by Holly Hart
This was supposed to be it, my big chance.
The bar was half empty now, and the only people remaining were the staff and those—mostly packed by the bar—who were too drunk to really understand what was going on.
"Fuck!" I whispered vehemently, responding to the anger coursing through my body. I didn't even look outside, had no interest in seeing the celebrity who'd probably just ruined any chance I’d had a career in music, even if just a few hours before I been hankering over a picture of his gigantic cock in the hair salon. Right now, no one in the world was less attractive to me.
Thwack!
I heard one last punch landing, and in my heart of hearts I hoped that I was hearing the sound of Clay ‘Hung’ Hunt being knocked out cold. I even imagined it, reveling in the schadenfreude of seeing him laid low.
But I wasn't nearly so lucky. Just a couple of seconds passed before he walked into the bar, shirtless and blood dripping from his lip, a few droplets trailing their way down his powerful, rugged frame.
I’d said that there was no one in the world less attractive to me – but if I were being honest, I'd have to say I was lying. I hated the man right now, hated his guts, and wanted to punch his lights out for ruining my night.
But if he asked, I'd share his bed in a heartbeat.
I snuck a peek out of the window and saw a beast of a man, easily fifty pounds heavier and three inches taller than the cocky pop star who'd just strolled almost unharmed into the bar, lying on the pavement – completely unconscious. He looked like a hard bastard, too, the kind of man you wouldn't want to cross in a dark alley, and yet Clay had laid him out like it was nothing.
I couldn't help but be impressed. Not that watching men fight was my kind of thing, but the contrast between Clay’s undeniable good looks – his ice blue eyes and Hollywood jaw – and the beastly, battered thug lying in the gutter was patent for everyone to see.
Clay looked like some kind of hero, and he was getting a hero's welcome. Even the drunks lining the bar parted like the Red Sea, aware they were witnessing something pretty special. I couldn't hear what he ordered, but the girl behind the bar sprang into action so fast that I could tell she was star struck and trying to hide it. A few seconds later, he had an amber whiskey in his hand and he was turning to the stage.
Turning to face me.
"Where's the music?" he called out in a jocular tone, and the crowd – now flooding back into the bar behind their idol – simpered along with him.
Where’s the music? Where's the goddamn music?
Inside, I was fuming. I wanted nothing more than to scream at him for ruining my night, but I knew that wouldn't get me anywhere. I bit my lip hard to avoid saying anything I'd regret in the morning, when the Jack Daniels coursing through my veins wasn't loosening me up and urging me to say something I'd beg to take back.
But I came pretty close.
3
Clay
The moment I saw her, I knew I was going to fuck her.
I just didn't know she was going to change my life.
I flashed her a huge smile, the same smile that had gotten me into dozens of women's pants in a heartbeat, but the reaction I got wasn't exactly what I was expecting.
She stared back at me with a vicious anger in her gaze, her eyebrow half cocked as though in an unconscious challenge. I needed to know who she was, because the stunning cocoa temptress had my cock stiffening like no woman had managed in the last decade.
Suddenly, that little strawberry kiss I took on vacation seemed like a pale imitation of a woman. In my mind, she suddenly tasted like cardboard, not chocolate cake.
And right now, chocolate cake was all I wanted.
The challenge inherent in the girl's stare got me excited, even if I didn't know why she was having such a visceral reaction against me.
It didn't bother me. It had been too long since any woman had put up a barrier between me and her bed. Usually, they threw themselves at me, and for me, most of the attraction was the thrill of the chase.
I needed to show that I was unruffled, even though I was pretty sure the outline of my huge cock was showing through the denim of my jeans, so I took a hefty gulp of my whiskey. Fuck, I liked it when it burned, and the amber liquid burned all the way down to my stomach.
I didn't need the liquid courage; I had enough of that already, but the warmth now spreading through my stomach wasn't unappealing, and I decided to take matters into my own hands.
I turned to face the crowd, all of them holding up smart phones and snapping pictures. I knew that my manager would kill me for this; the last thing he would want in the middle of his negotiation was pictures of me all over Instagram. But with me, what you see is what you get.
"Let's make a deal," I said, my voice full of authority and barely wavering – a miracle, given that I'd sank at least a dozen beers tonight.
The crowd looked at me quizzically, but – typically – not a single one had the balls to open their mouth and ask me what I meant.
"I know I've got no way of checking," I said, "but all I'm looking for is a good night."
Judging by the curious looks on their faces, the line didn't do much to clear up what I meant.
"So how about we put down the phones, huh?" That little comment was greeted with an audible hiss of disappointment.
Fucking hell, what a generation. Can't any of these idiots have a good night without posting pictures and messaging their friends all night?
Don't they realize they have an opportunity to party with me – Clay goddamn Hunt?
Don't they know they'll have the best night of their lives?
I powered on regardless. I’d never made it my business to care much about what the little people thought. "When did anyone ever have a good night behind a glowing screen? Do you guys wanna party?"
