Chapter 8
CHAPTER EIGHT
ADDISON
There’s a famous country star in my kitchen cooking me dinner, and I don’t know what to do with that.
A famous, gorgeous enough to drive me crazy, country star.
I shouldn’t be so affected by her presence, because first of all, I’m not looking to date or sleep with anyone right now.
And second, because it seems like she showed up here with a whole lot of baggage.
And I don’t mean all that stuff I almost tripped over in the lobby of the inn.
My life has been drama-free since I got the hell out of my joke of a marriage and all the way out of Chicago. The only drama I have to deal with now is Brenden’s, which is usually more entertaining than stressful.
But there’s something about the way Riley fucking Rowland looks at me that makes it impossible to look away from her.
It’s like she’s truly interested in seeing me, despite the glamorous life she must lead and all the other rich celebrities she knows.
And it kind of feels like she’s looking for something in me that might be able to help her find something in herself.
That’s the part that’s hardest to ignore—and also the most dangerous.
The last thing I want is to wind up in a headline as the random small-town woman Riley Rowland was spotted with.
And I’m not interested in being anyone’s queer experiment.
But she seems so genuinely curious, and more than a little lost in a way that makes me want to take care of her and see her happy.
And okay, yeah. Did I mention the part where she’s so gorgeous it’s driving me crazy?
I can’t believe she found my fucking vibrator in the damn couch.
As if my lack of a sex life wasn’t obvious enough, now she’s aware that I sometimes get bored and try to mix it up by fucking myself in the living room.
I’m not typically embarrassed by stuff like that.
But seeing her small hand with her pink fingernails wrapped around the toy I use to get myself off had half of me wishing the couch would swallow me up completely, and the other half imagining her being the one using it to get me off.
Or me taking it from her hand and using it on her. Or both. Preferably both.
Jesus, what have I gotten myself into?
And now, after that unfortunate incident, she’s cooking me dinner.
Which is... unexpectedly sweet. I’m so used to being the one cooking for everyone.
Family and friends know I’m a chef, so even when I’m not working, people still expect me to cook.
I’ve never really minded before, because it’s something I truly enjoy doing.
But the fact that she offered, that she wanted to do it for me, is one more thing to add to the list of things about her that have been a pleasant surprise.
We ran to the grocery store together so she could grab the ingredients she needed for teriyaki salmon bowls, and as we were selecting produce, I found myself thinking about how domestic it felt.
I also found myself struggling to recall a single time during our marriage that Christy and I ever did that together.
Christy hated grocery shopping, and she pretty much hated cooking.
Yet she still fought to be the one who kept the restaurant when we divorced.
At the time, I couldn’t understand why, other than simply to spite me. It wasn’t until later that I learned she hired a famous social media influencer to be the new head chef. A woman she’d been cheating on me with.
Anyway, after the nice outing of grocery shopping with Riley, she banished me from my own kitchen—or she might have simply suggested I go relax while she does the work.
But I’m realizing now that, even though I told her I wasn’t worried about her messing up my kitchen, I may be more of a control freak in that area than I thought.
So I’ve already checked on her twice, and now I’m itching to do it again.
If I’m being honest with myself, though, it may not be strictly because I’m worried about potential kitchen disasters, but also because relaxing is pretty much impossible while knowing this woman is in my house, only a room away from me.
When I wander into the kitchen for the third time, she simply laughs and shakes her head. The smile on her face as she resumes what she was doing makes me wish I was the songwriter so that I could properly memorialize the beauty of it.
Freddie is weaving himself between her legs—probably trying to trip her up in hopes she’ll drop some food on the floor for him—but she doesn’t seem bothered by my greedy little menace.
Still, I go over and scoop him up, pressing a kiss to the top of his soft head. “Sorry about him.”
“Oh, he’s been fine,” Riley says as she ladles the rice she cooked into two bowls.
“Maybe so far, but you’ve got to watch out for him. There isn’t much he wouldn’t do for salmon.”
With a short laugh, she responds, “Same.”
I make a mental note to include salmon on this weekend’s dinner menu at the inn.
