Rock the Bodyguard (13 page)

Settling gingerly down onto her
sore bottom, Cash started to pick at her meal. It was a tasty enough chicken
breast marinated in Italian herbs and wrapped in panchetta with an asparagus
side, but she just couldn't work up an appetite.

“Cash, you need to eat,” Miles
urged her.

“I'm not hungry,” she complained.

“We should order cake,” Mattie
suggested. “Everybody loves cake.”

“No,” Miles said firmly. “Cash, eat
your dinner.”

“I can't!” She pushed away from the
table and ran for her room, tears of frustration streaming from her eyes. Every
step she took was painful, the fabric of her pants rubbing across her raw rear.

Miles followed quickly. “Cash,
what's wrong?”

She laid face down on the bed,
hiding from him. “I'm not hungry. I can't eat. My stomach is all twisted up in
knots.”

“Sweetheart,” he said, pulling her
close and stroking her hair. “Talk to me.”

She couldn't talk. She was so upset
and she didn't really even know why. A million reasons rushed through her head.
There was the tour, having to move every day, never knowing where she was going
to be. Then there was the grim threat of the stalker who had attacked Kevin.
She wasn't really supposed to know about that, but she'd overheard Miles and
Kevin talking about it and it scared her.

As Miles encouraged her, some of
her thoughts and fears began to tumble out in bits and pieces. Cash was sure
there wasn't a coherent sentence among everything she said, but somehow Miles
figured out what she meant anyway.

“I'm not going to let anyone hurt
you, Cash, not ever.” He made the promise with quiet certainty. “As for the
tour, I know it's hard. Touring isn't always fun, it means being away from
everything familiar and going to a new city every day and missing home.”

“I don't even have a home,” Cash
sniffed. “I've lived in hotels so long I don't even know what it's like to go
home.”

“Well, when we get back to the
States, why don't you make a home for yourself?”

Cash stilled in his arms. Make a
home for herself? Why would he say that? Why would he talk about her making a
home as if he wasn't in the picture at all? Did he not really like her at all?
Did he see no future for them?

She pulled away from him. “Look
Miles,” she said, trying to get herself together. “You don't have to baby me. I
know this is just a job to you.”

“Who said this was just a job?”

“You did,” she said. “You want me
to go back and make a home for myself. By myself.”

A flicker of frustration passed
over his handsome face. “I didn't mean I'd be dumping you the minute we got
back,” he said. “I just meant it's time for you to put some roots down
somewhere, that's all.”

“Oh.”

He gave her a grim look. “It is
best not to leap to conclusions, Miss Raine,” he said quite sternly. “It leads
to misunderstandings and misunderstandings lead to unnecessary conflict.”

She nodded mutely.

“Now,” he said, “about your appetite...”

“I'm not hungry, Miles,” she said,
“really I'm not.”

“You didn't even try to eat,” he
pointed out. “You just pushed the food around the plate. You need to get a
little into you.” He smiled suddenly. “Am I going to have to feed you like a
baby? Here comes the choo-choo train?”

Cash giggled and shook her head.
“No!”

“Well I will, if you don't come out
and at least get some food in you.”

Acquiescing to his desire, Cash
went back and tried eating again. Mattie and Kevin were already done, so she and
Miles were dining somewhat alone – though Mattie was bouncing around in the
back of the suite somewhere, swearing up a storm. Cash didn't know if it was
performance related or a temper tantrum. It was hard to tell with Mattie
sometimes.

“Eat something, Miss Raine,” Miles
said, drawing her attention back to her plate. “Or the airplane is going to
have to take off from base.”

Giggling all over again, Cash
gathered up some chicken on her fork. It tasted pretty nice; the bacon lent a
rich contrasting meaty flavor. She found, after a bite or two, that she was
actually quite hungry. She finished the meal accompanied by Mattie's dulcet
shrieks in the other room.

“Do I get desert now I ate all my
dinner?” Cash turned to Miles, wincing as she did. Sitting was painful,
swiveling whilst sitting, that was a very bad idea on a sore bottom.

“If you like,” Miles said, smiling.

