Slow Burn

by Isabel Morin

  “Now that we’ve both pointed out the obvious,” she continued, a beautiful blast of confidence surging through her, “how about we move on?”

  Matt colored but stood up. “It was a dumb thing to say,” he muttered. “I didn’t think you’d hear it.” He wasn’t quite looking her in the eye, but he seemed to be trying to. “You want a beer?”

  She found herself smiling. “Sure, that’d be great.”

  Matt left and Will smiled at her, shaking his head in admiration. “Damn, that was stone cold, sister. Well played.”

  “It was pretty awesome,” she acknowledged, unable suppress a huge grin.

  Normally she thought of perfect put-downs long after an incident had passed. But she’d killed it this time.

  Will’s smile was open and friendly, with maybe just a hint of something more than friendliness. He was still shaking his head as he wandered off in the same direction as Matt.

  “You didn’t have to do that,” Jesse said. “It’s my band, my responsibility.”

  “I get that, but I can handle myself, and I don’t want to be the reason you guys are snarling at each other. It’ll only prove Stu’s theory that he shouldn’t have hired me. Besides, I need them all to respect me if we’re going to work together.”

  He looked like he was going to argue, then just sighed and sat down on an amp and pulled his guitar onto his lap.

  “I see your point, but that doesn’t mean I’m going to stand around and let some guy give you a hard time. I’m not made that way.”

  She watched as he took off a broken string and began working a new one on. His hands were beautiful, big and strong, with long, mobile fingers.

  “Is this some Texas cowboy thing?”

  He looked at her then, his hands paused over the shiny, curving wood of his instrument. “No, it’s a man thing.”

  Her heart jumped into her throat, her face flushing with sudden awareness. Her whole body lit with it, her nipples hardening under the t-shirt that had his face on it. Jesse’s gaze stayed on hers for a long moment before he looked back down at the string in his hands.

  Grabbing as many boxes of merchandise as she could hold, she hurried away, anxious to put as much distance as possible between them.

  Chapter Three

  The opening band started to load in and Jesse greeted them and made small talk before clearing out of the way. He was getting amped now, the sizzle he felt before every show taking hold. Not quite the adrenaline that kicked in when he walked on stage, but a lower-level hum that made him feel awake and alive.

  Kind of like how he felt a few minutes ago with Beth.

  He’d barely been able look at her as she stood over him blazing with heat, her nipples hard under her top. A top with his own damned face on it. It was all he could do not to stare at her incredible rack, but seeing as how they’d been talking about respect, that would’ve been pretty low. Besides, the look on her face was even sexier.

  Her mouth was insane, full and wide and set in a face that was striking and kind at the same time. Her hazel eyes had a tendency to look either innocent or wary, and her wide mouth turned into a killer smile that softened her strong cheekbones. He couldn’t remember meeting a woman with a cleft in her chin, but Beth had one, softer and more subtle than what a man would have, and for some reason it just about drove him crazy. He pictured himself holding her chin, his thumb nestled right in that little hollow, before he kissed her senseless.

  “Hey, Jesse, get out here,” Stu called from the stage, snapping him out of his reverie.

  Jesse shook his head, smiling ruefully to himself. As tempting as it would be to get his hands on her, he probably ought to stick to the women who threw themselves at him every night. Things were a lot less complicated with women like that.

  Usually soundcheck took no more than half an hour, but the sound guy, an obvious stoner named Kevin, didn’t get what Jesse was after. His levels were all wrong and he didn’t even hear it.

  “Dude, this sounds like shit,” Jesse said into his microphone. “Bring the guitars up and the drums down.”

  Kevin nodded and the band once again kicked into their first song, but now the guy had turned the guitars up so far Jesse couldn’t hear Brian at all. Next tour he was bringing his own guy. Enough of this amateur hour bullshit.

  “I’ll handle this,” Stu said, shooting him a quelling look.

