by Rachel Shane
“No.” Matt hugged the ticket envelope close to his chest. “You two are together. I can see it in your body language.”
Harrison and I both scoffed at the same time and inched away from each other. I straightened to prevent my body leaning toward him like the Tower of Pisa.
Matt backed up a step, crashing into a group of guys. “You’re just using me.”
Harrison laughed. For an investigative journalist, this wasn’t news to him. I swallowed hard, cringing as I realized what I had to do, and strode forward. There was only one way to solve this. Harrison may have donned the sexy leather pants, but this time it really was cleavage that would work. I lifted a manicured red nail and set it gently on Matt’s shoulder, at the spot of skin kissing the edge of his collar. He sucked in a breath, eyes nearly rolling into the back of his head. Slowly, gingerly, provocatively, I trailed my nail down his arm. When I reached the tip of his finger, I pressed his hand against his thigh and then bridged across it like an ant crawling from one object to another. My finger continued along the front of his scratchy jeans until it stopped. Next to his crotch.
Harrison shook his head at me, but his mouth hung open. Just a little.
Before Matt’s eyes could pop open in the stark realization that I’d stopped, I leaned in, making sure to expel a hot breath directly into his ear. “How about you meet me backstage after the concert?” I paused, letting that sink in for a second. Allowing the fantasy to start playing in Matt’s mind. “I want to thank you later.” I let my nail cross over the bulge in his pants, earning a gasp, as my other hand plucked the envelope from his fist.
And then I strutted away.
I didn’t dare look back. A hint of musky cologne preceded Harrison falling into step beside me. He clucked his tongue. “You’re really bad.” The way he said it sounded more like a compliment than an insult. “I love it.” And then he said the worst thing of all: “You’re just like me.”
I scoffed and said in half-anger, half-jest, “No, I’m not. I have morals.” Well, sometimes.
“I meant that you’re willing to do whatever it takes to get what you want. Even if it means hurting someone.” He leaned close to me, his breath coating my ear the same way mine had just done to Matt. Goose bumps pebbled the skin on the back of my neck. “One and the same.”
I clucked my tongue in mock jest and handed our tickets to the collector. “Oh, but that’s impossible. I’m not delusional.”
He allowed a small chuckle at my joke. We cut through the crowd and toward the seating area. I stopped short at the welcome scent of foamy beer coaxing me from the concession stand. I usually hated beer, especially the watered down frat-party kind, but I needed reinforcements to get through tonight. I passed the clerk the fake ID that worked everywhere except the one place it counted: Harrison’s party. He reluctantly joined me and sprung his own fake from his wallet.
He held up two fingers. Make that two. My stupid mind wondered what else he could do with those two slender fingers. Note to self: kill Erin later for planting the idea in my mind.
I plucked two napkins from the container. “Am I actually catching you breaking the law?”
He lifted a finger to his lips as the woman turned her back to us to fill the plastic cups with yeasty beer. “I know you think I’m this color-inside-the-lines killjoy but I’m not. I can have fun.” He paused, a smirk fighting its way onto his lips. “Off campus, where university jurisdiction won’t reach.”
I squeezed the napkin into a tight ball. He had a calculated answer for everything. “I seem to recall you’re here on a newspaper assignment.” This was small potatoes compared to the dirt I really needed. This wouldn’t get Out House kicked off campus or win Rho Sigma back our house. This would only get Harrison a gentle slap on the wrist warning.
And if he got a warning, bye bye opportunity to gather the dirt he seemed desperate to hide.
“Technically, not yet. Not unless I have a story to break.” He took his beer off the counter and passed a twenty across to pay for both of our drinks. It was almost chivalrous.
But this time it actually felt like a bribe.
I STOOD IN FRONT of our seats, dumbfounded. Front row. Center. Set lists taped to the stage were so close to us, I could make out the font—Arial—covering the page.
Harrison gaped at me. “Front row? Okay, color me impressed. I think I underestimated your PR skills.” He scratched his chin. “And here I thought you only joined the newspaper for the wrong reasons.”
