Chapter 14 Celeste
Celeste
It’s been four days.
Four fucking days of Lucian Sterling breathing my air, and moving through my space like a shadow I can’t shake. He walks my halls and will stand close enough that I can feel the weight of him, yet somehow still impossibly far away, like he’s separated from me by something vast and unbridgeable.
Jamie used to do this on travel days. Hover at the edges with her quiet competence and clipped instructions, always present, never intrusive. But this is different; it’s more invasive.
Because Jamie wasn’t the man who broke my heart with five quiet, devastating words.
You’re better off without me.
Lucian carries himself like a held breath, always silent in a watchful and heavy way.
As if he’s waiting for something to happen between us, or worse, he’s already decided it won’t.
Tonight he’s at a security meeting at the Superdome while we do our own roundtable at the campground.
I should be relieved about the space between us, but I keep glancing at the door, half-expecting him to step back inside and pull the air out with him.
The slide-out is open to the early-summer heat, and New Orleans makes no effort to pretend it’s anything but itself.
The humidity moves like a living entity, slipping into the trailer even with the fans working overtime.
The air smells like river water and sun-warmed asphalt, a sweetness edged with something metallic from the nearby tracks.
Rowan has claimed his usual tour-manager corner, tablet glowing against his knee.
Korbyn is folded upside down in one of the swivel chairs, scrolling her phone with the kind of focus she only gives to chaos or memes.
Shiloh is half-asleep with her bass tucked against her chest, fingers still curled on the strings like she’s afraid the instrument might float away in the thick air if she loosens her grip.
And Linkin is pressed right up against me like a heat-seeking barnacle, leaning into my side on the couch with his head tipped against my shoulder.
Korbyn pauses her scrolling and puts her phone down before making eye contact with me. “Just in case anyone was wondering, Nashville is still trending. Like… aggressively. People are losing their minds.”
Shiloh exhales softly, eyes still closed. “My mom texted me this morning and asked if you were okay. She said she cried watching someone’s livestream.”
Linkin hums against me. “That’s because it didn’t feel like a performance.”
I glance sideways at him. “What’s that supposed to mean?”
“It means,” Korbyn says gently, a small smile tugging at her mouth, “people could tell you didn’t just sing it, you lived in that moment.”
“None of that was planned,” I admit, looking down at the scribbled notes in my lap. “It just… happened.”
Rowan finally looks up from his tablet, stylus paused mid-note. “People can tell when something’s real. That was the first time they saw you let the meaning of the song hit you instead of controlling it.” His gaze flicks briefly toward me. “Do you think we can get that again tonight?”
“I can try…” I glance down at the scribbled notes in my lap. “I don’t know if I can fake that level of heartbreak.”
“You don’t have to break yourself open every night,” Shiloh murmurs. “But for a minute… You have to let yourself feel it.”
Linkin exhales, then straightens, finally turning so he’s actually looking at me. “Yeah, rage is fun, don’t get me wrong, but this?” He grins. “This was connection. You always make the fans feel the music, but this was the first time they could tell you felt it too.”
The room goes quiet, that truth settling in and humming under our skin, heavy and exposed, like no one wants to be the first to disturb it.
So, naturally, Linkin does.
“But,” he says lightly, leaning back and glancing around the rig, “that would explain why the sexual tension in here has been absolutely feral ever since Lucian started haunting the hallways.”
I choke on a laugh I wasn’t prepared for. “Excuse me?”
“I’m just saying,” he continues, unfazed, “the air gets thicker every time he walks by. Like the walls themselves are uncomfortable.”
“That’s not sexual tension,” I snap. “That’s stress.”
“Stress that wants to jump him,” Korbyn adds unhelpfully, as she grins at us from her upside-down sprawl.
I drag a hand down my face, the pressure finally breaking enough for the truth to slip out. “Fine. I have a raging case of lady blue balls. Happy?”
Korbyn explodes with laughter, nearly falling headfirst out of her chair. “That’s a T-shirt quote I need immediately.”
