Never Land (12 page)

            Could Danny be trying to tell me something? After all this time, was he finally ready to let me know that he was ready to move on – past Peyton, past Roni – past all the stress, and towards me instead? Was I finally the girl that mattered to him – not just as a present fling but as the girl he could think about making a future with?

            The second we crossed the front door and I had laid the guitar down gingerly, even tenderly, I found myself in his arms once again, pressing my lips against his, hungrily trying to make him understand how much this gift had meant to me. “Let me thank you properly,” I moaned aloud, pushing him into the bedroom, my body aflame with longing. As we entered his bedroom, as he pushed me down onto the bed, I remembered involuntarily the events of less than twenty-four hours earlier. How I'd stood in the front hall watching Roni's near-naked body writhe with desire through a crack in the door, watching her try to seduce the man I loved. I recalled that feeling of powerlessness, of rage, and this in turn filled me with a new and more fervent desire: to prove to Danny once and for all that my body – my legs and hips and thighs and breasts – were more beautiful, more mesmerizing, more alluring than hers. I climbed on top of him, straddling him with my thighs, pressing his hands against my breasts, arching my back and rearing up with pleasure.

            “Neve...” said Danny, his voice half-admiring, playful. “What's gotten into you, tonight?”

            I had to show him what I could offer – what I could give. Show him the woman he could love – if only he would let me in, let me closer, show me the side of himself I didn't yet understand, the mystery behind his pain.

            When we made love it was powerful, electric. My whole body felt shattered by the pure and primal force of him. I had to erase every last memory of this place as it had been last night when Veronica had polluted it, every memory that separated me from Danny's arms.

            After we had finished I lay in his arms, tracing my fingers across his magnificent torso, my eyes lingering on the blue lion. What did it mean? A symbol of love – a connection with me? I almost hated to ask – to ask meant to imply that other, more dangerous question.
Did Peyton get one, too?
I bit my lip, but I needed to know. I couldn't bear the questions, the secrecy.

            “Danny...”

            “Yes, love?”

            “Your tattoo. It's the same as the one on my guitar.”

            “Yes – yes, it is...” He inhaled sharply.

            “What does it mean? Where did you get it?”
With Peyton?

           
There was a long pause, and my stomach dropped. Had I gone too far – asked too much of him? I flushed, flustered. “I mean, you don't have to tell me if you don't want to. If it's private or something.”

            “No, it's not private,” said Danny. “No – it had to do with...memorializing someone who meant a great deal to me. Someone I miss every day.”

           
Peyton.
My heart sank. There was no escaping her – not in this bed, not here, not ever.

            “My mother.”

            “Your mother?” I sat up in surprise.

            “Years after she died...” Danny twisted his mouth, pain spreading over his face. “Car accident up in skiing resort in the Alps. Snow and ice on the track. Just my luck, isn't it? I should never get in a car with another woman I love again...” His laugh was black and bitter. “When I was little, Neve, my mother used to read me stories. All the wonderful English schoolboy stories – King Arthur and Robin Hood and brave Lancelot and the other knights of the Round Table and all the ones you get in storybooks. Princes and princesses – fearsome dragons and chivalrous knights. She used to call me her little lion-heart – Daniel the Lion-Hearted. She would tell stories about this brave Sir Daniel, most noble knight in all the land.” His lip quivered slightly, and my heart – my whole body – ached for him. I wanted to comfort him, to wipe his tears away.

            “She was what I always pictured a princess looking like. Beautiful, to be sure – but more than that. With a kind light radiating through her eyes, a certain inner serenity that made you feel as if there was nothing in the world that could cause her love to waver or become uncertain, even for a moment. A light I haven't seen since – except, perhaps, with you. Perhaps when we first met, that's what I saw in you. Another woman – a princess. That dress you wore the first time you stayed over at my beach house, it took my breath away, reminded me of a storybook princess.” He shook his head. “No, you were something else. Something different. In your fire, in your passion for life, I saw the person my mother always dreamed I could be; the person I have long-feared I could never be. The knight – lion-hearted. Strong. Perhaps that's why I was drawn to you from the start.” He chuckled. “Not because of what my body sought in yours – but something stronger, deeper. A need we had to explore lest it consume us.” I could hardly breathe. I closed my eyes as Danny leaned in to kiss me, my heart beating so fast I thought it would burst.

