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  I felt panic bloom in my chest as I thought about that. I didn't know Chase at all. I didn't know where he'd grown up, if he'd been ever married or engaged before, if his parents were alive or if he had siblings or if he liked vegetables.

  What am I doing here? I shouldn't have come. This was stupid. I should have stayed in Detroit with—

  I cut my train of thought off ruthlessly. I wouldn't, couldn't think about him while I was with Chase. That was too close to a whole mess of emotions I didn't want to think about.

  "Anna?" Chase's voice cut through my tangle of thoughts.

  "Hmm?"

  "I asked if you'd ever been backstage before."

  "You did?" I shook my head and tried to clear the thoughts away. "Sorry. I'm just...sorry. No, I haven't."

  Chase frowned, then waved a hand in dismissal. "Anyway. I got a text while you were sleeping. Our agent booked us to play a club in Harlem tomorrow, opening for a local band. It's a great opportunity for the band, and I figured you could watch from backstage. It'll be fun."

  "Sure, sounds great."

  We finished eating in silence, and finally Chase set his fork down with a clatter. "You seem distracted."

  "Sorry, Chase. Just...I was dealing with some drama back home when I got your letter."

  "Anything you want to talk about?"

  "No, not really," I said.

  "Okay, well, I'm here if you do."

  Throughout dessert—paper-thin crepes filled with handmade apricot preserves, dusted with powdered sugar—I learned Chase had an older brother in accounting, in Connecticut, and a younger sister studying law at Duke, parents both passed on, no grandparents, no uncles, no cousins. He'd been engaged once, three years ago, but it had ended due to her being a cheating skank.

  I in turn told him about my sordid past, or some of it. I mentioned my mostly-normal mom, including her predilection for popping Oxy like Tic Tacs, and I mentioned my brother, who'd joined the Marines out of high school and never came back. I also didn't mention my dad, who'd been quick with the Jack Daniels and quicker with his fists. I didn't mention the guy with the knife in the alley, my first time DJing, when I was eighteen, before I met Jeff.

  I suspected there were things he hadn't mentioned, and I didn't push.

  I don't have to tell Jeff any of this, because he already knows. The thought was errant and unwelcome.

  We left the restaurant and strolled down the street, Chase looking sexier than he had any right to in a different pair of leather pants, these faded, beaten gray, with a white button down and a plain black tie loosely knotted around an open collar.

  "How many pairs of leather pants do you have, exactly?" I asked.

  Chase laughed. "Too many. They're my thing, you might say."

  "Do you ever not wear leather pants?"

  "Not if I can help it. They're suitable for all occasions. You can even wear them to weddings, if you pair them right."

  I had to admit he did look sinfully sexy in leather pants, which reminded me of my nickname for him when I'd first met him: Mr. Sexypants.

  Another errant thought flew through my head, a reminder how long ago it seemed that I'd met Chase and had that night in his bed. The weeks with Jeff had seemed endless, longer than they really had been. A lifetime, almost.

  Why do I keep thinking about Jeff? I'm with Chase.

  I shook my head and threaded my arm around Chase's. "So, Mr. Sexypants. What's next?"

  "Mr. Sexypants?" Chase quirked a corner of his lip up in an amused smile.

  "That's the nickname I gave you the night we met."

  "I can dig it." Chase tangled our fingers together. "Well, we can go have some drinks, or we can go back to my place and fuck like bunnies."

  "Sounds good," I said.

  "Which?"

  "Both. Well, first the one, then the other."

  Chase nodded, and we hailed a cab, ending up at a crowded bar stuffed with cheering sports fans and half-naked women. I felt overdressed in my miniskirt and halter top. I mean, seriously, most of the women I saw were wearing almost nothing, booty shorts halfway up their asses and a bra, if that. Chase's eyes wandered, as men's eyes will, but he soon turned his attention back to me. We drank vodka and cranberry juice and tried to talk over the noise. We were crushed into a back corner, standing up. I was up against the wall, Chase pressed into me, and we soon abandoned all pretense of conversation.

