I hadn't realized until then that she would think I wouldn't want to kiss her. I wanted to kiss her a million times, and I would as soon as she felt better. Instead, I just held her hand tighter.
Even if sex was off the agenda, I needed to think of ways to let her know I still desired her. I wasn't sure how, but that was the most important thing right now.
"Do you want to take a trip when we get out of hospital?" I asked her, hoping that making plans for the future would cheer her up.
"Where?" she asked. "I'm not sure there are many places I want to go. A tropical resort is out of the question, and anywhere bustling with people."
"We could go to the countryside. Just you and me, and nothing but birds and wildlife around us. It'd be peaceful."
She nodded. "That might be nice."
The main thing I wanted her to understand was that we did have a future. Nothing had changed.
She hadn't mentioned anything about me returning to the tour for a while, and I hoped that meant she'd grown accustomed to the idea.
I wasn't sure if I should kiss her before I left. I wanted to, but if I kissed her, I wasn't sure I'd ever stop.
It only took one look at Fiona's face for me to know I could never leave here without kissing her.
Fiona
I WANTED MATTY TO KISS me goodbye, but I wasn't sure if he would. Those physical touches meant so much to me, but I understood why he wanted to hold off. When he stood up to leave, I moved over to make room for him beside me on the bed. He gave me a questioning look but sat down facing me.
"We have to be careful," he whispered.
I nodded, but I had much more in mind than being careful. I wanted to do something nice for Matty. I wanted to give him some pleasure to repay him for all the time he spent with me, and I wanted to give myself the joy of watching him. There wasn't much I could do in this state, but I'd been thinking about it, and I wasn't completely useless.
He moved closer, and I put my hand on his leg. At least I still had one good arm. I put my other arm over his shoulder, reveling in the smell of his body and the warmth of him. As much as he said we had to take care, I couldn't resist him.
I moved a little closer to him. So far, nothing hurt.
As his lips met mine, I moved my hand up his thigh. He tried to push it away, but I held it there. I wanted to touch him. I wanted to know that I could still arouse him.
"No, Fiona," he whispered.
"Let me," I replied.
No matter what his words said, that gleam of passion in his eyes told me that he didn't want me to stop.
I moved my hand higher until I felt his cock through the fabric of his pants. It didn't take me long to get him hard. My entire body tingled at the feeling of his hard cock. I kept moving my hand against him.
"We shouldn't," he said. "What if the doctor comes in again?"
"He won't. Not at this time of night."
I knew the routine by now. No one would disturb us, not until the nurse came around in an hour or so. We had the curtain drawn around the bed and the door closed.
I moved my hand to undo his fly. It took some effort, doing it one-handed, but I managed.
Matt sucked in his breath. That sound did amazing things to my body. Just knowing I wasn't useless made me happy.
I slipped my hand inside his fly, my fingers connecting with the hardness of his shaft. Matt couldn't stay still. He shuffled down, lowering his pants to give me easier access.
His lips caressed mine as I moved my hand lightly down the length of his cock. I tickled my fingers over his balls, then gripped him harder.
Something clanged in the hallway and he jolted, but I didn't weaken my grip on him.
"It's okay," I whispered.
I kept moving my hand, pumping him, watching the pleasure on his face. He leaned back, consumed with the moment. As the precum leaked from his tip, I used my thumb to rub him.
He made little noises of pleasure. I ached to do more than this, to have him touch me while I touched him. To mount his hard cock and ride him.
As I moved my hand faster, twinges of pain went down my side from the movement. I couldn't stop. Matty deserved this pleasure. It was the one small thing I could do for him. I ignored the pain.
I moved faster, wanting to bring him to climax.
Those happy grunts got louder. He was beyond caring if anyone heard us. He moved his hips in time with my hand. I knew he was about to blow. I could see it on his face and in the tension of his body.
I stroked him faster, my breathing matching his.
Finally, he gave a loud grunt, then leaned forward to grab some tissues off the table beside me.
Without even doing up his pants, he slumped on the pillow beside me.
"My God, Fi. I was not expecting that."
I grinned. For a moment there, things had been normal between us. I'd been more than just some freak with scars all over my face. I wanted to hold on to that feeling forever.
Then I hugged my belly, rubbing my side a little. The pain continued even now I rested.
Matty did up his pants and then rang the buzzer for the nurse.
Any feeling of normality completely disappeared.
Matty
I HAD BREAKFAST WITH Mom and Dad before leaving for the hospital.
"How was Fiona last night?" Mom asked.
"Good," I said but ducked my head, hoping she wouldn't read the expression on my face.
I could hardly tell my mother that Fiona had given me a hand job in her hospital bed. The illicitness of that had made it all the hotter. Even thinking about it now made my cock twitch. I'd have been happy to hold off on any of the sex stuff until Fiona recovered, but if she wanted to fool around, that was totally fine with me. I'd follow her lead and hope she didn't try to do more than she should.
"I've made you some lunch to take to the hospital," Mom said.
I looked at the containers she had. A packed lunch? I didn't need her to do that for me, but I was sure it would be a heap better than anything I could buy at the hospital.