That seemed to break through their sad little attachments to their handheld devices, and a half-hearted murmur of approval rippled through the crowd.
"I said," I repeated, "is there anyone here who wants to party with Clay Hunt?"
The mere mention of my name got them going. It was like giving a line of coke to a lab rat; they sent themselves wild. Some wit in the corner started clapping and chanting my name, but I found it kind of lame so I shot him a dirty look – that killed it pretty quick.
"Tell you what," I said, doing my best to maintain eye contact with as many of the people in the room as I could. "Let's make a deal. I want everyone to put their phones away, I don't want to see another one for the rest of the night…"
A groan of disappointment rang around the room. Tragic.
I held up my hand and hushed them. "But here's what I'll do in return…"
I paused for a second to let the anticipation build. No one could ever say that Clay Hunt's wasn’t the consummate showman.
"Drinks are on me, all night," I said, using my singing voice to project myself across the room. Every single one of them was spellbound, hanging on my every word. It was just like a concert – I felt powerful. I knew that every guy in the room wanted to be me, and I knew that every girl wanted to fuck me.
Well, almost every girl, anyway…
"If I see another phone tonight, I'm going to cut you off. Don't be that guy who ruins it for everyone. But right now, I want to see champagne. I want to see bottles of vodka, Patron. I wanna see the goddamn tequila flowing, you hear me?"
The roar that greeted me in reply was almost better than sex. Better than sex with most girls, anyway. But not, I imagined, better than sex with the sultry cocoa temptress still sitting, clutching her guitar, on the stage.
I pulled an expensive leather wallet out of my jeans, flicked my AMEX Black Card out, and tossed it behind the bar. I didn't look to see whether the bartender caught it. I didn't care.
And then the party went off!
Honestly, for me, this wasn't much more than a quiet Friday night – but for some of the frat boys packing this bar to the rafters, this was the kind of night they were going to
tell their kids about. Hell, this was the kind of night they were going to tell their grandkids about!
All around me, there were sorority girls doing shots. One of them was lying on the bar, her tits just held together by a bra that looked two sizes too small, giggling while letting frat boys suck tequila off her flat stomach.
None of that mattered to me. I only had eyes for one girl in the place, no matter that dozens of them were throwing themselves at me.
"Hey, Clay," one of them whinnied into my ear, a New England horserider by the sound of her, "wanna take me home?"
She leaned into my ear, raking her hand down my jeans and grabbing my ass for good measure. "You can do anything to me…"
I brushed her off like I was raking leaves off my lawn. Compared to the black Lamborghini sitting on stage, she was just a rusty old Ford, and I didn't have any time for messing around with a jalopy. Judging by the astonished, pouting look on her face, she'd never had a man refuse her before, but then again – she'd never met Clay Hunt. In this town, she was the pick of the bunch, or at least she thought she was.
But the only woman I wanted to fuck was sitting twenty yards away from me, and if I couldn't have her, then I didn't want any of them.
But obviously, I was going to have her. The thought didn't even cross my mind that she might turn me down, because women just didn't turn Clay Hunt down. I couldn't remember the last time it happened – probably a couple of years before my first album went platinum.
I knocked the whiskey back, more because I wanted to get rid of it than because I needed the Dutch courage, handed it to some chick and walked towards my target. Not that target was the right word for this ebony seductress – no, for this woman, it was far too demeaning.
I almost wanted to say crush, but Clay Hunt didn't crush on women – it happened the other way around.
She was still sitting on stage forlornly when I reached her, and I effortlessly hopped up onto it. I saw a couple of jealous looks from chicks in the crowd as they realized their chances of catching me were diminishing with every step I took, but I paid them no mind.
"Hey, girl."
She turned her head and shot me a cold, chilling stare that almost knocked me back on my haunches.
"Hey," I smiled, holding my hands up above my head disarmingly for good measure, "someone get up on the wrong side of the bed today?"
It didn't seem to go down nearly as charmingly as I had intended.
"Oh, hell no," she said with what sounded a whole lot like astonishment in her voice. "Listen, boy, if you think you've got a chance of getting into my pants, you better get walking." She paused and stared me up and down. "Fast."
Boy?
"Hey now, that wasn't very nice," I said, doing my best to cover up my surprise at her reaction. "What did I ever do to you?"
"What did you ever do to me?" she parodied. "Are you being serious?"
Okay, this wasn't going anywhere near as well as I'd anticipated when I walked over. I thought she was just going to play hard to get – but now I saw that if I was ever going to get anywhere with her, I was going to have to get to the bottom of why she'd taken such a dislike to me.
"Um, I guess not?"
"Do you even understand why I'm pissed?"
Suddenly I was on the defensive, and I didn't even know why, or what I'd done. "Not really…" I sputtered, not used to someone chatting back to me like she was.
"Well, cowboy," she said contemptuously, "have a think about it. Have a think why a nice girl like me would be sitting up on stage – pissed – while you run the crowd like it's one of your own damn concerts…"
"Oh," I said, suddenly uncomfortably aware of why she was so annoyed, and uncomfortably – and unusually – aware that it was my fault.
