Chapter 11

CHAPTER 11

EMILY

Backstage in Chicago, I leaned against a partition, drinking a soda and watching the show. Tristan was performing one of Delirious Jones's most popular songs, "Maybe You."

This was always the song where I noticed if his voice was faltering, because it required him to really belt out certain notes. My heart was in my throat as I listened closely, praying his voice wasn't getting worse. I almost hoped I'd lose my keen sense of hearing so I could tell him he sounded better and mean it, because he'd surely ask me. So far, though, he sounded good. Relief washed over me.

Then I hiccupped.

Goddamn it.

Hiccup.

I should've known not to drink it so fast. Every time, this happened.

I focused on my hiccups a moment, and evidently the song ended. Everything from there happened so fast.

I heard him calling my name.

Tristan calling my name.

Tristan calling me to the stage.

My eyes widened.

No. No. No.

I moved farther into the backstage area, but someone from the crew pushed me to the stage. Tristan waved me over, but I couldn't move. He waved me over again. One foot in front of the other, I made my way slowly over to him.

Then I was right next to him, under the blinding lights.

Tristan asked me a question, one I was too shocked to comprehend-I had no idea what it was. Then he put the mic in my face for an answer. A giant hiccup escaped into the microphone.

The crowd erupted in laughter.

And I was living my biggest nightmare.

I gave the peace sign and ran off stage.

"What the hell just happened?" someone called as I returned backstage.

Fuck if I know.

***

Later that night, I was safely back in my hotel room with no intention of leaving until morning. Then the tour manager sent me the most bizarre text.

Stephen: I can't believe I'm saying this, but Tristan needs you to get him bed pads.

Emily: Bed pads?

Stephen: Yeah, like pee pads that go on the bed so people with incontinence don't leak onto the mattress.

What the?

Emily: Why the heck does he need those?

Stephen: He told me not to ask.

Emily: Are you kidding?

Stephen: Afraid not.

"What the hell?" I said aloud.

Layla stopped pouring her glass of wine. "What?"

"You don't want to know," I said as I found my jacket.

That son of a bitch. Was this some kind of a joke? And if I was really mad about it, why did I have a goofy smile plastered on my face right now?

I practically ran out of the hotel and hopped in the rental car, headed to the nearest pharmacy. I blew in and out of there as fast as humanly possible, because who wants to be seen buying bed pads?

When I returned, I used the passcode to enter the elevator that led to Tristan's penthouse suite.

When the doors opened, he was standing with a shit-eating grin on his face, his arms crossed like he'd been just waiting for me to appear.

"Urine pads, huh?" I threw the large plastic package at his head, prompting him to duck.

"How else was I gonna get you here?"

"You could've picked something a little less embarrassing."

"What would be the fun in that? Plus, I figured I hadn't quite embarrassed you enough tonight already."

I stared at him incredulously.

Then his expression softened. "I'm so fucking sorry about earlier, Emily. I never imagined you'd have the damn hiccups when I put that mic in your face."

"Why would you call me onstage anyway?"

"I've been calling members of the crew onstage every night. You know that. To thank them for their hard work. It's a little tour ritual. Then, I ask a funny question for each person to answer. Tonight was your turn. It wasn't meant to pick on you or anything."

I placed my hands on my hips. "You could've given me some warning."

"There's no fun in that. The best part is seeing the surprise on people's faces when I do it. I didn't know you were going to swallow a frog right before I called you out. You can't blame me for that."

I had to laugh. "I was so in shock I didn't process what you asked me. I still have no clue what the question was."

"You didn't hear the question, or you pretended not to?"

"I didn't hear it!"

"I asked you the most embarrassing thing that's ever happened to you."

"Ironically, it was that hiccup."

"Well, there you go. You answered correctly, into the mic." He laughed. "See? No one's going to be talking about my shitty voice after that. Thank you for stealing the show."

"I thought you sounded better tonight," I said, relieved to be able to say that and mean it.

His face lit up like a Christmas tree. "Really? Don't bullshit me, Emily. I can handle the truth."

"I wouldn't. I don't have any reason to lie."

"Well, thank fuck someone around here is honest with me. I didn't say a freaking word all morning and afternoon, hoping that resting my voice would help. Seems it did."

"If shutting up helps, you shouldn't be talking to me right now."

