Southern Rocker Boy (Southern Rockers Book 1) (21 page)

“But it’s going to look real.”

“With any luck,” she said before she practically pushed me back to suite. Ariel was in a candlelit bubble bath, drinking champagne, where I was supposed to join her. I wore flesh-toned briefs as I sank down into the bubbly water facing her. I swallowed the foreboding I felt as I reached for a kiss, which was more erotic than we had shared the night before.

Roxy really wanted to push the envelope. When we got to the bedroom scenes, she wanted us to dispense of any clothes whatsoever. She wanted to capture everything, and she didn’t want to risk breaking the illusion with body suits to do it. Ariel dropped her robe like it was nothing, standing there naked in front of the skeleton crew without a second thought.

I took a deep breath and shrugged out of my robe. If I impressed or disappointed any of them, they didn’t show it. Everyone was a consummate professional as I assumed the position on the bed. Ariel straddled me and Roxy fixed the sheets around us to meet the FCC standards, shooting us from behind so that Ariel’s perfect breasts were on view for only me as I lay under her. Her song played in the background, so that we could narrate it with our simulated lovemaking.

I tried to think about whatever I could think about to keep myself from physically responding to the erotic stimuli, but that only prolonged the torture. I had to give in to it to nail the scene.

I was more afraid I’d accidentally nail Ariel. If I pictured her as Lacy, I knew that was a very real possibility.

In fact the more I had to separate the two women in my head, the angrier I became at the woman who was currently in my arms, who was subtly using our situation to work me up even more. I could tell by the glint in her eye she was enjoying this tease, as if she knew I had to choice but to do what I was told. It made my moves even more aggressive, which Roxy seemed to love.

It took hours to get enough footage for her satisfaction. Finally, when it was done, we were able to clothe ourselves in the hotel robes. Ariel pulled me onto the bed for another batch of blasted selfies. She assumed her duck face, instructing me to do likewise as a joke. Then she wanted to rock horns with her tongue hanging out. Finally she decided on a sweet candid I instantly knew was going to make my life hell. “Hug me,” she instructed. “And look like you’re enjoying it, because you know you are.”

I faked it as much as I could before I finally made my escape. I wanted to leave immediately, but Gay insisted we needed to take everyone to dinner, to show them a little “southern hospitality.”

Personally I thought we had showed them quite enough.

As it turned out, it was another move on the chess board. We headed to an exclusive restaurant for Austin’s elite. She told me to “protect” Ariel as we raced past a horde of paparazzi who was in town for her, which meant essentially I had my arm around her as I shadowed her into the restaurant.

We were seated next to each other. As if she knew that she was on display, she was quite chummy as she leaned toward me, whispering things in my ear before she would snap another infernal selfie to post online.

No paparazzi could take as many photos of her than she did of herself… but that was probably the point. She was in charge of her image so she was in charge of her rumor mill.

And for whatever reason, she had decided that I was a nice distraction beyond her nasty breakup with her highly prolific boyfriend.

A hired car took her back to her hotel. I was almost surprised that she didn’t ask me to go back to the hotel with her. I would have refused, of course. All I wanted was to get back to the apartment so I could call Lacy.

Gay leaned over to me. “So how are things going with you and Lacy?”

“Great,” I said, although this video threatened to make things a little more complicated. “As a matter of fact, I had to pretend that every single girl in the video was her just to get through it.”

Gay chuckled. “Whatever works,” she dismissed with a shrug. “I loved what I saw the last couple of days. I think you’re ready for that next level.”

“Which is?”

“I want to promote you to my feature act.”

My eyes narrowed. “By me, you mean Blaze, right?” That had always been the plan.

“No, I meant just you, Jonah.”

“Why?”

She sighed. “Too much is riding on all of this. Next week I booked Dreaming in Blue, with Giovanni Carnevale. That’s Graham Baxter’s label, and he’s Jasper’s west coast competitor. I need a crew I can trust. And I just can’t trust her.”

“Why?” I repeated.

She looked around before she leaned in. “I’m seeing the same behavior I saw before she tore Tony Paul’s career to shit.”

“Which is?”

“She’s not doing anything I’ve told her to do to meet your same level of success. She even passed off the most challenging part of the duet this weekend to you when you and I both know she could have aced it if she only tried. That could have been her game changer. But she doesn’t want the game to change. She’s comfortable where she is.” It echoed what Lacy had told me about not wanting fame. “She’s making a little more money now, but let’s face it, sugar. She’s riding your coattails. The best thing I can do for her, and you, is cut ‘em free. Let you fly on your own, in charge of your own career. She’ll either rise to the occasion or she’ll pull the same shit she did on Tony Paul. She’ll tell you to ditch the condoms because she has it ‘all covered,’ and within months there will be another baby in the picture.”