“I’m serious,” I mutter, folding my arms and fixing my glare on my knees. “He’s here, in my space, and he’s acting as if none of it happened—like we didn’t…” My voice trails off, teeth sinking into my cheek. “It’s infuriating.”
The humor eases out of Linkin as he shifts closer, his voice dropping without turning solemn. “Do you still love him?”
“I don’t know what I feel.”
He watches me for a beat, then says quietly, “You do. You just don’t want to say it out loud.”
I don’t answer.
Because he’s right, and saying it would make it real, and Lucian doesn’t get that part of me again. Especially not after the way he left.
Rowan clears his throat, pretending not to hear about my blue balls, grounding the moment the way he always does. “All right, if Celeste can pull off the note change again, we can have our emotionally fueled setlist confirmed. We can give the crowd another cathartic breakdown to scream along to.”
Linkin leans in, his voice meant only for me now. “Just… let him earn it, ‘Leste. If he’s gonna be here, make him work for it. Every inch. Every word. Everything.”
I nod, my heart thudding too hard for such a small motion. Because the truth is, I don’t think I can trust Lucian not to walk away when things get rough again.
But God, I want to.
And that’s the most dangerous part of it all.
Korbyn abruptly flips out of the swivel chair, boots dropping to the floor as she turns around and kneels with her arms against the seat of the chair. Just rigid, like someone snapped a string inside her.
The room notices.
The easy noise fades. Linkin’s chatter trails off. Even Shiloh looks up, mug halfway to her lips.
She’s gone still, staring at her phone with her back to us.
“Little Crow, what’s going on?” I ask, already sitting up straighter.
Korbyn doesn’t answer, still as a statue.
“Korbs?” I try again, unease crawling up my spine.
Still nothing.
Rowan is already moving.
He circles behind her without a word, quiet as a shadow, and leans just enough to see the screen over her shoulder. Rowan makes a sound I’ve never heard from him before.
It isn’t a word. It isn’t even anger, it’s more like the sharp intake of breath from a man who has just recognized something he can’t unsee.
“I know them,” he says quietly.
Korbyn’s head jerks up. “What?”
His hand closes around Korbyn’s phone carefully, reverently almost, like he’s afraid the wrong pressure might shatter something already cracked.
His fingers are shaking. He starts to scroll through her phone.
Looking around Rowan’s shoulder, I see Korbyn’s husband in each of the pictures with different girls; each photo is more inappropriate than the last.
“I know these girls,” he says, the words coming out flat at first, like his brain hasn’t caught up to his mouth yet. He scrolls again, slower now, and his voice rises, tight and sharp with recognition. “I know them. I assigned their band to James when we signed them.”
Color blooms across his neck and jaw, an angry red that crawls up beneath his skin as his teeth grind together. The tablet slips forgotten from his other hand, clattering softly against the floor.
“This one,” Rowan says hoarsely, jabbing a finger at the screen. “She was on a support slot I booked last spring.”
Another swipe.
“And her—” His voice breaks, just barely. “Her mom called me. Thanked me for looking out for her.”
Korbyn makes a small, fractured noise that almost sounds like a sob, and Rowan stops scrolling.
The photo on the screen is different.
There’s no ambiguity. James is caught mid-act—covered enough to keep it from being explicit, but unmistakable in what’s happening, in where they are, in the intimacy that shouldn’t exist.
Rowan shakes his head like he’s trying to understand what he’s seeing.
“She just turned eighteen,” he says slowly, voice shaking with barely leashed rage, “three days before this was taken. I remember because I was the one who planned the party; her dad wouldn’t allow her to sign to our label until she turned 18.”
Rowan lets out a short and furious laugh. “I trained him. I taught him how to manage artists, how to protect them, how to keep predators away from them.” His voice drops, raw and vicious. “And I handed those girls to a predator.”
These pictures show a pattern of a man who knew exactly where the lines were and crossed them anyway.
Rowan lowers the phone like it suddenly weighs a thousand pounds. His shoulders sag for a heartbeat before squaring again. “I put him in rooms alone with them. I vouched for him. I told parents he was safe.”
