“They’re gone now?” Lillian craned her skinny neck around a bit more. Boy, did she have the librarian look down. Bun on top, eyeglasses on a chain, deep frown lines from shushing people over the years, I wondered if she’d always looked like that, or if it had crept up on her over time. Would that happen to me?
“Yup. Everything’s fine.”
Except for the large, warm hand snaking its way up the top of my calf, circling its way around the back of my knee. I pressed my palms onto the desk, my eyes fluttering half-closed for a second. Was that an erogenous zone? The back of my knee? Had Stan ever touched me there? Maybe to nudge me over on the couch and make more room for him.
This wouldn’t do at all. In the middle of the afternoon, in my library, with children and my boss and reality all around me. I gave my boot an angry little stomp and stepped to the side. Ridiculous rock stars with their wicked fingers making the back of your knee feel sexy through a pair of leggings, I hated when that happened.
“Do you think it’s safe now?” he asked, giving me a crooked smile. Like a pirate from a swashbuckling romantic movie. My parents were in their 60s, so they liked classic films. I’d grown up on a steady diet of Erroll Flynn sailing through the air, brandishing a sword with his devil-may-care attitude. Maybe if I hadn’t I wouldn’t feel so swoony now.
I cleared my throat. “I think so.”
“Thanks for getting rid of them.”
“They have no business barging in here.” I meant my indignation. I had absolutely zero experience with paparazzi personally, but you heard stories. How they spied on celebrities from their trash bins and used telescopic lenses to capture their intimate moments. I liked celebrity gossip as much as the next person, but it got mean, those photos delighting in catching a starlet without make up looking tired, or an aging rock star with a paunch.
Not Ash Black, though. He had no paunch. Last photo I’d seen of him he’d had his shirt off, completely ripped and inked up like something out of a fantasy. But that hadn’t been the last time I’d seen something about him, had it? There’d been something about him in the headlines lately. What was it?
“Are you always so bossy? Or do you have a softer side?”
I shook my head, annoyed with the effect he had on me. Why did everything he said sound so sexy? How could his voice sound even more amazing in person, like a deep, sensual growl inviting you closer?
No wonder he had any woman he wanted. A notorious womanizer, I’d seen photos of Ash Black with countless gorgeous women. That was it! There was some new story out about him and some popstar. But I didn’t remember the details.
“Can you help?” a little girl asked me, holding a stack of books.
“Of course, honey.” Rounding the desk, I assisted her with checking out a few books. We had self-check stations all set up, but scanning bar codes didn’t always go as planned with five year olds.
Back on the other side, I have to admit my heart stopped as I caught full sight of Ash Black, sitting nonchalantly on the floor at my work station. All in black, a leather jacket across his broad shoulders, he stretched his long legs out like he didn’t have a care in the world. The brim of his cap accentuated his square jaw.
Celebrities usually looked way worse in person, that had been my experience. Living in New York, I’d run into my share. The women typically looked emaciated, and the men usually were tiny as well, except for their giant heads. Absolutely huge noggins.
But not Ash Black. He looked better in person, if that were even possible. All smoldering sex and sin, he had to be over six feet tall and looked broad and lean and strong. He crooked his head to the side and looked up at me.
“You had me at hello.”
“Oh my God.” I had to stifle a laugh. This was all so insane. I had the sexy lead singer of my favorite band literally at my feet quoting cheesy movie lines to me. Had I fallen and knocked my head? Maybe this was all some kind of dream sequence.
“Let’s go somewhere, you and me.” He continued, seeming to enjoy my laughter.
“What?” What was he talking about?
“Excuse me, where are the holiday books?” A woman came over and asked. Thankfully, she stayed on the other side of the desk, unable to see the insanity on my end.
“Right over there.” I pointed to the large, colorful display complete with the gigantic sign “Holiday Books.” I still had to answer the question about 20 times a day.
