Rock Star Romance: Dan (Contemporary New Adult Rockstar Bad Boy Romance) (Hard Rock Star Series Book 4) (92 page)

“Why do we have to
leave in a month? And what if someone notices?”

Dylan shrugged. “I’d
assume another fire, though they might not have the guts to be that direct
again—not in another country. And we have to leave because we have to keep them
guessing.”

Rachel frowned,
closing her eyes with a sigh. “If they haven’t noticed me being here a month
from now, how dangerous could it be to stay here?”

“Love,” Dylan said;
she could picture his facial expression in her mind: slightly exasperated, with
a flash of sympathy in his eyes. “If we can, we need to move around while they
don’t know where you are. If they find you, it’s easier to track you. If you
leave before they find you, the trail’s already gone cold.”

Rachel pressed her
lips together, irritation warring with a flicker of instinctive fear. She
didn’t want to leave Rouen; not only had she come to love the city, but the
prospect of another multi-day trip without knowing where the endpoint would be,
shifting from plane to train to bus, was more than she thought any reasonable
human being could stand.

“We have way more
stuff than we did when we got here,” she said, her voice taking on a slightly
whining tone that she normally despised hearing. “God.” Rachel opened her eyes,
turning her head to look at Dylan. “If he’s so high and mighty and powerful,
why hasn’t he figured out how to get me safe yet?”

Dylan shrugged. “It’s
a complicated mess. He doesn’t like keeping you on tenterhooks any more than he
likes no longer being in control of his company.”

“Are they at least
after him, too?” Rachel knew she shouldn’t wish her own troubles onto someone
else—particularly someone who had given her so much—but she almost resented the
man who put her in the position of having received a foolishly-given fortune.
“If he wanted to give me money, why didn’t he just give it to me out of his own
damn account?”

Dylan laughed. “I
don’t try to plumb the minds of the people paying me,” he said with a shrug.
“And yes, they are after him too—so at least you have company in your misery.”
He stood quickly, and Rachel felt her heart beat a little bit faster as Dylan
stepped towards her, kneeling on the edge of the sofa, leaning in to hover over
her face. “Company other than your suspicious bodyguard.” Rachel softly moaned
as one of his hands trailed along her body, cupping her breast and then
shifting to her waist.

He moved again,
turning around to straddle her hips. Rachel reached up to wrap her arms around
Dylan’s shoulders as his lips came down upon hers, sealing off any protest she
might have made. Rachel opened her mouth as Dylan’s tongue swept along her
lips, teasing her. She moaned again as he rocked his hips against her, able to
feel the hardening ridge at the crotch of his pants pressing against her.
Dylan’s hands moved all over her body, caressing and teasing her everywhere
seemingly all at once as he deepened the kiss, his tongue probing her mouth.
His fingers moved quickly, unbuttoning her cardigan, peeling the fabric back to
expose the camisole underneath. Rachel found herself rising from the couch and
then falling back against its cushions again as Dylan quickly stripped off her
clothing layer by layer, barely breaking away from her lips to pull the fabric
over her head.

Rachel’s hands fumbled
as she moved to unbutton his shirt, her dexterity suffering in the face of her
rising arousal, the distraction of Dylan’s lips shifting from her lips to her
neck, his teeth grazing her sensitive skin. He cupped her breasts, squeezing them
carefully, finding her nipples by touch as they hardened against the thin, lacy
fabric of her bra and teasing them until they were firm, tingling to his touch.
Rachel writhed, feeling her pussy becoming wetter and wetter, her inner muscles
tightening convulsively as her arousal intensified. Dylan pulled back; Rachel
knew she wasn’t imagining the admiring look in his eyes as he looked down at
her, breathing heavier already, his cock already fully hard, straining at the
fabric of his jeans.

“When I saw you put
this on,” he said, lightly tracing circles around her nipples over her bra,
“all I could think about was taking it off of you again. God bless French
lingerie makers.”

Dylan lifted her up
once more, moving his hands to her back; his deft fingers worked the clasp free
while he kissed her hungrily. Rachel felt him shifting against her as the
fabric slid along her skin, falling away. She somehow managed to finish
unbuttoning his shirt and tugged it down over his shoulders, along his arms,
tangling her limbs with his as she struggled to get him naked. The first time
they made love, it had been in Dylan’s bedroom in the dark; since then, no
matter how many times she saw it, the impact of Dylan’s body still had power
over her: the deep muscling of his chest, the ridges and valleys that formed
over his abdomen, the deep cut of his hips, all thrilled her. The fact that he
found her body gorgeous, impossible to resist—his words from their first time
together, that any man who wouldn’t try to make her scream with pleasure was a
fool, echoed in her mind—was difficult to believe, but impossible not to
respond to.