I chuckled. “You mean keep my enemies close? That is a nice bonus.” I swirled my beer. “To be fair, I think I overestimated your douchiness. It’s just a notch lower than I’d had you pegged. But don’t worry, you’ll have plenty of chances to bump it back up.”
“Why do you do that? I’m trying to be nice for a moment and you turn it into an insult.” He lifted the beer to his lips and sucked back a few swallows, peering at me over the rim of the cup.
His words tangled in my chest. He was right; he tried to wave a white flag tonight and I still attacked him. “Fine,” I grumbled. “I definitely underestimated your kindness. Happy?”
He gave me a tight smile. “Welp, we can knock sincerity off your list of strengths.”
“I guess neither of us can resist an insult,” I said and before I could stop myself, the corners of my lips turned upward. I quickly remedied the situation and pasted a scowl on my face. No way would I continue flirting with the enemy like that.
Forty minutes later the lights dimmed, I downed my third beer, and the audience went wild. If I drank them fast enough, the taste didn’t bother me and neither did the way I kept glancing at Harrison checking of his watch. Smoke filled the stage, tendrils curling into the audience. The crowd pressed in on us, forcing us closer together. Our elbows bumped and our hips grazed.
Pulsing musical beats filtered through the room, vibrating under my feet. The crowd screamed. Plumes of fire shot up from the edge of the stage, forcing me back a step from the heat. I caught only a glimpse of Harrison’s glowing, sweaty face before darkness returned. A spotlight shot onto the stage and illuminated a shadowy figure rising from a platform deep below, a ring of fire circling him. The cheers infected me—and possibly the alcohol. My arms punctured the air and an excited scream ripped from my lips.
Clever Trevor stood less than ten feet away from us, decked out in a headdress fastened with bright red roses like a bride’s bouquet and a veil all in one. A skin tight plastic suit in sparkly silver showed off every curve of his body, and an arrow lit up, pointing directly to his crotch where a giant rose hid his goods.
“See?” Harrison leaned into me. “I’m underdressed.”
I tilted my head to hide my smile.
“What’s up, friends?” Clever Trevor shouted into the mic. “It’s good to be back to my hometown! Go Braves!” Two backup dancers emerged wearing the local high school uniforms. A mascot in a very politically incorrect Native American costume performed flips in the background.
The cheers grew even louder.
“You’re not just an ordinary crowd, you’re my homies. My amigos. My one-night stands! So you better lose your shit when I sing!”
Nearby, a few girls swooned as if they might actually pass out. I was just about to join the cheers when my phone buzzed. I lifted it out of my purse to discover a new email. I wiggled my shoulders to the beat and flipped to the message, not even bothering to check who it was from. I froze.
To: BiancaCruz
From: LucianaCruz
Subject: Yatsume, you ignore me, I ignore you. I’ve closed your bank account.
No body, just a subject. That was all my mother needed to say. An ice pick stabbed through my gut. She’d cursed me out in Spanish in the text and now my mother had moved onto Japanese, calling me the English equivalent of a disliked person. I squeezed the daylights out of my phone, my pulse soaring to unhealthy levels. My tuition was paid for but the bank account my mom fed went to rent, food, and everything else needed t
o keep me alive. This was her way of forcing me to call her, to beg, plead, and grovel for her help. I hyperventilated at the thought.
Harrison eyed me strangely. “You okay?”
His words snapped me back to reality. A slow melodic ballad crooned through the speakers, and the crowd sang along to Clever Trevor’s beautiful lyrics. The melody flowed through my veins, calming me down. Tomorrow. I’d call her tomorrow. Tonight I’d forget she ever existed.
“I’m fine.” I shoved my phone in my purse, and bopped my head to the music a little too aggressively at first until I shook my hips in sync with every beat. When Clever Trevor’s sultry velvety voice crooned his signature song throughout the room, I screamed the lyrics in sync until my mind filled with them and nothing else. “You stabbed my back but now I hold the dagger.” My feet hopped in place and my arms went crazy, flinging left and right to match the beat. Dancing made me feel better. “I stride toward you with my confident swagger.”
