A Love Song for Lucifer: An Enemies-to-Lovers Romance (Leading Ladies) Page 12

  When I arrive in the lobby, she has Lumi in an airtight hug. I think I even see tears glistening in both their eyes. It should surprise me that there is so much emotion over leaving each other after only knowing each other for one week. Except, I have no ground to stand on. I would make an absolute fool of myself if someone made me say goodbye to Mel right now after this week together. I’m pretty sure Cole would have to carry me out kicking and screaming. It wouldn’t be a pretty sight, and luckily no one has to see that because I get to walk out of here with Mel tucked under my arm.

  I take the opportunity while they’re still saying goodbye to leave a tip for the staff. They’ve all provided exemplary service on their first true week of work at the hotel, and I think the number I leave for them shows that and even more. After all, someone will have to clean up a room full of lilies left in Mel’s room. Not to mention, the sex we’ve had all over this hotel, practically marking it as ours. Yeah, actually, they deserve even more, I realize as I pull out another wad of cash.

  I walk back over to Mel, who now has Brooke wrapped in her arms.

  “Thank you so much for trusting in me to be a part of your opening,” Mel says as they separate.

  “Are you kidding me? Thanks for gracing us with your presence. I’ll be back in New York next week. Let’s meet for lunch then. Maybe we can find a place that serves salmon soup.”

  “Mm, deal. I can’t wait,” Mel agrees.

  I give Cole a fist bump and bring Brooke in for a hug when she’s finished her goodbye.

  “I’m really happy for you,” Brooke adds before letting me go. “Mel is amazing and brings out a side of you I’ve really missed.”

  “Thanks, Brooke,” I say as I pull away. “Hopefully, I manage not to fuck it all up.”

  She looks at me with a bit of concern, as if me suggesting that I might mess up is already admitting that I’m going to.

  “You know you have control over that, don’t you?” She says with a stern face.

  I nod and laugh, as if I’m just joking. Yet, there’s a feeling in the pit of my stomach that suggests that I don’t actually understand that I’m the one in control. I push it down because the truth is too hard to swallow.

  Because, if I’m not the one in control of my life, then I know who is.

  The same person who has always loomed over my life like a shadow that chokes out the warmness of the sun.

  The same person who’s texts I’ve been avoiding all week.

  My father.

  CHAPTER TWENTY-FOUR

  Melody

  “I don’t understand,” I scan my eyes across the inside of the jet. “Where are all the other people?”

  “The pilot is in the cockpit and Cindy is probably prepping a meal.”

  “This is not what I had in mind when you said you booked my transport,” I say, hesitating in front of the airplane’s door. The smooth cognac leather interior makes it seem like I’m about to enter a set for a music video. Come to think of it, I’m pretty sure I have seen this in a music video.

  I was hesitant that Luc upgraded my flight at all, but reluctantly accepted it. But this?

  “Listen,” he says, bringing his arms around my waist and coaxes me in. “I realized that this way we could have more time alone together, before…” He pauses, clearly unsure how to finish that sentence.

  “Before what?”

  “Before the craziness of our lives greets us as soon as we land in New York,” he shrugs. “No one was using it today, anyway. The company has it when we need to court artists.”

  Ah, the company. The subject we’ve managed to avoid with the grace and care of a tightrope walker.

  “Then I’ll leave it up to De la Roche Records to offset our carbon footprint, too,” I say with an overly bright smile.

  “I’ll offset this trip ten times as long as it gets you to wipe from your memory that I just mentioned De la Roche Records,” he says, pulling me onto his lap in one of the plush leather recliners.

  “You know we can’t avoid talking about the company you’re the CEO of forever, right?”

  “I know we can avoid talking about it for the next 8 hours, and that’s enough for now.”

  I peer around. It will be hard when their logo is adorning everything from the headrests to the cocktail napkins, but I’ll give it an honest try.

