Page 15 of New Year's Faye

Sam brushed a hand across my arm. “What?”

I peeked at him from under the icepack. “We should stay married. Until the end of the tour. It’ll generate interest from your fans, and intrigue from the press. Then it’ll all settle down and we can quietly annul after the tour when we’re not constantly in front of the media.”

Sam frowned. “You’d be willing to do that?”

“Sure.” I closed my eyes again. “But only if you give me a raise. And a prenup. Don’t want you stealing all my debt.”

He snorted, sweeping a loose braid back as he gently stroked my cheek. “Sleep, Faye. I’ll work something out.”

“Okay,” I agreed, and promptly did just that.

3

SAM

"Watching from the wings while you run the show

Catching every detail we need to know

Taking care of things that others forgot

But who's taking care of you?"

- The Wild Ones, "Stage Manager"

Faye glared at me from across the tour bus.

She’d been doing that a lot since we’d woken up with rings on our fingers and a marriage license on the bedside table.

Fuck. That’d been a shock. Waking up in Faye’s bed with her looking like fucking smoke show even after a full night of drinking and drama with smudged make up and a crumpled dress? Damn. Happy New Years to me.

Her immediately fainting and knocking her head on the side of the bed? Not so great.

The memories of last night were hazy, like the edges of an old photograph, but I’d managed to recall a few details—her laughing as we danced, the flash of a neon-lit chapel, my own voice slurring out a “Fuck yes!” as someone slipped a ring into my hand.

I glanced down at the band on my finger, feeling the cool, solid weight of the medal. A sharp ache had taken up residence in my chest, a reckless kind of satisfaction that felt both irrational and persistent.

I glanced back up to find Faye still glaring at me, her eyes narrowed as she told me silently that she didn’t find our situation funny at all.

“Don’t give me that look,” I told her, unreasonably amused by her reaction. “You’ve done this to us more times that I can count.”

She crossed her arms across her chest, arching a delicate eyebrow. “This is my job.”

“Not today,” her assistant, Liz, said cheerfully. “Todayyou’rethe story.”

I ignored the snickers from my fellow bandmates as Faye’s cheeks took on a dark flush.

Joining us were Justice, Felix and Radley—my fellow Wild Ones. Not too long ago, we were a pack of ramshackle kids who happened to strike it big. Now we were about to undertake the next leg of our world tour.

Our appearances certainly reflected the change in our circumstances. Where before we were all rough edges and cheap clothes, now we were primped and prodded, dressed in designer gear from the top of our heads to the tips of our toes.

“Have to say I’m enjoying sitting on this side of the table,” Justice drawled from where he lay sprawled across his bunk inthe bus—a guitar in one hand as he absently plucked at strings. Tattoos decorated each arm and peeked out the top of his V-neck shirt. A shirt for which I’d given him shit more than once. Though our lead singer didn’t care, he’d had simply smoothed a hand over his dark hair, and grinned at me, throwing his arms out as he’d proclaimed he was giving the fans exactly what they wanted.

Based on the explicit fan emails I happened to read occasionally—he wasn’t wrong.

“How are you not hung over?” I asked him, tossing a guitar pick at his head.

He ignored it, strumming slowly. “When one doesn’t drink, one doesn’t get drunk.”

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