Her clothes fell away
as she focused on stripping Dylan. As his hand slipped up along her bare
thighs, moving up to caress her already-drenched folds, Rachel shivered. Her
legs spread wider from instinct; her hips pushing down as Dylan stroked her,
his fingertips feather-light and then more firm, teasing her with touches that
sent hot and cold tingles through her body. Rachel reached down, realizing that
she somehow succeeded in getting the last of Dylan’s clothes off, and wrapped
her hand around his hard, throbbing cock. Dylan groaned, his fingers working
her faster, his lips trailing all over her face, her neck and chest. Rachel
writhed and twisted underneath him, panting and gasping; her fingers tightening
around him. She felt the slickness of his fluid beginning to flow against her
fingers and brought her thumb up to rub it against the tip.

“Woman, you’re going
to kill me,” Dylan said between panting breaths, bringing his lips back up to
hers, kissing her hungrily as they moved together. Rachel cried out as he
slipped two fingers inside of her all at once, rubbing her clit with tight,
swirling movements of his thumb as he probed her wet, tight inner walls. His
voice dropped lower, growling in her ear, “You always feel so good, Love. So
hot, wet and tight...I just can’t stop myself from thinking about you
constantly.”

He nipped sharply at
the sensitive patch of skin just beneath her jaw, where her pulse fluttered.
Rachel tilted her head back, pushing her hips down to meet his thrusting,
rubbing fingers as she stroked his cock faster. She felt him twitching, his
hips bucking as she touched him, and knew that he was struggling to keep
himself under control—to keep from succumbing to the eroticism of their
foreplay.

Dylan’s fingers
brushed up against her g-spot and Rachel gasped, shuddering, her whole body
going tense in reaction. He smiled against her skin, finding her pleasure
center once more and stroking it slowly as his thumb played with her clit.
Rachel was too distracted by sensation to continue pumping him, her hand nearly
falling away as she pitched and arched with reaction to the pleasure that was
so intense, it was on the verge of being pain.

She cried out as she
tumbled over the edge, Dylan’s fingers thrusting into her as she gushed around
him. Wave after wave of pleasure crashed through her as she writhed, pressing
her body against Dylan’s, holding onto him for dear life. Rachel gasped and
panted, moaning over and over again. Dylan worked her continuously, backing off
of her clit and g-spot just long enough to prolong her climax for as long as
possible. It was only as her spasms of pleasure began to abate that Rachel felt
Dylan’s fingers begin to slow down, to retreat gradually from her body,
stroking more lightly, almost soothing her as her muscles clenched and released
erratically in reaction.

Her arms fell from
around him, her head falling back against the throw pillows and cushions,
panting as jittering impulses of sensation danced up and down her nerve
endings. She barely felt his lazy kiss against her lips as Dylan shifted on top
of her, his arms moving to support her, cradling her shoulders. The stubble
along his jaw rasped against her skin as he nuzzled her, dragging his lips
along the column of her throat, murmuring words she could barely hear—praise,
compliments, sweet things her hazed brain barely took in. It was in moments
like this that Rachel really thought there had to be something more between
them than convenience and paid duty.

She recovered quickly,
able to feel the heat and hardness of Dylan’s cock pressing against her hip;
Rachel brought Dylan’s face back up to hers and kissed him hungrily, reaching
down to touch him. “If I feel so good, why would you only give me your
fingers?” she asked him.

Dylan chuckled,
shifting down between her legs, his fingers sliding along her folds in a
teasing caress. “I never said anything about only, Love. But you can come twice
without having to wait; it’s a little tougher for me to pull that off.”

He rocked his hips
against hers and Rachel let out a noise—not quite a gasp, moan or whimper, but
something between all three—as his hot, hard length rubbed against her, sliding
along her lips, the tip of his cock pressing against her already-sensitive
clit. Dylan shifted again and they both moaned in unison as he thrust into her
all at once, pushing past the token resistance her inner walls made, her
slickness making it impossible to go slow. They fell into a steady, even rhythm
together, their bodies falling into a tidal flow, Rachel twisting her hips and
pushing them down to meet Dylan’s thrusts, taking him deeper and deeper.

He kissed her
everywhere, murmuring in her ear how sweet she was; how good she felt wrapped
around him. “You fit me like a glove, Rachel. God, I love how you move.”

