Front & Center (Book 2 of the Back-Up Series) (21 page)

“Fuck.”

“You really need to be patient. Leila was absolutely right in planning this.”

“Ok. Patience.”

“One more thing. When you meet with Jessa, tell her you would like your own paternity test done. Do not tell her why. Stay calm and do not get excited or angry at her response.”

“I may need to take a Valium to keep from strangling her to death.”

“Be careful who you repeat that to.” Oscar scolds.



“Hi, Ace.”

“He
y, sweetie. So, Jessa boarded a flight in LaGuardia alone and is on her way to Vegas. I haven’t seen Danny in days. She has been to his place, but he hasn’t surfaced or left his apartment. I already let Oscar know.”

“
Thanks for working so closely with him.”

“No thanks needed. He’s a great guy and I’m glad he’s there protecting you.”

“I’m glad you’re in Jersey protecting me.”

“Me too. By
e, sweetie.”

A
smiling Jack busts into my dressing room and closes the door quickly behind him.

“What are you doing?”

“I’m visiting my girlfriend.” He comes to stand behind me, watching me through the vanity mirror. “Ooh, are you naked under here?” He asks as he uses his finger to open my robe a few inches.

“Yes,
and we don’t have time. We’re due on stage in fifteen minutes.”

“Baby, have I not proven I
work well under pressure? Lately we’ve never had enough time.”

“How are you here? What if someone saw you?”

“Will has the roadies scrambling with a ‘missing amp’ issue.”

“Did you
have something to do with this missing amp?”

“Me? Of course not. I may have bribed Trey
, though.”

Laughing at his admission, I say, “Wh
at is Trey’s price? He seems un-bribable.”

“You’d be surprised. He wants
a solo tonight.”

“Well
, good for him. We are in his home state.”

“Yep. He’s shrewd.” Jack pulls me into a standing position. “Enough talking.”

He goes right to it, nibbling on my ear, then my neck.

“M
mm…did you lock the door?”

“Of course,
woman.” Jack slowly kisses my lips. It’s the kind of kiss that drives me wild, and now that he knows that, he torments me with them every opportunity he gets.

“So listening to your single got me
all horny.”

“Did you like it?”

“Yeah, babe. It’s really good. I love it. The lyrics went right to my groin.”

“What?”

“They’re hot. When you sing about being in a constant state of torment, it does things to me.”

“That could become a problem since we’re apart right now.”

“Cold showers. They fucking suck ass.” He kisses my neck
, as I giggle at his admission. “When does it debut?”

“
Malcolm said to give him a few days. He’s going to send it to some key radio stations.”

He unties my sash, moving his hand around my waist to the small of my back. Pulling me into him, I can feel
each of his hard muscles…every one.

“
Men from coast to coast will want you. But you are mine. Don’t ever forget that.”

“And you’re mine.”

“Completely.” He lifts and sits me on the edge of the vanity, moving to stand between my spread legs. He then pulls my already erect nipple in between his lips and swirls his tongue around its peak. One hand slowly skims my body and comes to rest on the inside of my thigh and the other gently kneads my other breast.

“Lean back.”

I do as he asks, resting my back against the mirror. He kisses me and then disappears between my legs. Taking an ankle in each hand, he hooks my legs over his shoulders and goes right to it. His warm lips immediately send sparks through my body, his wet tongue lights the match, but then a knock on the door douses the flames.

“Oh my G
od. Jack!” I whisper loudly, in a panic.

“Ssh…don’t worry. Don’t say anything.”

Here we are, Jack on his knees with his face buried in between my thighs, and I’m spread as if getting a pap smear. After a few seconds, whoever knocked jiggles the doorknob, then moves on.

Jack
starts laughing, his body shaking while his face is still buried in my...

“Jack!” I push him away. “Stop.”

“I…
Babe…” He can’t even complete a full intelligible sentence from laughing so hard. He straightens and slumps over me, pinning me with his weight.

“I’m sorry
, baby. That was so funny.”

“It wasn’t that funny. And now I’m horny as hell.”

“We still have a few minutes.”

“No!” I
push him away and point a finger. “Stay away from me.”

I pull my robe closed and cross my arms, waiting for him to calm down.

When he hunches over and continues laughing, I move into the bathroom to get dressed. He follows me in, still apologizing profusely.

“If it makes you feel better…” He takes my hand and places it over his rock hard bulge.

“Good. Serves you right.”

“Can I hug you for luck?” Dimples appear, and my crotch reacts.

“Fine.”

He moves over to wrap his arms around me. “I really am sorry. I’ll make it up to you.”

“Yes
, you will, Mr. Lair. You know how I get before a show. You’ve wrecked my routine and frustrated me.”

