How to Catch a (Rock) Star (The Dead Hour #1) (12 page)

Johnny followed her eye line, seeming surprised that the girl was still there.

‘Oh, hey. So, thanks for last night. See you around, yeah?’ he said to her, turning back to Lillie without waiting for an answer. ‘Well, you’re a slow learner if it’s taking all this time to learn a couple of songs.’ He laughed and raised a knowing eyebrow at her. Lillie moved aside so the girl could leave and murmured a goodbye to her which went unanswered.

‘You… Johnny... that girl?’ she stammered out, shocked at his dismissive treatment of minidress girl.

He looked at her, a mocking frown on his face.

‘What about her? She knows the score. We had a good time, she had multiple orgasms, goodbye.’

Lillie stared after him as he went into the bathroom to clean his teeth.

‘Don’t tell me you’ve never had a one-night stand?’ he said around his toothbrush.

‘Well, yes, no, I mean - ’ she said, affronted at his lack of respect and good manners.

‘I said goodbye.’ He came back into the bedroom, ramming his few belongings into a sports bag and walking to the door. ‘Coming?’

Lillie stomped past him to the open door and stalked down to the lifts.

‘Lil! Are you mad at me because of that girl? Come on! She’s just a fan girl after a good time, which, I might add, she got.’ He looked very pleased with himself.

Lillie uncrossed her arms, whirling around and jabbing him in the chest.

‘You are disgusting,’ she hissed as he stepped back and rubbed his chest. ‘And rude. You barely even looked at her and you had just had sex with her. I was mortified.’

‘So, you were embarrassed to be caught in the middle of her leaving after she got what she wanted. A good fuck from someone in The Dead Hour.’ Johnny’s eyes were hard and when the lift arrived, they got in, turning away from each other and riding the lift in strained silence.

‘You know, you really shouldn’t judge, Lil,’ Johnny snapped, stepping out of the lift into the foyer.

Lillie huffed after him wondering what that comment was supposed to mean and bumped into him as he turned around to face her suddenly.

‘Oh look, there she is, your new BFF. She looks really hurt that I didn’t ask for her number,’ he said, pointing towards the reception desk.

Lillie followed his arm and saw Jed trying to extricate himself from the embrace of minidress girl, who had draped herself all over him. Chris was watching, amused, whilst Kate looked horrified.

Johnny walked towards the group, high fiving Chris and kissing Kate’s cheek as Jed managed to remove minidress girl from himself just as Lillie arrived. She hung back, not wanting to appear territorial but Jed moved straight to her and pulled her into him.

‘Oh my God. Thank Christ you’re here. She would not leave me alone and Chris was no help at all,’ he said into Lillie’s ear.

Lillie stared after the girl as she sashayed out of the hotel, seemingly unfazed by the arrival of Johnny.

‘She’s the one who was with Johnny this morning,’ Lillie said.

‘He needs to be a bit more discerning then,’ he said, turning to Johnny. ‘Christ, Johnny. You should have heard what she said to me. I can’t believe you slept with her.’

Johnny grinned,

‘What? She was hot. Plus, she let me…’

‘Okay, you don’t need to elaborate. Can we just go now please? Tess already texted me once this morning and I don’t want to be late,’ Lillie said.

‘Fine. But I think she just proved my point for me,’ Johnny said, rolling his eyes at Jed. ‘Lil got her panties all in a twist about me being disrespectful. Girls like that do not want respect Lil, they want orgasms.’

‘Okay, maybe you’re right,’ Lillie sighed. ‘Let’s just forget about it and go to Brighton.’

Johnny nodded his agreement and followed her out of the hotel and by the time they reached the house, everything was almost back to normal and Johnny had promised to be on his best behaviour in front of Tess.

Lillie felt weirdly nervous about Tess meeting the band, especially Jed. Tess, for her part was excited to meet them all. She had been texting Lillie non-stop all week and had watched all their footage on YouTube.

When Tess opened the door, Lillie was surprised to see that she had dressed for the occasion, discarding her normally preppy look in favour of a more rock chick vibe.

Lillie hugged her, stepping back as Tess hugged Kate hello and waited for Lillie to introduce the boys. Lillie noticed that Johnny looked very pleased to meet Tess, too pleased. She saw him take in her long blonde curls, big blue eyes and perfect teeth. His eyes hovered on her low cut black t-shirt, straying down to her bare legs in her too short dark grey cord miniskirt.

