Cover Me: A Rock Star Romance

by Carrie Elliott

  Adrian held out a hand to Karen. “Looks like you’ll be taking that ride after all.”

  She smacked his hand and stood. “I have my own car, but I have calls to make anyway. I’m going to step out back.”

  Undaunted, he followed her through to the kitchen. “Make them quick. I want you on my payroll and we need to talk.”

  “You can talk all you want,” she said, sliding the glass door to the patio open. “Doesn’t mean I’ll listen.”

  Derek turned his eyes on me when Adrian followed her out and shut the door. “She wants him,” he said.

  “Bad. Think he knows?”

  “Hard to tell. I can’t figure him out.”

  “I don’t think he’s a robot anymore.” I leaned back trying to see through the kitchen out the glass door.

  “No. He’s a master of hiding his feelings.”

  I looked back at Derek. “Maybe you should try to be a bit more like him in that respect.”

  His face flushed except for a ring around his mouth from the tightness of pressing his lips together. His eyes narrowed to a piercing stare. “You want me to hide my feelings, huh? For you? For my music? What part of my life should I give a shit about, Bess? Any of it?”

  He whacked the cushion from the back of the couch, knocking it to the floor as he stood and stormed out the front door.

  Damn it. That wasn’t what I meant. Talk about overreaction.

  I followed him out to the front porch. “All I meant was that sometimes having a poker face in business isn’t a terrible thing.” He leaned against the wrought iron railing on one side of the porch and I leaned against the other side. It reminded me of leaning in the door jamb of the master suite in his L.A. mansion. It seemed like a lifetime ago.

  “I don’t lie and I don’t hide. How long have you known me? Have I ever been able to disguise how I feel?” He gripped the railing and looked out at the street.

  I let him cool down for a couple minutes before saying what I knew to be true. “This is about Jack Stewart. What happened with him?”

  His head snapped forward and he pinned me with a hard stare. “Why don’t you tell me?” He took a step and crossed the small porch to stand in front of me. “Was he inside you? Is this something else I get to compete with him for?”

  My hand itched to slap his face again. “Do not speak to me that way. I don’t care how upset you are, I’ve done nothing wrong.”

  He gripped my upper arms and pulled me against him. “Was. He. Inside. You?” His lips brushed my ear as he spoke the words in a deep, gruff voice.

  “What if he was? You won’t even tell me how many women you’ve been with! I’m not sure you even know!” I pushed him away, but he wouldn’t let go of my arms. “So what if he was one of the big, whopping four men I’ve been with. It wasn’t like it lasted or meant anything life-altering.”

  “I knew it,” he said, putting his hands to his head as he spun away from me. “I knew you fucked him.”

  My temper got the best of me and I kicked him. Square in the ass. “What the fuck?” he said, grabbing his butt and turning back to me.

  My clenched fists at my sides shook with rage. “Yes,” I screamed. “I fucked Jack Stewart! What do you want me to say? I can’t take it back and trust me—I would. You can’t take back the hundreds of women you’ve been with. I think you can give me one even if he is your least favorite person on the planet!”

  He groaned and sat on the top step. “Jesus. Anyone but him.” He rubbed his palms over his thighs. “How am I supposed to look at him knowing he’s been inside you? How am I going to not want to kill him.” He looked up at me.

  “Easy.” I sat beside him. “It was over a year ago and he made me regret every second I was with him.”

  He turned to me, his forehead creased and brows tilted. “He hurt you? What happened?”

  I sighed and leaned back on my hands, looking up into the branches of the maple tree in the front yard. “We were in Europe. It was exciting to be on tour with the band and covering my first long-term series for The Scene. It was a whirlwind. Then one day we went site seeing, just the two of us, and that night it happened.”

