MirrorMusic

  Mirror Music

  Lily Harlem

  As Robbie Harding belts out hit song Jenny to a packed Wembley Stadium, my heart tears, my mind fudges and my insides heat to a lusty, pulsing boiling point.

  Why me more than the other 90,000 screaming fans?

  Because I’m Jenny—he’s singing about me.

  The guy is sex on legs with a voice to match and has starred in all my hot dreams since the day boys became interesting. For three precious years, it was more than hot dreams. Turns out he wants me back in his life and his bed. How can I resist?

  So with lots of naked, sweaty and downright dirty time to make up for, I wield my backstage pass, hunt him down and refuse to be starstruck by the boy next door. Seems Robbie agrees, as he insists on tuning in to my needs and rediscovering our rhythm before we even reach a bedroom.

  An Ellora’s Cave Romantica Publication

  www.ellorascave.com

  Mirror Music

  ISBN 9781419931604

  ALL RIGHTS RESERVED

  Mirror Music Copyright © 2011 Lily Harlem

  Edited by Jillian Bell

  Cover art by Syneca

  Electronic book publication January 2011

  The terms Romantica® and Quickies® are registered trademarks of Ellora’s Cave Publishing.

  With the exception of quotes used in reviews, this book may not be reproduced or used in whole or in part by any means existing without written permission from the publisher, Ellora’s Cave Publishing, Inc.® 1056 Home Avenue, Akron OH 44310-3502.

  Warning: The unauthorized reproduction or distribution of this copyrighted work is illegal. No part of this book may be scanned, uploaded or distributed via the Internet or any other means, electronic or print, without the publisher’s permission. Criminal copyright infringement, including infringement without monetary gain, is investigated by the FBI and is punishable by up to 5 years in federal prison and a fine of $250,000. (http://www.fbi.gov/ipr/). Please purchase only authorized electronic or print editions and do not participate in or encourage the electronic piracy of copyrighted material. Your support of the author’s rights is appreciated.

  This book is a work of fiction and any resemblance to persons, living or dead, or places, events or locales is purely coincidental. The characters are productions of the author’s imagination and used fictitiously.

  MIRROR MUSIC

  Lily Harlem

  Trademarks Acknowledgement

  The author acknowledges the trademarked status and trademark owners of the following wordmarks mentioned in this work of fiction:

  Beck’s: Brauerei Beck GmbH & Co.

  Harrods: Harrods Limited

  Jaguar: Jaguar Cars Limited

  Selfridges: Selfridges Retail Limited

  Oscar: Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences

  MTV: Viacom International Inc.

  Chapter One

  Jenny, Oh Jenny, I’m still here, still waiting, still aching

  No one else has ever compared

  Oh, Jenny I’m here, still waiting, still aching

  Still breaking my heart over youuuuuuuuu

  The final lines of Manic Machines’ latest number one hit swept through Wembley. As the last, tortured syllable drew to an end, a stitch tugged at my heart and tears pricked the backs of my eyes. For a bittersweet second all was silent as the massive crowd held their collective breaths, hypnotized by the raw emotion, the heartfelt lyrics and the haunting melody.

  Then the place erupted. Screams, cheers and wails of adoration blasted the air in a sonic boom. The lead singer, Robbie Harding, hung his head over his microphone and shoved a hand around the nape of his neck, massaging it as though it ached. I strained to see him as hands and arms shot up in front of me—fingers outstretched, lighters aloft in an eerie salute to Jenny.

  Jenny.

  Jenny who had, he’d just told his fans in very eloquent, very emotive words, broken his heart into a million little pieces, none of which he knew how to put back together.

  Four years ago Jenny did that to him. Four long years. But he doesn’t mention that in his lyrics. He sings as though it was only yesterday they screamed at one another and he accused her of cheating and lying. He sings as though it was only yesterday they slammed doors, broke promises and shattered dreams.

  So how do I know it was four years ago?

  Because he’s singing about me.

  I’m Jenny. Jenny Calahan, and four years ago I broke Robbie Harding’s heart. He broke mine too. But he’s the one singing about it in front of thousands while I watch from the sidelines, still aching, still breaking.

  Can I turn on the TV or lift a magazine without seeing his impossibly handsome face? No. Not a chance. He used to be just across the street at number 81 and I could avoid him when I visited my parents, but now he’s everywhere. Manic Machines just keeps getting bigger and bigger. They’ve become huge in the USA, too, which of course has meant a string of glamorous Hollywood stars hanging on his arm over the last six months. Not that I care of course. Who he dates is none of my business.

  Not anymore.

  “That’s a wrap for tonight, folks!” Robbie shouted, his eyes once more lifted to the crowd and the spotlights illuminating his tall frame and tousled dark hair. “Thanks for being such an amazing audience.” He grinned broadly and waved both hands as he stepped to the left. “We love you, London. Good night!”

