Rampage (A Night Fire Novel Book 4) (4 page)

Chapter Five

This was the part that Seph had been waiting all week for. She loved to go shopping. I however wasn't used to it at all and that's why it made the list. I had copious amounts of money yet I lived in a modest house with modest furniture. To say that I didn't really fit in, in Hollywood would be accurate. It wasn't intentional to buy a house that wasn't as grand as my counterparts, it was just me.

I didn't want a flash monster of a house when there was only me. It would mean that I would need people to clean rooms that I would probably never go in and to me that seemed ridiculous. I would have to furnish rooms that I would never use. So I bought a house that was suited to me. It was flash yes, I will grant it that but it wasn't overdone. It was expensive but that was because of the neighborhood. Of course I had to have roaming security, especially as the week before I arrived a few houses down from me had a crazy fan incident.

When I moved in I told Bill in good humor that I wanted a moat and sharks in it and maybe a few piranhas too. He frowned at me like I had two heads. Okay, so no jokes about security around Bill then.

I found I had a love of shoes. That's Fendi's fault. One pair of awesome ankle boots with a pencil thin heel and I was in love. Damn them. Several pairs of shoes later, we wandered to the next store. Seph was determined that the 'obscene amount of money' I was to spend was going to be extremely obscene. Apparently my wardrobe was lacking in shoes and handbags. I walked out of Louis Vuitton with a couple of bags and into the next store that was all about jeans.

Now I would need something to haul all my new possessions home.

Seph wasn't helping either. She had several bags in both hands. After several hours of shopping, two very tired hands and hopefully a nice dent in the bank account, we decided to return to the hotel suite. Seph went through my purchases, selecting the choices she deemed worthy for the nights activities.

I wasn't sure exactly what was planned, of course I had a vague idea that it would be rather x rated. Evan seemed rather eager to watch the girl on girl kiss and he probably spent his nights in a lot of clubs. Was that pigeon holing him? Probably. Maybe he might be a tavern guy, maybe that's why the woman at the bar last night was so laid back with the bottles on the table.

“I loaded some new songs on your phone.” Seph said mildly as she held up a pair of black jeans.

I glanced up from the tourist map to my darling little mischievous sister. Concern should be ripping through me, her nonchalance was a dead give away. She would be over exuberant, telling me everything I needed to know.

But not now, now I was left to my own thoughts.

“Oh?”

“Yeah, a band I thought you might be interested in.”

Warily I picked up my phone and flicked through the music library, finding the new band called Night Fire.

“Who are they and why did you put them on my phone?”

She shrugged as she kept her attention on the clothes in her hands. Yes, something really was up with my sister.

“Just listen.”

I huffed as I plugged in the jack and put the buds into my ear. They were reasonable, the music was a hard rock genre, not too far from what I would listen to.

“Have you heard of them before?”

“No.” Seph said as she held up a tiny skirt. “You should wear this tonight.”

Squinting at the album art, I laid back on the bed. Five guys standing, full figures in the shot. It was hard to make them out, tiny screen, small picture to begin with. I couldn't enlarge the picture any, curiosity got the better of me and I searched for them on the internet using my phone.

“Holy fuck.” I gasped as I read their website. “Did you know?”

Seph couldn't hide her amusement. There was the over exuberant Seph that I was used to.

“Jaxon told me last night. I assume that Evan didn't tell you?”

“No.” I grunted, a little annoyed.

“Total bad boys.” she almost jiggled as she said it, hardly containing her glee. “Bill is going to flip his lid when he finds out you spent the night fucking music's biggest and naughtiest guitarists.”

She laughed darkly.

“Good girl image is now gone, far away, never to be seen again.”

“Naughty as in?”

“Drunken behavior, trashed hotel rooms, very filthy songs.”

Huh. I must have listened to their one and only tame song.

“The bass player, jeez...” she laughed a little. “Totally pissed in a plant at some function.”

“Charming.”

Her phone buzzed, she pulled it from her pocket.

“They seemed pretty subdued last night.”

She shrugged as she pressed buttons on her phone.

“Goody.” she squealed and then abruptly left the room.

I returned to my stalking no, research on the internet. Totally engrossed by the images that were coming up, my god, he is even more gorgeous in front of the camera. Far out, he should be illegal. Probably is.

The bed depressed and I let the phone drop, seeing the very gorgeous Evan crawling up the bed.

“Hey.”

“Oh hey.”

