I stare at the emptiness of the vast estate. The weird family he belongs to - other band members, his manager, even his PA - colours his life in ways I can’t imagine.
We never spoke about the ‘what happens next’. My heart and body crave to be around him, but I see things like Jem and wonder how I could survive. Jem isn’t surviving - and Dylan nearly didn’t. Was Dylan once as big a mess as Jem is? Or even worse, is he still like Jem but has this hidden?
Dylan spends all day at the recording studio and I spend mine avoiding that part of the house in case I see any of Blue Phoenix. I’m not ready to embrace the rest of Dylan’s life yet.
I took a little time earlier using Dylan’s laptop to research ideas for my future. The disconnection from the crap my life has become in Bristol brings clarity, as if I am on some kind of retreat where I can take stock of my life and plan where to go next.
I have the qualifications to study something at university but I have no idea what. Closing my eyes and picking a course by clicking randomly won’t help. I sigh and scroll around the site. University would buy me time - and more opportunities. Maybe marketing or some kind of business course? Hell, I don’t know.
The shadows grow longer, and only when the temperature drops and goose bumps my arms, do I realise I’ve been sitting here a while. Crunching footsteps alert me to someone approaching and I glance up, hoping it’s not Jem.
Dylan. The setting sun behind silhouettes his tall figure and he bends down to kiss me gently.
“Hey.” He sits and wraps his arm around my shoulders, hugging me close. “Enjoying relaxing?”
“Getting a bit bored.” I close my book.
“Oh. Sorry. We have to get these tracks finished…”
I touch his face. “Don’t apologise to me.”
“Okay, I don’t want you to…” He pauses.
“Leave?” I ask.
He shifts. “Yeah.”
“I’m not staying.”
Dylan removes his arm and stares at his boots. “Oh, but…”
“I don’t mean I’m leaving today but I can’t stay here forever,” I say, and take his hand. Dylan doesn’t respond and his eyebrows are tugged down. I lace my fingers through his. “Dylan?”
“As long as you don’t do what you did last time.” He turns the ocean eyes to mine. “Leave without saying goodbye then shut me out.”
“No, I won’t.”
“Good.” He lifts my hand and kisses the back, our fingers still entangled. “I understand you want to leave, but do you think going back is a good idea? Maybe you should move somewhere safer than your flat?”
“I don’t need to move somewhere safer! I’m going back to my life, carrying on.”
Dylan stiffens. “So you are shutting me out?”
“No.”
He smoothes my hair from my eyes, cool fingers brushing my warm forehead. “Being Dylan Morgan’s girlfriend is complicated though, I don’t want you being scared off.”
The words skip in my chest. “Girlfriend?”
“You’re more than a summer crush now.”
His blue eyes shine but I can’t resist teasing him. “No, we haven’t dated properly yet.”
“We’ve done plenty of other things…” His gaze moves towards my tight vest top.
“So, plenty of people do ‘other things’ without dating,” I say nonchalantly.
“I want to date you. You never gave me the chance.”
“We went to Sandchurch”
“And look how that ended. Sky, let me take you out somewhere properly.”
“Where? You can’t go anywhere public.”
“Says who?”
“Your rampant horde of social media toting fanatics.”
He shakes his head and rubs a finger along my mouth. “You’re funny.”
“And you’re famous.”
He slumps back. “Okay, we’ll talk about this later, but I am going to treat you like a real girlfriend, not hide you. How long before you have to go back to work?”
“I’m on a temporary contract. If I don’t work, I’m not paid. If I don’t get paid, I lose my home.”
“I could find you a job?” he suggests.
I bristle. “Remember what you said about not changing me or running my life?”
Dylan strokes my hair. “I didn’t think. I didn’t mean it like that.”
I rub my eyes, tired from my late night in Dylan’s bed. “I agreed to be in your life, but I need to do this slowly.”
“Sure, I understand. You need to go back home.” His semi-pout doesn’t go with his words.
