Starstruck (Rock & Release, Act II)

by Riley Edgewood

  Oh. Right. Vera told him I was sick. But if she covered for me, why did she tell me it was so important to come in? "Yeah. Sorry I'm late."

  "Where's your shirt?"

  Shit. I glance down, tugging at the hem of the tank top I'm wearing instead of my employee polo. "I forgot."

  "I guess it doesn't matter." He stands, his knees cracking, and hops down to where I stand. "Your boyfriend is—"

  "Gage is not my boyfriend." It's never felt more like the truth.

  Jared rolls his eyes. "I'm not talking about him—but where is Gage? He's late, too… Did you guys spend the day getting it on or something? And if so, I won't dock you for lying about being sick if you give me details."

  "Uh, no. On both accounts. Don't be such a skeeze, Jared." I have no patience to deal with him right now. I wonder if Zoey's late, too. If she's scheduled today. Maybe she's got Gage playing hooky the way I planned to.

  "Hey!" Vera joins us and flicks a finger against Jared's chest. "Did you tell her the news yet?"

  "I'm about to." He sighs. "Your boyfriend, Luca James, is a real pain in my ass."

  I don't bother to respond, but Vera bounces on her toes and nudges Jared with her finger again. "Tell her already!"

  "He got you off for the night."

  "He…what?" My mind immediately goes to a place it shouldn't, thinking about Luca getting me off, and the smirk across Jared's face tells me he knows exactly what's on my mind. I frown, clenching my jaw until the images in my head fade.

  "He wants you backstage before the show!" Vera practically squeals. "And front row seats for the concert—and he got them for me and Teagan, too!"

  "Teagan's here?" I glance around, but don't see her anywhere.

  "That's what you're thinking about right now?" Vera shakes her head, disappointed in me. "You really are weird."

  I almost laugh. Almost. But the sad truth is that my brain can't make sense of much at the moment. Luca wants to see me. Gage is with Zoey. Teagan's somewhere around here. I miss my parents. I have no idea what I'm doing with my life.

  "…went back with Norris already," Vera's saying when my attention makes its way back to her. She points across the patio, to the guy sitting at the bar. "Luca left his manager here to take you back with him."

  "I'm not hiring college girls anymore. You're all way too unreliable." Jared stalks away from us.

  "Blah, blah," Vera watches him, shaking her head again, but grinning, too. "He's jealous."

  "Of me?"

  "Wow—no." Her smile falls and she looks at me like she can't believe how self-obsessed I am—and she's right. I want to eat my insensitive words. "He's jealous of me because I'm not falling all over him anymore."

  "Right. Sorry. I'm sorry." I take her hand and squeeze it. "I'm not thinking straight today."

  "Whatever. It's cool." She twists her hand out of mine, though, so I'm not sure I believe her. I don't blame her. "Let me introduce you to Marx."

  Luca's manager, Marx, beer bellied and surly, takes me backstage in a completely different way than I went last night, and loops me straight to Luca's dressing room.

  "He's in there," he tells me, gruffly. "Hurry up with him. The opening act, whoever they are, is halfway through their show."

  "Paranoid Oranges," I say. But he's already turned back the way we came. "Such a nice guy," I mutter after him.

  Then I take a deep breath and knock on Luca's door.

  CHAPTER THIRTEEN

  Luca opens the door to his dressing room, yanks me inside, and pulls me into his chest so fast I nearly twist an ankle.

  "Hey." The word squeezes from my mouth as the tightness of his grip makes it hard to breathe. "I can't br —"

  He swallows the rest of my words in a kiss.

  A hot, heavy, rough kiss.

  And I give it right back to him. The pressure of his mouth on mine, the tight grip of his hand around the back of my neck, the solidness of his abs against my body—it's like an explosion erupts beneath my skin. I need it. His mouth. This kiss. I crave it. I can't drink him in fast enough.

  I need more. I need to stop replaying Gage and Zoey in my mind.

