Play Me (Love on Tour #2) (10 page)

“Not really.”

She stared at me. “I don’t want to have sex with some random roadie or some creeper venue manager. I want to have more sex with you.”

I leaned back in my chair. Everything about this was wrong – the girl, the situation, and definitely my reaction. I wanted her. I wanted her like I’d never wanted a woman before, and I wanted to keep her all to myself.

“I told you before, I’m a bad idea.”

“You’re not gonna hurt me or scare me.”

“Is that really your criteria?”

She stood up and moved toward me. She leaned over and her soft hair fanned against my shoulder.

“I am also very, very attracted to you, Hank. And you made me feel like I’ve never felt before.” Her seductive act started to waiver, but she didn’t move away, she moved closer. “I felt sexy and excited and alive.”

Her arm was shaking as she used it prop herself up on the side of my chair. She was so nervous and vulnerable. I couldn’t resist her. I pulled her into my lap.

“Okay, Bell. I’m yours. But you have to know the rules.”

“I know.” She took a deep breath. “It’ll be our secret. No one else will know. And it’ll just be casual. No craziness, no attachments.”

Those were the rules, and I needed them to be understood. But I wanted to introduce a new one, too.

“And no one else. No sneaking off. No freaking me out because you’re locked in a fucking bathroom somewhere.”

It was a low blow. But the truth was, I couldn’t stand the thought of her with another guy. But I couldn’t just say that.

“No way. And I have an IUD, so without any sneaking off…”

Jesus, this whole thing was a disaster waiting to happen.

“Come here,” I said softly.

12

“Mike, a word.”

Mike looked up from his laptop. “Sure, Hank.”

“Come to my green room with me.”

Mike put aside his computer and followed me down the hall.

Bell had stayed with me all night last night. I was lucky enough not to have any visitors, just a couple text messages from Sean. But this morning she’d had to sneak back to her room. Then we were in ‘pretend mode’ all day on the bus. That was going to get irritating fast. But the sleeping arrangement was a more immediate concern.

I waited until Mike came in, then I shut the door behind him.

“What’s up?”

“It’s Bell. I’m worried about her.”

Mike ran his hand through his hair. “Yeah, me too. She’s too reckless.”

“I think we need to keep a closer eye on her.”

“I know, I know. She’s with Baby and Sean right now. And when Sean goes on stage I will be sure to watch her every minute. Sean flipped out about as bad as you did last night when he heard what happened.”

I had no doubt. No one could be overprotective like Sean.

“The other night I came back to the hotel and she was in the hallway with Jon, sucking his face.”

“Yeah, she told me about Jon. She left out the part about you finding them, though. I didn’t know he was around. When she mentioned him I wasn’t even sure if it was the same dude.”

“It was the same dude. He’s gone now, though. I got rid of his ass.”

“Yeah, but how did he even get here?”

“That moron tour manager rehired him.”

“Fuck.”

“Yeah, so my point is, she has to be watched at night, too.”

“Okay, maybe she should just share my room.”

“I got a better idea,” I said.

“Okay.”

“Just make sure that she and I have adjoining rooms from now on. I’ll keep an eye on her.”

“I don’t mind–”

“Mike, she’s going to throw a fit if we treat her like a little kid,” I pointed out.

“I guess, but… are you sure?”

Was he kidding? He was the one who told her to fuck me. Of course, he didn’t know I knew that. And I sure as hell hadn’t told Bell that I’d overheard their conversation in the hallway.

“It’s fine. Besides, it’s not like I have girls in my room every night anymore.”

“You’re still keeping with this celibacy thing?”

I gave him a dirty look. “You didn’t think I could make it?”

He shrugged. “Not really.”

“Whatever. Just make it happen, okay.”

“Okay.”

I was too good. I’d just arranged to have Bell in my room every night without anyone knowing. It was exactly what I wanted. It was also crazy dangerous. I was headed down a dark path. But I didn’t have the will to stop it.

****

“So Henry, how’s our little project going?”

“How exactly is it
our
project, Baby?” I asked, avoiding eye contact with Bell, who was sitting across from me.

Baby picked up her glass of water and took a sip. “It was my idea.”

