American Love Songs (19 page)

Sierra seemed to be a natural on film—no surprise, since she was actually both singer and actress in real life—and for once, nobody was giving Parker grief about being camera-shy; he played the part to perfection. They shot the scene—really two scenes, since Parker was on an entirely different, adjacent set—in three takes; they would film the conclusion to the scene, Parker watching Chris leave the apartment from his window, after.

Jake pretended he didnt hear Allannas huff when Chris put his hands all over Sierras tiny body.

There was a quick wardrobe change for Sierra and Parker, and then Jimmy was up for Bachelor Number Two. Parker was meant to “catch” Jimmy leaving Sierras apartment just as he came home with groceries, which Jake supposed was why Jimmys costume called for an unbuttoned shirt and a pair of board shorts.

The more he thought about it, the bitterer he was. At least the Beatles had all suffered together!

Then it was his turn, and Brian called him over for a quick conference while Sierra ducked back behind the door to her “apartment” to change into something that would better match his costume.

“Okay, so heres what Im thinking,” Brian said. “You were on a date. At a wedding. Maybe some kind of conference. Something fancy. You had a little too much to drink.”

Sierra popped back in from her side of the set in three-inch heels and a dress that made even Jake want to whistle. “Maybe I should be carrying these instead,” she suggested, leaning on Jakes arm while she reached down to take her shoes off.

“Perfect. Okay, so youre a little drunk. Youre a little horny. You cant keep your hands to yourself.”

 

Jake looked at Sierra doubtfully. “I dont know if I can do this,” he admitted. “I dont know if anyone told you, but Im kinda gay.” “Dont sweat it,” Sierra told him before Brian could interrupt with something suitably scathing. “Trust me, Jake, we can do this.” “Places!” Brian called, and Jake barely had time to panic before Sierra dragged him down the hallway.

“Just follow my lead,” she whispered, wrapping the arm holding her shoes around his shoulders and guiding his arm around her waist. “Youve been drunk before, right?”

As it turned out, playing the straight man wasnt all that difficult—at least, not if you had Sierra hanging off of you and whispering instructions into your ear. “Now laugh like I said something really sexy and funny. Good. Try to cop a feel. Im going to squeeze your ass. Jesus”—she broke off laughing—“that tickles! Push me up against the door.”

Jake followed her instructions to the letter. Then she grabbed him by the lapels of his jacket and laid a really sloppy kiss against his mouth. With a great deal of effort, Jake managed not to break away in surprise.

After a few seconds of making it look good, she shoved him away again to rummage in her purse for her keys. Jake belatedly remembered Brians instructions and did his best to make that difficult for her; he crowded in close beside her and whispered in her ear, “Are you always this bossy?” He was having a surprisingly good time—not as good as the character he was supposed to be playing, but still.

The door on Sierras right clicked, and before he could stop himself Jake looked up and froze in Parkers gaze.

Then he heard a resounding
crack
in the background, and the spell was broken. Jake turned his head just in time to see Chris raise a hand to his cheek and Allanna stalk off in tears.

“Cut!” Brian yelled.

Jake looked at Jimmy, who was sitting just behind where Chris was standing. Jimmy looked at him. Then Jake looked at Parker. Parker stared back pointedly.

Chris wasnt looking at anyone.
Jake said, “Fuck.”
Well, at least the tour was almost over.

A
FEW weeks after the Canadian leg of the tour blissfully wrapped in September—Jake said “blissfully” because Allannas replacement, while efficient, wasnt exactly
family
—he found himself in a downtown LA studio sitting in on a photo shoot. It wasnt like Jake had never been in a photo shoot before—he was a rock star; he got his picture taken all the time. Last week at the VMA awards, for example.

He just didnt usually have much time to watch other people having their picture taken. At least, not with Parker, because he was usually in the picture with him. He was usually too busy making love to the camera to notice what else was going on in the frame with him.

But that was before
Guitarist
magazine decided to do a feature on Parker. That was before they sent the four of them to an exclusive photographer in downtown LA to get some pictures taken for the article. He was sure as hell noticing now.

