Blame it on the Bass: Heart of Fame, Book 6 Read online

  Sonja let her lips curl into a mocking smile. “You’re lucky I even remember you.”

  He grinned, plucked the mic from her left hand and tugged her closer to his body. “Levi—” his voice caressed her wildly unstable lust, “—Levi Levistan. I think we dated once, right?”

  Before she could answer, he twisted a look over his shoulder toward the karaoke MC standing openmouthed at the control deck on the side of the stage. “Anything by Nick Blackthorne?”

  The MC’s head bobbed up and down. Fast. Frenzied almost.

  Levi swung back to face Sonja. “Ready?”

  She shook her head.

  He laughed. And right there and then Sonja knew he was going to break her heart again. It might very well happen the second their duet finished and he went back to his famous life. It might happen before the sun rose if she was lucky enough to buy him a drink. But at some point, she was going to be crying over him again. Because Levi Levistan had never been one for laughing often, or aloud. When he did, when he truly gave himself to the happy response, his laugh was aural Viagra.

  Long before she’d fallen in love with his sexual prowess or his musical talent, she’d fallen in love with his laugh.

  The very laugh he was giving her now.

  Sonja closed her eyes, ground her teeth and, with the same sense of fatality she’d existed in every day of their teenage romance, threw herself into the moment.

  Fighting what she’d felt for Levi was never, ever an option.

  Opening her eyes, she fixed him with a steady gaze. “All right, let’s—”

  The music for Nick Blackthorne’s “Whispers in the Night” began before she could finish. And before she could steal herself against what was to come, prepare herself, shield herself, Levi opened his mouth and began to sing.

  Her knees buckled. They always had when he’d sung back in their dating days. His voice was husky and a little scratchy, like he was always recovering from a sore throat. But damn, when it flowed from him in song that rough quality gave the words a rawness unlike any other.

  Like most bass players, he rarely sang solo. It was a fucking shame, in Sonja’s opinion. She knew why it was the case—Levi wanted it that way—but the rock world needed to hear more of his voice. She wasn’t just being biased. That was the way it was.

  A soft nudge in her ribs made her blink.

  Levi grinned at her, mirth dancing in his eyes, music throbbing about them in a tempestuous beat. Music. Just music.

  Heat flooded Sonja’s cheeks as the realization she’d yet to sing a note slammed into her. Jerking her mic up to her mouth, she opened her lips and damn near spat out the lyrics…from two lines ago.

  Levi laughed incredulously while singing the correct lyrics, making the words sound far more devilish than Sonja suspected Nick Blackthorne had ever intended.

  The audience laughed along with him and by the next line, also sung with jovial perfection by Levi, Sonja finally caught up and joined in, losing herself to the music. And Levi’s company. When compared to being with Levi, rock didn’t stand a chance.

  Oh yeah, you’re about to get your heart broken again, aren’t you, woman?

  Five minutes later, the last note of “Whispers in the Night” faded away. A split second of silence filled the bar and then, like the first clap of thunder in a storm, the patrons of Do Re Me erupted in wild applause and cheers.

  Flushed with sheer happiness, Sonja turned to Levi and grinned. “You still got it, Stan.”

  An unreadable expression flittered across his face, as if her statement shocked him. “I do, don’t I?” And before she could answer him, he spun to the karaoke control. “Mind if we do another, my good man?”

  The crowd’s cheers and woops of delight grew louder.

  He turned back to Sonja. “Ready to go again?”

  She cocked an eyebrow, her heart fast in her throat. “With you?”

  Warm, strong fingers laced through hers, yanking her stare to her hand and then up to Levi’s face. He was holding her hand. Holding her hand and smiling at her. Oh God, he was smiling at her. “C’mon, Sonny,” he said, and Sonja didn’t miss the hope in his voice. She’d heard it before. When he’d introduced her to his parents. Before they scoffed at him and told him he was lucky to get a girl, considering how scruffy and moody he was.

  She stared into his dark eyes, his fingers firm on hers as if he feared she was going to bolt and leave him up there on the stage alone.

