Above the Noise (13 page)

I COULD HEAR
Becki singing in the shower, which made me smile. She had damn good taste in music, but she couldn’t hold a tune to save her life. I lay in bed, overcome with the excitement of the beginning of something big but, at the same time, an overwhelming sense of desistance. Somehow in the act of making love to and professing my love for Becki, my past became just that, my past. Never in all my life had I experienced a love like what I felt for Becki, and it came on so strong and so quickly. It had left me emotionally flailing to make sense of any of it for the past few months. My emotions were all over the place, and I was glad to have a moment alone to sort out what I was feeling. Not because I wanted to hide my emotions from Becki, I just wasn’t sure I could put what I felt into words, and I just needed to work through that myself, alone.

There were tears but not tears of sadness. Simply four years of tangled up emotions pouring from me and leaving room behind to fill the ache in my chest for what I could safely assume was the love of my life. I was comforted by the closure I felt. I didn’t need to forget my past or where my heart had been and how it had been hurt. I just needed to be able to let go of those emotions and move on. My past was still part of where I’d been and who I was because of what I went through with Chloe, the abuse I’d suffered at the hands of more than one of my mom’s boyfriends, the accident, and my confusion over Gracie, but it wasn’t taking up any of my heart anymore. Realizing I was in love with Becki, being forthright with those feelings, and having her reciprocate them had given my soul permission to move on and finally let go and accept all that life had thrown at me.

When Becki walked out wrapped in a towel, I realized how long I’d laid there trying to sort out the tornado of emotions coursing through me.

“Hi.” Her voice was timid, and her smile sweet.

“Hey there, beautiful.” I winked and patted the bed next to me.

“You’re very naked. Don’t you wanna cover up or something?” She sat and looked me up and down.

“Do you want me to?” I folded my arms behind my head and stretched out a little. She shook her head and raked her eyes up and down my body one more time. Her eyes passed more slowly over my cock than any other part of me, which brought it to a more firm state, and that made her giggle. She leaned down and kissed me.

“Calon, I have never… I don’t have… just, wow.” She climbed over me and slid between the sheets. I pulled my arm out from under my head, so she could use me as a pillow.

“Yeah, me too, Becks. I love you.” I loved the way that felt rolling off my tongue.

“You said that already.” She giggled.

“I know I did. I just want you to realize that, although I was completely caught up in the moment, I would never have said those words if there was even the tiniest sliver of uncertainty. There’s none. I love you, absolute!”

“I like that you absolutely love me.” She smirked.

“No, I meant it the way I said it—I love you, absolute.” I turned and kissed her forehead. She flipped onto her stomach and propped herself up on her elbows. She reached across my chest and grabbed her phone from the night stand. She tapped the screen a bunch of times, and then looked at me out of the corner of her eye then back at her phone.

“You do know what that means, right?” She smiled, knowing I was a pretty damn good lyricist, so challenging me on my vocabulary was a moot point.

“Try me.” I winked at her, and her breath caught ever so subtly.

“Okay, some synonyms are—without limit, infinite, no catch, no fine print, no holds barred, no ifs ands or buts, no joke, no strings attached, pure, unconditional, unlimited, and unrestricted.”

“Sounds about right.” I rolled over and draped my arm over her.

She wiggled upward so her face was right at my ear and whispered, “I love you, absolute, too.”

THE NEXT COUPLE
days were spent almost exclusively in the studio practicing with Fuckhead and his band. Becki spent her days learning the ropes with Cyan, Max’s publicist. She and Becki hit it off immediately and were really enjoying each other, so it kept her out of Max’s line of vision during those long practice days. I tried to be civil to Max, but just seeing his cocky ass face took me back to the night at Paisley.

It was Friday, and we had been at it for hours to nail our set list and practice a cover song we’d never performed. We were beat, but the adrenaline of playing an LA show started to hit us on the drive back to the hotel to get showered. We were the entertainment for big time recording artist, Ryan Flowers’s niece’s Sweet Sixteen party. It was a cool set up. Jordan’s party was upstairs in a private room that had a large balcony that would give her and her guests a clear view of the stage, but no access to the bar below. The rest of the bar would be packed with patrons ready to rock. That was boss. We were stoked.

“Dude, so you ditched us for your girl? Already?” Bones’s tone was tactful, but a hint of offense came through in his body language.

“Nah, man. Listen, she needs her own space. I’m sure it’s a lot to take in, ya know? She’s been living alone in a single dorm for a couple years, and all of a sudden she’s thrown into a one room hotel room with four guys.”

“And now you have a sex room,” Manny said it with a friendly chuckle.

“Yeah, that, too.” I felt my face get hot. I hoped to God I wasn’t actually blushing. I’d never live that down.

“You guys fucked?” Bones, King of Crude, would give you the shirt off his back but had absolutely no friggin’ filter on his mouth.

“Let it go.” I looked right at him and spoke in a stern, but not condescending, tone.

“All right, so, we’re ready for tonight? Shots when we get to our room?” Leave it to Spider to cut in and assist in getting Bones off my back.

“Sounds good. Now, listen, guys… I want to surprise Becki with the last song, okay. So, don’t spoil it.”