  “8 more hours, then.” I follow up with a kiss. He smells like aftershave. The delicious stubble that was growing longer and longer in Finland is now bare. I guess leaving Finland also means leaving behind that mountain man that was blossoming before my eyes. It’s not like the clean-shaven business man has any trouble being the most absurdly attractive man I’ve laid my eyes on either. All these orgasms are somehow making him even more attractive to me, although I wouldn’t have thought that was possible.

  “Champagne?” A cheerful voice comes from behind me just in time for me to wonder if she saw Luc grind himself into me. I hop off to preserve some sense of decency and settle in to the chair next to him.

  “Sure,” we say at the same time. The woman, who must be Cindy, smiles and places flutes in front of us before seamlessly popping the cork off the champagne. The woman is gorgeous- blond and tan in a black dress suit. I can’t help but wonder if her looks are no accident. I did some research on Luc’s dad and there is no question that he likes women a whole lot. Especially young, blonde, curvy women. What does Luc think about that? There is so much I have to learn about him.

  “Thanks, Cindy,” Luc says with a smile before picking up his glass and turning toward me. It certainly helps that his emotional response to Cindy is as if she is a caring grandmother, not a gorgeous, blond, curvy sexpot. Oh man, I need to calm down and stop obsessing over how sexy the flight attendant is. Being envious of every beautiful woman around Luc is not the way I want to drive myself insane. There are so many other ways to go insane that would be much more fun.

  “To a new year,” he says, lifting his glass to mine.

  “And to new beginnings,” I add.

  Before he can finish his sip, his phone vibrates on the table. He sets his glass down and checks it.

  “Crap,” he says, scrolling through something on his screen. “Ugh, I should take care of this on my laptop. It’s an emergency at…” his speech slows down and his eyes begin to squint. “An emergency with Big Bird.” He nods his head, as if agreeing with himself. “Yep, an emergency with Big Bird that I’ll have to take care of on my laptop real quick. I’m so sorry.”

  “Mm-hmm,” I say with a laugh. He is really committing to not talking about his work. “Okay, well you handle the emergency and afterwards, I really look forward to dissecting why Big Bird was the first thing to pop in your head.”

  “I promise I’ll let you psychoanalyze me all you want,” he brings his hand over my cheek and pulls me into a deep kiss before breaking away and slipping his laptop out of his backpack.

  This actually gives me time to work on a song. I pull out my battered old notebook and favorite green pen and open up the page where I left off.

  A nice bonus that has come out of this trip is that lyrics are coming to me. Not only coming to me, they are pouring out. And they are the type of lyrics that are surprising to even me. I’ve been trying to write for years but always have trouble finishing the song. I’ve tried to write about anger, sadness, grief, feeling inadequate, but this… this is uncharted territory. This is a love song. And sure, it might be inspired by Luc, but if he asks me, I’ll deny it.

  But as I sit here, sipping champagne and watching his ‘serious face’ as he types over the laptop, the butterflies in my stomach at least don’t let me deny it to myself. Luc is my inspiration and more.

  My first verse is about a sensation- the very moment I let my guard down and felt the rush of allowing myself to have what I really wanted. And what I wanted was Luc.

  Under a Northern sky

  I held my breath

  With you nearby

  But when you breathed out

&n
bsp; I breathed in

  Now I never want you off my skin

  Now… what’s the refrain? I let my eyes linger from Luc’s furrowed brow to his soft red lips while the bubbles from the champagne tingle my nose. His phone vibrates, this time with a call. He looks at me apologetically and picks it up, walking to a bench at the other side of the cabin. He takes a seat to discuss with the caller but stares right at me. He watches me as I stare back at him. He looks so… expensive. His deep blue pants and grey cashmere sweater match the vibe of this private jet perfectly. His face has the symmetrical lines of his supermodel mother, but now it is stern, burdened with the weight of managing millions of dollars day to day. How is it possible that this is the man that has totally and completely taken my heart? I’ve never met a person more far removed from my world. He’s removed from most people’s version of the world, in an underworld all his own.

