All I knew was that Parker couldn’t be my answer.
He turned to head out the door to join Vinnie, or maybe to yell at him for scaring me, and then he paused. He turned back toward me. “Why is a beautiful girl like you with all the money and connections in the world working in a place like this?” His voice was soft.
I glanced up at him. His brows were knit together with curiosity, like he was trying to figure me out. I grabbed a stack of t-shirts from the box into my arms, and then I said, “Because I can.”
I heard a chuckle behind me as I walked out of the room, the image of his hat on the grooved table burned into my memory.
four
I could feel his eyes on me.
I kept doing my job, all the mundane tasks that I did every day. I wanted to look over at him, wanted to see his dark eyes light up as they met mine, but it was all wrong.
I knew nothing about this man aside from his name and the fact that he was in a band, yet we were somehow connected. I’d known it from the second I heard the first whisper of a lyric on his album. My soul was linked with his, and meeting him in person only confirmed that.
Virtually everyone listens to music. Some feel a connection while others don’t, but most are realistic enough to know that they’d never really have a chance to meet the voices emitting from the speakers.
My situation was different.
Because of my dad, I had access to just about every musician on the planet. If Parker James hadn’t walked into Vintage that night for a signing with his band, if I hadn’t pressed play on his album that morning, if life was completely different…
Something told me I’d still have crossed paths with him at some point.
It was inevitable.
But just because we had met didn’t mean that it had to go any further than that.
I was lost in thought when dark eyes met mine over a rack of books. I shuddered and averted my eyes back to the books I was rearranging.
“Why are you trying so hard to ignore me?” he asked bluntly.
“I’m just doing my job.” My voice sounded tired, which was the exact tone I was trying to portray. It was an act, but I didn’t want him to get the wrong idea. I didn’t want him to think I was interested. Even if I was. “And you probably shouldn’t be over here. Your legions of fans will attack.”
“Look at me.” It was not a request, and I was startled enough by the force in his voice to follow his direction. “I’ve never seen eyes as blue as yours. I could write a fucking song about it.”
“You don’t seem like the romantic type.”
“I’m not,” he said. He laughed humorlessly. “I’m an asshole. If you only knew.”
“Then tell me.”
Some blonde grabbed Parker’s arm. “Can I get a picture with you?” she gushed.
“Sure, sweetheart,” he said. I could hear the arrogant insincerity in his voice, but obviously Blondie couldn’t. “Wait in line. I’ll be right over.”
“No, I mean now.” She tugged his arm toward her. I glanced up and saw a friend waiting with her cell phone camera-ready.
“I’m in the middle of something.” He pulled his elbow away roughly. “I’ll be right over.” He turned back toward me, and I watched her dejected face fall. She didn’t walk away.
“Give me your number,” he said to me. It was another demand.
I shook my head. “No.”
“Why not?” he challenged.
I motioned between the two of us. “Because this isn’t going to be a thing.” I was done arranging the books, but I didn’t want to stop talking to him.
I forcefully reminded myself that I refused get involved with a musician. I couldn’t.
But this guy I’d met less than an hour earlier certainly had my undivided attention.
The fan’s friend finally pulled her back toward the line, and I watched her walk away before I spoke again. “I can’t get mixed up with you.”
“Let me be the judge of that.” There was that arrogance again.
“You were about to tell me about how you’re not the romantic type.” I thought maybe changing the subject would distract him from the dangerous conversation we were having.
Turns out I was wrong.
“That girl that just wanted to take a picture with me? If I hadn’t run into you tonight, I’d probably be out back shoving my dick in her mouth during my next break.”
He said it for shock value. I didn’t doubt that was exactly what he typically did, but he certainly hadn’t shown that side of himself to me. The side I’d seen was gentle. Borderline sweet. He’d defended me without knowing me to his friend. That counted for something in my book.
This was all an act. It was his bravado, his way of pretending like he was macho. It wasn’t him. The real Parker was the one who told Vinnie to stop talking shit about me.
“Don’t you need to get back to your band?” I asked, not sure what else to say.
“Don’t you even want to know why?”
“Why what?”
“Why I’m not shoving my dick down her throat?”
Of course I wanted to hear what he had to say. Of course I wanted to know why. But logic overruled emotion as I realized that the only reason he was paying me any attention at all was because Gideon Price was my father. “You can do whatever you want with your dick, Parker. It’s not my business.”
“Maybe it should be your business, Jimi.” His voice was low and dangerous. It was a clear invitation, one I wanted to accept, but I wasn’t going to.
“So you can shove it down my throat? No thanks.” I walked away from him and toward the registers.
Tim and Virginia were working up front. Of the ten people Vintage employed, I really only talked to Tim and Virginia. I wouldn’t call Virginia a friend, exactly, but she was the kind of person I could get a drink with after work. She acted like we were best friends, but the truth of the matter was that she didn’t know me.
No one really did.
I’d learned that people used you for what they needed, and when they were done with you, they threw you away. I didn’t need that in my life, so I stayed away from relationships in general.
