Page 32 of You Belong With Me

Zach went over and picked up the guitar, running a hand over its curves, expression serious. Was he thinking about Grey?

He looked back at Leah and smiled lopsidedly. “All right, we’ll try it your way.”

Morning came eventually. Actually she knew exactly when it came because she was already up and walking along the harbor front, having given up on the concept of sleep sometime around four a.m. So she had the perfect view of the sky lightening slowly over the water.

“Just another day,” she muttered as she reached the end of the marina and stopped to breathe for a moment as the sky painted itself gold and pink and deep blue, the light making the sleeping boats shine gold and the water below them shimmer while they waited for the day to begin.

A new day. Just like any other. Yeah and if she believed that, she could probably convince herself that pigs could grow wings and fly her to the mainland. It wasn’t just another day. It was day one of the season of Zach Harper. A season she’d never expected would return. But here it was. She’d be spending a lot of time with him until these songs were finished.

She just needed to make sure that her heart survived the experience.

Five hours later she was sitting outside the booth, no longer worried about her heart, but starting to wonder if it was possible to die from terminal awkwardness. Zach had arrived about an hour ago, by which time she’d practically scrubbed the studio from top to bottom as well as changed her set up for the song they would be working on today about five times.

It hadn’t done much to calm all the nervous energy that was making her feel as though her veins were full of tiny spiky balls bouncing around. She’d almost spilled coffee on herself when she’d offered to make Zach a cup as a way to break the ice.

He’d almost spilled coffee on himself when he’d taken it from her.

Then he’d retreated inside the booth after making the bare minimum of small talk, leaving her to go back to her seat in front of the board and try to summon the nerve to get started.

While she hesitated, she still watched him. Sitting there, looking nervous or something close to it. His fingers drummed the side of the guitar as he shifted on the stool.

She hit the intercom. One of them had to act like the adult in this situation. It was just first-day jitters. Lots of bands had those when they came into a studio. So it was her job as producer to make Zach feel comfortable so they could stop being weird and get to work. “Everything okay? You need to change something?”

He shook his head. “No. It’s good.”

“All right.” She stared at him through the glass. If it had been Nessa, she might have gone in there and made chitchat until she relaxed. But she wasn’t really sure that would work with Zach. “So why don’t you just run through the first song a few times so I can get a feel for it and then we can try for a take?”

Maybe they should have kept this to Grey’s studio. It was smaller, more familiar to him. But she was more at home with the set-up here, and she wanted to give him her best.

Zach nodded, closed his fingers around the guitar’s neck, and adjusted the angle it rested at on his thigh. Then he began to play.

It sounded great. He was good. More than good. She’d spent half the night listening to Fringe Dweller’s two albums and the couple of demos Zach had e-mailed her, plus a few old recordings of him and Faith playing that she found buried in the depths of the studio server, but none of them were quite the same as listening to him play live.

Seeing him curving slightly over the guitar, fingers moving surely, she felt like she was seventeen again, trying to listen to him on the sly and wanting him more than she had imagined it was possible to want someone.

No. No-oooooo.

Not going to happen. She crossed her legs, leaning forward. She was here to listen. To hear the music and decide how to bring it to life, not to crush on the guy playing it.

She was a professional. She’d had famous guys on the other side of her glass before. Hot famous guys.

And she’d done her damn job.

So that was what she was going to do now.

No stupid crush allowed.

No sirree. All hormones would be maintained under strict control.

And then Zach began to sing.

God. His voice. Lower than Grey’s famous tenor, but it shared some of the honeyed quality that had made his father’s voice so compelling. And despite that touch of familiarity, it was somehow all Zach. Grey had been known for the hint of rasp under the power of his vocals. Zach’s voice was clearer, even when he dropped to a low note. Stronger than she remembered. He’d been working on it, it seemed, and something told her if he ever decided to let fly on one of the power-rock ballads that Grey had been the master of, he might just be able to blow Grey out of the water.

But that wasn’t how he was singing now. No, this tune was low and intimate and a little dirty. A song of longing and of trying to win back a woman wronged. And seemingly every note he sang was perfectly pitched to set all her nerve endings on fire, heat springing to life in every female part she possessed.

She sat frozen, trying not to melt into a puddle as she listened. She had no idea what words he was singing any more, just that right that second she’d do just about anything to keep him singing them.

Fu-u-uck.

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