He picked up his pace,
thrusting harder and faster. Rachel found herself matching him, her heart
beating faster, her body tingling as Dylan’s hands wandered over her, caressing
and teasing. He rolled and twisted her nipples between his fingers, nipped
along her neck, and brought her breasts up in turn to his mouth, sucking and
licking and kissing until Rachel thought she couldn’t possibly hold back her
orgasm any longer. One of his hands slipped down between their bodies, his
fingers finding her clit by touch—by memory it seemed—stroking and rubbing her
as he continued to push deeper and deeper inside of her body.

Rachel’s thighs
tightened around Dylan’s waist, her hips arching up from the couch cushions,
pushing down seemingly of their own volition. She couldn’t control herself as
the pleasure mounted in her body, hot and cold flashes of sensation crackling
along her nerves. She felt Dylan’s body growing more and more tense, holding back
as long as possible even as the inexorable need for relief consumed them both.
Rachel moaned louder and louder, the sounds turning into cries, near-shouts of
pleasure as the tip of Dylan’s cock brushed against her g-spot; his fingers
working away at her clit, dissolving any ability to think. It seemed like only
a matter of moments before her whole body went rigid, every muscle tensing in
an instant before the first wave of pleasure crashed through her.

Rachel hit her second
orgasm, grabbing at Dylan in desperation, crying out as her fingernails dug
into the skin of his shoulders and her inner muscles flexed around him. Spasms
of sensation shocked through her that were so intense, she barely felt Dylan
reaching his own climax. His cock began to twitch inside of her, the flood of
his sticky-slick heat gushing along her inner walls. They continued moving
until they were spent; their hips slowing to a halt, their bodies sagging
together and their limbs tangling as the last ability to hold themselves up
evaporated. Rachel panted, her mind reeling, her body tingling with
aftershocks. She smiled to herself as she felt his weight against her, the
sweat from their bodies mingling, trickling down between wherever their skin
touched. For the moment, everything that bothered her, everything that made her
restless and irritated and insecure, was gone from her mind; all she could
think of was how good she felt, how pleasant the feeling of Dylan’s body was
against hers. Rachel succumbed to the deep pull of relief and satisfaction,
burying her face against Dylan’s shoulder and slipping into a doze she couldn’t
resist even if she wanted to.

****

A few days later,
Rachel’s frustration about her fugitive status had not gone away; instead, it
had steadily increased. Every time she thought about it, she found she could
justify her benefactor’s actions less and less. Yes, it was very nice of him to
have provided her with a bodyguard and protector—someone to be the brains
behind the operation and keep her safe. But if he had given her the money in a
better way—or, she had to admit wryly, if he hadn’t given her the money
at
all
—she wouldn’t need a protector. Granted, she also probably wouldn’t have
ever met Dylan.

They were eating
breakfast, lazily discussing what adventures they might have that day, and
Rachel’s irritation crested. “Exactly what the hell is he doing? It’s been over
a month since this shit started, and I’m no closer to being able to go home.”
Rachel put down her mug of hot chocolate and looked at Dylan. Somehow they’d
both come into the habit of simply referring to her benefactor as “he” or “him”
without referencing the name of the man who had started the mess she was in.

“He’s on the run, too.
Kind of hard to get all your ducks in a row if you can’t stay in one place.
Besides, I thought you liked Rouen.”

Rachel scowled at him,
picking at her croissant. “Except that, apparently, I don’t even get to stay
here—I have to leave again on some cross-continental expedition to get to
wherever we’re going next by the least traceable route.” Rachel could
appreciate the necessity of avoiding detection even while she resented it.

“There are some who’d
enjoy never having to stay in one place, you know,” Dylan countered.

Rachel snorted. “It’s
not a matter of not having to stay here, it’s a matter of not being able to. I
don’t share your romantic attachment to being a nomad.”

Dylan smirked at her,
finishing his coffee with a slurp. “Might as well see the bright side of
things,” he suggested. “Maybe we’ll head to Spain, and you can enjoy the
flavors of Catalonia next.”

Rachel shrugged,
looking irritably at her half-finished breakfast. “Why can’t we just…I don’t
know...
do
something? I mean—you know who it is, right?” It occurred to
Rachel that she couldn’t actually be sure of how much Dylan knew of the broader
situation. He told her more than once that he didn’t ask questions that weren’t
pertinent to the assignment at hand. But he had also informed her, once the
necessity of fleeing the country had arrived, that the people after her were
not part of the company her benefactor had failed to strike a deal with, but
rather members of his
own
company.

“I know a few names,
but what kind of action do you think we can even take?” Rachel frowned. “If you
seek them out, you’re going to lead them right to your door. What exactly would
you say to them?” Dylan’s voice was not quite mocking. “They were willing to
torch your apartment building to get at you—I don’t think ‘Please leave me
alone and accept your losses’ is going to accomplish much.”

