by Ava Lore
Kent didn't need the crowd like Carter did. Kent was the one who labored, whose strength came from the inside, and I realized, standing there as the crowd roared so loudly I thought I'd go deaf, that I was the one who helped Kent. I propped him up, and he wanted to do the same for me. He wasn't going to let me fall, not out of pity or charity, not because he felt sorry for me, but because he needed me. He would do it for me because he saw in me something I didn't even see myself: someone who was strong, who could be his partner. There was so much ahead of us, so much still to come, but for now, it was enough to know that we could be two halves of a whole, that we could be the one the other needed. It was enough to know that I could be one person in the world that Kent trusted besides himself.
He wasn't going to let me go.
Warmth spread through me, and as the crowd died down as Carter raised his hands, I finally felt at ease. A calm, sweet feeling. I hadn't felt that way in years. I listened, curious, but no longer nervous.
"It has come to my attention," Carter said when the crowd had quieted, "that some of you think my heart is broken." He grinned. "That would make for some good songs, wouldn't it?"
The crowd cheered, and Carter waved them down. "I'm sorry to say, my heart has not been cruelly shattered, so you guys won't get any sad ballads out of me for a while yet. But while I have your attention, I wanted to set the record straight. The woman that everyone thought was my girlfriend is just a friend.”
A small chorus of boos.
“Hey, shut up!” Carter said. “I'm being real here. Let me explain. Rebecca Alton is very dear to me, but we never dated. You all know I've had problems with substance abuse for a while.” He laughed a little bit. “It was pretty obvious. Well, Rebecca showed up in my life, and she helped me turn that around.”
He blinked and ducked his head. The crowd was still, and many cell phones began to light up as people started lifting them up to film.
Carter took a deep breath and continued. “Without Rebecca, I don't know what would happen to me. She's like the big sister I never had. I love her, very much, but it was never romantic. You guys also know how much I love a joke, so you're not going to be surprised when I tell you that it was all my idea to make out for the paparazzi. I thought it would be funny to string them along, and it was for a while... until I realized Rebecca would be perfect for someone I knew. You all know who that is."
The crowd muttered. I felt them breathing, out there in the dark, their faces aglow with the light from the stage. Receiving the words of their gods, or something.
"Rebecca has not, and has never, cheated on me,” Carter continued. “It was me who set her up with Kent, and I'm thrilled to say that I was right and they are perfect for each other, and I couldn't be happier for them. So tonight, we'd like to debut a song that no one's ever heard before. A special song. This is a song that Kent wrote, and I think you all know who it's for."
Then he backed away from the microphone and, to my unending shock, Kent stepped up to it, and the crowd cheered.
He cleared his throat. "I'm not, uh... I'm not used to singing, so forgive me if I fuck it up," he said, and the darkness filled with laughter. "This is a song for a special person to me and the rest of the band. It's called “A Long Hello.” You can record it if you want. Enjoy."
And back stage I stood, rooted to the spot, paralyzed.
No one had ever written a song for me before. Not even Jason when we were first dating.
Swallowing hard, I reached down and pinched myself, willing my brain to snap into the present, to appreciate all of this as it was happening. It was so unreal to me, a precious moment whipping past like the line of a flyaway kite that I had to catch.
The sweet, low sounds of Kent's bass started. Then Sonya joined in with the piano, and finally Carter, and I realized I'd heard this song before. It was the song that Kent was playing in his room the night we first fucked. I'd listened to him writing it.
My eyelids fluttered and I suddenly felt dizzy, swaying on my feet. I couldn't get enough air.
Then Kent started to sing, his rich, velvet voice untrained, unpolished, and so, so beautiful to me. I listed to it booming out into the night, and closed my eyes against the sting of tears.
"This is for the one who falls,
this is for the one who tries,
this is for the one who lives and dies,
this is for the one who never let me down,
this is for the one who loves,
this is for the one who makes me sing,
the one who didn't leave,
the one who still believes,
this is for you
for you
for you.