“I have to get you out of here.” I shook my head, looking down at the rock star at my feet. Another mob was sure to arrive any minute. And I couldn’t think straight near him, not at all. His lips looked way too full and delicious, yet still so masculine.
“That’s what I was saying.” He grinned up at me, all sinful mischief. “Let’s get out of here. Why don’t you ditch work and come with me?”
“Yeah.” I gave another dismissive laugh. He couldn’t be serious. “Come on, there’s a back exit. I can try to smuggle you out of here.”
Looking around, I assessed the danger. No sign of any cameras, no men lurking in trench coats. We had a clear line of sight to the Employees Only break room, which led to a hallway, which led to the way out. I extended my hand.
He reached out and took my hand in his. You know how in old-school romance novels, when the two main characters first touch there’s like this magic moment? The world stops on its axis and the hero and heroine look at each other and know, they just know they’ve met the love of their life?
This wasn’t like that. This was like the wickedly sexual cousin of that meet cute. The rough, large grasp of his warm hand against my smaller, soft palm. The way his fingers wrapped around me, controlling, owning. I could instantly imagine his hand pressing mine against a wall, onto a bed, pinning me there while he tormented me and made me beg him to take me, hard.
He stood up all on his own, though I had intended to help him up. All I did was stand there looking transfixed at our hands, the two of them intertwined, his skin slightly darker than my own.
At his full height, he stood much taller than me. His frame much larger. Swallowing, I nearly swayed into him.
He leaned in and asked in an intimate voice, “Where can we get out of here?”
Right. Getting him out of there. I nodded, and led the way swiftly over to the door. Damn, I needed to unlock it. Digging in my pocket, I found my keys and fumbled for the right one. I should have done that over at the desk when he was still hidden, but I hadn’t thought of that, now had I? Thinking was fairly hard at the moment. He still held my hand and I didn’t let go, either.
The right key in the lock, I opened it up and we slipped in together, unnoticed.
“Your secret backstage hangout,” he whispered into the empty room. Dim light filtered through a tiny, dingy window overlooking a fire escape. Our small break room came complete with two folding chairs and a card table, plus a mini fridge and microwave on a countertop.
“Is it just like where you hang out backstage?” I couldn’t help but tease. This whole thing was so crazy. It couldn’t actually be happening.
“I have this exact microwave.” He patted the old, stained boxy white thing. It had probably cost $19.99 from Walmart seven years ago.
“We have so much in common.” I pretended to marvel.
“What’s your name?” He smiled at me.
“Ana.”
“Is that your full name, or short for—?”
“Anika.”
“Anika.” So help me God, the way he said my name. It rolled off his tongue like a delicious treat, him savoring every morsel. And he still held my hand. I didn’t pull away. I’d let this ridiculously impossibly delicious moment play out for a few minutes longer before it popped like a bubble, vanishing without a trace.
“And you’re Ash Black.” I knew he was, I just had to say it. It was a little like meeting Santa Claus. You clearly knew it was him, who else would be in the red suit with the white beard and all that, but you still couldn’t really believe it. Even in SoHo w
ith its high celebrity-to-square-block ratio, Ash Black was a next-level sighting. I’d spotted Jay-Z in a New York Yankees cap strolling down the sidewalk, Gwynneth Paltrow drinking a dark green smoothie, Matthew Broderick and Sarah Jessica Parker with their twins. But none of them made my knees go wobbly and my chest feel tight and hot like I’d trapped sunshine inside of it.
“Thanks for rescuing me, Anika.”
“Oh, I don’t know if I rescued you.”
“They were out for blood.”
“I don’t like bullies.”
“So you helped me out because you didn’t like them. Not because you like me?” he teased.
“Well, I didn’t say that.” I tucked a strand of hair behind my ear and looked down at my boots. I’d worn an old pair today, ones I’d bought when I’d first started college six years ago. And he’d been all up close and personal with them underneath the desk. Had I known, I would have chosen something cooler. Not that I had such a huge selection in my closet, but my roommate Liv might have let me borrow something. She had thigh-high leather stilettos. Those seemed like the kind of boots appropriate for a run-in with Ash Black.