I gulped hard. We had had the birth control conversation after that first encounter on my old stomping grounds. She had told me that she was on the pill, but it was my decision to ditch the condoms. I just wanted to be with her without any barriers. I figured that she had learned that hard lesson once, and she’d be more careful in the future.

It flew in the face of all the advice my Daddy told me. “Never give that decision to anyone else, son,” he had said. “You protect yourself.”

I turned to Gay. “I appreciate your offer, but I’ll need to think about it.”

“What’s there to think about? You’ll get more money, more exposure, and you really want to be on that stage by yourself next week when Graham Baxter is in the audience. Let them see what you can do. Don’t let your opportunities get waylaid because she’s too stupid or scared to reach for that brass ring.”

I glared at her. “She’s not stupid,” I said.

“And neither are you,” Gay insisted. “You know what you need to do to make it. Look at everything that has happened so far. You think that was all just a big accident? This is the direct result of your smart choices. Don’t make a dumb one now because of some lay.”

“That’s not what she is to me, Gay,” I snapped. “I love her.”

“Then do what’s best for her, Jonah. Force her to grow. You know she could be a star. Give her some incentive to try.”

I sighed. “Let me talk to her about it first,” I said. “If she’s okay with me having my own show, then I’ll do it. If not, I want to stay with Blaze.”

Gay pursed her lips. “Your choice,” she said. “But just remember, Jonah. Choices have consequences. If you turn this down, I have to reconsider how much time and energy I want to put into your career.”

“Another threat, Gay?” I asked softly.

She shook her head. “I’m a pragmatist, sugar. And so are you. You know which side your bread is buttered.” She patted my hand. “I don’t need threats because I know you’ll make the right choices. For yourself… and for your family.”

That stopped me cold and she knew it. I made no further protest.

I braced myself for the night ahead when the hired car drove me to Southern Nights that Friday evening. Gay wouldn’t let me drive myself anymore, not since the incident with the groupie in the shower. So I got there before Lacy did. My gut ate itself with dread as I waited. I honestly didn’t know what part of what I had to tell her would make her go ballistic, but I was sure that a fit was forthcoming.

And who could blame her? She had worked hard for more than a decade paying her dues. Here I was, Johnny Come Lately, and just fell ass-backwards into her dream. No matter what she felt for me, there was a part of her sure to be bitter or resentful. She was only human.

And the video, I thought with a roll of my eyes. After everything she had been through with Tony Paul, this kind of thing would surely prove to be a huge trigger for her trust and abandonment issues.

I sighed and rubbed my eyes. It was hopeless. If only there was some way to get her on board with all of Gay’s choices. Then she’d get all the success she was due. I spied the wardrobe out of the corner of my eye. Casually I lumbered to the massive closet and thumbed through the outfits Gay had provided. The leather mini skirt… the body suit… halter tops that left little to the imagination. The top shelf was lined with platform heels and stilettos. It was as though Gay was dressing her to walk the boulevard rather than to perform on stage.

I thought back to Ariel and wondered if that was one and the same. Her body was her brand and she seemed wholly unattached to it as she stripped down and bared herself for her video.

“What are you doing?” Lacy asked from behind. I turned to her. She looked so sexy wearing jeans and a T-shirt. It seemed ridiculous to ask her to wear anything else.

I pulled her to me. “Thinking about you.” I crushed my mouth on hers. I didn’t care that we were at the club. I had missed her so badly over the last troubling two days. I knew I wasn’t going to feel right until she was in my arms again.

She kissed me back freely. “Kinda missed me, huh?”

“Every damned day,” I growled as I lifted her into a big bear hug. I was grateful that she was in a good mood. It meant she hadn’t been blindsided by the photos I was sure Ariel had posted to the Internet. I could ease her into it, assure her that it was business only no matter how it looked, and hopefully keep her trust.

She wrapped her arms around me tight. “I missed you, too,” she confessed. Those confessions didn’t come easily for her. She hadn’t even told me she loved me yet. I knew it was scary as hell for her after all she had been through.

But I could feel how much she loved me by the power of her embrace and the depth of her kiss. She wasn’t just with me to scratch an itch. That would have happened already. Four years was a long wait between relationships. I would have never gotten my foot in the door if the feelings weren’t there.

I set her on her feet and she glanced behind me at the rack of clothes. “So. Did you find something sexy for me to wear?”