            “So it wasn't just the sex?” I smiled, teasing him slightly.

            “Not just the sex,” he leaned in and bit my lip lightly. “Though it helped. My little lioness...” He stopped and sighed. “But you see – I was never that knight. Never that man she dreamed I would be. At least not according to my father.”

            “What do you mean?”

            “I look like my mother – everyone says that. I reminded him of her – perhaps. Of the woman he had lost. My mother wasn't like his later wives – young women he exploits and manipulates into marrying him, humiliating them in the tabloids, never measuring up to my mother. He loved her with a love that was pure and strong. She loved him before he was ever rich, ever famous – and he loved her. Head over heels. I always thought they were the ideal couple when I was growing up – but all that changed...”

            “When your mother died?”

            Danny blanched. “Yes,” he said slowly. “When she died. We were coming back from the ski slopes near Mont Blanc, driving back to the chalet we'd rented. I was being a little brat – I was tired and hungry and whining that I wanted to get dinner before we headed back home.” He closed his eyes, a look of utter anguish covering his face. “My father refused – he said he wanted to get back before it got dark, the roads were too dangerous. I was bawling and screaming like a little idiot, and my mother took pity on me and asked him to stop. She said I wouldn't be a little boy much longer and why not spoil me while we still could. My father refused – said it was time I grew up and learned to be a man and that I couldn't have everything I wanted. The two of them started to argue – on those icy roads – they were fighting and shouting and yelling as they almost never fought – so distracted they didn't see the oncoming car...”

            Tears were falling from his eyes. “We plowed into the truck sideways. My mother was in the back seat with me – she ducked to cover me and that was the only reason I survived. Because the shards of glass that exploded into the car hit her first, not me. My father was knocked unconscious – my mother died on the spot. Their last words to one another had been an argument.”

            I felt my hands grew wet – and soon I realized why. I too was crying, my tears dropping with his. How great a burden Danny carried – feeling responsible for not one but two deaths in his life...my heart went out to him. I reached out for his hand, wanting to press it to my lips.

            “He's never looked at me the same way since, you know,” said Danny. “He's never been the same. But I know the truth – behind the playboy facade, the pressure, the lies. They were so close – until I came along. Until a whiny brat caused the argument that took my mother's life, that took her from it. He can't look at me without seeing that tantrum that cost him the woman he loved...the little boy I used to be – my mother's killer...”

            “That can't be,” I said. “Nobody could blame you for that – you were only a little boy. And your mother gave up her life for you – nobody can blame you for that...that's what mothers do for their children.”

            “He sent me away to boarding school when I was eight. I spent holidays with relatives – a few awkward dinners with him now and then. Barely saw him until I graduated Oxford – when he decided to take an interest in me, in my life. But now, even now, we're like strangers.” He sighed deeply. “But Neve, he's the only family I've got. The only one with any memories of my mother.”

            I took him into my arms, wrapping my body around his, letting him cry, his tears hot upon my breast. I felt myself cry with him, my body dissolving into sobs – our pain melding together.

            “I've never told anybody that before,” Danny whispered. “No one except you.”

            I stroked his hair, kissing his forehead, unable to speak. Danny's pain – the tragedy that I had first noticed when I looked into those dark Byronic eyes – was bottomless: a story I had only just begun to understand. No wonder why he couldn’t have anyone get close to him. He was afraid he’d end up killing them.

            I looked into his baby blue eyes with his dark lashes wet from my tears and his mixed. My heart squeezed in my ribcage so tightly I could hardly breathe. I loved him so much. My Danny Blue.

            But could I save him?