"Okay, fair point. But talking to you is my reward for a job well done. I can be quiet in my sleep tonight and all day tomorrow."

I shook my head. "You're too much."

God, he looked so freaking hot right now. His dark hair was damp from the shower, falling over his forehead. He wore a sleeveless shirt that really showcased his muscles and tats. I would never tire of looking at all of his ink. My body tingled from being in close proximity to him. Goose bumps peppered my skin.

"I know it's late. But hang out with me for a while."

"I can't."

"Why?" He flashed me a wicked grin. "The pee pads would be for nothing, then."

"Next time, please make it anything besides pee pads."

"You called me out on my fake allergies. Since you know I just order stuff as an excuse to see you, I figured I'd have a little fun with it." He batted his lashes, which were dangerously long for a man. "Come on. I've got good food for us."

"It's not appropriate for me to be hanging out with you, given my job here."

"Says who? I make the rules, if you hadn't noticed."

I looked out the window toward the skyline, feeling myself cave. "I don't know…"

"I just want your company. Nothing more, Emily." He made an X over his contoured chest. "Cross my heart and hope to die."

A whiff of his amazing scent floated in the air toward me. I wanted to spend time with him. That was the problem. What had started as general curiosity about this man had turned into nothing short of an obsession I could never admit to. It was far more than a crush at this point. I'd stolen a music magazine someone had on the bus so I could look, up close and personal, at the photo of Tristan's shirtless chest. I wanted to memorize all of his body art.

So, yeah, I definitely needed to leave. But instead, I asked, "What do you have to eat?"

"It's not as good as Abdul's, but Stephen went out and got me Middle Eastern tonight."

"Is there falafel?"

"Maybe." He winked.

I walked into the penthouse suite, marveling at the way the city lights illuminated the room. I stopped in front of the window and noticed his powerful stance behind me in the reflection on the glass. Now my body had gone from tingling to on fire. The hairs on my arms stiffened as he spoke softly behind me.

"Let's eat."

Tristan arranged the food on the counter. We each made a plateful and took it over to the living area, where we ate casually, sitting across from each other on two different couches. My nerves started to calm.

The peace was short-lived, though. In the middle of our meal, the elevator doors opened and in walked a beautiful woman with legs for miles and long, bright blue hair. Her slender arms were covered in tattoos, and her fake breasts spilled out of a black leather corset.

What the hell? I put my plate down and sat up a bit, feeling my throat about to close.

Tristan's brows drew in as he stood. "Can I help you?"

"Atticus said you sent for me."

"I'm sorry. He lied. I didn't send for anyone…"

"Oh." She looked down at her feet. "Sorry."

"No worries. Have a good night."

She turned around and got right back into the elevator.

An awkward silence hung in the air as Tristan sat back down.

"Figures that would happen when you were here." He scrubbed a hand over his face. "I've been trying to convince you I'm not with a woman every damn night, yet somehow they keep magically appearing."

"I guess you weren't lying when you told me he sends you girls."

"Yeah. I told him to stop, but he doesn't listen."

"Why stop?" I asked scornfully before taking a long sip of water to squelch my unfounded jealousy.

"Because I don't like those kinds of surprises anymore."

My cheeks burned. "If I wasn't here, would you have invited her to stay?" I braced for his answer.

"Not tonight. But I think the real question is…" He tilted his head. "How different would it be for me if you weren't on this tour? Your presence has been a good distraction. So I think it's safe to say my headspace might be entirely different if I didn't have you to look forward to. The person I am without you on tour might have been more likely to let her in, yeah-out of sheer boredom."

"Are you implying that your lack of interest in groupies is because of me?"

"I look forward to seeing you. My focus has therefore shifted. It's not even a sexual thing, but-"

"Oh, right. I'm no Megan Fox," I interrupted.

"I never said that."

"What you did say was that you don't have friends who are women, yet you insist you're not interested in me sexually. That's a direct contradiction. So needless to say, I'm a little confused as to what the deal is here."

His eyes seared into mine. "You're the realest human I've met since I got caught up in fame. And since that night you trusted me enough to confess what happened with your mother's boyfriend, I've wanted to know more about you. But I haven't wanted to overwhelm you with questions. I'm trying to get my fix in subtle installments. And, yeah, maybe you're my first female friend." He winked.