“I’m sorry.”

An announcement with our five-minute warning comes over the PA system. “Out!”

“Ok. I’ll see you on stage. Time to hate you.” He kisses my cheek and sneaks out. That man is going to be the death of me.

It turns out my horniness helps with my pretense to hate Jack perfectly. Usually, when he makes snide comments about me to the audience, I remain quiet, pretending to stew. Today, I fight back. During our first duet, I decide not to share a mic with him and instead choose to roam the stage and openly flirt with Trey during his solo. Trey takes the opportunity to bust Jack and responds perfectly towards my advances.

Jack begins his verse
staring out into the crowd. He slowly turns his head to finally look at us. The look is heated and says, “
You are so dead”
.

I
respond with my own glare, challenging him to “
Bring it on”
.

Towards the end of the song, I move to the center mic and purposefully keep distance between us. He leans in until his lips touch mine. He seductively snakes his hand into my hair, holding my head in place while sneering the lyrics to me. To the audience, it looks like we can’t stand each other.

The rest of the show goes much the same way, our tensions
causing our performance to look enraged. It’s the first show since I broke up with him that we’ve interacted at all. The audience loves it. After our encore, they begin chanting, “Leila and Jack”, over and over.

“They sure want you two back together.” Hunter says
, as we exit the stage. As usual, Will

and the roadies are all at the stairs, waiting to pack up our equipment.

Jack uses the opportunity and mumbles, “Not gonna happen.” He then disappears into his

dressing room. He always turns me on w
hen he acts this way. Once I’m tucked away in my own room, he texts me.

coming in

no. too risky.

His response is to barge into the room.

“Jack, you are going to get caught.”

“They are breaking down the stage. No chance.” He stalks towards me like he’s about to eat me for lunch. “Trying to make me jealous?”

“Did it work?”

He places my hand right where it was before our show started. “What do you think?”

“I’d say that is a yes. Have you been sporting this for the last two hours.”

“Uh, yeah.”

“I’ll help you take care of it if you’d like.”

“
That’s the plan.” He removes my jeans and panties, lifts me and places me in the same spot

I was in when we were so rudely interrupted.
He then drops his jeans to his ankles.

I look down and smirk. “Commando?”

“Just saving time.”
He slips two fingers inside, while using his thumb to stroke me. “You’re so ready.” He removes his fingers and thrusts into me fast and hard.

“
Ah, fuck.” He says with his lips on my ear.

He buries his face in my neck, muffling his grunts and groans.
The ache he left me with earlier has intensified unbearably. I take hold of his ass cheeks to urge him to go deeper and faster still. He complies and with every lunge, he gets me closer.

He slips his hand between us and
a few strokes of his fingertips is all it takes.

Jack groans
and repeats a throaty, “Ah, fuuuck.” Once he stills, he pins me with his body weight, not moving a muscle.

“You ok?”

“Hmm. I’m good.” He murmurs into my neck. “You?”

“Very good.”

“Glad to hear it.” He says, but still doesn’t move.

“You have to go.”
When he remains slumped over me, I poke his chest. “Jack.”

“Hmm?”

“You have to go.”

“Such a buzz kill.” He pulls out and looks down
at my exposed crotch. He runs the pad of his thumb over me, causing my breath to hitch and my hips to buck.

“This sucks.”

“What?”

“
Leaving you here, especially like this.”

I grab his shirt and pull him towards me. “I know.” I kiss him deeply and he inches closer
, until he is pressed against my entrance again, erect and ready to go. This was a bad idea. I’ve riled him up again.

I push him away and shake my head.
“No. No. No. You really have to go.”

Taking matters into my own hand, I hop off the vanity, pull up his jeans,
carefully zip and button him up, and shove him towards the door.

On his way out,
he turns and admits, “I forgive you.”

“
For what?”

“
For the cold shower I have to go take.”

I have so much swirling in my head that it’s causing a constant dull pounding in between my ears.

Ace confirmed Jessa flew out of New York by herself. Unless Danny is arriving from a different location, she is coming alone.
She is staying at some dump on the old strip. My guess is she can’t afford anything better.

I
can’t wait to find out why she called this little meeting. Being in the same room with her is going to be challenging. I already feel the impulse to strangle her, and she isn’t even here yet.

Leila is not happy about this, and I can’t blame her. She worries Danny will appear to complicate things. Oscar assured her that he would be there, hiding in the background.

Besides all the Jessa charades, I’ve had to
juggle the secret hotel I booked for Leila and me, the surprise of having our siblings coming, and coordinate the other “thing”, all while doing our show and pretending to hate the love of my life.

When did my life become such a
fucking soap opera?

