Chapter 14
“Lovely” - Fly by Midnight
Saylor
Escaping the party is a relief. My muscles are sore from traveling in the bus all day and dancing in the pit all night.
I’m tired from the exhausting schedule we’ve been keeping.
My body longs for the comfort of home and my familiar mattress, even if it’s lumpier than a bag of potatoes.
Still, I can’t wait to fall into a bed and sleep like the dead.
That thought quickly evaporates when Rhett leads me to the tour bus instead of a hired car. My feet catch on the pavement, and he reaches for my arm to steady me. In the haze of the concert, I managed to forget that tonight is our first night sleeping on the bus. In a shared bedroom.
In a shared bed.
Dear god, I’d rather go back to the pit than set foot inside that forty-five-foot torture chamber.
Rhett has no such hesitations. He stands back to let me climb the steps first, and I do so with a racing heart. Was that what the wink was about? Him letting me know he was looking forward to tonight?
If so, he’s about to be majorly disappointed.
He warned me this was coming, but I’m still not prepared to sleep beside him. Not with this crazy sexual tension between us. Not when nothing—and I mean nothing—is going to happen between us.
We pass through the bunk room, and I glance at the single beds with longing before Rhett opens the door to the back bedroom.
It’s not very big, which only makes the situation worse.
Lights glow in strips near the ceiling, and a large bed covered in white linens takes up most of the room.
It’s at least a queen-size, but it swallows up the entire space, leaving no doubt in anyone’s mind about the two things expected to take place here—sleeping and fucking.
I feel the need to emphasize that only the first will be happening on this tour. “I can just sleep in one of the bunks,” I say, and jerk my thumb over my shoulder. “That way you can have the bed to yourself.”
“Don’t be ridiculous. There’s plenty of room for both of us.” Rhett reaches behind him and pulls his black T-shirt over his head. I avert my eyes. “Besides, the bunks are full.”
I force my eyes away from the ridges of muscle that make up his torso. They want nothing more than to study every inch of that blessed physique, but doing so would be one of the worst decisions I could possibly make. I know my own weakness for a chiseled man. It’s best to stay far, far away.
Unfortunately, it looks like I won’t be going very far tonight.
“Do you want to use the bathroom first?” he asks, nodding toward a small door.
I grab my things from one of the tiny closets tucked into the walls—Rhett arguably has about three times as many clothes as I do—and duck inside the cupboard-sized en suite.
I’m eager for the opportunity to escape the temptation of those abs and that smile he could pull out at any minute, sending me melting onto the floor.
When I come back out, Rhett is sitting on the bed with his guitar, still shirtless. He glances up, gives me a sloppy half smile, and I nearly drop the bag in my hand. I scurry to the other side of the room, where he’s no longer facing me. He sets the guitar down and retreats into the restroom.
I breathe a sigh of relief and crawl into bed. My plan is to be asleep before he comes back, but as luck would have it, I can’t sleep. My eyes refuse to so much as shut. Before I know it, I’m reaching for my phone. Staring at a screen always makes me tired.
I’m still logged into Rhett’s account when I open TikTok, and I have instant regrets.
As predicted, Rhett’s wink at tonight’s show has gone viral.
There is a social media storm, with everyone trying to figure out who it was directed at.
Multiple girls have posted videos saying they’ve been in a relationship with Rhett for months and that the wink was for them.
I don’t know whether to be amused, irritated, or scared.
As long as these wannabes are distracting people with their wild stories, it keeps the focus off me.
But part of me is still annoyed that the world seems to think they own part of Rhett, as if he’s nothing more than a book in the public domain.
The bathroom door opens, and I immediately lock my phone. Either he was very fast in there, or I’ve been scrolling much longer than I realized.
The bed shifts as he crawls into it, and every single hair on my arms stands straight up.
I clutch the blanket in my hands, not sure how it’s going to protect me, but unwilling to let it go.
The scent of men’s body wash drifts over, and I inhale deeply before thinking better of it. God, why does he have to smell so good?