They all nodded as we parked and hopped out. I texted Becki on our way up in the elevator and then hopped in the shower while the guys set up some drinks on our small table by the window that had collected more than a couple fifths of top shelf booze we’d received at Glam, the bar in our hotel. Seems word had gotten out that we were staying at the Phoenix, and the bar was packed every night. It was our first taste of the celebrity treatment in the form of bottled tokens of appreciation from Miranda, Glam’s stunning manager. She had coal black hair and legs all the way up to her arm pits and wore clothes that left nothing to the imagination. I would have put money on the fact that she was barely legal. There was no way she could be our age. I guessed it was a hand-me-down opportunity from a rich daddy.

Becki and I hadn’t been naked together since the night in her room. Our practice schedule was crazy, and Cyan had her out late hobnobbing with some big names in the business. On those nights, she’d come up to our room hours after I had been asleep, climb into bed with me, and we would hang onto each other, exhausted, until the sun came up.

As I washed the day’s sweat and grime off, I realized how much I missed being so close to her. Just thinking about her lying next to me in my bed had a half-boner rising into the stream of water. I ducked my head under the water and closed my eyes. Goose bumps lifted across my whole body when I thought about her body writhing under me when she came. My body shuddered. I rubbed my face with both hands and opened my eyes to find the shampoo when my eyes landed on something that took my breath away. Her face.

“Mind if I join you?” She was naked, and her voice was so low and sultry I had to remember to breathe. I took her hand and helped her in. She pressed her cool body flush against mine.

“How did you get in here without them throwing a fit?” I took her face in my hands and kissed her deeply.

“I just told them I had to grab some stuff I left behind. So, if you wanna fuck me you need to make it fast.”

“Oh, it
could
be fast, Becks. But that’s not nice.”

“Listen, nice boy. I’m all about you being respectful and shit, but if I ask you to fuck me in the shower and we only have a couple minutes, then I am giving you permission to be quick and not worry about being polite.”

“Turn around and hold on.” I took her hips in my hands and spun her. The intense ache she gave me was primal and urgent. She smirked over her shoulder and grabbed hold of the faucets. Her back was heaving with deep breaths, and she was making small, incoherent sounds. “Becks, you’re gonna have to be quiet.”

She nodded.

I bent my legs and came up underneath her ass, holding myself at the right angle to slide inside her, and I did, hard. She whimpered and threw her head back. I grabbed her hip with one hand and her shoulder with the other and pumped into her, trying to alleviate some of the ache that came from being so damn hard.

I felt her adjust the way she was standing then felt her hand on my balls. She had reached between her legs to hold me in her hand. Just then her hand moved away, her pussy clamped down on me, and I knew she was touching herself. I felt it building, an explosion that was going to be hard to control.

“I’m… I’m there… Becks, I’m gonna come.” I was breathless and so dizzy I threw one hand over to the hand rail for support.

“Come for me, Calon. Fuck me and come for me.” I could tell by the guttural sound of her voice that she was on the edge, too.

There was no control. We lost it. We called out in what probably sounded pained from outside the bathroom, but there was definitely no pain involved. Over and over the sensation rocked me deeper inside her, and, when she’d wrung me dry, I slowly pulled out of her and sank to the floor of the tub. She carefully sat back between my bent legs, and we caught our breath under the hot rain of the shower.

“Becki?”

“Yeah?”

“You can talk dirty to me every day for the rest of my life, okay? That was so incredibly fucking hot.” I wrapped my spent arms around her and squeezed.

“I’d be happy to entertain your dirty mouth, too, should you ever feel the urge.” Her head fell back on my shoulder, and she sighed.

Someone banged on the door, and we both jumped. “When you two love birds are done filming your porn in there, we have a show to play. Come on! Getting her stuff, my ass!”

Becki and I stayed seated under the water for a couple more minutes, kissing and chuckling at Bones’s antics. I helped her dry off, and she quickly dressed then quickly and quietly ran out and headed down to her room to get ready. She and Cyan were headed to meet with Paisley’s management ahead of us.

I planned on Becki standing off in the wings of the stage, so I could get her attention just before we did the last song. But after christening the hotel shower, I wasn’t sure I could keep it together. I knew my mind would take me right back to the moment she turned and bent over.

I was undone, splayed open for all the world to know. I was madly, insanely, and absolutely in love with Becki Jane Mowry.

THE STAGE WAS
dark, and the crowd was restless, just how we liked it. We waited in the wings as a few shrill whistles bounced around the people who stood beyond the edge of the stage. This was it. A soft hand slid into mine.

“So proud of you, Calon. Now, go rock this place!” She smacked my ass and stood on her toes to kiss me. Her warm hands on the sides of my face calmed the few nerves that were out of whack, and I was ready.

“Let’s go!” There were shrieks and applause when those up close saw the guys make their way onto the dark stage. When I walked out, I looked around to see that everyone was in their place, and then I nodded. Spider called out through the mic, “All aboard!” Then Manny broke out with a cackle that sounded just like Ozzy. Bones came in with the recognizable bass beat, and when the lights flashed down onto the stage, I grabbed the mic and belted the “Aiy-aiy-aiy-aiy-aiy,” and then came Bones with the bass and Spider with the rattle. Manny made his guitar scream as we warped into our own version of the classic “Crazy Train” intro.