Chapter 29 #2
“I quite like those. Girl songs, girls in general, girls in … particular.” The crowd does a cute, collective soft chuckle.
“Let’s just say I was enamoured with one, for quite a long time, and I got the chance to play for her while she was in a ball gown, in a ballroom, in the North of England, after she’d been away for half a year too long.
I thought, this is the song she, since she was five years old, always dreamed of a boy whisking her across a dance floor to.
But I think she forgot she told me that one night because she likes her whiskey.
I was foolish, I thought, ‘if I just sing it to her, she’ll fall in love!
’ Unfortunately, I was right, but it wasn’t me she fell in love with. ”
The crowd goes, “Aww,” and Kel was there, so she looks at me with giant puppy dog eyes waiting for my reaction. I can’t believe I told Jett that and forgot, I really want to slap myself in the face right now.
“I think I’ll sing it to her once more, just to see if it works this time.”
I feel a lot of eyes on me which is not surprising after what he slipped into our interview.
He wraps his tattooed fingers around the microphone stand and leans towards me, just as he did in the North that night.
Everyone else in the room disappears. Jett stares that hole right through me again, but without the mask this time.
He sings as smooth and soft and hypnotizing as he did that night in that mask.
If he hadn’t had it on when he last sang this to me, I would have seen.
I mean, seeing the look now, holy shit. I’m in love already, you cheeky boy.
Now you’re just torching my insides for sport.
Do I remember his eyes looking at me so deep, dark, and full of yearning?
I mean, I don’t think I ever failed to notice them, but now I see what was lurking there, what I ignored because I wasn’t ready.
The haunting way he sings Mazzy Starr doesn’t make me fall adorably in love with him, cutely, gingerly.
It reminds me of how ugly, how raw, how fast I’ve fallen.
Jett’s love knocks me on my ass and sends me hurdling through space, until I land with an earthshaking thud, faceplanting and falling headfirst as ungracefully as possible.
I flash him Jett’s Girl on my nails paired with Mine on the tennis bracelet before making him the two-handed heart for him like the last time he sang me this. He pretends I’ve thrown some sort of invisible arrow at his heart and acts in a shocked attempt to yank it out, and I grin.
When the song ends, we can’t stop clapping.
Kel stares at me, “What did you do to him?!”
“What did he do to me?!” I hiss.
Then she looks at me like I’m showing her a lost episode of her favorite show she never knew existed, looking at me just like Lola’s BFF Nina had done and says the same damn thing.
“Holy shit, Maddy.”
I wanna be like, What does holy shit Maddy mean exactly? Because I’ve been hearing it a lot, but I can’t because Jett is making little sparkly heart eyes at the crowd and saying, “Oh fuck, I think it worked that time!”
“Baby!” Britta exclaims. I look to my cousin, who’s staring at me with her jaw dropped. “Oh, this is serious!” She says to go with the holy shit, Maddy look.
No shit, it’s serious. Giving up all control and ownership of my heart to Jett? It’s like my heart’s been ripped out, put on a spit, and turned painfully slow over a passionate open flame. I wouldn’t risk my pride, my heart, everything like this just to get railed once, come on.
Dean slings Jett’s pink Stratocaster over his shoulder, and I really do feel eighteen again.
He’s talking about his first hit, Kill Me Maybe, and Kel starts shaking me because she’s so excited.
It’s so cute and yeah, I will admit this is the first Jett song I liked, along with the whole world too, apparently, as he starts singing and everyone joins in.
‘Cause I’d rather feel the burn, the pain, the shock.
Than feel nothin’ at all on this ticking clock.
I don’t need another friend now, baby,
Go ahead, kill me maybe.
His old lyrics somehow mirror exactly how I feel about giving him my heart. It’s worth the risk compared to feeling nothing, to get to fully feel this something.
I’m in a total trance through the rest of the set, including his last, the cover of Eyes Without a Face, and I believe I have been completely hypnotized by the boy.
I only register that Jett’s done when he’s suddenly here in front of me, hugging my little crew and thoroughly charming them.
I stare in awe. His parents are with us, and we’re all embracing and smiling and unbelievably proud.
Jett has a sweet new manager to replace the defective old one, and she introduces herself to me as Zelda.
She is very British and resembles his mum.
She starts telling me all the exciting ideas she wants Jett and me to execute, as if I’m part of his team … Am I?
I look around to notice I’m holding my phone but Jett, his parents, Auntie, Cousy, and Kel have all disappeared. “My, my family?”
Zelda grins, “Jett got them a table at that new place across the street everyone’s been dying to try.”
I don’t understand the disorienting feeling this trance holds over me but let’s just say, Jett has special gifts, and this is just another one of many.
“And … Jett?”
“Oh, he’s in his dressing room backstage waiting for you. Let me show you.”
“Waiting for me? He was just here, I—”
“He said he was waiting specifically for the Maddy Morningstar he should have had pressed up against the wall after the magazine photoshoot. Does that make sense to you?”
“Unfortunately, it does.” How can he effortlessly get into my head like this? Leave it to Jett to use people as thank-you gifts and ask his staff to help recreate a moment in time, anytime he wants to, just because he can.
I wave her away sweetly and do my cutest, most innocent-sounding knock on his door. “Jett? I heard you’re waiting to see me? It’s me, Maddy.”
Jett opens the door and sweeps me inside so he can shut and lock it behind me, hand pressed against the door right above me, crowding me, invading all of my senses.
Jett’s heady cologne, the plethora of diamonds in his ears casting an angelic glow, the washed-out irises and shiny magic smeared across his waterline.
It’s all too much, and the lace of my panties is soaked through in an instant.
He slips the leather jacket off my shoulders, letting it fall to the floor so he can stroke the bare skin of my arms. One hand rests right where it did during our portrait session.
“Miss Serious Actress. Is your heart beatin’ that fast just for me?”
I tuck my fingers under his black suspender straps. I don't miss how well he plays the part, even making his accent thicker like it was then. “It only beats for you, Jett.”
His lips skim across mine. “Thought you wanted nothing to do with me, said dating was a distraction.”
“Distract me, then. I don't want you pressing anyone else up against a wall but me. I'm the one that deserves you like this, not them.”
“Mads.” He groans, pressing his hips flush with mine.
“I don’t know who you’re talking about, all I see is you.
Innocent little angel. I feel like I needta, but I don't think I can take it easy on ya. I'm past slow an’ gentle. I haven’t stopped thinking about you since the night we met. I’m starving for ya, princess.”
I put my stiletto nails to good use, adding pressure before dragging them down the hard muscles of his back with one layer of fabric serving as buffer. “I’m not that innocent if I’m yours, now am I? It’s been a week, Jett, you couldn’t want me that bad.”
“Not saying I remember everything that happened that night, after you went home. But I know I couldn’t stop thinking about you, how you smelled, how your arse looked in those frilly white knickers when you bent down to pick up your phone.
I may have turned on the telly as soon as I got there.
Put on your show, god damn Cherry darling. ”