Aimee and the Heartthrob (9 page)

“Anything ready to play? I’d love to hear it.”

“Uh, no, not yet.” How was it that he’d spent the last hour writing a song specifically about Aimee? The one girl who should not be inspiring him.

“I’ve been thinking,” she said.

“About?”

“What you said about Prince and his versatility. I think you should write a song on the piano, experiment, stretch yourself.”

But the only stretching Miles could think about was Aimee across the grass, and what exactly he wanted to do with her. He swallowed again and wiped his forehead. Why was it suddenly so blasted hot outside? Frickin’ global warming. “Yeah, maybe.”

“I’m serious. I know you don’t play, but you’re musical and amazingly talented. Seriously, Prince might be your idol, but he’s got nothing on you.”

He couldn’t help grinning at the compliment, as ludicrous as it was. “Really?”

“Absolutely. It’s the piano, you’ll figure it out. If nothing, it’ll be a good exercise, right? In fact.” She sat up straight. “Write it for me.”

He automatically laid an arm over his notebook. “What?”

“If you need motivation.” She flipped her hair off her shoulders. “Think of it like an AP Music Theory assignment. Promise me, Miles Anthony Carlisle, before my three weeks are up, you’ll write me a song on the piano.”

Miles could’ve said he didn’t need the extra pressure of learning a new instrument and composing a song. He wasn’t a trained monkey. Being around Aimee, though, was awakening something inside him. Just like those signs she’d made in school, she gave him confidence and a desire to do more. She made him want to be better.

He’d never been inspired by a girl before, a real girl he was with. But he sure as hell was now. He felt his lips pull into a smile. “What do I get out of the deal?”

“Huh?”

“Well, you want me to write a song for you—you’re actually
ordering
me to, if I heard you right.” He linked his fingers across his guitar. “What do I get? What’s the payoff?”

“Besides composing a song that could possibly be your next number one hit?”

He nodded.

“I don’t know.” She bit her lip. “What do I have that you want?”

Chapter Eight

Aimee knew she was playing with fire, but as long as she kept reminding herself that Miles wasn’t the guy she should fall for, that they were just friends, she was fine. So it was totally okay if they hung out. But every time she pictured how he’d smiled at her when she’d asked him what his payoff would be, the last thing she wanted was to be just his friend.

The next morning, not quite ready to see her
friend
again, she skipped breakfast, and was starving by lunchtime. Thinking she could grab something quick from the hotel restaurant, Aimee took the elevator down to the lobby. It was packed with fans holding signs and glossy photos and magazines.

How did they already know where S2J was? She threaded her way through the crowd and had to wait for more than an hour for coffee and a prepackaged turkey wrap. Heading toward the elevator, she saw Nick in the lobby.

“Hey.” He gave her a half hug, pulling her shoulder into his chest and kissing the top of her head. “Is that lunch? Why didn’t you eat with the group?”

Aimee didn’t want to get into the whole thing of friendship and playing with fire. “I slept late,” she said. “You?”

“I’m just getting in.” He put a hand over his mouth and yawned. “Up all night with the roadies fixing a problem with the extending stage.”

“No wonder you look like reheated road kill. Going up to your room now?”

Nick nodded. “Before I do, though, how’s it going? We should at least give Mom and Dad the impression I’m not letting you run wild.”

“Everything’s good.” She shrugged. “Hanging out on my own mostly. Marsha’s really busy with running the fan club, but she checks on me every once in a while. Miles does, too.”

Nick’s eyebrows arched into a
V
. He opened his mouth but then closed it and blew a breath out his nose. “You shouldn’t get involved with him, Aimee, and I’m saying this as your brother: he’s way out of your league.”

“Seriously?” Aimee crossed her arms, almost wanting to laugh. Almost. “You have the nerve to say that when you totally lied.”

“What did I lie about?”

“Um, about Miles knowing I had a crush on him back home.”

Nick’s face went pale, and he glanced over his shoulder. “You asked him about that?”

“Yes, Nick. And he swore it’s not true—he didn’t know, and he never said all those mean things about me back then. Why did you tell me that?”

Nick shifted his weight and dropped his gaze to the floor. Finally he looked up and said, “Come with me, let’s talk.”

Aimee rolled her eyes but followed her brother across the lobby and out to the pool. Since S2J had rented out the whole hotel, the only swimmers were a few wives and kids of the crew. Nick moved two plastic chairs under an umbrella.

“So, you guys have been hanging out?” he asked.

“Not really. This whole tour thing is like living in a small town. I see him all the time. But you can stop warning me away from him; he’s not some seducing player like you think.”

Nick exhaled a snort. “Yes, he is, but that’s not the point.”

“Well, he isn’t with me, and what
is
the point?” She leaned forward and lowered her voice. “Ya know what, I don’t even care. You’re my brother, not my father or guardian or jail warden. I can do whatever I want.”

“Look, there really is a reason I told you Miles knew you had a crush on him, and it’s not just because the way you were so freaking gah-gah over him made me wanna murder someone.”

