Blame it on the Tequila

by Fiona Cole

  “Don’t worry about it. She’s just concerned for you.”

  “Yeah,” she answered a little too quickly.

  “Is it something else?”

  I swallowed down my groan when I felt the tickle of her fingers tracing my pecks. “I don’t talk about my dad.”

  “No, you don’t.”

  “He, uh … he was a musician.”

  “Huh.” The word didn’t convey even an ounce of my shock. I started to worry my eyes would pop out of my head if they bugged out anymore.

  “Yeah,” she said with a laugh. “He wasn’t anything big. But he wanted to be, and so he left us when I was young to chase it. Sometimes he would come back if he thought having a family would benefit him. He’d tried more than once to use the fact that he had a young daughter to get noticed or move ahead. My mom hated it—I hated it. Eventually, she had enough and kicked him out.”

  “Shit. I’m sorry.”

  “It’s not a big deal. My mom, just kind of, has a thing about it.”

  “It’s understandable.”

  “I guess it’s why I always avoided the spotlight. I didn’t want to be like that.”

  A thought struck me then, hitting me harder than the brother comment. “Do you think I’m like that?”

  Her head tipped back against my arm as she looked up through the shadows. “Like what?”

  “Someone who chases the fame.”

  “No,” she answered easily with a small huff of a laugh. “I’ve never looked at you like that. Even though you talk about how much you want it and never hide the fact that it’s all you want, I’ve never thought you would leave important things behind for it. Also, my dad kind of just wanted it given to him. He didn’t want to work for it. Probably why he never actually made it.”

  “Where is he now?”

  “Don’t know.”

  She shrugged, and I brushed her hair back, catching glimpses of her pale skin in the moonlight.

  “I won’t leave you, Nova.”

  “Don’t make that promise because you might have to. As much as I want to, I may not be able to go with you.”

  I hated that truth. I wanted to say fuck it all and do as Ash threatened: kidnap her and make her stay by my side. “Okay, how about this? I’ll always come back to you, Nova. Always.”

  “I can live with that,” she whispered so close her words brushed my chin.

  Her hands wrapped around my back and held me close, pressing her soft chest to mine. Tipping my chin, I cradled the back of her head and brushed my nose against hers, aching with the effort to hold back.

  “Parker?”

  I grunted, too scared to say anything.

  “Just…”

  Whatever it was, she let it go, and the next thing I knew, her lips were on mine. Even quicker than that, she was under me. As soon as our lips connected, the chains on my control snapped.

  She spread her legs, cradling me between them, and it would have been so easy to shove our clothing aside and be where I’d dreamed of being since I met her, but this was Nova, and I knew that whatever happened tonight wouldn’t change tomorrow. She deserved more than a fumbled rush in the dark.

  Trying to slow us down felt about as hard as I imagined climbing Everest would be. I rolled to my side, delving my tongue into her mouth for a few more tastes to hold me over. With the intense pressure of my desire crushing in on me, I struggled to get a grip on my lungs as I finally slowed to a few pecks and eventually stopped completely.

  “I hate this,” she whimpered.

  “Me too.”

  Before Nova, my focus had always been on music, and if a girl came along that intrigued me, I went for it. Then there was Nova. She intrigued me from the first smile and soft-spoken conversation. But once I got to know her, I saw the depth to her that matched my own. We just…clicked in an almost indescribable way.

  I loved her. I wasn’t really sure what that meant. I guess I always thought of it as if you loved someone, then you made them your partner, your lover.

  Nova wasn’t my lover, as much as I wanted her to be, but she was my partner—my best friend. My other half. She created this all-consuming tidal wave of this feeling—all the feelings—inside me, and I couldn’t put a name to it, but I knew it made me happier than I had ever been before.

  And when I tried to put a name to it, all that came out was love.

  If this was love, then I’d take it. Because having her in my arms right now was all I ever needed, and I never wanted to let that go.