Parker halted my progress by grabbing my arm and pulling me toward him. He stepped in close to me, so close that I could feel his breath whispering against my lips as he spoke. I stared at his lips, willing myself to maintain some self-control as he spoke. “You can’t deny there’s something between us.”
Every part of me wanted to move my head an inch forward so our lips would meet. I wanted his warmth, his comfort, his roughness, his severity. I wanted to know everything about who he was. I wanted to know why he desired my company over the blonde. I wanted to give him my number as requested, to invite him into my house, my bed, my soul.
All this from knowing the man for literally less than two hours.
I couldn’t imagine the kind of brutal torture we could do to each other if we had the time.
But he was leaving for a tour, and I was a realist.
“You’re right. I can’t deny it. I won’t. But it doesn’t matter.”
“Of course it does,” he whispered, his breath warm against my mouth. A quiet, intimate moment passed while his dark eyes bore candidly into mine. Standing this close to him, I could see tiny flecks of gold in his brown eyes. From far away, his eyes looked like dark chocolate. Up close, they looked lighter, like dark chocolate mixed with bronze and whiskey.
No one existed around us as my eyes took in every detail of his. The store became muted in the background, exceptionally silent in a moment that belonged solely to us, the eroticism of it mixed with lust and desire. A tingle of need danced down my spine. I’d never craved a kiss before, but I suddenly felt like I’d die if his lips didn’t touch mine. I saw everything in his eyes that I needed to see. He’d suffered. He’d been down a hard road. Yet he brought this light with him, a light that suddenly I knew only I could see in him.
His eyes flicked away from mine and down to m
y lips for a few brief seconds. I was about to assault his mouth with mine when our stolen moment in the middle of the store was interrupted by perhaps my least favorite person in the universe, Drummer Vinnie.
“James, we need you back at the table. Bitches are getting out of control without you there.”
The spell was broken as he dropped my arm and his eyes moved from mine over to Vinnie.
“I’m coming,” he said, his voice that had whispered intimately to me only a few seconds earlier at full blast again.
He glanced briefly back at me. Torture and pain that I didn’t understand passed through his eyes before he turned from me and walked wordlessly away.
I drew in a shuddering breath, more affected by the moment than I cared to admit.
He was a stranger. A complete, total fucking stranger.
And I was pretty sure a piece of me had fallen in love with him in that moment that was only ours.
five
“I’m sorry, but we have to cut the line off here,” I heard Tim say to some customers waiting for their chance to meet the members of Flashing Light. The store was a mess, and I was just doing my best to keep the top layer of everything looking nice enough for people to consider purchasing. It had been a successful night for sales, but it felt like the longest two hours of my life.
A rise of protest greeted him, and I wondered how pasty and lanky Tim was going to deal with it. Luckily, Flashing Light’s manager was there to back him up.
“Flashing Light has a set tonight at Live Oak at eleven,” their burly manager said to the crowd. “Head over there so you don’t miss it.” A few people toward the back left the line peacefully, presumably to head over to the bar he’d just named. It was only a few blocks away. Walking distance. A few stayed, hoping to get their chance to meet the band.
When the line started getting shorter and the manager forced the back half of the line out the door, I felt a sudden loss.
I couldn’t ignore the pull I felt to Parker, but he was leaving for six weeks.
I didn’t want to be the reason he didn’t do whatever the fuck it was that boys did the first time they were on a tour.
Besides, I had to think of my own sanity. I couldn’t possibly sit at home wondering what he was doing for those weeks.
Or how many girls were getting the pleasure of his dick in their mouths, as he’d so eloquently put it.
He’d be leaving my store soon, and I couldn’t handle another goodbye. It was stupid, perhaps, but I had lost too much over the past year. I hardly knew the guy and I didn’t understand the feelings I was having. All I knew was that I was feeling again.
So instead of saying goodbye, I locked myself in a bathroom stall. He’d have to leave to get to his set, and he wouldn’t know where I was. It was weak. But, admittedly, I was fragile.
I put the lid down and sat on top of it. The floor was sticky. The bathroom needed a good cleaning, but Virginia was on toilets that night, not me.
I did everything I could to focus on the ordinary, but thoughts of Parker snuck their way in. A single tear leaked from my eye, and I laughed as I wiped away the moisture. I hadn’t even cried when Damien had left me without an explanation, so I wasn’t sure why I was crying now.
I felt like a crazy person locked in an institution inside of that stall. Laughing and crying at the same time.
I checked the clock on my cell phone. I’d been in there for at least fifteen minutes.
It should have been enough time. The band should have left.
“Rox? You in here?” Virginia’s voice shattered the silence.
“Yeah.”
“You okay?”
“Yeah.”
“You just need some quiet time?”
“Yeah. Is it quiet out there?”
“The band’s gone. So are all of the loud bitches with the huge tits.”
“Thank God,” I said, unlocking the stall door and letting myself out. My eyes met hers, and I couldn’t help but think how lucky she was.
