In For Keeps / Under His Touch. Taryn Belle
faced forward, but she had angled hers away from him into the aisle. She was wearing a simple black dress that screamed First day on the new job, but its conservative cut was hopeless at hiding her sexiness. She still had her eyes aimed at her notebook, so he let his eyes drift down to her bare legs.
The crazy thing was that Kiki wasn’t even his regular type—he normally preferred his women tall and willowy. But Dev loved her tiny frame, the curve of her hips, the way her small breasts strained beneath her modest neckline. The way their bodies had moved that night had proven how perfect they were together. And now she was close enough to touch, not to mention all alone with him. When he thought about what they could be doing right now, what use they could make of the sleeping quarters—it was killing him.
“...road crew?”
He jerked his eyes up to find her looking at him expectantly, pen poised. Those wide blue eyes under delicately arched brows. That long hair falling over her breasts in a smooth curtain. The crease in her dress right between her legs.
Focus.
“Uh, yeah. You’ll meet them in London,” Dev said. “Scotty—my bassist—is flying in from Chicago today. He and Stuart will—”
“Stuart?” Kiki interrupted.
“My drummer. He’s flying into London from Brussels.”
“Got it. Speaking of which...” She lifted a sheet of paper up from the small table between them. “According to this itinerary, you’re staying at The Connaught with the rest of the band. Is that a mistake? I’d imagine you’d want to stay at home while you’re in town.”
Damn—she didn’t miss a thing. Dev had moved from LA to London a decade ago, but his Kings Cross penthouse felt less and less like home since he’d bought the house on Moretta. His flat screamed of the bachelor days and rock star nights of his twenties, and that just wasn’t where his head was anymore. “It’s just easier if the band is all together,” he said, which also happened to be the truth. “I’ll pop by at some point to make sure the place is still standing, pick up some clothes. By the way, we’re only staying in hotels in London and Paris. After the Paris show we move to tour buses for the remainder of the European leg. Once we’re in Australia we’ll be in hotels again.”
“I know. I’ve already confirmed all the bookings,” she said, glancing down at her notes. “What about rehearsals? I don’t see anything about that.”
“The three of us will spend the rest of the week rehearsing at Ryder Studios. We already put in a good round a month ago, so we’re pretty tight.”
Tight. Good God, could he really not say such a banal word without thinking about how Kiki’s pussy had felt around his cock? How old was he, fifteen? He seriously needed to get a grip, but now that the door had been opened, his cock was all in. All he could think about was stripping her down and fucking her until she screamed, flight crew be damned. He shifted in his seat to hide his raging erection. This line of thinking wasn’t going to help anything.
The drone of the engine filled the silence as a flight attendant entered the cabin. “Something to drink, Mr. Stone?” she asked, holding out a cheese board.
“A club soda, please,” Dev said, plucking a cracker and a wedge of Brie from the platter.
“What, no champagne?” Kiki asked without looking up. “Pretty impressive for a rock star.”
If you only knew, Dev thought. “Would you please stop calling me that?”
“What? Impressive?” She looked up at him under long lashes, uncrossing and recrossing her legs. He caught a brief glimpse of zebra-print panties.
He was going to fucking lose it. He hit a button on his armrest, filling the cabin with the sound of Coldplay.
Kiki tilted her head at him. “You don’t like silence, do you?”
Dev started. Didn’t he? He’d never thought about it before. “I’m a musician. I think it makes sense that I enjoy listening to music.”
Kiki gazed back at him until he felt like squirming. Her eyes held a knowing look, as if she could see all of his secrets. Like she knew shit about him that he didn’t even know himself. No one had ever known him like that, and it was unnerving.
Suddenly she stood up and stretched her arms to the sides. “I didn’t get much sleep last night. I’m going to try out my bed.”
And with that she walked away, leaving Dev alone with his club soda and his tortured imagination.
BY THE TIME the night of the first show rolled around, Kiki was regretting the day she accepted her new job. The work was more demanding than she’d expected, but that wasn’t the reason. She’d assumed Dev would slip into a different persona when he was in celebrity mode—high-maintenance, egotistical, absent, no longer interested in her. She was wrong. Dev was exactly the same guy he’d been on Moretta: fun, relaxed, kind to his staff, a natural leader. It seemed like he was everywhere she was, and he always had that heart-stopping sexy smile for her. In the hotel elevator. At the catering table. At the rehearsal studio. And now backstage, where he’d winked at her as he passed her in the hallway. Every time his eyes met hers she felt like she’d been electrified—which made keeping her boundaries in place even more important. She couldn’t afford to weaken, especially now that she was on the road with him. Like it or not, Dev was a man she was willing to break her rules for, and Kiki knew exactly what would happen if she got involved with him—he’d leave her when he found out the truth about her, just like her ex-husband had.
So why hadn’t she made this arrangement strictly business when she had the chance? He’d put it out there—your terms—but she’d left it alone. Dev was a man of his word, and she had to admit that a part of her hadn’t wanted to shut that door completely.
She walked along the side of the hallway, trying to stay out of the human traffic jam. She knew Dev was in his dressing room. Her pulse quickened as she thought about the stage outfit she’d laid out for him an hour ago: a white button-down Armani shirt and black leather pants. The thought of seeing him onstage had her nerves on edge. But was it because she was about to witness the hottest performance on Earth, or because of what she was afraid might happen after it? Everyone knew that was when the groupies showed up. Dev might not flaunt them in her face, but she wasn’t naive enough to think that one night with her had changed his ways forever.
She reached the main artery of the backstage area, which was controlled chaos. Roadies shouted orders to each other, organizers zipped around with clipboards and iPads in hand, a bored-looking caterer tapped away on her phone behind a table laden with food. A heavyset man shouted loudly into his cell phone while he paced inches from Kiki’s toes. Scotty lounged on a nearby sofa, tossing Skittles into his mouth one by one while Stuart walked the floor in front of him, tapping a beat out on an invisible drum set. And above it all was the roar of the twenty thousand fans filing into London’s largest concert venue, O2 Arena.
Kiki was good at hiding her intimidation. Sinking down into a plastic chair, she took her phone out to tick the day’s tasks off: meals organized; media interviews booked for the following day; assorted shopping trips done; fan mail answered; backstage photos posted to Instagram and Twitter; a Snapchat story of the band warming up for the show made; water, towels and snacks set out for the band.
She was about to click her phone off when it rang in her hand. Laina Rose. Kiki grinned. Laina was her best friend from high school, and the whole reason she’d moved to Moretta in the first place. Her friend had grown up spending her vacations on the island with her super-wealthy family, so when Kiki called her in tears after Jack left her, Laina had come to her rescue by offering her the guesthouse on her parents’ estate. Kiki had thought she’d spend a few weeks there recovering, but instead she’d found herself getting a job at Pablo’s