He was pleased with her. She liked
it when he was pleased with her. It gave her a warm, secure glow in her tummy.
Which made a change from the hot, tingling glow in her bottom.

“Actually,” Kevin said casually. “I
don't think desert is in order.”

The statement earned a sharp look
from Cash and Miles, but Kevin didn't seem to care.

“I think we've got something more
important to talk about,” he said. “Now that dinner is done. Cash. Mattie, can
I see you in the lounge, please?”

Cash and Mattie looked at one
another, sharing the same sense of impending doom. Slowly they both made their
way into the lounge. Mattie threw herself into an armchair. Cash remained
standing.

“Before we do anything else
tonight,” he said. “I want an explanation.”

“An explanation?” Cash gave him a
butter wouldn't melt in her mouth look.

“I may not attend concerts,” Kevin
said. “But I do watch videos. And I read forums. I've caught up with what you
two have been up to in the last couple of weeks and I want an explanation.”

Cash went cold. “I...er...”

Kevin was looking at her steadily
and for a second Cash thought back to him spanking Mattie. She glanced around
at Miles, nervous. Miles simply shrugged at her. She got the message. She was
on her own.

“We've just been experimenting,”
she said, sounding somewhat lame. The conviction she had on stage faded
completely in front of her stern manager.

Kevin was not impressed by her
reply in the slightest. “Stop experimenting and go back to the schedule.”

Cash nodded and looked toward the
floor, biting her lower lip. “And what if I don't want to?”

“It's not much about what you want,
Cash. It's about your obligations. It's about contracts. You understand, don't
you?”

Cash nodded slowly. “I guess.”

“Mattie can continue to open for
you, but she has to stay out of the show. Your performances and hers need to be
completely separate.”

“This is bullshit,” Mattie
interjected.

“Mattie, this is a business meeting,”
Kevin snapped. “If you can't behave, you'll have to wait in the bedroom. And
I'll speak with you later.”

Mattie shut her mouth. Cash was
also silent as Kevin glared at both of them. “There's no point sulking,” he
said. “You two went behind my back. You tried to hide this from me. You both
deserve a good spanking for what you've done.”

“Yeah, we tried to do something
new, and we did something the fans fucking loved. That's definitely something
to beat us for,” Mattie exclaimed.

Kevin scowled at Mattie. “Just
because an audience screams, it doesn't mean damage isn't being done. Cash has
a demographic. That demographic doesn't want to see her singing...” he cleared
his throat, looked at his smart phone and read a comment directly from the
Internet “Satanic songs straight from the devil's soul.”

“We've never sung about Satan,”
Cash said, screwing her face up.

“Wait, there's more...” Kevin began
to read again. “Disgusting socialist anthems... communist...” He paused and
looked at Cash. “You cannot sing political songs, Cash. Don't make the mistake
of getting political.”

“Plenty of bands sing political
songs,” Cash pointed out.

“Yes, bands. Artists. Not pretty
young singers... not...”

“Not me,” Cash finished the
sentence he was grasping for. “Not sex symbols. Nobody wants sex objects to
have something to say, do they? I'm not allowed to have a thought in my head,
or to express it. I'm just supposed to smile and shake my ass.”

“Cash...”

“Tell me something,” Cash said,
drawing herself up to her full height and fixing Kevin with a steel blue gaze.
“If I'm just a sex object, what separates you from a pimp, really?”

There was a gasp from Mattie. “Oh.
Shit.”

Kevin's scowl deepened. Cash had
never seen him looking actually angry before, but he looked angry in that moment.
Very angry. For a second, she was scared. She backed up a few steps, until her
own anger kicked back in, returning her to the fray just in time to catch hell
from Kevin.

“I've been working my ass off for
you for months. You earn ten times what you used to. Right this second you're
on an international tour. I'm making your dreams come true, and this is the
thanks I get? You call me a pimp?”

Cash met his anger with her own.
“I'm no Eliza Doolittle, Kevin. I was good when you met me and I'll be good long
after you're gone.”

“Whoa, okay, you two need to settle
down,” Mattie broke in, trying to play peacemaker. “Kev, you're a good manager.
You suck up to the labels too much, but you know what you're doing. Cash,
you're fucking hot and talented and you know it.”