Korbyn folds in on herself, grief collapsing inward, and Shiloh is there instantly, anchoring one arm around her, the other braced at her back.
She murmurs something low and grounding meant to slow her breathing and to keep her tethered to her body.
Linkin paces a tight line across the rig, jaw clenched, fists flexing at his sides like he’s afraid of what he’ll do if he doesn’t keep moving.
Rowan’s hands curl into fists.
“This stops here,” he says, voice iron-hard and vibrating with restraint. “I swear to God, I will kill him.”
No one corrects him or says anything to redirect his anger. In one way or another, we have all been subject to predatory behavior in this industry. Rowan established the label for his sister and runs his empire in a way any brother would be proud of.
And for the first time since this started, I’m not thinking about Lucian at all. What just surfaced in this rig is bigger than my heartbreak.
“I feel sick,” Korbyn whispers.
I drop to my knees in front of her, the vinyl floor cold through my pants, and take her hands before she can pull them away. Her fingers are ice-cold, trembling faintly in mine. “Hey. Look at me,” I say gently. “We’re going to handle this. Whatever this is, you’re not doing it alone.”
She nods, but it’s reflexive, like her mind is already somewhere else, replaying moments that no longer make sense.
Rowan exhales slowly through his nose, forcing himself back into control. “Okay,” he says, tone shifting into something colder. “First thing, you do not go back to the house alone.”
“I don’t want to go back at all,” Korbyn says, barely audible.
“Then you won’t,” Shiloh replies immediately, squeezing her shoulder. “We’ll pack what you need. We will all go with you.”
“I need to call legal,” Rowan adds, his jaw tightening. “And I’m pulling him off any active management duties starting right now.”
Linkin stops pacing so abruptly that it’s like he hit a wall. “Okay,” he says, decisive now. “We need to move you.”
Korbyn blinks up at him, still dazed. “Move me where? What are we even talking about?”
“James is your husband, and he most likely has keys to your rig. We need to move you somewhere he doesn’t have access to,” he replies flatly.
Rowan exhales sharply. “He does have keys; he’s had spare keys since we got our rig.”
“I’ll switch beds with her,” Linkin says immediately.
Rowan turns toward him. “That means you’d be bunking with me.”
“Thrilling,” Linkin deadpans. “I’ve always wanted to listen to you grind your teeth through the night. Maybe you can give me a tattoo in my sleep. I’ve always wondered if I could sleep through a tattoo.”
Rowan snorts despite himself, then sobers. “That works. Are you good with that, Korb?”
Korbyn hesitates, then shakes her head slightly. “I don’t want to be alone,” she says quietly, the words barely making it past her lips.
“You won’t be,” Shiloh says at once. “You can stay with me instead.”
I nod in agreement as Rowan’s attention shifts, his gaze sliding past me toward the doorway.
Lucian stands there; somehow, he made it in the rig without us noticing.
Rowan lowers his voice instinctively. “Korbyn will stay with Celeste,” he says, the decision clicking into place. “Lucian’s already positioned between the door and the bedroom. If anything happens—”
“We’ll be right here,” I say immediately, squeezing Korbyn’s hands. “You can stay with me as long as you want.”
She looks at me and nods. Linkin tips his chin toward Lucian. “That puts a former FBI agent between her and literally anything with bad intentions. I like those odds.”
Shiloh hesitates, then nods too. “I’ll bring her things over,” she says, laying a hand on Korbyn’s shoulder. “You won’t be missing anything.”
I rise, keeping one hand anchored in Korbyn’s. “Come on,” I tell her softly. “Let’s go carb load before the show.
That earns the smallest huff of a laugh from her, fragile enough that it hurts.
Around us, the rig starts to change gears. Rowan steps aside with Lucian, their voices low. I’m not sure how long Lucian was listening, but he needs to know what’s going on if we’re going to keep our Little Crow safe.
I guide Korbyn toward the door, away from the weight of what just happened, toward light and noise and distraction, toward anywhere she can breathe.
For now, that’s enough.