“She’s cold.” I shrugged. “You’re not.”
“I…I don’t know what to say to that.”
“Maybe it would be easier for both of us if you just crossed the line.”
“Make it personal, you mean?”
“Not necessarily. But maybe treat me like I’m a person, not another client on your roster. My heart does beat despite your attempts to get me to want to end my life by way of paperwork.”
She smiled. “I’ll think about it.”
“Good.”
Chapter Four
Braden
I went to bed around midnight, my head pounding from all the stupid thoughts running around inside. Like what if she can’t help? What if she can? Why do I crave her smile so much, and why do I look forward to the number ten on my watch just so I can eat popcorn with her?
She was all business during the day, driving me insane with her ideas.
But at night? She was mine.
And I liked her better that way, without her armor on, without the red lipstick that seemed more like a deterrent than an invitation.
I quickly shot off a text to Zane, then realized it was a group chat with Will, my agent. Whoops!
Me: FYI next time you guys decide to “help” can you make sure the girl in question isn’t Pollyanna with a stick up her ass? Please and thank you.
Will: Huh? Who are we talking about?
Zane added Drew, Ty, and Trevor to the conversation.
Well shit, there went the private conversation I’d been about to have.
Zane: I’ll admit she wasn’t hard on the eyes. Honest moment, when I heard the term life coach, I imagined some Tony Robins-looking guy in a matching Adidas windbreaker and the inability to use an inside voice, so…
I frowned at the phone.
Me: Who the hell is Tony Robins?
Trevor: Ah, youths.
Ty: He’s loaded, that’s what he is. He makes people feel better about being mediocre.
Drew: You’re just saying that because you’re pissed he makes more money than you.
Zane: Yeah, he’s not wrong. Guy charges more for two days of a convention than a handful of our concert tickets.
Me: Wait, back up. He’s a life coach?
Zane: Keep up, young one. He is, just like her, only she’s clearly more…what’s the big word I’m looking for? Help a guy out!
Trevor: I’ll take Rhymes with Concrete for two hundred, Alex!
Zane: Discreet! DISCREET. Son of a bitch, why was that hard?
Ty: Hard. Just like our poor Braden as the hot life coach kisses his boo-boos and tells him he’s not crazy.
Will: You’re not crazy…by the way.
Me: I know I’m not crazy. I’m not the problem. It’s all the other psychopaths out there.
Drew: Maybe Ty’s right. Get laid. It might create more happy chemicals to combat the traumatized ones.
Me: Um, he said I was hard, he didn’t say to have sex.
Zane: Sex fixes everything (said with heavy sarcasm)
Trevor: I mean, it can. If you’re horny, I guess. But it’s probably against her contract to touch you in your happy place.
Me: Can we not call it that? Ever? LIKE EVER.
Zane: Your fun zone?
Drew: Trail of tears?
Me: THE HELL?
Ty: Because girls weep with pleasure, bro…take a compliment.
Will: Yeah, I didn’t mean it that way.
Me: I hate all of you right now. It’s been three days, what if she can’t…?
Will: She can.
Zane: She will.
Me: You didn’t let me finish.
Drew: Look, man, I know you’re freaked that she might not be able to help you, but promise us you’ll try. I want you touring with us, all right? You’ve been family since we picked you up off the streets at nineteen!
Zane: Sad and wandering in the rain, asking God for a sign.
Ty: With an embarrassing amount of Adrenaline and Zane posters in your room.
Will: Begging the universe to avenge you!!
I sighed.
Me: You guys done? Oh, also, my YouTube video that day got two million MORE views than you guys.
Drew: F U. By the way, how’s Mom?
Me: You’re dead to me.
Will: To be fair, his mom is really striking.
Ty: Not to be creepy or anything but—
Me: No, just no. And I’ll try, all right? But if she busts out some weird vision board shit, I’m out.
Zane: Wait, you don’t have a vision board?
Me: Tell me you’re joking.
Drew: His has a pony on it. Don’t ask.
Me: But why?
Trevor: DAMN IT, SOME THINGS DON’T NEED TO BE BROUGHT UP!
Zane: lolololololol we’ll tell you when you’re older, sport.
Me: On that creepy note, I need to go shower and head to bed
Drew: Taking lots of cold showers, are you?
Ty: Hide the socks.
Trevor: Out of lotion?
Me: I’m flipping all of you guys off. I’m not some pubescent teen. Oh also, I lost my virginity at sixteen and slayed in high school, unlike some people. Cough, cough, Zane.
Ty: He was protecting his treasure while you were pillaging every able-bodied female for more.
Me: A man doesn’t pillage. He does, however, give multiple orgasms. I’ll send you a manual later. Sounds like you still need help finding the G spot. It’s cool, bro. Not everyone has that skill.
Drew: I have that skill in spades.
Trevor: We know. We have earplugs because of it.
Me: I’ve never been more proud.
Will: Stop setting a bad example!
Me: Okay, I really am going, I want to know about the pony later.
Zane: You really do. YOU REALLY DO.
Will: You’ll never be the same, and I mean that. I’m shuddering.
Me: I’m out!
