* * *
Just before I’m about to leave for the day, my Mac pings with an alert that I’ve received an email from the agent of the pop princess looking to go country whom I’ve been in the early contract stages with. She’s decided to pull out over “a difference of visions,” but attached to the email is an article from some industry insider magazine reporting on Lorelai’s “disastrous” （their words, not mine） apology tour that wasn’t.
I skim through the article, out of morbid curiosity, but it’s the same old shit-for-brains nonsense as all the others. I read the email again, gauging my response. Honestly, I’m not surprised, nor am I really that upset. I mean, I don’t want to lose business, especially only a few years in, but I get it. If she was trying to make the transition to pop, it might be different, but if she’s trying to get on the good side of the industry and worm her way in, aligning with On the Floor Records is probably not the way to do it.
“Knock knock!”
I look up and see Lorelai in a tiny flowy skirt, a denim jacket, and her cowboy boots. “Hey, gorgeous … er, friend.”
She raises an eyebrow, amused. “You okay?”
I close the lid of my laptop with a slap and get to my feet, stretching. “Yeah. Long day, but I’m much better now,” I assure her. “Let me just grab my helmet. Did you walk?”
Lorelai holds up her helmet that I somehow missed. “Yeah. I didn’t get my run in this morning, so I took a meandering stroll.”
“Hey, boss, did you see that email from Star Olympia’s agent? Can’t say I’m shocked they backed out, but that commission would have been—” Arlo’s voice echoes through the hallway until he leans around the doorjamb. “Oh. Hey, Lorelai! I didn’t realize you were here.”
“I let myself in. You looked busy. What’s this about Star Olympia?”
I wave a hand, purposely casual while throwing Arlo a meaningful look. He takes my cue and blows a loud raspberry. “Eh. Nothing. She was maybe considering recording a country album with us, but honestly, it was barely a thing. You know pop stars. Flighty as fuck. Good riddance if you ask me. Who wants ’em or their money. Not us!”
Okay, so he might have laid it on a little too thick. I throw him an exasperated glare before Lorelai turns to me, looking worried. “She backed out?”
“No. She never had a contract. We met once to consult.” After which she was ready to sign the papers and hand us total control, but I figure that part’s best kept to myself. I grab my helmet and start to shuffle everyone toward the door. The sooner we get to my bike, the sooner it will be too loud for Lorelai to ask me any more probing questions.
“It was because of me, wasn’t it?”
“No, darlin’。 It was because of me.”
“Huck. It’s because you’re working with me.”
“Can you lock up behind us, Arlo?”
“For sure. Have fun, you two!”
We make it out the door and around the back of the building, where I’d parked my bike in the shade earlier this morning. I straddle the bike and look expectantly over my shoulder at Lorelai. “I don’t have a sidecar, Jones. You’re gonna have to hop on and hold tight.”
She presses her lips together and I know she wants to ask me more questions but there’s no point. I’m more stubborn than she is. Eventually she relents, pulling her helmet on and getting on behind me. She wraps her arms around my waist extra tight and we get out of town.
* * *
One of the perks of not dating, I suppose, is that no one feels the need to wait for romance and flowers and soft music to get naked. No arbitrary third-date deadline to keep things proper. Just sex. When you stop by her place to drop off work and she’s dressed for a run and you suddenly realize you have a previously unexplored interest in the slippery thin material of athletic wear, sex. When you’re pulling together an album at work, and she comments on the convenient height of your desk and how hot you look in reading glasses, sex. When you watch the video of her telling off the douchey radio deejay for the fifteenth time and need her to know how amazing she is, sex. When she sends a quick “hopping in the shower” text followed by “left my front door unlocked better hurry before someone kidnaps me,” shower sex.
And when you’re cruising on your motorcycle, her and your stomachs full of Nashville hot chicken and the “best slaw this side of the Smokies,” and your friend eagerly sticks her hand down your pants, practically causing you to crash said motorcycle into a tree before you safely park down a deserted dirt road, pull her onto your lap, roll on a conveniently packed condom, tug her panties to the side and plunge so deep inside of her that you’re pretty sure you’ll never stop seeing stars … well, motorcycle sex.
I’ll be honest, sitting here, still mostly dressed, clutching my beautiful, sexy, wrung-out friend against me, slowly smoothing my hands up and down her muscular thighs （because of course she really did wear her shortest skirt on our non-date） and listening to the sound of our heartbeats making a thudding return back to normal … I can’t say I’m not enjoying this. Immensely.
And in these moments, when we’re connected in this way—as close as two people can possibly be—it’s almost enough. She’s with me and I’m with her. That’s all that should matter. Anything else is over the top.
But then I press a kiss to the space where her long neck and shoulder touch and we reluctantly pull apart. The connection is broken and that’s all it was: a meeting of bodies. A temporary link. Shared air, and now that we’re apart and she’s adjusted her straps and I’ve zipped up my pants, the air is only air.
25
CRAIG
YOU AND TEQUILA
Thirty minutes later, the sun is starting to slip in the sky when I pull up to our place and cut the engine. Lorelai unfolds herself from the back of the bike and turns to where I haven’t moved yet. I tug off my helmet and hold it in front of me but stay on the bike.
“Nightcap?” She bites her lip.
“I better not.”
Lorelai’s eye flash with obvious hurt and I bite my tongue from saying what I really want, which is “I brought my toothbrush, how about you just give me a drawer?”
“Yeah. You’re right,” she says instead. “If anyone saw…”
“Christ, Lore. You know I don’t care about that.”
“You should,” she insists hotly. “I’m poison. Drake’s a—”
“Fucking idiot,” I snap, exasperated. “Don’t you finish that thought.”
She ignores the warning in my tone and shifts her weight, looking like she’s itching for a fight, which is crazy. Lorelai and I never fight.
“You’re the idiot. It’s like you don’t even care about your business, attaching yourself to me. I’m poison in this town, and you know it.”
What is happening?
I get off the bike and reach for her arm, tugging her to her steps and holding out my hand for the key. She narrows her eyes at me and slaps them in my palm.
Once I unlock the door, I lead her inside and shut it behind us. “What are you even talking about?”