During the sound check, the bar manager sat with me, flirting shamelessly, while I kept an eye on things. There were the usual suspects milling about, but nothing out of the ordinary. I watched Travis, the roadie for a while. He seemed to have a thing for Miranda, but didn’t strike me as quick-witted enough to arrange notes and flowers and such. He was more of a worker bee. I didn’t suspect anyone who worked at the venue, mostly because this had already been going on long before we had arrived. This was someone else, and it infuriated me I couldn’t put my finger on it yet.

After giving the cold shoulder to Veronica - who was annoying, at best - she finally went on about her business, offering her ‘services’, should I need them at any point in the evening. When I told her it was the girls she should be checking in with, her demeanor changed, not particularly appreciating being told what her job was. Good enough for me. She was blocking my view of Miranda anyway, and even though she was off limits, she was mine to watch.

I wasn’t entirely sure what prompted Carmen to fling a drumstick at her, but it was funny. The job was more enjoyable than I had anticipated; the sisters’ banter was hysterical, and Miranda was so appealing, anyone would have wanted this gig. I couldn’t even remember why I didn’t want to do it in the first place, and it had only been a day or so on the job.

After it was settled that I’d be going with the girls, I found myself holed up in the dressing room with Carmen, Miranda, and Leo, the funniest man alive. With the tanned look and blond hair of a surfer, Leo was the Little Queens stylist. It turns out he’d been doing hair and makeup for years, and after much begging, he had agreed to go on the tour.

“And who are you, honey?” he asked me when we walked in.

“He’s the writer I texted you about,” Carmen said nonchalantly, waving in my direction.

“You didn’t tell me how good-looking he was, girl,” he replied, looking me up and down like I was on the menu. The moment of realization hit me; he was definitely gay.

Also looking me up and down with a sneer, Carmen replied, “I hadn’t noticed.”

As my mouth dropped open from relative shock over being talked about like I wasn’t in the room, all three of them began laughing hysterically. Leo walked over and put his arm around me.

“Aww, honey, we’re just messing with you. If you’re gonna hang with us, you’ll get used to it.” He winked at me and walked over to get to work on Miranda’s hair. “So, what are we doing, Red? I love what you’ve done with the color,” he said, as he ran a brush through her beautiful red hair.

“I think we should just curl the ends a bit? No need to go crazy. It’s a little warm in there already, so if you try to make it big, it’s just going to fall when I get all sweaty.” She gave him a crooked smile in the mirror.

“You know I can make your hair stand up like cement, if that’s what you want,” he laughed.

“I definitely do not want that,” she giggled. That fucking giggle of hers. If candy had a sound, her laugh is what it would sound like. It was a treat for my ears, and every time she giggled, I felt a little throb in my chest.

“Ok, curly ends. We’ll do the usual makeup?” Miranda nodded, and then Leo turned his attention to Carmen. “And what about you, Miss Thing?”

“Me? I’m going on, as-is,” Carmen replied smugly.

“Oh no you are not, honey,” Leo answered, his voice raising an octave.

“I’ll change my clothes, because I’m hot too, but honestly, I don’t want you to do my hair today. I’m going to pull it back tonight,” she replied.

“Well, if that’s the case, I’m doing it for you. None of that ‘I just got fucked, rolled out of bed, and this is my messy bun’ look, girlfriend. You’re headliners now, and you’re gonna look like muthafuckin’ headliners on my watch,” Leo snapped at her, before grabbing some shit out of his bag to start doing the girls’ makeup. As Carmen’s jaw dropped, Miranda giggled again and smiled at me in the mirror. Her blue eyes had a smoky grey hue to them, as if they changed colors in that moment.

For the next hour, all I really did was watch Miranda quietly, and tried to avoid getting caught blatantly staring. While Leo painted her lips the bright red she so often wore and was known for, I realized I was definitely gawking. As she made a kissing face in the mirror, and pouted her lips, I began to wonder what they tasted like, imagining how it would feel to gently run my tongue along them before pressing my lips to hers. Briefly caught in my own daydream, I swallowed hard, and shifted in my seat, realizing I was getting extremely turned on.

