11. Chapter Eleven
Chapter Eleven
Make It Hurt
Simone
I don’t leave my studio all day.
I do nothing but play my guitar, dragging chord after chord from the strings and hoping the music will drown out everything that happened last night.
It doesn’t.
Which means I may have a Luca-related problem.
It’s like a disease.
A persistent fever.
A nightmare that refuses to end when I open my eyes.
My stupid, treacherous brain will not stop replaying the feel of the devil’s mouth against mine.
His hands gripping my waist.
My hips.
My ass.
His fingers tugging at the edge of my underwear.
His tongue moving against mine.
His lips and teeth against my neck.
His voice telling me exactly what to do.
Congratu-fucking-lations, Simone Rochefort.
You are officially screwed.
And the worst part?
I don’t regret it.
Not even a little.
I only hate that it meant more to me than it did to him.
Trust me, no one wants to be inside my head right now.
I waited years for Luca to look at me the way he did last night. To touch me as though he had finally stopped seeing Bran’s little sister and noticed the woman standing in front of him.
Eighteen-year-old me would never believe it happened.
For a few reckless minutes, I finally got everything I once wanted.
But fantasies never tell you what happens after the kiss ends.
They don’t prepare you for the silence where something meaningful should have been.
We got caught up in the moment.
The words felt like acid against my skin.
Hot.
Corrosive.
Burning through whatever fragile hope I was stupid enough to feel.
I don’t know what I expected from him.
I was too stunned by the fact that Luca kissed me to consider what would happen afterward.
Luca Moreau—the most controlled, cynical man alive—lost control with me.
He kissed me.
Touched me.
Made me come without even taking off my underwear.
Of course he retreated afterward.
Of course he returned to his emotionless, mechanical state.
Of course he found another way to reject me.
The irony is that this time, he made the first move.
He crossed the distance between us.
He kissed me in the street.
He carried me back to his car and touched me as though nothing else in the world mattered.
Then he tried to reduce it to a mistake.
The humiliation turned into spite before I reached my bedroom.
That spite has helped me pretend he doesn’t exist.
I’m not subtle about it.
I don’t care who notices the way I refuse to look at him or how I treat him like an inconvenient piece of furniture.
No one can see inside me.
They can’t see the bruised, bleeding mess beneath my skin.
They don’t know how much the smallest shift of his shadow affects me.
Charlie, my longtime producer, suggested a small performance to appease the fans devastated by the tour cancellation.
Not that appease is the word we’re using publicly.
The official phrasing is an intimate thank-you performance while Simone and her team reassess the tour schedule.
It sounds far better than her father was nearly assassinated, and now everyone is afraid she might be next.
The performance won’t be large.
One secret location.
A hundred invited fans.
A stripped-down set with a handful of musicians.
No elaborate production. No prerecorded vocals. No fireworks or costume changes.
Just music.
Real music.
Dad and the security team haven’t officially approved the venue yet, but I refuse to believe they’ll stop me from doing this too.
Even a small show requires an army.
Because Dad’s movement restrictions keep me from working at my penthouse, where my team usually rehearses, everyone has been forced to come to the estate.
After an embarrassingly thorough inspection at the gate, naturally.
Apparently, Dad considers every assistant, vocal coach, and sound engineer a potential bomb carrier until proven otherwise.
Cue the eye roll.
The studio here isn’t terrible.
Dad designed it for me two years ago, shortly after my career took off.
It occupies most of the estate’s east wing, with soundproof walls, velvet couches, a full mixing station, and enough recording equipment to compete with a commercial studio.
Half-finished lyric journals cover one desk.
A red neon sign glows across the far wall.
MAKE IT HURT.
That’s what music is supposed to do.
Take the wound.
Give it a melody.
Make someone else feel it.
My team has moved in and out of the room since early morning.
Charlie is stationed behind the mixing board with a matcha permanently attached to one hand. Janie, my vocal coach, hovers during every warm-up, correcting my pitch with quiet suggestions.
Assistants and interns enter with coffee, cables, paperwork, and messages from people I don’t have the energy to answer.
Bran occasionally stops by under the excuse of checking our progress.
Most of the time, he ends up speaking with Luca.
Unfortunately, Dad has ordered Luca to remain in or near the studio whenever my team is here.