I booked a suite at the
Bellagio
overlooking the fountains. Vegas is costing me a fortune, but I’d gladly pay ten times the price to be with her. As a ruse, Leila and I have our rooms booked in the same hotel that the band is staying in. We will check in and then sneak out to the
Bellagio
.

Will gave the roadies the night off, since our first show isn’t until tomorrow. We all predict they will be like kids in a candy store and most likely disappear the entire time.
Oscar will be following Leila and me, in case Jessa’s mole isn’t as excited about being in Vegas as we hope.

I feel bad
for running them ragged because we are staying somewhere else, but there’s a reason for this madness. The Marriott is just not special enough for what I have planned. Everyone who is aware of our predicament has been nothing but supportive, including my band.

I received a t
ext from Lizzy announcing that she and Evan have arrived and the suite is perfect. She helped to organize everything I needed for my private dinner with Leila. They are taking in the sights and will meet up with us later tonight, in time for the intimate party I’ve planned with the rest of the band. I tried to get Patti and Mandi to join us, but they just weren’t able to come so soon since their Chicago trip.

We should be pulling into Vegas
in a few hours. It’s super early, and I can’t sleep once again. It works out to my advantage since it’s the only time I can sit on the bus with complete privacy. The rest of the guys are all sleeping in their bunks, and it’s just our driver, the laptop and me.

I
decide to take a chance and text Leila.

are you up?

When she doesn’t respond, I check out some of the gossip sights to see if anything new has festered overnight. I Google Leila’s name and the usual posts come up. Her haters are still spewing nonsense, but no one is really paying attention to them. Seeing her gorgeous face on the screen fuels my hunger for her. I miss her so much. I miss having my arms wrapped around her each night like I used to. There are some new posts from fans that heard her song on the radio. Just thinking about it causes my cock to twitch. Her voice does things to me. The song Malcolm chose for her is perfection. It’s just a matter of time when every station from coast to coast will be playing her hourly.

N
ext, I open our website and am shocked at the number of followers we now have. Just a few short weeks ago we had a few thousand followers. Our numbers are now in the tens of thousands. They adore us. They call themselves The DL Sinners. Their loyalty to us is amazing. They jump on all our updates, posts, and pictures that Jen adds to our blog. They pimp us out tirelessly. They attack all and any haters. They have our backs, and it’s humbling to know all these strangers would defend us, support us, and share our story just because they love our music. It’s all the awesome support we are getting from our fans that keeps me sane.

As I enter my own name in the search
bar, a new blog site pops up as the first entry.

Ah,
fuck
. The name alone tells me this isn’t good.

A
chick I banged created a blog for all the other chicks I banged. There are hundreds of followers, all detailing their connection to me. Scrolling through their faces makes me sick to my stomach. I don’t even remember the majority of them.

Great,
fucking great
. This is just what I need right now.

hey babe, whatcha doin’?
Leila responds to my earlier text.

um. nothing.

are you jerking off?

no. i can’
t. my stupid bunk squeaks.

l
mao. i’m sorry, i wish i could help.

you
could always talk dirty to me.
I reply in a desperate attempt.

it kinda doesn’t work over text.

attach a pic. that’ll work
.


t
hat’s all i need. a naked pic ending up in the wrong hands.

j
ust my hand. singular. my other hand would be busy.

w
here would your other hand be busy? your bunk squeaks and you are surrounded by men.

Damn it.
let’s stop talking about this.

you started it
.

ok, smartass.

why are you up so early?

Couldn’t sleep.

So, watcha doin’?
She repeats her question from earlier.

I stare at her text for a full minute.

jack.?

do I have to tell you?

Yes!

i’m
on the internet.

watching porn?

Ha ha. i’m googling.

Ugh.
I don’t want to know…wait- yes I do.

When I don’t respond, she adds,

hello?

First
off, i read about your new song. it’s starting to be played.

Yeah, Malcolm sent me a text telling me.

You sound so hot.

You’re biased.

True. But you do.

So second?

Huh?

You said first off. What
else are you doin’?

Nothin’

Liar.

I once again stare at the phone. Jeez, how do I tell her all my ex-fucks have banded together

to brag about their experiences with me?

??
waiting…

i’m telling you because I promised not to keep things from you
-
lairlovers.com

oh
my god!

A few minutes pass and no additional texts come through.
Now it’s my turn to prompt her.

lei?

really jack?

i’m sorry !

i love jack lair…i love jack lair…he loves me…he loves me…

what are you doing?

reminding myself.

i do. i love you more than anything in this world.

i know.

i’ll make it up to you.

Yes you will!

I
wish you were here now!
I admit.

Me too.

