Fatal Temptation (6 page)

With Ling gone to her sleepover at Holly’s house, the Cooper family’s home is quiet tonight. Chris is out with his buddies at a local bar watching a boxing match, which leaves Sadie in her lonesome. With the match already started and most likely not ending until late tonight, she knows she has the time to make it out to the show tonight and to get home just in time for Chris to arrive. She just has to decide if she wants to or not.

With the time currently at 8:30pm, she knows that she has to make her escape now before Chris wonders where she is. She decides to send him a text message to let him know that she is going to be
out with Valerie and the girls, just in case he grows suspicious.

Sadie
locates her cell phone on the kitchen island and as she is about to compose a new message, there is already one on her phone. It reads:
“Hey baby, me and the guys are going to stay out late tonight. Don’t worry about staying up for me. I’ll be in touch later. Love you.”

As
Sadie reads the text, she can feel a sense of relief come over her. This means that she now has time to leave the house, watch Asher perform and then head back home, all before Chris would even know she left. The more she thinks about tonight, the more she gets butterflies in her stomach.

She hasn’t felt that sensation for years and it is refreshing. However, at the same time
Sadie can feel an inner conflict developing in her body. She is a married woman and mother, what is she thinking going out to a club on a Saturday night to watch some guy in his early twenties perform?

Is
she out of her mind?

Before she can
really put too much thought into it, she knows that she has to change and get out of the house soon, if she is going to go to the show and catch him in time. Her immediate attraction to him proves to be the victor and she has to explore it. She knows she would regret it if she didn’t.

Sadie
runs up the stairs to her bedroom to sort through some outfits that say casual yet sexy at the same time. Not wanting to show too much right off the bat but wanting to catch his eye, she opts for a pair of tight faded jeans and a black tank top; one that hugs her curves and breasts perfectly. As Sadie undresses and slips into the new articles of clothing, she wonders if she should change her underwear. Even though the thought of being intimate with Asher is wrong, she can’t help but feel like she should prepare for it, just in case.

She slips out of the everyday bra and panties and into something a little sexier. She adorns a super small black thong and a lacey push up bra to match. To finish this all off, she sprays her skin down with a light coating of perfume, just enough that someone can smell it if they were close to her.
Hopefully, that someone will be him.

After redressing into her new attire,
Sadie walks into the bathroom to do a once over on her appearance. She puts on a little eyeliner to give her eyes a more dramatic look followed by an additional coat of mascara. She adds a little rouge to her cheeks, a little paint to her lips and she looks at herself one last time.

Even though she looks great, she is still not completely satisfied until she looks to her hair. She can’t wear a ponytail out to the club to impress this guy. She needs to look sexy and to radiate sex appeal. Being blessed with naturally curly hair, all
Sadie needs to do is release her mane of locks from the elastic band and she has supermodel hair, which is exactly what she does. With a few sprays of hairspray and a tousle of her locks, she is ready to go.

The drive to the downtown core leaves
Sadie feeling nervous. Just thinking about Asher is making her hands sweat, her heart pound at a mile a minute and her stomach twisting up inside in knots. If he was able to do all of this with just her thinking about him, Sadie felt even more unsettled by the realization of how she would feel if he were to do more to her.

The drive feels as though it takes forever, even though she is downtown and outside of the club in nearly a half ho
ur. With the show starting in ten minutes, she knows that she needs to get inside to get a seat. She stands in line but is ushered to the front by a doorman immediately. “Right this way,” he says to her, allowing her to butt the line.

“Why me?”
Sadie asks, unfamiliar with the club scene, after being away from it for years.

“Beautiful girls never wait,” he
says as he unclasps the red rope and gestures for her to go inside. “They never pay either. Enjoy the show.”

Sadie
feels flattered but all is stopped as she looks back at the line and the numerous angry faces and nasty looks she receives. She ignores them though and heads inside, with only two things on her mind – Asher and not getting caught.

The club is a bit of a hole in the wall kind of place but it has been a
juggernaut in the music scene for years in this city. Many famous bands got their start on this stage and this place holds a lot of history, even if it is a big grungy. Sadie heads to the bar to grab something to help her to take the edge off and then takes a seat near the back. She wants to stand out to Asher on the stage, but at the same time, she wants to blend in, just in case a familiar face comes her way.

“Hey beautiful, can I buy you a drink?” some young, intoxicated male asks her as he approaches.

“I already have one, thanks,” Sadie replies, dangling the cocktail in her hands before him.

“Well you j
ust let me know if you get thirsty again, I’ll take care of you.”

“I’m already being taken care of,” she replies, this time with more sass. She hints towards the big rock on her finger.
She knows that it’s not a great excuse to use, given she is betraying Chris simply by being here, but in this case, it saves her ass.

“Your loss,” the guy says as he turns around and looks for another potential mate.

Sadie watches as the guy goes through at least three more women and faces rejection that many more times.

As she watches him, her attention is directed towards a man all dressed in black. He is wearing a hat and has a camera hanging from his neck.
Sadie wonders if he is the same guy that she spotted earlier, but she doesn’t know for sure. She stares in his direction and tries to make eye contact, but once he sees that she is looking at him, he becomes anxious and quickly gets loss in the sea of the crowd.

Sadie can’t help but allow curiosity to get the better of her, as well as a feeling of panic. Just as she is about to rise from her seat and follow the mysterious figure out of the bar, the stage lights come up and a man walks across it, microphone in hand. “Ladies and men who are gentle but not really, welcome to the
Starlite Room. How are we all feeling tonight?”