I looped my arms around her waist. “Anything you wear is sexy, baby. You’re the sexiest woman I’ve ever met.”

She grinned up at me. “Flattery will get you everywhere.”

I studied her face for a moment, choosing my words carefully. “Kind of makes any fight over the wrappings a silly one, don’t you think?”

Her brow creased. “What do you mean?”

I stepped away to pull out the mini skirt. “So what if you wear this? It doesn’t cheapen you because you’re not cheap. In fact, I think it shows how much control over you that you really have, especially with your tattoos. People can see from across the room that your body belongs only to you.”

Her eyes narrowed. “I guess.”

I shrugged. “Just saying. You can play the game by your own rules.”

Her voice was quiet. “I thought I was.”

I pulled her to the sofa and onto my lap. “You are. I love what you do.”

“But?”

“But nothing. I’d love you if you went out there in pasties and a G-string. I’d love you if you went out there wrapped head to toe in burlap. It’s not about the clothes. It’s about your voice. Your presence. And that’s anything but cheap, sweetheart.” I curled my arms around her waist. “Even if you went out there fully naked, I’d still support everything you did and every choice you made. You’d have to visit me in jail from forcefully castrating any guy who got close to you,” I added and she laughed. “I’ll always be your biggest fan, Lacy.”

She sighed as she stroked my hair. “You just don’t want to be the only one showing skin out there,” she teased.

“Guilty as charged,” I smiled as I reached up for a kiss. She indulged it for a moment longer than I expected, and my body strained for her.

It had been a frustrating few days.

I pulled away regretfully. “We should probably go rehearse,” I said.

She nodded before she kissed me again, trailing her tongue across my lips until I opened my mouth. She kissed me deeply and I groaned deep in my throat. My hand slipped up her shirt. I had to touch her skin. She arched her back towards me. All I wanted to do was to press her back into the cushion and lavish kisses all over her body. I pulled away a second before I would be unable to.

I pulled her out onto the stage where we began to rehearse our songs. Both of our voices were edged with need. It made the material more intense than it was. We were reduced to making love with our voices, and we’d both gotten pretty good at that.

By the time it was change for the show, I let her go ahead of me so that I could talk to Gay. I pulled her aside by her old piano. “If I can get Lacy to make some better choices, could she perform with me next week as the feature act?”

She studied my face. “If you think you can pull it off, more power to you. But I’m going to need to see a lot of change this weekend, Jonah. I can’t risk another meltdown when we have important people coming to see the show. Who knows? Graham Baxter could make an offer before Jasper. Wouldn’t that be a hoot?”

“Hysterical,” I said. “I want you to promise me that you’ll give her a fair chance, Gay.”

Her eyes hardened. “I’ve always given her a fair chance, Jonah.”

“Then it won’t hurt anything to promise you’ll keep doing the same, will it?”

“Fine,” she gritted. “I promise that I’ll give Lacy one more chance to prove to me that she really wants to make it in this business. But if she fails, that’s it. Got it?”

“Got it,” I repeated, though it scared me what that meant for Lacy. She needed this job. Surely Gay wouldn’t fire her for something as stupid as costume choices.

I nearly wept in relief when Lacy walked out onto the stage in the leather miniskirt and her corset top, sans anything underneath. It revealed a host of tattoos I knew represented a big ol’ middle finger to anyone who would ask her to be anything other than who she was. I figured by Gay’s pursed lips that she got the message loud and clear.

So she wouldn’t feel alone, I went shirtless, with just a leather vest to complete those skin-tight blue jeans. I topped it off with a cowboy hat, because that was who I was.

That night we sang our sexually charged set to a manic crowd that we worked into a frenzy. When we were done, I insisted she join me for a long ride in that cozy, private car, but she declined. “Tuesday,” she promised with a lingering kiss before she escaped courtesy of a bouncer through the backstage door.

Ariel was our headliner that Saturday, and our opening set was harder edged than sexual. We tackled “
Under Pressure
,” which intimidated me all the way up until I nailed Freddie’s vocal to resounding applause. Lacy gave me a thumb’s up. I mouthed that next time it was her turn. She shook her head before she got the crowd riled with our last song.

She left during the feature act, but Gay instructed me to stay. Ariel had requested my services during her set when she debuted the new song. My job was simple: sit in a chair, in unbuttoned jeans and no top, and allow her to dance all around me like a human stripper pole. I balked immediately but it added dollar signs to my current check, so I gritted my teeth and agreed. This was part of the PR push of her new record and the new video, which proved to be mutually beneficial.

