But that was what had happened and had to be for the most arrogant girl he had ever met. The whole damn thing was that she wanted to know her completely... He wanted to make her his, entirely his.
He never wanted a woman as Melissa Bittencourt. And it was this realization that made him come back to himself and finally stop that madness of kissing her without stopping. So, he took a deep breath and struggled to control the reactions of his body, especially a part of his anatomy that insisted on gaining life. He turned his back to the girl and walked to the desk, opening the drawers, pretending to look for something.
The rocker still remembered the last time he had intimate contact with Melissa and he didn’t want to see her faint again. He wasn’t a hormonal teenager, he needed to calm down. But it was difficult, very difficult. Especially when Melissa came closer and Gabriel felt the smell of shampoo and soap that emanated from her, invading his breath. He had to lean on his desk and take a deep breath several times.
“Gabe? Are you alright?” She asked worriedly.
“Yeah. Just give me a minute...”
The singer was completely speechless as he felt the girl's arms wrapping around his waist.
"I know what's going on," she said as she hugged him. She shouldn’t, but she was radiant to know that it affected the singer in that way. "I'm not that innocent."
If Gabriel had not been so focused on keeping in control and yet so... horny, he would surely have felt his face burn with shame. He had never had to hide his horn before. When he was involved with a woman, the person in question was very happy to see the evidence of his arousal. But with Melissa... If he'd been so thirsty, he would have pushed her away. He knew.
"I'm sorry..." He whispered and he felt ridiculous for having to apologize.
“I know”. Melissa interrupted the hug to turn him to face her. It was so strange. She didn’t feel worthy of attention, but at the same time, it was wonderful to know that she was wanted, despite being what she was. So, she decided to be honest with the singer once again. "But I can’t imagine why me... Just me. Look at me, Gabriel ... I'm a freak.”
"You never say that again!" He caught hold of one of the girl's trembling hands and placed it on his chest. “Do you feel that? My heart beats fast just by looking at you... Melissa, you're the most fascinating creature I've ever met. How could I be indifferent to that?”
The sincerity that the girl could see in the eyes of the singer only made her even more thirsty for him. Then, giving in to the terrifying desire to be in Gabriel's arms again, Melissa pressed her lips to his, kissing him with such greed that she tasted blood. She only realized that she had been lifted off the floor when Gabriel sat her on the desk and began to spread wet kisses on her neck. His self-control had gone into space, but at that moment he did not care. He needed to feel her.
"Gabriel, I..." Arthur's deep voice echoed through the room as he opened the door and stepped inside.
“Shit!” Gabriel cursed as he looked up at Melissa. Damn friendship that gave Arthur freedom to enter his room like that without warning.
“Are we in trouble?” The girl questioned arrogantly, her lips swollen by the violent kiss.
Gabriel nodded and sighed. He wanted to kiss her again, but he turned to face the assistant who was staring at him as if he had gone mad.
Maybe he was crazy. For Mel.
CHAPTER TWELVE - JUST A KISS
“I'm caught up in this moment
Caught up in your smile”[16]
" You've lost your mind..." Arthur shouted as he walked back and forth. "Especially you, Gabriel. How much irresponsibility!”
The singer ignored the angry look he had on himself and his friend's finger up, he was more interested in the way Mel slipped his arms under his shirt, touching his skin and, making him even more excited, wove her fingers together on his stomach. He knew she was just trying to hide her arms, but the touch was stealing attention. He was staring at Arthur in front of him, but his attention was all about the girl sitting on the desk, hugging him from behind.
Without realizing it, he raised his hands to her knees and squeezed them.
Arthur stopped in front of the two of them and cast a glance at Lissa's hands hidden under the singer's shirt and Gabriel's fingers on the girl's knees.
"You want to drive me crazy." He accused. “What the fuck, Gabriel! With a fan?”
Melissa let out a giggle that Voss found charming. The singer looked over his shoulders and winked at her.
