The central heating in this place must be off its fucking rocker. I pull my collar away from my suddenly sweaty neck and consider swinging from the ceiling like an orangutan, scooping Lizzie Smith up, and whisking her away to someplace quiet and very, very private. But her cold stare suggests she’s not up for such shenanigans, so I calm the dancing toes inside my sensible black oxfords and haul in a breath of stuffy, patchouli-drenched groupie musk.

I can put on airs with the best of them, even amidst raging hormones banging against the confines of skin and sinew, dying to get a word in edgewise. Yeah, I’m completely in control here. Nothing can stop me from unlocking the hot, writhing submissive level from the Dominant spank-bank penthouse.

Fuck, I’m losing my mind.

“It’s a pleasure to meet you.” I shake my head and blink long and hard. “See you again.”

She tosses a condescending glance to Richard like a tiny treat at a blind dog’s head. “Get out of here. And charge my phone. The damn battery died again.” She tosses the device to him.

He nods, flickers his gaze at me for a second, and then slinks away toward the door. Was he the mystery man in the room with us in New Orleans? Is he one of her submissives too?

Too? That would imply I’m hers. Like a toy or a doll she might play with if she sees fit. After several months of silence, I don’t know if I even qualify for toy or doll status with her.

She waited for me to call. How is that possible?

My mouth turns cotton-dry.

Lizzie slips into Richard’s vacated chair and urges me with a strong, silently worded look to sit opposite her. I lick my leathery lips and oblige.

“I asked you a question,” she says, leaning into her seat. Her legs cross, poking her hips out to either side, drawing my eye down the length of her calves. Apple-red toenails tip the pale feet strapped under leather-and-beaded sandals. My mind wanders to other kinds of straps.

“Why didn’t you call me?” Her sharp voice whips my attention to her face.

“I—I didn’t know if you wanted me to.”

She snaps forward, a scarlet-haired Eve in Eden, looking for just the right apple to pick. “I left you my card. Of course, I wanted you to.” Her nostrils twitch. “Do you have any idea how long I’ve been waiting for you? How I stared at my phone every night, expecting your voice, and being let down by your lack of communication?”

I drop out of my daze long enough to notice we’re—she’s—attracting attention from the growing crowd. These kids may be waiting for Killer Buzz Float and Just Breathe, but they smell fame in the far corner, and they’re chomping for a bite of her.

I stand. “Let’s go somewhere else. This isn’t the place.”

Her eyes narrow. “I decide the time and place. Or did you forget that too?”

Biting my bottom lip, I position myself to block the fans’ view of Lizzie. “Okay, then you decide. Where to?”

The inferno in her eyes diminishes to a low burn. “My hotel.”

Seriously?

Shit. I can’t just leave the band here.

She stands in front of me. Too close. God, the same perfume she wore in New Orleans tickles my olfactory nerve into a frenzy, like a dog languishing in a belly rub. My legs would be doing the crazy dance if it weren’t for all these people hanging around and staring.

“Whatever you want, Siren. Lizzie.” Did I just agree to go with her? I shouldn’t have. I’m officially on the clock. I have to text the band.

She starts toward the exit. I fumble through my pocket for my phone and halt for a second to type.

“Are you coming?” She stares at me expectantly.

“I wish,” I mumble as I catch up and continue drafting the text.

Fans interrupt us every couple feet, begging Lizzie for selfies and autographs. She pauses for a few and ignores the rest.

If Letty were here, she’d have stopped for every single person. Thank the gods Letty’s not here. I’m not sure my anticipation can wait much longer. Though, Lizzie does come off a little strongly. Her attitude wreaks havoc with the sweet, Midwestern girl appearance. The fans aren’t the only ones getting mixed messages.

But, fuck, LIZZIE SMITH IS SIREN. And she’s been waiting for me to call her. My life just tipped on its axis and shifted magnetic poles and ocean currents. The world is no longer as it was. Hope exists.

Once we wrestle our way through the crowd to the hallway, she curls her lip at my phone. “Who are you texting?” She grabs the device and looks at the screen. “Who’s this Letty?”

“The singer for Killer Buzz Float.” Surely, Lizzie knows who Letty is.

“Get rid of her.” She shoves the phone into my pocket. “We’ve got shit to discuss. Alone.”

