by Emma Scott
I grabbed my phone and called his number. It immediately went to voicemail. I shot him a text: Please call me as soon as you get this.
But it remained unread. I paced the living room, my nerves lit up like a switchboard.
“V?” Veronica asked from the kitchen. “What’s wrong?”
“It’s Miller,” I said. “I think…I mean, I don’t know for sure, but I have a bad feeling.”
“About what? Did something happen?”
“No, but I—”
I gave a little cry of surprise as my phone lit up with a call. Evelyn.
“Evelyn, talk to me. How is he? What’s happening?”
“Violet,” she said, her tone calm but tinged with fear. “I don’t want to scare you but…how fast can you get here?”
Chapter Twenty-Eight
It happened in a blur. One minute I was in my room throwing clothes into a bag, and the next, I was on a plane to Las Vegas, first class, courtesy of Gold Line Records. Evelyn picked me up at McCarran in a sleek black sedan with a driver. The Strip went by outside the tinted windows.
We were both only twenty years old, but Evelyn was dressed in an impeccable A-line skirt and blazer, while I looked like a pile of laundry in jeans and a sweatshirt, my hair in a messy ponytail.
“Tell me everything,” I said after tense greetings. “The truth. Not the PR bullshit that he was hospitalized for ‘exhaustion.’”
Evelyn scrolled her phone with long manicured nails. “I told you when I called that it was exhaustion because that’s all the world needs to know. Now that you’re here, I can tell you that, yes, Miller collapsed after the show two nights ago. His numbers were very low, but in the ER, they got him stable. Now he’s at the hotel, resting.”
“Collapsed?” My stomach felt as if it were made of stone. “How bad is it?”
“Bad enough that he needs to quit touring, and he won’t,” Evelyn said, finally setting her phone down to give me her full attention. “His doctor says Miller is pushing himself too hard. But he’s determined to finish the tour to give that charity a bunch of money. He feels guilty about all this.” She gestured at the elegant sedan. “And he’s miserable without you. It’s turned him into a bit of a bastard, to be honest. The long distance is too hard on him. You know how he is. He’s all or nothing.”
“I know. He’s going to be just as dedicated to the charity. He won’t want to quit.”
“You have to make him quit. You’re the only one who can convince him. He won’t listen to me.”
I glanced at her sideways, the old twinge of bitterness from our past still hovering between us. “I’ve seen the pictures of you two. You seem pretty close,” I admitted.
“What you’re seeing is a friendship.” She smoothed her hair that was pulled in a tight elegant ponytail. “Despite my best efforts.”
I whipped my head to her. “What does that mean?”
She shrugged. “It means I play to win, always.” She smiled fondly to herself. “My dad likes to joke that ambition is my Gatorade. I would have gotten over our little rivalry, eventually. But then Miller wrote that song for you. So many songs for you. I wanted that too. What girl wouldn’t?”
“So, you arranged to spend the next two and a half years with him to be that girl?”
“He’s gorgeous. Talented. When he sings…” She bit off her words and shook her head. “I wanted that. I wanted to be the girl in the love song. I thought if I stuck around long enough, if I were there for him, I would be. That was my goal, and I never lose.”
“Jesus, Evelyn.”
“But I did lose. Hard. No, that’s not true. To lose would mean he’d been playing the game, and he wasn’t.” She turned to face me. “There’s no one else in his universe but you. Not me or a thousand other screaming girls could ever change that. God knows, I’ve seen women try and fail to get his attention, but he looks right through them. He wouldn’t even entertain the possibility of sleeping with someone else. Which also contributed to him being an asshole, I’m sure.”
“I know. It’s been hard for me too. We promised to try to talk every night but—”
“He is talking to you. Every night.” She scrolled her phone and then held the screen to me. “This was two nights ago. Right before he collapsed.”
