Moving Forward (Moving Neutral, Book Three) (15 page)

Chapter
Thirty-Five

Sophie knocked on my hotel room door twenty minutes later, followed by two carts of room service that I hadn’t ordered.  When I tried to pay for it, the waiter assured me that it had already been taken care of, so I slipped a tip into his hand and thanked him. 

The plan was for us to get ready at the hotel, and then head over to the club around eleven, to be done with the red carpet before the ball dropped.  Until then, we had a dozen plates of food and two bottles of champagne.

Sophie grinned.  “Who’s good at opening these?”

“Tanner,” I said.  I didn’t want
to wind up with a black eye or a broken nose before the night had even started. 

Tanner grabbed a dishtowel and started to ease the cork off the bottle
—I didn’t know much about good champagne or bad champagne, but the bottle was awfully pretty.  I hoped he didn’t break it.

Before he could even pour
it out, there was another knock on the door, and two girls came in for hair and makeup.

I giggled, sitting in a chair next to Sophie.  “I could get used to this,” I murmured, clinking my
glass with hers.

Sophie smirked at me.  “I think you already have, Case,” she
smiled.

“Everyone always says your lif
e begins in college, but somehow I never expected….” I looked around the room, still a little awestruck that this had suddenly become my life. 

“Look up,” the makeup artist told me, and I obediently focused on the ceiling so she could dab underneath my eyes with some sort of concealer or shadow.

Tanner had disappeared into the bathroom, probably to shower with all my pretty new beauty products — couldn’t really blame him there. 

“So, I heard you were in the studio today,” I said to Sophie, trying to talk to her without turning my head to mess up the makeup artist.  “How’s the new album going?”

“It’s ok,” she said, hesitating a little.  She glanced at Tanner, but he was focused on the champagne bottle and not paying attention.  “I mean, it’s still early.  It’s okay, really, it’s just… it’s not as easy as we thought it’d be.  It’s a really different process this way.”

Something about her response didn’t sound right to me. 
I darted my eyes to look at her, so fast that the makeup artist smudged liner into the wrong part of my eyelid.

“Hang on,” she chastised me, crossing the room to find a q-tip.  “Don’t move,” she called over her shoulder.

Sophie was looking down, her big brown eyes a little sad. 

“
Different how?” I murmured.

“Different as in, there’s no Blake.  No
ne of Blake’s music.  Tanner doesn’t write, so we’re choosing from songs that were written to be hits, not written by us.”  She glanced across the room.  “It’s just… delicate,” she said quietly.  “I thought it would be a lot easier.  Even when something sounds okay, we can’t seem to agree.  I thought we’d be fighting less without Blake, but it’s more… a lot more.”

I looked at her sympathetically.  “
Maybe you just haven’t found the right song yet,” I said.  “Maybe when it comes along, things will just fall into place.”

She gave me a smile that looked a little forced
.  “Yeah,” she said quietly, her eyes glancing up at something behind me.  “That’s probably it.  We’ll know it when we find it.”

I smiled
sheepishly.  “Well, it’s not like you’re lacking guitar skills.”

“Did someone say
—”  Tanner’s voice suddenly emerged from behind me.  I’d thought he was still working on the bottle.  “I thought I just heard…. was it… a compliment?  From Casey Snow?”

I felt the back of my neck turn rosy, spreading to my cheeks. 

“You’re dreaming it, Tanner,” I said, not turning to face him.

“Hey Mel,” Tanner said, gesturing to the makeup artist who was cleaning her brush on a cloth rag.  “I think you might have used a little too much blush on Snow over here.  You’d think she had a crush on someone with those cheeks.”

Tanner knew me too well by now.  He was already out of reach by the time I threw a pillow directly at his head.

Chapter Thirty-Six

After our hair and makeup was done, Sophie got whisked away by a handler to head out to the party.  I checked the clock on my phone — it was already almost ten p.m. 

Tanner and I wouldn’t be arriving for another forty-five minutes.  Apparently, the two of us arriving together
had upped our call time into the A-list zone.  I wished Sophie could have come with us, but both Tanner and Lauren assured me it’d be better PR for her to do it on her own. 

Tanner poured
more champagne into our cups, and I curled my knees up on the couch.  I was wearing a bathrobe, planning to slip on my dress and heels the last second before we left.

I took a sip.  “So, Sophie says
you guys are working on the new album?” I asked, trying to nonchalantly throw it out into the conversation.  I figured I might get more out of him, now that there weren’t hair and makeup people hanging on our every word.

Tanner looked at me suspiciously
.  “Blake put you on recon duty?”