The buzzkill stood stock still next to me, arms crossed…watching me dance with an amused expression.
“You take a swing but I block your tries.”
My cheeks ignited and a flattered thrill went through me. Maybe it was the alcohol, maybe it was the desperation to distract myself by dancing to my favorite singer, or maybe it was Erin’s insinuation from earlier digging under my skin, but I grabbed Harrison’s hands and swung them back and forth.
“I slice my knife through your decadent lies.”
He offered me a tight smile in return but his body stayed rigid and stiff. Music was a neutral ground, a place we could both share without fighting. But also, as long as he kept himself in check next to me, he’d never slip up. Never trust me. Never accidentally say something that might be the key to his downfall.
The chorus started, drums wailing. I slid my hands down Harrison’s sides and cupped his hips, nudging his torso side to side with gentle pushes.
“I’ve got the sword to make you bleeeeeeeed.” Clever Trevor partially sang, partially screamed the last word, buoyed by the thousands of voices joining him.
Harrison crossed his arms in a clear block to against my attempts to make him loosen up, so I stood on my tiptoes and whispered in his ear—okay, more like shouted, “Just dance, you fool!”
“I’ve got the words to make you pleeeeeeeead.”
He wiggled his shoulders, hitting the beats just right, but stopped a moment later. He raised a brow as if to say, happy?
“I’ve got it all.”
I shouldn’t care. I should ignore him and have fun on my own. My favorite singer was up on stage, his gaze cast downward as if he were focusing directly on me. If I closed my eyes, I might believe it, a private concert pumping in my ears only. But I wouldn’t have even been here tonight if Harrison hadn’t given me the incentive to weasel my way into tickets. It wasn’t that I owed him, it was that he continually held control over me. At his house party, preventing me from drinking. At the wake and bake, deciding whether or not to keep my secret. Tonight, by doling out an assignment I couldn’t refuse. I had to get control back and getting him to dance suddenly felt like a battle I needed to win, at least to prove to myself that I could have the upper hand for once.
“I’ve got the tools to end you nooooooow.”
I leaned in again, gripping Harrison’s shoulder, and brought my lips to his ear. “You told me earlier you know how to have fun. Now’s your chance. Don’t be lame. Prove my estimations wrong.”
“I’ve got the conviction to state my voooooow.”
A fierce look came over him and his arms tightened around my lower back, pulling me close.
“I’ve got it all.”
I slid one leg between his, my skirt spreading over his thigh. His hips followed mine as the music rose to a crescendo and the drums pounded harder with the start of the next verse.
The music dipped low and Clever Trevor whispered, “But I don’t have you.”
The way Harrison matched my moves, beat for beat, seemed like a victory. I was leading him; I was in control. Our hips gyrated in a preview performance of what might happen in the bedroom, a swivel, a thrust. After a moment he readjusted our position, accidentally knocking his knee higher—into my lady bits.
“I fight against you while you hold up your hands.”
Instinct insisted I readjust again to move away, but I pressed against him harder. This was the distraction I needed. My eyes slipped closed for a brief second as sensation flooded to the spot his knee connected.
“You keep on thwarting my meticulous plans.”
My stomach flipped when he tugged me even closer. I tilted my hips until his knee rubbed against me again, beneath my skirt, and a wave a pleasure erupted through me. I let out a breath.
“I curse your name but it dies on my lips.”
If this was any other guy in any other place, I’d knot my fingers in his hair and sink my lips into his. Kissing was safe, expected, necessary. But because he was this guy, I should push him away, step out of his embrace before he realized every pulse of his knee was hitting me in the exact right spot. The pressure felt amazing.
“I thought I hated you but I’m coming to grips.”
Harrison’s head dipped low, fitting into the scoop of my neck. Our cheeks pressed together as we rocked to the beat. His fingers sunk into the flesh of my sides, trailing up gently, a strange juxtaposition to the hard swivels of our hips.
The chorus kicked up into gear, pulsing louder, faster. His knee increased tempo in a way that no longer seemed accidental but a deliberate attempt to drive me insane.