  He focused on my neck for awhile, his lips cold from his drink, his breath hot, and every kiss he planted in his slow descent to my breasts made my nipples stand higher and harder with desire. I couldn't help noticing we weren't the only couple thus occupied, as most of the dark corners were taken by couples in similar positions. A few seemed to be actually going at it, the girls on their date's laps.

  His mouth finally found the edge of my shirt and could go no farther down, not without pulling my breast free, and hell no to that. Not in public. I didn't care how dark the corner was.

  The problem was, I wanted it. He'd found my erect nipple even through the shirt and bra, scratching at it with a fingernail till it stood harder, and yes, his other hand slid up my skirt and stroked my damp panties. He was hard, his bulge against my belly, and I could almost but not quite make myself reach into his pants. No one was paying attention to anyone else, and any noises we might have made would have been swallowed by the too-loud music, the blare of the TVs, and the cheering, laughing, screaming, chattering buzz of the bar patrons.

  My blood was racing, my heart hammering. He'd worked one finger around my panties, and I was lifting up on my toes as he worked it in slow circles.

  Do it, Anna. No one's watching.

  I dug my hand into his pants and touched him, felt sticky wetness smear my palm as I stroked him. He groaned against my chest, a sound felt in my bones rather heard. I pulled his face up to mine and kissed him, heat blossoming in my belly as his tongue explored my lips.

  A door opened not far away and a couple snuck out, hand in hand, sated grins on their faces. I tugged Chase to the door I'd seen the other couple leave, discovered it to be a bathroom, of sorts. It clearly catered to this purpose, with a chaise lounge in one corner.

  Chase grinned at me, then pushed me toward the lounge. I moved to lay back on it, but Chase had other ideas. He gripped my hips and turned me facing away from him. I knew what he wanted, and I went along with it. Shimmying my panties off and stuffing them in my purse, I knelt on the lounge chair on my hands and knees. Chase grinned and licked his lips, then pushed my skirt up over my hips.

  He caressed my ass with a gentle hand, then smacked me, hard enough to make me shriek in surprise. More smooth circles on my ass cheek, then a smack. This time, he speared two fingers into my wet folds at the same moment he smacked me, and I had to grip the arm of the lounge with one hand.

  The bathroom door didn't have a lock. I realized this as Chase straddled the lounge chair standing up, positioning himself behind me. Anyone could walk in and see me getting railed from behind. It shouldn't have made me wetter, but it did.

  A zipping sound, and then his fingers were replaced by his erection, and I bowed my back upward as he thrust into me. His hands gripped my hips and jerked me into him. He wasn't gentle, and I liked it. Oh god, did I like it. He pounded into me, one hand on my hip, the other fingering my clit as he plunged. I didn't bother trying to muffle my moans as he drove into me, harder with each thrust, flesh slapping.

  "God, you're so tight," Chase groaned. "I love fucking you like this."

  "In...a public...bathroom?" I had to gasp the words past the grunt that escaped me at each thrust.

  "It's hot, but no. I meant from behind."

  I heard the door unlatch, and then a surprised male voice: "Whoa. Nice."

  "Fuck off," Chase growled, and the door closed again.

  I should have been mortified, but wasn't. I should have been, but I realized I'd had more than a few vodka cranberries, and the shame was a low burn in the back of my head that I knew I'd feel l
ater. But now, oh god, now I didn't care, not with climax so close, not with Chase slamming into me, and his finger working my clit as he thrust, adding an edge to the fire exploding through me, and the knowledge that someone else had seen me like this only fueled the fire, added a frenzy to it, and now I was falling over the edge.

  "Give it to me," I groaned, "yes, give it to me."

  "Say my name," Chase said. "Say my name."

  "Chase, Chase." I breathed it.

  Then he pushed a finger onto my asshole, not pushing in un-lubricated, thankfully, just circling, and I screamed into the arm of the lounge, my head thumping against the fabric as he pistoned his hips into me.

  He came, then, slowing his thrusts but driving deeper than ever and his fingers dug into my skin and he froze with his hips to my ass, deep and spurting seed through me.