“Fine,” Kevin said, setting his jaw
grimly. “Here's what's going to happen. You and Mattie can keep doing what
you're doing. God knows I can't stop you when you're on stage. But know this,
when the label finds out – and they will, it's all our asses.”

“Fine,” Cash agreed. She spun on
her heel and stamped off to her room. She slammed the door shut and threw
herself on the bed. She was angry. So angry. Kevin had listened to their music
and instead of seeing how amazing it was, all he could think about was the
label and the money. His insistence that she stay nothing more than a sex
symbol made her feel cheap. It was a complete insult to her and everything she
was. More insulting was the fact nobody had come after her. For a long time she
looked at the door, willing it to open.

It didn't.

Irritated by the fact that nobody
had come to inquire after her, or sympathize with her, Cash's annoyance grew.
It turned into something more like outright anger. She reminded herself that
she'd done nothing wrong, that she was an artist and she was allowed to define
her own artistic vision. Kevin had no right to question her, let alone chastise
her. As for Mattie! Well, she'd gone very quiet the minute Kevin snapped at
her. So much for the famous little rebel.

There was only one thing for it.
Cash sat down in front of the vanity and began to carefully apply fresh makeup.
She was already wearing the mandatory touch of foundation, lip liner and
mascara required in case of paparazzi, but it was time to add more. She broke
out palettes of color and carefully picked between them, applying shade and
contouring her face until a glance in the mirror revealed a powerful young
woman who defended her art vigorously and didn't take chastisement from any
man.

She changed her clothing too,
discarding casual travel clothes in favor of a black leather jacket over a
sequined tank top. The lower half of her body was more difficult to clothe due
to the remaining heat in her rear thanks to Miles. He'd promised she wouldn't
sit, but that had turned out to be an exaggeration and Cash was prepared to
suffer for her art. She pulled on a pair of pale skinny jeans and completed the
outfit with four-inch heels that gave her a significant boost in both height
and confidence.

When she flung open the door and
stalked out into the common area, all eyes immediately fell on her. She was
getting used to having that effect. She reveled in it. It was good to know that
one's mere presence could make a room go completely silent. She opened her
mouth to speak, but before she could say what she had to say, she was cut off
by a patronizing question that went a long way towards stealing her thunder.

“Where do you think you're going,
young lady?”

Cash ignored Miles, zeroing in on
Kevin instead. She knew precisely what she looked like, her blue eyes framed
dramatically with dark liner, lashes and shadow. It was just a little color,
but it transformed her into someone much more powerful than the Cash who got
her bottom spanked for not eating.

“I know what separates you from a
pimp,” she said, speaking proud and clear. She let the statement hang in the
air for just a moment, watching as Kevin's once congenial expression hardened
into annoyance. “The difference is,” she continued boldly. “That you work for
me. I decide what I sing. I decide how I sing it. And if you don't like it, you
know where the door is. Understood?”

There was a stunned silence. Even
Mattie kept her mouth firmly shut.

As the silence drew on, Cash became
aware of the fact that her announcement was not having quite the effect she'd
hoped it would have. She had expected a stammering apology from Kevin, instead
she was being faced with hard looks from not just Kevin, but Miles too. Both
men were glowering at her and neither one of them seeming to be in any way
cowed by her announcement. It was quite something, to be caught in the ire
filled gazes of two ex-military men. They both had a certain intensity to them,
an intensity that not only matched hers but exceeded it, making her want to
retreat. If she'd given in to pure animal instinct, she would have turned tail
in that scary silence in which she could only wait to see what reaction she was
going to get.

Her heart skipped a beat as she
glanced at Miles, his handsome face hard with disapproval, his brow quirked in
a way that seemed to say 'you know better than this, young lady'. But it was
Kevin she was really worried about. Prior to the tour, Kevin had been something
like a friend, he was never pushy. But now he looked just as stern and just as
in charge as Miles.

“You hired me as your manager,
Cash,” Kevin said. “A manager is required to manage, and that means letting his
client know when she is making a mistake. Like now, for instance.”