I scowled.  “This is just for me.  You guys are my friends, you know
— well, some of you.”  I thought of April, wondered how she was handling all this.  Since she
had
basically pushed Blake out of the band.

Tanner seemed to relax a little.  “It’s going okay.  There’s so much music out there
to choose from, but most of it’s complete shit.”  I stifled a laugh.  “Or maybe it’s not, you know, but you can’t really tell until you get into the studio and play it a few times.  So we spend all our time learning these new random songs that the label thinks are a ‘good fit’ for us, whatever that means, and most of the time, we get done laying down the track and they’re still complete shit.”

I put my hand on his shoulder
.  “You’ll find the right one.” 

“I mean, I’m sure Blake wrote shitty songs too, but he wrote them for
this band
,” Tanner continued.  “He wasn’t trying to write a song for any band that wanted to buy it, on the hope it’d be a hit.”  He sighed.  “We’ve been working on it for months, and we don’t even have a single.”

He took a deep drink from his glass, and moved closer to me on the couch
, abruptly changing the subject. 

“What about you, Snow?  Decided what you’re going to do yet?”

My lips felt warm and bubbly from the champagne, and I didn’t mind when Tanner slid an arm around my shoulders. 

“
I’m supposed to have some meetings while I’m here,” I said, fidgeting nervously with the sleeve of the bathrobe. 

“What meetings?”

I looked at him curiously.  I’d actually been hoping for some advice, and I was relieved it had come up. 

“
Well, um,” I paused, trying to figure out where to start.  “After that YouTube video came out, Lauren thought I should start thinking about what I was going to do next.  Everyone did, I guess.  Except me.  I just figured that Blake and I would figure it out together.”

I could feel Tanner’s hand freeze when I mentioned Blake,
but I continued.

“But it seems like Blake and I are…” I tried to figure out a way to get the words out.  “Well, Blake is
—” I finally broke my gaze on my bathrobe sleeve and met Tanner’s eyes.  “It’s not going to work, with Blake.”  I let out a deep breath.  “Not right now, not maybe ever.”

Tanner brushed his hand down my back, leaning closer. 
“I know,” he said quietly. 

I looked up
at him.  “What do you mean, you know?”

“Snow, I’ve known since the last time you were in Los Angeles.  You didn’t think I wondered about why you were living in a hotel room
when your boyfriend’s house was ten blocks away?”

I gave him a sheepish smile
.  “I wasn’t sure you were that bright.”

“Ouch,” he pounded a fist into his heart, like I’d broken it.  “Snow, come on.  I know you guys have been off and on, but I was
pretty sure that when you showed up at the airport — well, I figured you’d picked me.”

His words made me catch my breath.  Had I picked Tanner? 
Had I done it without even meaning to?

He looked closer at me, searching.  “
Did you?”

I have no idea
, I should have said. 
I need more time
, maybe. 
I like you, Tanner, I just don’t know if I…

But I didn’t say any of those things.

Leaning forward, I kissed Tanner softly on the lips.

Chapter Thirty- Seven

I felt Tanner’s shoulders grow suddenly tense with surprise, but he didn’t waste a moment. 

H
is arms wrapped around me, pulling me closer.  His lips were soft and warm against mine, tentative at first, like he wasn’t sure whether I was going to pull away.  When I didn’t, he dug one hand into my hair and the other around my waist, pulling me close to him in one fluid motion.

My mind was racing, full
of thoughts that wouldn’t stay still long enough for me to figure them out.  All I could think about was Tanner’s soft lips, his calloused fingers working their way up my arms, gripping my neck with possession and then dragging his lips down to it, his teeth nipping roughly underneath my ear.

“
Tanner,” I whispered softly, amazed that those were the words on my lips.  They should have been,
stop. 

Except.  Did I really want
him to?

Tanner’s fingers worked faster than my mind, running along the edge of my robe
.  He slipped a hand inside without undoing it, rubbing my waist, sliding his fingers up my back. 

I felt my breath go ragged, hardly able to think straight
.

“
You have no idea,” Tanner whispered his voice gravelly with desire.  “I’ve been waiting for this since—”

But before I could find out, the hotel phone rang.

I felt us both freeze, hesitating, wondering whether this was the ice bucket that would ruin the moment.  For a second, I just wanted to ignore it, pull Tanner’s lips back to my neck and keep going.  Part of me wanted to find out just how long he’d been waiting.

But I must have hesitated too long. 
On the third ring, Tanner ripped his blazing eyes away from me and took two wide steps to the phone.  Picking it up like he couldn’t decide whether to throw it against the wall, his voice was poisonous when he answered.  “What?”

A pause.  I pulled the robe back around me and fell back on the couch, my knees shaking so hard I wasn’t sure I could stand.

