Tate
Long, dark hair. Mesmerizingly dark eyes. Pouty pink lips. A soft jaw. Eyelashes longer than a doll’s.
And a really great fucking pair of tits.
This is my new PA? And I’m expected not to fuck her. Good job, Sofie. Good damn job.
I approach her, this Ella, and stop in front of her. Her eyes climb up my body until they meet mine, and she holds my gaze steadily. No wavering, no lip quivering, no blushing. If it wasn’t for the way her tongue is flicking against her bottom lip, I’d say she couldn’t give a shit she’s standing in front of me.
“Ella,” I say slowly, trying her name out. It rolls off my tongue perfectly. “Hey.”
“Hello,” she replies demurely, holding my gaze for a second longer.
Demure. Shit. I don’t do demure. But then again, I can’t do her, so what does it matter?
“You think you can keep up with a rocker’s lifestyle?”
“I’ll give it my best shot.”
My lips tug to the side. “I’m sure you will, darlin’. Are you used to showin’ girls out of hotel rooms?”
“Not particularly, although I’m sure it’s something I’ll have to get used to pretty quickly. Am I right, Mr. Burke?”
Mr. Burke? What the fuck? “My name is Tate.”
“To those close to you, and forgive me for saying so, but I’d rather like to keep my distance.” She smiles, unruffled, and steps to the side. “It’s really great to meet you all. I’m sorry we’re late. It’s my fault.”
She pulls out the spare chair between Sofie and Kye and, smoothing her dress under her ass, takes a seat. She sweeps her hair around to one side, exposing her neck to my line of view as I walk around the table and sit back down.
Shit. What’s with the hot PAs? Can’t we hire some ugly-as-shit girl? Someone I won’t want to flip on their back every time they walk into a room? I can already tell Ella is going to be more of a problem than Jenna was when we first hired her.
Ella’s gonna test my resolve, pushing at patience I don’t fucking have.
She smiles widely at something Conner says. Yep. She’s gonna be a fucking pain in my ass—just because of her existence.
“You look like you’re ready to get to know her,” Ads mutters and leans over. “And not in the way the rest of us are.”
“Fuck you,” I reply. Grabbing my beer, I bring the bottle to my lips and swig. “Next time, I’m hirin’ the fuckin’ assistant.”
Kye snorts. “Sofie gave you the chance this time. You were busy with, what’s her face? Angelica?”
“Who the hell is that?”
“Stacy? Nora? Penelope?”
I point the neck of the bottle in my brother’s direction. “Penelope. She sounds familiar.”
Ads chokes and knocks his fist into his chest. “Jesus. Why doesn’t this prick have a little black book yet?”
“Rumor has it that they don’t make them big enough,” Ella chimes in.
I dart my eyes across the table to Ella’s, ignoring my brothers’ laughter. At least Sof tries to hide hers.
Ella’s lips curve up around her glass of wine. She takes a small sip, her eyes dancing with unrestrained amusement, and I lean back in my chair.
“Mr. Burke, and now this? I don’t think I like you very much already.”
Her smiles widens, and she sets her glass down. “Good. Then I already accomplished the first job on my list.”
“You.” I turn my attention to Sofie. “You’re on the top of my shi—eet list,” I correct, glancing toward Mila. “Right at the top.”
Sofie sips her drink, completely unaffected by my words, and I turn my attention back to Ella. Whatever bravado she had just seconds ago is gone, because instead of looking at me, she’s staring at the table.
I lean back in my seat and keep my gaze trained on her. She calls me out, then refuses to look at me? Fuck no. If you’re gonna sass me, keep it the hell up. Don’t back down—and if you’re gonna, don’t fuckin’ start sassing in the first place.
If this is gonna be a pattern, she’s gonna last all of a week as our personal bitch.
The waiter comes in and takes our orders one by one. Still, I look at Ella, waiting for her to look back. She doesn’t. She keeps her gaze firmly on the menu, her voice quiet and hesitant as she orders. My head tilts to the side.
How the fuck can she sass me so bad and then turn into a motherfucking mouse?
“Filet mignon. Medium rare.” I hand my menu to the waiter over my shoulder. He takes it and presumably writes my order down, because he leaves the room a minute or so later.
“Pizza, Dadda! Pizzaaaaaaaaa!” Mila bangs her high chair tray like a drum set, and Aidan snickers from next to me. Conner shoots him a hard look as he soothes Mila by passing her a juice box from her bag under the table. Sofie leans in to Ella and they share a smile, and Kye turns to me, but I cut him off.
“Where are you from, Ella?”
