TAINTED: THE COMPLETE DUET

by Jenner, Carmen

  “Don’t you smirk at me, Ryan,” I snap.

  Coop is shirtless now, showing off all of that beautifully muscled torso and the ornate tattoo sleeve running the length of his arm and the left side of his chest. He casually leans one elbow up against the doorframe, bringing his nipples right into my line of sight.

  “What’s the matter, Ali-Cat? You don’t like to be kept in your kitty cage?”

  “Screw you.”

  “Well I would, but I’m afraid you’re locked in there, and I’m out here.” He grins like a freaking maniac. “Do you see the predicament we’re in?”

  “Let me out of here.”

  “That’s it? That’s all you got for me?” He arches a perfect, black brow. This boy enjoys playing with me far too much. “You’re not even going to try and sweeten the deal?”

  “What? You think I’m going to let you win that bet? Or offer to suck your cock if you let me out?” I say with a mocking smile. Coop’s eyes hood with desire and I frown when I realise I haven’t rattled him at all, but just given him fuel for his already raging fire.

  Fire. Boner. Same thing.

  “Let me know when you want out of your cage, kitten,” he says, and the motherfucker smirks as he’s walking away.

  At least an hour after they taped me in there, I cut my way free with a pair of Deb’s nail scissors that she’s left in the bathroom. I’ll likely get my arse chewed out because of it tomorrow when she finds the sticky residue all over her precious scissors, but I don’t care. The bus is quiet, the main lights are off, and I can see a little light playing peekaboo with Coop’s curtain around his bunk. I tiptoe so as not to alert any of them to my escape, and I head into the back room.

  I’m still wrapped only in a towel, but I could kiss the boys for losing their shirts so often. I pick up a worn Misfits shirt from the floor and throw it on. I know it belongs to Cooper because it smells like him, and I gratefully, pull it over my head. It covers the important bits, so that’s all that matters, because no way am I sleeping naked around these guys.

  Pulling the blankets from the drawers beneath the bed, I press the button and the mattress slides out. I lie down, more than happy for the extra room to stretch out. I can’t sleep though, and after twenty minutes of tossing and turning I get up and put the Xbox on. I’m maybe twenty minutes into a Dead of Night when Coop startles me from the doorway, making me die in the game and loose about ten health points in real life.

  He leans against the doorframe, his arms casually folded over his chest and one of those stupid vapour cigarettes hanging from his mouth like a sailor with a pipe. What is he, Popeye? Sadly, he even looks hot doing it. Screw this guy for being so damn good looking. Screw him to hell. Um ... yes, please.

  “Uh oh, pussy’s roaming free,” he says.

  “You just killed me, you butt munch.”

  He shuts the door behind him and comes closer, jumping up on the bed beside me and wafting his vapour in my face. It smells kind of nice, like gingerbread, but I still shoo the vapour away as though it were smoke. “Your mouth is such a turn on, Ali-Cat.”

  “Oh, my mouth has plenty more where that came from.”

  Coop grins and I’m sure there’s a response on the tip of his tongue but when he lifts the corner of the blanket, preparing to tuck his legs beneath it, that response is snatched away by the sight of my naked legs.

  “You boys got come on my clothes, remember?” I remind him, though I’m not really sure why he needs an explanation as to why I’m not wearing any pants.

  “I’m beginning to think I’m going to get come on my T-shirt too.” I frown at him in confusion and he clarifies, “You’re wearing my T-shirt.”

  “Oh, that’s cute, you’re doing that Alpha-hole thing again. Like me wearing your T-shirt is some big fucking deal.”

  “I am not an Alpha-hole.”

  “Yes, you are,” I say, poking him in the side as he slides back onto the bed and tucks his legs under the blanket. “You’re so cute when you pout.”

  “I am not fucking pouting. I don’t pout. Grown men don’t pout.”

  I love these exchanges between us—it’s like tennis on crack, volleying insults back and forth, each of us throwing down our racket in a rage when then tension becomes too great. Half of the time I want to punch him in his pretty face. The other half I want to rip his clothes off and run my tongue over every inch of his body.

  I chuckle, because I can’t help sinking the hook deeper. “Aww, don’t worry, Tyke, you’ll grow up to be a big man someday.”