“So what?” He finally said something, making Arthur look back at him.
“So what?” The manager shouted. “If that thing leaks... This contest was the worst idea you ever had.”
"I think he's going to have a syncope..." Melissa commented softly in the singer's ear and inadvertently rested her chin on his shoulder as she slipped her fingers through the waistband of his pants.
Trying to ignore the way she was innocently poking him, Gabriel forced himself to focus on his friend before he, as Mel had pointed out, had a syncope.
"Arthur" he called quietly. “You are exaggerating”.
“Exaggerating? This tour did not even start right now and you're already catching up with the winner of the contest... I’m not surprised that she accepts...”
“Hey!” Melissa exclaimed, offended. “What do you mean by that?”
“Any fan would love that..." The assistant continued to pay no attention to the girl. "But your lack of judgment is astounding. This will end badly! And this can still disrupt the shows... I’ll don’t mention the possibility of the press discovering, the other fans discover... They will think that we have rigged the contest so that you can carry a girlfriend during the tour...”
“Arthur!” Gabriel called louder. He didn’t like the direction the conversation was taking. "If I wanted to take a girlfriend with me on the tour, I'd just take her... The tour is mine. I do what I want.”
“Irresponsible and now uncompromising” Arthur continued. "You're not like that. What the fuck! They might still think it's harassment, you know. How are you going to explain this?”
"He's definitely going to have a syncope..." Lissa whispered and this time she bit into the singer's earlobe. She was enjoying a lot watching Arthur's nervousness and feeling Gabriel trembling with her caresses... She never imagined that one day she would be able to tease a man like she was doing with Gabriel. Not with her past, but the feeling was too good for her to resist. She could continue to tease as much as she wanted, but with Arthur in the room, Gabe couldn’t do anything at all.
"We're adults, Arthur..." Voss struggled to speak when all he wanted was to turn around and kiss Melissa again, and this time with his hand wandering her body. "The harassment hypothesis is just ridiculous."
"The press is ridiculous, Gabriel. You know it. But it can still be worse than the press on your foot... Remember?”
“Enough!” The singer raised his voice, making his friend shut up and Melissa back away. "I'm an adult, Melissa is an adult, what we do together is nobody's business.”
“Even s...”
“What the fuck! It's none of your business ..."He exploded and Lissa glanced at the assistant staring at his friend with a hurt look.
"No one needs to know..." She spoke earnestly, abandoning the taunts and pitying Arthur. She didn’t want to see friends to fight, especially because of her. "I will not tell anyone."
“No one, is it?” Gabriel glanced at the girl at his back. “Not even for Angela?”
“Not even for Angela.” Lissa nodded without blinking. She didn’t really know how to tell her friend what was going on. If she promised don’t tell, they wouldn’t have to worry about explanations.
Gabriel nodded.
“See?” Gabriel turned to Arthur again. “No one needs to know...”
"This is going to be difficult with you hanging around..." The manager pointed. "But as you said, it's none of my business. When the shit explodes, you call me to lower the dust.”
And wi
th a performance worthy of Karen, Gabriel's younger sister, the manager left the room and the young couple behind.
"I think he is upset..." Melissa pushed the singer away from the desk.
"He is..." Gabriel confirmed, already sorry for the explosion. He knew his friend was just doing his job and, in a way, he was worried about him. "I shouldn’t have yelled at him.”
"I'd better go after your nanny and apologize."
Voss would do this, if Mel were not standing in front of him with her lips still swollen.
"So..." He dismissed the thought of going to find his friend and picked up Melissa again.
“Gabriel!” She scolded him for having her throat kissed, but despite the false accusation, she allowed herself to be kissed and taken to the singer's bed.
"I was enjoying your caresses..." He spoke softly to her and, with a frightening freedom to Melissa, slid his hands down the side of her body and settled them on the girl's buttocks. “I was really enjoying.”
She tensed and looked at him slightly frightened.
“Did you like it, huh?” She tried to stay soft.
