Revelry (Taint #1) (15 page)

I shake my head. “What did he give you?”

“I’m sorry. I don’t know what you’re talking about,” she says apologetically. I feel kind of bad, because she genuinely seems like a nice person, but I’m not budging.

“Cooper Ryan, what did he give you?”

“I’m afraid I don’t—”

“I’m not moving until you tell me.”

She crouches down and whispers, “Please don’t say anything. My boyfriend is a huge fan. He promised us backstage passes to their next show.”

“He’s pretty desperate right about now, huh?”

“He’s a little unnerved, yes.”

“Lady, you so could have pushed him for more. I bet he’d be willing to barter just about anything for a distraction right now.”

“I don’t want to take advantage,” she says.

“He’s a rock star—if it’s one thing he knows how to do its take advantage, and Cooper Ryan practically invented that game. Write down your address and give it to me before we disembark,” I tell her. “I’ll see that he sends you more than backstage passes.”

“If you’ll just follow me, please?” She smiles sweetly, and I gather all my stuff together and do as she asks. When we reach Cooper he’s sitting with his head buried between his knees.

I feel a stab of remorse through my stomach when I see him there trembling, his dark curls wet with sweat. “Coop.”

“Oh thank fuck.” He sighs. The relief on his face is tangible. He grabs hold of my hand and squeezes hard. “You came.”

“I’m here.” I smile awkwardly at him.
Yeesh. You’d think someone was dying
. “You wanna move over, or am I just gonna stand for the rest of the trip?”

“I can’t go near the window,” he states. I glance at the window; the shutter is tightly drawn. It’s pitch black outside and all of the seats around us are shrouded in darkness. He gets to his feet and allows me to squeeze into the seats. Once I’m settled, he sits down and pushes back the armrest between us, and then he practically crawls into my lap.

“Oh, okay, hi,” I say as he rests his head on my shoulder. The sweat from his hair immediately soaks my T-shirt and his forehead practically burns my neck. “You’re kind of burning up. Why the hell are you wearing a coat?”

“In case we crash.”

“We’re not going to crash,” I say and push his head off of my shoulder. I attempt to remove his coat, but Cooper has other ideas. He clasps the lapels tightly in his white-knuckled grip.

“No, I need it.”

“If you hate flying this much, why do you do it?”

“Because it’s kind of hard to have a world tour without crossing the ocean in a big-arse metal box.” He winces and swallows hard. “Christ. I need a drink.”

“Coop, let go of the jacket. You’re sweating. You’re going to pass out.”

“That’s kinda the plan,” he says, and his knee is bouncing like crazy.

“Okay, if we’re going to make you pass out, we’re going to do it the right way.” I push the call button for the flight attendant. The same awestruck woman that dragged me into business class comes to tend to us.

“We need booze. A lot of booze.” She twists her perfectly painted red pout into a grimace and I say, “Please? He’s really freaking out. I’m sure he’d be happy to send your boyfriend a signed guitar.”

Cooper scowls at me and I give him an “it’s your funeral” glare. He glances up at the woman and says, “Whatever you want, it’s yours.”

“I don’t want to impose—”

“I’ll make sure he sends something nice,” I assure her. “Now, the alcohol, please?”

“Any preferences?”

“The strongest thing you have.”

She nods and scurries away, returning to us a minute later with four empty plastic cups and eight tiny bottles of Vodka. I pick up one, unscrew the cap and hand it to him, deciding that he can keep his jacket for a little longer, but as soon as he’s wasted that thing has to go. It seems a shame to cover up such nice arms. He downs one bottle after the other until he’s consumed four of the drinks. I take one for myself, because damn it, after the sleepless night I had at Zed’s and on the first few hours of our journey, I need a good hard drink … among other things.

After he’s tossed back another he fiddles with the air con above our heads, and whispers, “Is it hot in here?”

“It’s because you have on that jacket. Take it off and I won’t need to freeze to death under this air con.”

“I don’t wanna.”