  But if I had to leave like she said, I’d always come back because there was no living life without Nova. Of that, I was sure.

  Twenty-One

  Parker

  “Thank you, Columbus!” I shouted into the mic. “You’ve been amazing, and we can’t wait to come back.”

  The crowd roared, and I closed my eyes under the flashing spotlights, basking in the sound I’d never tire of. My strap scraped my neck when I bent in half for a bow. Standing up, I flicked my sweat-soaked hair back and walked to the edge of the stage, tossing my pick out into the crowd like I had after every concert. Oren climbed out from behind his set and tossed out his broken drumsticks he used and abused throughout the concert.

  He had more broken than usual after playing so hard.

  The energy had been different this time around. More intense, and I think it had everything to do with the new energy we cultivated every day on our bus after clearing the air with Nova. It’d been about a week, and we’d already added four more songs to the playlist and cleaned up the others we’d barely scraped together before.

  I think it had everything to do with the woman who stood off in the wings jumping and screaming along to each word of our songs. Every time I glanced her way, a jolt of electricity hit me, and I hit each note sharper than before. She’d come to two of the three shows this week, and it was like a puzzle piece that had been shifted just a little off-kilter clicked into place for us.

  Like we’d said before. Nova was the glue that kept us grounded.

  When we hadn’t had her, we’d ignored the shift and focused on our dream, growing accustomed to the ill-fitting feeling. Like a rock in your shoe that you didn’t have time to get out, so you just ignored it and eventually grew used to it. Until you were reminded of what it felt like to have that nagging pressure there all the time—then you realized how off you’d been walking this whole time.

  Now, if only I could break through the thin veil holding us apart. I was so close, crawling into her bunk every night, not even bothering to wait and hide it anymore. We watched TV and talked about experiences. She told me about her favorite hikes, and I told her about our favorite shows. One night we’d laid on our sides, barely fitting in the damn thing with a pen and paper between us and jotted down lyrics like the tension constantly trying to bind us together bled into the paper.

  With one more bow from all of us, we finally left the stage, getting high-fives and backslaps from the crew. Nova stood to the side, beaming with flushed cheeks, her lip firmly planted under her teeth. I moved to her like a magnet, and when she saw the intention in my smile, her hands came up as if to hold me back.

  “Don’t you dare, Parker.”

  “C’mon. It’s not that bad,” I said, plucking my damp shirt from where it clung to my chest.

  “No.”

  “What about now?” I asked, stripping my shirt over my head.

  She stopped walking backward and took me in. I loved catching her off guard without my shirt on. We all walked around the bus in various states of undress, but only with me did she freeze, her attention solely focused like I was a god.

  “Is this better, Nova?” I asked quietly, now that I was only a foot away.

  She swallowed and nodded jerkily. “Yeah. It’s, uh—it’s a start.”

  “What would make it better? How do I get you in my arms?”

  The question snapped her attention from where it mapped every ridge of my chest up to my eyes. We weren’t just talking about
right then after a show. I meant all the time and not just at night either.

  The flash of a camera stole her attention, and when she looked over my shoulder, her eyes blanked of any heat, and she stepped back.

  “I’ll catch you after you clean up and do the whole rock star thing,” she explained, her eyes flicking to the journalist Aspen set up to write about our show.

  She backed into a crowd of workers, doing her best to blend in and failing. Nova stood out to me among the masses, and I was sure I’d find her even with my eyes closed. But taking her in, I didn’t understand how anyone could miss her with half her red hair down her back and a weird knot thing on top. She had on one of our band T-shirts she’d tied up over her loose, torn jeans that she rolled up over her snakeskin ankle boots. I snorted, loving her obsession with weird as hell shoes. And if that wasn’t enough, she wore some sheer cardigan thing that hung to the floor. The deep teal made her look like a mermaid in the sea of black clothes everyone else wore.

  Another flash directed at me, standing there with my shirt in my fist, pulled me out of my daze.

