Seduction by Song Page 13

  He nods, smiling when he looks at me out of the corner of his eye. “Everyone works hard to get to the place they’ve always dreamed of being.”

  I smile, too, liking the sound of that philosophy very much.

  “We’re here,” he says, finally.

  I look up, and gasp.

  Romeo pulls over in a clearing in the park that we had been driving through. While most of the streetlamps we passed were broken or shut off, this small area is illuminated by a set of beautiful lanterns. A picnic table sits in the center of the clearing, decorated with a silky blanket and an old-fashioned wicker basket that opens to reveal a huge variety of picnic foods.

  “You planned all this?” I ask, whirling around to face Romeo.

  He smiles, plucking a single rose out from behind his back—where had he even been hiding that?—and holding it out to me. “Of course. Well, Jonathan—my driver, you met him earlier—helped with the set up. I couldn’t very well be here and on stage, after all.”

  I wrap my arms around him in a tight hug, pressing a kiss to his cheek. “Romeo, it’s gorgeous.”

  He nudges me back a little and leads me to the picnic table. “Shall we? I hope you’re hungry.”

  I almost start to nod, the delicious scent of the foods he had prepared wafting up from the basket, but stop when I realize I couldn’t possibly sit through dinner with Romeo so close to me. Instead, I shake my head and wrap my arms around his shoulders until he looks at me again.

  “Not for food,” I tell him, whispering like it’s a secret. “I thought you were going to show me how manly you were.”

  He grins as he wraps his arms around my waist, his grip firm as he lifts me up to place me on the picnic table. I drop my hands in surprise and shiver at how pleasant the fabric covering the table feels against my fingers.

  “Is that a challenge?” he asks, breathing low and dangerous in my ear.

  Without thinking twice about it, I nod. I open my mouth to say something, anything, but I’m interrupted when he claims my mouth once more in a passionate kiss. I gasp against his lips as he pushes me back, spreading me out flat on the table as he spreads my legs to hook them around his waist.

  He’s already hard through his jeans, thrusting his hips against my inner thighs in tight little jabs. I groan and feel myself getting wet at the thought of exciting him like this, of him being so aroused over my body.

  I know he can feel my wetness as clearly as I can feel his erection. I had chosen a skirt for that night, and it parts easily to reveal my damp panties. He grabs both of my wrists in one of his hands and pins my hands above my head, kissing me again and stealing my breath away.

  It’s so distracting that I don’t notice his fingers working to push my panties aside until he’s rubbing the pads of his fingertips against my clit. I hear myself moan breathily into the night sky, startling some birds in the trees nearby. My cheeks flush at the realization that we’re doing such obscene things out in the open, practically in public, but I can’t bring myself to care as I roll my hips back to get more of that delicious friction.

  He plunges his fingers inside of me before long, kissing from my neck to my collarbone as he works me open. It doesn’t take long—I’m already aching for him.

  “Romeo, please,” I say, moaning against his hair as he buries his face in the crook of his neck.

  He pulls back, letting go of me to start unbuckling his belt. He stops, briefly, to land a sharp, but carefully painless, slap on my inner thigh. “Keep your legs open.”

  The command sends shiver shooting straight down my body, all the way to my toes. I shift to spread my legs for him, as wide as I can, as I watch him pull him dripping cock free. He slips a condom on and pumps it a few times with his hand as he gets into position, and he gives me no warning as he thrusts into me in one long, sure stroke.

  I gasp and moan, and I groan his name. I wrap my arms around his shoulders and pull him in closer until he’s fully seated inside of me, filling me completely. Then he begins to move, setting a quick rhythm right from the start. The sensations it sends throughout my body are almost too much. He lights every one of my nerves on fire and I have to cling to him, my nails digging into his skin, just to stay grounded in reality.

  “Romeo,” I say again, gasping the syllables out so loudly that I almost think they can hear us all the way back at the stadium.

  “Yeah, babe, yeah,” he says, grunting with exertion as he thrusts in deeper, harder. He grabs my hands again, this time using both of his to pin my wrists to the table above my head.