The crowd reacts with an obnoxious roar, but
Sadie remains poised in her seat, concerned about the man she just made eye contact with and if she is in fact being spied on.

“Are you ready to rock?”
the man yells into the microphone.

The crowd screams once again.

“Well we’ve got a great line up for you tonight and we are going to start things off right with a band all the way from London, England. Give it up for The Machine!”

The crowd screams again and the man leaves the stage. The lights dim even lower as the band graces the stage. Even though it is d
ark, Sadie can see him on the stage. She can make out his silhouette and the visual makes her salivate. Being in this close proximity to him makes her feel an uncontrollable sense of lust for him. The lights haven’t even come on yet, but through the darkness, Sadie can feel him breathing and can sense his every emotion. She only hopes he can feel the same intensity as she.

Finally, with their guitars strapped to their bodies and the drummer ready to, the music begins. As soon as the drummer and the bassist start the main beat for the song, the lights come on and the crowd screams to welcome them, but
Sadie just stares ahead, her heart nearly pounding out of her chest.

There, gracing the
stage is Asher looking sexier than ever. He wears a tight black tank top and shows off even more of his arms than before. He is in great shape and his muscles are protruding out of his skin. A light dust of hair covers his lower arms and is coated by a tan that covers all of his exposed skin. He wears a pair of dark black jeans that cling to his legs and combat boots, which give him even more of a bad boy appearance. Sadie looks around and notices that all of the women are reacting to him in the same way and she can feel herself become envious. Then, he starts to play and her focus is put back on him.

Asher
strums the guitar and plucks at the strings. The style of music from his band is very reminiscent of old school sexy blues and rock and roll. Everything is slow and very grungy. This is the kind of music if it doesn’t rouse something in you, then you don’t have a pulse.

Seeing him strum the strings, and slide
his hands all over the neck of the guitar makes Sadie lick her lips. She imagines herself being in his arms in that moment and the kinds of things he would to do her with his hands and fingers. Watching him up on that stage so close to her yet so far away drives her wild. Even though there is something enchanting about watching him up their on stage, she yearns for something more intimate with him; something more personal.

The lead singer finishes the song on a high note and the crowd goes wild.
She watches as Asher switches his electric guitar out for an acoustic one, the band preparing for a softer set. Once he is prepared, he sits down on a chair on the stage prepared for him, strumming away once again and leading the singer into the first few notes of the song.

The more she admires him serenading
the crowd with his music, the more she wants him. Asher commands the stage and the presence of everyone in the room, especially the women. They are purely swooning over him and Sadie knows she is in competition. The more she thinks about it, the more she realizes that all of these women in the room could be versions of her. She has no idea how long Asher has been in town for or how many other women he has been able to seduce. Chances are, she fell for the same game all of them had and the thought is making her feel sick.

Wi
th all of these women being at least ten years younger than her, she wonders what she is even doing here in the first place. It was a terrible idea from the get go and something that she should have never considered. She has a great life with Chris and an even better life with Ling. Her and Chris have their sexual issues, but at the heart of it, she already has a man in her life that loves her. Most women here aren’t even graduated college and probably living in their parent’s basements, while Sadie has been living in luxury for the past few years. She is a mother, not a cradle robber.

She finishes up her beverage, needing the influx of alcohol to help subdue her raging emotions and she heads straight for the door.

“You better park it missy,” Asher’s voice can be heard through the microphone. He stops playing momentarily and his band follows suit.

Sadie stops dead in her tracks and turns around slowly, begging that it is not her but in the same breath, saying a silent prayer to herself that it is. Sure enough, as soon as she spins and faces him, he locks eyes with her and takes a moment before leaning into the microphone again.

“We only have a few songs left. You can’t leave now.”

Out of all of the women in the audience, he was able to locate
her and he even stopped his lead singer in order to make her stay. Sadie wonders how she could ever leave now, given how Asher was able to spot her in a crowd of hundreds. She has to at least be hospitable and exchange a few words with him now. It would just be rude if she didn’t.

She gathers herself and makes her way back towards the stage, standing near the front of the audience to get a better look at him. As she approaches, the younger women all suffocating the front of the stage whisper secrets into each other’s ears regarding Sadie, evidently out of jealousy. She hates to let it get to her, but at the same token, being a mother and still being able to intimate girls ten years her senior, is an easy ego boost.

She stands close to the stage, watching him perform the rest of the set and feeling closer to him than she ever has before. She can see every muscle in his arms on fire with every strum and pluck he takes on the guitar. He moves in perfect rhythm to the music, even the slow songs, signaling to Sadie that he knows how to work a crowd and his body. The more she watches him up there on the stage, the more she finds herself enjoying her time here. He’s a great performer and a very talented musician. She is impressed.

As the final song comes to a close, Sadie can feel her nerves bundle in her stomach, tying it into knots all over again. Asher smiles in her direction, anxious to see her soon and to finish up the set. She can sense it.

She knows.

“We are The Machine and we thank you! Enjoy the rest of the show and we’ll see you soon. God bless!”
Asher yells from the stage as he busts into a mini solo on the guitar to finish off the set. Once again, this causes the crowd to roar and they are finally done. The band all thanks the crowd once last time and Asher looks over to Sadie, a beaming smile curling on his slender coral lips.