by Caisey Quinn
But every single time she and Steven had come to crossing that particular threshold, one of them always held back. Or passed out. Their encounters rarely occurred when sober.
“Sorry to disappoint,” she told her friend. “See you soon, Lu.”
“MOVE YOUR ass, Country Queen,” Lulu said as she banged on the bathroom door the next morning. “We have to leave in an hour and I need to shower.”
“Nice rhyme. Maybe you can write my songs from now on,” Kylie teased as she exited the bathroom.
The two of them kept up the constant witty banter all morning in an attempt to avoid discussing the situation at hand. The one that was about to become their reality for the next few months.
Stepping out of her apartment building and into the unforgiving glare of the sun, Kylie squinted and slid on her aviators. Beside the black SUV picking her up stood her manager and a slender exotic-looking girl with a chin-length haircut that looked as expensive as her designer suit.
“Kylie, this is Hannah, the day-to-day manager we discussed accompanying you on this tour. Hannah Reagan, Kylie Ryans,” Chaz said gesturing to each of them.
Kylie shook Hannah’s hand briefly. “Nice to meet you, Hannah. Not sure what you did to get stuck babysitting, but I’ll try not to get gum stuck in my hair. Not too often anyways.” She smirked but then forced her lips into the most genuine smile she could manage. Wasn’t this poor girl’s fault her management company thought touring with Trace was more than she could handle on her own.
“I’m Olivia,” Lulu said. “Stylist, best friend, life coach, and owner of Kylie’s embarrassing middle school pictures should you need them.”
Kylie snorted at her friend’s ‘life coach’ comment and watched as Hannah took them both in. Lulu, with her short, bleached-out boy haircut with pink and black streaks, and then her.
She wondered what she looked like to someone who didn’t know her. The jeans she wore were ripped, but they’d come that way and she didn’t even want to know how much they’d cost. She’d stopped asking long ago. The vintage T-shirt she had on wasn’t one from her dad’s collection, it was designer too and probably worth more than what the band featured on the front had made in their entire career.
“Hannah’s from the New York office and is really excited to be learning the ropes of artist management.” Chaz continued discussing Hannah’s qualifications until Kylie was tired of nodding and smiling.
“We’ll be fine, Chaz. Someone is making sure my truck makes it to each show, correct?”
Kylie prided herself on not being a diva. She didn’t make people fill her trailers or green rooms with roses or champagne or bowls full of M&Ms with all the brown ones removed.
She just had one relatively simple request. Wherever she went, her daddy’s truck went. It had its own special trailer that blended right in with the ones carrying tour equipment and luggage.
“Yes. Jackson Ashford is in charge of it. He has the spare key and will handle anything you need. I’ll text you his contact info.”
“Sounds good. Thanks, Chaz. I’ll keep in touch.” With that, she nodded at the driver who’d opened her door and slid into the vehicle.
“Hey, Kylie,” Chaz called out just before the door closed between them.
“Yeah?” She leaned forward so she could still see him.
“Make good choices, okay? This is bigger than you now. You get that, right?”
She rolled her eyes behind her sunglasses. “Yes, sir. No getting caught with hookers or blow. I got this. Peace out, Chaz.”
She didn’t have to see him to know he was shaking his head in that exasperated way he had.
“So you were kind of a major bitch to Hannah Banana back there,” Lulu said as she hopped into the SUV from the other side.
Thankfully the new chick was riding in a different car. Kylie wasn’t really in the mood to keep up the forced small talk and fake smiles. She pulled a prescription bottle from her purse and dropped two oval-shaped tablets into her hand. She could feel her friend’s steady gaze on her as she retrieved a bottle of water from the mini-fridge and took her migraine medicine.
“I wasn’t trying to be,” she mumbled over the pills she was trying to swallow. “Guess my life coach should’ve taught me better manners.”
“You don’t pay me enough for that.” Lulu nudged her elbow off of the armrest they shared. “Anyways, she seems nice enough. Little out of her element, but nice. Maybe take it easy on her. Remember how out of place you felt when you first came to Nashville?”
Leaning back in her seat, Kylie closed her eyes and took a deep breath. “Yeah, I remember. And you know damn well I spend the majority of my time trying not to remember. Thanks for bringing it up.”
“You’re welcome,” Lulu responded, as if Kylie’s appreciation had been genuine and not laced with sarcasm.
The drive to the lot where the tour bus and the rest of the convoy waited was quiet. Until they pulled in and Lulu broke the silence. “Hey, speaking of reminders, did you forget to mention something? Maybe something kind of important?”
Kylie stretched her neck and rubbed her temples. Obviously the meds hadn’t kicked in yet. “Not that I know of, why?”
“Because that guy waiting by the bus looks a hell of a lot like Steven Blythe. Unless you know another tattooed guy with black hair and a habit of carrying a guitar case around.”
Kylie lowered her sunglasses and looked out her window. Dear God. That damn sure was Steven Blythe.
What the hell is he doing here?
The question had no sooner entered her brain than the blurred memory of why he was here came back to her. He was here because she’d drunkenly decided he could fill in for her guitarist on this tour. Because Trace Corbin apparently wasn’t enough drama to deal with.