  I moan as our shirts ride up together, creating a rough friction against my breasts. I couldn’t remember the last time I made love—no, I corrected myself; this was fucking, rough and raw and perfect—with all my clothes on. Although I ache to feel the press of his skin against mine, there’s something about the urgency that comes with not even taking our clothes off that brings me so close to the brink that I have to think of totally unsexy things just to keep from climaxing right then and there.

  As though he knows what I’m thinking, how close I am, Romeo takes both of my wrists in one of his hands and drops his free hand down to cup my breasts, squeezing through my shirt.

  “You’re so damn beautiful,” he says, his voice rough and hoarse against my ear. “You gonna come for me?”

  I gasp, feeling my climax washing over my without warning. I moan my pleasure out into the night air for anyone to hear, but Romeo catches the sound in his mouth—yes, I want to tell him, just for you. The sounds I make are all for him.

  He comes moments later, right after me, and collapses on top of me. We’re both breathless for a moment, but even exhausted Romeo does his best to keep his weight off of me. The blanket is crumpled under us, but I can’t bring myself to care as I tilt my head up to kiss him, sweetly and slowly. Our tongues twine together in the most lethargic way. With the stars overhead, we kiss until we both lose our breath again.

  Over dinner—a light meal of sandwiches and fancy cheeses, which we finally get around to eating—Romeo keeps me in his lap and feeds me small bites between kisses. At the night of the night, he lets go of me reluctantly. He has to travel with the band, but he wants to see me at his next show. Front and center, just like tonight.

  “But I don’t think I can wait a day to have you again,” he says as he tucks my hair behind my ears. “Come see me during rehearsal. I’ll make sure security knows to let you in.”

  The thought of watching him practice, of getting a private show, is an exciting prospect. I smile and stretch up to kiss him, quickly. “Maybe I can help you relax during your break, too.”

  He laughs and cups my cheeks again. “God, you’re perfect—but, unfortunately, I have a personal rule about sex before shows. Afterwards, though—you’re mine.”

  He growls the last words and I pretend to pout at the refusal, but the promise of later is always enough to make me crave more when it comes from him.

  “I’m always yours,” I tell him as he leaves me back in the parking lot of the stadium.

  I don’t know if he hears me as he walks away, but I’m sure we both already know it’s true.

  CHAPTER TWENTY TWO

  I wake up in Orlando with the silliest, hugest smile on my face. The girls, after hearing a bit about my night (I still refused to go into detail), decided we would grab some clothes from home and head to Orlando that very night. They would pay for gas, they would drive, and they would even spring for a hotel. I argued that it was too much just for me, but they all rolled their eyes—practically in unison.

  “Don’t be such a stickler for money, Erin,” April said. “We’re all well-off enough to afford it. We want to do this for you.”

  It didn’t take them long to convince me, the bliss of my night with Romeo still lingering on my mind.

  I find a note from the girls and a fresh latte waiting for me when I finally convince myself to roll out of bed. They’d gone shopping and promised to bring back something totally luscious
for me to wear. I smile fondly to myself and sip at my latte as I slip into the extra set of clothes—a simple jeans and t-shirt combination—I brought from him. Although I loved shopping as much as the next girl, they knew better to invite me.

  I had plans, after all.

  The empty stadium that greets me when I show up for Romeo’s rehearsal is a strange sight. True to Romeo’s word, the security guards dotting the horizon of the stadium let me through without any trouble. It takes me a while to make my way to the stage since I was told to take a route that would approach it from behind, so as not to disturb the rehearsal in progress.

  When I do find the stage, I find it totally empty. I frown, wondering if I had been misdirected. That last guard I talked to had been awfully old—maybe he made a mistake?

  I don’t have time to think about this for long, or to even begin trying to find my way, when I hear shouting coming from a room backstage. The door that the noise is coming from is closed, but as I sneak closer to it, not wanting to be heard just yet, I could hear the words clearly through the wall of the dressing room that the voices were coming from.