Freddie wriggles in my arms, expressing his desire to be released from cat jail, so I set him down with a warning to be good. He immediately goes back to headbutting Riley’s shins.
Since she hasn’t tried to kick me out again, I stick around, watching intently as she finishes up our meals. “Do you do a lot of cooking at home?” I ask.
She shakes her head. “Definitely not. I um... I have a private chef who prepares a lot of my meals for me. But it’s mostly because I’m busy with music stuff a lot of the time, and I need to make sure I’m eating healthy and staying fit.”
By the way she quickly looks away and ducks her head after telling me this, I get the sense that she’s embarrassed about it.
Though I’m not sure if she’s embarrassed about not cooking for herself or simply about her wealth and privilege.
Maybe it’s the acknowledgement that she’s in the position of hiring people like me, and the way this highlights the vast differences between us.
But I don’t give a shit about that. I love what I do for a living, and I’m not ashamed of it.
“There’s nothing wrong with that,” I assure her. “I imagine you need to be in peak health for performing and touring the way you do.”
“It really helps, yeah.”
“What’s the longest length of time you’ve been on a tour?”
It takes her a couple moments to think about it as she drizzles a sauce on top of the bowls, then she says, “Nine months. But that was a world tour, and I don’t usually do those.”
“Wow. Do you miss your family and friends or just your normal life when you’re gone for that long?”
She passes me one of the bowls. “Sometimes my mom comes with me, and I’ll fly my brother out for a few shows in the summers, but yeah.
I miss my family when I’m away from them.
As for friends, I’m pretty sure most of my friends are the people that work on my tours in whatever capacities. And my normal life...”
Her expression turns more contemplative as she picks up the other bowl and stares into it. I wait for her to find her words.
Well,” she finally says, “touring is my normal life. I know I’m not always on tour, but it seems like that’s always what I’m working toward.
When I finish one tour, I’m recording a new album and planning the next tour.
I’ve been doing this for so long that I don’t really remember what a normal life was like before it. ”
I gesture for her to follow me and lead her into the dining room. One end of the table is taken up by a puzzle I started weeks ago when I was bored and then never bothered to finish, so we sit at the other end. Mentally, I kick myself for not cleaning that up while she was busy cooking.
“I can’t imagine living a life like that,” I tell her. “I’m not sure I’d want to. But you must love it, right?”
She spears a chunk of salmon onto her fork but doesn’t take the bite.
“I did. I mean, I do. I dunno.” Shaking her head, she sets her fork back down, letting it rest against the edge of the bowl.
“It’s the life I dreamed about when I was a teenager, and I’d be lying if I said it’s not thrilling achieving your dreams. It’s just that since I’ve temporarily stepped away from it, when I think about it now, my entire career almost feels like it was someone else’s life.
That probably doesn’t make sense, because it doesn’t even make sense to me. ”
“Honestly, yeah, I’m not sure I understand what you mean,” I say. Setting my fingers lightly on her thigh, I add. “But I’d like to try to understand if you want to try to explain it.”
Her eyes dart down to my hand on her lap, and though she doesn’t seem unhappy about the contact, I remove it and go back to eating as she starts talking again.
“I guess it’s like I’m looking at Riley Rowland the country star in my mind and getting this feeling of, Is that really me?
Being back in Mayweather does make me feel closer to the normal life I had growing up here.
And it’s making me feel closer to myself.
To the awkward girl who played music in her room, who had unattainable crushes, and who no one really paid much attention to.
.. so she didn’t need to worry about what people thought of her every moment of every day. ”
I’m not sure what to say to that. But I’m suddenly trying to picture her as a teenager.
I’ve definitely caught glimpses of that awkward girl behind the celebrity image.
Really, I don’t think I’ve seen the celebrity image at all, and I’m not sure if it’s because she’s been able to drop it completely here or if she’s been comfortable dropping it with me specifically.
“And I’m not saying I wish I could be a teenager again,” she says, reaching up to rub at the back of her neck. “No way. I don’t want to discount all the ways I’ve grown since then. I just wonder if maybe I reached a point where I grew too much. Grew into something impossible to maintain forever.”
“Well, nothing lasts forever,” I offer, not too helpfully.