21 - Who Are You?

Petey stiffened against him, damning her reflexive response to his uninvited intrusion.  Guiding her thoughts to the Preamble to the Constitution settled her immediate panic, but she mentally completed the whole passage before finalizing her answer. 

“That sounds a lot like something you might want to know if we were going to have a relationship instead of just sex.”

“Quid pro quo, baby,” he quoted, undeterred.  “You still owe me one.”

Damn stupid game.

She needed distance, but his arms only clamped more tightly around her when she tried to escape.

“Petey, don’t fight for once.  Just tell me.”  His lips lightly brushed her temple while he made lazy circles in the small of her back with his thumb.

It was hard to resist him from within a fog of post-coital bliss and, inexplicably, his easy touch drained her will to be a cold-hearted bitch.  She could give a little.

“Nobody,” she murmured, relaxing into his embrace once again.  “Not the way you mean.”

“Then what way?”

Why hadn’t she banked on him following up with a second rapid fire question?  It’s what he always did.  He may curb his nosiness after the second question, but he never stopped before.  This time, he was going to have to.

“Quid pro quo, Bongiovi,” she mimicked gently, easing off his chest, straightaway missing his oddly comforting presence.  “You got your answer.”

He allowed her to retreat this time, but silently glowered and sulked as she gathered her clothes and began dressing.  "And only one lover?"

She shouldn’t come here and do this again.  It was getting out of hand.

From the time she’d crossed into his domain tonight it had felt like more than a casual screw.   First the wine, then the silly information exchange that she shouldn’t have partaken of.  Then the compassionate tone that might make her think he gave a crap about her as a person instead of a sex toy.   She hadn’t bargained on being anyone’s sex toy, but she’d come to like it.  It was also about as much as she was willing to deal with.  Anything more was… unwelcome.  

“Petey.”

She pushed her head through the opening of her sweater, gaze magnetically gravitating to his naked body.  He was sitting upright now instead of being reclined, but Jon was obviously as comfortable in his own skin as he was his clothes.  Who could blame him?  The sculpted chest, washboard abs and muscular were all enviable. 

“What?”  She flipped her hair back, shoving a hand into the tousled mess for a quick shake.  Wishing for her boots or Chucks, she absently thought it was going to be a long walk home in heels.

“Stop running for a damn minute,” he ordered crossly, at last reaching for his jeans.  Rising, he shimmied into them and zipped cautiously, leaving the waist unbuttoned.

Nobody has a right to look that hot after sex.  His hair all disheveled from my hands running through it.  The faint red marks my fingers and teeth made on his neck and chest.  Proof that the most sought after man in music was mine, if only for a moment in time.

Why was she thinking this way?  An inkling of thoughtfulness was displayed and she was diving headlong into a pit of sappiness?  That wasn’t rational or any acceptable form of it.  It was plain stupid.

And that pissed Petey off.  Some day she hoped to master the fine art channeling her self-anger appropriately.  Unluckily for Jon, it wouldn’t be tonight.

“I’m not running,” she snapped.  “We fucked and I’m leaving.  That was the deal.”

The instant coloring of his face should have warned her.  The tales of his temper were infamous, but in all their squabbles she hadn’t seen him to be anything more than heavily annoyed.  Yes, he’d raised his voice, but she hadn’t felt threatened.

Turned out that it wasn’t a raised voice she should be worrying about. 

His fingers bit into her upper arm, halting her departure with a jerk.

“Then don’t leave before I pay you,” he ground out through clenched teeth.  The vein in his jaw pulsed as ominously as his threatening stance.

Unaffected, Petey’s face scrunched up into exasperated bewilderment.  “What the hell are you talking about?”

“You obviously want me to treat you like a whore, so what’s your going rate?  Is five hundred enough?  Because I’d pay that for the blow alone.”

She recoiled from the harshness of his words as though he’d dealt a physical blow.

“You bastard!”  Struggling futilely against his iron fisted grip, she had no choice but to stand there and listen while he continued to belittle her.

“Don’t put this in my lap, baby.  I wanted to be friends with you, but you’re so far fucking removed from the rest of the world that you weren’t willing to demean yourself that way.  I was good enough to fuck but not…”

The last of his words jumbled together under the dull roar of blood rushing through her ears.  Her mind shifted into autopilot, randomly accessing the one of the haphazard bits of information that overfilled it.   Numb lips scarcely moved as the quotations tumbled out in a whisper.

“On the fifteenth of May, in the Jungle of Nool,
In the heat of the day, in the cool of the pool,
He was splashing... enjoying the jungle's great joys...
When Horton the elephant heard a small noise.”

“Petey, what are you saying?”

She blocked out his anger, intent on clearing her mind of the confusing turmoil of emotion that was interfering with rational thought.    

“"My friends!", cried the elephant.
"Tell me! Do tell!
Are you safe? Are you sound?
Are you whole? Are you well?"

