Free A Lush Betrayal by Selena Laurence Page B

I want to discover each and every one and try to assemble an entire man from them.
    He clears his throat. “Well, what I do to get ready for a show is, uh, not get ready.” He quirks an eyebrow at me, and I look at him questioningly. “See, if I think about it, I’ll get too nervous, so I do whatever I need to avoid thinking about it. That usually means sitting down and working. I was doing some writing when you came in. A new song for the next album.”
    “Really?” I’m surprised. “So no special vocal warm-ups? No superstitions about what you need to eat or who you should talk to or anything?”
    “Nope. Just work. I write songs and sometimes go over paperwork, listen to some tunes I enjoy, maybe even read a book. No special anything. Then, when it’s time to go up front, I go and walk on stage blind. I trust my crew to have everything set up the way it should be. I trust my band to be ready and I trust myself to put on the best performance I can.”
    I watch him for a moment, blown away once again at the unexpected answers he’s given me.
    “I figured you for a control freak,” I say frankly.
    He laughs. “Oh, I am, but that’s what goes on days and weeks before the actual event. By this point, if it’s not right, it’s not going to be. I hire the absolute best people in the business and ride their asses like a fucking dictator. If we can’t pull it off by the time we get to the performance, then we all deserve to crash and burn in public.”
    He walks over to where I’m leaning back against the makeup counter that runs along one wall. He leans next to me, peeling the label off of his water bottle.
    “How about you, Mel? You’re pretty damn good at what you do. Are you a control freak?”
    I ponder his question for a moment. “No. The youngest kid never has much control, especially with an older sister like mine. So I’m the one who can go along with all sorts of things and doesn’t need to be in control. But that doesn’t mean I don’t have opinions or can’t stand up for myself. Just that I’m flexible.” I turn my head and he’s looking directly at me. His green eyes are so vivid. I know exactly what all those women wait in lines for. The possibility that you could get this close to those eyes and that face is enough to convince you to wait for years, let alone hours.
    He leans in even closer to me and reaches out to tuck a piece of hair behind my ear. I’m breathless.
    “That’s good to hear,” he says so quietly that it’s almost a whisper. “We’ll make a good pair, you and me. I can be in control, you can be flexible , and we’ll get along just fine.”
    Holy crap. My heart is racing. He’s in my space, and I feel lightheaded. I can hear him breathing, and his velvet voice sinks deep into my gut.
    “What if I don’t want to be controlled?” I nearly gasp out.
    “Mmm. You might like letting me be in control. At least some of the time,” he rumbles.
    “Five minutes to show!” a voice yells out in the hallway. Joss and I both jump back, and I can feel my face flush. He picks up his water bottle and chugs the rest of it in one.
    When he’s done, he tosses it into a trashcan across the room. Then he turns to look at me. “You gonna watch from backstage?” he asks, a big grin on his face.
    I nod, still not sure I can form coherent words.
    “Let’s get you set up then.” He takes my hand and I walk to the tour opening Lush show on the arm of the lead singer, who might be the sexiest man in recorded history.

Joss
    I’ VE ALWAYS imagined the feeling I have onstage is something like what a competitive swimmer must feel in the pool. I don’t hear anything else or see anything else but my band mates and the music. For all of our problems, we work together like a well-oiled machine. Even Mike and I smooth out when it’s show time.
    The first night of a new tour is always nerve-racking, but tonight there’s a different energy in the air. I’ve set Mel up in the wings of