Chapter 15

            The next few days were a whirlwind of gigs. We extended our stay in England. Every single night we had something going on – small performances in intimate cabaret settings, a couple of opening acts at larger arenas. I hardly had time to worry about my relationship with Danny, let alone my feelings for the rest of the band members. I barely even had time to breathe. Life on tour was exhilarating, to be sure, but it was also exhausting. Danny and I hardly had time to see one another; before I knew it, I was getting up at five or six in the morning to practice and rehearsing all the way through showtime. Of course, I couldn't really complain. No matter how tired I thought I was, no matter how much it felt as if my whole body were about to collapse, there was something about striding out onstage in the perfectly fitting couture costumes Cassie had ensured were delivered straight to my hotel room that made me feel alive again, full of energy. All at once – it seemed – we'd made it. We were living the dream. The five of us were pictured on the cover of
Rolling Stone
 - looking every inch the rock stars we'd wanted to be. We had personal shoppers to dress us; we had paparazzi following our every move. I'd watched my dad go through this when I was younger – I was used to being around fame. But somehow it was different when it was me, when it was all of us in the limelight. I got used to the expertly tailored clothes that Cassie lay out before me – to the cocktails and the bottles of champagne and above all things to the applause that greeted us all every time we walked onstage. It was easy to start to take these things for granted, to see them as just automatic perks of the job. But for me, each VIP Lounge entrance, each free bottle of Veuve Cliquot, was more than just a luxurious benefit. It was a reminder that someone, somewhere, thought we were important enough to care about, important enough to support. Someone out there believed in us.

            On our last night in London, we had a commitment that made all our hair stand on end. We were invited to the exclusive launch party of Blue Enterprises' newest venture – a cruise line. To celebrate, Clarence Blue had chartered a small boat on the Thames, stocking it with expensive liquor and kitting it out with a dance floor and some of the hottest DJs in town – and he'd invited every A-List celebrity in the UK to boot. Kyle, Luc, and Steve were ecstatic – after all, they had no way of knowing that Danny was Clarence Blue's son – Danny had done everything possible to keep that particular bit of information quiet. But I was less excited. Just the thought of entering a room with Roni Taylor, let alone Danny's father, was enough to make me feel nauseous. But there was no way I could get out of going without explaining to Cassandra Curry the reason why, and Cassandra was in no mood to let me off easy.

            “Everyone who's anyone will be there,” she said sharply. “If you want to be a rock star, you have to play the part. It's not just about the music, sweetie. You've got to network. You've got to know the right people – and impress them. RRR has a close relationship with Blue Enterprises – and we want to keep it that way.”

            I had no choice but to go. Although I dreaded running into more painfully snooty society types – I was no more eager about running into Joanne Waldegrave than I was about running into Roni – I knew that if I was going to be trapped on a boat with them for several hours, I'd at least have to make sure I gave them no leverage to mock me. I wore a scandalously short green cocktail dress that played up the color of my eyes, making sure every inch of my tanned skin was shown off to perfection, thinking grimly that for all her beauty, Roni Taylor was as pale and pasty as a porcelain doll. I put on my makeup carefully, adding a distinctively gothic edge to my eyeliner, determined that I wouldn't let anyone – no matter how perfectly coiffed – see me at anything but my best. Not that I had to worry – Cassie wouldn't have let me out of the hotel if I hadn't been. She fussed over us as if we were small children who needed to be led, supervising every moment in the preparation process as if it were a rehearsal for a performance.

            “Don't worry,” Danny said. “I'll make it clear to Roni that her little games, her insanity hasn't gotten to me. I'm proud to show up with a girl as stunning as you on my arm, and I want the world to know it.”

            As we boarded the yacht, the five of us linking arms as we headed down the red carpet, paparazzi flashing cameras in our faces, I felt a curious sense of relief. We hadn't spent much time as a band together offstage – I'd been going off alone with Danny, and I got the distinct sense that both Kyle and Luc were actively avoiding me to stave off the awkwardness that had gotten worse now that Danny was back in the band. It felt good to be together again – a team, a unity. Together we were brilliant, powerful. Unstoppable. When we were like this I felt safe, secure. Like not even Roni Taylor could touch me. Certainly, the feeling of Danny taking my arm, kissing my hand, touching me in public only contributed to my sense of confidence. He cared for me – he wanted me – and he wanted the world to know that we were together.