Still Not Over You(63)
I haven’t lost her, and I still have a chance to save us after I un-fuck everything.
I don’t know how I keep being so stupid with this woman, and so lucky she’ll still be here for me. Drive all this fucking way for me, risking the demons I’m wrestling with.
Risking the demon I am.
I love her.
After tonight, I swear I’m going to show it every way a man possibly can.
I tear back when I can’t breathe, when I can’t hear for the pounding of my bloodstream, hot and wild as whitewater rapids with the need she ignites in me.
“Back soon, babe. Stay here,” I whisper, with one last brush of lips, then make myself tear away and walk from the room before I’m tempted to say fuck the concert, fuck Milah, fuck Dallas, fuck everything. I just want to run away with Kenna somewhere safe.
Too bad that's not a real option.
I have to close down. Have to be cold. Have to be the soldier I used to be to get through this.
First point of order: tell James and Skylar not to let anyone in or out of this room but me and Milah.
Second point of order: find Dallas.
I switch to channel eight on my radio. Dallas' men are on channel four, liaising with mine, but I always keep my own crew on a private channel so we can talk if we need to.
Call it paranoia, or good planning. I call it the smartest thing I could've done, when with a few murmurs I’ve got all my guys on high alert, slowly filtering out to monitor Dallas' men.
*
Half an hour later, we’re on the verge of Milah going on stage, and my crew hasn’t spotted anything out of the ordinary.
Dallas is nowhere in sight.
Milah’s fretting in the wings, pacing with high-energy pre-show nerves, her entire body a blinding mess of glitter and her rhinestone-studded pink boots flashing and clicking as she paces. The woman must've done a thousand shows in her life since she blew up the charts, and it's amazing to see her so freaked out.
“Will you hold still?” I growl.
“I can’t,” she hisses. “This is my biggest show ever. Make or break. Have you ever sung in front of ten thousand people? The President of Transylvania is watching – he's a huge fucking fan!”
I bite my tongue, deciding not to tell her Transylvania isn't a real country. More like part of Hungary or Romania or wherever the fuck. Skylar would know since her grandma's from there.
My train of thought running off the track tells me it's not just Milah's nerves.
“It’s too many people,” I say coldly, peering around the curtain at the overflow arena crowd. Any one of them could be working for Dallas, sights set on Milah. “We should call this off.”
“Now?” she halts in her tracks, staring at me. “Are you crazy?”
“I’m worried. Got a bad feeling about this, and it’s my job to protect you.”
“Then do your job and stop letting your hormones go to your head, idiot,” she bites off, folding her arms over her chest and looking at me with a huff. “It’s not hard to tell what's going on: your dick’s pointing you back toward C-cup. Get your brain on me long enough to finish this show, and then you can go home and play house with your little Plain Jane.”
I grind my teeth, but I can’t say anything else. She’s the client. She’s the boss.
“Fine,” I mutter. “But first sign of trouble, you hit the deck. Get low, stay low, and wait for me to come for you. No arguing, Milah. We're talking about your life.”
“Aw, please. Nothing’s going to happen,” she says with a flippant wave, then makes an odd little gulp sound and presses a hand over her stomach. “Except maybe me puking from nerves. Silly, right? I've done this forever.”
But then the announcer is live, voice echoing over the arena, lights going up and sparks showering over the stage. Milah jumps at her name being called, then flashes me the first real smile she’s ever shown, breathless and anxious and showing how young she really is.
“Wish me luck,” she says, then flits her way out to the stage.
“Break a leg,” I mutter reluctantly.
Just hope to hell that doesn’t end up being literal.
17
Curtain Call (Kenna)
God, I’m glad Milah’s gone.
Even if she did that little about-face and showed there’s an actual heart beating underneath her silicone chesticles, the half-hour we spent tensely circling each other in her dressing room wasn’t exactly the most pleasant.
Thank God for Skylar. That strange, small, statue of a woman kept us in line better than a sheepdog with a few strategic looks. The kind that promised fire, brimstone, and somehow, ninjas, if we got into it again.
We needed it, too. Especially after Landon kissed me in front of Milah – and especially after she claimed he loves me, leaving me locked up inside my own spinning head and not really in the mood for her barbed attempts at small talk.
I really need Landon to make up his freaking mind.
If he keeps jerking me around like this, I’m bound to get whiplash.
Right now, though, all I’m in danger of getting is sleepy.
I never thought a high-stakes chase to find Landon would end in me sitting useless and idle in an empty dressing room, drumming my nails glumly, watching the excited crowd on the wall-mounted TV.