He noticed the way the jeans Macy put him in clung to Parkers thighs and the way Parkers hair, grown out of its usual buzzcut through negligence, had been styled to look like someone had been running their fingers through it. He noticed the way the dramatic shadows from the overhead lights turned Parkers eyelashes into enormous seductive crescents. He noticed the obscene way Parkers hips cradled the body of his guitar.

God, did he notice.
It was becoming something of a problem.

Jake propped his ankle on his opposite knee and leaned forward a bit for camouflage.

It wasnt that hed never noticed that Parker was attractive or anything. Hed posted more than one semi-lyrical account on the bands blog about how ridiculously hot Parker was. It was actually kind of embarrassing, looking back now at their first meeting, that he had let those dorky glasses and ratty clothes impede his apprehension of perfection. On his more honest days, Jake would admit—even if only to himself—that he was kind of infatuated with Parker.

So it wasnt that he didnt know Parker was attractive. It was just that it didnt
get
to him. Hell, hed basically been living with the guy for almost two years—he was used to it. The novelty had worn off.

Or so Jake had thought.

Parker was not very good at getting his picture taken. He was too shy to look into the camera and too modest to make a “model face.” He listened to the photographers directions, but every pose looked stiff and unnatural, and it didnt look like he was having any fun. After the first ten minutes, Jake heard the photographer sigh from across the room, and the woman looked imploringly in his direction.

No pictures in the world were worth this kind of torture. Jake needed to get out of that room ASAP, and that meant helping Parker get this stupid thing over with. “Dude, you suck. Come on, make a pretty face for the nice lady so we can all go home.”

That jerked Parker out of his little bubble, and he turned to face Jake and shot him the finger—about as vulgar as he ever got. Much better. “Nobody asked you to come.”

Actually, Mike had asked—in fact, he had insisted—but never mind. Jake grinned to himself as the photographer snapped a picture of Parker behaving badly. Hell, it couldnt be bad for his image to be photographed being a little unruly. He was way too white bread. “Thats what she said.”

“Not in your case,” Parker grinned.

Jake made a face at him. As payback, he addressed the photographer. “Hey, did you know Parker can play that thing upside down behind his head?”

Parker shot him a look that said hed pay for bringing that up, but he dutifully hoisted his guitar over his head like he did in the really intense concerts and plucked out a few bars of “Here Comes The Sun.”

Groaning inwardly, Jake pointedly did not stare at the sliver of belly revealed by the motion. The clothes theyd vacuum-sealed Parker into for this shoot were really sinfully tight. “Arent you a little old for belly-baring tops?”

“Man, youre a jerk today. Is it that time of the month already?”
Zing
. Jake smirked. “You know, Im beginning to see why youve never had a girlfriend.”

 

“What can I say, Im married to my job.”

Parker suffered the indignity of a public wardrobe change—for someone so shy, he was not particularly modest; it was one of the things Jake first noticed about him when they started living together. Jake suffered through watching it—or rather not watching it, taking out his cell phone and starting up a game of Pacman.
“Oh, am I boring you now?”

It was a light, teasing tone, but Jake knew it and felt the underlying insecurity. He bit the inside of his cheek in an effort to calm himself and quit the game. “Im sorry, princess, I didnt realize you needed my undivided attention.”

“Children!” Chris clucked his tongue as he entered the studio. He wasnt made up or wearing any of Macys trademarked styling cues, so Jake figured he was there to supervise, for the time being. “I leave you alone for five minutes, and youre at each others throats. Do I need to give you both a time out?”

From her body language, Jake could tell the photographer was fairly fed up with the banter, but she wasnt saying anything, probably because she was getting the best shots of her life.

Jake relinquished his Parker-handling duties to Chris and got the hell out of there.

J
AKE had been waiting patiently in Parkers dressing room—or as calmly as he could when he had a hard-on for his best friend—for the best part of an hour. Hed just managed to convince himself that going back to ignoring his extremely ill-advised feelings for Parker was the best course of action, and his erection had reluctantly begun to subside, when the door opened and Parker himself came through it.