  “—of the tickets were refunded, you son of a bitch!” someone—Dante, I think—is shouting. “Hey, man, I fucking hate to admit it, but the chicks come to this thing for you. For a chance to get wooed by the legendary Romeo Ortiz or some shit. What did you think was going to happen if you started playing favorites, huh?”

  I gasp. Romeo begins to talk, but he’s keeping his own voice quiet and controlled—I can’t make out what he’s saying. The problem is clear enough, though: me.

  Because of me, people were refunding their tickets. Because of me, Romeo was getting into fights with the band mates. Because of me, everything was—ruined.

  Without thinking, I run.

  Back in the hotel room, I slip into a pair of sweatpants and curl up on the bed. I want to cry, but the tears won’t come. My thoughts and feelings are still at war, logical and emotion trying to fight for control. On the one hand, it was clear enough that I did what I had to do.

  I could tell from the way Romeo talked last night that he would never, under normal circumstances, so anything to harm his career.

  Everyone works hard to get to the place they’ve always dreamed of being, he’d said. He was living his dream. Who was I to get in the way of that? I couldn’t ever hurt him like that. Except, I obviously already had.

  Although I had no idea how much their ticket sales suffered for tonight’s show, I knew that it couldn’t be good. Dante was hotheaded, I knew that much, but he also loved his job. He wouldn’t blow up at Romeo like that unless the losses were significant.

  Losses that I caused.

  Yet—yet I couldn’t convince myself that this, that leaving, was the right thing to do. After all, in Romeo’s arms was the place I’d always dreamed of being. In the months before I met him, I had these dreams—sexual, sensual. A faceless man would wrap me up in his arms and pleasure me in ways I never knew in reality. I wanted so badly to meet this man, and when I fell into Romeo’s arms, my dreams began to shift. The man was no longer faceless. He was Romeo—he spoke with his voice, touched with his hands, and stared straight into my soul with those deep brown eyes of his. And my initial reluctance, my resistance, my disdain for him are something that made this feeling so much sweeter in the end.

  Shouldn’t I fight for the right to stay with him?

  I worked hard to get into my dream university and I worked hard on my thesis, but I never had to fight for something I desperately wanted. The cards had simply fallen in my favor all my life. Even now I didn’t have a challenge facing me—only a decision.

  And it felt like the toughest decision I would ever make.

  I shake my head, trying to put the whole situation out of my mind for even a second. Romeo was probably already wondering where I was, the rehearsal I promised to attend having started hours ago. If he didn’t see me at the show tonight—well, I didn’t know what he would do. It’s frustrating how my insecurities, barely visible before, had surfaced now that I was falling for him.

  I didn’t know what I would do, what I should do. I knew I couldn’t go to Romeo now. I would never be able to think straight if I did.

  Yet I didn’t want to be alone, either. I grabbed my purse and changed into my jeans again. The mall the girls said they went to wasn’t far. They took the car, but I could call a cab and meet them there. Maybe they would have some advice—just because I was the clinical psychologist in training didn’t mean I didn’t need some advice for myself once in a while.

  I’m already on my way to the door when I hear a knock. Thinking it’s one of the girls (they probably forgot their hotel key or something), I open it without hesitation.

  Damn, did I wish I hesitated.

  My brother is glaring at me before I even open my mouth to ask him how he found me. He doesn’t enter the room, almost as though he doesn’t want to stand too close to me. I cross my arms and wait for him to explain his presence.

  After a moment, he holds up a magazine like it explained everything.

  In a way, I guess it did. Its headline proudly declares: Erin Gouchet and Romeo Ortiz—True Love or Just Sex?

  “You know how I feel about this man,” Logan says. I can hear the anger in his voice. He isn’t shouting at me yet, but he’s just barely containing his rage. “Do you have anything to say to yourself?”

  I want to snap that I don’t have to explain myself to him or anyone. I’m a grown woman, and I’m damn tired of everyone—of him, of Dante—for questioning my motives with Romeo.