Lillie quickly stepped into his eye line, giving him a warning look before ushering everyone into the house. He widened his eyes at her, feigning innocence and Lillie made a mental note to get Jed to talk to him as soon as possible.

Tess played the perfect hostess, making cups of tea for everyone, laughing at Johnny’s request for something stronger with an edge of flirtation that Lillie didn’t like. She wasn’t going to let them be alone she decided.

It was sunny and warm for a change and they took their drinks outside, Tess producing a tin of brownie cookies that she had made. Lillie bit back a sarcastic remark about her normal lack of domestic abilities, grimacing as Johnny took one and made an overly appreciative remark. She watched with suspicious eyes as Tess sat next to Johnny, who turned to angle his body towards her, his eyes dropping down to the low neck of her T-shirt. Jed put his arm around Lillie’s tense shoulders, looking at her questioningly and she smiled tightly.

‘So, Tess. How’s school?’ she said, stressing the last word and looking at Johnny. He was avoiding her eyes and staring at Tess.

‘It’s really cool.
Uni
is so different from school. I have this really great lecturer in my media module, he’s really inspiring.’ And she was off, talking about the projects she was working on and how much she was loving the freedom of university after the overly academically-minded and creativity stifling girls school she and Lillie had both been sent to for most of their school lives.

Lillie wasn’t really listening to her. She was busy watching Johnny watching Tess. Jed nudged her and she whipped her head around to look at him.

‘She’s doing great, isn’t she?’ he said to Tess, obvious pride in his voice.

‘Yeah, I’ve been watching you guys on YouTube. It’s not really my normal type of music but I think I could get into it,’ Tess said, a coy smile on her lips as she darted a glance at Johnny, who sat a little straighter when she looked at him. Lillie could swear he was tensing his pecs and held back an angry sigh.

‘Well, it’s not exactly The Frills, Tess,’ she said.

Tess flushed and gave her a Tess Special, her eyes hard.

‘I don’t like The Frills, Lillie. You must be mistaking me for Will.’

‘Who’s Will?’ Johnny asked, straightening up even more.

‘Our brother. He’s obsessed with Casey from The Frills,’ Tess smiled as Johnny gave a sigh of relief.

‘The Frills?’ Jed looked at Lillie for clarification.

‘They’re a manufactured all-girl pop band and Casey is Will’s ideal woman. Skinny, big hair, gorgeous. Anyway, they’re commercial pop meant for teenage girls but he loves them. It’s embarrassing really. He’s nearly thirty.’

The conversation rolled around to the band and the tour and Jed excused himself to go to the bathroom. Lillie went with him to show him where it was and went upstairs to go the loo herself. When she came back out, Jed was talking to Kate and Chris and Tess and Johnny had disappeared.

‘Where are Tess and Johnny?’ Lillie burst out and Kate looked up in surprise,

‘Tess wanted to show Johnny some of her art,’ she said.

‘I bet she did,’ Lillie said, already turning back towards the house.

‘Lil! Where are you going?’ Jed got up.

‘To save my sister from your friend,’ she said over her shoulder. She ran up the stairs and flung Tess’ door open wide. Two faces turned to look at her in surprise. Tess was sitting at her desk, laptop open whilst Johnny stood behind her, leaning over her shoulder, one arm braced on the desk.

‘Lil. Hey,’ Johnny drawled. ‘What’s up, babe?’ He grinned at Lillie whilst Tess gave her another hard stare.

‘What are you doing up here?’ Lillie said, hovering in the doorway as Kate came up behind her.

‘I was just showing Johnny some of my stuff,’ Tess said, her voice belying her annoyance. Lillie was sure she saw Johnny’s eyes briefly flicker towards Tess’ cleavage before he looked back at the screen.

‘Oh cool, let me see,’ Kate said, moving past Lillie to stand on the other side of Tess. ‘Tess! Oh my God, this is really good!’ Kate raised her head and looked at Lillie,

‘Come and see, Lil.’ Lillie came over and stood behind Johnny, tiptoeing so she could see the screen.

‘Tess. This
is
good. I had no idea.’

She stared at the photo on the screen. It was a beautiful photo of their brother,Will, caught in the throes of laughter as he watched his daughter dancing in a Little Mermaid outfit, his arms reaching out for her as she twirled towards him. Lillie felt her eyes sting with tears. She hadn’t seen them for so long.

‘Thanks,’ Tess said moving onto the next one. Mum and Dad in the garden, Dad’s deep red and luminous pink roses spilling over their heads as they both drank from glasses of wine, their eyes locked onto each other’s.