“You’ve got the apology that I neeeeeeeed.”
Nerve endings tingled throughout my lower half and heat ignited along the same path. A low gasp ripped from my throat. I tightened my arms around Harrison, holding on for dear life, as we fought to stay upright, like the entire world was sliding beneath our feet and we were about to crumble on top of one another.
“You’ve got the proof to make me belieeeeeeeeeeve.”
His steady breath pumped warm puffs against my ear, sending more goose bumps erupting over my flesh. Spikes of pleasure jolted through me. Those damn leather pants.
“You’ve got it all.”
My own breath came in quick gasps and his knee worked harder, in league with my racing heart. I thrust against him, meeting every pulse with one of mine.
“You’ve got the vindication that I craaaaaaaaave.”
Sensation flew to my nerve endings, buzzing like a swarm of bees inside me. A moan erupted from my lips and drowned against the pumping speakers. His fingers scrambled for the bottom of my shirt, clutching the fabric in tight fists, and I swear he let out a whimper of his own.
“You’ve got the courage to make me braaaaaaaaaave.”
My eyelashes fluttered closed and I bit my lip to keep from screaming out as pleasure built along the spot his knee rammed against.
“You’ve got it all.”
The music changed cadence to short staccato beats and Harrison altered the pressure. My breath came heavy in his ear, my whole body throbbing with euphoria. Emotions warred inside me, the need to give in to the sensation and let go like I’d instructed Harrison to do. Like I’d never done with any other guy. But the other part of me was blocked by the line were crossing. And it was a line. Because at the other end of it was Harrison, mortal enemy, bane of my existence, destroyer of dreams.
And yet, I didn’t want him to stop.
The music slowed until it dropped away completely, leaving only Clever Trevor’s sultry voice ricocheting through the space and throbbing in my veins. “But you won’t have me.”
The stage lights faded to black. Harrison’s grip on me loosened. His knee slid out from between my legs, robbing an anguished gasp from my mouth. My whole body was coiled, ready to spring loose. My eyes popped open to see the asshole stepping out of my embrace and bending to retrieve his beer from beneath his seat. He hit me with a sickening smirk.
My body still thrummed, s
till gearing up to a peak but with no cliff to dive off of. I screamed out of frustration instead, directly into the sharp slap of silence that fit between the space of songs. Not quite the release I was looking for.
Harrison leaned into me as the next song started up. “You’re right,” he said. “That was fun.”
I stormed out and into the bathroom to splash cool water on my face. My palms braced against the white porcelain sink as my chest pumped in and out. I’d danced with him so I could be in control for once but somehow he still managed to win. And the worst part was he won me over.
I COULDN’T LOOK AT Harrison for the rest of the concert. Thankfully the dark lights hid the permanent new feature on my face: scorched rosy cheeks that squashed my confidence. Harrison kept his own head forward, body returned to the rigid statue that had tempted me the first time. I longed to belt out the lyrics but instead my lips pressed tightly together. Every time I replayed the moment, mortification swept through me, hunching my shoulders. Here I’d come to unearth a scandalous secret about him and he’d somehow dug up one about me I didn’t even realize I had. Because my body betrayed the truth even if my mind refused to admit it.
Still, the fact that Harrison had deliberately brought me to the point of no return and then abandoned me as some kind of sick joke made my body think twice.
When the lights blasted on, we followed the brigade of teenage girls out of the arena. He turned his back to me and my eyes immediately flew to his ass, which looked frustratingly fantastic. Stupid leather pants! I stewed, contemplating calling Erin for a rescue ride home so I didn’t have to stick around backstage until my cockblock determined it was time to leave. But that would be letting him win once again. I’d gotten us the backstage passes and I intended to cash in on that prize. Plus, I had to make it seem like he hadn’t gotten to me.
We spilled out into a packed hallway and fought against the crowd to head to the restricted area. We flashed our passes at a bouncer and found retreat in a dark, empty corridor that bridged to the backstage section. Each thump of Harrison’s feet combated my pounding heart.