  "God, Anna. You make me come so hard." He spoke slumped over me, breathing in stuttering gasps.

  We cleaned up and left the bathroom, getting looks from more than one person, telling me we'd been heard as well as seen.

  "Let's get out of here," I said to Chase.

  Even my heady buzz couldn't cool the flaming of my cheeks.

  "You don't want another drink?"

  I stalked towards the door, trying to get away from the amused eyes I felt on me. "No. Not here at least."

  "Honey, it's fine—"

  Honey? I wondered where that endearment had come from.

  "I want to go," I cut in.

  "Okay then."

  We left and walked back to Chase's place in silence. I wasn't sure what I was feeling, and I didn't know how to express it.

  "Anna, look, I—"

  "I'm not mad. I've just never done anything like that before. They knew. They heard us."

  "It wouldn't be the first time people have gotten carried away in that bathroom, I'd wager."

  I gave him a cross look. "Well it's the first time for me, and I don't know how to feel about it."

  Chase pulled me to a stop at the bottom of his steps and held my arms. "Did you enjoy it?"

  "Yeah. It was great. But—"

  "Do you know any of them?"

  "No, but—"

  Chase stepped closer, and I could feel the heat radiating off him, his dark eyes burning into mine, intense and piercing. "Look. I've never been there before, and neither have you. We didn't know anyone there, and we never will. Who cares if they heard us? Who cares if someone saw us? They were probably just jealous it wasn't them getting hot and heavy in the bathroom."

  "You've never been there before?" I was softening, and I realized I had been mad at him.

  "No," Chase said. "I've heard about from a few different people, but I've never been there. I didn't even know about the bathroom. That was you."

  "I saw a couple come out, and they'd obviously just boned in there, so I figured..."

  "It was hot. I've never had sex quite so publicly before. It was kind of..."

  "Exhilarating," I filled in.

  We grinned at each other, and then we started laughing.

  "Whoa. Nice." Chase said, mimicking the gravelly voice of the guy who'd walked in on us.

  "He was talking about me," I said.

  "Not arguing there," Chase said, smirking. "Come on, let's go in. I have some Red Stripe."

  A few more beers and I found myself in Chase's bed, pinned down by his weight and his hands on my wrists as he slowly and thoroughly plundered me. As I did every time, I came hard, and more than once, before Chase finally fell asleep.

  I laid awake for another hour or so, trying to sort through the jumble of emotions the day had engendered. 'Trying' is the operative word, though. It was too tangled to figure out at three in the morning, half-drunk, and sexually exhausted.

  * * *

  We spent the next day on a tour of New York. Chase took me on the subway, in cabs and on foot, showed me the big tourists spots and then a few of the more underbelly sort of places. We had dinner at another tiny, out-of-the-way restaurant, and then it was time to get to the club where Six Feet Tall would perform. I helped set up, watched them warm up, and then the club started to fill up and Chase showed me a spot backstage.

  Backstage turned out to be a busy place, bustling with techies, assistants, band members, and a host of other people whose functions I couldn't have even guessed at. Chase was in his element, wearing the sexiest pair of leather pants yet, ripped and tattered and weathered, knee-high boots with buckles and spikes and straps, and nothing else. His marvelous body was bare from the waist up, chiseled and cut, and even larger than ever, if that was possible. He'd rubbed oil into his muscles, and he had leather cuffs on his forearms that spanned from wrist to elbow, looking like something a medieval warrior would wear.

  I couldn't take my eyes off him. He strode back and forth the backstage area, clutching his mic in one hand, eyes bright and focused. His dark hair was wild, spiked, messy, as if he'd just fucked hard. Which he had. We'd found a bathroom and Chase had backed me against a wall, lifted my leg around his hips and driven into me wildly until we both collapsed into each other. The sex had energized him, it seemed, made him buzz with pysched passion for his impending performance.

  When the lights dimmed to black, he rounded on me, kissed me hard and fast.

  "Kill 'em, baby," I said.

  He grinned at me, then trotted out on stage with his band in tow.

  Baby? Where the hell did that come from?