“Have you worked here long?” He took a step closer to me, his fingers still intertwined with my own. With his thumb, he began to slowly stroke my hand, caressing that sensitive spot between my thumb and index finger. I swallowed nervously, a tingle running up my spine.
“Ah, about a year.” Maybe only around eight months? It was hard to think straight when the man I listened to every night, rocking out on my playlist, working me up and coaxing me to let go, live life, take chances and rawck out, stood right in front of me asking regular, everyday questions. And touching me. Yes, the kind of touching that would be allowed at a middle school dance, holding hands. But wow did he know how to hold hands, possessive and strong, intimate and promising so much more with that lazy sweep of his finger.
“Do you like it?”
“Like it…?” Him standing so near to me? The deep brown color of his eyes, so dark they almost looked black? The stubble on his strong jaw that looked so rough and appealing the fingers on my other hand twitched at my side, wanting to reach out and feel for myself.
“Your job?” he prompted with a sexy smile.
“Right, yes. Yeah, I do, a lot.”
Did he know he had this effect on women? I bet he knew. I tucked my hair behind my ear again, a nervous habit, and told myself to get it together. He was just a person like anyone else. A person millions of people worshipped and adored. A man people craved hearing the slightest news about, dreamed of capturing even a second of his attention. And now he stood alone with me in a room seeming somehow captivated by me, fascinated by my mundane little world.
“You seem good at it.” He took a step closer still, near enough now he could close all distance in an instant. He stood so much larger than me, so solid. He’d always looked big in pictures and he sure had his shirt off in enough of them so you got a really good sense. Big and thick with muscles, tattoos lacing along his skin.
“You seem like a great librarian.”
“I can’t imagine how you could know that.”
“I can tell. You’re good with kids.”
What was a huge rock star doing standing around sweet-talking a librarian in the back room of a New York public library? He had to have other places to be, other things to do.
“Here, I’m sure you need to be heading somewhere. I can show you…” I gestured toward the hallway leading toward the back door.
“Come with me.” Leaning his large forearm against the cabinet over my head, he framed my body, every lean, sexy inch of him.
“Come with you?” Breathing was getting even more difficult. Good thing it was an automatic function, like my heart pumping. Which also felt somewhat labored at the moment.
“Let’s get out of here,” he invited me, all sex and sin.
“I don’t finish my shift until five.” You could take the goody-two-shoes out of the library, but you couldn’t take the… wait, no, that didn’t work. You could take the librarian out of the… anyway, the point was I had a deeply-ingrained work ethic.
“Wait, don’t tell me.” He looked down at me with a crooked smile, as if what he were about to say were impossible, but he was going to say it anyway. “Are you not a fan?”
“Of your music?”
“Yeah.”
God, he smelled good. Not like cologne or product or anything but sexy, musky and masculine and so inviting.
“I listen to your music.” My voice came out soft, like I was confessing a secret.
He wanted to hear every word. “Do you have a favorite?”
Um, whatever you’re doing right now? That was my favorite. I managed to keep that to myself, not blurt out anything quite so lame, but it took some babbling. “Oh, I like all kinds of stuff. You wouldn’t believe it if you saw my music, I’m all over the map. I grew up playing classical music, so I’ve got a lot of that, but I’ve got a lot of your music, too.”
“A lot of my music?”
How did he make that sound so intimate, like I’d just confessed to touching myself late, late at night while thinking of him? As if listening to his music was the same thing as fantasizing about getting stranded on a tropical island with him after some sort of a plane wreck. It would be just him and me, plus somehow luggage would wash up with super cute bikinis and make up. The beaches would be amazing, the natural food supply plentiful, nothing but the hot sun and our near-naked bodies to entertain us. So, OK, yes, I had fantasized about being trapped with him in various scenarios featuring natural disasters, but how else was a regular girl supposed to get to know a hotter-than-hell celebrity if she wasn’t snow-bound, ship-wrecked or otherwise beset by a natural disaster? A sharknado would work.