Rachel stood, her
cheeks burning. “Haven’t you ever heard that the best defense is a good
offense? Maybe we could track
them
down and start taking them out, one
by one.” Dylan shook his head.

“I get that you’re
restless, Love,” he said.

Rachel’s eyes
narrowed. “I’m going to need you to stop calling me ‘Love,’ especially when
you’re laughing in my face.”

Dylan’s smile, if
anything, became broader. “But you’re such a Love, especially when you’re
angry.”

Rachel took a deep
breath, shook her head and turned away, walking towards the bedroom. Whatever
tentative plans they had formed for that day—Dylan had suggested maybe they
could catch a train into Paris, lose themselves in the crowds for a few hours
and get a change of scenery—she suddenly had no interest in.
I want some
time to myself. I want to be able to sleep alone for once. Or go into a store
without someone two steps behind me. Or just leave the apartment without any
particular plans and wander around!

Rachel threw herself
onto the bed she shared with Dylan. How much of his attention towards her was
due to the fact that he actually liked her, and how much was merely due to
convenience and opportunity? If he hadn’t come into her life as her bodyguard,
would they have anything in common at all? Would she have even gone on a single
date with him? Rachel chuckled to herself, turning her head into the pillow.
Who
are you kidding? Of course you would have gone on a date with him—he’s
gorgeous. And you’d have brought him home at the end of the night, too.
The
lilting Irish accent didn’t hurt either. But under normal circumstances, Rachel
couldn’t imagine that they would have been together—much less living
together—if it weren’t for his need to constantly protect her from the
mysterious henchmen.

Rachel’s irritated
thoughts were interrupted by the chirping of her phone. Like Dylan, Rachel had
gone through four phones since she fled from her apartment; this was the latest
one, with a number she didn’t even know. It almost seemed like a formality
rather than something that actually had a function; no one who actually knew
her had her phone number—and most of them were probably still living under the
assumption that she was dead. The fact that she had just received a message—a
text, by the particular tone—was strange enough to stir her to pull herself up
off of the bed and find the phone.

The number that
flashed on the screen was encrypted; just like the number from her first phone
call from the people who were chasing her, it didn’t have enough digits to be a
real number. Rachel frowned. She unlocked the screen and opened the message.

What do you really
know about the people who claim to protect you? Do you want to know the truth?
Or do you want to continue going along with plans you aren’t even privy to?

Rachel stared at the screen.
The timing and the encrypted source of the message were suspicious. Had “they,”
whoever they were, just been waiting for her to become disenchanted with
fugitive life? It was too convenient. Clearly, Rachel thought, they were having
trouble hunting her down—though the fact that they had her number implied they
at least had some idea of who she was and where she was, and they wanted her to
make a bigger move out into the open.

In spite of her
suspicion, Rachel was more than a little curious. What truth could they
possibly have to tell her? For a moment, Rachel decided she was going to delete
the message completely—but maybe it would be better to tell Dylan about it. If
they had found her new phone number, they were probably close to finding her.
In the back of her mind, almost like a tickle, she had the impulse to
respond—to ask what the hell they thought they were doing and why she should
trust them any more than the people who’d kept her alive, providing her with
more money than she could realistically spend over the next twenty years.

She grappled with the
idea for a few minutes, pondering. Rachel knew that if she told Dylan about the
text message, he’d insist that they had to leave—soon, if not immediately. And
she would be inclined to agree with him, just in theory. If they had her
number, they had a lead on her. Maybe not a great one, but a lead, nonetheless.
If she didn’t tell him, that would give the people after her time to track
where the text message ended up. She might not be as lucky to already be out of
the apartment when they decided to attack. But the message itself gave her a
feeling like an itch deep in her brain; what
did
she know about Dylan?
About her mysterious benefactor? Only what she had been told.

By the time she
decided to hedge her bets and tell Dylan about the text message, Rachel found
that it had disappeared. She sighed; her decision seemed to have been made for
her. She couldn’t really tell him about a message that was no longer there, and
her apprehension rose at the fact that whoever had sent her the encrypted
message also had the ability to then extract it. Dylan would never believe her
if she told him she’d not only received a text from “them,” but that he
couldn’t see it because it vanished from her phone. She’d just have to hope
that he was as good at his job as he claimed to be.

Dylan was making
dinner—coming from the same system, he was more comfortable with the settings
on their stove than Rachel was. Just then, the second text message came
through; once more, Rachel was torn between telling him about it immediately
and keeping it to herself—or even responding.

How do you know you
can trust the people you’re with? Wouldn’t you rather make up your own mind
instead of being told who’s good and who’s bad?

A third one came while
she was in a public restroom, a few days later.

