Chapter 16
Chapter Sixteen
S aturday night, Blake followed twenty-two Day Dreams Studios staff members into a roped-off section near the side of The Rox’s stage wondering how the hell he had gotten himself into this situation.
The biggest thing he’d done like this was karaoke night when he was a teenager.
He’d never sung on a real stage.
Sing the duet, they said. It will be great publicity, they said.
He shuffled down the second row of seats and ended up between Jeanette and Paul.
“I love this place! I’ve never been in the seats before. I’m usually on the lawn,” Jeanette gushed. “This is so cool!”
Paul patted her arm with fatherly affection. “We should do this more often. You all work so hard. You deserve a night out every now and then.”
The Rox was an outdoor amphitheater carved into a hillside with a covered stage in the center of an enormous bowl. The stage was backed by what looked like an old Grecian-inspired building, with huge columns along the sides and facilities and meeting rooms for the artists out back.
The stage was already decked out with drums, guitars, and keyboards just waiting for someone to come along and put them to use. Every now and then, he saw a stagehand dressed all in black hurry out to do something like check a microphone.
Rows of VIP seats and an open-aired expanse of green lawn sloped gently upward to an ivy-covered fence that enclosed the whole place and blocked out the city noise. Stadium-style seats rose up to the left and right to complete the bowl.
The lawn was packed with people on blankets or low-slung chairs. Every seat was filled. The low-level hum of people talking filled Blake’s ears with expectation.
“How many people can this place hold?” he asked Jeanette.
“I don’t know.” She scanned the crowd. “Couple thousand?”
Paul leaned closer to them. “It’s a six thousand-seat venue, give or take a few.”
“Six thousand. Wow.” His mouth was dry. Where was water when you needed it?
He wasn’t nervous, exactly. He’d performed in front of people his entire life. He loved the attention. Usually.
This, though…
He scanned the crowd. That was a lot more people than he was used to on set, and they were all focused on the person they wanted to see on stage.
With a start, he realized nobody appeared to recognize him.
Blake was just an anonymous face in the darkness. Just one of the crowd here to see someone else.
He wasn’t sure how he felt about that.
He’d never gone to a big concert before. The most he’d ever seen in person was a nightclub band. He didn’t like crowds, especially if anyone recognized him. It inevitably led to a mob scene and disappointment on social media afterward if he didn’t say the right thing or do the right thing. It was a lot easier to be the cool guy in front of a camera, where he could control the sound bites. Being in front of live human beings was a totally different game.
Piper, though, appeared to thrive on this. Her eyes lit up whenever she talked about what she called intimate little shows. Her fans clearly adored her. Rabid didn’t even begin to describe them.
The band came out in a teasing trickle. First, the drummer slipped behind his instrument almost without anyone noticing until the beat started up.
The crowd went nuts.
They waved signs, shirts, posters. They screamed Piper’s name over and over until it was a frenzy of sound that threatened to bust his eardrums.
“Piper! Piper! Piper!”
“Bellamy! Bellamy! Bellamy!”
A man with long, curly, dark hair and tattoo sleeves up both arms came out fist-pumping the air and shouting to encourage more enthusiasm from the already worked-up crowd.
They ate it up.
He ran his fingers down the length of the keyboard, greeted the drummer, then started playing low notes that went along with the beat. He played a few trills, which revved up the crowd even more.
Two women sauntered onto the stage. One had spiked blonde hair with pink tips, a black mini-dress, and red thigh-high boots. The other had long red hair and wore jeans and a black T-shirt with the word Bellamy in sequins across her chest.
They waved, and the crowd lost their minds.
He’d never felt anything like this. The anticipation was palpable. The need for something just out of reach filled his head with noise and made his heart race. It was like sex, without the sex. If Piper didn’t come out soon, there was going to be a riot, and possibly a collective orgasm.
The women fist-bumped each other, then split to either side of the stage, where they picked up guitars and started playing.
The beat kept going, sure to drive everyone’s heart rate up and up. A recognizable intro to a song came together as the guitar joined the keyboards.
“We love you, Piper!”
He didn’t recognize the melody yet, but the crowd sure did.
Jeanette said something to him, but he couldn’t hear her over the din.
“What?”
She pointed and screamed.
Six thousand other people did the same thing as Piper Bellamy finally strode out onto the stage.
She wore a skin-tight, black-sequined, one-piece jumpsuit that turned every curve and angle into a sparkling fantasy. Her hair billowed around her like a dark cloud. There was something sparkly in it that caught the light every time she moved. Her bright-red lipstick accentuated her full, luscious lips and was like an arrow pointing to exactly where he wanted to put his mouth.
If she didn’t start singing soon, he was going to lose it along with the crowd.