  I shrugged it away as the lights came up with the drummer pounding a fast rhythm on the bass kick-drum. The bassist came in next, slapping his strings in a complicated riff, and then the guitarist wound in with a slippery, snaking tune. Chase stood bathed in a spotlight, hands at his sides, head down, motionless. I could pretty much hear all the women in the audience creaming themselves from this vision of him, huge and cut and dominating, even silent and still.

  This was a rock band, no holds barred, just this side of metal, but with real melody and musicianship. The music continued, picking up pace and energy until it reached a crescendo, and then, on a single synchronized note, the band fell silent and Chase filled the space with his voice, a low vocalization that rose and rose and rose. The band kicked in, then, perfectly timed with the shift in his singing.

  God, they were good. So good. The crowd went nuts, screaming, waving, suddenly pumped for a kick-ass opening number. His lyrics, oh man. Deep, full of feeling and poetry. Intelligible and meaningful, unlike the tripe spouted by so many other bands these days. He meant every word.

  And then, of course, after a few heavy-hitting numbers, the lights dimmed and the energy dropped. Chase sat with his legs dangling off the low stage, mic held in both hands, close to his face, eyes downcast as if seeing long ago memories, and crooned a ridiculously touching ballad of heartbreak and loss and love. Of course, he sold it as dramatically as he did the angsty, angry numbers.

  They finished their set and I visited the bathroom while they loaded their gear. I found myself in a corner stall, sitting on the toilet and listening to a pair of girls primping at the mirror, discussing Chase.

  "Ohmigod, is he hot or what?"

  A second voice made a shrill squeal, and I could practically see her waving her face with her hands. "I mean seriously. He's huge. I bet he's hung like a fucking horse."

  The first girl popped her lips, reapplying lipstick, probably, and then said, "Hung like a horse is right. You could totally see his package through his pants, and he wasn't even hard. I bet he's awesome in bed."

  "I've heard he's into some weird shit. I know this chick who hooked up with him after a show once. She said he's hung like a fucking god, and that he's amazing in bed...if you like being tied up and spanked, among other things." A pause, then, "He can spank me as hard as he wants, I'd let him do anything. He can even put it in my ass."

  "Marcia! That's nasty. And if he really is that huge, wouldn't it hurt?"

  "Not if he's slow about putting it in. He's gotta work up to it, use his fingers first, a
nd a lot of lube. It's really fucking hot, if he does it right."

  "You've done anal?"

  "Hell yes. I let Doug fuck me in the ass all the time. It's hot. The fun part is, no condoms, and you can do it even during your period, if you're in the mood."

  "God, that's so nasty. And I'm never in the mood when I'm on my period. I would never let Brian put it in my ass. He's asked a couple times, but I always say no. This ass is exit only."

  "Well mine isn't. That singer is so hot, he makes me wet just looking at him." A pause, hands being washed and dried. "I wonder if I can get backstage to meet him."

  "I know one of the bouncers here. I'll get you backstage. I might even join you for a threesome with him. I'll bet he'd be down with that, if he's as kinky as Jenny said he was."

  I was alone again, and I nearly vomited.

  I found him by the stage, cornered by who I imagined were the girls from the bathroom. He hadn't seen me yet, so I stayed in the shadows, blatantly eavesdropping.

  "So, do you have plans for later, Chase?"

  "If you don't, we could grab a few drinks, maybe go by my place...hang out for a bit. You know, just see what pops up."

  Chase looked awfully tempted. He actually hesitated. I saw him search the bar for me, and I sank back farther into the shadows by the hallway to the bathrooms.

  "As much as I'd like to, ladies, I do have plans for tonight. Maybe another night though. My next show is in a few days, and all the details are up on my band's website."

  God. He knew exactly what they were proposing. I still felt ill. Why am I jealous?

  I tried to shove it away. So what if he'd hooked up with someone before I got here. I had, hadn't I?

  It wasn't just hooking up with Jeff, though. That meant something.

  Shit. What did that mean? It meant something? Then why am I jealous of Chase? Why does the thought of him having a threesome with some groupie sluts bother me?