  Jesse waited while Stu went down to the soundboard and the two of them dicked around so long he just about lost it. The only thing that kept him from biting off everyone’s head was the sight of Beth over at the merch table. She held a stack of CDs as she watched them, her mouth a tight, anxious line.

  Stu gave the nod and they played bits and pieces of other songs, finally moving to an acoustic number he was thinking of doing that night. He couldn’t even hear himself, and it didn’t look like anyone else could either, but he was halfway through the song before the sound was adjusted correctly.

  “That’s enough,” he said into the mic. He wanted to make sure Kevin heard him loud and clear. “Stu’s handling my set tonight.”

  That got Kevin’s attention. “Dude, what the fuck?”

  Jesse ignored him. Putting his guitar on its stand he turned around and walked off stage. Luckily the table in the green room had a plate of sandwiches and barbequed ribs. Cracking open a beer, he threw a plate of food together and sat on one of the battered armchairs to go over the night’s set list.

  He scratched things out and re-ordered some songs as the rest of the band filtered back in. Beth came in a few minutes later and grabbed some food and a bottle of water. He watched as she scanned the seating options as if trying to decide whether she should sit near him. Did she think he was going to bite?

  With forced casualness she finally sat down next to him, which was a relief since he didn’t feel like talking to anyone else. She was a breath of fresh air after two months on tour with the same guys night after night.

  He raised an eyebrow in acknowledgement and pretended to work on the set list. Really he was watching her eat out of the corner of his eye.

  “God, I needed that,” she said, coming up for air. A pile of rib bones lay on her plate. “Do you guys eat like this every night?” she asked, licking sauce off her fingers.

  He watched her pink tongue dart in and out, watched her suck the tip of her thumb, completely oblivious to what she was doing to him. It was so innocent, like some kind of Ohio girl porn.

  “We have riders in our contracts for food, but we only get it if the club we’re playing has a kitchen. Otherwise we have to find something nearby.”

  She took another long drink of water and he watched her throat work.

  “You seemed kind of harsh with the guy out there,” she finally said.

  “Maybe, but the last thing I need is to go on tonight worrying that idiot is going to screw up the sound. There are five hundred people who bought tickets for tonight’s show, and I need to blow their minds. I can’t worry about hurting his feelings.”

  She seemed to think that over, but she didn’t look convinced.

  “Are you one of those people who wants everyone to like her?” he asked.

  “What? No.”

  He gave her a look.

  “Maybe,” she mumbled. “But I can’t help it. I don’t want people to feel bad.”

  “I’m not saying it’s okay if I’m a dick to everyone who annoys me. And yeah, maybe I could have been less harsh with Kevin, but sometimes you can’t worry about what’s nice.”

  “I guess. Sometimes it’s like I can’t even admit I’m angry or hurt, you know?” she said, looking down at her plate. “You should have seen how calm I was when I found Jeff cheating on me.”

  “Seriously?” he said, amazed at the idea that a woman could be calm under those circumstances. In his experience, women generally screamed and threw things when they felt wronged.

  “It’s not like I was happy about it,” she said, her eyes snapping, voice defensive. She grimaced.
“Sorry, I shouldn’t take it out on you.”

  “See, right there,” Jesse said, pointing his beer at her. “Don’t apologize. I’m being nosy and judging you. You should be pissed.”

  She gave a half-hearted laugh. “It’s not like I didn’t do anything,” she said, frowning, her eyes on her hands. “I stopped by our house on my lunch break to get some paperwork for my new car, and I found him in the kitchen with her. They were half dressed and it was obvious what they’d been doing. It was a total cliché. He said it wasn’t what it looked like, but I was just… I don’t know, numb I guess. And I just thought, well that’s it then. It’s over.”

  She looked up, the remembered bleakness in her eyes enough to make his chest go tight. “I said something like ‘I can’t believe you’d do this’ and he said it didn’t mean anything. Meanwhile this woman in a t-shirt and underwear is still standing in my kitchen, holding a yogurt like maybe she’s going to finish it. I told her to get out, and then I told him to move his stuff out while I was at work. But I didn’t yell. Not once.”