They texted a few more times, and then suddenly pictures of ponies flooded our group chat. I was still trying to figure out what the hell would make them so weirded out by that when I finally yawned, so I plugged in my phone and went to sleep.
My alarm, the sound of a cow mooing—don’t ask, the guys constantly changed it without my knowledge, and I kinda got used to the crazy—went off. I begrudgingly went into the bathroom, brushed my teeth, got as presentable as possible—which actually wasn’t all that presentable considering my red hair was basically like a homing beacon for people’s eyes. I threw on a pair of clean joggers and a T-shirt, fully prepared to have to deal with the side of Piper that gave me hives.
Paperwork Piper.
Huh, maybe I should start calling her that just to get a reaction out of her. God, I wanted to hide those heels and black pantsuits more than anything. I mean really, who owned that much black? I was a rock star, and even I didn’t wear that much black—and it was basically the only friggin’ color that didn’t clash with my hair!
When I made it into the living room, I nearly dropped my phone on the floor. Piper was wearing black jeans and a black T-shirt, but miracles did happen, because she had on black Nikes.
I nearly wept.
When she bent over to organize something, I got the perfect view of an ass that had all my attention and then some. She moved slightly to the right of my gorgeous dining room table, and that’s when the bomb went off in my head.
It was like she went to bed thinking, hmmm this isn’t working, maybe he’s right, then woke up and thought, huzzah, I know what will do the trick, crayons!
“What. The. Hell.” I gaped. “Are you doing?”
“Oh Good!” She clasped her hands together and looked ready to bounce up and down. “Perfect timing! We’re going to go over our exercises, not paperwork, but you will be working with paper!” Holy shit, she seemed too proud of herself. I almost didn’t want to burst her bubble.
“This?” I pointed. “This is what you took from our conversation last night?” I shook my head
. “I mean, are we finger painting?”
“No. Though we can if you want.” She grinned. Where the hell did she get all this pep? It was like a Starbucks Christmas commercial had exploded in her little body over the last twelve hours. She rushed me and then held out her hands. “Okay, so I know this is going to seem elementary, but bear with me, all right?”
I was afraid to nod my head as my feet slowly shuffled toward the section of my house that now looked like Hobby Lobby. “Well, you’ve got me, I’m at least curious. Are we teaching kids or something that’s going to be altruistic and remind me how lucky I am to do what I love?”
Her expression fell a bit. “No. Actually, we’re going to do something better. We need a place to start, and a vision of what our finish is going to look like.”
Thoughts of ponies suddenly exploded in my brain. No, no, no, no.
I swear the world paused and then went into slow motion as her mouth moved to form the words. “Vision board!”
She even clapped in excitement afterwards.
I blamed the guys for manifesting this in my life, cursing them about a million times before I set down my phone and tried to glare. “I’m not making a friggin’ vision board.”
“Stop being difficult.” She rolled her eyes. “Plus, if you’re a good boy, I’ll even let you use glitter.” She smacked me on the shoulder and then shoved me toward the table. All the while, I felt my balls retreating into my body.
Shit.
Chapter Five
Piper
He looked less than enthused. In fact, he looked ready to set fire to the glitter section of the table, and I had worked really hard to make everything look fun. After our talk last night, I’d realized two things. One, he was being open with me, which was good. And two, the professional me, the one who had very serious boundaries in place, wasn’t gonna get the job done. So I figured if I stopped being so clinical and opened up a bit, he would respond better.
“How is this supposed to help me?” He crossed his arms, making it impossible for me not to take notice of the lean muscles that bulged. It’s like the minute I turned off Life Coach Piper, the girl who found the rock star attractive charged to the surface with a giant roar.
I licked my lips and tried to focus on explaining why this was going to be helpful, but I seemed unable to form words.
He was pretty.
Really pretty.
Focus, Piper!
Still professional. Remember?
I mean, so what if my boyfriend dumped me right before I boarded a plane for Portland, only to be told that the flight was full, and I’d been moved to a middle seat?
It had been a direct flight from LA.
Three hours with no armrest.
But I knew that this was a fresh start, compliments of my ever-changing vision board.
I grinned triumphantly. “Close your eyes.”
He stared me down, his blue eyes twinkling with total judgment before he let out a sigh and did as I asked. “You’re right, Piper, closing my eyes and pretending nobody can see me is super helpful. Gee, why didn’t I think of that? On stage? In front of thousands of people—”
“Sarcasm is oftentimes used as a defense mechanism,” I interrupted. “Now keep your eyes closed. Where do you see yourself in one year?”
“Touring,” he said quickly. “Hopefully.”
“Uh-huh. And where do you see yourself in three years?”
He hesitated for a few seconds. “Making music.”
“Five years?”
He sighed heavily. “I don’t know, hopefully still doing what I love.”
“All right, open your eyes.”
He did as instructed. This time his eyes darted down to stare at his bare feet before locking onto mine. “That just proves that music is my life.”
“Music can’t be your life, Braden.” I said it softly, hoping to lessen the blow, but I saw his body flinch as if I’d just shoved him toward a cliff. I grabbed a blank piece of paper and held it out to him. “You can say that music is your life, that you want to do nothing but make music for an eternity. But a human needs more than just something they’re passionate about. Wanna know why?”
