“And you’re getting defensive,” he quips back. “Why is that?”
“I’m not a music fanatic.” I shrug. “We just march to the beat of different drums, pun fully intended.”
“No, no, Natalie, no,” he shakes his head profusely. “Not with music, never with music. It’s where we discover common ground.”
He stares at me for a few long seconds, turns off the news, reconnects to Bluetooth, and flips through the playlist on his cell.
“Eyes on the road, Crowne. I don’t feel like playing airbag roulette today.”
He ignores me and shifts his attention between the road and his phone. “Don’t you jam when you’re out with your girlfriends?”
“One girlfriend and one boyfriend, they’re my best friends. Damon’s my dad’s best friend, Marcus’s son. We’re like brother and sister.”
Shut the hell up, Natalie!
“And then there’s Holly. She’s the daughter of one of my mother’s closest friends. She’s a year younger than me, but we all grew up together. Anyway, I guess we jam out occasionally, but I never fight for control of the radio.”
“What do you listen to when you work out?”
“News radio mostly…stop looking at me like I’m an alien,” I mutter, only to get another slight lift of his lips.
“Got it,” he says confidently, referring to a choice from his playlist. “We’ll start here.”
“What?” I laugh at his animated expression as he cranks the volume up and kicks back in his seat. A second later, what seems like the middle of an old news bulletin sounds through the speakers—‘and during the few moments that we have left, we want to talk right down to earth in a language that everybody here can easily understand.’
Easton lifts a mocking brow at me, and I roll my eyes in response just before a jarring guitar riff blares through the speakers making me jump.
Easton immediately dips his chin, his head bobbing perfectly to the heavy beat that follows. It’s fucking sexy as hell, so natural. He holds me captive for a few minutes as I listen attentively. When his eyes dart my way, I avert them to the title—“Cult of Personality” by Living Colour. Adding it to the list of songs Easton’s played during our time together, I allow myself to sink into it. In minutes, I’m immersed in the powerful lyrics, the attitude of the song ringing in unison with Easton’s thoughts about the power of media and his personal beliefs.
I glance over to find he’s full-on smirking and know he was waiting for me to grasp the point of it.
Touché, Crowne.
As Easton continues to rock out at an ear-bleeding level, I can’t help but glance around self-consciously as we pull to a busy stoplight. Easton ignores the odd looks coming in our direction from the idling cars beside us and turns it up louder in response, which has me bursting out in nervous laughter. Grinning, I start to mimic his movements, which earns me another half-smile.
It’s when he pulls up through the drive-through of the hotel—the song still blaring out of our open windows—that my face flushes.
“Easton!” I exclaim with wide eyes as the music echoes through the wind tunnel of the entrance and into the hotel lobby. He continues to tap on the steering wheel, his fingers ticking off in perfect time with the drums, no fucks at all to give. Reddening by the second, I glance out the window to see an older couple exiting the hotel. Instantly, I reach for the volume, and Easton bats my hand away. Hand stinging and tempted to flee, I look back to the couple just as the older man animates and starts bobbing his head, giving Easton a thumbs up.
More hysterical laughter bursts out of me as I track the couple in the passenger’s side view mirror as the man continues to jam-walk until they disappear from sight. Shaking my head ironically but still smiling from ear to ear, I turn back to see Easton carefully scanning my profile.
“Well played,” I clap my hands sarcastically as the song comes to an end. “I got your point, but did you have to bang me over the head with it with such a heavy hammer?” I exaggerate my eyeroll upward. “But that’s you…isn’t it?”
My smile begins to slip as his gaze burns me from face to boot and back up. Swept up in his sudden intensity, I unbuckle my seatbelt as I try to compose appropriate parting words. He beats me to it with a rough whisper. “You just fucking fell out of the sky, didn’t you?”
The cabin of the SUV clouds with energy as a surreal gravity threatens to draw us closer.