  The devil was an angel

  So the story goes

  I write in my notebook. His eyes perk up when I look back at him, looking back and forth from me to the notebook, before he cocks his head in question. “Are you writing?” He mouths silently while strumming an imaginary guitar.

  I laugh and nod yes.

  He is an angel and a devil

  But I’m in love with both

  I write out some chords that seem like they would go well with the song and wish that I could take my guitar out to test them. But not while Luc is on a call that seems to go on forever. Cindy comes over and whispers to me that we’re about to take off, so I fasten my seatbelt and Luc does the same from across the plane, mouthing ‘sorry’ again. Apparently, he is hooked up to Wi-Fi or private jets have different rules because he continues talking through take-off.

  Once we’re gliding through the dark sky, I put my headphones on for some inspiration and close my eyes, letting my looming tiredness take over me.

  Eventually, Luc curls up next to me and falls asleep as well. We both slip in and out of consciousness throughout the flight. Any dreams of joining the mile-high club or enjoying the luxuriousness of a private jet are taken over by severe jet-lag, and sure, maybe the slightest desire to not love the jet. It’s basically a trophy to wealth that I imagine a lot of insecure old dudes have enjoyed after building their empires on the backs of musicians. I wish I could stop myself from feeling that way, but the only thing I genuinely like it for is that it was an earnest attempt by Luc to make me happy. Okay, it’s nice that I won’t smell like 100 other people after a cross-Atlantic flight. I wonder when he’s going to learn that he doesn’t need to get me these kinds of things for me to like him. In fact, I might even like him more without them.

  When we land, it is only 8 PM in New York but 3 AM in Finland and my body certainly feels that way. Luc’s head rests on my shoulder and we’re both curled up under the same blanket. I look at his dark eyelashes slashing through the peaceful slopes of his face and am struck by a tug of missing him already. At the very least, the New York City boroughs we each call home will separate us, but now that we’re back to our real lives, who knows what else?

  I stroke his hair softly to wake him. When that doesn’t work, I kiss his forehead. He looks up at me blinking and confused, then seems to remember where he is and smiles the most adorable sleepy smile up at me. In this moment, he is nothing but pure angel.

  We arrive through a separate part of the airport where we don’t have to go through the normal immigration and customs lines. Okay, I guess a private jet has many advantages. But we still have to wait while they set up for us. I twirl my rings around my fingers, wondering what to say. I can’t help but anticipate the point will finally come when we say goodbye. New York City is so big compared to our little world in the north. Couldn’t we get sucked up into the city and never find our way back to each other again?

  “Merde,” Luc runs his hands through his hair, looking down at his phone. Right at that moment, one of the immigration officers waves me over. I look at Luc questioningly, wondering what’s wrong.

  “Ah, go ahead. I’ll meet you on the other side,” he says with a nod.

  I walk up to the table to be inspected by an older gentleman with silver hair and a unimpressed face. I answer the obligatory questions, but am distracted, my eyes seeking Luc to make sure everything is okay.

  “Miss,” the immigration officer says with impatience. “Some place you’d rather be?”

  “Oh, no,” I bite my nail. “I’m sorry, I was just making sure my, uh, friend got through okay.”

  “You only need to be concerned with yourself right now.”

  “Of course,” I nod. “I’m sorry.”

  I manage to get myself back into the country successfully without pissing off any more officers and see Luc already waiting for me.

  He gets off the phone and paces toward me, looking distressed.

  “That was my driver. He warned me that there was some kind of tip about me being here with a woman. I have no idea where they got it from, but they have been dying for a story like this since my break-up with…” He trails off, seemingly unwilling to even say her name.

  “Oh, okay,” I say, uncertain of what the appropriate response to this is. I’m sorry?

  “I can’t put you through this. They would stalk you online to figure out who you are, and it just would be all too much. I told my driver, Mark, to take you home and I’ve already ordered myself a cab.”