DJs and dancers joined her on the stage. She really knew how to work the crowd. I watched her from backstage, taking notes that these were the things that Lacy would have to learn how to do in order to make her music dream come true.

Finally it was time.

“I’ve got a special surprise for you all,” Ariel announced to the crowd to. “We’ve got a really special guest tonight. Ladies, I know you already know him. Give it up for Jonah Riley!”

I swaggered out onto the stage to deafening screams. She grabbed me by the tie they insisted I wear over my bare chest and led me to a chair that looked like a throne. She sat me down on the plush black velvet before she took her position to start her dance for the show. I lifted my leg up over one of the arms of the chair. She sang the familiar song as she danced around me like a temptress. Finally when the beat turned primal and raw, she straddled my lap on the chair for a sexy lap dance. Her face was victorious as she hovered over me like a cobra about to strike. Like the video, I ran my hand from her waist over her hip, slapping it slightly before she ground herself against me. She grabbed the tie and planted a kiss on my mouth, piercing my mouth with her tongue as the crowd went wild. Every rumor they had entertained suddenly felt verified, and they were there to see it live.

If my family’s financial wellbeing didn’t ride on the money I was due for participation in this stupid charade, I likely would have dropped her on her skinny ass and stalked right off that stage. Instead I sat there like the paid gigolo I was, waiting for the music to mercifully stop.

When it did, she pulled me from the chair and we took a bow together before she dragged me off the stage. We didn’t stop until she closed the dressing room door behind us.

“Time for another selfie?” I sneered.

She chuckled. “Are you kidding? Right now a hundred people are uploading the photo of that kiss. Let them say I’m crying over Justin now.”

She looked pretty proud of herself as she perched on the makeup table and wiped away her dark lipstick, which left its imprint on her full lips.

“Glad it worked out for you,” I said before I turned to leave. She was on her feet in an instant, chasing after me.

“Why the pout? Your value has gone up in this deal. What were you before? Some bouncer?”

I turned on her. “This may come as a surprise to you, but I actually do have talent.”

“Of course you do,” she said as she rolled her eyes. “That’s what makes you perfect. Trust me. In a year you’ll be twice as famous as my ex.” She leaned against the door. “But I get it. It’s been a frustrating week for both of us.” She grabbed my tie and ran it through her fingers. “I’m staying at the same hotel. We could be there in less than an hour.”

“Are you serious?”

“Dead serious,” she said. “That’s a bona fide offer, baby. You and me and no cameras. What do you say?”

“I say you’re crazy,” I told her. “You don’t even know me.”

She shrugged. “What’s to know? You’re hot. You know how to fuck and you have a big dick. What’s it going to hurt to make a few of those rumors true?”

“I’m taken,” I told her as I pulled my tie from her grasp.

She laughed. “How adorable are you? You think that still matters.” She stepped closer. “You want to fuck me, so do it. Who’s got the right to tell you no?”

I stood staring at this temptress in utter disbelief. Finally I leaned my face close to hers, as if leaning in for a kiss. Her eyes softened and her lips parted with a gentle gasp. Before our lips could meet, I said “Me.” I lifted her up easily and moved her out of the way before I slammed out of the dressing room. The minute I exploded out of the backstage door, several girls waiting for me pounced immediately. “Jonah, take a picture!” “Jonah, sign my T-shirt!” “Jonah, take me with you!”

I pushed through the crowd and didn’t stop until I reached the parking lot. Jacinda followed me, which was absolutely the last thing I needed.

“I need the car,” I told her as I untied the tie around my neck.

“Relax, cowboy. I’ll give you a ride home.”

I shook my head. “I don’t think so.”

But several of the girls had followed me outside. Jacinda had to run interference as she grabbed my arm and led me toward her car. She raced out of the parking lot before anyone could get in their cars and follow us.

“So where are we going, cowboy?” she asked as she turned onto the main street.

I rested my head on the headrest. “To hell.”

She chuckled. “Join the club.”

I gave her the directions to my apartment. She didn’t press for conversation as she drove. We arrived at my place without saying hardly anything at all.

I turned to her. “Thanks for the ride.”

“Anytime.” Before I could escape the car, she said, “You did great tonight, Jonah. You’ll blow up after this. I guarantee.”

That was exactly what I was afraid of.

I slipped into the darkened apartment and headed straight for my bedroom. I reached for my phone to text Lacy, but I realized too late that I had left my stuff in the dressing room in my hasty retreat. With a sigh I collapsed onto the bed. Out of morbid curiosity I reached for my laptop.