“I wouldn’t move in with a guy straightaway, Dylan; especially not so soon after Grant. I have to do this one step at a time.”
This place is amazing - a dream house - but it’s empty. I understand why he wants me to fill the space.
Dylan squeezes me to his hard chest, and I bury my nose against the soft cotton of his T-shirt, inhaling the scent reminding me of Broadbeach and sex.
“So we can try this?” he whispers into my hair.
Seeing Dylan with the dark-haired girl last night slapped reality across my cheeks. I want to try with Dylan and can’t stand the thought of him with anyone else.
“Sure, but if you stalk me one more time we’re over.”
I pull back and when I see the amused look on his face, I want to slap it off. “I mean this. What you did wasn’t good. I won’t be treated like that!”
“Okay. I promise. It’s just…”
I shake my head, indicating he should stop there.
“So you’ll wait until tomorrow?” he asks.
I push him in the chest. “Okay, tomorrow.”
Chapter Twenty-Eight
Sky
A couple of days later, Dylan insists on accompanying me home, despite protest from Steve and Kim. He dumps my rucksack on the floor and his impression of my small flat is apparent on his face - the moment when people quickly glance around at all the things they think are wrong with something, and then try to hide with a neutral smile.
“Do you like this place?” he asks, shoving his hands in his pockets.
“This is what I can afford.”
“I could…”
“Stop,” I interrupt him. “Don’t even go there.”
“You didn’t know what I was going to say!”
“I can guess. And I don’t want anything implying I’m with you for what I can get out of you.”
Dylan seizes me around the waist and runs his nose along my cheek. “Are you sure? Some things you’re happy to get out of me…”
“Don’t…” I attempt a disapproving frown but I’m not fooling him.
He pouts. “Why not? Aren’t you going to show me your bedroom?”
“Jeez, Dylan, we just walked through the door!”
Fingers trace my lower back, sending shivers along my spine. “But all day I’ve thought of you. About this morning…”
“Well, my bedroom is too messy to receive guests,” I tell him, disentangling myself and pushing him away. “Plus, I don’t want you to fuck me and leave.”
He winces. “I don’t fuck you.”
“That’s how it would feel to me, especially with you going afterwards.” I take my rucksack from him and prop it against the wall.
“So no sex unless we share a bed?”
“Correct.”
He raises an eyebrow. “Not very adventurous are you?”
Is he teasing me? I shrug at him. “If you want adventurous, you’re with the wrong girl.”
Dylan laughs and steps towards me, I back away bumping the wall. “I can teach you,” he says, fingers playing beneath my short top and across my belly.
One touch and few words is all it takes for Dylan to start hormones charging around my body. I crave his hands on me, to be naked and drowning in waves of pleasure only Dylan could pull me into all the time. Now our bodies have meshed, mine doesn’t seem to want to disconnect. I hold my breath and fight the arousal rising.
“I knew I should’ve seduced you on the beach that night,” he whispers against my hair.
I circle my arms around his neck, resting my head against his. “No thanks, I don’t want sand in…places.”
“Oh? You sound like you have experience?” He grabs my rear and tugs me closer. “Have you? Because now I’ve got images of us on the beach…”
I gasp in surprise as his mouth meets mine, and delves his tongue into my mouth with one of his skilful, jelly-leg inducing kisses. Immediately we return to the passion of the morning, behaving like two sexually frustrated lovers who’ve met again after weeks apart, even though the last time I lay beneath Dylan was hours ago. We pull at clothes, drag hands across each other’s skin and fight for breath between the kisses leaving my face and lips sore.
I pull away, trying not to pant in an unladylike manner. “You have someone waiting to drive you home in a car downstairs. No way are you leaving your car outside the front of my flat for any longer than necessary.” I adjust my jeans, which somehow have become unbuttoned.
Dylan hooks a finger through the belt loop and yanks me close. “You should take them off, not do them back up.”