"Oh."
"Listen," I offered, "I didn't mean to come in here and step on your toes. I was just in the area—"
She cut me off. "Yeah, you were just in the area. And your petty little fight might just have cost me my chance of making it in the city, you know that? You know how hard a woman like me," her eyes quickly, almost imperceptibly quickly, flicked down to her skin, "has to work to make it in this business?"
I didn't, but I could guess. Suddenly, I felt sick to my stomach. I didn’t know what it was about this woman but she was rocking me to my core, and there was nothing I could do about it. I had no defenses against her – and apparently, she didn't have any against me. Although for her, it was in a very different way.
“Aw shit," I said lamely. "I get it."
She didn't bother replying; she just stood up, making as though to leave, and I felt a sudden, desperate urge to stop her. It was like I was in love with her or something. I'd never felt like this before, and I knew I had to stop her from leaving or I'd regret it for the rest of my life.
"How about we sing together?" I suggested, clutching on to what sounded like a brilliant idea in my head. In hindsight, I could see why she didn't take it quite as well as I had intended.
"Why the hell would I want to do that? Are you just playing games with me?"
"No," I said, genuinely surprised that she had taken what in my head had been an entirely innocuous suggestion so badly, "why do you say that?"
"You really are dense, aren't you?" she said angrily. "Are you seriously asking me why I might have a problem with getting on stage with you when you've ruined my night?"
"Ah, yeah. I get what you mean," I muttered shamefacedly. I just didn't know how I could get this girl to understand that I hadn't meant to hurt her, or get in her way. I wanted to say that it had just been an accident, but had a funny feeling that would go down pretty badly as well…
She began walking off stage, and my hand automatically lunged out to stop her, taking ahold of her arm in desperation.
"What do you think you're doing?" she asked with a curled lip.
"Listen, I can't take what I did back," I said, my mouth stumbling over the words in my urgency, "but I can try and make it better. I know you think I just want to get up on stage and show off, but think about it – I can do that any night."
After the look she gave me, I realized once again that I'd have to choose my words better around this girl, but she was a sharp cookie – or I was just tongue tied around her beauty.
"I didn't mean it like that, believe me. I'm not trying to show off, I'm trying to help you. Think about it, I've set this place off – they aren't going to stop for pretty much anything…"
"I know that," she replied. "That's why I'm packing up to leave."
I dangled the hook. "There's one thing that might calm this place down and get them listening again."
She turned and faced me, unable to hide the signs of interest on her face. I could tell she was desperate, wanted this more than anything. It reminded me of an old me, a self that I thought I'd left behind years ago.
"What is it?"
"Me."
"Hell no."
"Are you willing to give up on your dreams that easily?" I asked, delivering a low blow in a desperate attempt stop her from walking out. I knew in my heart that if she left now, I'd never have another chance with her. I was being entirely selfish, I knew that, but I comforted myself with the thought that if I convinced her, it might help her, too.
She stopped, her face contorting with anger. "You fucked up my dream. This one is on you."
I raised my palms up peacefully. "So let me fix it," I said, letting that one last sentence hang in the air between us.
I could tell that she wanted to do nothing more than leave, but I could equally see the battle that was being played out inside her written in the emotions that were scrunching up her face. She bit down on her gorgeous pink lip, and I felt an unbelievable urge to jump up there and press my lips against her cocoa skin, but restrained myself.
"Fine," she said after a long, long pause. "We'll do it your way, but if you think you're getting anywhere with me, you've got another thing coming. The day you get your hands on me is the day I turn in my grave
, got that, pretty boy?"
"Oh, believe me," I said, biting down on my lip to conceal my joy, "I get it."
"So what do you suggest?"
I looked at her, staring her directly in the eyes, trying to hide the fact that all I wanted to do was get her into bed, see her ebony skin contrasted against my soft, white Egyptian sheets, but I could tell she knew what I wanted to do and I could tell that she was willing to ignore it in the hope of salvaging her dreams of a career in the music business.
"How about a duet?"
4
Clay
The first words I heard the next morning were: "Jesus, Clay – you look like shit."
I groaned, clapping my hands against my head in a desperate, unsuccessful bid to stave off the inevitable hangover. I flung my arm out to my left, eyes still closed, arm searching the bed in the desperate hope that I'd somehow brought back that ebony temptress last night.
The search only served to remind me of what I already knew. The girl, whoever she was, was nowhere to be found.
Fuck!
I couldn't remember the last time my balls felt like this after a big night – certainly not any time in the last five years, at any rate. I’d had a different girl to warm my bed night after night for years, but after last night, I knew there was no way I could go back to being that guy. It was unbelievable, almost unexplainable, but I felt as though tectonic plates had shifted directly underneath me, changing everything.
It wasn’t her looks, though I definitely couldn’t get that glowing chocolate face out of my mind, it was how she’d made me feel. I suddenly saw a path back to joy in my music, and redemption for my career.
All of a sudden, there was only one girl I wanted, and I didn't even know her name.