“New York.” Her answer is barely audible across the table and the level of chatter.
“Where?”
“Manhattan.”
“Rich man’s playground.”
“Yes.” She grabs her glass, still looking at the fucking table, and ends our conversation.
I tap my fingers against the tabletop. Fuck, I hate it when people don’t look at me when I talk to them. I especially hate it when a girl fucking ignores me so blatantly. I can’t fuck her, sure, but it doesn’t mean I can’t make her putty in my goddamn hands.
It doesn’t mean I can’t sweet-talk her hoity-toity ass into bending to my every whim and desire.
“Eyes down, bro,” Kye mutters.
“To her tits? No problem.” I laugh.
“To your beer bottle, asshole,” he responds with a laugh of his own. “She’s off-limits.”
“Never been very good with those limit things.” I swig from my beer bottle. “They get in the way.”
“No shit,” Aidan adds in a low voice. “That’s the fuckin’ point.”
I cut my eyes to him, smirking. “You are a genius, Ads. Fuckin’ unbelievable.” He flips me off in response, and my gaze finds Ella. “She’s odd, huh?”
“Odd because she isn’t on the floor panting with her legs open?”
“That, too. No—she’s quiet, don’t you think? I just tried bein’ a nice little boss and she fucked me off.”
“That’s because you’re a jackass,” Kye inputs. “Watch and learn.” He turns his attention from me to Ella and taps her arm.
Slowly, she faces him with a hesitant smile. “Yes?”
“Where’d you go to college?” Kye dives right in. “Sorry,” he adds when she blinks harshly. “Just wanted to know more about you. That’s all.” He follows his words with a charming smile, and she relaxes.
“Oh, I’m sorry. It caught me off guard.” She straightens in her chair. “I studied at Harvard and am preparing for school.”
Conner chokes on his beer. “No way. What the fuck are you doin’ here sortin’ our shit out for?”
“Bad Dadda!” Mila gasps, pointing her finger at Conner. “Bad!”
Ella’s smile widens, just a little. “I needed a change of scenery.”
Dirty little liar.
“All the boys in Manhattan too clean cut for you, darlin’?” I ask across the table.
“Actually,” she responds calmly, folding her napkin in front of her, “you could learn a thing or two from them, Mr. Burke. Like manners.”
“I’d love to, but men don’t take lessons from boys.”
“Tate, you’re about as manly as a goldfish,” Sofie butts in. “The day Mila finally liked you, you sang nursery rhymes for two hours and built sandcastles with her for four. Oh, and didn’t you dump Nina because she messed with your family?” She raises an eyebrow.
“Doesn’t mean a thing, Sof,” I throw back.
“Whatever. Lay off Ella and find some other girl to release your obvious frustration on.”
Our eyes meet in a tense stare that’s only broken by Mila’s excited shriek when our food is brought in. Sofie drops her eyes to the plate of pizza in front of her and grabs her knife and fork to cut it, ending our wordless battle as easily as she ended the conversation five seconds ago.
Being soft with a two-year-old girl is way different from being soft with other people. She’s so damn blinded by my relationship with Mila that she forgets I was a total fucking asshole to her for years.
Once again, my gaze flicks to Ella, but hers is firmly focused on her plate. I grab my fork and look at my own dinner. Sofie, Aidan, Kye, Conner . . . she looks at all of them when she talks to me. Like I’m a piece of fucking shit not worth being on her shoe.
Ella’s soft spoken, but it’s controlled and precise. Like every word is prepicked, and she’s trying not to offend. Hell, even when she says something that could be offensive it’s nice as fucking pie.
I don’t believe she wants a change of scenery. You don’t go from the bright lights of New York and the harsh regime of Harvard to being a runaround for a band. It sure as hell isn’t for the money we’re paying her either. She’s already admitted to a privileged upbringing, and if she didn’t, it’s obvious as fuck from that perfect hairdo and that damn dress.
All she doesn’t have is a sense of entitlement.
The girl is one big motherfucking enigma, and hell if I don’t want to crack her code, if only to get under her skin and piss her off.
Empty plates are cleared from the table, and Sofie darts around Conner to clean Mila’s sauce-covered hands and face with a wipe. Or five wipes, as it turns out. Sofie mumbles to herself about “freakin’ pizza” as she balls the wipes up and leaves them on her side plate. Ella watches them with a light smile, but it drops when she glances at me and sees me watching her.
Our eyes meet for a split second, but something flashes in hers. Something that doesn’t usually glint in girls’ eyes whenever they look at me, so it’s sure as hell not good.
