Chapter 7: Rock Stars Make You Sweat

Kat

Riley completely disregards my request not to go to any trouble. By the time I get out of a long shower and put on a robe, he's back with four Target shopping bags.

"Sorry, only place open," he says apologetically. "Thank god I sent Tamara—she's the band's stylist— out in time—could have been worse." He walks right in and proceeds to hang three days' worth of clothes in the closet. He snips tags off yoga pants and tank tops and a pair of baby-doll pajamas and two bathing suits. He stacks shoe boxes on the dresser.

"Riley, why so much stuff? I told you—"

"I know what you told me, Miss Ballard. But my boss told me to make sure you had what you needed, in case you stay the weekend. They are playing the Benz tomorrow night, you know. The Fox was much too small of a venue for their fan-base here. The band just wanted to play there...hometown fantasy."

I nodded. I did know they had a second show.

He hands me a bag of lingerie, and bustles past me into the bathroom, dumping enough makeup and beauty products to fuel a cheerleading squad. I pull out a hot pink lacy bra from the bag.

"How in the hell do you know my bra size, Riley?"

"I don't, exactly. There should be a couple of sizes in the bag, but one does develop an eye for things." He looks frankly at my chest and then meets my eyes again and shrugs. "This ain't my first rodeo," he deadpans in an American accent.

"So you do this all the time for Trace." Of course he does.

Riley laughs. "That's not what I meant at all. I just meant, when you date in LA—and I do— you get exposed to a variety of...uhm...sizes."

"But you do handle this for Trace, right? Deal with all the girls at all the shows, clubs, in all the cities...back in LA, too, probably," I wave my hand.

His lips tighten, and he continues to snips tags.

"Sorry, I know you work for him. This is just weird, for me. I've known Trace my whole life. Being here like this...I don't know what this is." I gesture to the closet, filling up ridiculously fast.

He sighs. "To be honest, I'm not sure Trace knows, either. I will tell you, this isn't his...style."

"This is exactly his style. The bad boy caretaker thing? Very Trace. I'm sure the girls eat it up."

He gives me a strange look. "Well, I concede the point about the caretaker thing. There is that side of him, sure. But he doesn't roll that out to randoms.. If Trace brings a girl to the hotel after a show, she's usually pretty clear on what to expect in the early hours: breakfast and a limo ride home. No numbers exchanged."

"So he tells his groupies straight up he just wants sex from them? You think that makes him a good guy?"

He shrugs. "Makes him more honest than most in this industry. Sorry, can I just say...there's maybe not as many as you are thinking. And not too many women have seen the caretaker side, either. His mother, Mac, and..." he trails off.

"His girlfriend?" I say with a wry smile. "He mentioned one."

Riley snorted. "He was teasing you. He does not have a girlfriend, on that I can assure you. Look, Miss Ballard, I've spoken out of turn, here, only because Trace is a little frazzled and I don't think he's representing himself well this evening. But I like my job, and I keep it by being effecient, loyal and discreet. So...we should...change the subject."

I nod. I'm not sure I believe Riley about there not being a girl every night, but does it really matter? Obviously Trace has a life. It's not his fault I haven't been living mine to the fullest. Riley is now tearing open a phone charger package and plugging my phone in.

"Alarm set for 3?" he asks. I nod. "Room service is closed. Need any cash for the bar downstairs?" I shake my head. "Coffee order for the morning?"

"You're insane, you know that, right?"

He grins. "Nah. Working for Trace is actually one of the easier jobs I've had. It's not always touring, you know. In LA, I have a life, and this job pays quite well, so I get to enjoy it. All set then? I put my number in your phone. Call if you need anything. Call immediately if Trace has any confusion when you check on him."

I nod.

"Right, then." He sketches a salute and saunters out the door.

I pull on the yoga pants—they  are gray and covered in dusty pink nebula—and a soft, fluffy pullover and lay down to sleep. Two hours later, I'm lying in the dark, my thoughts alternating between a replay of tonight's highlights and an imaginary reel of my sister's life.

Trace had said West Coast. Is that where Ashlynn was living now? What was she doing? Did she have a job? How was she surviving? My parents and I hadn't heard from her in over two years. One day she just took off. She came home, after the first time, and then took off again, when she and my parents started to argue about her condition. Then it happened all over again. She didn't come home a third time. Occasionally, Ashlynn will send me a text to say she's okay, but she will never respond to my questions about where she is, or how she's living.

At first my parents hired a private investigator to look for her, but nothing came of it. I couldn't understand when they stopped looking for her. They said she had made her own choices, and she had to live with them.

