Rock Courtship Rock Courtship (Rock Kiss #1.5) (4 page)

He was polite to her when she had meetings with him and the rest of the band. He was polite to her when she called to ask him his views on particular publicity options. He was polite to her when she joined the band for dinner as a friend and not their publicist. He was
always
polite.

And nothing else.

Her hand clenched on the phone. If he’d been that way from the start, she wouldn’t have known any different, but David hadn’t just been polite to her when she came onboard the Schoolboy Choir team. He’d been sweet and funny and warm. So many times toward the end of her relationship with Eric, when her ex-fiancé had done or said something that hurt her, it was David she’d called.

She’d never told him the real reason why she was calling, had always made it about work, but he’d made her feel better nonetheless. It had taken her several months to realize David was shy, but it wasn’t the kind of shy that left him tongue-tied or lost. He just needed a bit of time to get to know people, warm up to them. When he did, his loyalty was etched in stone, his support unconditional.

That support had helped her deal with far more than he knew.

And now… he was polite and reserved and she
missed
him. So many times, she had to fight the urge to take hold of those strong, solid shoulders and shake him, tell him to stop it!

Even though he was meant to be a client and nothing else.

Bracing herself for the horrible, polite message to follow, she opened his e-mail. Her mouth dropped open.

He’d sent her a memo.

And it had nothing whatsoever to do with the bar fight.

Reasons Why You Should Give Us a Shot

Introduction:
In this memo, I, David Rivera, explain why you, Thea Arsana, should seriously consider entering into a relationship with me.

First, let me address what I believe is your main reason for not dating me: that I am a client. This can be easily remedied. You own an agency in partnership. Your partner, or, if Imani has no space on her books, one of your senior associates, can take over the Schoolboy Choir account. If you’d prefer not to move the account, you can have Imani vet anything that has to do specifically with me. (Speaking as a member of SC, we want you, no one else.)

Second, while I admit I am a couple of inches shorter than you and two years younger, I have absolutely no hang-ups about either. I don’t think such a small age difference matters, and I’m fairly certain my maturity levels are acceptable. I point out that I, too, am an eldest child. As for the height thing—I seriously love those heels you wear. Never will I be so stupid as to demand you wear flats.

Not when watching you walk in heels is one of my all-time favorite things to do.

I’m also in good shape. I realize I’m not as pretty as Noah, or as built as Abe, or have a dimple like Fox, but I have been told I have good teeth. Therefore, I’m not physically deficient.

Third, I think you’re hot. Extremely, combustibly hot. If I could, I’d keep you in bed for a week running, naked and mine, and I’d still not have enough. I think every part of you is hot, but I’m particularly turned on by your mind and your legs. You should see the fantasies I have of seducing your mind with my words while I stroke my hands over your legs, rub my fingertips along the inner skin of your thighs.

You don’t mind calluses, do you, Thea? They come from drumming so intensely over a long period. All that physical work also means I have plenty of stamina. I can go as long and as hard as you want, or as slow and as deep, or any combination thereof. Hard and deep. Slow and long. Hard, deep, long? I can do that.

Your choice.

Or if you prefer it gentle and lazy, I can do that too. (Though we’d probably have to burn things down to a simmer with a hard, fast bout or three first.)

I’d be careful as I stroked you, but I’m afraid my touch would be a bit rough, a fraction abrasive, especially when I reach between your legs and use my fingertips to squeeze that pretty, plump, hard little—

Thea closed her eyes, took a deep breath. It didn’t do much good, her chest heaving and her pulse a brutal thud against her skin. Mind filled with the potent erotic imagery he’d conjured up and thighs tightly clenched in a futile effort to contain the sudden throbbing ache in between, she stared up at the ceiling of the lounge.

All she saw was David’s hand on her thigh, the small scar he had across the first knuckle of his right hand a slash of white against the dark gold of his natural skin tone. His arm was hard with strength and dusted with tiny black hairs, muscle and tendon flexing under his skin as he teased and played with her clit using those callused fingertips before thrusting a single finger deep into—

She squeezed her phone so hard that she heard the case crack, her body rigid and nerves gone haywire. When it was over, she collapsed into her seat in stunned shock, glad that the curved shape of it and her position in a seating arrangement right in back had hidden her from view of the others in the lounge.

