Page 46 of Catch
His brow furrowed, and his lips twitched as if he were holding back a grin. “Did you seriously just drop me off at my door like, ‘Thank you for the fine fuck, my dear sir, but I must be on my way’?”
I snorted, my laugh echoing down the hall. “I’m not gonna be the reason you don’t sleep again tonight.”
“The fuck you are,” he chuckled, carrying me into his room and tossing me onto his bed. The mattress bounced beneath me,and before I could protest, he climbed in after me, pulling the blankets over both of us, wrapping me in his warmth.
His voice softened, a low murmur against my hair. “I don’t know how much time you’re gonna give me, Lox. Let me enjoy it while I can.”
My breath caught. For a moment, I wondered if I was just fulfilling some fantasy for him—as Loxley Adams, the persona the world knew. But then I remembered the way he’d called me Ms. Anderson while he was inside me.
At the time, I hadn’t thought much of it, but now, I was thankful. Because maybe, just maybe, that meant he saw the real me. The girl from South Carolina who loved to sing, not just the girl the cameras adored. The thought settled deep in my chest, warm and terrifying all at once.
“My brother died when I was fifteen,” I whispered, the confession slipping out before I could stop it. “He was only fourteen. A freshman in high school.”
Miles stilled beneath me, his body tensed as he absorbed my words. His hand paused mid-stroke along my arm, his breath catching for just a second before resuming, steady and grounding.
I wasn’t sure why I said it. Maybe because, tangled up with him in the dark, I felt safe enough to let someone in. My brother was part of who I was before I was famous, and after all the things I had been thinking about, I just wanted him to know something about the girl I was that no one else knew.
“Tell me more,” he whispered, his voice gentle, coaxing me to tell my story.
I smiled faintly, the memory bittersweet. “He used to ask me to sing to him. He’d tell me I was going to be a star one day and asked if he could be my bodyguard. He didn’t want me to leave our small town alone. He said the world was too big for me to face alone.”
Miles’ fingers resumed their soothing strokes along my arm, his touch grounding me as I sighed deeply at the memory. My brother and I never wanted to leave our mother, but we didn’t want to be stuck in the same small existence that she had lived from the moment my father left. We wanted out, we wanted more, and I hated that he never got to grow up and become something on his own.
“It’s not online, or in articles,” I added, my voice barely above a whisper. “No one knows I even had a brother. No one cares. But I don’t think there is a day that goes by that I don’t think about him. I didn’t mean to make this moment between us so weird, but for some reason, I wanted you to know he existed. I wanted you to know something normal about me.”
Miles surprised me then, his hand sliding up to gently pull at my hair, angling my head to face him. His eyes met mine, filled with something I couldn’t quite name but felt down to my bones. “This isn’t weird, Lox. I want to know everything about you. Just like I told you about my parents. Tell me the rest. Tell me what happened to him.”
I nodded, giving him a tight smile, then rested my head back down on his chest. “It was a car accident. A distracted driver t-boned him and my mama on the passenger side. Mama was barely scratched, but he died on the way to the hospital. Mama was never the same. Not that I blame her, I don’t think I was ever the same either. I can’t even remember where they were going, but I remember the sheriff showing up at the house and telling me he needed to take me to the hospital to be with my mama. I was supposed to be doing my homework, but I was writing a song.”
“Is it one I’d recognize?” he asked softly.
“Nah,” I scoffed a laugh. “I’ve never gotten to release my own music. They let me sing one every now and then in a show, but Ihave a strict list of genre-approved songs for the two albums I’ve released.”
“I want to hear all the songs you’ve ever written.”
“It’s not as many as you’d think. After I lost my brother, I stopped writing for a long time. I stopped singing, too. Then one day Mama came into my room with a few thousand dollars in a little envelope. She told me Mr. Harris from down the road was headed to Nashville and agreed to give me a ride. She told me to go chase my dreams.”
“How old were you?”
“Sixteen.”
I heard his sharp intake of breath, the shock evident. “Holy shit, Lox. You’ve been on your own since then?”
“Not really,” I laughed softly. “I walked right into the record label I’m with now and sang until someone threatened to kick me out. Sam walked in before I gave up, and he took me upstairs to the executives. They listened to me for a minute, had a meeting behind my back, then told me they’d sign me. I was stupid enough to think I’d have it made, and in a way, I did. I was almost seventeen, had my own driver, a new condo, and a cushy bank account. It happened so fast. I wish I could go back, be smarter.”
“You were so young and on your own, they probably figured they could puppeteer you, mold you to be anything they wanted,” Miles added, hitting the nail on the head.
“Bingo,” I poked at his chest. “It hasn’t been all bad. I’ve been lucky, in a way. They’ve controlled my career, but they’ve never done anything to me that would harm me.”
Miles grabbed my wrists, his fingers brushing over the faint bruises Sam left before I ran. He didn’t have to say a word before I shrugged and sighed.
“Yeah, but I meant in ways some young women are treated in this business.”
I could feel him relax a little underneath me, which made me realize he had been thinking it but didn’t want to ask. Knowing I’d never been sexually assaulted, or made to do anything of that nature, settled what I guess was idle rage inside him.
“I still don’t like anyone controlling you, Lox.”
“I’m free for now, and when I go back, I’m gonna be stronger and ready to fight back. Thanks to you.”