I don't see it that way. None of what happened to Ashlynn was her fault. It was mine. After Ashlynn's accident, she just wasn't the same. She complained all the time that her head hurt. She said the medicines the doctor's prescribed made her a zombie. She was different, more reckless. She didn't care about any of the things she cared about before, except for her boyfriend Cam. But he couldn't stick with the new Ashlynn. The doctor's say head trauma sometimes causes personality changes. I didn't know what to think of the new Ashlynn. I'm not sure if pain, trauma, or drugs were driving her new personality.

Thoughts of Ashlynn's accident brought me back to Trace. A brief thought that his punch to the head might send him spiraling like Ashlynn flits through my mind, but I put it away. He didn't even black out, and he seems exactly like himself—or at least how he always was with me—flirtatious, yet mindful, a little bit chill, a little bit edgy, a lot of fun.

But god, he's super sexy now.

Thoughts of how sexy Trace is lead me to the memory of our car ride over, our physical flirting. I feel guilty, but the truth is pretty obvious—Trace and I can't keep our hands off each other. Except for the lobby and elevator, we've hardly gone more than few minutes without touching each other in some way. I should shut that down. I have a boyfriend, and this...thing with Trace is just like before...some kind of crazed interlude. He's in town til Sunday, and then he'll be gone. Do I really want to risk Colin for 36 hours with Trace?

It occurs to me that perhaps I have already sacrificed Colin. I did in fact, refuse to go home with him. Hadn't he said level up or game over? Do I even care? I run a hand over my bruised arm. Is Trace right about Colin or was him squeezing my arm in a panic just a freak thing?

I'm padding down the hotel corridor at 3am in bare feet before my alarm goes off. When I enter Trace's room, it's pitch dark. I pan the flashlight on my phone around and realize his room is not a room, it's a giant suite. The sitting area looks completely untouched—not at all like you'd think a rock star's hotel room would look like. No empty liquor bottles, no furniture askance, no bongs, no unconcious bodies. No Trace.

I find him in one of the bedrooms, asleep. I turn the bathroom light on and pull the door to, to give just enough light for me to see him by. I call his name softly a few times, but he doesn't wake. I sit on the edge of the bed and study him for a few minutes. Despite the bruising radiating from his temple down the left side of his face, he looks amazing. He was always good-looking, but he's twenty-three now and really coming into his prime. His dark eyebrows give him a brooding look that is balanced by his square jaw and stubble. His lips are parted slightly in sleep, and I have this impulsive urge to kiss him. Blame it on Disney. Sleeping Beauty. Snow White. All that wake-your-true-love-with-a-kiss propaganda.

I say his name again; he's still asleep. I pat his shoulder lightly. No response. Probably the pain killer has him out cold, and I'm going to have to work hard to wake him. Okay, so before I do that, just one little innocent kiss. Probably I'll feel nothing like before.

I lean forward, but just before I put my lips on his, his mouth turns up in a smile and he murmurs, "You sure you wanna do that? Remember what I told you after the last time? The morning after?"

My stomach flips and I jerk back, rising from the bed, backing all the way into the wall.

"Fuck!"

"That's not what I said." He pulls himself up slightly in the bed and grins. "But I think that's what you said."

I'm still pressed against the wall. I'm shaking, but not from cold. From embarrassment. I just got busted trying to steal a kiss from a famous rock star. I feel like some kind of crazed fan. Somehow I had dropped my phone. I stumble around, looking for it. I have to get out of here. I find it. I edge toward the door.

Trace is watching me, amused. "Where the hell do you think you are going? Get over here," he says, sliding over in the bed and pulling back the covers, inviting me to join him. He's wearing nothing but boxers.

"I...uhh...I don't think that's a good idea," I stammer.

"Yes, you do," he sighs. "Kat, my head hurts. You said no more games, right? Just get in the bed. I want to talk, and you want to talk, but we obviously both want to touch each other a little while we are doing it."

I hesitate for only a moment, but there's no point pretending. I mean, I was just trying to kiss him on the sly. I slide into the bed with him, but turn away from him. He moves close to me, the only point of contact between us where he pulls my hand onto my hip and laces his fingers over the top of mine. It's nice, but to be honest, I wish he'd come closer.

"Well, do you remember? What I said the last time we saw each other."

"You told me you wouldn't kiss me goodbye. You told me you would never kiss me again." I murmur.

"You're leaving a lot out. I told you I would never kiss you again and feel bad about it. I told you the next time I kissed you, the timing would have to be right for us to be together. Really be together. No more holding back."