And I will follow you no matter where you go,
And there will be no tears inside your heart,
I will dry them, we will dry them for you,
we will be by your side,
and hold you in our arms
hold you,
hold you up..."
My heart broke and died in my chest, then was reborn, over and over again as he sang. The crowd was almost silent, and out in the dark I saw a hundred thousand cellphones lifted, their screens flashing in the dark, recording this moment. Tonight it would beam out across the world, and everyone would know this new song by The Lonely Kings.
Everyone would know it was for me.
The lights blurred. The music lifted, soaring into the dark. I couldn't even catch the rest of the lyrics over the thunder of blood in my ears, but I heard the melody and the harmony and the cadence of Kent's powerful, velvet voice.
I reveled in it. I lived it. And when it was over, I died in it.
I didn't want it to end. I wanted it to keep going. A perfect moment for me to revisit for the rest of my life.
Out in the darkened club the crowd was going nuts, and it was then that Kent glanced off to the wings of the stage, held out his hand, and gestured for me to come to him.
In a daze, I drifted out, my hands reaching for his.
Our fingers touched. Then he pulled me to him and kissed me, and the crowd went wild.
Chapter Sixteen
Even when we finally got back to the hotel, none of it seemed real. My whole life had passed before my eyes multiple times that evening, and I was not quite in the proper state of mind to process any of it. All I knew was that I'd punched my abusive ex-boyfriend, that Carter had given an explanation that was semi-plausible, and that Kent had declared his intentions towards me in front of a thousand screaming fans. “It makes a good fairy tale,” Kent explained it as we drove back. I had to admit it was sort of true... even though the real story was an even better fairy tale. I knew the news was already making its way around the world.
A fairy tale. A really really weird fairy tale, but a fairy tale all the same.
“That shit was ba-nay-nay,” Carter was saying as we piled out of the van. “One of the pit crew told me the cops were called because Jason couldn't stop beating on his bassist, and his nose got broken. That is so fucking crazy.”
“I knew he was a piece of shit,” Sonya said. “That's the sort of guy who blames everyone else for his failures.” She hopped into the parking lot and stretched. She'd changed back into her regular clothes, but her face was still caked with make up. “Shit,” she said. “I seriously need a shower.” She turned and looked at Kent as he circled the van and came to stand beside me. “So are we done here? I want to go home.”
He put his arm around me and I felt him nod. “We are,” he said. “We'll be going home tomorrow.”
“Awesome,” she said. “Let's go get drunk.”
“Yes!” Manny agreed.
“Eh...” Carter said, and Sonya punched him in the arm.
“You can have a Shirley Temple if you don't want to drink, but come with us. Don't be boring.”
“I'm not boring!”
“You bore me.”
“Everything bores you. You're bored because you're boring.”
Sonya punched him a
gain. “Stop being a jerk and drink with us.”
For a brief moment Carter looked over his shoulder at Kent and me, as though asking for our permission. I half expected Kent to forbid him from the post-show celebration, but all he did was take my hand and say, “Don't overdo it.”
The three of them started out across the parking lot, arguing about what sort of shots they were going to do and who was going to drink who under the table.
Then Kent and I were alone together in the parking lot.
He reached for me, then hesitated. “How's your hand feeling?” he asked.
“Smarts,” I said. “But it's not broken.”
“That's good,” he said. “I'm glad you punched him and not me. I wouldn't have been able to play if I'd punched him.”
I laughed at that. “God forbid the show be canceled.”
“Well it was a rather large part of my scheme.”
I sobered a bit. “Do you think people are going to buy that story that Carter told? I mean... really?”
Kent shrugged. “Honestly?” he said. “Who gives a shit?”
And I had to admit that I didn't. I had my family. I had the band. And I had Kent.
I had people who cared about me, and that was plenty.
Reaching out, I took his hand, and he gingerly closed his fingers around mine, clearly afraid he was going to injure my hand further.
Together we walked through the hotel lobby, rode the elevator, and went to his room in a comfortable silence, but the moment the door closed behind us, I felt tension run through Kent's body.