I start to protest and think the better of it. We mosey down the hall, and five more people stop Lizzie. While she’s distracted, I turn my back and finish the text. I have a meeting. Be back late. Great show.

Just before hitting send, I delete the “great show” part. No need to lead Letty to think I’m turning soft.

Shit, did Siren—Lizzie—arrange for Dodge to call me about the tour? And then Richard when I said no? She must have. The implications sink in like Scooby Doo battling quicksand in a bad cartoon.

Who the hell is this woman? And why is she so insistent?

Lizzie finishes signing the fans’ Killer Buzz Float shirts and continues onward, dragging me behind her with nothing but a scowl and the hypnotic sway of her ass. She ducks into a side hall when more fans appear and waits for them to pass before slamming open the bar on the door to the outside world.

“Jesus Christ, they’re demanding. I never get a second of privacy,” she complains. Then she turns to me, walking and talking, her sandals slapping the pavement. The sound brings back memories of New Orleans. “But nosy fans and prying eyes are about to disappear. You and I are gonna pick up where we left off.”

With me getting fucked by my ex while she leaves me hanging? Not sure I can do that twice.

“You’ll have to forgive me, but I’m a little surprised by all … this,” I confess. “I don’t understand.”

“What’s not to understand? I like you, Jillian. That should be enough.”

Whoa.

“I like you too.” I search for the right words. “I’m sorry for not calling. I didn’t know what to make of the card. You just up and left. I figured you weren’t interested.”

She halts her steps, and I nearly run into her. “I tried to communicate that I was very interested. Did you not notice the way I watched you? Didn’t you feel my eyes drilling you like Miles drilled you from behind? God, Jillian, I gave you an entire night. What more did you want?”

Her gruff attitude is a little off-putting.

Okay, a lot off-putting.

“Maybe my communication device and yours weren’t synced up properly. I’m not sure they are now either. What exactly do you want, Lizzie? I don’t read minds, so you’ll have to lay it out.” That was bold of me, but she’s throwing all kinds of signals I can’t decipher.

“You. I want you, Jillian. On a slab for me to deconstruct with probing fingers and dildos and floggers. I want to hit you and make you come while you ride my face. I want to humiliate you and bring you to climax so many times, one erotic swell blends into the next. And then, I want to do it all over. I want you.”

Gulp.

Okay, she’s not what I expected. She’s a bitch. She’s rude. She’s a narcissist.

And I’m totally on board with what she’s selling if she’s really going to do those things. Still, I have reservations.

“I don’t mean to sound dense, but … why?” I ask. “You could have anyone in the world. You’re young and gorgeous. I’m older and—”

Her eyes flash. “You have something the others don’t.”

I arch a brow in question.

“Resilience.” She scrapes her gaze down my chest to my crotch and licks her lips. “I push you to the edge of hell, and despite every instinct telling you to fall, you manage to remain standing. Everyone caves under my touch—everyone—but you won’t. I need a woman who’s unbreakable. I need you.”

Fuck.

So, I’m her challenge. Her pet project. Her test subject in safe word clinical trials. Color me flattered, intrigued, aroused. And slightly scared shitless.

Crossing my arms over my chest, I say, “I gotta know before we go any further if you plan to walk out on me again.”

She edges into my personal space and grabs my chin, squeezing my cheeks. “Are you?”

I rub my face into her hand. “You want my number?” I ask.

Her mouth eases within a couple inches of mine, and she drops her hand. “No. I want you to use mine.” Her cinnamon breath mists my lips.

Fuck.

I blink.

“Get in the car, Jillian. Now.” Her voice resumes the cold timbre from the greenroom as she hits a key fob and unlocks the doors of a nearby Jaguar F-type.

Red. Shocker. Lizzie is the color red.

“Yes, ma’am,” I say.

“Do I look like a fucking ‘ma’am’?” No, I’m more of a ma’am than she’ll ever be. “You call me Siren.”

The name takes on a totally different meaning now that I know she’s the lead singer of Banging Betties. The voice in the Betties’ songs with all the Auto-Tune shit and effects isn’t hers. No, her real voice came out to play on that stage in New Orleans. The real voice is the one I want.

“Yes, Siren,” I agree reluctantly.

I climb into the Jag and swing the door shut. Half of this situation is totally wrong, and the other half is totally right. Heart and head battle for control.