“You alright over there, writer?” Carmen barked at me.

Briefly taken off guard, I replied, “Yeah, of course. Just a bit thirsty.” I stood up, my semi-hard dick relaxing from the jolt back into reality.

“I am too,” Miranda whispered, almost inaudibly, as she turned around and looked at me with puppy dog eyes.

“I’ll be right back, girls… and writer.” Leo stepped out of the room quickly.

“You never got your tea, did you?” I asked her.

Sticking out her lower lip into a pout, she shook her head, and blinked at me several times, reeling me in again.

“When Leo gets back, I’ll go get you some tea,” I replied to her pleading look.

“Sucker!” Carmen exclaimed.

“I don’t mind. Can I get you anything, drummer?” I asked her. If she was going to call me writer, I’d start calling her drummer and see how it played out. She let out a barely audible chuckle, which I considered a win.

“No thanks, I’m good. I’m going to start drinking alcohol soon.” She gave me what I was deeming her signature smirk. “But Miranda here would like some kind of light tea, with some honey, for that throat of hers. Her little puss ‘n boots face can’t tell you that telepathically, and we’re at just about that time where she doesn’t talk again until thirty minutes before show time.”

“Wait, you don’t speak before a show?” I asked, totally surprised.

Shaking her head, she poked Carmen to respond to me.

Letting out an exaggerated sigh, Carmen explained, “So, because of allergies and shit - overuse from yapping, if you ask me - sometimes she gets scratchy, and while it sounds cool in my opinion, apparently it doesn’t feel so good. So, she rests it for about two hours before the show and then warms up her vocal cords about a half hour before show time. It’s a new thing. I think it’s kinda weird, but I also don’t have to listen to her bossy ass for those two glorious hours either, so it’s mostly a win for me.”

Miranda pursed her lips, and flipped her sister the bird. I laughed out loud, turning her attention to me. Miranda furrowed her eyebrows at me sternly.

“Aww I’m sorry, Miranda. I’m not laughing at you, I swear,” .She gave me another pouty look, causing a little flutter in my chest. Stop that, dude. Ignore those lips. Stop looking at those eyes. She’s your client. She’s off limits. Stop thinking she’s so fucking adorable. It wasn’t working.

Feeling like a deer in headlights, I was saved by Leo’s return with two large suitcases. “I’m back! And I brought all the sexiness with me. Oh, and your clothes.” He joked with them, earning big smiles in return.

“Well, that seems like the perfect time for me to take a walk and find some tea,” I moved toward the door. “You sure you don’t need anything else? Anyone?” I looked around the room to the heads all shaking no, and made my way out.

They probably would have kicked me out while they were changing anyway, so it ended up being the perfect time to have another look around. I was fairly confident the three of them would stick together in the dressing room, so I didn’t need to worry about the stalker at the moment, while I got Miranda some tea and made a few calls.

The first call I made was to Mr. Royal. I let him know we’d found another letter waiting for her when we arrived. After telling him I wanted to have my forensic guys take a look at it, he arranged for a courier to meet me during the show while the girls were on stage. This way, I could have it sent discreetly and no one would be the wiser. While roaming the hall, looking for a place to get Miranda her tea, I ran into David, the owner, again.

“Hey there, can I help you with anything, son?” he stopped to ask me.

“Actually, yes. Miranda needs some tea. Where can I get that?”

“Victoria didn’t bring it yet? I can have her come down right away,” he offered, surprised his manager hadn’t helped out.

Not wanting to deal with her again, I said, “No, that’s not necessary. If you just point me in the right direction, I’ll get it myself.”

“Are you the assistant?” he asked me.

“No sir, I’m a journalist, following the Little Queens tour. Documenting, observing, writing, all that stuff. I work for a magazine,” I explained, growing impatient.

“Very nice. Well, we could always use good PR too,” he not-so-subtly replied.

“I’ll keep that in mind. Now, about that tea? She needs it before she goes on.” I brought him back to what I cared about.

“Oh yes, yes. The kitchen is actually on the other side of the building, but there’s a break room for employees that should have tea in it. It’s the third door on the right, down that hallway,” .He pointed for me.