  I ruffle his hair and he reaches up and wraps his hand around my wrist, squeezing just hard enough for me to feel how easy it would be for him to overcome me. He slides his thumb over the inside of my wrist and I swear my vagina pulls out her skipping rope and starts fucking jumping up and down at the prospect of that simple touch becoming more. Coop surprises me by sliding our joined hands over his cut stomach and down beneath the sheets, over his hard cock.

  “I think it’s big enough, don’t you?”

  I swallow hard.

  Alpha-hole one. Ali zero.

  I wish I had my blanket, because a fluffy blanket right now would really calm my nerves. Not that I’m nervous or anything, I mean, I’m only in bed with a rock star ... whom I hate. Or ... sort of hate. I remind myself. Stupid dumb rock stars and their jizz. I want my fluffy blanket.

  “So, Vegas, huh?” I ask to cover the fact that I’m thinking about rolling around on this bed naked with him.

  “Yup.”

  “You been there before?”

  “Nope,” he says. “I really flustered you with that, didn’t I?”

  “Little bit, yeah. It was kind of a dick move.”

  He laughs at my pun and shifts on the bed, lying down.

  “Um ... what are you doing?”

  “Going to sleep. Turn out the lights.”

  “No, I mean why are you going to sleep here? Your bed isn’t full of jizz, just mine.”

  “I’m an insomniac, Ali. I have to take sleep when I can grab it. Your presence calms me, and right now I feel like taking a nap. So ... shut up, turn out the light, and get over here.”

  For a moment I just stare at him, and then when it becomes apparent he wasn’t joking in any way, I shrug and do as he asks, because who the hell am I to argue with a half-naked hot man who wants to snuggle?

  “You’re still not winning that bet.”

  HE HADN’T WON THAT bet, but over the course of the next week Cooper and I met like this while the rest of the bus was asleep. We lay on our backs and stared up at the brightly-coloured fish in the tank as we spoke about everything from the tour to our favourite flavours of Baskin & Robbins. I talked a lot about my relationship with Brad and he spoke a lot of his daughter, Pepper, pulling out his phone and showing me pictures and videos her mother had sent him. He never talked about Holly though, and the few times I’d seen her in the videos telling Pepper to wave to Daddy, Cooper’s jaw had tightened, and the muscles in his face ticked as if he was grinding his teeth. I didn’t push him on the subject. I figured he’d open up to me about his ex if and when he felt comfortable. He obviously hadn’t yet, and I tried to ignore the way that stung. It also made me feel a little embarrassed that I’d been so quick to divulge every little detail about my relationship with Brad. I hadn’t stopped to think that it was something he mightn’t want to hear.

  Some nights we’d find ourselves in the kitchen, just to shake things up a bit. Cooper would lazily strum his guitar and sing. A teeny tiny part of me wanted to believe he was singing to me not to get into my pants, but because he really meant what he was singing about. My inner bitch quickly quashed those ideas, and in a way I was glad. It would be far too easy to lose my head and my heart to this man. And despite all our flirting—and those two amazing orgasms on the plane—that was a line I wasn’t willing to cross.

  This was a job. Sure, it came with benefits like seeing rock stars half-naked and working out on the bus, or getting to not just
witness but also partake as an unwitting semen recipient in my very first circle jerk, but I was getting paid for it all the same. I worked hard to get that position at Harbour Records and I intended to keep it for as long as I could. I wasn’t about to let the lure of a sexy rock star ruin all I had worked for.

  Though given his behaviour, it was apparent the sexy rock star had other ideas.

  CHAPTER TWELVE

  MAULED BY A WERECAT

  ALI

  We’ve been in Vegas for just two days, and already I long for those late-night chats on the tour bus. I have a Deluxe Panoramic Corner room of my own in the Wynn Hotel. It is luxe, it is too much, and it is way too quiet. I’ve already explored the strip, watched a tonne of porn, run the batteries flat in my We-Vibe, taken a bath and infiltrated my Facebook profile with dozens of food porn pictures. I’d thought about calling Coop, but what would I say? “Hey, butt munch, come up to my room and snuggle”?