The simple statement took the wind
out of Cash's sails. There was no anger in his voice, no retaliatory snark,
just a simple fact that made her feel a little bit silly.

“Your job is to represent me,” she
said. “It's to get me what I want.” She was aware of the fact that she was
starting to sound very petulant, but dammit, she wanted things her way. “I've
worked my ass off for a long time,” she said. “And I'm not happy with the
current direction.”

“In that case,” Kevin replied, “you
come to me and you tell me that. You don't sneak around for weeks on end,
changing the deal without the record label knowing you've done it, without me
knowing you've done it. And then, when you get caught out, you don't call me a
pimp for representing you in a way you were perfectly satisfied with until very
recently.”

Dammit. He was right. Cash knew he
was right, but she couldn't back down, not after all her dramatic statements.
Not after all her dramatic makeup. To make matters worse, even though she was
looking at Kevin, she could feel Miles' disappointment hitting her like a wave.
Suddenly, in spite of all the effort she'd made to look bold and brazen and
strong, she felt like a naughty little girl.

“I'm sorry,” she said, lowering her
eyes and speaking in a near whisper.

“I don't know what to say, Cash,”
Kevin sighed. “A great deal of what you want is incompatible with your current
success.”

“What does that mean?”

“It means that you can do whatever
you like, Cash. You can walk away from all of this tomorrow and go back to
singing in dive bars. But you can't have your cake and eat it too. This
lifestyle and these earnings come with a certain kind of product.” He paused
for breath. “But,” he said, “ and this is a big but, I will talk to the label
when we are done with the tour. Maybe we can find a way to redefine the Cash
Raine brand that makes you happy.”

A smile spread over Cash's face as
Kevin gave her a glimmer of hope. “Thank you,” she said. “Thank you so much, I
am so sorry I was rude to you.” She clasped her hands together and gave him her
most apologetic look.

“It's alright,” Kevin said,
standing and moving over to her to give her a hug. “I know you've been under a
lot of stress, we all have. I also know that you'll be answering for this
little outburst soon enough.”

Cash stiffened in Kevin's arms and
peeked over his bicep. Miles was looking at her and he did not look happy. Not
one little bit.

“I've done enough answering for one
night, I think,” she said, gracefully stepping back. “I think I'll go to bed.”

“Cash...”

She heard Miles say her name. She
ignored it. She wished she hadn't worn high heels; it made escaping an awkward
situation really quite difficult. She found herself tottering into her room at
the highest speed possible, feeling completely silly as she did.

Before she could shut the door,
Miles was there. He alleviated her of the burden of scampering in high heels by
wrapping his strong arm around her waist and sweeping her up off the ground.

“Miles, no!”

She was afraid that he was going to
start spanking her all over again, but he just sat her on the bed.

“Take those off, you're going to
break an ankle.”

Cash obeyed, working at the little
buckles until her feet were free. Sitting on the bed was an unpleasant reminder
of what had taken place in that very room not all that long ago. Her bottom was
very tender, especially encased in tight jeans that only intensified the ache.

“You're lucky Kevin is the
forgiving kind,” he said, his hands on his hips as he looked down at her. “That
was quite an outburst, young lady.”

“I'm sorry,” she said. “I was just
so tired of feeling pushed into being just this one thing.”

“Is that the cause of this fancy
dress?” A muscle in Miles' cheek ticked as he clearly tried to hold back
amusement. He was teasing her.

She relaxed a little, her shoulders
slumping as she gave him a puppy dog look. “I'm not in trouble with you, am I?”

“You probably should be,” Miles
drawled. “But I think you've had enough for one night. Just remember to be
polite to the people trying to help you, alright?”

Cash nodded. “I just... didn't
expect him to find out tonight. I wasn't ready.”

“But you knew he would find out
eventually.”

“I guess,” Cash admitted.

Miles' voice dropped into a liquid
smooth dominant tone. “Did you enjoy that? The feeling that sooner or later,
you were going to get caught out?”

Cash shook her head. “No.”