Bell stared at her plate of spaghetti and twirled her fork in the long, thin strands. I took a bite of my steak and chewed slowly.

“It was Baby’s idea?” Mike asked. “I didn’t know that.”

Baby had abandoned her plate. It was empty anyway. The woman ate like a horse now that she was pregnant. “Whose idea did you think it was?”

“Oh my God, you’re Hank Tolk!”

Saved by a fan.

“Yeah, you want an autograph?” I asked the woman who’d approached our table.

Mike was sitting next to me, between me and the fan. “Sorry ma’am. Can’t do it right now. We’ll catch you on the way out,” he said.

This seemed to work, and the woman walked away after giving me a smile. Damn it.

“I figured it was Sean’s idea, so you could get that little sports car,” Mike continued.

While Sean was doing an interview with some magazine, Mike and I had taken the girls out to eat. So I didn’t even have him to help me out. Not that he would have been useful.

“No, the idea came first, the bet came second,” Baby said. “And you didn’t answer my question,” she pointed at me.

I couldn’t look Baby in the eyes and lie to her, so I deflected. “You see me with any girls?”

“No, I haven’t. And I must say, I’m impressed.”

Bell was eerily quiet. As I watched her take a dainty bite of garlic toast, I was imaging the way her perfectly straight teeth felt when she nipped at my earlobe.

“Yee of little faith,” I said.

****

Bell slowly rubbed circles on my chest. Her fingers interlaced with the fuzzy brown hairs in the center. I leaned my head back on the pillow and gave out a little moan. Everything she did made me feel good.

“That was a strange conversation we had at dinner tonight.”

“Mmmmm.”

“So what’s the deal with the bet?”

“I already told you, car for the guitar.”

“That’s not what I mean. Baby – damn, I mean Dani – said that she came up with the idea before there was a bet.”

“Yeah.”

“So why did she come up with the idea for you to be celibate?”

I put my hand on her shoulder and rubbed up and down with my thumb. “Well, I wasn’t really enjoying sex anymore, so Baby suggested that if I was celibate for a while, maybe it would fix the problem. I didn’t really like the idea–”

“Wait, back up. You weren’t enjoying sex anymore?”

I shrugged.

“I don’t get it.”

“You didn’t use to enjoy sex,” I pointed out.

“Okay, but this is you we’re talking about. You are
not
boring.”

“Neither are you,” I mumbled into her hair.

“So, why wasn’t it fun?”

“I guess it was just too routine. I guess I was having too much of it. At least that was Baby’s theory.”

“What was Sean’s theory?”

Sean’s theory was a whole lot closer to the truth – that I needed to find the right girl. There was no way I was telling her about that. But I would tell her that she was the reason I liked sex again.

“Who knows? The thing is, you totally fixed my problem, Tinker Bell.”

She looked up at me. “Yeah?”

“Hell yeah.”

****

I was anxious. I’d gotten back to the hotel at least an hour ago. I’d showered and was sitting on the bed, naked, watching TV. Bell had not opened the door to our adjoining rooms yet.

It was the fourth night of this arrangement. On the previous three nights she’d slipped into my hotel room within minutes of getting back from the venue.

I thought about knocking on the door that separated her room from mine. But I had too much pride. That’s what it boiled down to. I didn’t want her to know how badly I wanted her.

But where the hell was she? She came back on the bus, just like me. And just like me, she acted as though nothing was going on.

I did have reason to worry, though. Maybe she was pissed. Just after I got off stage, a girl approached me in the back hall. Her name was Sheila. We’d hooked up before, and she’d run into Alonso. Alonso knew her and let her backstage.

“Hey, Hank,” she purred, running a hand down my stomach, then folding her fingers into the top of my waistband. “Miss me?”

“Sheila. Hi.”

I normally would have had some sort of one-liner. I would have told her that I missed her and then walked to my green room for some hot sex. But turning girls down was still new to me. I was tongue-tied.

“Your show was amazing tonight.”

“Thanks.”

“Let’s go somewhere quiet and I’ll show my appreciation.”

“Sheila, I can’t tonight.”

“Don’t be silly.” She started kissing my neck.

“Hi Hank,” Bell said, walking up to us casually.