“Take off the fucking jacket, Coop.”

“You could do it.”

“Fine, come here. I’ll take it off for you.”

I grab the lapels of his jacket and slowly peel one side off his shoulder, and then I peel off the other side and push the sleeves down his arms. I can’t help tracing my fingers over his hot flesh as I remove the jacket and fold it, placing it on the seat beside him. His eyes track my every movement, and his breathing disturbs the few strands of my hair that are hanging down from my messy top knot as it washes over me.

He licks his lips, his eyes trained solely on my mouth now. I’m like a zookeeper in a lion’s cage, wanting to back away, but not daring to make a move in case he lunges.

“Coop,” I whisper. “Have another drink.”

“Yeah, okay,” he says, but he doesn’t move to take one of the bottles, he just buries his head in his hands and rocks back and forth. I glance across the aisle. Deb, Leif and Ash are all asleep, but Zed’s watching us with a huge goofy grin on his face. He gives me a thumbs up and I roll my eyes, turning my attention back to Coop.

I touch his shoulder and he turns his head towards me, but he doesn’t sit up. “Hey, you’re going to drink this, and then you’re going to tell me something that you’d normally be too afraid to tell someone.”

“Like what?” he asks, sucking back the last drop in the bottle and slapping his fist against his broad chest.

“I don’t know.” I shrug. “Surprise me.”

“I want to take you in the bathroom and fuck the shit out of you until we touch down.”

“Okay,” I exhale in a loud rush. “How about something less in your face.”

He slowly sits up and reaches for another bottle of booze. “I knew I couldn’t keep my ex. I knew the second we left town for the city that she’d go running back to him. I knew she wasn’t in love with me, and that it would more than likely make her miserable, and yet I dragged her away from everything she knew because I wanted her, and I wanted my baby.”

“Wow. That’s … um … definitely more than one thing.”

“It’s the same reason I insisted you come on tour, because I wanted you.” He stares at me with glassy, bloodshot eyes. “Because I’m that fucking selfish that I put my happiness before others’.”

“Also, more than one thing,” I mutter, cursing Mr Absolut and our eager-to-please flight attendant.
Why did she have to bring so many bottles of vodka?
“Hey, why don’t we move onto something else, like um … we could play eye spy?”

Cooper starts picking at the label of the vodka bottle in his hand. Does that whole sexual frustration thing apply to teeny tiny bottles of liquor too? If so, then he has a massive itch to be scratched, judging by the way he’s twisting and peeling that thing.

“I stand on stage in front of thousands of people, and I don’t enjoy a second of it,” he says.

I frown in confusion. “What are you talking about?”

“I’m convinced they’re all going to see straight through me, right to the selfish bastard on the inside.” He leans back against the headrest, staring up at the ceiling. “The one who ruins lives.”

“You don’t ruin lives, Coop.”

“I ruined yours, didn’t I?”

I take a deep breath. “I’m on a plane right now crossing the Pacific Ocean. I’m drinking with the world’s hottest rock star, and if that article I just read in economy was anything to go off the man soon to be crowned Society magazine’s Sexiest Man Alive. I get to tour with Taint and see firsthand how that works. I wouldn’t say that my life is ruined.”

His brows knit together and he glowers at me. “But you made a big deal about how much you hated me for ruining your life.”

I roll my eyes. “Yeah well, sometimes I talk too much, and I say shit I don’t mean.”

“I like talking to you. My head feels clearer.”

“Good. Then you can quit hogging all the booze. Between you and Zed, I’ve had no sleep in the last forty-eight hours.”

“You wanna sleep?” A smile twitches the corner of his lips.

“You think you can sleep?”

He looks around the plane and then he whispers, “Can we sleep together?”

“I told you I’m not having sex with you.”

“No I mean,
sleep
sleep? Like we did at Zed’s.”

“Okay, I don’t really know how we’re going to do that on a plane, but should you—”

“I’ll just …” Coop says, and he snuggles into my side.