“Is something wrong?” I asked.
Kent let go of my hand and turned looking down at me. His face was troubled, and I had a weird feeling in my stomach.
He took a deep breath. “Rebecca...” He looked pained, then forced the words out. “Rebecca, I just wanted to say I'm sorry.”
Sorry? I thought. Sorry for what? It didn't make any sense to me that he would be sorry. I opened my mouth to say so, but he held up a hand.
“I've been an asshole since the moment we met, and I'm sorry,” he said. “I treated you like a groupie on the plane, and then I kept coming on to you after I hired you. Then I distanced myself, like an ass, and then when I realized I trusted you and relied on you I took advantage of you again. And it wasn't until you said you were going to leave for the good of the band that I realized that all this time I had been obsessing over you, watching you, dreaming about you... I'd been taking you for granted. Just like Jason did.”
I stared at him, disbelieving. I wondered if I was dreaming. I wanted to ask him if he was serious, but he kept going. His eyes had dropped from mine and he stared at my hands, holding onto the strap of my messenger bag.
“And you know...I said that your shitty ex-boyfriend could have gone to the moon if he'd known what he had in you, and I meant it. You are the sort of woman any man would be glad to have. I know you don't think of yourself that way, but I see a hard worker and a loyal friend, and you take shit you don't need to and that pisses me the fuck off. Especially when it's me shoveling that shit at you. So I'm sorry. I'm a piece of shit. I treated you terribly. I'm an asshole. I don't really know how to stop being an asshole, but if you're willing to give me a second chance, I swear I'll learn.”
A second chance? You had me at the sexual harassment. The words were rising in my mouth before I had a chance to push them back down. “I like you as an asshole,” I said.
Kent raised his eyebrows, at last able to meet my gaze again. “Oh?” he said.
“Yeah,” I told him. “You're a total asshole. I love it. Now go on. Tell me how great I am some more.”
His chuckle rumbled in his chest. “Well, fine. You saved my baby brother, and you've made my band more cohesive and my life more peaceful. I didn't even know that was possible. I expected to die at thirty-five of a heart attack. But you make me think there might be something more to life than all this stupid shit I'm obsessed with—charts and money and tour dates and all that bullshit. So there it is. I don't deserve you, but I still want you. I'm sorry.”
“I'm not,” I said. “Now would you shut up and kiss me already?”
Kent didn't need another invitation. The words had barely left my mouth and he was on me, all hands and lips and lean, hard body.
His mouth found mine in an instant, his hot, rough fingers on my face. The air seemed to leave the room as he pressed me back and back again, until my spine hit the door, and my hands were restless and hungry as I reached up and ran them over his chest, up his throat, into his glorious hair. Our teeth clicked with the force of our joining, and our tongues warred and tangled between us.
My eyes slid closed as Kent abandoned my mouth and instead pressed a hot line of devouring kisses down my jaw to my throat. I hooked one leg over his hip and urged him closer, wanting only to abandon myself to this feeling. We were fragile, I knew that, just starting out, and I wanted to remember every moment of our first time when we were finally free to be with each other.
When Kent slipped my shirt over my head, I tried to savor it, every sensual caress of fabric over my skin, every insistent nudge of his hips against mine. When he worked my bra off over my shoulders, peeling the lace away to reveal my breasts beneath, I tried to memorize it, the soft ghosting of his breath over my skin, the fine tickling of his long hair, hiding his face and brushing against my collarbone as he opened his mouth wide and tried to devour every inch of me. First he released the clasp of my bra, letting the garment fall to the floor, then let his hands skate down my body until he found my hips. His fingers dug into me, squeezed my ass with possessive force, and when I moaned I didn't even care that the whole hotel could probably hear me.
“Rebecca,” he murmured into my skin, and my hands tangled in his hair, holding him close to my heart as first one pert nipple and then the other found their way into his mouth. His teeth nipped at my flesh, a sharp, delicious pain against the backdrop of roaring desire, and I sobbed his name as his tongue began a dance over my nipple that made the hot space between my thighs light up like a firework.