Tess moved onto the next one. Lillie. She recognised it from the Christmas just gone. She had a wistful smile on her face as she stared at something off camera, probably her niece. The sun was streaming through the window behind her, picking out the slight glint of red in her otherwise dark brown hair.

‘Can you print that one out, please?’

Tess, Kate and Lillie all turned to look at Johnny.

‘Oh, sure,’ Tess said, a slight frown on her face.

‘Jed would really like that photo,’’ Johnny said by way of explanation.

Tess smiled and went to print it out.

‘Actually, maybe you could just email it to me,’ he said quickly.

Tess’ hand hovered over the mouse.

‘No,’ Lillie said. ‘Just print it. It’ll be easier.’ She definitely didn’t want Tess to have Johnny’s email.

‘Actually, it won’t. I’ll need to load paper and change a few things,’ Tess said, picking up a pen and looking at Johnny.

He smiled triumphantly at Lillie and wrote down his email address. Lillie grabbed Johnny’s arm and squeezed hard.

‘Let’s get back downstairs, we haven’t much time left,’ she said, steering him towards the door.

Tess and Kate followed them downstairs and Lillie deliberately sat herself between Tess and Johnny, ignoring Jed’s questioning look.

The rest of the visit was tense. For Lillie at least. She couldn’t relax whilst Johnny flirted with her nineteen-year old sister. His every glance at her chest and lingering look at her legs made Lillie grit her teeth. By the time they left, way after Lillie had planned after a take-away curry and too many beers, she had a mammoth headache, especially after witnessing a too long and far too close hug between them. Lillie pretended to sleep on the drive back to Portsmouth and remained quiet until they got on the ferry and she was on her own with Jed in their tiny cabin.

‘What the hell was that?’ she fumed as Jed sat on a bed, watching her pace the five metre length of their room. ‘She is nineteen. How old is he?’

‘Twenty six.’ He lay back on the bed, hands behind his head.

‘How dare he? Did you see the way he was looking at her?’ Lillie carried on. ‘He’s twenty six. She’s nineteen. She is not some skank like that girl this morning that he can just shag and leave.’ Lillie stopped and faced Jed.

‘She has his email.’

He looked back at her, not daring to say anything.

‘He better not be inappropriate with her,’ Lillie said. ‘I need to talk to him.’

Jed leapt off the bed.

‘No. Lil, no. That is a very bad idea.’

‘I don’t want him near my sister.’ she said. ‘I really, really like Johnny. I do. But he is a manwhore. And she is nineteen.’

‘I know. He won’t do anything but if you forbid him…Let me talk to him, okay? He wouldn’t ever hurt Tess.’

‘Okay. But you promise you’ll talk to him? I will kill him if he hurts her in any way and I definitely do not want him entering any kind of relationship with her. She’s nineteen, Jed.’

‘Yeah, you keep saying that. You know, there’s only seven years – ‘ he stopped talking when he noticed Lillie’s expression and sighed. ‘Okay, I’ll talk to him, I promise.’ He sat back on the bed and Lillie looked at him raising an eyebrow and crossing her arms. ‘Now?’ he said.

‘Yes. The sooner the better I think.’ Jed sighed and got off the bed again.

‘I won’t be long,’ he said and left her with a brief kiss.

Lillie sighed deeply and lay on the bed. She knew what it was to be nineteen and have an older, sexy man look at you in that way. She should have known that Johnny would be attracted to Tess. Should have taken Eddie, she thought to herself, there was no way that Tess would have fancied him.

She fell asleep thinking about the situation and woke with a start a couple of hours later. Jed was still gone and she was starving. She reached for her phone to call him but he had already sent a text saying he was in the main bar with Johnny. Lillie stared into the mirror and decided she couldn’t be bothered to make herself look alive although she did brush her teeth before leaving the cabin to find them.

She was met with a cheer from Jed and Johnny as she walked into the too brightly lit, blue and white decorated bar. Her shoulders dropped as she realised that Johnny was hammered and Jed was nearly there with him. Johnny pushed himself up from his bar stool and fell into her, leaning all his weight on her in a drunken hug. Lillie lowered him back onto the stool, holding her breath against the powerful alcoholic fumes rolling off him.

‘I love you Lil, I would never hurt you or your sister,’ he slurred. ‘She is hot though. Should be illegal for a nineteen year old to look like that,’ he carried on, arcing his hands over his chest and winking at Jed.