Jake didnt even recognize the sound that came out of his own mouth. Parker had obviously been through makeup again, only rather than slathering concealer over his freckles and slutting up his eyes with liner and mascara, he was clean and fresh and pink, one hundred percent all natural. Hed traded the slinky button-down for a tissue-thin T-shirt so transparent Jake could see his nipples. And God help him, Parker was wearing his goddamn glasses, the green of the frames doing just
everything
for the color of his eyes.

Jake couldnt help himself. The second the door closed, he had Parker shoved up against it, hands fisting in his hair, knee slotting between his legs in those butter-soft jeans. His mouth was on Parkers before either of them could say a word, licking at the seam of his lips, and Parker made a noise Jake felt more than heard as he opened himself willingly and let Jake just take whatever he wanted.

Jakes body was on fire. He was hyper-aware of everywhere it was touching Parkers, every wrinkle of fabric, and especially the skin just above the waist of his jeans, where Parker had just dug in his fingers, each nail a brilliant half-moon of perfect agony.

Parkers breath hitched when Jake tested him with his thigh, rubbing it tight across Parkers crotch, and fuck if Parker wasnt already hard and straining against the front of his jeans. Jake was peripherally aware that sleeping with his coworker was a phenomenally bad idea, and Chris was completely going to kick his ass, but he couldnt make himself stop, and he was pretty sure, from the way Parkers teeth had just scraped against his tongue, that Parker didnt want him to.

It wasnt so different from their first kiss—raw and desperate— but this time they were stone-cold sober, and holy Christ, if Jake had known Parker could kiss like this, was
interested
in kissing Jake like this, he wouldve done this months ago. He rubbed his thigh up again, and Parker tore his mouth away with a groan that went straight to Jakes dick. A brief glimpse of blown pupils and swollen lips, and he gave chase, latching his mouth onto Parkers neck and scraping his teeth over a pulse point.

The hot slide of a tongue against Jakes ear and then firm suction on the skin just below it ratcheted his arousal up another notch, and he bit down, laving the hurt with the flat of his tongue. Parker had to be part remora or something, because he was really going to town on Jakes neck, and Jake started to go a little crazy thinking about what it might be like to have those lips elsewhere. When he dragged his teeth over the bruise hed been crafting, Parkers hips bucked up, his nails bit harder, and he made a sound like dying before leaning his head back again and just letting Jake go for it.

He did, using both hands to move Parkers head just where he wanted it, devouring all that pale, freckled flesh with his mouth as Parker ground frantically into him. It was hot like nothing had ever been hot before, especially when he put his tongue in Parkers ear, and Parker started babbling, “Jake—Jake, thats”—he stopped to let out a truly filthy moan, and the pitch of his voice went up an octave. “Jake, if you dont stop Im gonna—”

It wasnt a cue to stop, and Jake didnt take it as one. He put a hand over Parkers mouth and bit his pulse point again as Parker fucking shook apart, mewling and shuddering and coming in his pants so hard Jake could feel the pulses against his leg, and holy
Christ
, Jake wanted him.

“Parker, Jesus fucking
God
that was hot,” was the only thing Jake could think of to say. His brain was pretty much stuck in an endless loop of
sex sex sex,
and the look on Parkers face when he pulled away didnt help any. If he was embarrassed at all, he wasnt showing it; in fact, he looked predatory, pupils dilated but fixed to Jakes, mouth wet. He took a step away from the door, and suddenly he had Jake backed into the corner and they were chest to chest, breathing in perfect synchronization, touching only where Parkers hand was splayed between Jakes pectorals.

Parker dropped his eyes and licked his lips and widened his stance, and all Jake could think in that moment was,
holy shit, Parker’s going to suck my cock
, which was something hed wanted for a very long time and had been desperately repressing for reasons to be determined later. Anyway, Jake was ninety-seven percent sure Parker was about to blow him—and then Jimmy walked in.

“Hey, Parker, have you seen—oh, hey, Jake. I was just looking for you.”

Jake very manfully refrained from disemboweling Jimmy on the spot. He tore his eyes away from Parkers smudged-up glasses and turned his head to face Jimmy instead. Maybe he could get a rain check? “Whats up?” He sounded like hed been chain smoking for about seventy-five years.

“Mike said we should get some shots of the rest of us while were here, use them for promos or something. Theyre waiting for you in makeup.”