I was already running late to see Fiona when I got a call from Ash. He probably wanted an update.
"Matt, do you have a minute?" he asked. "We need to talk."
This sounded serious. I told him to hold off for a moment and went back to my own room.
"I know this is the worst possible timing for you," he said.
I really didn't like the sound of that, and I knew Ash wouldn't call right now unless it was something big.
"We've got a problem," he said. "Remember that song we 'wrote'? That stupid 'Candy-Colored Kitten' song?"
Sure, I remembered it. Our management had wanted Ash and me to write a song for our boy band, StarX, but the two of us had no experience with songwriting. We were about sixteen years old and didn't have even the slightest idea where to start. After about a thousand attempts, they'd given up on us. Instead of actually teaching us what to do, they brought in a professional songwriter to write it, then slapped our names on it.
Even though I'd tried to forget it, I'd be in a cab or a shop somewhere, and that song would hit me like a slap in the face.
"Yep," I responded, wondering what the hell would be so serious about "Candy-Colored Kitten".
"The guy who wrote it is suing us."
My stomach dropped. I still didn't quite get what the issue was, but this didn't sound good.
"Huh? But that was years ago. And didn't our management take care of all that?"
"I have no idea, mate. They said they did, but they could've told us anything back then. We were stupid kids. This joker says he's going public. I reckon he's just been biding his time. Exposing something like that when we were washed-up ex-boy band has-beens would've done nothing, but now the pair of us have legit rock careers, and this will do a shit-ton of damage."
Ash sighed. It'd do more damage to him than to me, since he was the one in the limelight. I just played guitar.
I paced around the room. This was a problem I want
ed to disappear, and it was a problem our ex-management should be dealing with, but if they'd screwed up in the first place, Ash and I would be better off handling it ourselves.
"Pay him off," I said. "Whatever he wants, give it to him. Neither of us has time to piss around with something like this."
"That's what I'm thinking. Because, Matty, there's a lot more at stake here than just our reputations, don't you see?"
"Huh?"
I didn't understand what Ash hinted at.
"You can't be in the media spotlight right now. Not with Fi in hospital. You'll have reporters on your ass day and night, and once those reporters know you're going to the hospital, they'll be snooping around to find out why."
"Oh, fuck." The realization hit me like a punch in the gut.
If pictures of Fiona got out right now, it'd destroy her. And you could bet your life that if the press found out about the accident, there'd be pictures. I'd been way too lax, walking around the hospital, chatting with fans in the cafe. At the very least, I could put on a baseball cap and some sunglasses so I wouldn't stand out so much.
I balanced the phone on my shoulder while I rummaged through my bags looking for a cap.
"I'm getting my lawyer to talk to this guy. Hopefully, he just wants a bundle of cash, but I thought I should let you know in case things don't go to plan. It's shitty. It's really shitty. Right now, you should be focused on Fiona and nothing else."
When I got off the phone, I spent a lot of time pacing the room.
Like Ash said, the guy probably just wanted cash. Most people doing shit like that had their hands out, but some people could be vindictive. They didn't care about the money; they wanted to tear you down.
Ash had been going from strength to strength as a rocker, and some people hated him for that. They wanted to keep him in his pop singer box. I didn't get the same kind of pushback because I wasn't a front man. Occasionally, people would ask me if I was the guy from the boy band, but then they'd get over it. Even if I was in one of the most successful bands in the world, I was just the guitarist. Damo was the real star. But even that got me some shit.
When you have the "ex-boy band member" label on you, you're meant to spend your days sitting around mourning your lost youth. People don't just passively hate; they actively seek out ways to make you suffer, especially if you don't crash and burn.
I thought about calling Damo and letting him know about this. After all, if this all came out, it'd affect the Freaks too.
Damn it. "Candy-Colored Kitten". What a shit song. If it weren't for all the other issues, I'd be happy for the world to know I'd had nothing to do with writing it. This guy had to have no shame if he wanted that exposed to the world. Sure, it'd been a number one hit, but it was possibly the most cringeworthy song ever written. Jesus, they'd made us wear kitten ears for the video clip, and I could still remember the stupid dance with cat hands.
Who'd have thought that would come back to bite us in the ass like this?
I had to shake those thoughts out of my head, though, and put on a smile. I didn't want Fiona getting the slightest hint that something was wrong. It'd probably blow over, anyway.
I kept pacing the room. Until I could face her with a smile, it was better to stay away.
Fiona
WHEN DR. ROCHE CAME to change the dressings on my face, he decided some of the bandages could be removed. I wasn't sure how I felt about that. The bandages might be ugly and uncomfortable, but who knew what was going on underneath them.
"Do I want to see?" I asked after he'd removed them.
"It's not so bad. A bit of scar tissue, but you're healing nicely. The swelling's gone down quite a bit."
I hadn't looked in a mirror since that first time seeing myself. The sight of my face had freaked me out so much that I'd even covered the mirror in my bathroom so I couldn't see myself when I brushed my teeth.
The doctor got me a hand mirror. I hesitated before looking at myself.
"Remember, a lot of the scarring will fade over time. And once you're back to full health, we can discuss options for minimizing that. Don't think of anything you see now as being the way your face will look forever."