  The sun shot through the maple leaves in hazy beams that caught bugs flying through, lighting up their wings. “Was I thinking it was something more? I guess I probably was, but I didn’t even know him. I never did know him. What I wanted was someone to be close with, intimate with. Not physically. Any man will do if it’s only sex. I wanted more. That wasn’t what went down with Jack. We went out a few times, had sex a handful of times and then I saw him with his mouth and hands all over some groupie skank.” I shrugged. “That’s all I was to him—another woman to stick his dick in.”

  Derek blew out a deep breath. “I’m sorry. I mean, I’m not sorry that it didn’t work out or I wouldn’t be here with you, but I’m sorry it took me so long to find you again and you got hurt.” He put an arm around my shoulders and pulled me to him, tucking my head down to kiss the top. “If I would’ve been there for you, you wouldn’t have had to be with him at all. And I’m sorry I spoke to you the way I did. I deserved that kick in the ass.”

  “Yeah, you did.” I closed my eyes and breathed him in. Sometimes I wondered if he really did keep any of himself back, or if everyone got the entire package. I secretly hoped there was a piece of him reserved for my eyes only.

  “You fucked Jack Stewart!” Karen said, strolling around the side of the house with Adrian.

  “We heard. So did the entire neighborhood.” Adrian smirked. “Now I know why Bast is dead set against doing shows with him.”

  “I’ll think about it,” Derek said, standing up and tucking his hands in his pockets. “That’s all I can promise for now.”

  “Right.” Adrian glanced at Karen then back to Derek. “I’ll get to work tomorrow and with your blessing on using your Cover Me sample, we’ll reinvent Unholy Union the way it should be.”

  “Sounds good.” He clasped hands with Adrian and they did the guy back pat thing.

  “I’m heading out,” Karen said, her eyes flitting to the ground, her car and Adrian.

  “She’s coming for that ride with me back to L.A.” he gestured to his Porsche. I knew the lure of him and that car would be too much for her to resist. “I’ll have someone pick up her car tonight.”

  “I’ll start looking for a new assistant,” I said, rolling my eyes.

  “Hey, he’s willing to put up the dough to have me,” she said, trying to maintain an aloof attitude. She would’ve gone to work for Adrian for free and she and I both knew it.

  “It was nice meeting you,” I said, and shook Adrian’s hand.

  “I’m sure we’ll see each other around more now.” He gave Derek one last lift of his chin before escorting Karen to his car.

  Derek and I watched as he fired up the engine and gunned it out of the driveway. Karen’s face glowed with laughter.

  “That guy always gets what he wants,” Derek said, grinning and shaking his head.

  “I wonder if he knows what he’s in for.” I couldn’t help but smile thinking of how hard Adrian would have to work to get anywhere with Bess. “She’s a master at Hard-To-Get.”

  “I’m sure he’s a master at hurtling over anything a woman puts in his way.” He winked at me. “I prefer to run straight for it and try to crush it to the ground.”

  “I know, my dear. Subtlety isn’t your strong suit.”

  I looped my arm in his and headed back up the steps to the front door. We were almost inside when a white van pulled over on the street in front of the house and a couple paparazzi jumped out and started snapping pictures. “Hey, Bast! What’s with shacking up with the owner of The Scene?” one of them called out. “Trading some action for a retraction?” The group jeered and cackled.

  I tensed as Derek shoved me inside and slammed the door. “Fuck,” he muttered. “They must’ve got a lead on Adrian.” We stared at each other as the taunts shouted from the front yard grew louder and an S.U.V.
pulled up. “And so it begins,” he said, hugging me to his chest.

  It was like turning the corner and running smack into your worst fear. I didn’t have to worry about going back to L.A. to face reality. Reality found us.

  Fifteen

  Derek

  “Mom, don’t come over here. Stay inside.”

  The last thing I needed was my mother in full-on panic mode next door.

  “I’m calling the police,” she said. “They can’t just sit out there all night.”

  “The police won’t do anything.”

  “I’m going out there,” my father said in the background.

  “Your father’s going out there.”

  “I heard.” I laid my head on the kitchen table and gave up the fight. “I’ll call you back.”

