by Riley Love
The chef’s assistants arrived at that moment, like they were in on the whatever-you-need deal and placed empty bowls on the table. Metal crackers and mallets were placed in front of each of us. The guys had settled into some sort of food nirvana, giving the table the same sleepy-eyed gaze they would a lover. Moments later, I understood why as the assistants heaped the table with lobsters and crabs. My stomach purred in appreciation.
A hush fell over the table as everyone dug in. I grabbed a lobster and went to work.
Todd chuckled as I cracked open the body and scraped out the pieces of meat most people missed. “The lady knows her way around a lobster.”
“I have family in Maine. They taught me a thing or two.” Family that hadn’t been in touch as much lately. Mom’s sister had been sick too. I hated that we’d once been such a happy family and we were getting torn apart.
After dinner, I was dessert. The guys passed Hunter’s phone around, taking turns watching every second of us together. I sat next to Hunter, kissing him every time I moaned on the video, like it was a prize in a drinking game. I was dizzy from the desire, and the fact that these guys were slack-jawed, downing their sangria in one long drink after watching me.
“Next round tomorrow, Lina,” Blake said as he handed the phone back to Hunter. He leaned over the table, his gaze fixed on me.
I swallowed hard. “You’re next?”
Blake was a little older than the other guys, and the first signs of gray had begun to show at his temples and in his goatee. I’d reached the stage in my life that I considered that so hot. He was always the one with his face splashed across the front page of the tabloids with some starlet, in trouble for things like slipping into the back of a limo that didn’t belong to him and having sex or throwing huge, bathing-suit-optional pool parties that wound up on the gossip shows. I wasn’t sure if there were any of my stories that Blake Caldwell hadn’t already crossed off his bucket list.
“If you’ll have me.” Truth be told, Blake intimidated the hell out of me. He was the one I was afraid of disappointing.
His gray eyes were like an ocean storm. “I’ll have you, Lina. Don’t worry about that for a second.”
Oh, shit.
“Do you have your story picked out, or will I spend tonight writing something special?” I could only imagine what I’d come up with, fueled by sangria and the memory of Todd’s and Hunter’s touch. If I’d learned anything from being with those two men, it was that I shouldn’t hold back. Not only with the stories but with everything. They’d homed in on the emotions that I needed the most, found the places where I was empty and filled them. They understood that I needed someone to notice me, to appreciate me, and take a fucking second to ask if I was doing all right. It was almost better than the sex.
Almost.
Blake chuckled. “Oh no, Lina. I knew exactly what story I wanted to star in with you as soon as this weekend was proposed.”
I scanned the table. All heavy-lidded, wine-and-lust-drunk eyes were on me. Even though I’d already had sex with two of the guys, I hadn’t asked a lot of questions. Partly because after following the band so closely for fifteen years, I felt like I knew them, even though I didn’t. And another part of me didn’t want to ruin things with too many questions. We were floating in this haze woven together by my stories and their songs, and I liked it that way.
“Whose idea was it to have me come here?” I hadn’t entered a contest. I was simply notified by email that I’d been invited to an all-expenses-paid weekend with my favorite band. Casey said it was because of my fanfiction and she wanted me to write about the weekend, but she didn’t say who came up with the strategy.
“It was my idea.” Zach slid closer to me. I untangled myself from Hunter and gave Zach my full attention. He pushed his hair away from his face and picked up my hand. “I was looking around the internet to see if we had any fucking press lately. Wondering how we were going to get people talking about Jupiter in Blue again. I found your blog and saw how active it was. Your posts and the comments from fans who obviously wanted more. Once I started reading the stories, I couldn’t stop.”
Zach paused, licking his lips and adjusting himself in his chair, like his pants might have been getting a little tight. I could definitely help him with that.
Who was I? Moments ago, I was sucking the taste of the sangria off Hunter’s swollen lips, and now I was seriously considering unzipping Zach’s pants and giving him a hand job. Or another kind of job. Or lifting my skirt and riding him like a bucking bronco right at the dinner table.