  The retort dies in my throat, again, and I can’t meet Logan’s eyes. “You can’t listen to those rags,” I say, lamely. “They’re pretty much all bullshit.”

  “So you aren’t sleeping with his fucker?” Logan says, his voice rising in volume. His rage is boiling over, I could see that clearly enough, but it wasn’t directed at me—instead, he stares down at the magazine as though he were furious with Romeo. “Is he using you as some sort of publicity stunt? Erin, you just say the word and I’ll make sure that liar—.”

  “Stop—!” I begin to say, but the rest of the words don’t make it out of my mouth. I sigh, frustrated with myself, and bring my head up to frown at him. “That’s not what’s happening, Logan. He isn’t using me. I—I am seeing him. It’s not just sex, though. It’s much more than that..”

  Logan blinks and stares at me for a moment. His eyes soften for one split second before his expression hardens again as he shakes his head.

  “This isn’t right, Erin.” He crosses his arms, relaxing his hands that he had, probably subconsciously, balled up into fists seconds ago. “The way he’s flaunting you to the media is putting you—putting us, our whole family, to shame. Look at you. I bet you’re going to see him now.”

  I open my mouth to protest, shaking my head furiously. “No! I mean—I don’t know. I don’t know if I’m going to see him, okay?”

  My voice cracks a little. Indecision still plagues my mind, the memory of Dante’s argument from earlier that afternoon coming up. My brother hated that I was with Romeo and even I wasn’t sure if I should be with him—what would be the cost? His career? I couldn’t risk that. Yet how could I leave him when the feelings between us were growing more powerful each day?

  Logan’s scowl indicates that he doesn’t believe my denial for a second. “You’re not going anywhere, Erin. I know that asshole’s in town, and you aren’t going anywhere near him. He’s going to go off with his whores and you’re going to forget about him. I will not let him make you one of those women.”

  I gape at him. How dare he? My eyes begin to sting, but I force back the tears. Logan is done making me cry. I was no longer a child he could control. His determination to keep me from Romeo made me more certain than ever before that I needed to see Romeo tonight. Silently, and sarcastically, I thank Logan for helping me make up my mind.

  But the way he squared his shoulders made it obvious that he had no inten
tions of letting me out of this room. He was going to guard the door like a dog and I was going to have to think of another way out.

  In one small act of defiance, I slam the door on his face and lock it shut.

  Once I moved into the room far enough that he wouldn’t be able to hear me, I sigh. So I had decided to see Romeo tonight—even if I did need to leave him for the sake of his career, I at least owed him an explanation. Besides, who’s to say we couldn’t make this work? All I had to do was make sure he knew he had to put the band before me. We would be able to keep seeing each other, perhaps in secret. None of his female fans had to know. The media circus surrounding our alleged relationship would fade away soon enough.

  But now what? The decision didn’t help me now.

  I was trapped.

  The girls, as usual, save my life.

  When I realized they were still out shopping, and therefore free from Logan’s watchful eye, I texted them to let them know I needed an escape route.

  April, of course, rants about how much of a bastard Logan is for a good half hour before she lets Maddie and Juliet take over. She always hated him, but she kept quiet around him after I made her promise she would. I knew, deep down inside, that she had always been right about Logan—he was my brother, though, and I wasn’t ready to admit that out loud even if I already knew it internally.

  We’re only on the second floor of the hotel we chose for the night, so they devise a plan involving a daring jump and a sturdy branch on the tree outside. I feel just like a kid again, when we used to climb the trees in my backyard until our parents screamed for us to come back down before we killed ourselves falling.

  It still takes a good five minutes for me to psych myself up enough to leap out of a window and into a tree. My heart pounds with adrenaline and I almost chicken out, but an image of Romeo whispering bonita against my cheek flashes before my eyes.

  I jump.

  And I nearly slip. If I had fallen to the ground, I probably would have cracked my skull. April’s sitting on a lower branch, though, and she springs up to steady me before I can topple over. We’re both breathing hard by the time we make it to the ground, climbing down carefully after that near miss.