"Yes, I did..." He nodded and pulled her closer, sticking his body into hers, making her feel how much he liked her.
"Gabriel..." She tried to stop him as his fingers tightened, but her voice sounded more like a low moan.
He continued with the sensual attack and with his lips again on hers, laid her on the mattress. He would have placed himself on top of her if she hadn’t used her knee to push his chest.
“Stop!” She screamed at him and crawled on the mattress, pulled away, leaning against the head of the bed. "I'm not going to have sex with you."
Gabriel ran his hands through his hair in frustration. He wasn’t really surprised, not after her reaction the first time he tried to be more intimate, but he was confused... Damn! It was she who shook him until he could no longer.
With a sigh, he sat down on the edge of the bed, his back to her.
"Well..." He started, trying to hide his frustration. "Screams and jerks are better than fainting, I suppose."
The singer's words hurt her, but Melissa couldn’t blame him. Gabriel didn’t know the truth behind her damn panic attacks. If he did, he would certainly never quote her that way. And damn it! He could be generosity in person, as an Mr. Darcy of the 21st century, but damn, Gabriel was a man too! And she had provoked him in ways she did not even know how to do. It was natural for the singer to be disappointed.
Unfortunately, those intimate caresses would be all he would have, because Melissa Bittencourt was not ready to take a step forward... Maybe she never was. And that was one of the motives that made her totally inadequate for him.
"I think I'd better go back to my room," she said, getting to her feet.
"We haven’t eaten yet," Gabriel reminded her.
“Let's cancel this dinner. What you want to eat is not on the menu” It was supposed to be a joke, but it didn’t work. Instead of smiling, Gabriel stood up and glared at her.
"What the fuck did you just say?" His voice was low and hoarse and though it didn’t frighten her, the girl shuddered.
What the Hell! She had hurt Gabriel.
"I'm sorry," she said, genuinely sorry and embarrassed. "I was joking... I just wanted to ease the tension.”
"I'm not some damn womanizer, Melissa. I think you can check this in your file or the crap on the internet! They never caught me changing women as if I changed clothes. I'm not like that. If I want to kiss or touch you the whole time we're together it's because you really matter to me.”
The girl wished a thousand times that he would curse her, mistreat her, or simply drive her out of that room. Insults would be far more bearable than those sweet words that once again found out how much Gabriel Voss was special.
"Forgive me for being an idiot," she said as she approached the singer. "I just can’t explain certain things. I wanted to be able to tell you everything, but I'm not...”
"You were very hurt, were not you?" "She might not tell, but Gabriel was not a fool. He knew from her reactions what had happened, he was just trying to confirm.
In silence, he stroked the female face and with the caress, the girl could not deny. With a positive nod of her head she confirmed Gabriel's suspicions.
Melissa could feel him tense.
"It's been a long time." She tried to soften the situation. "It's just... I haven’t got over it yet. But, I will overcome.” It was a lie, of course. However, she felt she needed to calm the Rockstar, who was visibly shaken ahead.
"Right," Gabriel said after long minutes of silence.
Although he felt the blood boil in his veins, the singer did his best to reassure himself. He wanted to kill the unfortunate man who dared to hurt his girl. Yes, Melissa was his girl. It didn’t matter if she turned his life upside down and drove him crazy. He was hopelessly in love with that girl ... In a way he never imagined he would. In the moment, he would try to respect her boundaries and give her all the time she needs to recover from whatever she has suffered. And then, when he finally discovered the man responsible for leaving her full of traumas, he would make the individual pay.
“That's it?” She asked with an arched eyebrow. "Just a ‘right’?”
“Excuse me. I was rambling.”
"I know ..." Melissa didn’t press him, though she saw in his eyes that there was a lot he wanted to talk about. Maybe he just didn’t know how. Just as she wouldn’t know how to answer him, if she had to deal with the questions he would surely like to ask. "Good. I'd better go before your nanny comes back and drags me out of my hair."