  No. I was not doing that. No matter how much I might want to.

  Despite our weirdly burgeoning friendship, and the fact that he sought me out as often as I found him on the tour bus, this was still work. We’d been thrown together by circumstance, but I was still getting paid to do a job. The lines of that job description had been fuzzy at best, and now they seemed to extend to sexual appetite suppressor, personal-crisis-when-confronted-with-confined-spaces therapist, and cuddle bunny.

  I pick up my phone, checking for the tenth time tonight to ensure that he hasn’t sent one of those hilarious yet mildly irritating texts, when it vibrates. I see his face flash up on the screen and I let it ring, waiting a whole five seconds before I answer it so I don’t sound desperate.

  “What?” I say into the mouthpiece, as if I’m particularly annoyed that he’d dare to call me.

  Tonight had been their album launch at TRYST. It was insane—booze, flesh, fangirls, celebrity, and money, money, money. I’d definitely felt underdressed in jeans and a T-shirt and my lucky red Cons. I’d stayed only as long as I had to before coming back up to my room.

  “Ali,” he slurs, sounding very drunk. Hinges squeal, and the thumping bass in the background eases a little. He must have walked into the bathroom. “Where are you?”

  “In my hotel room. Where are you, Coop?”

  “I don’t know.” He sighs. “Why are you alone, Ali-Cat?”

  “Excuse me?”

  “I don’t get why you don’t have someone?” he slurs. “Why isn’t there a line of dudes camped outside your hotel room? Why did your arsehole boyfriend fuck another woman?”

  “I don’t know, Cooper, why did your ex leave you?” I cringe the second the words leave my mouth. That was a low blow, but damn, something in those questions cut me right to the core. When it becomes apparent that he’s not going to answer me I say, “Okay well, I’m glad we had this chat, but I’m tired. So if you just called to be a dick, then thanks but no thanks. I already have one of those on the nightstand, and the best thing about BOB is that he doesn’t talk when all I wanna do is roll over and sleep.”

  “I think I love you,” Coop says, and I ignore the pang in my chest and the weird flippy thing that my stomach is doing because he’s drunk, and more than likely responding to the idea of me getting myself off. “You’re a really fucking cool chick, Ali.”

  “Yep, that’s what they tell me. Good night, Cooper.”

  “Wait ... don’t hang up. I need you.”

  I wait a beat for him to say something afterwards. Anything. But just when the flippy feeling inside my stomach starts up again he says, “I need you to come get me. I’m drunk and there are fangirls here. They all want something from me. These women want to sleep with me, Ali.”

  “Imagine that,” I say. Jealousy and anger both rip right through me. It was so nice of him to call, point out how alone I am in the city of sin, tug at my stupid fucking heart strings, and then remind me that every woman he meets wants to bang his brains out. “Goodnight, Cooper.”

  “Please?” he begs, and he sounds so damn lost.

  “I’m in bed, butt munch.”

  I feel like an arsehole, because I know he wouldn’t refuse me if the situation were reversed. Call me a sucker, but I can’t listen to him down the other end of the line, sounding so lost and so alone. He’s surrounded by so much admiration, yet he doesn’t seem to want any part of it. I’m not sure Cooper was really designed for a life in the public eye. He’s far too sensitive. The really fucked up part is that someone should be here managing this. Taint needs a manager. Coop had told me their last manager had been a heinous bitch. They’d fired her, but they hadn’t yet hired anyone else. At the very least their AR—also a heinous bitch, but more commonly known as Vanessa—should be here waiting in the wings behind every concert, watching every move, and making sure the boys don’t screw themselves over with the media. Instead, she’s back in Sydney, probably sucking Guidelli’s dick while they sip Dom Pérignon and wipe their mouths with napkins made of hundred-dollar bills.

  I let out a resigned sigh. “Where are you?”

  “I don’t know.”

  “Damn it, Coop, how the hell am I supposed to know where to find you if you don’t even know where the hell you are?”

  “Wait a second, I’m getting up.” He pauses for a moment and then says, “I’m at the green place.”

  “The green place?” I ask confused, then I walk over to the floor-to-ceiling windows and I see it. “You mean the MGM?”