“Let’s get out of here and go somewhere together.”
So vague and somewhat letchy, but boy did it sound inviting. “I…” How could I just walk out on a shift? Ditch my responsibilities? Maybe rock stars did that kind of thing all the time, but not piano-teaching librarians. We showed up on time, prepared, with a helpful, accommodating attitude and stayed until we got the job done.
“I have to do storytime at three.”
“Storytime?”
I’m reading Olive the Other Reindeer.”
“All of the other reindeer?”
“No, Olive. You haven’t heard of it?” He looked at me, bemused and blank. I guessed if he didn’t have kids in his life there was no reason he’d have come across the Christmas book. “It’s really clever and sweet. Olive is this little dog who misunderstands the song. She thinks ‘All of the other reindeer’ is ‘Olive, the other reindeer.’”
“All of the other reindeer,” he sang softly into my ear. Ooh, that put me on pause. His husky voice, like aged whisky poured over ice, such a dangerous blend of soothing and sexy. How could he make a line of “Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer” sound so good it made me want to take off my panties? I guess that’s why they called him an idol.
“So,” I exhaled, the hitch in my voice betraying how tempted I felt.
“You’re turning me down to read to kids about a confused dog?” He smiled at me. I blushed. It did sound stupid when he put it like that. “I like your priorities,” he insisted. “But when do you get off?”
Get off. He gave that simple, innocent phrase a whole new twist. I bet if I met up with him he’d get me off. Probably give me the best orgasm of my life. Probably pin me down and take me, rough, plunge into me so hard I’d scream for more.
“I can pick you up at five,” he offered.
“I teach piano lessons until nine.”
“You’re a piano teacher too?” He looked delighted at the news.
“Yeah.”
He shook his head, marveling at me. “A librarian piano teacher. I’ve hit the jackpot.”
I had to laugh. My career choices had never exactly invoked that response before. I mostly got a slightly bored reaction. Not hot like the fashion in
dustry, sexy like modeling, creative like an artist, or big money in any sort of way. When I met people my age and told them what I did, I usually got a detached nod, maybe some head-scratching, and a subject change.
“You’re perfect.”
And it was Ash Black saying that, all muscular six foot two inches of him, praising me in his famously gravelly, seductive voice. I blushed. And I laughed.
I couldn’t stop laughing. I felt so giddy, as if I might float away like a helium balloon untied from its mooring. The lead singer of my favorite band, the bad boy starring in my late night fantasies, standing there holding my hand and complimenting me in my tiny, dingy break room. This would be a great story for my roommates.
“What’s making you laugh?” He looked at me, a smile on those delicious lips.
“I’m just imagining telling my roommates what happened today at work.”
“Oh, how you had to help that little girl check out some books?”
“Yeah, that.” I cracked up again. “And the rock star who ran in behind my desk.”
“What will they say?” Oh my, he still held my hand as we spoke, our fingers intertwined like a perfect fit. I swear, in the middle of this December day the man radiated heat and his chest was so broad. That leather jacket was unzipped, revealing a plain, faded black shirt. It looked like it was cotton and I bet it would be soft to touch, but he’d be hard underneath.
I swallowed. “My roommate Liv won’t be impressed. She’ll probably go on a rant about corporate rock.” She’d shaved her head last week and gotten a new tattoo on one of the few remaining bare patches on her right arm.
“No?” he asked, low and husky. He brought his hand up to my hair and caught a strand between his fingers, feeling it as if it were fine silk. “How about your other roommate?”
“Jillian. She’ll be worried.”
“Worried?” His hand continued to work magic, stroking my hair, making me feel like a gorgeous, rare treasure.
Undone: A Fake Fiancé Rockstar Romance Page 4