I flustered as I fumbled with the phone, not wanting him to see that I had been checking him out on the internet.

“Whatchya looking at?”

“Uh... soft porn.”

Wasn't exactly a lie. I was kind of turned on by it all. Damn him and his good looks. He laughed and then leaned in to kiss me. Soft and slow.

“Did you miss me?”

“Yeah.”

“Good. I brought a present.”

He got off the bed and lifted a small bag onto the bed, pulling out a bottle of Dom Perignon.

“I hope this is okay. When you said champagne you weren't specific. The guy in the bottle shop said this will do the job. Oh, and these.”

He pulled out a punnet of strawberries.

“Awesome, you are the best.”

I tossed the phone aside and hugged him. This was a nice place to be, it seemed perfect. His hands lingered around the small of my back, finding a path under my shirt. His touch was warm and delicate, skating over the skin and making me shiver with delight.

“Yeah.” he said with a cocky sigh. “I am the best. Now you get naked while I deal with the bath.”

“How about I go and get some glasses?”

“Not out of the bottle today?”

“Nah.”

Besides, I need to find my sister before she gets down and dirty again. And naked. Anyone would think that the little minx was raised in a nudist colony by the amount of times I've seen that little ass wiggling around this hotel suite in the past twenty four hours. Seph and Jaxon were in the lounge room, quietly talking as I approached.

As luck would have it, my sister was still fully dressed. Strange. I flicked my head toward the bar as I turned its corner, finding an under bench cabinet to search. She quietly followed me over and squatted beside me at the open cupboard.

“What’s up?”

“Did you tell Jaxon about us?”

“Sh-yeah.” she scoffed.

I frowned as I pulled the champagne glasses from the shelf, wondering what Evan thought. If he had been told.

“So Evan would know... do you think he would have told him?”

“Maybe. Dunno.”

“I did.”

I lifted my gaze from the cupboards, Jaxon leaning on it as he watched us having a conversation at the doors.

“One A list movie star and one former A list movie star turned indie film director.”

“Yeah.” I sighed as I stood, putting the glasses onto the bench. “That would be us.”

“Makes no difference to us.” he shrugged and turned to walk away.

Then he stopped in his path and turned his head.

“But you might want to actually tell him. He's kinda funny when it comes to the honesty thing.”

“Funny ha ha or funny crazy?”

“Don't hide things, don't lie..” he shrugged turning back around. “He's the kind of guy that the tough facade will break easily if a girl like you crushes him.”

I picked up the champagne flutes and walked over to Jaxon frowning at him.

“A girl like me?”

“Yeah, you're a forever girl.”

“What?” I squinted my eyes, my frown deepening.

He grinned as he leaned into my ear to whisper.

“Forever queen bee, do you understand the word?”

I could have sworn I heard a Texan drawl in his soft voice.

“Yes.” I hissed at him.

“Well then, what do you think a forever girl might be?”

Seph sidled up to him, handing him a beer.

“A girl that a man would want beside him forever.”

He chuckled and turned to the lounge, flopping into it.

“Shit.” I whispered.

Seph was gaping at me. Obviously Evan and Jaxon had been talking about us and the future in our absence. Seph grabbed my elbow and dragged me into the dining room.

“Oh my god Harmie, what are you going to do?” she frowned. “Jeez, maybe he was talking about getting serious, shit... this is Vegas, my god, what if you get so damned drunk tonight and he asks you to marry him? Shit.” she started to pace the floor. “What then Harmie?”

I shrugged.

“He's gorgeous and we get on really well. Sex was unbelievably amazing. And he's waiting up in my room with champagne and strawberries. Waiting for me. So, I don't know.” I half shrugged. “Go with the flow I guess.”

“My god, when you said you were going to let your hair down, I never thought you would even consider...
that.
”

“Jeez, he hasn't even asked. You're jumping ahead of yourself there Seph, settle down.”

“Okay... well if he does, and you do, make sure I'm there, okay?”

“Yep.”

Evan was sitting on the edge of the bed when I returned to the room. The curtains had been drawn, darkening the room. A soft glow emanated from the bathroom that was lit with lots of candles, a scent wafted through as I passed the tub. I put the flutes on the vanity and I sauntered over to him, pushing him back onto the bed and climbed onto his lap.

“Hey, did you get lost?”

“Nah.” I half laughed. “Just got talking.”

My fingers played under the hem of his shirt, gently tugging on the trail of happiness.