He sighed and took the empty sheet of paper from my outstretched hand. “Fine, I’ll bite. Why?”
“Because you lose who you are when you lose the only thing that gives you purpose. If I took music away from you right now, what exactly would you have, Braden?”
He paled significantly, his bravado almost gone as he shook his head. “I’m not going to let that happen.”
I reached out to comfort him. I touched his shoulder, realized how massive it felt beneath my hand, how warm, how right, and shuddered. “I’m not going to let that happen either. That’s why I’m here. To help you find your focus, your identity, your purpose so that music isn’t just your passion, but also trickles into every area of your life. You aren’t just Braden Connor—rock god. You’re so much more. And until you see that, see your worth, make a plan…” I grabbed a bottle of the green glitter. “Create a vision where you’re not standing still, panicked, in a vicious cycle of fear—”
“I’m not afraid,” he snapped.
I tilted my head. “I’m not the one who said it, Braden.”
He tensed beneath my hand. And then he reached out and grabbed another glitter container from the table, gave me an annoyed look, and grumbled, “I wanna use the blue.” He eyed me up and down. “You know, to match my balls.”
I squeezed his shoulder and laughed. “That’s the spirit—ish.” I didn’t ask him why he had blue balls. I didn’t even want to go there, even though my curiosity made me want to comment. I put the professional boundary back in place and waited for him to get started.
He exhaled, and then his grin slowly lit up the room. “If I’m playing with glitter, we’re going to need alcohol. Take a picture of this and post it to social media, and I’ll drive your rental into the ocean. Got it?”
“Got it.” I laughed. I didn’t have a rental. He was my ride. He was my everything for the coming days, he just didn’t know it yet. “Let’s get started on that vision board!”
I almost cheered when he pulled out a chair and started organizing all the different pictures and arts and crafts around him, and then his eyes fell to the polaroid camera.
Braden’s head lifted. “You up for an adventure, Coach?”
Chapter Six
Piper
I was used to clients just doing what they were told, then finding a breakthrough and moving on. But with Braden, it was like he wanted me to be a part of it, in a big way. So when he said he had an idea, I thought, oh cool, he’s gonna take some pictures of his guitar or something.
I didn’t expect that I’d be gallivanting all over his beachfront property while he took pictures of things he wanted to put on his board.
“It’s serene.” Braden snapped a picture of the ocean. “No matter what happens in my life, I want the ocean to be something I come back to, something that represents my music and the way I want to inspire the world around me.”
I gulped. “That’s beautiful.”
“You’re beautiful.” He winked.
I just rolled my eyes. “Flirting with your coach gets you an F.”
He cackled out a dark laugh. “Are you saying you want to F me?”
“Ah, middle-school humor, how refreshing,” I countered, even though my entire body broke out in chills with the way he was looking at me.
Bad, it was so bad. And totally against the rules of client and coach. But damn, he was impossible not to like. Not helpful at the moment when I was starving for more and more of his smiles.
“Admit it, you just won’t laugh because you don’t want to encourage my very obvious advances.”
I frowned. “Obvious advances, huh? You’re a flirt. Trust me, I work with guys like you all the time.” Lies. I’d never worked with anyone who had Braden’s magnetism. It was intimidating and impossible to ignore.
He snapped a
nother picture, this time of my face. “So you work with musically gifted savants who have red hair, mad kissing skills, and big hands? Crazy, and here I thought I was the only one.” He winked.
I opened my mouth to say something when he suddenly held out his hands. “Right there, don’t move.” He lifted the camera and took another shot. His blue eyes were intense, locked onto me so vividly that I forgot to breathe, forgot what I was even there for. Because all I kept thinking about was him. I was here for him, in so many ways.
I’d never been the type of person to make it personal—my job. But with him, it felt that way, and I couldn’t figure out why.
On the outside, I was a professional doing her job.
On the inside, I was counting his smiles.
And wondering what I had to sacrifice to get more.
I was greedy for them.
A few days in and the way he looked at me gave me hope that not all guys were narcissistic jerks.
“One more.” He smirked. “Jump in the air. I want to take a picture of pure joy.”
I burst out laughing. “What makes you think jumping would make me joyful?”
“Oh, you know, just thinking that a life coach very much likes to live for the tiny moments because it reminds her that she’s alive.”
I gaped. “That was deep.”
“Musician.” He pointed at himself. “Now jump.”
It felt like a double entendre. The air felt pregnant with tension and unspoken meaning. I didn’t want to dissect what was happening, so I just listened rather than gave orders.
“Like this?” I jumped into the air, throwing sand while he snapped the picture.
He bent over laughing, and then his eyes got wide.
“What?”
“STOP!” He held out his hands. “Just…don’t move!”
I heard “don’t move,” but the ocean was so loud that I didn’t stop moving until I took another step, directly onto something slimy.
“Ew, gross—oh, shit!” I yelped and then went crashing down next to a jellyfish that, even though it looked dead, could still sting the crap out of my foot.
“Piper!” Braden was at my side in an instant. “Thank God it only got the side.”
Provoke: A Seaside Pictures Novella Page 4