She smiled, but Gabriel continued serious.
"Arthur wouldn’t be crazy. He would never touch you." He stared at her. intensely. "No one... Absolutely no one is going to touch you.”
Melissa swallowed. She knew what that meant. Briefly, Gabriel was promising to protect her. For a moment, the girl felt herself flooded with enormous happiness, but the sensation lasted very little. She immediately remembered the part she played there. Her involvement with Gabriel was marked to end. One year and they would be apart.
Although hurt, the girl settled for the situation and understood the confusion of Gabriel's feelings. She had given a stir in the monotonous life of the singer and that made him enchanted by her. It was just that. When the frenzy passed, he would fall into himself and realize the pierced boat she was. Surely, he would leave like everyone else did... even her mother, the person who should most protect her in the world. So, she swallowed the cry that she held and forced herself to smile, as if she really believed what he was talking about.
"Thank you for the kindness." She gave a little wink, twisting to look natural.
"No need to worry about anything else." Gabriel smiled and leaned over to kiss her.
Melissa accepted him willingly, both to realize the staging and to satisfy the irrational need to have him for herself. She was already completely addicted to Gabriel Voss.
♫
“Holly shit!” Melissa peered through the crack in the doorway and turned to Gabriel and Arthur. "There are more people out there than I imagined.”
"Of course, there are..." Arthur snorted. He was still pissed off for the last night. “Meet & Greet is overcrowded, as well as tickets to the show are sold out.”
“Nice!” She pretended to show excitement. "It's just that, well, not everyone can pay for a few seconds next to a star and..." She broke off when she saw Gabriel shake his head.
"I really think we should have charged for this one..." Arthur replied after assessing her. "It would be a good way to get some more money for the charity event, but as you know, Gabriel doesn’t like charging to meet the fans.”
One more mistake. She thought bitterly. She would have to read Angela's dossier. She didn’t know he didn’t charge for Meet & Greet nor the show was charity.
“Of course. I know... I'm here, am not I? Free travel!”
Gabriel laughed with pleasure. It was amazing tha
t Melissa had been able to fool him for more than a few hours, but now that he knew she wasn’t a fan, he could see how much she got caught up in certain situations. Arthur would also notice if he did not turn her focus away.
"I'm going to sing for you today..." He approached the girl and pulled her close, hugging her and giving her a kiss.
“Gabriel!” Arthur scolded him. “The photographer is coming in at any moment.”
"Yeah... The photographer..." Melissa pushed him away with her usual jerks. “Behave yourself.”
“Before we start, do you want to record a video?” The singer questioned her. “We can make one for you, after the announce of tonight's show...”
She almost questioned why he would make a video announcing a show that would start in a few hours and that it already had all the tickets sold out, but she remembered in time how Angela used to yearn for his videos, posted on Instagram, always before the shows.
“I'm gonna have to show up?” She asked.
“Of course!" It was Arthur who confirmed it, with the superior air with which he had been talking to them all day, stressing how much the question had been idiotic in his conception.
“Wow, Arthur! You're being an asshole today... I think it's a lack of sex. You spend a lot of time taking care of Gabriel and forget to have sex.”
Gabriel laughed. Arthur scowled at her.
“Mel...” The singer was forced to stop laughing and handed the cell phone to his friend, already logged in Instagram. “This tour can be anything, but boring... With you, every day will be fun. Now, let's break the internet...”
“Hi, Texas!” He smiled at the camera and glanced at Melissa at his side. She didn’t say anything, but she forced a smile and nodded. "Just a few more hours... Are you ready to tear up tonight? I can’t wait to sing for you.”
"You're annoyingly nice," Melissa whispered to the singer as Arthur let the photographer in. “It makes me sick.”
Gabriel examined the short video again and put it online. Before he turns to Melissa, the video already had more than a thousand likes... Only a few seconds and so many people had already seen what he had to say. How could he not be nice when he was so loved?
Broken Angel (English Edition) Page 14