“Sofie,” she says softly, turning away from me. “I’m going to head back upstairs. It’s been great to meet everyone, but I need to arrange for a new phone and credit card.”
Sofie nods without questioning her. “Of course. I’ll stop by your room at nine tomorrow. The guys will be practicin’ all day, which translates to us running around like headless chickens after them.”
“We ain’t that bad,” Conner grumbles.
Sofie raises an eyebrow, but she doesn’t respond.
Ella smiles. “Sounds like . . . fun. Night, everyone.” She stands, waves awkwardly, and heads out of the room.
Why does she need a new phone and credit card?
“Where are you goin’?” Sofie sighs heavily, looking at me.
I get up and flatten my hands on the table. “I’m goin’ to tell her what you forgot—that she’s our employee and we’ll get her a fuckin’ phone and credit card if she needs one.”
She rolls her eyes. “Trust me, I could tell her, but she’d laugh at me. I can tell.”
“Sure she will. You’d give up convincing her after one ‘no.’ ” I pause at the door. “But she’ll do whatever the hell I say because I’m her boss.”
“Don’t be a dick!” Aidan yells after me.
“Tay! Ad! No!” Mila rambles. “Bad!”
I swallow my laugh. Damn, that kid is something else. She’s a fucking star.
I walk through the restaurant to the lobby and see Ella leaning against the reception desk, nodding at something the receptionist says. Without the judgment of my brothers, I stop and look at her. Her hair falls halfway down her back, and her dress clings just tightly enough that I can tell it’s concealing a fucking killer body—and her legs go on forever. Aw, hell.
She smiles and straightens, turning for the elevator. I jog across the lobby and beat her to the button, my thumb pushing it just seconds before hers does.
“Oh. Hi.”
My lips tug to the side. “Hi.”
“Are you following me?”
“No, darlin’. I’m the followed, not the follower.” I put my hand on the side of the door and let her walk into the elevator before me. I push the button to the fourth floor and lean against the wall, crossing my arms over my chest.
“Obviously. Well, can I help you with something?”
There are so many fucking things she can help me with, namely my rapidly hardening cock.
“Dangerous question,” I remark, ignoring her subsequent eye roll. “You said you need a new phone and credit card.”
“Correct.” She tucks some of that dark hair behind her ear.
“Sofie should have told you that we’ll arrange that. For as long as you work for us.”
“That isn’t necessary, Mr. Burke. I’m perfectly fine doing it myself.”
“Sure you are, Ella, but you’re not going to. You’re our employee and we’ll take care of you.” And boy oh fucking boy, would I love to take care of this chick.
“Well, thank you, but like I said, it isn’t necessary.” She smiles shyly and steps out of the elevator ahead of me.
My jaw clenches. I don’t give a fuck if it’s necessary or if she wants it or not. “They’ll be in your name. We’ll take care of the phone bill, but the credit card is on you.”
Her shoulders heave and she turns her head halfway over her shoulder, her eyes on my feet. “Thank you, but no thank you.”
She slides her key card into the slot, but before she can open the door, I snatch her hand away. She flinches in shock, and I spin her so she’s facing me. Still, though, her eyes are on my shoulder.
“When you wake up tomorrow there’ll be a phone and credit card in reception waitin’ for you, and you will take it. And, Ella?” I cup her jaw and force her eyes upward. They crash into mine, blazing with annoyance, and I tilt my face toward hers, enjoying the hitch in her breath. “For someone concerned about my manners, you have a serious lack of them. When I talk to you, you fuckin’ look at me. Understand?”
Wordlessly, she steps back, and I let my hand fall. She nods once, quickly, and yanks on the door handle. She disappears inside the room in a split second, leaving me standing in the middle of the hall, staring at the closed white door.
Wondering why the fuck her annoyed gaze was riddled with fear.
The Charleston Stadium is in darkness except for the stage. Silence fills the stands, but the first few rows and stage are, again, a different story. Final practices are always fucking crazy, because there’s always something that needs changing before tomorrow’s sound check.
Like can I not eye up the tall girl with bottle-blond hair with the clipboard?
The girl has tits that defy gravity and a top that doesn’t. No, I can’t stop looking at her.
“Tate. Seriously,” Carla, our manager Marc’s assistant, snaps. “Can you focus?”
“Can you get this chick out of here?” I nod toward Tits. “Until then, no, I fuckin’ can’t.”
Carla presses her fingertips to her forehead and turns toward Tits. “Jodie, go backstage to wardrobe and ask them for a damn turtleneck.”
Jodie. Huh. She doesn’t look like a Jodie. Maybe an On My Knees Waiting for Tate, but not a Jodie.