  “Actually, that sounds pretty classy,” he said. “Kind of like he wasn’t worth wasting your energy on.”

  She smiled, though her heart wasn’t in it. “I think… I think under the hurt and betrayal I was maybe relieved to have a way out. What he did was so clearly wrong, you know? It was clear-cut, unlike the doubts I’d been having.”

  “I can see that. Anyway, you’re not a completely lost cause. You gave it to Matt pretty good back there.”

  She straightened up at that. “You’re right. That was pretty badass. Maybe I’ve turned over a new leaf.”

  He grinned, glad to see her coming back to life. “A badass new leaf.”

  She laughed and tapped her water bottle with his beer. “I’ll drink to that.”

  ***

  Beth held Jesse’s smile, warmth spreading through her at the idea of herself as classy and strong, not to be trifled with. Then guys from Chain Gang, the opening band, came into the room and piled into the seats all around them and their conversation was overtaken by other talk. A bong was filled and passed around to a chorus of coughing fits.

  Beth got up to refill her plate, and this time she grabbed a beer. So what if she was working? This was a different world with different rules. Besides, she was a badass.

  She was standing by a plate of cookies when Stu came over with a list of hotels she needed to call to confirm their reservations for the next week.

  She took the list from him. “Do you have the schedule for the rest of the tour, and maybe something that shows all the interviews Jesse’s booked for? I’d really like to see the whole picture. I work better that way,” she explained.

  He was silent for several seconds, during which she was convinced he was going to ream her out for being so presumptuous.

  “I knew there was a reason I hired you,” he said, breaking into a rare smile. “I’ll send you what I have.”

  “I have a laptop back at the hotel. You could email me the stuff and I’ll keep it on there. I have accounting software, too,” she went on, pressing her advantage. “If you’d like I could also keep track of expenses.”

  He thought for a second, then nodded. “I’m crap at that kind of stuff, so I will let you handle that, but I’ll be checking it over.”

  “Of course.”

  It took her longer than she expected to make all the confirmation calls to the hotels, and a couple of them had too many or too few rooms booked, so she had to fix those. The club had was just letting people in when she got off the phone. Grabbing a couple more cookies she hurried down a short hallway that led from backstage to a side entrance into the main room.

  She made it to the table just before her first customers appeared. Nervous now, she pulled out the price chart and lock box and pasted a smile on her face.

  “God, he is so sexy,” one twenty-something woman said to her friend as they stood looking at t-shirts. “You’re going to die when he gets up there, especially if you can see his arms. He’s got killer arms.”

  “Are you going to try to get backstage after the show?” the friend asked.

  “You bet your ass, I am. I didn’t the last time I saw him ’cause I was with Joe, but there’s nothing to stop me tonight. What about you?”

  Beth tried to keep her face expressionless during this conversation, but she couldn’t help the sinking feeling she got listening to them. Both women were hot and dressed to show it off. She didn’t know how things worked with the whole backstage thing, but she was going to find out soon enough. And if they did let women backstage, these two would be in.

  Dear God, don’t let it be her job to decide who got backstage. If she was going to encounter sex, drugs and rock ‘n roll, she would prefer to do it a little at a time rather than all on the first night.

  Fan number one bought a shirt.

  “Did you want any of the CDs?” Beth asked, feeling like maybe she should push the products.

  “I have all his albums,” the woman replied, handing Beth a twenty.

  Beth smiled and watched her walk away. She had no business, no reason, to feel jealousy or resentment or anything else, but the idea of Jesse sleeping with the woman knotted her stomach.

  How dumb was that?

  She made a few more sales as the band set up and then the lights dimmed and Chain Gang went into their first song. People seemed to like them well enough, and though their music didn’t do all that much for her, she was happy just being in the middle of all that energy.