“Great, thanks.” I paused for a moment, thinking of one more thing I wanted to ask. “Hey, by any chance, do you know who sent the flowers to Miranda today?”

“What flowers?” he asked.

“There was a bouquet of flowers in the dressing room with a note to Miranda, but it wasn’t signed. Any idea how it got there, or who it’s from?” I knew it was a long shot, but you always ask the questions.

“Not a clue. Must have been delivered to the ticket office and brought back this morning, I’d imagine. Victoria might have an idea, or one of the girls in the office up there?”

“Thanks, David, you’ve been very helpful.” I shook his hand and took off to get the tea.

If the flowers were delivered to the front office, they probably just came from a delivery service, and the note was likely written by whoever worked at the flower shop. So, the stalker might not even be in St. Louis; it would be easy enough to call in an order like that. Pretty cold trail so far, which was annoying, but it was still early. Mark Royal didn’t hire me to actually solve the crime, or to find the guy; he hired me to protect Miranda. That wasn’t going to stop me from trying to weed this snake out of the grass, into the open where I could catch him. The best protection was not needing it in the first place. Although, they were getting famous enough that they needed regular security detail all the time, in my opinion. Preferably, not undercover.

I also took that opportunity to give myself a good old-fashioned lecture on professionalism. I’d never gotten attached to a client, and deep down, I knew I needed to get my head back in the game. For a fleeting moment, I considered calling in one of my guys to take my place somehow, but the thought of not being around her was worse than fighting my attraction to her. Also, the idea of someone else watching over her made my head swim with pangs of jealousy. Sighing to myself, I attempted to regain the sensibilities I was contending with on this job. The more time I spent with her, the deeper my attraction was, but worse than that, a connection was forming and I really didn’t want to stop it.

Finally getting to the break room, I made her a cup of tea, and grabbed what was probably way more honey than she needed, shoving the packets into my pocket. As I neared the door, I could hear Leo and the girls laughing, although Miranda was visibly trying not to laugh out loud. They really were something else, these sisters. Getting myself back into character quickly, I knocked on the door in case they weren’t decent.

“Come in!” Carmen shouted.

As I casually entered, tea in hand, what I saw in front of me was the sexiest woman I’d ever encountered. Mouth falling open, I was speechless, frozen in my tracks. Not only was Miranda made up for the show with done-up hair and makeup, but she was wearing tight black jeans, accentuating every fucking delicious curve .She had on boots that came up to her knees, and a black tank top that sparkled, even in the harsh lighting of the dressing room, showing off her full, round breasts that were almost spilling out the top. She looked like pure badass rock and roll and sex, but still had the sweet beautiful face I’d been memorizing.

“I’d say we nailed it,” Leo broke the silence, snapping me back into the moment.

“I think the writer likes what he sees,” Carmen laughed. She, too, was done up. Same red lipstick that Miranda wore, with her hair pulled back into a sleek ponytail like she said she wanted, and black leather pants with a simple white tank top. Standing next to each other, you could tell they were sisters, but they were the baddest, hottest sisters I’d ever seen for sure.

“Um, yeah,” I chuckled, trying to recover. I handed Miranda her tea, and she blew me a kiss, followed by a smile of gratitude. “No problem,” I told her.

“You’ve never seen the queens all dolled up yet, have you?” Leo said, with pride in his voice.

“Uh, no. No, I haven’t. Except in pictures, I guess. Seeing you girls in person is… just wow,” It was all I could muster.

“Thanks, writer,” Carmen said, going back to her drumsticks, which she was playing on her lap, her feet up on the vanity. I turned my attention back to Miranda and said quietly, “You look amazing.” I couldn’t stop the words from leaving my mouth, even though I’d tried to just think them to myself.

Looking up at me through those thick lashes, she held her tea closely and mouthed the words, “Thank you.” As I watched her mouth form the words silently, I stared at those lips again, causing my heart to beat against my chest with lust. Balling my hands into fists to stop myself from reaching out to touch her, I knew I couldn’t deny it. I was so fucked.