She had a microphone in one hand, but she didn’t turn it on. Instead, she beamed at the crowd, one hand over her heart, as she gave each section a wave and a bow.
The fans closest to the stage were crying. He’d never understood that reaction until now. Not that he wanted to cry. No. The pressure building inside him had nothing to do with tears.
Seeing her in that outfit, owning the stage like that, was the hottest thing he’d ever witnessed in his entire life.
The energy and excitement in the air were palpable things that wound around his heart and made it beat so fast he could feel his pulse throbbing.
All he could think about was getting her back to his house and into his bed as fast as possible so he could strip that sequined black thing off her.
Piper caught his eye, and her smile deepened, becoming more intimate. Her dimple appeared to wink a secret at him.
God, he wanted her.
She turned on the microphone and strode back to the center of the stage. “Thank you so much.”
The beat picked up, the band began to play, and Piper started singing one of the most popular Bellamy hits. The noise in this outdoor arena reached a level that could have been heard on a space station. Everyone knew the words, including him, and everyone sang them loud and proud, in between the cheering and the shouting and the crying.
When the song ended she bowed, waved, and waited for the din to die down a little. Then she beamed at the crowd and said, “Thank you! Thank you for coming. You know, I’ve been doing these little shows for years now, but every single time is like the first. You all make me feel like the most beautiful woman in the world.”
A roar went up from the crowd as they recognized which song she was about to do next.
Blake lost himself in the chaos and whistled and cheered along with everyone else, until the break.
Someone touched his elbow. Jeanette grinned at him and pointed to the side of the stage. “They’re ready for you. Go get ’em!”
Blake made his way past the people milling around during intermission toward the young girl in black waiting for him. He felt like a man about to walk off a cliff.
Now that he’d seen Piper on stage and felt how the crowd responded, he wasn’t at all sure he could do this without making a complete fool of himself. Had he ever played a part like this?
The stagehand touched his arm. “Hi, I’m Tiffany. Come with me.”
She led him to a small dressing room where Piper and two women armed with makeup brushes and hair dryers were waiting.
Piper’s smile when she saw him wrapped around his heart and kicked his pulse up a notch or three. “What do you think? So far so good?”
“I think I’m out of my league here,” Blake said truthfully. “I doubt they’ll be happy to see me out there. Pretty sure they might riot if I take time away from you.”
“No they won’t. Trust me, they are going to eat you up. Especially looking like that.” She gave him an appreciative once-over. “I like the jeans and black shirt combo.”
A frizzy blonde with a brush ushered him into a chair and went to work on him.
“Remember,” Piper said with a hint of amusement, “the band will riff while I intro the song and prime them to see someone special. Then I’ll start, and you saunter out on stage before your opening line, okay? Do your best Jesse impersonation. They’ll love it.”
“Sure. No problem.” He was embarrassed that his voice almost squeaked. He wasn’t shy, dammit. This wasn’t going to be a big deal.
“Relax.” She laughed and massaged his shoulders while she looked at him in the mirror. “Just wait until those young things in the front row get a look at you. I’m going to be jealous. They’ll forget all about me.”
“That’s not possible.”
“Trust me, it is.” She sounded resigned. “They like me because they can’t have Della. I’ve always been second on the list of Bellamy Babes. ”
He frowned at that. Was she not listening when they’d screamed for her all through the songs? That crowd was in love with her. They would remember this night for their entire lives. They’d tell their kids they once stood this close to Piper Bellamy. Six thousand people out there were creating family legends tonight, starring her.
“Do me a favor. When you go back out there, really listen to what they’re saying.”
“What do you mean?”
“No one out there is screaming for Della.” He caught her gaze. He wanted to make sure she understood what he was trying to say. “They want you .”
She did a double take, then looked away.
“I…I have to get back out there.” She patted him on the shoulders. “You have about thirty minutes, give or take a few.”
He watched her leave with a circle of stagehands and band members in her wake. She was a force of nature, a whirlwind that shifted the world around her without even noticing, and he was as caught up in it.
Yet he didn’t feel trapped like he had with Rachel. Piper didn’t make him want to run. She made him want to get her alone and see how many kisses it took to get rid of that lipstick.
Thirty-five minutes flashed by in a heartbeat, and then he was waiting just off stage for Piper to summon him out.
“I have a little surprise for you,” she told the audience with a sly smile. “You all know I’ve been working on a little project called Scorched , right?”
The crowd shouted a cacophony of responses that amounted to a resounding yes.
Her grin stretched from ear to ear. “You also know that animated features have songs, right?”
They went a little more nuts, and a chant of “Piper, Piper, Piper” went up .
“Well I’ve been given permission to share one of those songs with you tonight. It’s a sneak peek of the duet between Princess Jewel and Jesse. Would you like to hear it?”
