“Enough,” I growled, my jaw ticking furiously in an effort to keep from coming.

Tate ignored me, swallowing my cock down her throat as her fist squeezed tighter around the base of it. It was as if she was trying to ring me dry, and she was doing a phenomenal fucking job. But I didn’t want to come in her mouth, or her tits, or on my own goddamn stomach. I wanted to come inside her sweet pussy.

She let out a wicked hum, sending vibrations through the head of my dick and into my entire body, pushing me closer to the edge. My teeth gnashed, and a ferocious snarl rumbled from deep within my chest as I tried desperately to ignore the tingles in the base of my spine, alerting me to the fact that I was about to blow.

“Goddamn it, Tate,” I grunted, reaching down and grabbing under her arms. I hauled her up my body until she straddled my waist, her slick cunt gliding along my cock and driving me out of my mind. “You’re in the mood to play, huh?”

She writhed on top of me, desperately trying to get off as she stared down, her eyes clouded with hunger. “Mmm. But I wasn’t finished,” she teased.

“You are now.” With that, I drove her down onto me at the same time I snapped my hips, filling her as deeply as I could.

My balls instantly drew up tight, and her walls began to spasm around me. We moaned simultaneously.

“Oh God,” she whimpered, throwing her head back. She started moving, riding like her life depended on it. “Yes! God, Deck, you feel so good!” Sitting up, I wrapped one arm around her waist as I used my other hand to lift her plump, round breast to my mouth, taking her nipple between my lips and biting down. “Yeah, just like that,” she groaned, picking up her pace. “Harder, baby. I’m so close.”

I bit down again, this time harder, as I pumped my hips up over and over. Her breath hitched and she plunged down, grinding against me as she came on a sharp, keening cry.

I quickly followed her over the edge, coming so hard I nearly blacked out.

We collapsed back onto the bed, and I’d have been content to stay there for the rest of our lives. Unfortunately, the real world insisted on invading.

A pounding knock sounded on the hotel room door. “Yo! Get your lazy ass up! Everyone’s heading down to the lobby!” Killian shouted through the solid wood. “I wanna get this video done so we can get the hell home!”

And just like that, the blissful dream world we’d been living in the whole damn trip came to an end.

“Be down in a minute, for fuck’s sake!” I hollered back.

“God, I hate LA,” Tate declared on a whisper, burrowing her face in my neck.

Rolling her to her back, I slid out of her silky heat and stared down at her face. “You do? Since when?”

Her expression grew sad, and I instantly knew the answer without her having to say a word. Things between us had taken a turn for the immensely better ever since Sacramento, and there was no way in hell I was going to fuck that up by taking us backward.

Not giving her a chance to reply, I said, “Then let’s get this shit done, yeah? Faster we shoot, faster we can get back to Seattle.”

The sadness melted away, and she gave me a brilliant smile as she replied, “Sounds like a plan.”

* * *

Tatum

“This is so bizarre,” Lyla whispered in awe as she gazed around the set where the guys were about to shoot the music video for “Soulless.” She’d come in from San Francisco, planning to head back with us and hang in Seattle for a bit before we had to jet off again for the start of the tour. I loved having her there with me, though I wished it was a different single we were filming for. “I mean, I know they’re famous and everything, but they’ve always just been ‘the guys’ to me.”

I had zero desire to hear the song again, but I had to admit, I was excited to watch the guys shoot. Even if their performance was fake and scripted, seeing them in the element had always been a thing of beauty.

“I know what you mean,” I replied with a smile. “It’s hard to picture them as celebrities when I’m still breaking up catfights between them just like back in school.”

“Well I’m glad you two can be so cool about it, ’cause I’m still freaking out,” Gina grumbled as she joined us, a tray of coffees in her hand.

“Who are those for?” I asked curiously, spying the infamous paper mermaid cups.

She looked at me with confusion as she answered, “Killian said the guys needed coffee. Should I have gone somewhere else?”

That son of a bitch.

“He actually said that?” I asked, my anger starting to grow thanks to a certain bass player’s childish behavior.

“Yeah. And the closest damn Starbucks was like a fifteen-minute walk from here. Then the line was damn near out the door. Are they pissed I took so long?”

“Uh, isn’t there a coffee station near the craft services table?” Lyla asked.

Gina’s entire face grew red with rage as she glanced at the full-service coffee bar a few yards away. “Are you fucking kidding me?”

“Thumbelina!” we heard shouted from the direction of the dressing area. “Coffee, woman!”

At the sound of Killian’s condescending tone, the vein in Gina’s forehead began to pulsate. “I’ll fix it,” I reassured her, placing my hands on her shoulders. “I’ll make him stop, I swear. In the meantime….” I took the coffees out, passed one to Lyla, and kept another for myself. “We get to drink these, and Kill can go screw himself.”

