“So…” My mind was a blur of feelings. “Distraction.”
“Distracted?”
“What?” I shuddered as he deepened the kiss, his hands digging into my skin and lifting me into the air, cold air hit my back and then he was pressing me against the lower dining room table, against more dishes, against more silverware, and I didn’t care, I literally had no idea how long I let the sensation of Zane Andrews consume me, but inch by inch, hurried breath after breath, he continued to push his way into my world.
And I realized, between two dinner placemats, as we both found release, there would never be any going back.
For either of us.
“Zane.” I fought to catch my breath as sweat dripped down the side of his face. “Thanks for telling me everything.”
His expression was unreadable. He leaned down and kissed me again and again.
It wouldn’t be until later that night.
That I’d register the emotion, he’d just tried to hide.
Guilt.
Chapter Thirty-One
Zane
“YOU READY FOR THIS?” Jay asked a few hours later. I’d spent the rest of the morning in bed, skipping my recording session much to Will’s dismay, and hightailed my ass to set.
A cameo.
I could do a cameo.
The crowds of extras were stifling, it was supposed to be a party scene, and I was playing myself on stage.
Like usual.
On stage.
I could do it.
I flinched when the makeup artist added more dark shadow to my eyes, something that Jay was completely adamant about, was that I play myself but like this darker self, my designer jeans were shredded within an inch of their life, and I was barefoot.
The scene was supposed to be a Halloween party and apparently, I was a vampire.
A half-naked vampire.
That looked a hell of a lot like Jack Sparrow. I flinched when I saw my own reflection, freaky blue and white contacts stared back at me as fangs met my bottom lip. “I can’t sving like vis!” I lifted my hands into the air in exasperation.
Alec and Demetri were both in makeup chairs next to me, also headed up to the same fake stage, only they were getting zombie makeup put on them.
Demetri lifted up his phone. “Keep talking.”
I rolled my eyes. “No.”
“Say something with an SSSSSS.” He laughed.
“Sthuck you!” I yelled
“What was that?” He cupped his ear.
Alec glanced down at his phone and burst out laughing while Jay approached with his headset around his neck and Lincoln flanked on his right.
“Remember.” Jay was so damn young to be directing, but he was kicking ass. You could tell in the way the actors watched him, hung on his every word, even Lincoln, not that Lincoln had ever been a bad guy, he was just…very Hollywood, until he met Dani, now he seemed more normal.
Hell, like I even knew the meaning of the word.
I told Fallon to wait for me by Dani, who decided upon Fallon’s arrival that they both needed to grab coffee if they were going to make it through the afternoon.
“I need you to look pissed.” Jay grabbed Lincoln by the shirt. “This scene is pivotal, okay? It’s the third book in the series, alright? The one where Alec and Nat are together but he’s been lying about his past.”
Suddenly uncomfortable I looked down.
I wasn’t necessarily lying.
Just not sharing something that could ruin the moment and cause potential hurt, besides, did it really matter?
Finish the album.
Spend as much time with Fallon as possible.
And get a checkup if I start feeling weird.
My last check was six months ago, and although the aneurysm was still there, I was told it wasn’t growing and might heal up and disappear on its own, but that if by my next check up the body hadn’t repaired itself, I would need to go in for surgery.
Brain surgery.
That could leave me a vegetable for the rest of my life.
Which, until meeting her, didn’t seem to matter all that much. After all, I didn’t like people—and they sure as hell didn’t like me or wouldn’t like the real me if they ever knew my secret.
That I puked my guts out after meet and greets.
And hadn’t been to a mall in years.
“Hey, you ready for this?” Alec stood and held out his fist for me to bump.
“Yeah.”
“At least you get to lip sync, you know? Otherwise, you’d sound like a freak.”
“Wow, thanks.” I rolled my eyes. “I’ll still sound better than you.” I teased.
“Okay, eight.”
“Eight?”
“Grammies. I keep count so I know how many more I need this next awards season to kick your ass.”
“Three.” I called, “Just in case you were wondering.”
“It will happen, after all, we actually got an album recorded this last year while you sat on your ass and ate marshmallows while watching Real Housewives.”
“Bethenny’s a goddess,” I called after him.
He was right, though.
I needed to finish recording tonight.
Even if it killed me, which it very well might.
A twinge of guilt snapped in my chest like a small twig, like I was trying to sneak up on something and my own guilt caused my foot to slip against something loud.
That was how I felt with this secret.
It wasn’t the public’s business.
But it was hers.
Wasn’t it?
We were going on four weeks of knowing each other—nobody shared everything after only four weeks.
It was a lie.
I knew it even as I thought it.
“Places!” Someone yelled while my vampire self got ushered toward the stage.
Fallon waved at me from behind the camera, both she and Dani had a cup of coffee in hand and were pointing and laughing.
Yes. Hilarious. Edward Sparrow, Ladies and Gentleman!