And if that shit isn’t a real name, it should be. For a lot of girls.
Carla looks at me once Jodie’s left and narrows her eyes. “Now can you concentrate?”
I stare at her, not saying a word. Seriously, she should know better by now. It doesn’t take much to distract me—and if a girl has a rack like that, she’s gonna distract the hell out of me.
“Can you think with your fingers and not your penis?”
I smirk. “I can think with them and I can act with them, Carla.”
“Get your head in the game, dickhead, and maybe she’ll let you get your head somewhere else after practice,” Aidan calls to me.
“No one will be getting heads anywhere after this!” Carla shrieks.
“Can we be professional? For five minutes?” Conner groans.
“Sure we can, baby bro. On Saturday, where there are a fuck ton of girls out there begging for my head.” I half-grin.
“Enough!” Carla’s voice rings out through the stadium. She looks at all of us, but her eyes linger on me for a second longer. “Y’all have to perform in twenty-four hours. Tate, if you need a break, I’ll send someone for a Playboy, all right? And you,” she turns on Aidan, “stop encouraging him with promises that won’t happen. Jodie is staff. Do you hear that? Staff.” She glares. “Tate?”
“Jodie is staff and off-limits to my cock,” I respond dutifully, setting my guitar on my lap.
“Thank you.” Carla steps back and sits down. “Can we start with ‘Broken Heart’?”
“Yep,” Aidan says before I can argue. Fuck. This isn’t my favorite song.
He knocks his sticks against the side of his drum and counts us in. My fingers move to the strings of my guitar almost automatically. “Broken Heart” is one of our first songs, and no doubt the one that made girls all over the country fall for Conner’s drawl. It’s more country than rock, more emotion than music, one he wrote after Sofie disappeared.
Now, he hates it as much as I do. I hate it because I don’t understand it, and he hates it because it reminds him of the past.
He sings, his voice taking on the same low and husky tone it always does when we play this song, and my eyes half shut. My fingers, my body, they don’t understand my dislike. They understand the vibrations of the music. They understand the humming of the strings, wave after wave of melody.
Each note is a transportation to another place, where only us and the music reside. It’s always been the same, even when there’s thousands of girls screaming at us. As soon as the notes hit, it’s us, at home, in the garage, dreaming of something bigger.
The echo of the stadium doesn’t exist. The endless fucking resonance of the music doesn’t exist.
It’s us, a bunch of young guys with an unattainable dream. Not us, America’s favorite band.
It’s a bunch of fighting brothers, snapping at each other, all battling for the same thing. Now that we’re here, it doesn’t make a difference. We fight like fuck because we care. Because this damn dream isn’t a dream. It’s real, and none of us want to let it go. None of us will let it go.
Because the dream isn’t all lights and freedom and relaxation. It isn’t all fun and fucking laughs like we thought it would be. It’s hard work, it’s long hours, and it’s worth it.
“I got a broken heart because of you, shattered and smashed, it won’t go back,” Conner sings. “You broke it good, baby, ripped it apart. But it still beats, boom boom, yeah it still beats, boom boom . . .”
His last word is long and drawn out, fitting with the echoing vibrations of the guitar strings. As we do after every song, we look up at Carla for her approval. It’s an instinctive movement now, because we might have a PA to keep our asses in line, but Carla is the chick that whips them into shape.
And fuck, I shouldn’t have thought about our PA, because now all I can think of is Ella’s long legs disappearing beneath her dress.
“Tate. Are you listening?”
“Agree with every word, Carla.” I snap my eyes to her.
“You didn’t hear a thing I said, did ya?”
I shake my head slowly. “Not a damn thing.”
She shuts her eyes briefly and jerks her head to the side toward the door. “Lunch is here. Y’all take an hour. . . . Tate, maybe you should take two or I’ma kill you.”
“Carla.” I set my guitar down and clasp my hands to my chest. “I’m hurt, baby. You’d kill me?”
She smirks. “Keep your puppy-dog eyes for Saturday night, Tate Burke. You ain’t charming me. I’m here to make sure y’all don’t mess shit up and that you don’t cause any more media frenzies.” She waves and turns. “If y’all need me for some dumb reason, you have my number.”
With that, she slips past Sofie and Ella in the doorway and disappears.
“Are y’all being pains again?” Sofie sighs, Mila on her hip.
“Us?” Kye snorts. “Just Tate.”
“Tay!” Mila shrieks, pointing a chubby finger at me. “You bad!”
“Me?” I gasp. “No!”
“Lieeeee!” She wriggles, and Sofie puts her down. Mila toddles to the stage and peeks over the edge, again pointing at me. “You lieeeeee! Lieeeeee!”