  I shove my hands against Luca's chest and push him backward, stepping in sync with him, until the backs of his legs hit the front of a couch and he falls back into it, taking me with him. And in one twist he's on top of me, my back pressed against the arm of the couch. One of us bites my lip in the process, but the pain barely registers; in fact, I almost like the sensation. Still, he pulls up, away from me, breathing heavy.

  "Well that was unexpected." I drag a finger across my lip, enjoying the tingle remaining there.

  "Where were you?"

  "Somewhere that doesn't matter now." Still high from the exhilaration rushing through my veins, I reach out to stroke a finger across his forehead and down his cheek. It comes away damp. "You're sweaty."

  "I've been pacing. I had an idea I wanted to tell you, but then you didn't show up. You're throwing me off my game, Cassie." He glares at me, but the upward twist at one corner of his mouth tells me he's not truly mad. "I didn't think you were coming."

  I try to bite back a smile and fail. "Guess that doesn't happen to you very often?"

  "Patience isn't my strong suit." He tugs at the collar of his T-shirt. It's black with the diagram of a skeleton across the front—something I'd usually think worked only on Halloween, but he makes it look good in July—and the sleeves are cut off, so that his tattoos stand out more than ever. I fist my hands against my stomach to keep from running them along the art on his skin. And I clamp my tongue between my teeth for the same reason. But that doesn't help. I scoot off of the couch and cross the room to perch on a stool, a safe distance away.

  Now that I'm too far away to give in to sliding my tongue along his skin, I release it to say, "What's your idea?"

  "Maybe I don't want to tell you anymore."

  "Fine. Have it your way." I laugh at his petulant expression. "But for the record, I didn't know you arranged for me to have tonight off to hang out with you, so I didn't know there was a need to rush."

  "But you knew you'd be seeing me. I thought you'd rush anyway." He stands and prowls, not unlike a sleek jungle cat, toward me. Stopping short of the blockade in front of me, created by my pressed together knees.

  It's very, very hard to keep my eyes on his. "You're lucky I'm not mad about losing the money I could have made."

  "You didn't even show up for your shift."

  I lean toward him a little bit, raising my brows. "Which is why I'm not mad."

  "Good. Because I've been thinking…" He trails off, watching my face.

  His hesitation makes my stomach jump for some reason. I watch his face for a clue. "Yes?"

  "I want you to come on the road with me." He puts his hand on my thigh, as though to steady me. Which, a moment later when his words sink in and threaten to rock me off the stool, is a welcome thing.

  "You don't…" I stutter. What am I trying to say here? "I mean, we haven't even had…" I can't bring myself to talk about having sex. It's too clinical. Too awkward. Isn't that the point, though? Isn't that why someone like Luca James would invite someone on the road with him? For sex?

  "But we will," he says, catching what I couldn't say aloud, his hand sliding a little higher.

  I should push him off. Instead my legs slide the barest fraction of an inch further apart, making my next words a lie. "You shouldn't sound so certain."

  "No pressure, Cassie. But I'm pretty good at reading people—at reading you." His hand inches a little higher. My legs slide a little wider and he closes the space between us, his hips against my knees. "I want to spend more time with you. If you get naked with me, all the better. If you don't…well, I'll be sad and I'm pretty sure we'll miss out on some pretty fucking awesome moments. But I'll live. All you have to do is say the word if you want me to stop." He pushes my knees farther apart with his hips.

  My entire body revs, with him between my legs this way. He drums hi
s fingers along the inside of my thigh, watching my face, intently. "I don't think you want me to stop."

  I'm going to tell him to stop.

  I am.

  He should stop—and I can't go on the tour with him. (Though my mind is reeling at the invitation.)

  I open my mouth to tell him, but at this exact moment my brain reminds me that Gage is with Zoey right now. It's just a blip of a thought and it's dismissed almost before I'm finished thinking it. But the reminder is there and so instead, "Don't stop," slides out of my mouth.

  His eyelids shutter halfway and he looks out at me, all smoke and smolder, from under long dark lashes. "The things you make me want to do, Cassie. You have no idea…"

  My entire body goes hot, blazing.