She looked gorgeous in tight skinny jeans and a loose grey tank top that was tied in a knot at her waist. She must have gone home to change, which for some reason made me anxious. I didn’t want her anywhere but in my arms—in my bed, wherever that bed may be.
The lights dimmed.
Alec and Demetri started their creepy little acoustic melody and then the music shifted to the one we had written for the actual movie.
I moved to center stage.
My nerves at an all time high as everything fell silent and then the beat picked up and I did what I did best.
“My name’s Saint,” I whispered gravely into the microphone. “Are you ready to confess your sins?”
The extras went wild, so wild that I nearly cut and ran, but it was a concert, a fake one, but one I could control, this is what I did.
I entertained.
“I’ve been bad,” a girl screamed. Not sure if that was scripted or not, but I leaned down with my microphone and tilted her chin toward me.
Screams erupted.
I whispered above the noise directly into the mic. “I’ll show you bad.”
The music blared as I turned around, shoved in my stupid ass vampire teeth and started to lip sync.
“Show me dirty, I’ll make you clean.” I ran down center stage and slid across my knees leaning backwards as girls grabbed at my abs and ripped jeans. “I’m your saint, I’m your dream.”
Lincoln and Pris, Jay’s wife, who was playing the part of Nat, started dancing with the rest of the extras, while my hips bucked against hands slamming into me and tongues licking my arms.
I shivered and stood. “Confess, confess, confess.” The crowd started shouting with me. “Reckless, dirty girl, confess, I’ll make you wish you weren’t stuck in a prison of your own making, just give me the chance, I’ll be yours for the taking.”
I put the mic on a stand and lifted my hands as the lights lit up behind me, Alec a
nd Demetri’s harmony crooned in on the chorus.
It was hard to hear above the screaming and the music.
And that was saying a lot, since I sold out nearly every concert I performed.
The music cut, but we had to still pretend to be dancing on stage and getting the crowd riled up, but Lincoln and Pris had to deliver lines.
We waited for our cue then started up again.
And before I knew it, the scene was over.
“Again,” Jay called out to everyone. “One more time.”
Chapter Thirty-Two
Fallon
I WATCHED IN WIDE-EYED amazement as girls ran their hands over his rock hard body, I had to remind myself over and over again that this was his job.
But now that he’d had sex, would it translate to something else?
His hips pressed into the air and then against a girl’s hand.
My jaw nearly came unhinged when one girl started licking his wrist and then took a bite.
His eyes fluttered closed as he moved fluidly with the crowd, like they were his drug, his next hit, his voice, or the recording rose above the music as lights flashed across his perfectly sculpted face.
The entire set buzzed with electricity.
Zane, in his element, was completely and utterly unstoppable. The type of talent you see once in a lifetime and wonder how the heck he does it every day without having a nervous breakdown.
And suddenly everything he said, clicked into place.
The anxiety.
The way he’d grown up.
And the constant pressure from the very crowd that adored him, a crowd that in one instant could turn on him.
It wasn’t just a lot of pressure, it seemed impossible.
And yet, he danced with ease, he sang like he was the male version of Beyonce and owned the world.
He made me believe that if I could just touch him one time, my life would be changed.
He made me believe it.
Whatever it was.
The character he was playing? Saint? It would be easy to fall in love with him rather than Zane, the man behind it.
Because Zane was normal, Zane had normal fears, normal reactions, but Saint? He was completely untouchable.
And yet at the same time, to every woman in that room? Obtainable.
Dani’s eyes went wide when Alec and Demetri joined him in this crazy chorus dance sequence thing. “I’m pretty sure I’d kill Linc if I saw him on stage like that.”
I tried not to be offended. “Why?”
She stared at the guys then back at me then back at the guys. “Actors sell a different person. Singers sell an enhanced version of themselves. He may be Zane to you, but he will still always be Saint. Alec and Demetri are great guys, but they are still extremely…rough around the edges, in all the best ways. I adore them, I’m just saying. Singers always claim acting and performing are the same. She shook her head. “But I beg to differ, because when Linc acts he doesn’t own the crowds, not like this, this is magic, and I can’t imagine the toll it must take mentally, to do something like this every single day.”
I didn’t trust myself to speak, at least not right away. When I did, I could barely squeeze the words out. “A lot.”
“What?” She asked.
“The toll. It’s a lot. It strips them, makes them inhuman, objects.”
She lowered her head then wrapped an arm around me. “Sorry, that was rude of me, I’m not trying to compare evils or anything here, both play pretend, but both come home. That’s the important part.”
“Home,” I repeated as memories of Zane’s words hit me in the head like a slap in the face.
I don’t have one of those.
But he did now, right? With me?
The breath backed up in my lungs. What, with me and my parents?
Seriously?
If my father saw us in bed together, Zane would end up on our wall. And my mom? Right, I can just imagine her leaving marshmallows under his pillow and buying him Lucky Charms because according to her it was the same thing.