How do you know who
really started the fire in your apartment?

Each time, the
messages disappeared as abruptly as they showed up. Each time, Rachel debated
whether or not to tell Dylan. The fact that no one had yet attacked them—that
Dylan hadn’t remarked on them being followed—implied that whoever was behind
the text messages, and whoever was after her, didn’t know exactly where she
was. Or did it? Surely someone who could put messages on her phone and then
take them off again was just as capable of discovering her whereabouts based on
where the messages went. It was as good a tactic as any, Rachel had to admit.
Getting her to come out of hiding would save some trouble in sending people
after her. It also preyed on the very doubts she’d already had about Dylan, and
about her mysterious benefactor. She had just accepted the idea that the people
who’d threatened her had been the ones to start the fire in her apartment;
after all, she had been with Dylan when it happened—it couldn’t have been him.
But did it have to be the others?

“You’re rather lost in
thought lately,” Dylan commented as they ate lunch sitting in the front section
of a café. One thing that Rachel had quickly appreciated about French culture
was the extended midday meal; eat a few bites, sip some wine, maybe smoke a
cigarette, eat a few more bites. The leisurely attitude that considered an hour
for lunch to be the bare minimum was definitely something that Rachel, being a
longtime slave to the time clock and before that, a rigid school schedule,
appreciated.

“Just wondering how
long I’m going to be on the run before things get settled for good,” Rachel
said, hedging slightly. She glanced over the top of her wine glass at Dylan. He
was smoking a Gauloise, the food on his plate for the moment forgotten.

“If it makes you feel
any better, you can come back to Rouen and live here as long as you like as
soon as it’s all over with,” Dylan suggested.

Rachel shrugged.
“Doesn’t really help me now,” she pointed out. She noticed—her mind already
suspicious—that he said that
she
could come back to Rouen, not that
they
could come back. The shifting around of increasingly frustrated thoughts
started to crystalize, and Rachel thought to herself that she’d have to find a
way to make a real move—for better or for worse—soon. She needed more
information than Dylan was willing to give her. She needed to know what was
really going on; what the other side of the story was. Even if she found that
the other side of the story was unbelievable, she wanted to know what it was.
Rachel finished off her roast duck and potatoes, trying to decide how she would
go about getting in touch with people she didn’t even know, whose whereabouts
were a complete mystery.

They made their way
back to the apartment that evening, while Rachel continued to ponder the best
way to contact people who should—by all indications—already know where she was,
who she was with, and what she was doing. If they knew, why hadn’t they moved?
Why had there been no attacks, not even the faintest sign of someone tailing
them? Rachel didn’t doubt that Dylan would be hyper-aware. Even if he hadn’t
been entirely honest with her, if there was someone after them, he had a vested
interest in not being caught himself.

“Hey, Love,” Rachel’s
ruminations cut off at the sound of Dylan’s voice. She startled slightly as she
felt his strong arms wrap around her from behind, coiling about her waist. “Do
you realize,” he murmured lowly, his lips brushing against her neck, “That you
and I have not made love in twelve hours? I think that’s a damn shame.” Rachel
laughed, her heart beating faster from a mixture of arousal and doubt.

“Has it really been
that long?” she asked, keeping her voice light. “My hips feel like it’s been
more recent than that.” Dylan’s teeth grazed her skin and Rachel shivered, her
body beginning to heat up.

“I’ve been counting
every last minute,” Dylan told her lowly. “It was before breakfast—maybe you
were half-asleep, but I was definitely awake for that.” His hands wandered over
her body, caressing her, cupping her breasts and then dropping down to her
hips.

“I was starting to
worry that maybe you don’t like me as much anymore.” Rachel snorted.

“How much would that
really matter when I’m stuck with you, regardless of what my feelings are?”
Dylan’s hands faltered for just an instant. He kissed the nape of her neck
gently.

“Well for one, there
would go my ability to get laid for the foreseeable future,” he said lightly,
his hands coming to life once again. He tugged at the drawstring on her soft,
linen pants, untying it with nimble fingers. “For two,” he added, slipping one
hand under the waistband, his fingertips skimming the lace underneath, “It’s
much harder to protect someone who doesn’t want to be around you.”

In spite of her
misgivings, Rachel began to respond to his touches, leaning into his hands,
arching back against Dylan’s strong body behind her. A soft, half-whimpering
moan left her lips as Dylan began to stroke her through the thin lace of her
panties, his other hand teasing one of her nipples until it began to harden to
his touch. Rachel tilted her head back and to the side, resting it against
Dylan’s shoulder, gasping as Dylan’s hand slipped underneath the lace to stroke
her already-wet heat.