“Um, did I forget to mention he was filling in for Aiden on this one?”
“Um, yeah. Apparently you did.” Lulu gaped at her in disbelief. “Do you really think this is a good idea?”
No. “Sure. Why not? He’s a friend. He needed a job.”
Lulu snorted out an obnoxious laugh. “I bet. Didn’t realize you were giving out jobs.”
“It’s not that big of a deal.” She wondered if she said it out loud enough times if it actually wouldn’t be. Or if Lulu would believe she believed herself.
“Sure it’s not. Who better to bring along on a tour with your famous ex than your current fuck buddy? It’s genius really. This should go swimmingly.”
“He’s not my—” Kylie began but didn’t get to finish because Lulu was already out of the SUV and had slammed the door. “Fuck buddy,” she said, completing her sentence for her own benefit as she got out of the vehicle. She ignored the puzzled look of her driver as he held her door open. She lugged her carry-on bag onto her shoulder and made her way to where Lulu was waiting.
“I might’ve been slightly intoxicated when I made this particular executive decision,” she whispered to her friend as discreetly as she could.
Lulu checked Steven out blatantly and nodded he approval. “Well…at least he’s nice to look at.”
You have got to be kidding me.
The thought repeated itself half a dozen times in Trace’s mind as he watched Kylie greet Steven Blythe. By their tour bus.
He’d told himself that he was probably just there to say goodbye. It wrenched a knife into his gut, but he’d prefer that option to what was really happening. The motherfucker had his guitar with him. And was currently being introduced to Kylie’s band. A band conspicuously missing one member.
He knew it was possible that he was imagining it—wishful thinking and all that—but Kylie’s smile appeared tight from where he stood. The creases in her forehead could’ve been from the sunlight in her eyes, but the giant shades she had on were probably providing sufficient protection her from that.
No, he was almost positive she was uncomfortable. Well, that made two of them. He turned to his manager and jerked his head towards Kylie and Steven.
Or she just wanted to give her boyfriend some time on.
The thought provoked a painful tightening in his chest.
“Think he actually gives a shit about her or he’s using her to get ahead in the business?” He felt his jaw flexing as his manager cleared his throat.
“I think it’s none of our business either way.”
He nodded once. “Right.”
After Pauly had left to board the bus he’d be riding on, Trace spent the next few minutes helping the crew load equipment into the trailers.
Despite the magnetic pull he felt towards where Kylie still stood with her friend from home he’d met a few times before, an attractive dark-haired girl he didn’t recognize, and Steve, he did his best not to glance over his shoulder in their direction.
He hadn’t even looked up until his bass player came over to lend a hand.
“Who’s the blonde?”
“Friend of Kylie’s from back home, Mike,” he answered without removing his eyes from the equipment he was loading. “Do me a favor and don’t bother, okay?”
The other man held his hands up. “Now wait just a damn minute. Since when does your shitty love life have to interfere with everyone else’s?”
“Since now.”
Mike frowned at him from under a mess of blonde hair. “You know, if it were me in your position, I’d be thinking that this tour could be the perfect opportunity to—”
“Thin ice, Brennen,” Trace practically growled at him. “Drop it.”
“You don’t even know what I was going to say.”
Trace slammed the door to the last trailer shut with a bang. “And I don’t want to know.”
Without another word on the subject of Kylie Ryans, her friend, or what might or might not happen on this tour, Trace turned away and stalked over to his bus. Granted, it was only half his. But it was half his. Not half Steven Blythe’s. Dammit.
“Hey,” Kylie said softly as he approached. “Um, I haven’t gotten on yet so I didn’t know if you’d already picked which room you—”
“Take whichever room you like,” he said shortly as he blew past her little entourage without slowing.
Take the room, take my heart, take my life. He would’ve written it down and used it for lyrics later but he didn’t have the ability to think straight at that particular moment. Seeing Kylie and Steve together was his kryptonite. It hurt. It sucked out his soul and made him feel weak and vulnerable and pissed the hell off about it.
Dropping the one bag he carried in the booth in the middle of the bus, he plopped down into the seat and lowered his head in his hands.
For a few moments, he sat in silence, alone with his thoughts. Thoughts of calling his sponsor because he wanted a drink so bad he could taste it. But that wasn’t the want that was overpowering him.
He wished they’d had rehab for Kylie Ryans addiction. He never would’ve left.
The sweet sound of her laughed chimed through the bus as she boarded and greeted the driver. He hadn’t even noticed the man before. He only caught a few words of their conversation, but the ones he did were, “Oklahoma, my daddy, this guitar, and of course I’d love to sign that for your daughter.”
Yeah, she was different in a lot of ways. But she was still the same girl who had stepped tentatively onto his bus two years ago.
His mind’s eye conjured the image of her greeting him on the bus during his Back to My Roots tour. He’d known even then that there was something about her. But he’d had no idea how drastically she was going to change his life. And he’d been completely clueless about how much she was going to change him.
He dragged himself back into the present and watched her smile and nod during the exchange with the driver, wishing for the first time ever that he’d never met her. He wished that he was a stranger to her and that this was their first encounter. So that she could get to know him as this man. A sober one who valued his career, his relationships, and more than any of that, her.