But that’s always been the underlying issue for me, hasn’t it? Control.

When I gave it to Lizzie in the gold room, I uncovered new layers of myself I didn’t realize existed. The exposed skin glistened raw but bright like the fresh, vulnerable scales of a snake after molting.

The few times I quit smoking, I felt physically better than I ever had before. Without the cigarettes stuffing up my lungs and causing my heart to race, I could breathe and move freely, when I didn’t realize I had been chugging before. I had more energy, more motivation, more life.

But the mental shit that comes with ditching a habit is hard. The mental shit is always my undoing.

Lizzie eroded the rusty parts of me that needed to go. She scrubbed me clean while leaving me dirty.

Lizzie is my forbidden apple.

I glance over to her svelte body curled into the driver’s seat, a dainty hand lowered to the gearshift, fingernails catching the floodlights in the parking lot. She seems to relax once we’re away from the chaos that is a rock concert. I enjoy the hypnotic rhythm of her expert shifts of the gears. Traffic thins, and soon it’s just the two of us.

Despite her harsh personality, a shroud of “dazzle” envelops Lizzie. Everything from her gait to the way she moves her body while she’s standing still screams rock star. The fans noticed it in the greenroom too. It’s hard to take your eyes off a presence like hers. She’s a larger-than-life, once-in-a-million-chance-of-meeting-her person. And our paths have now crossed twice, which makes me one of the lucky ones to not only have basked in her presence, but also shared the intimacy of being the recipient of her flogger.

She can’t be more than twenty-two or twenty-three, which means I’ve had over a decade more to troll the planet than her. So young to wield so much power. But young stars tend to burn hard and burn out fast. I hope that’s not the case for her.

Lizzie hits the power button on the radio. The tinny pop of Banging Betties floods the speakers. Some of the glamour wears off as I suppress a cringe at the overproduced track.

“I want you on the Get Your Rock Off tour,” she says over the music.

She wants me on the tour, or Killer Buzz Float on the tour? Because it needs to be the latter.

“I appreciate that.” I think.

“You’re not convinced.”

“No, it’s not that,” I lie. “We’ve got contracts. We made promises.”

“Richard never let silly things like contracts or promises get in the way of what I wanted. Why would you?”

Uh, because I don’t know you from Eve, and I’m a woman of my word? Damn, I’m hot as fuck for this girl’s body, but her narcissism, not so much. But even though I disagree with her morals and should dismiss myself from further discussion on the tour topic, all I can think about is licking her pussy, baring my ass to her flogger, and dildo-fucking her.

I rub my forehead and watch the cars disappear in the side mirror. Lizzie must not be worried about getting pulled over for speeding.

“Look, the tour is out of my hands. I can present the proposition to the band, but I seriously doubt they’ll want to risk canceling shows when they still have several more to perform. It’s just not good business.”

“Tell them it’ll mean more money.”

I face her, glad her eyes are on the road so she can’t see the disgust in mine. “My band doesn’t care about money. They care about the music. And their fans. And their commitments.” Why is this such a foreign concept to her?

She flicks me a round of shady side-eye. “Why? Unless they totally suck, they could probably make a shit-ton of cash.”

“You haven’t even listened to them?” Is she fucking kidding?

She shrugs. “I don’t care about them. I care about you.”

The mud begins to settle, and the water clears. She dragged her manager and the tour promoter into a hostile takeover with a band she’s never even heard of to get to me. ME. Jillian Frost. Thirty-five-year-old manager who gave up a decent salary and benefits at a respectable law firm to tour the country with five fucked-up band members (and an exotic dancer) who play songs about sex and rock ’n’ roll.

“I’m nobody,” I state.

“You’re mine. That makes you somebody.” Her hand leaps from the gearshift to my thigh. She squeezes. I meet her eyes, and everything changes.

The psycho stalker singer’s demeanor tips from bossy know-it-all to genuine girl on a first date with another girl she really likes. The whiplash flings me back into the land of apple tits and honey pussy. The accompanying hunger is fierce.

I wish I could say I don’t want to be hers, but it would be a lie. Because for all the head knows, the heart has a way of robbing it at gunpoint, stealing all its Cheetos, and leaving behind a whole lot of roadkill in its wake.

“Tonight, I’m yours,” I vow. That’s all I can give her. For now.