She plunked the tray on a small folding table not too far away and snatched out a coffee for herself before stopping a guy shuffling past to give him the last one, saying, “It’s from the guys in the band. Enjoy.”

Lyla and I laughed at his bewildered expression as he slowly took the drink and started away.

“That was twenty-five bucks of my own money,” she continued to rant. “I’m gonna murder that guy before this tour’s over.”

“Murder who?” Gwen asked as she and Corrie came to join us.

“Killian,” I answered. “He’s taken to playing immature, nasty pranks on their new assistant.”

Gwen’s eyes went big as she turned to Gina. “He’s pranking you? That asshole! Don’t worry, babe, I’ll totally help you bury his body.”

Thankfully all plans of homicide were put on the back burner when the four members of Civil Corruption came sauntering out of the dressing area. People all around began to scramble as the guy directing the video went over to them and started gesturing wildly while he gave them instructions.

There were two areas where they were going to film. The first was set up like something out of an apocalyptic doomsday movie, complete with dilapidated buildings and a cracked, crumbling road like a bomb had been dropped right in the middle of the city. The second was an outdoor area, an empty, barren desert with fire barrels set up strategically. In both scenes, the guys would be playing just like they would on a stage, complete with Garret’s drum kit, Declan’s microphone stand, and all the other instruments.

Declan glanced over in our direction, quickly catching my eye, and shot me a wink that sent my panties up in flames. God, he looked unbelievably hot. Of course, they all did, but he stood out from the rest, that was for damn sure.

Their clothes were tattered and torn, and it looked like dirt or oil had been smudged all over. Each was in tight, ragged jeans covered in holes and plain white T-shirts with carefully placed tears in the fabric that stretched across their muscles. I had no idea what the director was planning, but from the looks of all four guys, the women were going to go crazy over the video.

“What’s going on with you two?” Gwen asked, pulling me from my perusal of Declan’s fine body.

“Hmm?” I replied, trying not to blush at being caught staring. “Nothing’s going on. Why do you ask?”

“Maybe because you’re staring him down like he’s a T-bone and you’re a hungry dog?” Corrine spoke on a laugh.

“Yeah, and you’ve basically roomed with him the entire trip,” Gina continued, adding fuel to the fire. “Either something’s up, or someone seriously needs to lose their job. Three cities, three hotels, and they’ve all managed to screw up your reservation?”

Their skepticism was evident, and I could feel Lyla’s penetrating gaze boring into my skin. I hadn’t shared anything about Declan and me with her since that first night, and I knew she was going to start demanding answers very soon.

“Quiet on the set!” someone shouted, effectively ending our conversation, thank god.

Everyone started fluttering around. The guys headed into the bomb area set and got ready, and the rest of the girls and I grew silent so we could watch. I’d never been a part of this process before, and I was giddy with anticipation to see how everything turned out.

The director called for action, and Garrett started banging out a beat with his drumsticks. They’d dub the music later, but for the time being the guys were playing live and unplugged. Mace and Declan strummed their guitars in fluid synchronicity, and Killian’s bass rumbled through the area. As soon as Declan stepped up to the microphone and opened his mouth to sing, rain started pouring down on them from the ceiling.

I was so enraptured by how the drenched T-shirt conformed to Declan’s chest and abs that I barely paid attention to the lyrics he was growling out in that decadent voice of his, which was just fine with me. That was until two women on the crew started whispering just a few feet away from us.

“You know, I heard he wrote this song about an ex-girlfriend. Apparently she was a real bitch.”

“And a dumb one too,” the other girl replied in a hushed voice. “I mean, what chick’s gonna willingly walk away from all that? Who gives a shit what he did wrong?”

“Right?”

My stomach tangled in knots as the two of them continued ripping apart my intelligence and overall character. The words to the song finally started to penetrate, and I went from feeling turned on and happy to downright miserable in the blink of an eye. The past had just reared its ugly head and bitten me right in the ass. There was no escaping it no matter how hard I tried.

I felt Lyla press in close to my side. “Ignore them,” she whispered in my ear. “They’re stupid bitches who don’t know what the hell they’re talking about.”

The smile I gave her was pathetic at best. “I’m good,” I lied. Truth was I was the furthest thing from good there was.

Lyla gave me a sympathetic look and turned back to watch the show while I wallowed silently. I was just about to excuse myself for an extended bathroom break when two arms closed around me from behind and lifted me clear off the ground.

“Surprise, babycakes.”

As soon as my feet hit the floor, I spun around in sheer excitement. “Camden?”

“The one and only. You miss me?”

I threw myself at him, wrapping him in the biggest, tightest hug I could manage. “So much,” I sighed happily. “You have no idea.”

Leave it to my best friend to have an uncanny ability to pop up right when I needed him most.