Moses
Another drink in, Michaela was plotting our escape. “We have to ditch Craig.” That was the extent of her plotting, but she had me convinced.
She came up with this brilliant plan, which again, wasn’t much of a plan. She distracted Mac while I got my ass out of the bar and into the Uber I’d ordered. Somehow, it worked, and a minute later, Michaela came running out the door and launched herself into the car.
“Go, go, go!” she cried, laughing and falling over in my lap.
The driver listened, and I turned around just in time to see Mac spilling out on the sidewalk, arms over his head.
The second part of Michaela’s brilliant plan was to watch the Bellagio fountains, which was where we were now, waiting for them to go off. We were next to each other, leaning against the stone railing surrounding the massive, man-made lake in front of the Bellagio hotel.
It was near midnight, but on the Vegas strip, it could’ve been the middle of the day. Ambient lighting cast a glow on Michaela’s rich, copper-brown skin.
Holy hell, was this woman pretty. Gorgeous. Fucking exquisite.
I’d had something of a minor crush on her when she worked our tour a couple years ago, but that wasn’t new. To paraphrase Big Pun, rap genius,I’m not a player, I just crush a lot. And yeah, maybe I was something of a player too. I’d leaned hard into the stereotypical rock star lifestyle. I knew I was a walking cliché, but I didn’t mind it…at least not until I had this gorgeous woman sitting in front of me, laughing at what a fucking cliché I was.
“Tell me one real thing.” She turned to face me, leaning her elbow against the stone.
I’d pressed my thumb against her lips earlier, emboldened by a completely unearned shot of bravery. But damn. Just damn. Her lips were full and dark, and the bottom one had the sexiest indent right in the middle.
“I like your lips.”
She sagged against the railing. “I believe you. I also believe you’d say that to just about anyone. Try again.”
She was right. I would. The thing was, I meant it with her. Her lips…hell, her whole mouth, kept distracting me. It was the first thing that came to my mind.
“Okay.” I sighed, pulling the brim of my hat down lower. “I’m worried I don’t know how to be anyone other than Mo, Lead Singer of Unrequited, you know?”
She nodded, her knee brushing against mine as she shifted again. “Your job has become your identity. Yeah, I know something about that.”
“Why? Why is your job your identity?” I asked.
She looked away, toward the sidewalk filled with tourists. Mac was probably having a heart attack, but I’d never felt more anonymous than I did in that moment. Surrounded by people who were too busy looking at the massive hotels to study my face under the low bill of my hat.
“Maybe I don’t know how to be anything other than Michaela Ashwood, Tour Manager.” She took out her phone, opening her Instagram app. “I’ve built an entire brand around that identity.”
Her Instagram page had over a hundred and fifty thousand followers. Holy shit.
“You’re insta-famous?” I scrolled through her pictures, which were all of her on tour. Backstage shots with musicians. Holding guitars. Riding buses. Pictures of Michaela in front of famous sites all over the world. Nothing personal—all work. The captions were short, simple, detailing where she was, who she was with, the music she’d heard lately.
“I made a page a few years ago so my family could follow my travels, and it blew up. It’s a monster I think about beheading every damn day.”
“Do you...want a picture with me?” I braced myself for her answer.
“No. This night is personal. I wouldn’t share it.”
Thank Christ. I had enough people wanting pictures with me, wanting to tell their friends they knew me/had screwed me/touched me one time. I was really fucking relieved Michaela wasn’t one of those people.
“Why don’t you stop it if you hate it?” I asked.
“It’s part of my identity now. And I don’t hate everything about it. The interaction with my followers is generally fantastic. And maybe the praise and compliments fill an empty little piece of me. That’s terrible, right? So shallow and vain.”
“Hey.” I looped one of her curls around my index finger, giving it a little tug. “You’re asking the guy who basks in the applause of thousands of people night after night. Everyone loves praise. Some of us just have bigger praise buckets that need a whole lot of filling to make us content.”
She sucked in a breath, her bottom lip between her teeth. “That was a lot of truth.”
Dropping her curl, I skimmed my knuckles along her cheek. “Being around you tonight is making me content.”