"Is it, like, morbid curiosity you have about me?"

"Not morbid. But curiosity? Yes. Absolutely."

I was supposed to be the curious one in this equation. How had this turned into a two-way street? I didn't know, except to say that no one made me feel the way Tristan did when he looked at me-like I always had every ounce of his attention. He'd made it clear with his actions that he was interested in me. Besides, he could have any woman he wanted sexually, so it couldn't have been only about attraction. I wasn't used to this kind of attention. And, I had to say, as much as I wanted to resist, it felt good.

"What else do you want to know, Tristan?"

He made himself more comfortable on the couch. "Start from the beginning. Tell me about your childhood."

"There's not much to tell except that my parents broke up when I was three. My brother Max is a few years older than me and lives with his girlfriend in Oklahoma now. So I don't see him much. Anyway, my parents were never married. But my dad left us when I was so young that I don't even remember him."

"Where is he today?"

"Probably still in Missouri somewhere. But I'm actually not sure. Sad, huh?"

"For him , yeah. He doesn't know what he's missing."

"I don't think he cares..." I chuckled angrily. "And sadly, neither do I anymore." I thought back to a dream I'd once had. "Once when I was around thirteen, I had a vivid dream that my father showed up at my door with an Easter basket and a live bunny. The basket was filled with pink flowers. Peonies. The bunny was just sitting in this huge pile of pink peonies. It was the cutest little light brown bunny with floppy ears. He handed me the basket and asked if he could make up for some of the time we'd lost. The dream ended before I could give him an answer. I remember waking up and feeling so sad-not because of my father, but because the little bunny wasn't real. Neither were the peonies. That's when I realized I really had given up on him."

"Wow." Tristan nodded. "That's so interesting. Once someone disappoints you that badly, they don't deserve anything more than to be overshadowed by a rabbit and peonies."

"Yeah," I muttered. "Exactly."

"So it was just you, your brother, and your mom?"

"Yup. Well, us and her many boyfriends. I got so used to the changeover every couple of years that I almost came to expect it. We all know how that last one ended, though..." I shivered. "Ironically, there hasn't been anyone serious since him."

"She never dated again?"

"As far as I know, she hasn't. At least no one serious. I think that situation scared her off men."

"That guy...did he beat your mother more than that one day?"

"Yeah. He was the worst of the bunch. I guess you could say she saved the best for last." I looked away. "During those years, I was so wrapped up in high school, I turned a blind eye to it for a while. I felt guilty leaving her alone with him, though. But she claimed to love him. Things just kept getting worse. He started getting real paranoid, accusing her of cheating on him." I tightened my fists. "Then the day I came home and found him choking her…" I cringed, thinking back to that nightmare. "I had to act fast." My breath shook.

"It's okay." He reached his arm out. "You don't have to go into the details."

"You know how the story ends anyway, right?" I let out a long exhale.

Tristan nodded and just looked at me for a moment. "What was life like after that?"

"I lived with a lot of guilt. Even if he deserved what happened, it's hard to live with something like what I did. I began to self-sabotage a lot of the good things in my life. I knew I needed a massive change in scenery, so it became my mission to get the hell out of Shady Hills."

"What kind of self-sabotage?"

"I had a boyfriend at the time that happened." I swallowed hard.

"What happened with him?"

Am I really going here, too? "Jacob was everything to me. We were friends long before we ever dated. The dating part was a small chapter of our overall story. We'd been friends almost our whole lives, actually-since we were really young. In high school, we tried our hand at dating. I never wanted to hurt him, but after the incident with my mother's boyfriend, I fell into a dark place. I felt like I didn't deserve Jacob. I wanted to spare him the grief of dealing with me while I worked through my issues. I also knew I needed to leave town, and he was a year younger than me. He had his entire senior year left while I was going to college in Nevada." I shook my head. "So I ended things with him-for his own good. I thought we were too young to be that serious, too. I didn't want to ruin our friendship by staying romantically involved."

"You regret it?"

"Only the part where I broke his heart."

Tristan blinked. "You're not still in love with him?"

His question hurt my chest. If there was one thing I knew for sure... "I will always love him."

"Where is he now?"

I shut my eyes, willing the pain away. "He's dead."