“The best part, for me, was how you fucking got us, like, understood us on a level that a lot of outsiders don’t. You knew exactly what each one of us needed. I had the guys check out the link. And we couldn’t stop reading. Everyone had their nose buried in a screen. Casey and Alex got so pissed at us because we’d rather read than record. When she asked me what was so damn captivating, I pitched the idea of you coming down here.”
“You left out the best part.” Blake’s accent was to die for after he’d had a few glasses of sangria. Or once I’d had a few glasses of sangria. Sexy and sophisticated and I couldn’t wait to hear it when he was whispering dirty suggestions to me as he stripped me out of my sundress. “When we tried to decide which one of us you really wanted.”
“I wish…” I looked down at Zach’s fingers laced between mine and Hunter’s hand on my thigh. How different the two of them were. Then I glanced at Todd, my body warming as his lips curled into a smile from that sliver of attention, and then back to Blake’s intense stare. “I wish I could have all of you.”
Or that I could take the very best parts of them and make them one person. But no one was perfect. I was far from it myself.
Blake laughed. “You’ll know when you’ve been with all of us, Lina. There won’t be any doubt.”
I went back to my bungalow alone. It was torture, even though I wasn’t ready to take another lover yet, and it wouldn’t be fair to the others to invite Todd or Hunter back for an encore. Someone had to set some rules for this weekend. I had to give them all a chance. It was the only way to keep my heart from forming opinions.
I meant what I said. I really did wish I could have all of them.
The island air caressed my skin as I lay in bed naked, watching the video over and over. My pussy was throbbing, dripping wet. A message flashed over the top of the screen.
My sister. Everything’s good here.
It didn’t even feel like my life. Two days and I’d completely detached myself from my routine. I really did wish I could have all the guys in my life every day.
A knock at the door startled me. I pulled the blanket over me. “Come in.”
I hadn’t bothered to lock the door. There was no one at this resort I didn’t want to see.
“You shouldn’t let strangers walk into your bedroom.” Todd ran his hand through his long hair. Even in the low light, I didn’t miss his grin.
“You’re not a stranger.” I scooted over and the blanket shifted. “What’s up?”
He sat on the edge of the bed and hooked his finger into the edge of the blanket. “What are you wearing, Lina?”
I threw the blanket back, letting it settle low on my hips.
His lips parted. “You naughty girl. You had no idea who was about to walk in here.”
“I knew it was one of you.” I ran my hand up my stomach, over my breast. I relished the electric charge that blossomed over my skin. Not only from my touch but from the heat of Todd’s gaze following the motion. “Why are you here, Todd?”
He cleared his throat, dropping his gaze. “I was wondering if you wanted company. We don’t have to fuck again. But I can’t stop thinking about you, and I was hoping maybe you were thinking about me too.”
I prayed the video had stopped playing. I’d forced myself to stop thinking about Todd because our time together had come and gone. This video was a cruel reminder of things I couldn’t have. “Is that a good idea? After this we
ekend—”
“Nobody ever said what would happen after this weekend, Alina. There aren’t any rules. It’s up to us.” This might have been the first time he’d called me Alina.
Oh. “I didn’t think you’d want more.”
Todd pulled his shirt over his head and crawled under the blanket, hooking his muscular arm around my waist. He didn’t pull the blanket up. Instead he kissed my shoulder. “You didn’t ask.”
It was nice lying here with him, like this. His warm skin against mine. Our breathing once again fell into sync, the soft thump of his heart answering mine. The waves crashing outside my open window. “I thought that was the deal.”
Could we have a future?
“You do a lot of thinking, LinaLu.” He curled his fingers against my skin, and I had a feeling Todd did a lot of thinking too. “You can have whatever you want. A beautiful woman like you shouldn’t hold back.”