“That was ages ago,” Aimee muttered.

“Miles and I have been friends a long time, before you even met him, before I brought him home. You don’t know
everything
.”

“So what? Does he have a secret evil past or something?” she asked with a laugh. But when Nick didn’t laugh, her smile dropped.

“Not evil. When I first met him, actually before we met, he was pretty messed up.”

Aimee pressed her lips together as two moms bundled up their kids in pool towels and left. “Messed up, how?”

“It was right after he moved here from England. He got into some trouble. The judge said he was acting out.”

“Judge?”

“Yeah. He was in and out of the juvenile court the first six months he lived here.”

“He was twelve years old. What kind of trouble could he’ve gotten into?”

Nick sighed and squinted at the sky. “He ran away from home a few times, ditched class, shoplifted. He was hanging with an older crowd, guys who were into some bad stuff. He got pulled out of the regular public school before seventh grade. That’s when I met him.”

Aimee’s head was swimming. “Where?”

“At the Big Brothers program. When I was in eighth grade, my class went to his school once a week, some kind of integrating program, I guess, I don’t really remember. I met Miles my first day. He wouldn’t talk to me, was a total loner, all pissed off at everyone for no reason that I could figure out. And it wasn’t like I was a trained counselor or anything, I didn’t know what I was doing. He was hanging out by the CDs in the rec room, and, I don’t know, I guess we bonded over music. Even though he grew up in the UK, we liked the same stuff. He’s really into old-school artists like Prince.”

“I know,” Aimee said.

“After a while, we started hanging after school. My teacher actually emailed Mom and Dad, telling them what was up, about Miles and the trouble he’d gotten into before.” He laughed under his breath. “Probably meant to scare them away from him. But you know our parents.”

Aimee exhaled her own little laugh. “Yeah. They took him under their wings.”

“Completely.” Nick nodded. “Brought him in like one of the family, no questions asked. That’s when Mom and Marsha became friends. Miles was pissed about his parents splitting up, his dad cheating on her, and his mom moving them here after that. He was probably depressed, though we never talked about that. I didn’t even know what depression was. He was smart and passionate and angry with nowhere to harness his energy. That’s when we both got into music. Miles joined the school band and I took choir.”

“
You
were in choir?” Aimee asked with a chuckle. “I don’t remember that.”

“It was very short-lived, but it got me interested in the technical side of music. I bugged my choir teacher nonstop to let me run the sound system for the school concerts. By the time Miles got to Pali High, I was already running the A/V team, and he was a pro at the trumpet. He taught himself guitar that same year, totally shredding it after a few months.” Nick shook his head and played with his watchband. “The guy was wicked talented, even I saw that. Nearly made me hate him, but, you know, it’s Miles, and he’s pretty impossible to hate.”

Aimee smiled. She had memories of a scruffy-haired twelve-year-old Miles coming to their house for the first time. He was quiet, but when he spoke in that cute accent, Aimee had been instantly enchanted. She’d thought he’d been painfully shy when they’d first met, but it made sense now. He wasn’t shy, he was troubled and lonely and probably scared.

“Yeah.” she smiled at the ground. “He is impossible to hate.”

“Ames,” Nick said, leaning forward, resting his elbows on his knees. “Maybe he’s changed some things in his life, but a lot of it, his temper and short fuse—I know for a fact that’s still an issue. I’ve witnessed him fly off the handle more times than I can count. I’ve seen him at his worst, which means I’ve obviously never wanted him hanging around my sister. He’s used to getting whatever he wants—whatever girl he wants.
That
hasn’t changed, trust me. Hell, he’s called
The Heartthrob
for a reason.”

“Stop it, Nick.” Aimee stood up, not wanting to hear another word. At the same time, not knowing what to believe.

He pushed back his chair and raked his fingers though his hair. “You can like him all you want, I can’t stop that, but I told him to keep his hands—and everything else—off you.”

Her cheeks flushed, thinking about Miles’s hands, and their accidental backstage collision the night of the first concert.

“Don’t make me punch the guy on your behalf. He is my best friend.” Nick took her by the shoulders and stared hard into her eyes, making her want to blink and look away. “Promise me. Promise me, Aimee.”

“Fine. I promise,” she said, mostly to get him off the subject. She crossed her fingers behind her back, remembering how Miles had held her hand when he’d pulled her down the hall, how it had given her head-to-toe goose bumps.

“Good.” Nick exhaled and let her go. “Well, I gotta sack out for a few hours. They’re keeping me really busy, but next time I’m free, we should hang.”

Aimee forced a smile. “It’s a date, brother.”

Nick gave her arm a squeeze, then headed out.

She kicked off her shoes and dipped her toes in the pool, recapping everything he’d just said. Aimee’s heart ached when she thought about how hurt Miles had been…just a little boy, alone and scared, and in so much trouble.