  “Oh, okay.” I say yet again. This is really outside of my comfort zone, and I’m not doing a smooth job of hiding that.

  “He’ll be waiting for you as soon as you step outside those doors,” Luc points to the doors and looks around anxiously.

  “Oh…” I say looking to the door and back to him. “Okay.” I’m really on a roll here with my responses.

  This is the moment, I realize. This is the moment I’ve been dreading. Luc seems to want to keep a solid distance of 5 feet between us, as if getting too close to me on American soil will detonate an explosion.

  “Alright,” I finally say, realizing that he has no intention of kissing me goodbye. “Goodbye, then.”

  “I’m sorry,” he says, looking around again, and back at the doors. “I don’t know if they can see in here.” The man who, just last night, made love to me in a place anyone could have walked in, now looks anxious to be seen only talking to me.

  “I hate to leave you this way. Let’s meet back up as soon as we get a good night sleep,” he adds with finality.

  “Yeah,” I say, twisting my hand tight around my guitar case. I step to the door. “Thanks for the flight by the way.” I say looking back, before turning away and walking through the doors, leaving Luc behind.

  Flashes immediately start going off as soon as I exit, but stop as quickly as they started. Because of course they don’t want pictures of me. I’m a nobody if Luc isn’t by my side. It was my fear before I even let him into my heart, and now that fear has finally been confirmed.

  CHAPTER TWENTY-FIVE

  Lucien

  It is slightly surreal being back in the white lines and shiny surfaces of De la Roche Records. It was only a week in Finland, but it feels like an entire lifetime. I have my feet up on my desk, and even though I have a million things to do, I’m sitting here and staring out the window. I guess this is what people would call… reflecting?

  Barb knocks lightly as a warning and comes in with my coffee.

  “You alright, Mr. De la Roche?” She is eyeing me warily, clearly not used to seeing me as anything but busy at the office. I notice she got the matching diamond earrings for her necklace, as she said she would after she got her Christmas bonus.

  “Thanks, Barb. I’m fine. I was just thinking…” I dart my eyes back out the window. “Isn’t it strange that this company is founded on one of the most inspiring art forms known to humanity, yet our office is like a damn laboratory?”

  Deafening silence from Barb fills my office. I turn to look at her, genuinely wanting to hear her answer. Instead, she is just sort of bli
nking at me. Then resolve lines her face. “Oh, no... Did you do that drug thing that all the millennials are doing? Did you go to the desert and do ashwagandha or whatever it is?”

  I laugh a full belly laugh. I can tell this reaction doesn’t comfort her, but in fact seems to alarm her even more.

  “Ayahuasca?” I ask when I finally compose myself.

  “Yeah, I watched a special on that and, I don’t know, whatever happened to just reading a book? Why does your generation have to do everything with drugs?”

  I nod, eager to appease her. “Agreed, Barb. I promise, no drugs were present on my vacation unless you count oxytocin, which there was a lot of.”

  “Ah, the love drug. I don’t need a special to know about that,” Barb says, her hands going to her hips and suddenly looking like she can tell me anything and everything I need to learn. And I want her to. I need someone to tell me what the hell is going on with my brain, because this is not anything I’ve experienced before. It’s like I’ve been hijacked by some invisible force where my sole purpose has now become to kiss Melody, and to talk to Melody, and to intertwine my body so deep into Melody that we melt into each other over and over.

  And I would ask Barb everything, because I know she too has been similarly hijacked by her husband, Bob, and has remained that way even after 40 years. Even when Bob buys her a vacuum for Christmas. Even when Bob comes home, having completely forgot to buy the turkey on Thanksgiving. Even with a name like Bob. I can see she loves that man when her eyes light up when she talks about him. I suddenly feel like I could be on the precipice of having the same thing, despite it being a future I never imagined for myself in my wildest dreams. Well, not a future with Bob, no, but to go through life so deliciously hijacked that I want to spend it with another person.