  “Please?”

  His request wrenched at her heart and, mustering all the feisty spunk left over in her jaded well, she smirked. “Only if you reckon you can keep up with me.”

  He laughed. “Never could before, but I always loved trying.”

  Fresh heat flooded Sonja’s cheeks. And her pussy. God help her, she had to stop thinking about sex with him. Singing, yes. Sex? No. She didn’t have the correct appendages for Levi’s known tastes. Once upon a time, a lifetime ago, yes, but not anymore. And come to think of it, wasn’t he in a relationship? With an American screenwriter or something? A guy American screenwriter?

  She swallowed, but before she could question what exactly he was doing there with her, he twisted around to nod at the waiting controller behind him. “‘A Woman Called Heartbreak’?”

  The karaoke controller nodded, turned to the computer that housed a thousand songs waiting to be sung and keyed in a command. A second later, the carnal sounds of Nick Blackthorne’s tormented, angry song filled the room.

  This time Sonja didn’t miss a word or beat. The music claimed her, owned her. She’d never sung with Levi during their wild teenage dating years. She’d been happy to indulge herself by just watching him play and listening to the throb of his guitar. Singing with him now, in a club full of people, as he threaded his fingers with hers…

  The words to the song flowed from her lips, ripe with harrowing pain and lust. She sang with Levi, her stare locked with his, her heart racing.

  Their voices harmonized with perfection. She could hear it. Fuck, what a rush. She tore into the words, let their broken contempt wring her soul, surrendered to the power of the music and the force of Levi’s unwavering gaze.

  Charged energy thrummed through her, crashed over her and swept her along. She belted out the final verse, giving herself over to the sheer exultation of the song, the music, the man holding her hand. The man who’d been the first to enter her a lifetime ago. The man who’d moved her soul not just with his guitar but with his laugh.

  She gave herself over to the absolute perfection of them singing together.

  The rightness of it.

  And then, with a crescendo of drums, “A Woman Called Heartbreak” ended.

  Sonja lowered her mic, her breathing nothing more than rapid, shallow pants. Her pulse pounded in her ears at way Levi looked at her—with dawning amazement and something else, something familiar but new.

  “Not too bad,” she quipped, although it sounded more like a raspy croak. Because she could barely draw breath. Not when Levi was tugging her closer to his body. Not when he was sliding his hand around her hips to the small of her back, her hand still clasped in his. Not when he pressed the very hard, long ridge in his jeans to her belly. Oh crap, she remembered that ridge. It was totally unexpected now, and yet totally right. So right.

  Fuck, was she really going to lose her heart to him again? Was she really going to—

  “Not too bad at all,” he murmured, a second before his lips captured hers and he swiped his tongue into her mouth.

  Sonja froze. For a second. No, not even that. Half a second. Half of half a second, and then she dropped her mic to the floor, tangled her hands in his hair and kissed him back.

  A deafening roar splintered her stunned disbelief as the bar’s patrons burst into cheering approval.

  She could understand that. She approved of it as well. Fuck, it was everything she remembered and more. Familiar and oh so different. His lips and tongue and teeth explored her mouth with the same aggression the
y’d always had, but this time there was a frantic urgency that had never been there before. As if her very lips offered the answer to a question she knew nothing about.

  Whatever it was, it turned Levi’s kiss raw. Almost animalistic.

  It was incredible.

  His hands pressed to her arse, one squeezing and cupping her butt cheek, the other still gripping the mic. The knuckles of that hand dug into her, but Sonja didn’t care about the pain. Didn’t care about the wild cheers of their audience either. Didn’t even care they were in public and Levi was gay and famous and no longer hers to kiss.

  How could she, when he was taking possession of her mouth so thoroughly and forcefully and…and…

  Oh crap, he was now squeezing her boob. Levi Levistan was squeezing her boob on a stage in front of who knew how many people. He flattened it with his palm as he dragged his thumb over her rock-hard nipple and swiped his tongue against hers.