  “Yes!” he shouts. “That’s where I am. I left the high rollers’ room with Zed and then we got separated.”

  “The high rollers? Christ, Cooper. Please tell me you didn’t lose a tonne of money.”

  “I lost a grand on the wheel, and that was enough for me. Zed made fifty thousand dollars though. If he ever tries to convince you to play strip poker, bow out gracefully. The dude’s a machine.”

  “I don’t see myself ever playing strip poker with Zed, but thanks for the tip,”

  “Would you play strip poker with me?”

  I shake my head and pull on the jeans I wore earlier and a Ramones shirt, no bra, and then I shove my feet into my Cons. My hair is a mess, so I throw it on top of my head and secure it with a hotel pen shoved through the bun like a chopstick. “I don’t play poker. I’d lose.”

  “I see no problem with this.”

  “I don’t play games I can’t win, Coop.”

  “Is that a threat, Ali-cat? ’Cause it’s a fucking sexy one.”

  Jesus. How much did he drink?

  “So you’re in a bar off the high rollers’ room?”

  “Technically,” he states loudly, and I can just imagine the way his face looks when he says it. “I’m in a toilet, in the bar, off the players’ room at the MGM.”

  “Okay, do me a favour and stay there? I’ll be there in ten minutes.”

  “I’m hiding out from groupies, Ali-Cat. I’m not going anywhere.” I’m just about to hang up the phone when I hear the door swing open in the background. Cooper mutters, “Oh shit.”

  A female’s voice purrs, “There you are. I wondered where you disappeared to.”

  “Yeah, I’m here ... you know, gastro,” Coop replies.

  “Aww, you poor baby, do you need me to take you home and take care of you?”

  “Err ...”

  I sigh, about to hang up the phone when he whispers “Hurry Ali, please? Oh ... wow okay, that’s a really nice pair of breasts you have, but why don’t you put your top back on and we can go get a drink?”

  “Oh I love a guy with an accent,” she purrs.

  “I need you, now,” he whispers into the phone and I grab my key card and some cash, and practically fly out of my hotel room in order to save the hot rock star from himself.

  Ten annoying minutes from cab to curb, and a torturously long elevator ride later, I’m standing at the entrance to the hotel’s nightclub. I push my way into the crowd and search out the bathrooms, but my wrist is caught instead. I turn, about to whack some handsy guy i
n the face, but then I find Cooper, holding onto me for dear life, looking drunk and dishevelled, but still alive. Just.

  “I thought I told you to wait in the bathroom?”

  “I got mauled by a fucking were-cat in the bathroom. I barely made it out alive. Please get me out of here.” He leans into me—or he attempts to lean—but instead, he stumbles and uses his hands to steady himself. By holding onto my boobs.

  I raise a brow at him. “Really?”

  “Shit, ssorry,” he slurs. “Fuck they’re nice tits.”

  I shake my head, about to tell him that I know exactly what game he’s playing at when a woman with huge boobs, bad ratty extensions and nails like talons grabs Coop from behind. “There you are, rock star. You ready to rock my world?”

  His eyes go wide as saucers, and then he shoots me a panicked, pleading look before he turns to face her. “Guess you found me.”

  “I sure did, big boy.” She touches one of those long talons to the tip of his nose and her free hand slides across the front of his jeans. Coop lets out an undignified whimper.

  I roll my eyes. “I’m sorry, but if you could take your hands off my boyfriend’s cock, I’d really appreciate it.”

  “Boyfriend? Oh no, honey, the things he just did to me in that bathroom—he ain’t nobody’s boyfriend.”

  “I didn’t do anything, I swear,” he says, holding his hands up in a placating gesture.

  “Save it, Ryan.” I grab his collar and try to look as if I’m not about to lose my shit laughing. “You can explain yourself back in our hotel room.”

  I’m kind of surprised she doesn’t follow, but instead calls out something about how his band sucks, and she’ll never illegally download another copy again because they’re not worth the risked jail time.

  I’m still dragging him by the collar when we make it to the elevators and hustle inside before Ivanna Be a Big Kitty can come out after us.

  “Well, that was totally worth getting out of bed for,” I say.

  Coop slumps against the wall. “Shit. Is the room spinning?”