It wasn't entirely true. She and
Mattie had both very much enjoyed the little secret they'd been keeping from
Kevin. The knowledge that they were playing a dangerous game made it all the
more fun when they got out on stage and surprised everyone with a new fusion of
styles. 'Thrash Pop', some people were calling it.

“Really?” Miles pushed the question
a little further. “Because I recall a certain young lady on a tour bus telling
me how Kevin didn't know about this music and she looked rather excited about
it all.”

“Okay,” Cash admitted. “It was a
little bit fun.”

“But it wasn't quite so fun getting
caught?”

“Not when he was grumpy with us –
or with me,” Cash said. “Mattie didn't even get into trouble. That wasn't fair
at all.”

Miles sat down on the bed beside
her and put an arm around her shoulders. “That's probably because Mattie wasn't
the one being naughty. She wasn't the one rebelling in secret. And she wasn't
the one who put on war paint to tell him who he worked for.”

Cash grinned a little as Miles
squeezed her shoulders. “It's not war paint,” she said, “it's makeup.”

“Cash, sweetheart, you could lead a
small tribe, you've got that much of the stuff on. You have less on when you go
on stage,” he said, pulling her against his muscular frame. “We could probably
redecorate this room with just what you have stuck to that pretty face of
yours.”

She let out a little giggle. “Well,
maybe.”

“You've gotten good at hiding
behind image, haven't you?”

The observation was keen and it
made her feel somewhat naked. Miles always seemed to see through everything.
Where other people were impressed by smoke and mirrors, he saw through to the
heart of things – to the heart of people.

“How did you get so smart?” She
asked the question with genuine wonder.

Miles chuckled. “I'm not smart,
necessarily,” he said. “I've just had a lot of practice with people. When you
lead a unit, you have to know exactly who every person is. You have to
understand them in order to be able to trust them. Everyone needs somewhere to
hide. Some people hide in anger, some people hide in intellect – you hide in
color.”

She stared at him, realizing just
how true that statement was. “I think you're amazing,” she said, being
completely honest. “I've never known anyone like you. You're scary, but you're
kind and you're sort of dangerous, but you're also a complete teddy bear.”

“Teddy bear, huh?” There was a
dimple in Miles' cheek as he smiled. “Take some advice from this teddy bear –
I'm not going to be covering for you. In fact, I'm going to let Kevin know
precisely what you're up to, especially if it has anything to do with your
work. So if you and Mattie hatch any more little schemes, you're going to get
caught. Understood?”

“Aye aye, captain,” Cash said,
giving him a playful mock salute.

He smiled and pressed a kiss to her
lips, a kiss that deepened and quickly became passionate. She felt his hand
slipping down her back to cup her bottom and then he was pulling her against
his body whilst his tongue played skillfully against hers.

“Let's see what this bear does to
Goldilocks,” he growled against her mouth, laying her down on the bed.

Caught between a giggle and a moan
as his hand slid between her thighs and rubbed against her jean-clad crotch,
Cash unbuttoned her pants. All she wanted was to be naked with him.

He helped her and she soon had part
of her wish. Stripped down to her bra and panties, she let out little whimpers
as he palmed her bottom. The spanking from earlier was still making her flesh
tender. Every time he clenched his hand, fresh tingles of sensation went
zipping through her nether regions.

“I want you,” she breathed. “I want
you to take your clothes off.”

It was something he'd refused
throughout the course of their association and she was afraid he would do so
again, but Miles seemed to be just as tired of the super slow pace of their
physical relationship as she was. In response to her request he stripped off
his shirt, leaving his muscular torso bare.

She made an appreciative sound as
she took the sight of him in. He wasn't all rippling muscles like some of her
contemporaries, but he was strong and hard, slabs of muscle that were
completely unyielding as her bra-clad breasts were pushed against them. His was
a body made for action, one that had done some serious hard work in its time.

His mouth captured hers again and
she splayed her legs as he pushed his hand back between them, lightly massaging
her pussy through her panties. She could barely stand the pleasure of it all;
his touch was so sure, so confident, and so completely possessive. As the pads
of his fingers massaged her intimate petals she felt herself moaning ever more,
her hips thrusting until she was grinding shamelessly against his hand.