  Exquisite heat blasted through Sonja’s core, tight and wet and ready. Oh so ready. He’d been the first guy to ever have sex with her and her body had never forgotten him. Never forgotten him and ached for his touch again. And here it was, right now. Right now in front of every smart phone in the bar, which pretty much meant right now in front of the entire freaking world.

  How had this happened? She’d come here to pour out her agitated frustration with her tosser of a boss via singing, and instead she was now on fire with a long-denied desire for a man way too famous for her.

  And way too gay.

  The last thought chilled Sonja’s ardor. She pulled away from him, her heart in her throat, her breath stuck there as well. “What the fuck?” she snarled. Or maybe she panted it? Most likely panted, what with how her breath didn’t seem capable of escaping her.

  Levi stared at her, his nostrils flaring. Confusion swam in his eyes. And there was that damn question again, the one Sonja had felt in his kiss.

  “What the fuck is going on, Stan?” she asked again, with far more gusto than the first time.

  He sucked in a swift breath. Without a word, he laced his fingers through hers, turned to the crowd still cheering and clapping and stamping their feet—the flashes of their phones like a hundred detonating stars in the dim light—and raised his hand above his head, taking hers with it.

  The crowd erupted in fresh excitement, obviously overcome by the unexpected awesomeness of the moment. At least, that’s what Sonja figured they were thinking. All she could do was stand beside Levi, arm above her head, and wonder what the fuck was going on.

  Seriously, what in the hell was going on?

  “Thanks, everyone,” Levi called to the enthusiastic patrons, finally lowering her hand. But not letting it go. “Now we’re letting someone else take the stage, right, Sonny?”

  Sonja gaped at him. And then frowned.

  He gave her a grin, one that told her straight away there was far more going on than just a stolen kiss.

  Her heart clenched, preparing for pain.

  He tugged at her hand. “Let’s go.”

  She raised her eyebrows, refusing to let him move her. “Where?”

  His dark gaze locked on hers, the question in them again. And like a blow from a wrecking ball, Sonja realized the question wasn’t for her. “My apartment,” he said, his voice a husky murmur.

  The wrecking ball smashed into her again, this time bringing with it a whole new realization. One that she couldn’t do a single thing about. She was going to go with him.

  Back to his apartment.

  It didn’t matter he was gay. Or famous. It didn’t matter he was in a relationship. Or that her heart was never going to survive the minutes and hours that came after their arrival. He was Levi, the guy who took her virginity when she was barely sixteen, the only guy she ever truly believed in. She was going back to his apartment and even if they only sat and talked shit, she would never be the same again.

  Geez, was she messed up.

  And a masochist.

  He tugged her hand again, the question gone from his eyes. In its place was a dark urgency Sonja felt all the way to the centre of her soul.

  “Coming?”

  She licked her lips, studied him for a split second and then nodded. “Yeah.”

  His Adam’s apple jerked up and down his throat once at her acquiescence. His jaw bunched, his nostrils flared. “Good.”

  With just that word, he turned and leapt down from the stage, pulling her along with him.

  The bar’s patrons clapped and whistled. Some called encouragement to Sonja. She stumbled behind Levi, her fingers threaded through his, wondering what the fuck the people witnessing the moment thought they were encouraging her to do. It wasn’t like she didn’t know how to screw. Did they think she needed advice on how to make a famous rock star blow his load? Did they think she was going to suffer stage fright?

  They’d made it to the exit door before reality smacked into her. “Crap,” she burst out, grinding to a halt. “My bag.”

  Before Levi could utter a sound, she pulled her hand from his and hurried to the booth where she’d sat before taking the stage. Apparently she could have tugged her hand free of his minutes ago if she’d really wanted to, given how easy it was to do it now.

  Ha. You’re already under his spell, aren’t you?

  Smiling at the enthusiastic cheers around her, she arrived at the dark alcove and snatched up her handbag from where it lay on the bench seat. Heart pounding way too fast, she took a moment to flatten her palms to the table, close her eyes and pull five deep, slow breaths, counting to ten on each exhale.

  What was she doing?

  Going back to Levi’s apartment.