“So, I hear that I've been talked about.”

“Uh yeah.”

“So you know then?”

A grin washed over his face as he nodded.

“Hollywood royalty, yep. I checked ya out on the net.”

“Me too.”

He chuckled as his hands gripped my hips, biting his bottom lip.

“I don't normally listen to a lot of music, I don't really have time for it.”

“And I don't go to chick flicks.”

“So you had no clue at the tattoo parlor?”

“Nope. You?”

“Nah. How sad.” I say a little dryly.

It was sad. How could neither of us know? There were billboards across the country with my movies plastered on them. Well okay, blonde me I suppose but still, I wasn't that different.

“The wholesome good girl snags herself a bad boy. Could almost make it a movie.”

“Yeah, like that's never been done before.” I chuckled.

“Except you're not the wholesome good girl any more. Have you looked at the internet in the past couple of hours?”

“I try to avoid tabloids.”

“Well, you and I have been outed. I'm surprised that agent of yours isn't on the phone telling you.”

“Oh he probably has been. I turned the ringer down.”

I climbed off him and grabbed my phone, of course there are several missed calls, messages. All of them from Bill. I rolled my eyes and dumped the phone on the bed.

“Come on. I want that bath.”

Chapter Six

I could see it in his eyes that he was desperate to rip the clothes from me, but he held back. This was about relaxing and removing my clothes would make it the complete opposite. He was in the tub before I had even started to pour the champagne. Front row seat for the show. Of course, how stupid of me.

He had the most goofy grin on his face as I started to remove my clothes. Well he wanted a show, I did my damnedest to give it. I held the hem of my shirt, pulling it over my head and flicked it out to the floor. Jeans next, thank the stars I was wearing very sexy, matching underwear.

He was a little shocked when I walked away to my bag. I needed a hair clip, I wasn't in the mood for dealing with wet hair. As I walked back to the tub, I flicked my hair up off my shoulders. I stood before him in my underwear, he still had that goofy grin on his face. Anyone would think he's never seen a naked woman before. Surely that can't be true. Rock stars have groupies hanging around them all the time.

I removed the bra and flung it to the rest of my clothes, the g-string soon followed. The water was perfect, so warm and inviting.

“Tired?”

“Yeah.”

My feet ached from too much shopping, in fact I think my whole body ached. At that point all I wanted to do was sleep. I laid down on his chest, his fingers circled around the edge of my shoulder, wetting it slightly.

“So how much did you see about uh, me?”

“A bit. Why?”

“Well you know, you've got this whole good girl thing going and I'm so far beyond being anything near what the management wants for you.”

“Oh see that did you?”

“Yeah.” he breathed.

“Okay, so I'll fill you in about what the management wants.”

He shifted in the tub, obviously trying to brace himself for the torturous truth. I sat up and turned in the tub trying to stretch my long legs out. Evan took my feet and began to rub them, it was amazing and it made me smile momentarily.

“They think that I suit the roles that I've been doing. They see it as realistic roles based on my image, an image that they have created, not one that I asked for. This is a company that has taken it upon themselves to create the good girls, trying to filter out the party girls, trying to make Hollywood like the days of old. Which is great. I don't disagree with their efforts, but they only ever show me roles that are suited to this line. I've had many arguments with them about this because I wanted to try something different. Of course they always come back with the same old line, 'the movie will flop, you'll be laughed out of Hollywood.' So I have just accepted it.”

I sighed, flicking the water in my fingers. “So about six months ago my manager Bill suggested that I should be seen dating at the very least and marriage should be considered. The bastard had already created a list of suitable men, fully researched to ensure that they would meet the criteria.”

I laughed at the first of their suggestions. “The first date they tried to send me on was with Vic Wallace. Have you heard of him?”

“Yeah, I thought he's gay.”

“He is. So I refused outright because it was pointless. I told Bill his research wasn't very good if their very first suggestion for a boyfriend was gay. The next one was a complete waste of space. He spent the whole time on his phone, messaging or tweeting. I don't know. The next one was an asshole. He was so rude and stuck up. Berated the waiter for no real reason. I can't handle that kind of shit, so I upended the bowl of soup in his lap, apologized to the waiter for the arrogant twat at the table and left.”

Evan laughed as he took up my other foot, to start his very deep thumbed assault on the sole of my very sore foot. Damn this man and his magic fingers.

“The waiter caught up with me at the door and thanked me, he said that my kind were few and far between.”