  “You’d probably make the fans go wild if you took your shirt off during a show,” the reporter commented.

  “Nah,” Ash cut in, his arm tossed over my shoulders. “If he took his off, then I’d have to take mine off, and they’d forget who he even was. He’d cease to exist.”

  The other guys joined in, and we bantered, took pictures, and answered questions. It was actually a fun interview about our music and tour. Sometimes we got people who flirted or asked about our personal lives, barely touching on our music. I understood it and played the game, but it was always nice to have someone as passionate about music as we were.

  “There you are,” Oren shouted when we walked back into the room they’d set up for us.

  Nova sat on the couch, swiping through her phone. “Yeah, I figured I’d wait here away from the chaos.”

  Also, avoid any attention directed her way. Any time we went out, she stepped back in the shadows, keeping a healthy distance in case any photos were taken. Or she didn’t go out with us at all. Especially since her Instagram started blowing up even more than usual. She’d been posting intermittent photos of her working on lyrics with a stage in the background, hinting at more than just hiking adventures but never outright showing anyone’s faces.

  I kind of understood since any time I was pictured with a woman, people went crazy with ideas of secret dates and love affairs. But she was a songwriter, and it would be easy to explain away. Also, Nova herself was hard to peg down. She had a very small digital footprint.

  “What are you guys doing tonight?” she asked, pulling me out of my contemplations.

  “What we do best,” Oren said with a wink. “Party it up.”

  “You have fun with that,” she laughed.

  “You’re not coming?” Brogan asked.

  “Nah. I’ll probably head back to the bus. Enjoy some peace and quiet.”

  “Psssh, we’re in hotels tomorrow night for Cincinnati. You’ll have plenty of peace and quiet,” Oren explained.

  “I think I’ll go back with her,” I jumped in, saving her from Oren’s pleas.

  “Well, duh.” Oren rolled his eyes and made thrusting motions, insinuating what he thought we would be doing.

  “Hardly,” Nova deadpanned.

  “Besides,” Ash said. “I’m gonna head to the bus, too.”

  “You?” Oren asked.

  “Yeah. I need a fucking night of nothing. I’m hitting that six-week slump.”

  “Not the six-week slump,” Brogan cried.

  Ash shrugged. “Yeah, it’ll pass.”

  It always did. We almost always hit it on long tours, the exhaustion creeping into our bones. Thankfully, we had a week off coming up soon that we tried to plan around this time, and it couldn’t get here soon enough.

  “All right, party-poopers. I guess it’ll only be Brogan and me representing tonight.”

  “Please don’t get arrested,” Nova pleaded.

  “I solemnly swear I will do my best not to.”

  “I guess that’s all I can ask for.”

  Brogan held up three fingers next to Oren. “Girl Scout’s honor, Mom.”

  With everyone’s plans made, we parted ways. As soon as we got back, we took turns showering. Nova went first, and then Ash and finally me. Ash must have been really tired because, by the time I got out, his curtain was closed, and the soft rock he listened to at night played low.

  Bypassing my bunk, I climbed into Nova’s, smirking when her jaw dropped at my shirtless chest.

  “I think I’m still hot from the show,” I said, knowing the excuse to go sans top was weak at best.

  She laid on her back, one side pressed to the wall and the other pressed against me. Wanting to look at her, I rolled to my side, propping my head on my hand, and just stared. I mapped the faint freckles across the bridge of her nose, the pink lips she drew her tongue across, her pert chin and slender neck. I traced the pale skin until it disappeared under the loose cotton tank top. My fist clenched to keep from reaching out to follow the same path my eyes took, especially when her nipples pebbled under the thin top.

  I was damn near panting when her voice broke through my trance.

  “What does this tattoo mean?” She fingered the oblong swirls and blurs decorating the side of my ribs, not at all hesitant to touch me.