I tried to extract myself from Sheila. But when I pulled one hand away, she used the other to touch me, my thigh, my chest. She was like an octopus. And she was completely ignoring the fact that Bell was standing right next to us.

“Bell, um, this is Sheila. We used to know each other.”

I thought perhaps this would call Sheila’s attention to Bell’s presence. But she was completely unfazed. She stood on her tiptoes and reached for my ear with her mouth.

“Sheila, sweet–” I stopped myself from calling her sweetheart. Isn’t that what I breathed into Bell’s ear the night before? “Sheila, please stop for a second.”

I pulled her away from me.

“What’s the matter, Hank?”

Sheila still didn’t look at Bell. It was like to Sheila, Bell was invisible. But to me she was the largest thing in the world at that moment.

“I need to go. I need you to go back to the show,” I said, as forcefully as I could manage.

Sheila frowned. I looked at Bell. She was watching us closely, but she didn’t say a word.

I turned back to Sheila. “Honey,” I said, stealing Baby’s endearment for Sean. “I can’t hang out with you right now. I’m sorry.”

“Why not?”

“It’s a long story. Let me take you back to the floor.”

“I don’t wanna go back.”

“Wanna see Alonso? I bet he’d be delighted to see you, honey.”

Sheila shrugged. “I guess.”

“Okay, let’s go.” I put an arm around her waist and turned.

Bell was gone.

And now here I was, waiting to find out how bad things were going to be. It reminded me of some of the troubles Sean and Baby had on that first tour. There were several incidences where girls on the tour caused problems for them. Once a girl, a tall girl in heels, walked right up to Sean and started kissing him. Baby saw it and ran. I mean actually ran. She was fast, too. I busted my ass to catch up with her. I could remember the look on Sean’s face as clearly as if it had happened yesterday. He was terrified she’d leave him. I talked Baby into calming down, and she and Sean made up.

Of course, Bell and I were nothing like Baby and Sean. They were… a whole different thing. But I was enjoying this little affair we were having and I didn’t want to give it up.

The phone rang. It was Tim. I put it on speaker.

“Hey, I haven’t heard from you since you were in New York. I was getting worried.”

“It’s pretty late, isn’t it?”

“It’s not that late in California, dumbass. How are you?”

“I’m fine. Good, actually.”

“Yeah, what changed since New York?”

“The girl.”

“Hmmm. So tell me about her.”

“I don’t know what to say.”

“Does she drink?”

“Just the normal amount.”

“Does she do anything else?”

“She’s not an addict, Tim.”

“Okay, good start. What’s she like?”

“I don’t know how to answer that question. What’s she like? What’s anybody like?”

“Is she like Baby?”

“No, she’s not like Baby. They’re friends and they have a few things in common I guess, but she’s not like Baby.”

“How so?”

I let out a long breath. This man was amazing. He’d helped me so much and I owed him my life for it. And, in truth, I probably needed a shrink. With Tim as my sponsor, I got two for the price of one. But sometimes the shrink stuff was tough to take. I did not like talking about my feelings. And even though he was asking about Bell, I wasn’t fooled. I knew we were still talking about me.

“She’s quieter than Baby.”

“Quiet like Sean.”

“Nobody is quiet like Sean.”

I remembered the first time Tim and Sean met. Tim had tried his shrink shit on Sean. But it’s hard to do that on a man who looked at speaking as a chore. Plus Sean was as emotionally stable as they come, not even Tim could shrink that.

“Well, then what do you mean?”

“She was shy when she was younger and then she sort of came out of her shell. Plus, she’s kind of artistic.”

“Artistic? What does she do?”

“She’s a writer.”

“A writer. Interesting.”

I hated it when he said ‘interesting’ like that.

“She’s girlier than Baby.”

“How so?”

“I don’t know. She wears girlier clothes.” And underwear.

“I see.”

“But she swears.”

“I’ve heard Baby swear.”

“Yeah, but Baby swears to punctuate something. Bell just likes it. She also gives me a hard time.”

“So does Baby.”

“Yeah, they do it together. It’s annoying.”

“She sounds…”

“Like a handful?” I suggested.

“Yes. Like a handful. Maybe that’s exactly what you need.”

“What the hell does that mean?”