“Alright,” Tanner’s voice was full of icicles.  “We’ll be right down.”

He set the phone in the receiver and looked at me, his eyes still dark and hungry. 

“The car’s here.  Can we skip it?” He asked, cocking an eyebrow.

I smiled.  No matter what we’d almost done, Tanner was Tanner.  “We’d better go,” I said,
mostly relieved… and a little disappointed at the same time.  “Listen, Tanner—”

He held up a hand.  “Don’t even try to give me a ‘that was a mistake’ talk, Snow.  You owe me a raincheck, got it?”

I thought about disabusing him of that notion, but for some reason, I remembered what my mom said.  “Everything comes full circle,” I smiled at him, slipping into the bathroom to change into my dress.  “There’s always another chance.”

He blinked at me, and then smiled
, his eyes softening.  “Listen to that, Snow.  Maybe you should be a songwriter after all.”

Chapter Thirty-Eight

Things I’d learned during my freshman year in college:

1.  Red carpet interviews are insanely awkward.

2.  A red carpet interview conducted jointly with your guy friend who you’d very nearly hooked up with brings a whole new meaning to the phrase ‘insanely awkward.’

So I was pretty thrilled when there were only four or five cameramen and a handful of girls outside the club we were headed to. 

A girl wearing a neon pink bandage dress, glued to every curve of her body, wobbled outside on six-inch heels to meet our limo, as a doorman immediately pulled open the door on my side. 

Tanner, looking every inch the perfect heartthrob, opened his own door and then walked around the car to help me out.  I was grateful
— in Los Angeles, the streets weren’t snowy or slippery, but the photographers tried as hard as they could to get shots up your skirt.  Keeping your knees together while climbing out of a low-to-the-ground limo took some maneuvering, and it was easier for Tanner to just stand in front of me and block their view.

“Thanks,” I whispered, taking my place
at his side as he put his arm around my waist. 

“There are more photographers inside,” the girl in the hot pink dress told us, drawing us off to the side before the media started snapping photos.  “But they’re all employed by the club.  We own all the images, so if one of them takes a picture that you don’t want to make public, just let me know.”  She handed both of us business cards.  “We’re so excited for you guys to be here, and we want you to have fun.  If there’s anything I can do
—” she looked at Tanner with a sparkle in her eye, “seriously,
anything
— don’t hesitate to ask.”

I shifted awkwardly.  Tanner wasn’t my boyfriend, and I knew Tanner Cole was kind of a hot commodity, but was she seriously hitting on him
right in front of me
?  I glanced up at Tanner to see his reaction.

But Tanner had stuffed the card into his pocke
t, and was grinning down at me.  Only at me. 

“Thanks,” he said, perfectly politely, but giving away nothing.  “Should we do the carpet first?  Is Sophie inside?”

A flicker of disappointment flashed across the girl’s face, but she’d composed herself in a moment.  “Yup,” she said, gesturing for us to follow her.  “We’ve promised 3 minutes each to TMZ, E! News and MTV, does that work?”

I felt my knees lock.  I was about to be interviewed by MTV?

Tanner took a step forward, and then must have realized that I hadn’t moved.  He looked down at me, his expression amused.  “Everything okay, Snow?”

I looked at him, opening my mouth and then closing it again. 

“MTV?” I squeaked.

He let out a loud laugh
.  “Chill out, Snow.  They don’t even talk about music anymore — they probably just want to know who’s your favorite character on Sixteen and Pregnant.”

“
Maci,” I murmured, without even pausing to think, and Tanner burst into laughter again.

“I thought you were supposed to be this little braniac,” he said, teasing.  “Don’t tell me they teach you that at Columbia?”

I giggled.  “No, that one I learned when my overprotective parents gave me an eleven p.m. curfew all senior year.  I learned most of what I know about high school from Sixteen and Pregnant.”

Tanner grinned.  “And yet?”

I sighed.  “Yes, Tanner.  And yet somehow I’m here.”  I paused, smirking a little.  “Ok, good.  I just wanted to make sure they didn’t know about my meeting with your agents on Tuesday.”

Tanner Cole was a hard guy to surprise, but I
saw his eyes widen into saucers.  First shock, then something that could have been pride flashed across his face.  “Ok, Snow,” he said, locking his arm firmly around my waist.  “More on that later.  You better promise.”

I looked up at him innocently, batting my eyes.  “So, two rainchecks, then?”

He groaned, and in one swift movement, covered my mouth with a kiss.  For a second or two, I kissed him back, but the second the camera flashes started to go off, I pulled away, touching my fingers to my lower lip.

“Yes,” he said firmly, gripping my waist possessively.  “Two rainchecks.”