Zane would scream blasphemy.
A fight would break out.
Nope, definitely no home there.
Was home with me?
And if it was, what did that mean?
The song ended, scaring the crap out of me as I jolted back to the present and watched in smug satisfaction as Zane hopped off stage, and strode toward me. The crowd of needy extras parted.
His muscled body swayed through the bodies of women.
And then he was pulling me into his arms, twirling me around and biting my neck with his fake teeth. “How’s that for your vampire fantasies?”
“Wow, it’s everything I ever thought it would be.”
A girl next to us fainted.
A paramedic was called.
“Hmm, too much?” he whispered in my ear.
“Clearly.”
He grabbed my hand and tugged me through the gathering crowd around the paramedics, through long lines of costumes, and finally to the back of the loud, dark room.
In two seconds, my hands were on his jeans ripping them down to his knees while he lifted my skirt above my hips.
This was getting ridiculous.
We were in public.
His blue and white eyes looked crazed, as his hands shook against my skin.
“Need you.” His voice was no longer commanding, but a soft whimper.
“Where are your marshmallows?” I asked in a trembling voice.
His tongue snuck out across my neck as he whispered, “I replaced them with something sweeter.”
He placed his hand against the wall above my head just as I reached for him.
Our bodies joined.
And somewhere in the back of my mind, I wondered.
If he’d just traded one addiction to another.
But not really dealt with the underlying issue.
The need to feel safe.
Chapter Thirty-Three
Zane
I HAD A HEADACHE.
That was the first thing I thought when I jumped off stage and made my way through the crowd.
The second thing?
I didn’t want a marshmallow.
Stupid that my thoughts came in that order, but my normally twitchy sweaty fingers didn’t shove themselves into my jeans pocket in search of comfort.
My eyes searched for her.
But the crowd was stifling, nearly impossible to get through, and I knew I needed to kiss her, if I could just kiss her, the headache would go away, the nightmare would stop, and we’d celebrate recording the last two songs of the album.
Together.
After one kiss.
Okay, maybe two.
But the minute I touched her, spoke to her, bit her neck, I needed more, wanted more, the screams were making it worse, the heat.
In an effort to get her away from everything.
I’d pinned her to the wall.
And just as I opened my mouth to confess—the headache, the possible meaning behind it—she pulled my jeans down.
I should have pushed her away, confessed before I gave her one more piece of myself, before I took another from her, instead I let it happen.
Because I told myself that maybe, being with her, would make it go away, the stress, the pounding.
But four hours later, while in the studio, it was almost impossible to stare at the piano keys without my vision going blurry.
“Everything okay in there?” Will said through the com.
“Yup,” I lied. “Just tired.”
“I know, let’s just lay this track and you can finish tomorrow.”
“Right.” I swallowed the fear in my throat and rushed through the song, putting as much of myself into it as I could before my shaking hands braced the piano bench in an effort to steady myself.
“Perfect.” Will walked in and gave a slow clap of approval. “Now, one more track, and you’re done. How’s it feel?”
I saw two of him.
/>
It was just a migraine.
Never mind that I’d only had two in my life.
One after the concussion.
And now.
“I think,” I whispered as fear snaked around my throat. “That you need to take me to the hospital.”
Will’s smile froze. “Zane? What’s wrong?”
“My head.” I tried to stand, bracing myself against the piano for balance. “I have a headache.”
“Shit.” Will hoisted me to my feet with one arm and then immediately got on the phone.
“No.” I shook my head. “No ambulance, it’s fine it’s—”
My vision blurred again.
“Yes, I need an ambulance sent to C Street Studio one-twenty-eight. Possible migraine, yes he’s at high risk for an aneurysm… No, I’m not sure, he hasn’t seen his specialist in six months. Was supposed to be on watch…no, no, no. Zane, can you remember your birthday?”
I glared at both Will and Will. “I’m dizzy, not stupid.”
“Yeah, he’s coherent.” Will rolled his eyes.
The sound of sirens blared in the distance as we slowly walked outside the studio.
And came face to face with about one hundred reporters.
All with newspapers being shoved in my face. “Zane Saint Andrews gives up virginity to local girl.”
It took a while to read.
But once I did.
I lost my shit.
And tried to charge the crowd, only realizing that my legs wouldn’t cooperate as a cold sweat ran down my arms.
“Zane!” Will yelled as the sound of sirens closed in. “Zane! Stay with me man, stay with me.”
It was the last thing I heard before a numbing sensation took over and my entire life went black.
Chapter Thirty-Four
Fallon
I PACED THE FLOOR of the penthouse suite and tried desperately not to clean up. I mean I only worked five hours that week, but it still felt habitual, to clean up the rooms rather than stay in them.
Finally, out of boredom, I started folding the towels and then sat and turned on the TV.
Zane still wasn’t back.
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