He’d made her orgasm.

With nothing but the pressure of her thighs on her needy flesh and his words. The damn man had figured out her weak point and he’d aimed his missile right at it: her mind.

G
ulping down the sports drink
he needed to rehydrate and get his electrolytes back up, David checked his phone after the concert and saw no message from Thea, though the automatic read receipt confirmed she’d received it. A smile cracked his face. Thea was no shrinking violet. If she’d found his memo inappropriate, she’d have blasted him with cool fury. The fact she’d said nothing at all… Maybe he was clutching at straws, but as far as he was concerned, no answer was better than a flat-out no.

Regardless of that, he’d probably have driven himself crazy waiting for a response if Fox hadn’t come up with the idea of going to see koalas the next day. Hanging out with the guys and Molly kept his mind, if not off Thea, at least occupied enough that he didn’t obsess. Of course, that only lasted until he was alone in his room that night. Then he went over every word he’d written and ended up hard as stone with only his hand to ease the need.

It was nothing close to what he wanted.

Frustrated, his nerves strung taut, he went down to the hotel gym and exhausted himself to the point that he could fall asleep. The next night, he, Fox, Noah, and Abe hit a club to celebrate Abe’s birthday, and he stayed out late enough that his body kicked him into sleep when he sacked out on the bed.

He spent the following night writing lyrics, greeted the dawn with gritty eyes and a pounding head before getting on a flight back to Auckland, New Zealand. It was where the band had chosen to stay for a few more weeks while they recuperated from a tough year. However, instead of going to the waterfront apartments in the city that were theirs for the duration, he and Abe decided to head to a nearby island where the band had booked out a small hotel.

That night, he went for a swim in the freezing-fucking-water.

He’d tried it once before, survived. That had been before the temperature plunged.

Abe saw him dive in, yelled out that he was a lunatic, and had a whiskey waiting for him when he got back. Throwing it down in a single gulp, David grabbed a towel and rubbed his hair and body dry while the alcohol set fire to his chilled insides. “Remind me not to do that again.” His teeth threatened to chatter. “I think my nuts froze and fell off.”

Abe snorted, his dark skin gleaming under the porch light. “If they had, you wouldn’t still have that look in your eye.” Leaning his outdoor chair back against the wall, his feet up on the railing, the keyboard player said, “You have to get laid, man.”

“What are you? My social secretary?”

“Way you’re going, you need one.”

Not answering, David went into the house to get into dry clothes. When he returned to the porch, Abe poured him another drink. “Just say the word if you want to hit the clubs. I’ll be your wingman.”

Sitting out on the porch under a carpet of glittering stars long after Abe hauled his ass to bed, David thought of the only woman with whom he wanted to get naked and sweaty and dirty, and wondered what she was doing… whether she’d spared him a thought at all.

T
hea stared at the maddening,
brain-eating, energy-sucking, demon-spawn of a memo she’d been working on for
four
days. It was stealing her sleep, invading her dreams, making her question her grasp of the English language, and the entire thing was David’s fault.

“Thea Alice!” Her mother’s petite figure stopped in front of her. Lily had her hands on her hips, the scowling look on her face one Thea knew all too well. “I thought you said you weren’t working this trip.” The words were spoken in Balinese.

Thea replied in the same language. “I’m not, Mama.”

“
Oh?
” Lily looked pointedly at the laptop Thea had snuck out into the sprawling back garden and set up on a wooden table her father had built when Thea had been a child. Settling on the equally weathered wooden seat beside it, Thea had figured she’d be safe from discovery—her mother’s garden was a beautiful jungle.

Saucer-sized hibiscus flowers in yellow and red, orange and pink, as well as astonishing hybrids with hearts of fire and gold, bloomed in glorious abandon. Brilliant purple bougainvillea poured over and through the crosshatched frame above the table while a frangipani tree stood next to it, its fragrant flowers hanging heavy and lush within touching distance. Unable to resist, Thea had picked a creamy bloom and tucked it behind her left ear.

