Ian

Even though we’re booked at the recording studio today, I still show up bright and early just to prove that I can. It’s not even seven and I’ve already got a coffee for both me and Chelsea—hers made the way I watched her do it yesterday—and a dozen donuts for everyone. She might try to deny it, but after watching her make a half-syrup coffee yesterday, I know Chelsea’s got a sweet tooth, so I’m feeling pretty good about my chances of getting one of those smiles out of her.

Luckily, I don’t have to wait out in the cold. The security guy here has my name and lets me right up. The managers aren’t here yet, but that’s just as well because there were some things we wanted to work on beforehand anyway. I wait for about five minutes before Chelsea shows up, and today she’s in this little white sundress that’s probably see-through in the sunlight. Of course, I don’t have the benefit of seeing her in the sun at this ungodly hour, but she looks good enough to eat either way.

“Ian Monroe,” she says teasingly, spotting me on the couch sipping my coffee, “if I didn’t know better, I’d almost think you were a morning person, beating me here again.”

I just shrug and hold out her coffee. “What can I say? I’m addicted to my work.” It’s a line that’s been playing pretty well with the press ever since I cleaned up my act, but Chelsea doesn’t seem to go for it. Her smile tightens and turns fake and I’m kicking myself for saying the wrong thing even if I’m not sure what that was.

“It’s for you. Still hot,” I say, waving the cup at her again.

She looks at it dubiously, her eyes squinting at it like she’d be able to tell with those x-ray eyes of hers if I poisoned it. Finally, she takes it and braces herself for a sip. Then her eyes go wide and she takes another hearty gulp.

“How did you—”

“I’m observant.”

“Hmm,” she says, trying to hide a smile as she sits down on the opposite end of the couch. This studio’s only got the one, so of course she’s as far away from me as she can possibly manage.

“Donut?” I whip out the box and open the lid with a flourish. Her eyes go wide and she bites her bottom lip, and I have to suppress a groan because it’s sexy as fuck.

“No… I shouldn’t. There’s a tour coming up if you haven’t heard…” Her mouth says no, but her eyes are begging for it. She just needs a nudge in the right direction. So I wiggle the box.

“Come on, Chelsea, don’t you ever give in to temptation? Aren’t you ever a little bad?”

She glares at me, but I can tell she doesn’t mean it. Those eyes are sparkling behind that fake anger. She snatches a donut out of the dozen so fast that she might be afraid of the box biting her.

“You’re dangerous, you know that?”

“I’ve heard it once or twice,” I say, smiling as I tuck the box away.

As she eats the donut, flakes of sugary glaze fall off onto her dress and she daintily picks them off before licking her fingers in a display that’s going to fuel my shower masturbation for a long time to come. I didn’t think anyone could make eating a donut sexy, but Chelsea Garten has proved me wrong.

“So,” she says, dusting her hands off and licking the last crumbs from her plump lips, “I worked on those lyrics last night, but I don’t have any music to go with it.”

“Well, let’s see what you’ve got,” I say, hiding my disappointment that we’re jumping straight into work after all the fun we had yesterday.

She hands me the notebook and I smile at her big, loopy girl writing. My notebooks are full of unintelligible scrawls and she’s got perfectly formed letters, in neatly-measured cursive. I mean, of course she does.

I read through it once for the rhythm and then a second time, tapping it out on the table in front of us. There’s a melody playing far-off in the back of my mind, but I can’t bring it forward, so I hand her the notebook back. My brain will work on it while I work on other things and then suddenly the solution will appear. That’s how this has always worked for me. Agonizing over a song is only going to ensure it doesn’t get done. If I just let my subconscious do its thing, magic happens on its own.

“Well?”

“I like it,” I say, nodding. “I’m sad you didn’t keep my swordplay line.”

She smacks me with the notebook and I hold up my hands laughing, trying to protect myself from her attack.

“I said I like it!” I laugh.

She drops the notebook and purses her lips at me.

“I mean it,” I add, allowing a note of sincerity into my voice. “It’s good. I might have some music for it, but I don’t have it yet.”

Her face tells me that statement just made me sound crazy.

“What? You don’t do that?”

“Do… what?”

“Let your brain work on things for you.”

“I have no idea what you’re talking about.”

“Sure you do. When you’re agonizing over a chord progression or a lyric choice for weeks and you finally give up on it only to wake up at four a.m. with the eureka moment? You’ve had that happen, haven’t you?”

“Um… yeah,” she says, uncertain.

“Right,” I nod. “Your brain was problem-solving for you in the background. Just gotta give those ideas time to percolate.”

She rolls her eyes at me, but she’s smiling. “Okay, percolator, what do you do in the meantime?”

“We work on the other songs, obviously. You ready to warm up?”

It’s almost like she’s surprised that I’m suggesting we go straight to work rather than sit here chatting for a while longer. I hate to tell her this, but I’m planning on surprising Chelsea a lot.