  I hung up and put the phone on the table beside my face. Having cameras on every sidewalk in L.A. is normal. Having them swarming my parents’ house and Bess’s was a mess. The people in this neighborhood wouldn’t appreciate it. They were kind enough to give me my privacy when I came home, which was a rare event up until now, and wouldn’t welcome this intrusion.

  Bess’s cell rang. “It’s my mom,” she said. “I’ve been wondering when she’d call.”

  “Isn’t it like one in the morning there?” I said as she answered.

  “Yes, I know there are vans full of people with cameras outside and hello to you, too. I’m guessing Emmy told you I was here?” She strode down the hall into her bedroom and closed the door.

  I got up and headed to the front window. A peek outside showed the street full of people. A few I recognized—the younger couple with their dog who live on the other side of my parents. They moved in after I was gone. Mrs. Gomez from down the street who was looking extremely unpleasant. My dad, hands waving around in a fury as he yelled and the paps took pictures of him. He’d end up in the tabloids tomorrow. If I didn’t know that Mom would get a kick out of seeing him on the front of some rag mag at the grocery store, I’d try to stop him.

  The more he yelled, the more one of the paps yelled back. Dad got closer to the guy, his face red and pinched in rage. I’d seen that look several times before when he got pissed at me. The pap handed his camera to a guy behind him and stepped up to my dad. These guys weren’t known for backing down. Both of them were screaming and then Dad shoved him.

  It was like a street fight scene from a low budget movie. My brain couldn’t process that it was happening fast enough. Then it did. “Fuck!”

  The doorknob slipped in my grip and I fumbled getting the door open, but it only took me a couple seconds to dart out onto the porch and down the front steps. I was halfway across the yard with cameras flashing everywhere when I heard the warning bleeps from a police cruiser coming down the street.

  The crowd dispersed. Most of the paps retreated into their vans. I grabbed my dad who was locked in a head-to-head battle with the pap he shoved. Another guy was pulling the pap away. “Dad, the cops are here.” He let go and stumbled back into me.

  Bess came rushing up to us. The police cruiser came to a stop and two officers got out. “What’s the problem here?” the taller one asked.

  “No problem, officer,” Dad said, eyeing the pap.

  “This man assaulted me,” the pap said, not willing to let it go. “I have a right to be here on this street. He came out of his house and threatened me and when I refused to leave, he shoved me.”

  “Is that true?” the officer asked.

  “Wait,” I said, holding a hand out. “This is my fault. I’m the reason they’re here. This is my dad. He was only trying to defend my privacy.”

  “Your dad’s a hot head,” the pap said. “I see where you get it.”

  Bess put a hand on my back, like she thought I was going to haul off and pound on him. I wanted to, but wasn’t stupid enough to do it in front of cops and cameras.

  The second officer was radioing for backup. I knew what that meant before the tall one said it.

  “I’ll need the two of you to come with me. You’re under arrest for disturbing the peace.”

  “Oh no,” Bess whispered behind me.

  They cuffed my dad and the pap and when a second cruiser arrived, escorted them into the back of the cars. “I’ll get Mom and come to the station,” I told Dad.

  “Don’t worry about it,” he said. “I’ll call.”

  The officer shut the car door and walked around the front of his car. “Hope I don’t have to come back out here,” he said, looking from the paparazzi vans to me like this was my fault for simply existing.

  I nodded, not sure how to respond. I’d gotten into my share of fights with the paps and knew it was pointless. I wasn’t about to start another one minutes after my dad was arrested.

  They drove off and I turned toward my parents’ house to see my mom standing on the porch watching the cop car disappear down the street. Bess hooked her arm through mine and tugged me forward, toward my house. “Don’t worry,” she called to my mom. “He’ll be fined and let go.”

  “I’ll pay the fine,” I said, “and pick him up.”

  Bess and I climbed my front porch steps. Mom stood statue still, her fingers pressed to her lips. Her eyes shifted to the vans on the street. “After all that and they’re still here. Why the hell are they still here?” Her arm bolted into the air and she gave them the finger. “Go away you pariahs! Go away!”