  Goosebumps spread from the light graze, and the shock shot straight to my length. I twisted off my side just enough to see the ink and remembered the night I got it. I’d been on a week-long bender, driving myself into the ground around a year after we left. I’d been home in New York and could have sworn I saw her hair blowing in the wind, and when I caught up to her, it hadn’t even been close. I’d stumbled back to the apartment I shared with Ash and shattered every glass piece I could get my hands on in our kitchen, trying to do anything to ease the destroying tsunami of emotions I had over missing her—over being so damn mad that I didn’t know where she was—over being so confused about the two taking up so much space and leaving no room for anything else.

  Ash had come home and cleared a spot and sat with me, finally telling me it was okay to feel both, and apparently, all I needed was for someone to tell me it was okay.

  We cleaned up, and the next morning, I went to a tattoo parlor and told them what I wanted.

  “It’s a design of a supernova,” I finally answered.

  Her finger froze. “Parker,” she whispered.

  Her eyes met mine in the dim lights of the bunk, but they sparkled like the star we named her after. A beat of need pulsed in the cramped area and matched the thrum of my heart, urging me to take, take, take. Before I could move, she shifted, tugging the side of her tank up to bare a familiar guitar line drawing in the same exact spot as my supernova.

  I huffed a laugh of disbelief. What were the chances? “My drawing.”

  “It was good.”

  “It was shit,” I laughed.

  “Okay, I might have cleaned it up a bit.”

  I traced the rudimentary outline of the guitar I drew for her one night, up and down the squiggled frets on the neck, down to the initials P-C resting inside the body of the guitar. Taking it further—needing to—I leaned over and pressed my lips to the soft skin, soaking in her gasp. Barely lifting my mouth, I turned to her skin, loving the increasing rise and fall of her chest against my mouth. I edged her shirt up an inch further and nipped at the curve of her breast.

  She cried out and slicked her tongue across her parted lips, and I couldn’t take it a second longer. Moving slow enough to give her a chance to stop me, but with an urgency I knew we both felt, I adjusted myself up so I could reach her lips and latched on. She met me halfway, lifting her head off the pillow.

  We’d kissed that night of spin the bottle, but this was different. This had been building and building and building, and there was no stopping it. This was years of waiting with the bare minimum between us, and I just wante
d to live with her mouth on mine forever.

  This kiss screamed desperation in the messy onslaught of our tongues fighting to taste each other, to memorize the give of her lips under my teeth, to never forget the angle she tipped her head to match mine perfectly. I sucked in every delicious sigh and savored every whimper. One hand delved in her hair to hold her up, and hers gripped my back to keep me close. I was so focused on finally kissing her that I couldn’t think of anything else.

  At least until she arched up, and her nipples scraped my chest, a moaning whimper shooting straight to my cock. Then I couldn’t help but let my body take control. I rolled over on top of her, gripped her thigh, and pulled it wide enough for me to situate myself between them. I rocked forward, determined to make that whimpering cry again.

  “Parker,” she gasped. “Ash is right there.”

  “Does that bother you?” I asked. When she didn’t immediately say yes, I rocked again and leaned my forehead to hers. “Does it bother you that he can hear what you sound like in pleasure? That he’s probably imagining exactly what you look like when you make that sound?”

  “Oh god,” she whimpered again.

  I rocked softly, gliding my length up and down her slit, already feeling the warmth soak through the few layers between us. Trying to gauge her reaction, I watched her squeeze her eyes shut, and the faintest pink tinged her cheeks.

  “It’s okay if you like that,” I said when she didn’t answer. “It’s okay to want to be seen, Nova.”

  Ever since I knew her, it was like she’d been too scared to be noticed by too many people, but when she was, she flourished. Unfortunately, life kept shutting it down, but a person could still be seen without being seen by everyone. An insane thought popped in my head that made me about a million times harder, and I could’ve been wrong, but the possibility of trying was too great to pass.

  “Do you want to be seen, Nova?”

  “No, I—”

  “Not like a famous person,” I clarified. “I mean, like when you kissed the guys the other night and sat on my lap…did you like them watching you?”