  He slides one hand around the small of my back and the other slowly skims the rest of the way up the inside of my thigh. And he begins to work his thumb along the lining of the denim between my legs, the pressure growing heavier with each trail, back and forth, back and forth.

  If his hand wasn't at my back, there's no doubt I'd melt right off the stool. I should swallow, I need to swallow, but my mind won't work enough to let it happen.

  "Tell me you'll think about it." Back and forth, back and forth.

  "I can't." I can't think about anything—I can barely remember to breathe—while his thumb traces me the way it's doing now.

  "Yes, you can."

  "I can't run away from my life." But in the back of my mind, in the one distant area that isn't about to lose itself in what Luca's doing to me, I remind myself that it's exactly what I've done so far this summer. Going on the road with Luca… Isn't that just another level of escape? I could leave. I could avoid watching Gage and Zoey at work—and the constant reminder that she opened her heart when I couldn't.

  I could avoid running into my parents.

  I could avoid being in the same town where my brother is buried.

  "Cassie." Luca leans in until his mouth is less than a whisper away from mine. "Come with me." His breath, cool and fresh, washes over me. And ping, ping, ping, the nerves under my skin jump toward him, like little magnets drawn to the allure of his ridiculous face.

  "Why?" There. A logical question. "Why do you want me to come with you?"

  He sighs. "Because I like you. I like spending time with you. I like your sass—and I really like to make you blush."

  "Because girls don't ever say no to you, and now I've become a challenge?" I have no doubt this is part of it, at least. And…I'm not entirely sure that I care. At the moment, all I really care about is the warmth blooming in my belly. The tingles flowing along the path his thumb creates between my legs.

  He doesn't deny my words. "Because I can't stay here to get to know you better, to get to keep doing things like this"—his thumb presses a little harder, back and forth, back and forth, oh, God—"because I leave tomorrow and that's not enough time with you."

  "I…" I need to tell him no. But my toes are curling and my stomach is filling with flutters. If I tell him no, he'll stop doing what he's doing and that is the last thing I want right now. "What would I even do if I came with you?"

  "Whatever you want." His hand at my back presses harder against me, like the force will make me say yes.

  Whatever I want. No worries. No cares… "I have a job here."

  "So? If it's about the money—I'll find a job for you on the road. You could…you could help with my campaign."

  His campaign. Against drugs.

  Something so, so important to me.

  But that doesn't sit right, because, "I know why you want me to come with you. I know where I'd spend my nights. I wouldn't take money for that."

  His hand stills against me. "I didn't mean to imply—"

  "I know." And then, because I might die otherwise, "Don't stop."

  He laughs, his eyes dancing—and he slides closer, so much closer, working his thumb along me again in slow, perfect strokes.

  God bless boys with strong, guitar-playing thumbs.

  In the back of my mind, I can't believe I'm doing this. I've never been the kind of girl who hooks up with more than one guy at a time.

  Except…that's not what I'm doing, not anymore.

  Gage kissed Zoey. He's probably still kissing her.

  There is nothing stopping me from enjoying myself here and now.

  I shut my eyes and let my head fall back, giving in to the charged rush of sensations.

  "Torture me by taking your time, much?" Luca's voice is the hint of a whisper. "Always making me wait."

  "Shut up." I bite my lower lip, my eyes still closed, those flutters turning into pulses, my body trembling on the stool. His other hand presses more firmly against my lower back, and his thumb slides harder, harder, harder back and forth.

  "Say yes. Come." He emphasizes the last word—and I almost do. My body is rushing toward that peak; I'm primed to let go, to release—except the sound of the door slamming against the wall behind jerks me straight out of the moment.

  My eyes fly open and I twist around to see…Marx. Luca's stupid manager chooses this exact second to walk in without even knocking first.

  All the mounting trembles and pulses under my skin recede as quickly as they came. Something hollows in my stomach, the emptiness of unfulfilled release.

  "Need you, Luca." He ignores me and the telltale flush I feel across my cheeks.

  "Great timing, Marx."

  I turn back toward Luca, who shakes his head at Marx and then glances at me with an amused glint in his eyes. His hands are tucked casually in his pockets with only his thumbs—his talented, talented thumbs—hanging out at the sides.