A few feet from the other side of the table stood a banana palm with green bananas hanging from it in two firm bunches, next to it a papaya tree with its fruit starting to ripen to a pale yellow-orange, and behind them both a large and luxuriantly green mango tree devoid of fruit this time of the year. Then there were the myriad flowering plants she couldn’t identify, some exotics, others experimental hybrids. Thea’s mom, a dynamo with tiny, competent hands and fierce, dark eyes, was a self-taught horticulturist.

Lily might not have a degree to her name or fancy letters behind it, but people wrote to her for advice from around the world. Her hand-grown seedlings were in high demand from professional gardeners, all of whom paid a premium for the exquisite Lily Hybrids, her name synonymous with the unique and the precious. The most recent one had incited a furious bidding war that had been major news in horticultural circles.

 Thea was
so
proud of her mom. She was also slightly scared of her. “I promise I’m not working,” she said, half closing the lid of the laptop. “I’m writing a letter to… a friend.”

“What’s so important you have to spend days telling your friend about it?” Lily’s eyes grew bright on the final words, the delicate beauty of her face wreathed in a dazzling smile that lit up the golden brown of her skin from within. “A man!” Clapping her hands, she slid onto the wooden seat opposite Thea. “Tell me everything, Thea Alice.”

Thea could bluff with the best of them, manipulate the media like an expert, but the one person she could never fool was her mother. “It’s not a man,” she began, then groaned when Lily pointed a finger at her. “Okay, okay, it’s a man. But I’m not sure I want to get involved with him.”

“Why not? Is he like that one?”

“That one” was Lily’s way of referring to Eric. “No,” Thea said at once. “No, he’s not like Eric.” Well, she hoped he wasn’t, but the simple fact was David was a rock star who had women buzzing around him like flies. Thea was too pragmatic not to understand what that might mean; fidelity wasn’t exactly a priority when there were a thousand women waiting in the wings should the current one prove too much of a hassle.

“Thea.” Her mother reached across the table to take her hand, her eyes holding such a depth of love that it filled Thea to overflowing and made her own eyes burn. “What’s wrong, baby? You like this boy, don’t you?”

“Yes,” Thea said, and it was a scary thing to admit. “But I’m not ready yet.”

Expression gentle and steely at the same time, Lily shook her head. “When you suffer such a big hurt, the longer you permit it to live in you, the bigger it grows, until it seeks to devour your soul.”

Thea felt tears roll down her cheeks, plop wetly onto the edge of the laptop lid. “Mama,” she whispered, painfully aware Lily was speaking from personal experience.

Her mother had been a naïve girl of nineteen who barely spoke English when she’d gone to New Zealand on a work visa. Hired as a maid by Patrick and Karen Buchanan, she’d been proud and happy to be in a position to send money back to her parents and siblings in Indonesia. Except two weeks later, Patrick fired her for stealing when Lily hadn’t so much as taken a sliver of soap.

Seven days after that, the charming, intelligent, and good-looking Patrick Buchanan had tracked Lily down. He’d spun a story about how Karen had forced him to fire Lily out of jealousy. He’d fought for her, he’d said, but his wife was a difficult woman and their marriage on the verge of divorce. That had been the first visit of many. He’d preyed on Lily’s loneliness, isolation, and innocence to seduce her, make her fall in love with him while convincing her his status as a politician meant they couldn’t be seen in public together—not until the divorce was final.

Only the cheating bastard had never had any intention of leaving his wife; he’d arranged to have Lily deported when he was tired of her. She’d been four months pregnant with Thea at the time, and the only reason Thea knew the entire story was because she’d badgered it out of her mother at eighteen.

Now Lily squeezed her hand, smiled. “Ah, baby, I got over my hurt a long time ago. Your papa had a great deal to do with it.” A storm of love in her eyes, of joy. “He taught me that there are good men in the world, loyal, loving men who understand the meaning of honor. I hope you remember that and not just what that one did.”

Thea knew her mother was right, but she couldn’t get the image of Eric with his head buried between the bimbo’s thighs out of her head. “I trusted him, Mama.” Her voice broke. “I thought he liked me the way I am.”

The hurtful words Eric had flung at her continued to cut like razors.
You’re a ball-busting bitch who should’ve been born with a penis! I needed a real woman to fuck—at least she isn’t hell-bent on emasculating me!