A video played, taken from someone just offstage. Miller sat on a stool alone in the center of the stage, a single light bathing him. He played his acoustic guitar solo and sang a song I’d never heard before. “Wait for Me,” a thrumming song of desperation, his rich voice calling out into the dark void of the crowd, over and over again. He was saturated with emotion and longing in a way that only came out in his music. Every word sank into my heart.
“That’s for you,” Evelyn said quietly. “There is no one else.”
The video ended, and she wordlessly handed me a tissue.
I dabbed my eyes. “Thank you for that.”
“You shouldn’t thank me,” she said. “But you don’t have to worry about me anymore, either. I’m going to offer him my resignation.”
“What…why? In the middle of his tour?”
“I have my reasons.” She turned to me. “But he’s got to stop working himself to the bone. He needs you to convince him of that, especially now. His dad’s been calling.”
I stared, my eyes wide. “Holy shit,” I breathed. “Really? Is it… Are you sure it’s him?”
She nodded. “Since the Rolling Stone article came out, Ray Stratton calls almost every day. Miller won’t talk to him. Won’t even hear of it.”
“Oh my God…” I felt pushed back in the seat, my heart aching for Miller. For how confused he must be. Or how much pain he must feel, old wounds torn open when they’d never fully healed in the first place. “He never told me.”
“Because he doesn’t want to worry you about any of it. But I’m worried, Vi. And so is Dr. Brighton.”
The sedan turned into the Bellagio Hotel and Casino and rolled into the circular drive.
“He leaves for Seattle tomorrow,” Evelyn said. “The show’s a big one. The executives from the Helping Hands charity will be there, and they’re bringing a bunch of kids backstage. Miller’s invitation. I’ll be gone by the end of the week.”
She gathered her bag and phone and tossed on a pair of Gucci sunglasses to hide the tears in her eyes. “Make sure it’s his last show.”
Evelyn led me into the Bellagio casino, past the lobby where a thousand glass flowers covered the ceiling in a riot of color. Their beauty calmed the turbulent emotions coursing through me. I stared up as long as I could while Evelyn strode briskly, unimpressed. She looked like she belonged in the elegance of the hotel, while I felt unwashed and grubby.
“She’s with me,” she told the guard at a private elevator who let us on. The car went up and opened on a broad, quiet hallway.
“I feel like the paparazzi is going to jump out at any second,” I said as we walked past door after door.
“We have the entire floor.” Evelyn stopped at a suite where a big guy with a badge hanging from his beefy neck was standing. “Hey, Sam.”
“What’s up, G?” He gave me a nod as he opened the door for us.
I nodded back, amazed at how much the label had built around Miller: private elevators and security and entire floors of swanky hotels. Pride swelled in my chest, even as I felt more out of place and unsure that he’d want me here.
The suite Evelyn led me through was huge, twice as big as my and Veronica’s apartment, with elegant furniture, like a royal sitting room in Italy. A tall man in a suit—a stethoscope looped around his neck—stood at the bay window. Miller sat on the ledge.
There he is.
I stopped in the middle of the room, watching him. Drinking him in. He looked tired, a little thinner than he did on the Rolling Stone cover. The doctor had a blood pressure cuff around Miller’s upper arm, taking a reading.
Miller saw me, and his expression froze. He stood up, as if he were pulled by strings, and stepped toward
me, yanked the pump from the doctor’s hand.
“Vi…what are you doing here?”
His gruff voice went straight to my heart. It had been months since I’d heard him say my name in person.
“Evelyn called me,” I said, tears filling my eyes. “It’s so good to see you.”
“God, baby…” He started toward me, then stopped, also realizing we had an audience. He tore the blood pressure cuff off his arm and handed it to the doctor. “Can you guys give us a minute?”
“I’ll be back in one hour to finish the check-up,” the doctor said sternly.
“I have an urgent matter to discuss with you, too,” Evelyn said, giving me a parting glance, asking me to let her tell him the truth.
When they’d gone, Miller took me in his arms and I collapsed into them, my eyes falling shut with relief to feel the solidity of him and hear his heart beating against my cheek.
“Vi, you have midterms. Why did you leave Baylor?”