His words didn't reassure me. Even if I'd look better in the future, I didn't want to look horrible now.
I slowly raised the mirror, then set it back down without looking.
"You don't have to look if you don't want to," the doctor said. "I'll take the mirror away."
He tried to take it from me, but I snatched it away. I needed to see what I looked like before I could face anyone else. I just needed some time.
I took a deep breath, then raised the mirror to look at myself. Red, angry marks crossed my cheek. He'd uncovered the left side, which made me think the right side was even more damaged.
"Can I put on makeup?" I asked.
He shook his head. "Not yet. The pigment can make the scarring look worse. Maybe in a week or so, but you might need a silicon primer to help with healing beneath the makeup."
I nodded. I definitely didn't want to make things worse.
"So, about the sex?" I asked him.
"Ah. I was going to send someone to talk to you about that. At the moment, you shouldn't move too much, or it can undo the healing. But maybe there are ways... They'll discuss that with you. I've got to get going. Other patients to see."
I chucked as he left. That guy was so uncomfortable about sex.
After I had my breakfast, I waited for Matty. He was late. Maybe he needed to do stuff with his parents, but I'd come to rely on his visits.
While I waited, a woman came in to see me.
"I'm Stacy," she said. "Officially, I'm Dr. Marengo, but Stacy is much better. I've come to talk to you about your vagina."
I stifled a laugh. Already, I liked Stacy.
"I keep asking how long until I can have sex, and no one will give me an answer."
Stacy sat down on the chair beside me. "It's hard to know in these cases. We don't want to give you a fixed time frame, because the body heals at different rates. You have a lot of healing to do. But on the bright side, the fact that you're asking is good. It means you're not dead yet."
She laughed until I had to laugh too.
"Seriously, when someone's in a lot of pain, the last thing they feel like doing is shagging," she said. "So, you must be starting to feel better."
I wondered if shagging was an official medical term.
Stacy smiled. "Anything not too energetic is okay. The trouble is, once you get aroused, it's hard to be... well, not energetic. That rush of lust can overrule any signs of pain in your body, and the next thing you know, you're thrusting and humping to the point of setting the healing process back."
"So, tell me what I can do."
She sucked on her bottom lip and looked up at the ceiling. "Oral should be okay so long as you're in a comfortable position for it. It's not the act itself, but the way you hold your body. Like, this is no good." She made a gesture like hunching over to suck cock. "Because you'd be putting pressure on the damaged areas. And you can't lie on your stomach. Maybe if you're sitting and he's standing, that would work. But you need to stop if anything twinges or hurts."
She twisted her hands into various shapes as though they were in sex positions, then shook her head.
"It's tough," she said. "When you get near orgasm, that's the danger zone. Maybe I should talk to your partner about ways to handle that, because you obviously want to get shagging, and you'll turn into a ball of sexual tension if you don't do something about it. Exploding because you can't come isn't exactly good for your recovery, either."
I laughed, totally understanding what she meant.
"Don't laugh too hard," she said. "That'll wreck your insides too."
"So, blow jobs and hand jobs are okay," I said. "But no penetration and no orgasms for me?"
"That's pretty much it for now. Sorry."
She gave me her number and told me to get Matt to call her when he came in. Where
the hell was he?
Before he arrived, Nurse Lucy came in. "Tonight's the night," she said. "Makeover night."
I'd completely forgotten about that, but it wasn't like I had a lot else going on.
"What time does your shift finish?" I asked her.
"Six," she said.
We got that organized, and still no Matty. My phone had been wrecked in the crash, and I'd meant to ask Matty to get me a replacement, but that hadn't been a big deal when I was in ICU. Now that I had my own room, though, I missed having a phone.
Maybe he'd gone out sightseeing with his parents. That would be good for him, and he needed to spend time with them. I knew that, but deep down, I resented him for going out and having fun while I was stuck here with nothing to do.
It wasn't like I could go off having fun adventures. I tried to be reasonable, but he hadn't even said anything about being late today.
What if he didn't visit at all? It must get incredibly boring for him, hanging out here with me, holding hands even if there was the occasional hand job thrown in. Even if he said he didn't feel any differently about me, I wondered. There would never be a time when I wasn't insecure about how I looked, and even if it was damned unreasonable, I wanted Matty here to reassure me.
Matty
I FINALLY MADE IT TO the hospital. "Sorry I'm late," I said.
"That's okay. I'm sure you had things to do," Fiona said. "I can't hog all your time."
I wanted to tell her it wasn't like that, but without going into details, I couldn't really reassure her.
"You've had your bandages removed," I said, wanting to change the subject. "Wow, that must feel more comfortable."
She nodded but turned her face away from me. "It looks vile," she said.
"It's a scar. It's not anything to be ashamed of, Fi." I moved to her and took her hand. "If you don't want me to look, I won't, but a scar on your face isn't going to change my feelings for you. If I let something like that influence my feelings, I would've been wrong to say 'I love you' in the first place, because that wouldn't be anything like love."
Rock Mayhem: 8 Complete Rock Star Romance Novels Page 79