The roar was enough to deafen people in Arizona.
“Good! This is called ‘What I Want.’ I hope you like it and I hope you love the movie.” Pipe cued the band, and they started up the intro.
Someone handed him a water bottle. He took a quick sip while Piper sang the beginning of the duet they’d rehearsed and recorded countless times, but tonight, it sounded fresh and new to him. She turned and held out her hand toward him, her gaze locked on his, and he found he didn’t need to slip on a persona. He walked out on stage as himself and sang at her like she was the only one in the room.
“Oh my God it’s Blake Ryan!” someone nearby screeched.
He barely heard it.
He focused on Piper, and they sang the chorus together. Then she danced off to the other side of the stage to sing the next part of the song.
“I wanted adventure, I wanted to see the world.”
He took her example and sauntered off in the other direction to sing at the crowd on the left. “I wanted to show them that I could save the day.”
By the time they finished off the song, he was so hopped on adrenaline, his hands were shaking. They ended up center stage, facing each other. His hand was on her arm, and he stared down into her eyes as they sang the last notes together. “Now what I want…is…you.”
As the last notes faded away he, leaned in and kissed her cheek.
The crowd exploded.
“Told you they’d love you,” Piper said in his ear. Her breath was hot and fast, and it sent a rush of heat all the way down to his dick.
She pulled away, leaving a rush of emptiness in her wake. “Blake Ryan, everybody!”
He smiled and waved to the crowd, doing his best rock star imitation while hoping like hell nobody could tell he had a hard-on. Then he sauntered off stage, bolstered by the screams of six thousand people.
It wasn’t a bad way to go. He could see exactly why Piper loved this so much. It was a head rush, an ego boost, and a magical high. He’d never felt anything like it.
He waited for her backstage for what felt like an eternity. This was the last show before a four-month break, and she had gifts for the crew and hugs for everyone.
This was her world. Like Jewel, it was her domain to rule, and she did it with grace and style. She made everyone feel special and seen. It was a neat trick in a place like this, where it was too noisy to hear anything.
She caught him watching her and separated herself from the crowd to join him in the corner next to the stage. “You remind me of Lizzie. She always waited right here for us to finish.”
“Is that…a good thing?” Would it be wrong to take her in his arms right now?
“It’s a great thing, but you don’t have to sit out here like a deckhand. Come with me.”
She took his hand and led him through the bustling group of workers packing up the show, down the hallway behind the stage, to the now-empty dressing room.
She shut the door and the backstage noise faded away. “So what did you think? Are you traumatized for life?”
He ran his hand through his hair. It wasn’t the show that did him in, it was her in that one-piece, skin-hugging piece of cloth. She might as well be naked. “I’ve never felt anything like that. It’s quite the rush.”
Did she know he meant her, not the show?
She pulled two bottles of water out of the mini-fridge and handed him one. “It really is. It’s even better when there’s someone to share it with.”
“I totally agree.” He grabbed her hand, took the water from her, and tossed it aside. “I’m very, very interested in sharing with you.”
Desire flared in her eyes. “You sure we should be sharing here? I mean, we could get caught, and we’re working on a kids’ movie.”
“I don’t plan on telling them about this part, but maybe you should lock the door.”
“I already did.” Her gaze was direct and hot as she rubbed the back of his hand with her thumb.
He pulled her close and wrapped his arms around her.
She yielded to him, her warm body melting in all the right places.
“I have a bet with myself. I think it’ll take five kisses to get that lipstick off.”
“It’s a lip stain.” She rubbed her lips together. “It could take all night.”
“Oh really.” Interest flared all up and down his body. Tingles a lot farther south demanded attention, but he had no intention of rushing things this time.
Someone jiggled the doorknob, then knocked, and a high-pitched voice called out, “Miss Bellamy, are you okay? You need anything?”
“Maybe we should go back to my place,” he murmured into her ear.
His hand drifted down to her ass and squeezed. She was so tiny his fingers wrapped underneath and breached far more interesting territory.
She sucked in a breath and clutched the back of his neck for balance. “I’m…I’m fine.”
“Very, very fine.” He caressed her ass on down as far as he could reach between her legs.
She shifted a little to give him room. “I’m getting…changed. It might…take a…bit.
“Oh. Okay. Take your time.”
There was a pause, which he took advantage of by capturing her mouth with his. His tongue plunged past her lips to wrestle with hers. She tasted of those menthol lozenges she’d given him for a sore throat. They didn’t seem so bad now.
“We have until midnight to vacate,” the voice outside the door said.
“Midnight,” he whispered. “I’m going to need longer than that.”
She moaned. “Oh…”
His next kiss was longer and slower and designed to really test the staying power of that lipstick.