"And that time never came."

"Not yet," he agrees. "But it could. Real soon."

"I have a boyfriend, Trace. And you have a...lifestyle."

"A boyfriend is not a permanent commitment. And lifestyles can be modified. Why are you acting like this is such an impossibility?"

"Why are you acting like two and half years didn't just happen? We used to be friends, but we're practically strangers now. I don't sleep with strangers, not even rockstars."

"We are not strangers, and you know it. But don't worry baby, when I said the time could be right, I didn't mean I want to fuck you tonight."

The abruptness of his words sting. Why not?

"Wow. Apparently you've forgotten three hours ago, when you committed to not being an asshole, asshole."

He laughs. "So I'm an asshole because I don't want to treat you like a fangirl? Because I don't want to be with you when my head feels like its about to crack open and I know you were going to fuck some other guy tonight? Tell me why that makes me an asshole, Kat," he murmurs into my ear. "Because I'm trying, here."

I sigh. "I don't know, Trace. I really don't. All I know is I came in here to see about your concussion, and for a second I got...confused. That's all. Obviously, you are clear in your head. So I should go, and come back at six."

"You could do that," he agrees. "Or you could stay and we could sleep. We might actually get some sleep, that way."

I'm about to say I don't think that's a good idea again, but the truth is, I think it's a fantastic idea. He's right. If I go back to my room, I won't sleep a wink. But here, with Trace's warmth radiating against my back, I suddenly feel like maybe I could.

"Just sleep?" I ask warily. "I don't want anything else, you know."

"To be perfectly honest, sleep is exactly what I want, too. Trust me, my head is wrecked. Not much room for thoughts of sex stuff right now. Not even with you."

I relax a little, because even though I don't trust Trace with my heart, I still trust him like that. He'd never try to push something I didn't want.

"Okay," I say simply.

We lapse into silence. He continues to hold my hand. The warmth of two bodies under this thick down hotel bedding heats up the bed quickly. I'm drowning in this giant pullover I'm wearing. It was fine in my own cold bed, but here next to him, I'm already starting to sweat. Okay, I'm sweating for other reasons, too.

"I can't sleep in this," I murmur tugging on the fleecy material.

"So take it off," he says mildly. Then, sleepily, disconnected, he adds, "Not the first time."

The way he murmurs that, slow and sleepy, it burns through me.

I sit up and struggle with the top. He helps me. I'm not wearing anything but yoga pants now. I lay back down, turned away from him, somewhat self-conscious, but I wiggle a little closer to him. It's a big change in temperature, without the fleece. First I was hot, now I'm shivering.

Wordless, he pulls me against him. His chest against my back is warm and hard. I love the way we feel, skin to skin and his arm around me, hugging my ribs. He smooths my hair down, so that he can lay his head close to mine. He sighs—a heavy masculine sigh with a slight growl to it—and settles us together.

It feels soooo good, but it also feels...frustrating. Even though I know I'm not going to act on it, I've wanted Trace for so long, and I still want him now. I want him to touch me in all the ways Colin has touched me, because I know I will feel so much more when Trace does it. And I want to do all the things to him I know how to do, and even though I told him I didn't sleep with strangers, he's right—we've been here before, and he's no stranger. I want him every way, all the way, but I feel guilty, because of Colin. I'm also afraid. Afraid of what would happen after, because last time I was this close to him turned into a disaster. So I just stay as still as possible, all the desire and the fear zinging through me. Trace feels my tension. He doesn't' just feel it; he understands it.

"It's okay. Breathe, Sweetheart," he says, and he starts to take long, easy breaths. I try to match them.

After awhile just breathing together, I start to relax. He pushes his leg forward, and adjusts me slightly, so that I'm leaning back against him, not taking his weight. My body feels like softening wax, remolding to fit his. Fear eventually fades away.

Some time later—it could be minutes, it could be an hour— I wake to Trace, nuzzling my hair.

"You smell just the same, Kat," he murmurs sleepily. "But something's different. You're not free."

"I know," I say.

"Did I do that?" his voice is very low and much too even. I don't answer right away.

Finally, I say, "No, I did. But maybe you can help me undo it."

I'm not sure if he heard me or if he has drifted off to sleep.

Wow, things are already so intimate between Trace and Kat. Where do you think that closeness comes from? Their long-standing friendship? There's obviously more to their New Year's Eve story than has been told so far. What do you think happened? Did it cause their estrangement, or is that just from Trace's rockstar lifestyle?