Who knows how much worse it could’ve gotten if he and Nick hadn’t become friends. She knew nothing of that tortured, angry little boy, but no wonder he still had anger issues, though Aimee had never seen signs of that when they were together.

Now, Aimee kind of understood why Nick might not have wanted her to go after Miles back then. But even if her brother didn’t see it, Aimee knew Miles wasn’t like that anymore; she felt it. He was patient and sweet, even when she’d thrown all her brattitude and sass in his face. He was strong and confident and sure of everything. Miles Carlisle was someone who made her heart melt with just a smile across a crowded room.

If Nick told her all those things so she’d like Miles less, it had completely backfired.

She caught an empty elevator and headed up to her room. The band was on the tenth floor and her finger actually hovered over that button. But then she rolled her eyes and punched the number five.

Once in her room, she turned on her iPad, but the wifi wasn’t picking up, so she took it into the hall where the signal was stronger. A few people from the tour were walking around, so Aimee sat on the floor out of the way by the vending machines.

The moment she logged in, her FaceTime icon beeped. Becky was on the other end. Aimee’s stomach clenched for a second. Damn, thanks to that cryptic tweet, she had so much explaining to do to her bestie. So she sucked in a lungful of oxygen, tapped her tablet, and Becky’s face filled the screen.

“Hey ho-bag!” Becky looked drained and seriously midwinter semester pale, but didn’t sound like she was on death’s doorstep. “Where’ve you been for the last hundred years?”

“Hey,” Aimee said, plastering on a huge smile. Had Becky not seen the tweet? “How do you feel? And you’re the ho-bag. I can’t believe you got mono. Please don’t say you hooked up with Joey again.”

“Maybe,” Becky said with a giggle that turned into a thirty-second, phlegmy cough attack. She actually did sound like crap now, and Aimee could see how puffy her eyes were. “Sorry our plans got shot to hell.”

“Beck, don’t even stress. You’re the one who’s sick.”

“Don’t remind me.” She paused to blow her nose with about ten different tissues. “It’s bad enough that I feel like reheated shit, but Mom’s driving me crazy. Hey, where are you? I don’t recognize the wallpaper behind you.”

Aimee froze. She’d kind of forgotten Becky would be able to see her surroundings. “Um…hotel.”

“Bitchin’. Your parents let you stay alone, even though you’re not eighteen?”

“Mmm—not exactly. I take it you haven’t been on Twitter?”

Becky blew her nose again and tossed the tissue over her shoulder. “No, I’ve been too drained. This is the first thing I’ve done besides sleep. Why?”

“Nothing. Never mind.” She tugged her hair. “I’m sort of with Nick.”

Becky’s image froze mid-cough. “Thought Nick was with vile S2J all summer.”

“Uh, yeah. He is.”

“But…” Slowly, Becky’s expression changed. “You’re shitting me. You’re with
him
?”

Aimee didn’t need to ask which “him” Becky was talking about. Her best friend knew about the crush she used to have on Miles, and her secret blog. In fact, Becky was the one who shut it down for her, deleted it off the internet, when Miles had become the enemy.

But all of that had changed. Nick fully admitted that Miles hadn’t said those mean things back then. Aimee wasn’t sure how much she should tell Becky right now. They were best friends and told each other everything—well, except for how Becky had totally hooked up with Mono Joey. Gross! With all the coughing and seriously pasty-white complexion, Becky was clearly not feeling great, and wouldn’t it be mega mean girl to rub it in her face now?

So Aimee rolled her eyes and sighed dramatically, tapping into the hundreds of bitching sessions they’d had about Miles. “Yeah, I’m with the band, and it’s a
total
drag.”

“How did that happen?”

Aimee took in a breath and explained it all to Becky. “So now I’m stuck here for two more weeks.”

“Do you, like, have to see him all the time?”

Aimee instantly pictured Miles’s face, how hot he’d looked earlier when they’d been in the field behind the hotel. Then she pictured him in his wet T-shirt. Then she thought of how he’d looked the day before, how confused when he’d told her that he’d never said any of those things to Nick. He’d acted so sincere.

No, it wasn’t an act. He
was
sincere.

Aimee’s heart start beating hard when she pictured his face again, glancing at her over his guitar. But she couldn’t let on, not even to her best friend. Not yet.

“Yeah. I’ve seen him.” She displayed another Oscar-winning eye roll, her mouth on autopilot. “And guess what, he hasn’t changed a bit. Still totally full of himself like he’s God’s gift to every girl in the world. So conceited, and he barely has the talent to back it up.”

Becky snickered and blew her nose. “Good thing he’s gorgeous.”

“
He
thinks he is. You should see the makeup gear his people have to cart around. I swear, he’s got five boxes of product just for his hair! Such a joke.”

Just then, Aimee heard a noise from around the corner, and someone walked into view. Her spine stiffened. “Beck, I gotta bounce. Call you tonight.” Before Becky could finish saying good-bye or even cough, Aimee switched off her tablet and lifted her chin to stare up at LJ.