look at him. Takes your breath away.”
Kat said, “You need a divorce, Ren. Quick.”
“It’s not that simple,” Renee sighed.
“Sure it is. Your husband doesn’t let you have any fun.”
“I do… kind of love the bastard.”
“He’s horrible to you.”
“He loves me. He’s possessive.”
“He won’t fuck you. He won’t let you have a sex life.”
Renee sighed, “He turns a blind eye when it’s a woman.”
“Does he, though?”
The redhead shrugged. “I don’t know. I guess he never asks me whether I slept with a woman. He never tries to get me to admit I cheated with a girl.”
“Right. So he’s not really turning a blind eye.”
“He just asks if I was with any guys. If any of them hit on me, or whatever.”
“He doesn’t think you could be attracted to a woman?”
Renee laughed, “He’s probably a little sexist, sure. But it’s a loophole I get to enjoy sometimes—and then I know I won’t have to lie when I get home and he asks if there were any guys around that got too friendly with me. But anyway, enough about me—what’s happening with you?”
The two of them looked up as Josie came to sit with them, having given air kisses to Alyssa and Raj, who seemed to be drawn to the dance floor just now.
“Hey, you two!” the blonde said, looking like a million dollars. Kat got the feeling she was no longer worried about YouTube attention. Then to Kat, Josie said, “Why so glum, chum?”
Kat shrugged, “I feel a little bad that Julian’s not here, that’s all.”
“He ducked out—voluntarily, right?” Renee pointed out.
“Only because I think he thought it would be easier on me… for me to… you know, hang out with Daryl.”
Josie said, “I take it hubby doesn’t want to hang out with Daryl, then?”
“It’s not that, I don’t think. He just wants… I don’t know… he wants to make sure I do the deed, I suppose. He wants to give me space so that… you know… it actually happens.”
“He’s worried that if you don’t do it now, you never will.” The blonde seemed insightful, and Kat figured she had every right to be, with the way she and Ge
orge handled marriage.
“Maybe,” she agreed.
“That’s so hot—isn’t it?” Renee was grinning like a woman bewitched. “That he wants you to… do it… so much?”
What her bandmate said stirred something in Kat. Wasn’t it hot, though? Her husband wanted her to fuck another guy. He really wanted her to sleep with Daryl, to have the beautiful younger man do whatever he wanted with her. And anything that happened would turn Julian on—in fact, the more that happened, the more Julian would be turned on.
“I still feel kinda bad he’s not here,” Kat told her bandmates.
Josie said, “Sure you do. But you have to get past that—he’s given you a damn hall pass, girl!”
“I feel kind of bad I’m not giving him a hall pass, too,” Kat said, and that was true enough. Along with the fear that going through with this crazy adventure might sabotage their marriage—that Julian would change his mind suddenly about it all—there was also the slow-burning guilt inside her that this all seemed to be about her. Her going on tour, her having a fling with a younger man, her getting fucked by strange cock. Julian got nothing but a confession.
“It’s what he wants,” Josie said.
“It’s what he says he wants,” Kat pointed out. “And you can’t always tell if he’s just being diplomatic.”
Renee sipped her drink. “Do you want to give him a hall pass?”
Kat shrugged. “Not particularly.”
“So what’s the problem? You get to have your cake and eat it, too.”
“Exactly,” said Josie. “You know, it took me a while to get used to George… you know… wanting me to see other guys. But at the end of the day, you just have to realize that you may never entirely understand why he wants you to do it… but you might as well enjoy the fact that he wants you to do it.”
Kat smiled. “Where is George tonight?”
Josie shrugged. “He’s keeping away,” she said. “Hoping that I’ll get lucky if he’s not here to distract.”
Rock Her World Page 20