  "Let's go." Marx huffs and storms back through the door. Luca ducks toward me for a quick kiss before following his manager. I watch him go, waiting for my brain to catch up with everything that just happened.

  "Cassie." He catches the door before it swings shut behind him. "Say yes."

  The door closes with a soft click. And, somehow, I find myself sitting on the stool wondering how it would all work.

  CHAPTER FOURTEEN

  I haven't moved an inch when, a few minutes later, Marx returns. He knocks this time, at least, before he comes in. "Luca said to get you and your friends."

  I slide off of the stool and head toward him. "Isn't he about to go on?"

  He nods, but doesn't elaborate.

  "I'm not sure where our tickets are."

  "You're not sitting in those seats anymore anyway," he says. "Now come on." He motions for me to hurry and I follow him, stopping short behind him at the door to the band's dressing room. He opens it and I see Teagan and Vera, waiting together in the otherwise empty room. He jerks his head and they join us down the hall, wide eyes matching my own.

  "What's going on?" Teagan asks, but all I can offer is a shrug as I try to keep pace with Marx.

  "Hey," Vera whispers to Teagan. "What did Norris say to you before?"

  I glance to the side and notice the beaming smile across Teagan's face. She gives a small shake of her head, though, and simply says, "It's between him and me." And when she sees the question in my eyes, she adds, "No, it's nothing romantic, either. I liked Tisha—his wife, by the way—very much."

  Marx hushes us, though there's no clear reason why. Maybe he's used to doing things like this, chauffeuring the girls Luca picks up through concert halls, and has lost his patience for it.

  Ignoring his shushing, I ask, "Where are we going?"

  "You'll see," is all he'll say.

  Part of me wants to demand an answer, but my gut tells me to shut up and keep following him. An odd excitement is building in my chest.

  And this is how we end up watching the concert not from the front row, but from the side of the stage. Like, on stage. To the side, in the wing, out of the audience's view.

  "This is so cool!" Teagan throws her arm across my shoulders. "You are seriously the best to get us hooked up like this."

  Her grin is all Cheshire, practically ear-
to-ear. Whatever Norris said to her—something I'm determined to get out of her—is making her happier, bouncier than I've seen her in a long time. Ever, maybe. It's a good look for her, and for a moment, for this one little sliver of time, all my own problems and anxieties fade to the background so I can simply enjoy my friend's happiness.

  And then it's the show I'm enjoying. The music is so loud my ears ring, but my stomach fills with a giddiness at getting to watch Luca strut around on the stage from this close. And strut he does. He works his hips and thrusts for effect. The audience goes wild and so does Vera. I swear, the girl has zero control when it comes to Luca.

  Okay, who am I kidding? Teagan and I go wild, too, dancing and singing along, our eyes glued to the stage. Even when Polly looks our way and her eyes go wide in surprise—right before she narrows them to shoot daggers in our direction—nothing can quell the excitement of practically being onstage.

  And then Luca motions for the crowd to quiet and walks toward the edge of the stage, holding a finger to his mouth like he's got a secret to share.

  "We're throwing a song into the mix tonight," he says, holding a hand out toward the audience. "This one's old, but I'm sure you know it. And I'm gonna need someone to sing it to. Otherwise, I'll always wonder what could've been!"

  The crowd goes absolutely bananas. "Could've Been" was one of their first number one singles years ago. It wasn't a part of their set last night, but Luca's turning his head, looking at me in the wings—and now using that free hand to gesture for me to join him.

  Panic makes a knot in my stomach so fast I almost double over. I shake my head so hard there's a chance of whiplash. "Nope. Nuh uh. Not going out there."

  "Go, Cassidy!" Teagan shoves my shoulder.

  I can't. I'm too…I don't even know what I am. "He's doing this on purpose."

  "No shit," is Vera's contribution.

  "No. I mean. He's trying to force my hand." He's trying to dazzle me. I drape a hand across my stomach. "This is embarrassing."

  "Oh, boohoo," Vera says. "Hot rock star wants to serenade you on stage. Such a rough life."