When she finishes with a giggle, I glance at Conner. “Her new favorite word?”
He nods, his lips twitching. “Watch her, brother. She’s got you pegged.”
“Great.” I rub my hand down my face and walk to her, crouching in front of her. “Okay, I’m bad. Slap my hand?” I hold it out for her, but she shakes her head.
“Tar. My play tar.” She grins.
“Mimi,” I fake-whine.
She giggles again at my nickname for her, then stops, pouting, and gives me puppy-dog eyes. “Peez, Tay. Peez.”
She blinks several times in quick succession, and I stare at her. Fucking damn her cute little ass. I sigh heavily. “Okay. Come on.” I lift her onto the stage and she stomps over to my guitar, laughing wildly. I can’t help my own chuckle—the kid has the charm of I don’t know what. And somehow, she always gets her own damn way.
“Dum dum dum!” She attacks the strings harshly, and my eyes widen.
“No, Mimi!” I sit, grab her onto my lap, and trap her with my arms. “Gently, remember?”
“Ohhhh,” she coos. “Genty. Kay.”
I lift the guitar onto our legs. “Ready?”
“Duuuuum, duuuuum, duuuuum,” she hums slowly, pinging each string softly. “Duuuuuuuuum!”
“Great job!” I clap my hands in front of us.
“Duuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuum!” she gasps, giggling when she catches her breath again. “Good, Tay. Ree good.”
“Real good,” I echo, grabbing my guitar. “Lunch now? Mama has stars.”
Mila gasps and looks toward Sofie. “Mama, sars?” she yells, not caring that Sofie’s deep in conversation. She jumps off of me.
Sofie snaps her head round. “Uh, yes. After a sandwich.”
“No, now. Tay said!” She stomps her little foot.
“I didn’t!” I defend, putting my guitar down. “I just said you had them.”
Sofie looks at me flatly. “You know, Tate, this newfound friendship is about to be shoved in a very uncomfortable part of your body.”
“Sorry, Sof.” I jump off the stage and lift Mila down with an exaggerated swing. “I don’t get things shoved in me. Shoving something somewhere else, however . . .”
Ella wrinkles her face and looks at Kye. “Are you all always so crude?”
“Nope.” He swigs from a bottle of water. “Just him.”
“How do you cope?” she directs that at Sofie.
“I drink a lot of wine.” Sofie bites into her sandwich and looks at her seriously. “Don’t worry. I have a stash of it for situations like this. Ajax is an awesome babysitter. Right, Ajax?” She yells that over her shoulder.
“Babysitter . . . bodyguard . . . does it matter?” he responds from the door.
“Not where Sofie is concerned,” I snigger.
A bread crust promptly hits me in the face.
“Bite me,” she snaps.
“Be nice, princess,” Conner says. “He’s in a good mood today. We don’t want to anger him.”
I click my tongue. “Fancy your ass kicked, little brother?”
“Ass! Ass!”
“Mila!” Sofie gasps. “Tate! I don’t know who to yell at!”
“Tate,” Ella responds, hugging her knees to her chest on her seat. “He said it first.”
“You just took the top spot on my shit list,” I tell her, trying not to focus on the way her shirt pulls her tits together. Because, fuck me, that cleavage is begging for my face to be buried in it.
“Good. That means you’re less likely to try and seduce me.”
“Hey, Mila, let’s go get a juice,” Sofie says wisely, scooping her up. “Conner,” she adds in a firm tone, then glances at the twins.
“Not movin’,” they say together.
The side door to the stage shuts, and Ella swallows. Her apprehension is evident, and I don’t blame her. I can feel this tension between us, the one I felt last night, and it’s going motherfucking batshit banana crazy.
Leaning forward, I lick my lips. “Not necessarily,” I tell her. “Because if there’s anything you need to know about me, darlin’, it’s that I don’t try to do anything. I do it straightaway. So if I was tryin’ to seduce you, you’d be fuckin’ seduced.”
“Should I be honored?” she replies in a small but strong voice.
“That I haven’t seduced you?”
“Yes.”
“Maybe. For all I know, you’re the kind of girl who needs to be pinned against a wall and kissed before you realize you’re seduced to fuck.”
She pauses, or rather, she freezes, her eyes flashing with a hint of that fear I saw last night. “Good luck trying to find out,” she retorts, standing and smoothing her shirt out. Her eyes linger on the floor, then rise to mine. “I can guarantee you won’t, Mr. Burke, so kindly stop assuming you will, because you’ll be sorely disappointed.”