The forced proximity should make ignoring him impossible.
Fortunately, the room is crowded enough to let me pretend.
There are musicians, runners, assistants, and interns whose names blur together as they fix equipment, schedule rehearsals, and deliver drinks no one remembers ordering.
The studio never stops moving.
Beats thump through the speakers.
Phones vibrate with incoming demos.
Snare drums crack through the silences between takes.
I work like a woman possessed.
Anything to force him out of my mind.
My voice is raw from hours inside the booth. My fingertips sting from pressing guitar strings.
I’ve forgotten meals.
Forgotten time.
Several times, I catch Luca standing beyond the studio’s glass door with his arms folded, watching me.
Each time, I look away as though he means nothing.
Then I sing harder.
Play louder.
Push until the music hurts more than the memory of his mouth.
Last night, I did a convincing job of pretending the kiss meant nothing.
I desperately wish the performance had been real.
He’s only here because of his assignment.
Francis Rochefort’s orders.
Brandon Rochefort’s orders.
Protect the asset.
But resentment still burns beneath my skin whenever I catch the flash of Luca’s watch or hear the nearly silent sound of his boots as he shifts to another position.
Damn him.
At least I have Adrien.
Adrien Belcourt has somehow become the person I lean on most.
He has spent the past several days turning into someone I can genuinely call a best friend.
He arrived shortly after my team this morning and settled beside Charlie behind the studio glass.
Every few minutes, he offers a thumbs-up or an exaggerated smile.
“You’re killing it,” he mouths slowly. “You’re going to burn the place down.”
I give him a tired smile.
Adrien doesn’t push.
He doesn’t pity me.
He lets me exist exactly as I am—frantic, stubborn, and exhausted.
He does it so naturally that I occasionally forget we’re supposed to be pretending to date.
I catch Luca rolling his eyes at Adrien’s encouragement.
Then another thought sinks its claws into me.
I’ve paraded Adrien around as my boyfriend.
Last night, I kissed Luca.
Technically, I cheated.
Adrien and I are the only people who know our whirlwind romance is completely fake.
Luca doesn’t know.
Not that my supposed relationship stopped him from touching me.
He never liked Adrien in the first place.
But that isn’t the point.
For once, I find myself wondering what Luca thinks of me.
Does he believe I’m careless?
Dishonest?
A woman with no loyalty or control?
I usually don’t care what anyone thinks.
I do what I want because I want to do it, not because I need approval.
But Luca has always been different.
Even as a child, I wanted to know what he thought when he looked at me.
Apparently, that pathetic habit survived into adulthood.
I shake my head as though I can physically dislodge the thought.
It’s over.
My feelings for him.
Last night.
All of it.
Who cares what he thinks?
His opinion changes nothing.
I feel like complete shit today.
I can’t decide whether it’s because my period is approaching or because one of Charlie’s interns has spent the last several minutes hovering around Luca.
She laughs too loudly at something he says.
Since when does Luca have conversations with strangers?
What the fuck?
I sit on the edge of a velvet couch, flipping through my notebook with sharp, agitated movements.
My team moves cautiously around me.
Charlie works at the mixing desk. Janie adjusts a microphone stand. Two assistants carry in a container filled with cables.
Everyone seems to be wearing the same careful expression, as though one wrong word might cause me to explode.
They aren’t wrong.
I’ve been terrible today.
No song holds my attention.
Every note feels wrong.
Every key sounds flat.
Every lyric collapses before I can finish it.
For once, music isn’t saving me from myself.
Adrien isn’t here either.
As much as I hate admitting it, he has become the friendliest presence in the studio. I may have grown dependent on having him nearby.
That is entirely unlike me.
Then again, I’ve done several things unlike myself lately.
His text arrived this morning with enough cheerful emojis to decorate an entire birthday card. A family emergency required his attention, and he couldn’t come today.
I told him he didn’t owe me an explanation.
I woke with cramps in my lower back, aching breasts, and a headache that announced my period’s approaching arrival.
Wonderful.
I’m already a cranky bitch before my period.
Adding Luca Moreau to the equation should qualify as psychological torture.
“We need to finalize the set list,” Charlie says.
He taps his pen against the laptop.
Tick.
Tick.