Rising when Thea started to sob in earnest, the first time she’d truly cried since it all happened, Lily came around the table to hug her against her body. Thea turned, wrapped her arms around her mother’s petite form. Unlike Thea, Lily was barely over five feet tall. As a teenager, Thea had hated her height and features because they made it obvious she wasn’t her papa’s biological daughter.

Soon as he’d realized the reason for her morose mood, her father, Wayan, had sat her down and told her that
nothing
could ever change the fact she was his eldest daughter, his small shadow who loved to go fishing with him and who’d made his heart burst when she called him Papa for the first time as a two-and-a-half-year-old.

Thea had never again questioned his love and their relationship was one of the most powerful bonds of her life. Her relationship with her younger sisters was as strong. The two were only teenagers, Lily and Wayan having waited to extend their family. Thea adored the giggling flirts and was so happy that they, as well as her parents, got along with Molly and vice versa; Molly hadn’t been to Bali yet, but the six of them had all chatted over video calls.

Lily pressed a kiss to the top of Thea’s head when she finally drew back after crying out all the tears she’d been holding inside for months and months. It felt as if a great big obstruction was gone from inside her chest, the air cleaner, sweeter, the world brighter.

“Write to your man,” Lily said after using the bottom of her T-shirt to wipe away the remnants of Thea’s tears, much as she’d done when Thea was a child. “I’ll bring you ginger tea to ease your throat and cake to ease your heart.”

Thea drank the tea, ate the lusciously rich vanilla cake that sandwiched an equally decadent chocolate layer, then read her memo over again and hit Send.

D
avid was sitting on the
beach, trying to work on a difficult combination of guitar chords in an effort to keep his mind off the fact that Thea hadn’t replied to his memo, when his phone buzzed. The stubborn hope in his heart gave a nervous jump. Telling himself it was probably just one of the guys, he took it out of his pocket, glanced at the screen.

Thea.

Blood a roar in his ears, he set aside the acoustic guitar he’d borrowed from Noah and pulled up the message. It was empty, with three attachments: one was text, the other two images. He took a deep breath of the salt-laced air and clicked on the text attachment, gritting his teeth as it loaded. It seemed to take forever, wave after wave rolling in to shore in front of him, leaving sea foam that popped and faded away into nothing under the cool afternoon light.

Then there it was, a return memo.

Reasons Why Your Reasoning Is Flawed

Introduction:
In which I, Thea Arsana, explain the flaws in your argument, per your memo titled
Reasons Why You Should Give Us a Shot
.

Re your first point: Schoolboy Choir is my client. I’m not about to hand the band off to anyone. I certainly don’t need my business partner or our associates to look over my work. I am brilliant at what I do and I can separate my personal life from my professional.

That professional life has brought me into contact with any number of musicians. You must agree that those in your field do not make for excellent long-term relationship material. In evidence, I attach photos of one of your peers caught with his pants down with a woman not his wife. I believe you are friends with said peer and have been known to have a beer with him. It is often said that we are the company we keep.

You are deliciously sexy. Noah, Fox, and Abe have nothing on you. Don’t take that as encouragement. Sexy men can only get into trouble—see my previous line of reasoning.

The fact you see me as hot is a point in your favor, but I am not going to be swayed by your admittedly excellent way with words. As someone who also possesses excellent oral skills as well as a tight focus on the objective at the center of the oral discussion, you’re going to have to try harder to impress me.

Conclusion
: Regardless of our acknowledged belief in one another’s hotness, the main obstacles to any relationship remain unchanged: you are a client,
and
you are a musician. Even if I decided to make an exception to my No Dating Clients rule, I, as a woman who works with musicians, know all too well that the species cannot be trusted. And trust is everything to me.

D
avid read the memo five
times over, getting more frustrated with each read. If the “excellent oral skills” comment wasn’t a sexual one, he needed to start taking remedial reading lessons.

…a tight focus on the objective at the center of the oral discussion…

Now all he could think about were Thea’s perfectly painted lips on his cock. She was always put together head to toe, and she liked to wear lipstick this color that was kind of between pink and red. She changed it up, but that was her favorite. And it was the one he saw in his mind as she moved her lips up and down his erection, her eyes looking up at him and her hands on the backs of his thighs, nails digging into his flesh. The possessive clasp of her mouth left his penis wet and shining and Jesus, he was going to come in his pants if he wasn’t careful.