I turned toward him. Our heads were on the same pillow, our limbs tangled together. “It’s been a long time since I’ve thought like that. About the big picture. I’m usually putting all my energy into getting through the day.”
Todd closed his eyes for a long blink. Sleep would claim him soon. “My old man was sick,” he finally said. “Cancer. Around the time that Jupiter in Blue was getting big.”
I remembered this story. He’d lost his dad during the tour for the first album. And the press lauded him for never missing a show.
He tipped his head back, his expression completely haunted.
“He was our first and biggest fan. Maybe even bigger than you.” His fingers ghosted my cheek. “And I couldn’t fucking be there with him. He wouldn’t let me. We worked hard on the talent show circuit, doing whatever we could to get discovered. Spent a shit ton of his money.”
“I bet it made it a little easier for him, watching your dreams come true.” It was a crime that it had to be one or the other. That his son couldn’t have success and be with his dad.
Todd’s fingers were in my hair, and he pressed a kiss to my forehead. His lips lingered until they burned. I’d never forget this kiss. There was nothing sexual about it, but the pure, raw need broke my heart.
“I’d trade it all for one more day with him,” he whispered. “When I got home, all his shit was still in the TV room, waiting for him to come back for it. But he never was. Didn’t matter if we knew we’d lose him. We always thought we had one more day.”
I held him close to me, letting the waves crash against the shore. Nothing could touch us. I wondered if the band had picked me because they understood what I was going through. Because they understood the heartache of watching everything I knew, everything I ever believed slowly burn while the world spun around me.
“You’re doing the right thing, Alina. Don’t punish yourself for it.”
Chapter Nine
I had a hangover the next morning. Not from the wine. My body was pleasantly sore from having sex with Hunter and Todd—again—last night. We’d needed each other. Words couldn’t express what we were feeling. We needed to tell each other it was going to be okay—and then make the other one believe the lie. Nothing lasted forever. Our hearts broke to make room for more love.
Todd was gone when I woke, the bed empty without him. I’d wanted to wake up with him, to see what it was like. Test the waters and see if my life could be normal again.
No music came from the studio. Odd. The resort was strangely quiet. Maybe the guys went into town. Besides our arrangement, it seemed to be business as usual this weekend for Jupiter in Blue. This was what life would be like when I went home. Minus the sun and the sand. I missed them already.
It gave me a chance to go down to the beach. I’d been so busy since I got here I hadn’t had a chance to simply enjoy the sun, the white sand, and the crystal blue ocean. This truly was a dream, I thought as I dragged my chair through the sand so I could be closer to the surf. I loved the way the beach smelled. All that hot, salty air. My hair whipped in my face, so I tied it back and settled in.
I thought about reading and I thought about writing, but I opted to simply be. In two more days, I’d be on a plane headed back to Cleveland.
Mom would love this. She grew up in Puerto Rico, but she’d only been back a few times as an adult. Before she got sick, she said she wanted to retire there. She used to take Anita and me to Edgewater Park when were kids, but the city was always hunkering in the shadows. It wasn’t a getaway.
When I got home, I’d tell her everything. Well, almost everything. How the hot sand felt between my toes, what the palm trees looked like when they swayed in the breeze, and what juice straight from the coconut tasted like. I hoped she’d be able to envision it and that it didn’t make her too sad. Sometimes she had no clue what was happening to her, and sometimes she understood way too much.
“There she is.” Blake’s accent was as crisp as the waves crashing against the shore.
I rolled my head back to see the guys dressed like they were about to go on stage. Blake wore dress pants and a shirt the color of the ocean. Todd wore skinny jeans and a hooded sweatshirt, even in this heat. Hunter had on one of those sinfully tight T-shirts and jeans, and Zach…no. He couldn’t be wearing leather pants.
I lifted my sunglasses to make sure. He was.
“What’s the occasion?” I asked.
“A Japanese TV station wanted us to do an interview and a live acoustic performance,” Zach said. “We’re still pretty big there, so we’re putting a lot of effort into the launch there. But we had to go to the local TV studio to film. Their equipment blows ours away.”