  I grabbed her arm and pulled it down. “It’s not worth it.”

  Bess opened the door and put her arm around Mom’s shoulders. “Come inside. It’s over now.”

  My heart was beating out of my chest. My dad was on his way to jail and my mom was giving the finger to paparazzi. I could only imagine what the fallout was going to be like.

  Inside, the phone was ringing off the hook. Bess answered it while I made sure Mom was steady enough on her feet to get to the couch. She wandered into the family room shaking her head, but not uttering a word. It was like she was in shock. “Mom? You okay?”

  She sat and looked up at me. “We just don’t know how to handle it. I know you deal with this every day of your life, but for us…” she lifted her hands and shrugged.

  I lowered onto the cushion beside her, feeling sick to my stomach for putting them in this position. “I’m sorry. I shouldn’t have come home.”

  “That’s the thing,” Mom said, putting a hand on my cheek. “We want you here whenever you can get a break to visit us, but your life is foreign to us. We see you on T.V. and you’re mobbed by photographers and fans. I can’t imagine how you live that way.” A tear broke free from her eye and dripped on the couch between us.

  For all my fame and fortune, for making my dream come true, my mom felt sorry for me. And she was right. “I don’t live for me,” I said. “I live for them. For my fans.”

  Bess came in and stood behind the couch. Mom reached back and took her hand, looking between the two of us. “Well, maybe it’s time that you didn’t.”

  My eyes found Bess’s and I knew Mom was right.

  It was time I started living for myself.

  Bess

  Derek was strangely calm about the paparazzi and his dad being arrested. It was almost like he’d given in, admitted defeat. After years and years of being hounded, it happened. Celebrities gave up trying to fight it and lived with the cameras and the crowds wherever they went. I saw it happen in L.A. all the time and heard it confirmed in interviews I conducted for The Scene.

  Fighting for privacy was a losing battle.

  Mr. Bast called to report he was spending the night in jail and would need to appear in court and would most likely be fined. The paparazzi decided not to press assault charges.

  “We’ll stay here tonight.” I wrapped my arms around Derek and he leaned against the kitchen counter. His mom was relaxing in front of the T.V. with a stiff drink. “The paps will be gone by morning, I bet.”

  “I don’t know about that.” His big, warm hand ran up and down my back. “They’ll want a shot
of my dad coming home from jail.”

  I looked up at him and rested my chin on his chest. “I’m sorry this happened. You seem pretty calm about the whole thing, though.”

  “I’m numb to it. I let it get to me for so long and then this morning when I saw my dad yelling out there—something just turned off inside me. I don’t have an ounce of give-a-shit left.” He gazed down at me. “Guess I don’t need a poker face.”

  I ran my hands up his chest and around his neck, scratched the back of his head with my nails through his thick hair. “You couldn’t stop giving a shit even if you wanted to. Maybe this time seeing your dad in that situation zapped you, but this is your life and unless you’re telling me you’re ready to let it go, there’s no way you’re done giving a shit.”

  He lowered his head closer to mine. “Maybe I’m ready to let it go.”

  I rose onto my toes, nudging his nose with mine. “You’re nowhere near ready to let it go. You’re obsessed with even the thought of your career ending.”

  “I’m not.”

  “Plagued with fear,” I said, nuzzling his nose with mine.

  “My only fear is losing you. That’s officially the only thing I give a shit about.” He turned us around and lifted me up so I was sitting on the counter. “I’ve been a bad friend to you, Bess. The summer we wrote Cover Me was one of the best times of my life.”

  I didn’t want him to talk about that summer. It was the beginning of the end.

  “That song was us on paper. Two people who always had each other’s backs. Two people who knew each other better than anyone else.” He settled between my legs with his hands resting on my hips and his forehead pressed against mine. “Two people who would always be there for each other.” He took my chin and rubbed his thumb across my bottom lip. “Bess, I wasn’t there for you. I let you down.”