Page 28 of Starstruck
A hand lands on my shoulder, and I startle.
“She sure is a firecracker, that one.” Colt chuckles by my side. “This is going to be fun.”
It’s another week before we’re able to agree on a time to record—I’ve been busy finalizing the other songs on my album, while Isa has been working on recording hers. We only have today, and I’m determined to not let this take longer than that, seeing how difficult it was for us to work this one into our schedules.
Isa and I sit in my studio, her with a pen between her fingers and me with a guitar in my lap. We’ve been at it for a few hours now, and things are coming along nicely. Though I initially said we weren’t changing the song…she has made a few good suggestions that I would be stupid to ignore.
I pick at the strings as she writes down the lyric changes we just made, and suddenly my mouth is moving before my brain has a chance to tell it to stop.
“So, how do you know the Thornes?” is the genius question that comes out.
She looks up from her notebook, a confused look on her face. “Who said I know the Thornes?”
“I—” I cut myself off, sighing. “I just assumed. I saw you at the funeral.”
She chuckles. “There were, like, seven hundred people at the funeral,James,” she says flatly. “And I’m signed to their label. Obviously, I’d be at the funeral. Just like you were.”
I run a hand down my face. She’s right. There’s no way I could conclude that she was close with them from seeing her there. “Touché, Cordova,” I mutter. “Touché.”
She just looks at me, waiting. I should’ve shut up when I had the chance, because now it’s obvious she knows I’m not telling the truth, and the weight of her stare is enough to make me uncomfortable.
I let out a sigh and admit, “I was at the reception.”
“Do you think I’m stupid?” She narrows her eyes at me. “Iwas at the reception, along with maybe twenty others,includingthe Thornes. I would’ve known if you were there. We all would’ve.”
I set the guitar down beside me, leaning back on the couch. “I didn’t go inside. I was going to, but then I saw…” I trail off, realizing I probably shouldn’t share the private moment of Lennon’s I witnessed. “I just decided it’d be better if I didn’t.”
She stares at me, one brow raised as if to saybullshit, but her lips don’t move. Feeling like I’m being examined, I shift in my seat and pull out a cigarette. I offer one to her, and she takes it, placing the filtered end between her lips and lighting it.
“Forget I asked,” I mutter, not enjoying the way she’s reading me.
“To answer your question,” Isa says with a smirk, a cloud of smoke falling from her lips. “Lennon and I are best friends. I’ve known the Thornes for years.”
I’m taking a puff of my smoke as she says that, and then I’m coughing, her words striking me right in the chest. I was expecting her to say she was a family friend, not that she’sbest friendswith Lennon.
I catch my breath and look up to find her watching me with narrowed eyes and a wicked smirk.
Oh, she definitely knows. So much for trying to be subtle.
I scoff. “You know, don’t you?”
She crosses one leg over the other, an innocent smile playing on her lips. “Why, what on Earth could I possibly know?” she asks innocently. “Oh! Are you talking about what happened in the bathroom at Astro and how you let Lennon spend the night in your bed? Because if so, thenyes, I fucking know.” The shit-eating grin on her face suggests this conversation is one she’s been waiting for.
I shoot my own shit-eating grin back at her. “So, she told you about the best sex of her life?”
Isa rolls her eyes. “Okay,yes, but how arrogant do you have to be to assume that’s what she said?”
“Well, isn’t it?” I shrug. “Besides, it was the best sex of mine, so I just figured if it was that good for me, it was even better for her.”
“I suppose the eight orgasms speak for themselves, don’t they?” she jokes, completely unphased by talking about her best friend’s sex life.
Women are strange.
Though, I suppose Levi isn’t much better.
“Nine,” I correct. “It wasnineorgasms.”
“Oh, my bad,” she mock-apologizes, her eyes rolling, and laughs. “Man, she really wasn’t lying when she said you’re a cocky son of a bitch, was she?”