She was gorgeous with her big brown doe eyes and straight nose and black hair cut into a blunt bob. Her hair was a different color every other week, but what made her lucky was the fact that she could just be anonymous. She didn’t have to ever worry that someone only wanted to befriend her because of who her dad was.
She looked past me into the stall with the lid down over the seat. “You’ve just been sitting in here?”
“I skipped my usual breaks today. I deserved it,” I said, faking like I was checking myself out in the mirror when in fact I didn’t give two shits what I looked like. I just didn’t want to look at Virginia’s prying eyes.
“The store is a disaster. We’ve got a lot of clean up ahead of us.”
“Better get started, then,” I muttered, pushing my way out the door.
It was half past eleven when I started to feel the nerves tingling up my spine. Parker had told me that he would return around midnight.
I wanted to see him again.
Really.
But I couldn’t do it—not to myself, and certainly not to Parker.
I took the coward’s way out. Or maybe I was being a hero.
It didn’t make a damn bit of difference. I wasn’t going to face him again.
“Tim, I have a raging headache. Is it okay if I go home?” I asked. “I’ll come in thirty minutes early in the morning to restock shirts.”
“Don’t worry about it, Rox. Go home. Feel better.”
“Thanks,” I whispered, rubbing my temple with my fingertip to make my fake headache appear real.
I bolted out, got into the black Porche Cayenne my dad had insisted on buying me for my twenty-first birthday, and sped off toward home.
I watched my rearview mirror, noticing a car behind me following closer than I liked. I signaled at my exit, and the car followed me. I drove through town toward home, and that car was immediately behind me the entire way.
Nerves bundled in my abdomen. They always did when I watched someone behind me get off at the same exit as me and follow me for any length of time. Eventually the people I thought were following me usually turned off at another street, but this one didn’t.
I made a series of random turns, hoping to lose them. I wasn’t dumb enough to drive home when someone was following me at nearly midnight.
My heart raced as the car continued to tail me.
I pulled my phone out of my purse to call someone for help.
Maybe I was just being ridiculous. But maybe I wasn’t. Maybe my safety was at stake.
It was too dark to see who it was or to determine what type of car it was. I kept driving, trying to figure out who I should call.
Normally I would call my dad, but he was on his honeymoon in between tour dates. My mother was in another country.
I’d lost every friend I ever had.
I had no one.
I could call Tim. Surely he’d still be at the store. Surely he’d help me.
I could drive back to Vintage to see if this person continued to follow me.
“Hilton” screamed in red letters at me up ahead. I made a sharp and sudden turn into the driveway leading up to the entrance, checking my mirror. The car who’d been tailing me continued going straight. I pulled into the entryway of the hotel, an area someone had once told me was called a porte cochere, and I took a deep breath and closed my eyes as I tried to steady the rampant beating of my heart.
The exhale of my breathing exercise was cut short by a loud knock at my passenger side window. I jumped in my seat and then I lowered the window. “Good evening, ma’am. Checking in?”
“N—no,” I stuttered.
“Can I help you?”
“I’m sorry. I’m in the wrong place and just needed to stop for a second.”
“Can I get you directions somewhere?” He was young and earnest and kind.
“No, but thank you.”
He nodded. “G’night, ma’am. Drive safe.”
He walked back into the building, and I
chalked up one point in the Hilton column as I drove toward home.
My eyes were glued to my mirror for any sign of someone following me, but I was safe.
For now, at least.
I finally pulled in front of the building housing the condo where I lived in Beverly Hills, a three million dollar gift from dear old Dad. My heart rate was mostly back to normal and I was mostly over the fear that had engulfed me.
My thoughts shifted to my condo. Part of me was tired of relying on my dad to provide for me. It led to an existence of little appreciation for hard work. Maybe that was why I loved my job at Vintage. It made me feel like a regular person instead of the rich princess I was raised to be.
The daughter of a rock god wasn’t the only label that defined me.
And that was why I couldn’t face Parker. I couldn’t get involved with a musician. I couldn’t move from the princess of rock to the girlfriend of rock.
It wasn’t me.
I tossed my keys on my kitchen table, noting the smooth surface. This kitchen table was a far cry from the one in the break room. This one didn’t remind me of Vintage, but it did bring up memories of my ex. And Katie.
Katie had left me first, but she’d left me in a much different way than Damien had.
It all added up to the same thing, though. I was the common denominator. Anyone who got too close eventually left me, and I couldn’t take any more loss in my life.
six
I woke up in a cold sweat, my heart pounding in my chest.
It had been weeks since my last nightmare. I hadn’t realized how important a full night’s sleep uninterrupted by nightmares was until I had another nightmare.
Sleeping had been the one time when I couldn’t block out my emotions.
Sometimes my dreams were terrifying, and other times they weren’t. But they were always vivid.
When I was awake, I could consciously block out emotions. But when I was asleep, that was a different story. I couldn’t control what my subconscious wanted me to feel.
Vintage Volume One Page 3