“Do you have enough room?” His voice is low and gravely, as though he just woke up, but I’ve discovered by now that it’s actually from belting his heart out during the show.
“Plenty,” I say, even though I’m hugging the edge of the bed.
“I’m not going to do anything, you know,” he says after a minute. “You don’t have to fall out of bed to stay away from me.”
“I’m not.” Then, to prove my point, I roll over so I’m facing him. “It’s not like you’d get anywhere if you tried, so . . .” I want to swallow the words as soon as they leave my mouth. They sound way too flirty.
I can feel his grin, even though it’s too dark to see it. It works its way across the bed, tangled with the heat from his body. How am I supposed to endure another five and a half weeks of this?
“Noted,” he says, every letter of the word wrapped in that damn smile.
I search my brain for a way to change the subject. I cannot go to sleep with these being our last words of the night. “Your wink caused quite a stir.”
Silence. Then finally, “Did it?” Another pause. “For who?”
“Everyone. They want to know who you were winking at.”
“And you?”
“Me what?”
“Did it cause a stir for you?”
“I—” I clench my jaw. How am I supposed to answer that? Not truthfully, obviously. I force a laugh. “Why would it cause a stir for me? I’m pretending to be your girlfriend. These things are expected.”
He huffs out a soft laugh. “Okay.”
I prop myself up on one elbow and stare at his shape in the dark. “What does that mean? ‘Okay’?”
“It means okay.”
* * *
Midmorning, the bus stops at a hole-in-the-wall diner for breakfast. The eight hours of sleep I got did nothing to improve my mood—if you can call lying in a bed “sleeping.” I’m pretty sure I only got around four hours of actual REM.
On top of that, my tooth still feels like the devil is shoving his pitchfork into it.
Then there was the godawful restroom shuffle.
The bus braked hard at the exact moment Rhett and I were passing each other in the en suite doorway.
The lurch made my braless chest rub against his shirtless one, while his morning wood brushed against my waist. My cheeks flamed, and we both darted in opposite directions like we’d been shocked.
I slipped off the bus the minute it came to a stop in the car park, eager for both fresh air and distance from Rhett.
Unfortunately, we still have an act to keep up in front of the crew, so when Rhett slides into the vinyl-covered booth I claimed for myself, I can’t be surprised or irritated, except that I’m both.
“How’d you sleep?” he asks, dousing his platter of pancakes in syrup.
I tear off a hunk of my toast with my teeth. “Fantastic.” Then, just to be polite, I say, “You?”
He nods, his mouth full. “Terrific.”
It’s as much a lie as mine was. I heard him tossing and turning all night, and the dark circles under his eyes aren’t covered with makeup the way mine are.
I take another bite, and my sensitive tooth shouts its discomfort. Grabbing my cheek, I grimace with pain that is too severe to conceal.
Rhett’s fork clatters onto his plate as he reaches across the table for me. “What’s wrong?”
I shake my head, but the agony is still too strong to hide. “Just a bloody toothache.”
The concern doesn’t leave his eyes for the rest of the meal, but neither of us says much.
We hop back on the bus for another long day of traveling. I stick a clove-soaked cotton ball onto my tooth and try to get more sleep while Rhett and the band hang out in the lounge. I can’t have slept more than twenty minutes when he knocks softly and opens the bedroom door.
“Are you up for a surprise?” he says when I blink at him.
Kill me now. “Depends on the surprise,” I mumble.
The bus has stopped moving, so I sit up. How are we in Chicago already?
Rhett reaches out to me. “Come on.”
Ignoring his outstretched hand, I swing my legs over the side of the bed. I follow him out the door, smoothing down the curls that rebelled during my nap.
The band is sprawled across the bus lounge when we pass through, and Jamal gives me a wicked smile. Rhett doesn’t stop though, just heads for the door of the bus.
We step into the bright sunshine. We’re in a random deserted car park. There’s nothing here except a boarded-up building and a bright yellow sports car. The car door opens, and Leo steps out.
I cock a brow at Rhett. “What is this?”
“This”—he runs a hand fondly over the bonnet of the car—“is a Lamborghini Huracán.”