“They are.”

“Yeah. So, we had the gay guy, the waste of space, the asshole and by this stage I was fed up. That night I went home and got drunk. I wrote the list when I realized I was days away from my thirtieth birthday. Seph had turned up wanting to know how the most recent date had gone. Found me very drunk, very upset and scrawling shit on a piece of paper. When I was done, she read it and told me that her and I were going to do everything on the list. She took over the organizing of everything, all of it hidden from Bill. All I had to do was tell him that I was going away for a vacation to an undisclosed location with my little sister.”

Evan nodded slightly, his face was plain and thoughtful. All I could think about was Jaxon's words about being a forever girl.

“So the management trying to find you a boyfriend thing?”

“I can assure you that it isn't what Harmony wants. At all. I would much prefer to do it on my own.”

I hadn't realized it, but his body had tightened and as I had said that I would prefer to do it on my own, it relaxed. Shit. I stared at him as he let my foot go and picked up his champagne glass.

“So what do you want?”

He shrugged as he tried to hide behind the flute, sipping it slowly. Okay, so he's going to clam up now. Great. I took a sip of the champagne and a strawberry. Sitting at the end of the tub I watched him, looking like he was struggling in his mind about it.

“Come on Evan, out with it.”

I tried to be as warm as I could, coyly smiling as I wrapped my arms around my legs, bringing them up to my chest.

“Bare your soul to me.”

He gave a cautious smile, this looked like it was delicate territory.

“Okay. So uh.. I think you're a nice chick.” he lowered his gaze to the water, trying to find something to look at to distract him.

“A nice chick huh?”

“Yeah. I like being around you. You're funny, clearly you haven't let LA get to you, you're very compassionate for others... upending the bowl of soup.” he laughed. “I would pay to see that. What's the word for it?” he frowned.

“Empathy?”

“See! You're smart too.”

I rolled my eyes at him. I would hardly call myself smart.

“You're gorgeous and you haven't had any work done, yet you live in LA.”

“Eating properly, diet.” I shrugged. “It isn't hard. My mother raised us on a very strict diet of no junk food.”

“Yeah.”

He gazed at me, suddenly I felt rather shy. Why I have no clue. But I did.

“You are an almighty fuck, girl. Far out.”

I liked that particular assessment. I could take a few more of those.

“I know I'm a far cry from what you should be with but to me you just seem happy with me.”

He was a little quiet as he hit the end of the sentence.

“How so?”

“I saw the pictures on the internet of you at functions, premieres. You looked happy but it was a different kind of happy. It seemed so fake in comparison to what I've seen in the past twenty four hours.”

“That's because it was fake.”

“You're not happy?”

I shook my head sadly. “Drunken list, remember?”

“Yeah.”

He sat forward in the tub, moving closer to me.

“Are you happy now? Does this seem right to you?”

I gazed at those big green eyes staring at me, waiting for me to answer.

“Yeah.”

“Leave it behind. If Hollywood won't give you the roles you want then tell them to fuck off. Move here, with me.”

Desperation was pouring through his face, emotions high as he moved even closer, now he was a breaths distance from me.

“Runaway with me.”

I woke hours later, sprawled out on the bed on my stomach. Evan was behind me, I could hear that he was awake, the sound of a pencil scratching on paper, the occasional angered sigh. On the floor beside the bed was my list, I grinned when I saw that someone had written a new item on the list. Number eleven... runaway with Evan.

I rolled over and saw him sitting in his tight black jeans, doodling on a note pad.

“Hey.” he grinned.

“Hey.”

Rubbing my eyes as I yawned, I wondered what he was doing. I sat up on the bed, pulling the sheet with me which was just as well, Seph wandered in.

“Hey hey. When are we getting the show on the road?”

“Show?”

“Yeah, seven and eight. I want to get some booty shakin in my face.”

“Lovely.” I said as I shook my tired head.

Right on cue, she took the phone out and snapped a photo. Jeez, lucky I pulled the sheet over my chest.

“One day Seph, I am going to shove that thing...”

“Yeah, yeah.” she scoffed. “So?”

“Soon. Dinner first yeah? I'm starving.”

Evan flicked the book shut before I could see anything, putting it in his bag. He sat on the edge of the bed and put his shirt and shoes on.

“I just have to get some things and I'll be back, okay?”

“Sure.”

He leaned over and kissed me chastely.

“Soon.”