I place my hands on his chest, which rises and falls rapidly. Giving in and letting Dylan do what we wants would be so easy, but I don’t want him to leave me afterwards, and I know he has to. Steve demanded Dylan to return straight after bringing me home, and my pull isn’t great enough to overcome Steve yet.
“Someone is waiting for you.”
“I’ll tell them to go,” he says hoarsely.
“No.” I wriggle from his embrace.
Dylan runs a hand through his hair and adjusts his jeans. “Fuck, you turn me on, summer Sky. You’re teasing me…”
I hold a secret pleasure inside that I have this effect on Dylan Morgan. Did I tame a rock star?
“When do I see you again?” he asks. “You will come on our date with me, right? This isn’t the end?”
The lust on his face retreats to concern. He’s like an insecure puppy, right down to the dry humping.
“No, I want to try this, to get to know you. But that doesn’t mean things will work out.”
He brushes hair from my cheek. “Such a practical optimist.”
I place my hand on his face in return. “I want to try to make this work, but I’m not sure I can be part of the world I saw this weekend.”
“Nor am I anymore.”
I rub my lips together, a big issue needs resolving not just for him but also for a future us.
“But you have to go back and do rock star things. Don’t you have an album to record? Virgins to sacrifice?”
I get a Dylan grin, the one that makes him sexy because he’s so natural and happy. “So I can come back and do rock star things to you later?”
I swallow against the thought of what he means. “Tomorrow.”
“Fuck, that’s forever.”
Chapter Twenty-Nine
Dylan
Another night with Sky and the world on my shoulders lightens further. I wasn’t too happy she wanted to leave today, but I understand I need to back off. I saw in her eyes what she thinks about my world - and my place in it. I can do this, fix what’s around me and walk away. Persuade Sky we can make a go of this - help each other feel our way forward in life. I’ll get the album finished then tell Steve I’m not going on tour. Sky gives me the strength to do this; she pulls me away from the hollow Dylan blindly following orders. The one following orders by coming straight back here after taking her back to Bristol.
We use the recording studio at my estate, polishing what we recorded in the Abbey Road studios over the last few months. We’re behind schedule for obvious reasons but we’re almost done. Daydreaming about Sky being the reason I’m late, I walk through the double doors into the studio area. The sound engineer, Paul, isn’t around and voices carry through from the control room.
Jem lounges on the sofa in the area we have set aside for the constant eating and drinking that takes place between tracks. One booted foot resting across his knee, Jem swigs straight from a bottle of Jack. I grab the bottle and slam it on the table in front of him. I don’t want to spend all fucking day here waiting for him to be sober enough to get this done.
“Stop being such a fucking cliché!” I snarl.
“Fuck you, lover boy.” He picks the bottle back up again, fixing me with a look I’ve seen a thousand times. I know from the past how well hidden his real state can be. He’s high as a fucking kite.
“How the fuck do we get the rest of the tracks down if you turn up to the studio off your face?”
“Don’t be such a fucking hypocrite. You pissed off for a week and slowed things down!”
Biting back a retort, I walk into the control room. Bryn rests against the mixing desk and his face is murderous. Liam studies the laptop screen, flicking through the progress of the tracks. Honey’s sitting on his knee, tapping a text on her phone. What the hell is she wearing today? Or not wearing. I really don’t need to see so much of her tits - or the rose she has tattooed on one.
“Did Jem arrive like this?” I ask.
“Don’t think he slept,” mutters Bryn.
“I know he’s been bad again recently but he’s a fucking mess. And the way he spoke to Sky at the party…” Bryn and Liam glance at each other. “What?”
Honey disconnects herself from Liam and sits on the edge of the desk next to Bryn. “She reminds him of Lily.”
“What the fuck? And what do you know about Lily?” I flash Liam a look and he shrugs apologetically.
Lily, the groupie who wasn’t. The girl from the darkest part of my past. We were off our faces that night and Jem made the biggest mistake of our lives; a week later, I made things a thousand times fucking worse. The aftermath threatened the band until Steve made everything go away.