“You think I wouldn’t? I love you, Miller. And you collapsed after the show. Evelyn says you need to quit the tour.”
He stiffened and gently released me. “I see. She called you and got you all scared, so you dropped everything to be here. She shouldn’t have done that.”
“Your health is more important than my school or your concert.”
“My health isn’t going to change, Vi. It’s always been this hard, and it’s going to stay that way. Quitting the tour won’t change that, but it will disappoint a shit-ton of people who have paid to hear me. The people who put me up in fancy hotels like this and let me take care of my mom. And you.”
“You need to slow down, love. Before something happens.”
“I can’t,” he said, dropping his head so that we were forehead to forehead. “There’s too much at stake.”
“Too much pressure on you,” I corrected. I cupped his cheek, feeling the stubble under my hand, my eyes searching his. “Do you still think you haven’t earned this?”
“You read that magazine article. I knew I said too much.”
“It scared me, Miller. All that talk about confusion and falling asleep in interviews.” My hand on his face moved up to touch a scar on his brow that wasn’t there before. “You never told me.”
“I didn’t want to scare you, Vi. God knows I’ve done enough of that our entire lives. I figure if I can push through and finish this tour, then it’d be over. I’ll have made enough money to take care of you. I could pay for your tuition anywhere you wanted. In Santa Cruz. I figured when it was done, we could go home.”
“Home,” I murmured, and then his arms tightening around me, holding me together when I felt I’d been falling apart.
“I love you, Violet. I am so completely in love with you that being away from you is making me fucking crazy.”
Tears blurred my vision as my heart pulled toward him, the magnetic polarity of us realigning. “I know. I hate it, too. Every day is impossible. But I’m here now. No more goodbyes.”
His eyes searched mine, hope and relief shining in them. Then his expression hardened, and this time with a desire that burned right through me. A possessive heat that flooded his eyes.
He stood up, towered over me. I felt the air between us tighten, pulling. His hands took my face, his thumb brushing my lower lip. My pulse was a drum in my chest, counting the seconds until he was mine again. But he took his time, soaking me in, savoring this moment when I only wanted him. We’d been apart long enough.
“Miller…”
And then his mouth descended, capturing mine in a heated, delving kiss. My eyes fell shut as I became saturated with everything that was him. The scent of expensive clothes and cologne suffused me, but beneath it, he was still there. His skin. The taste of him. So familiar and safe.
Like coming home.
His kisses erased the distance between us. His nipping teeth, his stubble grazing my chin, his tongue sliding and tangling with mine, a reacquaintance. A reunion of bodies and souls, hands pulling at clothes in an exchange of gasping breaths and moans. We kissed until we knew each other again, settled into each other’s spaces after the long absence. We kissed until we fell back into place, where we belonged.
He lifted me and carried me to the bedroom, the window’s shades drawn.
“I need a shower,” I whispered against his lips.
I needed more time to reacclimate us. To be with him with nothing left between us. Naked together under a bright light, the distance between us washing away.
He nodded in understanding and pulled me to my feet. We kissed as our clothes came off, pieces at a time. In the cavernous bathroom, he turned on the shower and drew me under rainfall. I watched the water bead over his skin and slide in rivulets over the cut lines of his body. My eyes drank him in while my hands glided up and down the smooth, muscled perfection of his back.
“So beautiful,” I murmured. “Magnificent.”
“God, Vi… Never again. I’m not letting you go, ever again.”
He wrapped his arms around me, pulling me into him. I planted open-mouthed kisses on his chest, over his heart, tasting the water and the salt of his skin. My exploring lips found one of his small nipples, and I sucked it between my teeth.
Miller hissed a breath, and his hands that had been tentative and soft on me, now roamed and grabbed, taking their fill. He reacquainted himself with my breasts, the curve of my hip, my stomach. Everywhere he touched left licks of fire while his hardness sought entry into the soft, wet heat of me.
“Vi…” he gritted out.
“Not yet.”