  Why? To what end?

  To get your heart broken, why else?

  “Well,” she muttered, opening her eyes to stare at the tabletop between her hands, “as long as we’ve cleared that up.”

  “Cleared what up?”

  She jumped at Levi’s voice—a deep caress on her sanity—behind her.

  Biting back a curse, she spun around and perched her butt on the edge of the table, fixing him with a narrowed-eyed gaze. “If I’m going to sleep with you or not.”

  The muscles in his jaw clenched. She could see them doing their thing beneath the dark growth of his beard. Christ, the beard suited him. Made him look so fucking male and untamed and—

  He closed the minute distance between them and wedged himself between her thighs until their groins touched. It seemed he didn’t give a flying fart they were being watched by damn near everyone in the bar. “And what did you decide?”

  She swallowed. “That’s for me to know and you to find out.”

  He chuckled, rolling his eyes even as he smoothed his palms up the outside of her thighs to her hips. “You are exactly what I need right now, Sonja Stone.”

  “I am? Why?”

  He tugged on her hips, drawing their groins harder together. “That’s for me to know—”

  “And me to find out?”

  He shook his head at her question.

  Sonja didn’t stop her frown. “And there we have the secretive Levi Levistan. Seems things never change, ’eh?”

  He didn’t answer. Not with words.

  Instead, he lifted his hands from her hips, cupped her face in his palms and lowered his head to hers. “You can hate me as much as you want later, Sonny,” he whispered against her lips. “I’ll let you, but please, for tonight just let me forget…just let me…”

  He stopped speaking, his lips on hers finishing the request for him.

  The kiss was just as hungry and fierce and aggressive as the one he’d surprised her with on the stage. This time however, the bulge of his crotch was nudged with tight perfection against the curve of her sex. As he plundered her mouth, Sonja felt his erection pulse in his jeans.

  It was too much.

  It wasn’t enough.

  Pulling her mouth free of the kiss, she pressed her hands to his chest and pushed him back a little. “Levi,” she shook her he
ad. “What’s going on?”

  “Y’know,” a new voice said to Sonja’s left. A deep male voice with a distinct American accent. “I’m asking myself the same question.”

  Levi tensed. Jerked his head toward the speaker. Sonja did the same, biting back a groan at the man standing not even a foot away. A man she’d seen in more than one celebrity mag.

  Corbin Smith, award-winning screenwriter and Levi’s long-term partner, cocked an eyebrow at them both, and it was only then that Sonja realized the bar was thrumming with excited whispers. “So tell us, Levi,” he said, his gaze sliding from Levi to Sonja and back to Levi again. “Just what is going on?”

  Chapter Three

  Corbin had never hurt as much as he did the morning he and Levi had buried their baby daughter and her mother. All he’d wanted was to look into his lover’s eyes and find something to ease the hurt, some solace.

  Instead—as so many times before—Levi had shut his emotions away, locked them from the world. It was too much for Corbin.

  Too much.

  Unable to cope with not only the loss of a family almost his, but also Levi’s inability to share his pain and grief, Corbin had withdrawn. Pulled away.

  It was meant to make it easier for them both. It had seemed Levi didn’t want to grieve, and Corbin couldn’t look at him without needing to do so.

  It had been a stupid decision.

  One he regretted every goddamn day.

  And yet, as those days had rolled into nights, as those nights had turned into weeks, Corbin hadn’t know how to find his way back to Levi. Hadn’t know if he could. How could he find the solace he needed when Levi refused to share his grief?

  Which meant Corbin was more fucked up than he could ever imagine, because the only person in the world he wanted to spend the rest of his life with was the bass guitarist.

  Fucked up beyond measure. Because not only had Corbin’s ridiculous behaviour driven Levi into the arms of someone else, watching them kiss had affected Corbin in a way he’d never believed possible.

  Jesus H. Christ, he was hard.

  The last time he’d been hard over a woman he’d been in elementary school. Mrs. Pegg, the librarian who always wore stockings with seams that ran up the backs of her legs. He’d been eleven.