“I have no idea what you just said.”
He grins. “Just get in.”
I do, and it occurs to me I could probably buy one of these myself with the amount of money he’s paying me.
The leather feels like butter, and I make a note to capture this moment, because something like this will likely never happen again in my lifetime.
There’s no way I would actually waste Rhett’s money on something so ridiculous.
The interior has a distinct new car smell—not like Rhett’s Maserati, which smelled like him, dark and mysterious.
We peel out of the car park, kicking up dust behind us. Within seconds, the tour bus is nothing but a speck in the rearview mirrors.
I glance over at Rhett. The hoodie he’s wearing is gray, which may be my favorite color on him. Jeans, a baseball cap, and sunglasses complete his small-town look. He casually drapes his wrist on the steering wheel, even though the speedometer shows we are going a breezy one hundred miles per hour.
I clear my throat and turn my attention to the windshield. “Where are we going?”
“To have fun. But first”—he slows the car gracefully as we enter city limits—“we’re going to the dentist.”
I swivel to look at him. “What?”
He keeps his eyes on the road and the GPS. “You have a toothache, right?”
I can only nod dumbly.
“So we’re taking care of it.”
“Just like that?”
“Just like that.”
Soon, we’re pulling into the car park of a dental practice. I don’t know how Rhett thinks we’ll get an appointment right away, but when he tells them my name, they lead me right to the back.
Thirty minutes later, my toothache is greatly reduced, thanks to my new filling. My strength to resist Rhett is also greatly reduced.
“How did you do that?” I ask once we’re back in the car.
“I had Noah get you an appointment.” He shrugs like it’s no big deal.
A thick lump clogs my throat. “Thank you,” I say softly.
I’m more aware than ever of his presence beside me. We’re closer than we were in bed last night. He’s ditched the sweatshirt now, and the lower half of one of his tattoos peeks out below the sleeve of his dark green relaxed polo. I want to lift the fabric so I can see the whole thing.
I try to imagine Nate doing for me what Rhett just did, and I can’t. He wouldn’t even give me the money for the dentist, let alone set up the appointment and take me himself.
God help me. If I’m not careful, I will fall for this man, and it will be like plummeting from Mount Everest.
“I’m sorry, by the way.”
Rhett’s voice startles me out of my daydream spiral, and I glance at him in surprise. “What?”
He flicks his eyes toward me before returning them to the road. “For not calling you. After camp.”
I blink—one, two, three times—trying to process his words. He’s sorry?
“I never apologized for that dick move.”
My mouth feels as dry as cotton, but I manage to say, “It’s okay.”
From my peripheral vision, I see him shake his head, but I keep my gaze firmly fixed out the windshield. “No, it’s not. I really did like you back then, but—”
There’s always a but. I tap my fingers on the door’s armrest, wishing we could skip the part where he makes me feel like summer camp leftovers, the kind of thing you look back at with a fond smile, giving yourself a pat on the back for having grown up since then.
“I got shipped off to boarding school that fall,” he says. I feel his eyes on me, but I still don’t turn. “Things got really crazy after that, and . . .”
He doesn’t need to finish that sentence. We both know how it ends. I forgot about you.
“It’s fine.” I shrug as if I didn’t spend the six months after that scrolling through the pictures of us on my phone before finally deleting them and deciding never to fall for someone out of my league again.
Guess that lesson is still in the works.
Clearing my throat, I ask, “Have you heard from your dad?”
I regret my choice of topic the second I see Rhett’s face tighten. “Nope.” He flips on his blinker and waits for the light to turn green.
“I’m sure he’ll call,” I say, fighting the urge to place my hand on his arm. Not because I think it would give him the wrong impression, but because I know it would give my heart more firepower than it can handle right now.
“Well, that makes one of us,” he says, his jaw set.
While he may be trying to hide it, it’s obvious to me that Rhett Cole still very much craves his dad’s approval. And Randy Cole is a fucking asshole if he’s not planning to see his son while he’s touring in the United States.
“It’s his loss,” I say quietly. But maybe this is one thing I can fix.