No big surprise, my site got a ton of Japanese traffic. “I’m sorry I missed it.”
“You needed to sleep.” Todd dropped his hand to my shoulder. “You tossed and turned all night.”
The look Hunter gave him stole my breath away.
“Yes. You needed your rest.” Blake took off his sunglasses. “Because the rest of my day is all about you.”
“We’ll leave you to it,” Hunter grunted, stalking off toward the bungalows.
My head whipped around, and that perfect ass got smaller with every step. I turned back to the remaining guys. Todd shook his head, Zach wouldn’t look at me, and Blake looked super smug. Shit. I did not want trouble in paradise. Especially if I was the cause of it.
“Is he okay?” I asked, wondering if I should go after him.
“He will be.” Todd squeezed my shoulder. “I’ll go find out. Don’t worry about him.”
Yeah, right.
And then there were three.
Blake motioned that he wanted to sit at the edge of my chair. I curled my legs closer to my body to accommodate him. I grinned. He was so overdressed for the beach, yet he drank in sunshine as easily as he’d downed the sangria last night. His face was tanned, and the lines around his eyes crinkled in defense against the sun.
“Enjoying the beach?” he asked.
“I am. I went swimming.” And I was already dry. Except for the moisture that was forming between my legs. I knew why he was here. “But I was getting a little lonely.”
“If you want, we can stay here for my story. The chair will be perfect.” He ran his fingers along the woven fabric, coming dangerously close to touching me but he never did. Blake Caldwell was a tease.
And that was why I shook my head. Blake did all these outrageous things, smoke and mirrors, like a guy who held up banks. He wanted us to be preoccupied with the glitz and glamour so we’d never notice all the things he wanted to keep private. He never let us in. Those relationships with the starlets never lasted. There’d been rumors when the band first started out he’d lied about his age, and judging from the gray in his hair, I’d bet that was true. And there were even rumors that he and Zach had been together. It was all hearsay, but I liked that idea more than a revolving door of actresses in his bed.
I wanted to know who he was.
“I’d rather we went back to your bungalow.” I’d get the clues there about the r
eal him.
“Very well then.” He stood, brushing sand away from his trousers.
My heart slammed against my ribcage. Blake intimidated me because he was the most famous of the band. The unattainable one. He was so far out of my league I hardly bothered crushing on him because even from afar, because I was setting myself up for disappointment. This man had sampled the best of the best, and none of it had been good enough for him, since he was available to play with me.
I gathered my belongings and readied myself to follow him.
“You haven’t told me what story you want yet.” Only that it could be executed on the chair. Didn’t really narrow it down.
“Let me give you a clue.” He put his hand on my bare back, the island sun no match for its heat. “I’d like for Zach to join us.”
Zach stood expectantly beside me. His hands behind his back. He grinned as I took him in like I’d never laid eyes on him before. “It’s a damn good story, Lina. It would be a shame for it never to come true.”
My mouth was dry. “Is it there one where…”
I couldn’t even say it out loud. It was by far my dirtiest story. This was going to push me to my absolute limits. I had no idea if it was out of bounds for the guys. But they suggested it. This had all been a wild fantasy that I wrote a few years ago after a couple beers. When barely anyone was reading my fanfiction yet. I had no idea Jupiter in Blue would make a comeback.
“Yup.” Zach licked his lips. “Have you done anything like that before?”
I couldn’t let them down. This was their fantasy too. “Not quite to that extent.”
“We’ll get you there, love.” Blake’s words tickled my cheek. “We’ll take you anywhere you want to go.”
Blake’s bungalow was cool and dark when we stepped inside. I searched for little things that would tell me more about who he was, but on the surface, there wasn’t much. The bedroom was impeccably neat. Bed made, with no stray papers, half-read books, or forgotten water glasses. His laptop sat closed on an empty desk. It did tell me a lot. Blake like order and he cared about appearances.