I kissed him long and slow and then turned him around to take in the beauty of his back, the lines of his neck, the muscles moving under his smooth skin, tapering to his waist. I kissed him between his shoulder blades, tasted him with my tongue, then reached for the soap.
I lathered the broad plains of his back then moved around to his abdomen, skirting an insulin pump that had replaced his CGM implant—another change in his life I hadn’t been aware of.
My exploration of his body grew more purposeful; I never wanted to not know him.
I slipped my hand down to his rock-hard erection, gripping its girth and stroking him. Anticipation lit my nerve-endings on fire, relearning what he liked. How to touch him in order to draw that sexy, masculine growl out of his chest. He had only been mine a handful of times, and now, I was taking him back, inch by inch.
Miller gripped my wrist that held him and looked at me over his shoulder. “I’m going to come if you keep doing that.”
I let him go, and he turned to face me, his hair falling over his eyes that were blue, dark and hooded. My limbs weakened at the pure want I saw there, but I turned my back, before I surrendered to him completely. I wanted his hands on me, washing away the grit of time and distance, erasing our separation with every touch.
I lifted the long, wet mass of my hair off my neck and held it up, offering him my naked back and my breasts, exposed and defenseless in front. Miller’s hands found them first, kneading them, making them slippery with soap, as his mouth clamped down on the slope of my neck. I gasped, arching into his touch while pressing my backside against his erection.
His hands skimmed down the curve of my spine, down to the rounded flesh of my ass, then back up my back. I felt the restraint in his every movement until his patience ran out, and my need had consumed me to the point of delirium. Quickly, we washed the soap away and then Miller lifted me again and carried me to the bed. My skin shivered in the cool air, but his body blanketed me with its perfect heaviness and heat. He kissed me until we were both breathless then lay his forehead to mine.
“I can’t stop looking at you,” he breathed.
“Neither can I.”
“Tell me there’s been no one else.”
“Of course, not. No one but you. Ever,” I said and swallowed. “You…?”
“No one,” he replied, his voice gruff but his eyes soft and warm. “You’re my first and my last.”
&n
bsp; His words and the intensity behind his eyes broke me open, erasing any lingering hesitation or doubt. Cold air swooped in as he withdrew to put on a condom from his wallet. Then he was back, beads of shower water pebbling his shoulders. He propped himself on his forearms, settling fully against me, his hands in my hair. Our eyes met in the dimness of the room’s shaded windows, unblinking. I guided him to my entrance and slid his tip over my wet heat. His body coiled and tensed, using everything he had to hold back, as he kissed me. Softly. And then slid deep inside me with one smooth motion.
Every part of me tensed at the sudden, heavy fullness, then relaxed immediately under him, letting him in completely, as deep as he could get. He sank into me and held still a moment, head bowed.
“Jesus, Vi. So good. You feel so good.”
I nuzzled his neck, kissing his ear, his jaw, and then his mouth as he raised his head and began to move in me. A few slow, deep, penetrating thrusts soon gave way to a hard, fast rhythm because it had been too long. Our bodies had been deprived, and now, we sought to make up for it.
His touch in the shower had already primed me. Our separation had my every nerve-ending clamoring for this moment. The perfect, heavy pressure of him hit that spot inside me again and again, driving me quickly to the edge.
“Miller…”
“Come, Vi,” he said, his neck corded with tension, his body gloriously masculine and hard over my swaying breasts as he drove into me. He reached back and lifted one of my legs over the crook of his elbow, spreading me wider.
I gasped at the subtle change in angle that sent me over. I grabbed at Miller’s shoulders, my nails scratching to hold on, as his body pistoned into me, pushing the orgasm higher and higher until a final cry tore out of me and I fell back, as if falling from a great height, incoherent in the pleasure that rolled through me in waves.
I let my legs fall open, reached my arms for the headboard and let him have me. Miller rose up to prop himself on his hands and thrust with abandon, driving into me again and again until at last, his orgasm gripped him, tensing in his body and then releasing into mine.