I gasped, my knees giving way, but Kent held me up, his arms almost inhumanly strong as he worked his way down my body. When his tongue abandoned my nipple I almost cried, but when he began to trace a long, hot path down the center of my stomach I couldn't help but curl my fingers in his hair, knowing what would come next.
Kent took his sweet damn time getting to it, though. First his hands on my hips pushed me gently into the closet door as though anchoring me in place. Then he trailed his fingers over the waistband of my jeans, dipping beneath the denim, sampling the skin there as though I were a rare delicacy. Then he unbuttoned my jeans and peeled the fabric back, exposing my lower belly to his seeking mouth.
All the blood in my body rushed to the spot between my legs where I needed him most. My hips rocked into his lips and I felt him smile against my belly.
“Patience, Rebecca,” he said. “All good things to those who wait.”
“He who hesitates is lost,” I managed to gasp out, and his laugh rumbled against my skin, the sound racing through me, burying itself deep in my core.
“Touche.”
Goddamn right, I thought, but then he hooked his fingers into the waistband of my jeans and began to pull them down, slowly, sensuously, and I forgot about whatever passed for witty repartee in the heat of the moment.
I squirmed as he worked my jeans down past my hips, over my thighs, sliding them over my knees to pool around the high cuffs of my boots. I lost him then, his beautiful hair slipping through my fingers like water, so I tried to brace myself against the door, my palms flattening against the cool wood. His hot, rough hands skated over my skin, sending sparks racing through me, up the insides of my legs to my clit. One hand unzipped my boots and slipped them off as he planted heated kisses up the smooth curve of my thigh, his hot breath pooling in the valley between my legs. I stepped out of my jeans, trembling, and then I stood before him in only my panties, my breathing sh
allow, my heart hammering out a driving beat.
Kent leaned in and nudged me, first with his nose, then with his lips, suckling me through the thin, soaked cotton, scraping his teeth over the tender flesh beneath. My hands found his hair again, twisting and turning in the silky locks, our breathing labored and mingling together in the quiet of the room, and when he finally slipped the crotch of my panties aside with his skilful tongue, I wanted to weep with relief. I gazed down at him through a haze of desire as he rubbed his stubbled cheek over the tender flesh of my thigh.
“I love the way you taste, Rebecca,” he said, his voice rubbing over my exposed flesh. “I dream about it every night.” Then he lifted his eyes and met mine with a gaze so arresting I thought my heart would stop. A wicked smile sliced over his lips. “And now I'll get to taste it every morning.”
I gasped, and then his mouth was on me, suckling, tasting, flicking and dancing over the superheated flesh, slipping and sliding against my slick folds and the hard little nub of my clit. He seemed unable to get his fill of me, drunk with my taste, with my smell, and I was the same, addicted and strung out on his mouth and hands, on his body, on everything about him. On his restraint, on his abandon, on his strength and his sense of duty, on his anguished heart that he hid so well. My hips bucked against his mouth as he explored me, unleashing the full depth of his hunger into the hot space between my thighs. My core contracted as he laved me with lazy attention and I had to struggle to stay standing as slowly, sweetly, a delicious tightening began low in my belly.
“Kent,” I breathed. “Kent, please...”
He sucked my clit into his mouth and began to nibble on it with gentle teeth, and the tightening sped up. Then his tongue flickered out, scraping over my aching flesh, quick and sharp, and then I was coming against his lips, my body reaching for his tongue, needing to embrace him inside me, and as I came I cried out, my legs giving way.
I fell gracelessly as waves of pleasure crashed into me, bowling me over, turning me upside down and inside out, but Kent caught me and lowered me into his lap, cradling me in one arm as his other hand found my wet core and kept stroking me, pushing me up higher and higher. I thrashed against him as his mouth found mine, the taste of my own arousal slathered over his tongue. I wrapped my arms around his neck, holding him fast as my body dissolved and reformed, over and over.