“Yeah, let’s do it.”

We head into the recording room where the instruments and the better acoustics are and she grabs a guitar and starts warming up her voice.

I don’t do any of the things she’s doing. I just make the most insane, outlandish faces I can, trying to trip her up.

She’s trying to ignore me—and putting up a valiant effort at it—but I catch her smirking and pull out the crazy face I’ve been saving as a trump card. Just as I hoped, she bursts out laughing and then glares at me.

“Are you ever serious?”

“What makes you think I’m not?”

Her deadpan look almost makes me feel guilty.

“Look, I know you haven’t worked with many rockers, but we’re an expressive bunch. If I don’t warm up my face muscles, I could pull something and then this handsome face you’ve come to know and love would be unrecognizable.”

Chelsea scoffs, tossing her hair over her shoulder and turning her attention back to her guitar.

“It’s okay, I won’t tell anyone how insensitive you were to my people.”

She shakes her head at me, completely exasperated. “You’re ridiculous, do you know that?”

“I’ve heard it a time or two,” I say, grinning.

“Well, are your face muscles sufficiently warmed up? Because my voice is.” She’s trying so hard to sound stern and serious, but that telltale sparkle in her eyes keeps giving her away.

“Let’s do it.”

“What do you want to start with?”

“How about ‘Autumn Love’?” I say, naming one of her songs.

She nods and pulls up the music on her phone, setting it on a stand between us. I don’t need it though. I did my homework. I spent all night last night learning the lyrics and progressions for the songs of Chelsea’s that are going to be on the album.

We jump right in, and after a couple of false starts, we find our stride, harmonizing even better than we did at the show. Our voices mix and mingle together in a flirty little dance that I just know she has to be able to feel.

Once we finish the song and the music fades from the room, I hear it—applause. Chelsea’s head cocks to the side and we both step up to the window of the recording booth, cupping our hands around the glass to block out the glare.

A light on the other side flips on and both of our managers are there, positively beaming.

“Great job,” Rosa says, her finger on the intercom button. Merrill gives me a double thumbs-up.

“We were just practicing,” Chelsea says, clearly a little violated about the unintentional show we just put on.

Rosa shakes her head. “No need. You should just record it now. It can’t get better.”

Merrill’s nodding along. “She’s right. You two are a natural fit. Can’t improve on perfection.”

Chelsea looks to me, uncertain, but I shrug. “We should probably give the people what they want…”

She still doesn’t look convinced, but she nods. “All right, let’s do that one again.”

We get through “Autumn Love” and then two more songs—one of hers and one of mine, by the time the managers tell us our time slot’s over.

“Wow! What a productive day,” Rosa says as we head back into the lounge area of the studio. “Six hours in the booth and we already have a quarter of the record.”

That makes me pause. I knew we were doing good, but the thought that this album is already a quarter of the way done means that I just have that much less time with Chelsea. I wonder if I should fuck up some chords, make my voice crack, do something to sabotage our progress moving forward because I don’t want this time to go by too quickly. As much as I’m attracted to Chelsea and want her like nothing else, I actually really like making music with her and just hanging out with her. I’m pretty sure I’m not the kind of guy Chelsea Garten is going to hang out with when she’s not making an album with him. So if I want to keep her in my life, I have to do something, right?

But I can’t sabotage the record. We’re doing this for charity, for those sick kids. I just have to take one for the team and be better at my job than anyone expects. What a curse.

Merrill claps me on the shoulder with an approving look as he and Rose filter out, talking about the notes they have for the mixing and the order of the tracks. That’s all stuff for them to take care of. I just make the music. What they do with it afterward is not my problem or concern.

“So, that went well,” Chelsea says, rocking on her heels.

“Yeah,” I say, still thinking about how soon this is going to be over.

“Guess I’ll see you tomorrow?” She sounds hesitant and I know this is my opportunity. I gotta step up now and take it.

“You could come back to my place and we can work on the new song. My brain’s been working on that melody all day and I might just have something.”

Her mouth opens, like she’s shocked at the very idea of me inviting her to my house. I know what she’s thinking, and she’s not wrong, but if she doesn’t want anything more than songwriting that’s where we’ll stop.

“I’m not going to hurt you, Chelsea. We have work to do, is all.”

She shrugs, trying to play off the hesitation, but I already saw it for what it was and it leaves me with a bitter taste.

“Sure, I guess we should really hammer that out with this tight schedule.”

“Cool, I’ll send you the address,” I say, heading out of the studio before I can lash out. That wariness in her eyes hurt. Like she really thinks after all the time we’ve spent together that I’d try to get her to my place to take advantage of her.

Fuck her crazy? Yes.

Take advantage of her? Never.

Whatever happens between Chelsea and me will be completely, undeniably consensual. Though after that look, I’m not sure there’s any danger of anything at all happening.