  But the crowd was having none of it. Feet began to stamp. Hands clapped. Soon the floor shook as though a thousand elephants were hurtling across it. My ears rang with the noise. I could barely hear my own thoughts.

  Robbie left the stage. So did Ian and Dean, his two guitarists. But the drummer, Tim, stayed behind banging away. A slow, rhythmic beat that sounded like a languid heartbeat. Duh, duh. Duh, duh. Duh, duh.

  The crowd knew what that meant. “More, more, more,” they chanted. “More, more, more.”

  I strained to see the stage. Black except for one lemon-colored light shining down on Tim. His arms pounded, his head bobbed. The beat vibrated right to the center of my core and for a second calmed my jittery nerves.

  Suddenly high-pitched cheers sparked from the front row. Excited shouts that flowed toward me in waves. I saw the two guitarists step onto the stage and pick up their instruments. A low bass joined the beat of the drum.

  The crowd turned frenzied. They’d gotten their way, another song was coming.

  “Robbie, Robbie, Robbie,” they bellowed in time with their claps.

  There he was. Back on the stage in a perfect white circle of light. He had a bottle of what looked like beer in his hand. Probably Beck’s. That was his favorite. Or at least it used to be.

  I was jostled by a girl to my right as she shoved her camera in the air and snapped away. She didn’t apologize even though she nearly knocked me over.

  “This really is the last one,” Robbie shouted, his deep voice booming above the noise of the crowd. “Because you’ve been so amazing this evening, here’s one more song.”

  The audience roared.

  “Any requests?” he asked, plucking the microphone from the stand and holding it out to the sea of people.

  “Party Animal!” the girl next to me screamed. “Party Animal, sing Party Animal!”

  “Jenny, sing Jenny again,” hollered the lady on my right. “Sing Jenny.”

  “I can’t hear you!” Robbie yelled, cupping his ear and stretching the microphone out farther. “What do you want? Tell me.”

  I struggled to decipher an overwhelming request through the mayhem of song titles hollered out.

  “Strawberries and Screams?” Robbie asked, standing upright and grinning. “You want Strawberries and Screams again?”

  “Yes, yes.” My two neighbors yelled with new e
nthusiasm. “Strawberries and Screams.”

  The guitarists picked up the first funky lines of Strawberries and Screams, a record that had been played to death on UK radio and was obviously still a fan favorite. It wasn’t one of mine. Hearing Robbie sing about making love to a redhead with pale skin and fruity nipples made my skin itch and my jaw clench.

  “Excuse me,” I said to the girl who’d jostled me. She took no notice so I pushed past her into the aisle. I’d had enough.

  I trotted down the steps and walked into the deserted corridor. I could still make out Robbie’s voice filling the stadium, swirling around his crowd the way it used to swirl around me. The beating music vibrated into my soul, dragging a deeply buried memory to the forefront of my mind.

  I stopped and leaned back against the cold wall. Dropped my head into my hands and braced my knees. I was at the mercy of my mind’s eye, and like flicking a switch I was suddenly there again.

  Robbie’s face hovered over me and the gorgeous scent of his naked skin enveloped me. He ducked and murmured hot words into my ear. Hot words that spoke of how he felt and exactly what dirty deeds he wanted to do to me. My heart fluttered and a flush of tickles traveled over my scalp as his warm breath shimmied across my neck. He shifted his weight, his long, naked body solid and lean as he pressed me into the mattress in his small bedroom.

  “Jenny,” he murmured, sliding his hands between our bodies as his legs eased mine apart. “Jenny, Jenny, it’s only you, always you.”

  His fingertips created a tingle across the flesh of my stomach. His touch was so delicate, so full of love. I loved him too, my heart was swollen with it. He kept moving his hand over sensitive skin as his kisses headed lower down my neck and trailed across my breasts. He touched my intimate folds of flesh, separating them and searching out my clit. I thought I might burst with desire for him, with my need to become part of him, fade into him.

  I let out a small moan of longing as he left my clit and pushed into me, filling me, claiming me with his fingers. But it wasn’t his fingers I wanted. I wanted more. I squirmed, searching for his erect cock. Desperate for him.

  “Patience, Jenny,” he said with an amused lilt.

  But Robbie was not a patient man, and the next thing I felt was the smooth, round head of his cock pushing into my wet channel. He always got it just right, slow and steady while I stretched around him. I groaned and hunted for his mouth, plunged my tongue in to find his as I locked my ankles at the base of his spine.

  My palms traveled over the smooth, soft skin of his shoulders. His body was so perfect, so strong and so amazingly in tune with mine. He upped the pace, shoving in and out as I clung to him with all my strength. My breath caught as the blinding pleasure of the orgasm he created deep within me flooded my veins and strummed my nerve endings. In a tsunami of ecstasy, we came together, crying out, clinging to one another as though our lives depended on it. My pussy spasmed and throbbed, pulsating around his cock as he filled the condom, riding through his insanely intense pleasure as I claimed mine with a greed I’d never known before or since.