“What the hell?  Is that Dr. Seuss?”  He shook her lightly, his face a study in confusion… and maybe a little bit of fear.  She stared at him impassively, never disrupting the lyrical cadence of her litany.

“"Don't give up! I believe in you all.
A person's a person, no matter how small!
And you very small persons will not have to die
If you make yourselves heard! So come on, now, and TRY!"”

He scrubbed his free hand down his face in a gesture of utter helplessness. “Petey, why in God’s name are you quoting ‘Horton Hears a Who’?”

There.  It was back.  Her synapses began firing in a predictably sequential order once again and she exhaled her pent up breath with relief. 

He was only offering his insults as a way to vent his own emotion.  They weren’t to be taken personally.  He wouldn’t have slept with her to begin with if he thought she was a whore.  That wasn’t what the impeccable Jon Bon Jovi did.

“Jon, let go of me.”  There was no heat or rancor to her words.  It was but a blandly uttered request.

“Not until you tell me what that was about.”

Leaving her expression purposefully blank, she intoned, “I needed to clear my head.  Now let go of me.”

“Is that what the recitations are about?  Clearing your head?”

“Yes.  Please let go, you’re hurting me.” 

That was clearly the magic word, because he dropped his hand as though she’d scorched him, looking contrite.  “I’m sorry, but don’t go yet.  I want to understand what the hell just happened.”

She batted her eyelids owlishly and contemplated how to address that without revealing things she’d rather keep private.  Or seem like a totally heinous bitch.  She feared the two would go hand in hand.

“Jon, it’s not my intention to be a bitch when I tell you that I don’t want you to understand.  Let it go.”

Regret tapped at her conscience when a glimmer of hurt shot through his confused baby blues, but it couldn’t be helped.  He wasn’t playing by the rules.  He wanted more than she was willing to give.  Her body she was willing to concede, but everything else belonged to Petey.  She’d spent her entire life paying for it and she wouldn’t give it away again – not even for the beautiful man with the freakishly perfect smile.

“Goddammit Petey, what have I done wrong here?  Why can’t you answer a simple question for me without all the wailing and gnashing of teeth?”

“There are no simple questions so, in an effort to balance the scales, I try to make my answers as simple as possible.  That’s why I’m telling you to let it go.  If our arrangement no longer works for you, I understand, but I think it’s best for me leave now.”

Yes, go.  Go before he stirs up any more damn erratic emotions.

Forcing her feet to obey, she subjected herself to the mockery of the ridiculous high heels that had made her feel so womanly earlier.  Now they were just a nuisance to be dealt with as she clopped like a horse across the living room and into the foyer.

“Petey…”

Coat dangling from her fingertips, she turned with a sigh of acceptance.  She was obviously going to have to give him something or was going to explode into a million itty bitty twitching pieces.  “What?”

“It’s late.  Let me at least get a car to take you home.”

Oh.  A ride.  He wanted to offer her a ride. 

“That would be nice, thank you.”

Striding over the bar, he picked up his phone and tapped the screen.

You’ve lost your mind woman.  You never should’ve done this to start with.  This man has messed with your head from day one.  You should have known better. 

“It will take the driver a few minutes,” he stated, rejoining her by the door.  “Come sit with me while we wait.”

“I don’t think that’s a good idea.”

“Why?  Because I scare you?  Because I’m a heartless son of a bitch who says hateful, unforgivable things when I’m furious?”

She leveled a cool gaze at him.  “Partly.”

His hand extended a hand toward her, and she moved back out of reach.

“I’m not going to hurt you,” he muttered, taking the hand he’d offered and roughing his hair with it.

“I’m aware of that.”

“Are you also aware that I’m incredibly sorry for what I said to you?”

She nodded.  “It’s sooner than I anticipated, but I expected you would be eventually.  You were lashing out from frustration.”

“Damn straight,” was his emphatic agreement.  “Nobody can frustrate me the way you do.  Is that something else you’re aware of?”

“The feeling is mutual Mr. Bongiovi.  I’ve begun to question the wisdom of working for you.”

He frowned and shook his head.  “No.  Regardless of whatever the hell personal issues exist between us, you will be an asset to the tour.  I want you there.”

The doorman buzzed from the lobby, and Jon grimaced.  “The car’s here.”

But she was already tapping steadily across the tile.  “So I hear.  I’ll see you around sometime.”

“The seventeenth,” he called after her.  “I’m hosting a Christmas/Welcome Aboard party for the band and assorted crew.  You’ll be invited.”

Her fingers stilled on the knob before wordlessly wrenching it open and disappearing through the doorway.

But who’s to say I’ll accept the invitation?

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Please be forewarned that the story isn't flowing quite as quickly as it was.  Posting will probably slow to 2-3 times a week.  Thanks SOOO much for reading, and all your awesome comments!!  :)  ~ Carol