He wished for those things even more when she turned towards him and the smile dropped from her face at the sight of him. She was a professional though, so she plastered it right back on before his very eyes.
“I’ll take the suite in back if that’s all right with you. It has the attached bathroom I hear.”
Trace tried to make eye contact with her, but she wasn’t having it. “Okay.” He could give a damn about which room she took. There was so much to say, so much they needed to discuss, and yet neither of them could admit it out loud.
“Okay,” she parroted back in the same tone. Apparently that was all she had to say because she disappeared into her room without another word.
The second he heard her door close, he made a decision.
He wasn’t going to try and get Kylie Ryans back. She clearly had moved on and if she was happy, he had no desire to take that away from her. But he was damn sure going to find out if she truly was happy, and if Blythe was into her for the right reasons. And like it or not, he was going to find out whether or not he could handle being on tour with a woman he still loved.
IT WAS 2:42 a.m. and Trace had an answer to at least one of his questions.
The answer, unfortunately, was no. No he could not handle being on tour with her. Kind of a shitty time to be realizing this, that much he knew for certain.
Knowing she was less than twenty feet away, probably scantily clad in one of her favorite threadbare T-shirts under her covers was killing him.
His blood burned in his veins as he lay in his own bed sans covers. Somehow her scent had infiltrated the entire bus. He wasn’t sure if he was actually inhaling that sweet warm vanilla-honey smell he loved so much or if his memory had become so vivid that it included all five senses now.
But it wasn’t his memory keeping him awake. It was his inability to tell the future that had him all twisted up inside.
Questions swarmed and stung him in all his weakest spots. What if she brings Blythe on the bus? What if he sleeps in her room? Or worse—doesn’t sleep in there?
The thought of hearing even the tiniest sound of pleasure coming from her room while another man was in it stoked the fire she’d lit inside of him. The intensity was like nothing Trace had never known.
He’d never been possessive or concerned about the love lives of any women other than his sisters. And that was just because he had their best interests at heart and because, naturally, he didn’t want to know anything about their sex lives. Despite the fact that Claire Ann and Rae were thirty and nineteen respectively, in his head, they’d never had sex—nor would they ever.
But Kylie Ryans had. He knew firsthand that she’d had great sex. Earth-shattering, mind-blowing, ruin-your-whole-damned-life-for-anyone-else-ever sex. He knew because she’d had it with him.
WHEN THE bus stopped moving, Trace roused himself from the half-ass version of sleep he’d been in. His head throbbed from not getting nearly enough rest. He stood and stared at his reflection in the mirror.
Swollen bloodshot eyes, pounding head, and blurry memories of Kylie walking past him as if he were a stranger on the street. It was like having a hangover minus the fun of the night of drinking that led up to it.
He didn’t have an en suite bathroom so he had to step out of his room to take a shower. Which he did. A long and hot one that nearly scalded his skin right off.
But apparently painful memories didn’t evaporate as easily as shower steam. Because when he stepped out of the bathroom, he was once again wrapped in a towel from the waist down and standing face to bare wet chest with a fully clothed and fully startled Kylie Ryans.
“H-hey. Um, I just came to tell you that we’re all heading to breakfast. At the diner here in Columbus. And then we have soundcheck.”
He couldn’t help but grin. She was fighting the good fight to keep her
eyes off of his chest. But she was losing that fight.
“Got it. I’ll be out in a few.”
“Okay.”
His grin widened when she didn’t move. “So, uh, if it’s all right with you, I’ll get dressed now.” He tilted his head towards where she stood.
“Yeah. Of course. Please do.”
“You’re blocking my bedroom door.”
“Oh God. Sorry.” She nearly tripped over herself in her attempt to get out of his way. “I’m going to go now. To the diner. For breakfast.”
She muttered something under her breath that he didn’t catch.
“Hey, Kylie Lou?” he called out as she left.
“Yeah?” She turned and met his gaze with wide eyes.
There was so much he wanted to say to her. Apologies and desperate pleas for another chance came to mind. But the words wouldn’t come out of his mouth. So he chickened out.
“Enjoy the view?”
Her eyes narrowed and she glared at him briefly before storming off the bus.
Leaning back against the wall, he let out a breath.
It was going to be a long few months.
“ENJOY THE view? Enjoy the view! I mean, what the hell?” Kylie leaned her head down and turned her face towards her best friend so no one else in the diner would hear. “We’ve barely spoken, despite the fact that we’ve been on the same bus for nearly twelve hours, and all he can say to me is, Enjoy the view?”
She tried her best to whisper despite the fact that she really wanted to yell her frustration at the top of her lungs.
“And that’s why I believe in equal opportunity junk-punching,” Lulu responded just before taking a sip of her coffee.
Kylie gave a subtle shake of her head to let her friend know that was the end of the conversation when Hannah slipped into the booth across from her. She wasn’t exactly thrilled about having a day-to-day manager. But she knew Lulu was right—it wasn’t Hannah’s fault she’d been sent to babysit her. After her run-in with Trace on the bus she was starting to think maybe she did need one after all.