Jem and me have known each other since primary school, shared our hopes and dreams, and navigated this fucked up journey together. Lily changed things between us and we lost each other. What stories are out there for Sky to find? Unless Jem tells her everything, nothing she reads will make sense. Three years on and the whole mess is a fading bad memory. Only we know the truth.
Sky is nothing like Lily, this situation is completely different.
“Has he seen her again or something?”
Liam snorts. “Do you think I’d ever bring her name up?” He pauses. “You know what the whole fucked up mess did to him, and how he doesn’t want girls like her coming into the circle.”
“Girls like her?”
“Sweet, innocent but with a huge fucking knife ready to stab in your back. You should know,” says Liam
I shake away memories I don’t want. “If you knew Sky, you’d know how wrong you are.”
“So she’s not sweet and innocent?” drawls Honey, smirking.
“She’s not an eighteen-year-old school kid!” I snap.
Something hard slams into my back and I stagger forward, catching the mixing desk to steady myself. Jem grabs me by the T-shirt and yanks me backwards. I spin around. Bad timing. His fist collides with my nose, pain splitting across my face and I stagger. Honey shrieks, hands at her mouth as she looks at me slumped against the wall. Jem’s a good shot even when he’s high; I’ll give him that.
Bryn grabs Jem from behind, pinning his hands to his sides. “Don’t be a dickhead.”
Breathing heavily, Jem stares down at me as I hold my palm against my mouth. “That night was your fault. You were playing the fucking game too. So you’re responsible for every fucking thing that happened afterwards!”
Itching to retaliate, I remain slumped, not wanting to fight with him. Pointless fist fights. “Not everything, Jem. You dealt with things wrong.”
Holding his face close to mine, the bourbon from his breath is enough to make me drunk on the fumes. “Well, if you don’t fuck things up with Sky, I will. I fucking owe you one!”
He stands, and sucks on his swelling knuckles before turning and
leaving. Grabbing his bottle on the way out, he slams through the studio door, crashing into an alarmed looking Steve as he leaves.
Steve surveys the scene, eyes flicking between the three of us. I swat at Honey who’s staunching the blood from my nose with someone’s jacket. Liam’s probably.
“Now what?” He pulls himself straight, looking between us like an angry father. “Dylan?”
“Not my fault,” I grumble.
“So he broke your nose for nothing? It’s one fucking thing after another! Are you two back there again?” He hits his head with his palm. “Fucking great…”
I pull myself upright, snatching the jacket from Honey. “Doesn’t look like we’ll be doing much till I sort my face out and he sobers up.”
I slink off, but before I leave the look Liam gives Honey, and then me, intensifies the situation further.
I should’ve stayed in fucking Broadbeach.
*****
Dylan
Jem tips his chair back, hand against the boardroom wall staring at the ceiling. I remain standing, while Steve sits with his arms crossed over his chest. The conversation has stalled, although we’ve not had much of one. Jem refuses to apologise to me, I have nothing to say to him. No change there.
“Can’t you see how he’s going downhill again?” I ask Steve, indicating Jem.
Jem snaps his head around to me. “Fuck you.”
“Can you say anything to me without using the word fuck?”
“No, I fucking can’t.”
Shaking my head, I turn back to Steve. “Steve?”
“He’s okay. Once we’re touring he’ll settle down. There’s plenty to keep him distracted.”
“Like what? More alcohol and drugs? What if he kills himself this time?”
“Yadda, yadda, yadda,” says Jem, tapping his fingers rhythmically on the table.
“He’s okay,” repeats Steve.
“Like hell he is!”
Steve flips his phone over in his hands, brow furrowed. “I’m more bothered about you and that Summer chick than you and him behaving like testosterone fuelled teens.”
I stiffen. “What’s she got to do with anything?”
“Dylan’s lovely summer Sky,” sniggers Jem.
Summer Sky: A Blue Phoenix Book Page 21