  After their set music was once again piped through the speakers and for the next half hour she had a steady stream of customers. It didn’t take long for her to realize that manning the merch table wasn’t rocket science. She had a good head for numbers and was quick to make change, and it was fun meeting new people. Everyone was there to have a good time and excited about seeing Jesse. Standing at the table gave her a sense of the devoted following he had. Many of the people there had seen him before and some of them were even following him from city to city.

  No wonder he’d pitched such a fit at Kevin.

  The sense of anticipation grew and her last few sales were made quickly as the house lights dimmed again. Everyone got to their feet, hollering and clapping as Jesse came out, the rest of the band trailing behind him.

  The noise and applause went through her, filling her up until the whole room felt like it was in her head, her heart, pumping through her blood. Without saying a word Jesse counted off and the band ripped into the first song, and from that moment until the end she couldn’t look anywhere but at him.

  Now she saw with her own eyes what she’d sensed on first meeting him. He was electric, fluid, self-possessed and almost unbearably sexy. Everything she’d seen in him before was there, only turned up. Like he dialed down his charisma when off stage so as not to blind everyone.

  He seemed to feed off of the crowd’s energy. Even she found herself lifted by it. Hundreds of people packed into a small space, all leaning toward the band, wanting more, wanting it never to end. She was dancing and cheering and sweating along with everyone else by the third song, no longer thinking of anything but how good he sounded. How good he looked.

  She was as swept away as anyone else, and even on the edge of the crowd the heat of hundreds of people packed together and moving to the music was a physical thing. Being in the middle of all that energy sent a thrill through her, made her feel more alive than she’d felt in years.

  They finished up the rowdy number they’d been playing and then dropped down to just Jesse’s guitar. He strummed lightly, almost absently, as he surveyed the crowd.

  “How y’all doin’ tonight?” he asked.

  Five hundred people whooped and hollered back. Jesse laughed.

  “You catch that, boys?” he asked, turning to the band. He looked back out at the crowd and Beth waited, breathless, for what would come next. “So we’ve got the new album, which by the way we’re selling here tonight. You can purchase it from t
he lovely Beth over at that table,” he said, pointing toward her with a grin. “But now I’d like to play a tune that’s a bit more personal.”

  The crowd quieted, waiting while he pulled a harmonica rig over his head and tuned his guitar. Then he started to play. It was just him now, the rest of the band listening along with the audience as Jesse started to sing, and the first words that came to her mind were high lonesome. She couldn’t think where she’d heard the term before, but it that’s what she felt listening to him sing alone up there to the hushed crowd.

  Whereas the first few songs they’d played had been either raucous or had a fun rockabilly sound, this was spare and haunting. When he played the harmonica, it was like the wind whistling thorough a lonely landscape. As the lyrics unfolded it became clear the song was about the kind of lives people lead on the edge of the desert, whether that was literal or metaphorical.

  His eyes closed for long stretches, then opened to reveal those dark eyes, holding the same mournfulness. The way the lights shone on him, she could see the gleam of sweat at his throat. He picked out the last few notes, trailing off until there was complete silence in the hall. Then the noise rose to a whole new pitch, as if they too were moved by what he’d shown them. The smile he gave was pleased, maybe even shy. Like he’d revealed something he wasn’t entirely comfortable with yet.

  He turned to the band, gave them a signal, and the crowd subsided again as a new song started, this one with the band behind him. It was sober and melodious, and after a few bars she realized it was a love song, but just as spare and lonely as the previous one in its own way.

  She hadn’t expected this. The only songs of his she knew were the few she’d listened to the day she got the job and the ones she heard at soundcheck. But they hadn’t really played the songs at soundcheck, not all the way through for real, and they’d been marred by the starts and stops, bad sound and Jesse’s anger.

  But this. This was the kind of music that made you sit in your car until the song was over. The kind that pinned you down in your own memories or heartbreak. When the song ended she tore her gaze from Jesse and looked at the rapt faces of the people around her.