Tick.
The sound drills directly into my skull.
“Rehearsals begin tomorrow, and we’re already cutting it close.”
“You don’t have to remind me.”
An uncomfortable silence follows.
Janie shifts and looks toward Charlie as though sending him a warning.
“Simone,” Charlie says carefully, “we need to lock it down today. If you want to open with Ashes, that’s fine. But the transitions and key changes can’t be improvised during the performance.”
“I’m not improvising.”
My voice is sharper than necessary.
“I just…”
I stop before the rest spills out.
I don’t know how to explain this frustration.
This distraction.
My voice feels raw in the wrong way. My fingers stumble over chords I could play in my sleep.
Whenever I try to focus, I see Luca in the corner of the room.
Arms crossed.
Mouth set into a grim line.
Watching me.
My chest tightens until breathing becomes difficult.
This cannot be happening again.
I can’t fall for him twice.
I won’t.
My gaze moves toward the intern beside him.
She’s staring up at him with wide eyes, apparently having forgotten why she entered the studio.
“You.”
I curl one finger toward myself.
Every head in the room turns.
Charlie visibly winces.
The young woman straightens and forces an uncertain smile.
“Come here.”
She approaches slowly, arms hanging stiffly at her sides.
“What’s your name?”
I glance down at my notebook, though Luca’s stare burns against the side of my face.
“Mallory.”
My smile becomes painfully sweet.
“Mallory.”
I repeat the name as though testing it.
“Would you care to explain why you’ve spent the last five minutes standing beside my bodyguard instead of doing your job?”
Her cheeks turn bright red.
“I wasn’t—I only asked where he wanted the deliveries placed.”
Her words rush together.
“The water and the additional cables. You said everything needed to be cleared before rehearsals, and I didn’t want to put them in the wrong room.”
The reasonable explanation should stop me.
It doesn’t.
“Next time, ask Charlie or another member of my team instead of distracting security.”
Mallory nods quickly.
Her lips press together as though she’s trying to keep them from trembling.
Guilt pricks at me.
I ignore it.
“I understand.”
She retreats.
I close my notebook with a sharp snap and stand.
“Five minutes, everyone,” Charlie announces into the silence. “Then we’ll run it again.”
“We don’t need five minutes.”
I head toward the stage.
“We’re starting now.”
“Of course.”
Charlie’s smile is tired.
He has dealt with my temper long enough to recognize misdirected anger when he sees it.
“From the beginning.”
I climb onto the small rehearsal platform and adjust the microphone with jerky movements.
The backing track begins.
The opening of Ashes is stripped down to acoustic guitar and a faint heartbeat rhythm.
The first verse should be effortless.
I miss the opening cue.
Then I come in too early on the second line.
My pitch slides.
I sound like an amateur singing someone else’s song.
“Fuck.”
I yank off the headphones and throw them onto the floor.
“The track is wrong.”
“It isn’t,” Charlie says gently.
“Well, it sounds wrong.”
Another terrible silence fills the studio.
Everyone knows.
The track isn’t the problem.
I am.
“Fine.”
I step down from the platform.
“Take five. Drink water. Do whatever you need to do.”
The room seems to exhale.
People scatter toward the back wall, speaking quietly and pretending not to notice that I remain frozen near the stage.
My jaw trembles.
So do my hands.
I hate this.
I hate feeling out of control.
Like I’m drowning in a pool I filled myself.
I press both palms against my eyes and force myself to breathe.
I’m better than this.
Better than humiliating an intern because she spoke to a man I claim to hate.
Better than throwing a tantrum in front of the people who depend on me to lead them.
I’m Simone Rochefort.
I don’t choke when things become uncomfortable.
I don’t collapse in front of an audience.
Even when that audience includes the bodyguard growing through my thoughts like a cancer.
I want to tell him to leave.
I want him to stop staring.
I want him to come closer and somehow repair whatever he broke.
I can’t ask for any of those things.
After five long minutes, I lower my hands and turn toward Charlie.
He waits without speaking.
I circle one finger in the air.
“Reset the track.”
My voice is steadier now.
I climb back onto the stage.
“We’re doing it again.”
The neon sign burns red behind me.
MAKE IT HURT.
I tighten my grip around the microphone.
“From the top.”