“Yeah, okay,” I mutter, feeling really uncomfortable wedged between the window and Coop’s shoulder.
Because this isn’t awkward at all
. Before long though, I start to drift off, surrounded by his warmth and his peppery sandalwood scent.

When I wake I’m lying across two of the three seats, my legs are tucked up beneath me and I’m face down in his lap, and—surprise, surprise—I’m drooling again. What’s even more unexpected than me waking up with my head buried in his lap is that Coop is hard.
Everywhere
. I don’t know how we wound up in this situation again, but it has got to stop.

“Sorry,” I say, and I attempt to sit up but he shoves at my shoulders until I’m back in his lap again. “Ow. What the hell, Ryan?”

“Can you just … stay there?”

“You want me to keep my head buried in your lap?”

“This is the most calm I’ve felt since we boarded.”

“Yeah, because he thinks he’s seconds away from getting his dick sucked,” Levi says, as he pops his head up over the back of the seat. He wipes the sleep from his eyes and yawns. “Thank fuck you came along, Red, or we’d have never gotten any sleep. Jesus, Ryan, next time pop a couple Valium before we hop a flight and save all of the other passengers the head-fuck.”

“Shut up, Levi,” I say, feeling oddly protective. I sit up, because I can’t carry out a conversation when my mouth is this close to his penis. “How are you feeling? Did you sleep at all?”

Cooper nods and closes his eyes. “Yeah.”

“Well that’s good, right?”

“Yeah.”

I look at the cabin around us. The overhead lights are on again and the hostesses are preparing meals. Most people are awake. Deb, Leif, Zed and Ash sit across the aisle from us, all crammed into the same row of seats. Zed’s head is on Deb’s shoulder, even though her body is angled away from him and her silk eye mask is pulled down over half her face.

I frown and look at Cooper. “Why didn’t you ask Deb to come sit with you?”

“It’s best not to disturb Deb when she’s flying.”

“She’s your sister. I’m sure if she knew you were hurting she’d come sit with you.”

He laughs. “You don’t know my sister.”

The hostesses bring us meals shortly after and when the rubbish is taken away, Cooper stretches and lays his head on my lap. “Oh okay, we’re doing that?”

“That okay?” he asks staring up at me with a hopeful expression. I have this insane desire to run my fingers through his curls.

“Yeah, I mean I just woke up with my face in your lap, so I guess it’s only fair that you return the favour.” Only I don’t think I’ve ever been this self-conscious in my entire life. We’ve been sitting on the same cramped plane for several hours now without a change of panties and I’m pretty sure my crotch isn’t smelling potpourri perfect. Coop doesn’t seem to mind though, because he nuzzles his head into my lap. I’m pretty sure he’s deliberately trying to mess with me.

“Hey can you maybe stop trying to burrow into my sacred space? I mean you could at least wait for an invitation.”

“Am I likely to be getting an invitation?”

“No.”

He laughs. “Then why wait for it when I have this opportunity right here in front of me?”

I roll my eyes, but when I glance down at him I find he’s really not kidding. His eyes are blazing with heat and that heat about sears the flesh from my bones. Seriously, the fires of Mordor have nothing on this guy’s gaze.

“Cooper …” I begin.

He sighs, and I swear I can feel his breath on my flesh even through my yoga pants. My hands automatically fly to his hair and tug through the soft black curls before I can even really register what I’m doing and my cheeks flood with heat.
This is bad. This is really, really bad
. He closes his eyes and presses his nose to my body, inhaling deeply and I could die, both from desire and mortification.

I pull my hand free from his hair and squirm in my seat, thinking I may have to take a trip to the bathroom in a minute to relieve some of the tension. Cooper sits up, pulling my blanket out of my bag and spreading it over us. I have this insane urge to tell him not to touch it, that it’s my own, my precious, but I don’t … because that would be weird. He leans his head on my shoulder, and then he completely surprises me by placing his right hand on my upper thigh, beneath the blanket. I jerk with the touch and he silences me with a hushed
shh
in my ear.