My girlfriend is so fucking awesome.



The roadies are all yapping like a bunch of women. I sit watching them make their plans, while scowling. They are starting at one end of the strip and bouncing from go-go bar to go-go bar, until they make it to the other end. Will is joining them. This is perfect. We will not have to worry about them for hours.

On their way out, I threaten, “No one better get arrested tonight.”

The minute they leave the bus, I call Leila.

“Where am I meeting you? Can you give me a hint?”

“Nope. Oscar will handle getting you there. See you in a few.”

I hang up before she has the chance to ask another question.

Hunt, Scott, Dylan and Trey are all hanging together. The roadies think I’m joining them. Instead, I take a cab straight to the
Bellagio
. As I stand in the suite, I am filled with anxiety…not in a bad way. More like a kid on Christmas morning.

I have a few minutes before Oscar will get here with Leila. The candles are lit. The rose petals are scattered. The table is set
facing the floor to ceiling windows affording a dead center view of the fountains. I have nothing to do now but wait for her to arrive.

If
I were a smoker, I’d want a cigarette right about now. After watching seventeen long minutes tick away on the digital clock that sits on the end table, I start pacing the room. At the twenty-six minute mark, there is a knock on the door.

I release a deep breath and walk over to open it.

Leila stands alone, smiling shyly. “Hey.”

“Hey.”

“The
Bellagio
huh? There is no way the label approved the
Bellagio
.”

“No, this is all me.”

“You look so handsome.” She appraises my button down shirt and dark denim.

“Don’t look
so shocked. I can clean up sometimes.” I step back to admire her. She makes shorts and a t-shirt look amazing. “You look good enough to eat.”

“I feel under dressed compared to you.”
She moves right into my arms. “Seeing you in this shirt makes me want to slowly unbutton it.”

“You’re such a tease.”
I kiss the top of her head and move aside to let her in. She takes in the room, with her mouth gaping open.

“You did all this for me?”
She looks over to see me nodding wordlessly. “Jack, this is beautiful.”

I shrug and
admit, “I have some romance in me.”

“I can see that. I love it.”

I take her hand and pull her towards the couch.

“I wanted to make this special. Being
apart has been pure torture.”

“It’s been torture for me too.” She settles against me
, as we quietly enjoy just being together. This girl completely changed me. I love it.

“Do you want to dance?”

She looks up amused. “I’d love to dance, Mr. Lair.” I walk over to the mp3 player and hit the play list I created especially for tonight. The sound of Elvis fills the room and I hold my hand out to her.

She
takes my hand and fits herself against me. While staring into my eyes, I bend for a kiss. I wrap my arms around her, pulling her even closer. “Do you like the song choice?”

“I love it
. You sang this to me in Cleveland. I love to hear you sing. You’ve thought of everything to make this the perfect evening. Thank you.”

“
I have a few more surprises for you.”

She looks up at me wide-eyed. “What are they?”

“You’ll see.”

We sway to the music
, wordlessly. There isn’t a reason to talk. We both know what the other is thinking. We both know what the other is feeling. We are two halves of one heart. As we cling to each other, I catalog the feel of her in my arms. I want to commit to memory the way her body fits up perfectly against mine. The way her hair feels like silk against my cheek. The way her skin feels against my fingers as I grip her waist beneath her shirt. The way the gold flecks in her eyes glisten when she looks up at me through unshed tears.

Once the song ends, I wipe away the tears that finally escape. “
Happy tears?”

“Extremely.”

“Good. Are you ready for your next surprise?”

She smiles and nods quietly.

I take her hand and position her at the windows, facing the fountains. She takes it all in. My heart pounds frantically in my chest, as I stand behind and possessively wrap her in my arms. She runs her hands along my forearms and leans back against me.

A few minutes later, t
he lights that illuminate the front of the hotel dim.

“This is incredible. They time the
fountains to the music.” I say directly into her ear. Goose bumps appear along her arms. I’m not sure if it’s from the fountains or from the touch of my lips.

“I’ve heard of this, and I’ve always wanted to see it.”

The dancing waters rise majestically just as the music begins. A few seconds into the song, she bolts around to face me. “Uhh,” she sucks in a breath and adds, “That’s my song.” I nod while smiling. “How did you do this?”

“The label helped.” I turn her around so she can see the show. It’s beautiful. The way the water dramatically sways in tune to my chords. I move to stand beside her so I can watch her
reaction. She clasps my hand in both of hers, wide-eyed and tightens her fingers each time the pillars of water shoot high into the air. The song comes to an end, and the fountains quietly subside. As hoards and hoards of spectators lining the perimeter start to move away towards their intended destinations, our view of the street becomes unobstructed.