  Our breaths slowed and I dropped my hands from my eyes. It had been a long time since a flashback had overwhelmed me. Blinking in the harsh light of the corridor, I reoriented myself to my surroundings. The walls were painted a sickly green and the floor strewn with litter. Robbie was still singing, hammering out the chorus of Strawberries and Screams. A small tremor attacked my body. I could have told myself it was the cold but I knew it was the vividness of the memory that had generated the pleasurable little shiver.

  I glanced left and right and pushed away from the wall. Soon the corridor would be heaving with thousands. I didn’t want to get caught up in the surge of people. I should really get going.

  I shoved my hands deep in the pocket of my pink hooded top and my right fist clutched the small red plastic card that had dropped on my parents’ doormat two weeks ago. Manic Machines—Full Access Backstage Pass was written in thick black letters along with the dates and Jenny Calahan.

  I knew he’d sent it, along with a single ticket for each of the Wembley performances. Four tickets in total. Four separate nights.

  He wanted me to come.

  Really wanted me to come.

  The tickets were strange after such a long time with no contact but Robbie had never done things the conventional way, which, I guessed, is why he was the superstar he was.

  I hadn’t wanted to come to his concert and never would have chosen to. I knew seeing Robbie in the flesh would exhaust my confused, long-buried emotions. Also I didn’t know if I could cope with seeing him do his stuff. Singing brilliantly and entertaining thousands with his chat and his devastating smile and all the time him not belonging to me. But curiosity had gotten the better of me, which was why I was here on the last night of Manic Machines’ tour.

  My soft shoes were silent as I searched for signs to backstage. Eventually, after what felt like a mile with no luck, I asked a stern-looking security man who bent my pass with nailbitten fingers, testing for authenticity.

  “You’ve come the wrong way, love. Best thing you can do now is go outside,” he said after he’d all but bitten the plastic between his teeth. “Then head toward the heavy gates and show this pass. They’ll direct you from there, it will be quicker than going back the way you came.”

  “Thanks,” I said, re-pocketing the small rectangle of plastic and wondering whether to follow his directions or just jump on the Tube. It would be easier to ride home and forget all about Robbie. Forget that I’d seen him. Forget that I’d listened to him sing about the way we’d been when things were good between us. The way we’d kissed and made love, shared our fears and dreams. The way he’d held me tight and lost himself in my vanilla-scented hair. How he remembered I’d used vanilla shampoo was beyond me. Had he really become lost in my essence when he buried his face in it?

  I stepped outside into the cool October evening. It was pitch dark and the lampposts shone amber. A hint of drizzle caught in the pools of light and dampened my hot cheeks. I turned toward the looming black gates. They were huge and spiked. Beyond them was a host of trucks and vans. Several generators chugged.

  “Can I help you?” a stern voice asked from the darkness on the other side of the gate.

  “Er, yes,” I said, looking for the owner of the voice.

  A small man wearing a suit and a peaked cap appeared. Stadium Security was embroidered in gold thread on his jacket sleeve.

  “I’m trying to get backstage,” I said, holding up my pass as if it were a golden ticket. But this was no golden ticket. This was no pass to a chocolate feast. In my hand I held something Robbie had sent to bring me to him. A key, a whisper, a hope, a plea. Did I really want to unlock our past? Open up that can of worms again?

  The security guy raised his brows. “Of course, madam,” he said with a polite smile. “Come through this way.” He took several steps to the right and, using a torch to light his way, unlocked a smaller gate. “Come in and I’ll get someone to escort you.”

  He relocked the door and lifted a walkie-talkie from his pocket. I listened to him request an escort for an “all area visitor”. “Won’t be long,” he said to me, smiling.

  Within a minute a petite young lady clutching a clipboard to her chest appeared. Her shoulder-length mousy hair had flattened against her scalp in the drizzle.

  “Hi,” she said. “I’m Sylvia, head of MM’s PR management. Can I just check your pass?”

  I handed it over then turned as a sudden stampede caught my attention. On the other side of the gates, the crowd was streaming out the doors into the night, some running for the first seats on the Tube, others racing to the parking lot before the rush. But many dawdled, singing, with their arms linked and smiles on their faces.

  “This way, Jenny,” Sylvia said. “I’ll take you straight there.”

  *

  My stomach tightened as I followed Sylvia down a brightly lit winding corridor. Several people rushed past us
and we had to flatten ourselves against the wall to get out of their way. As we moved on again I patted my bubbles of blonde hair, frizzing because of the damp evening. I wore just the tiniest hint of makeup, a thin layer of waterproof mascara and sheer gloss.

  Beneath my hoody I had on a small cream t-shirt with a V-neck. Within the V sat the tiny butterfly necklace Robbie had bought me the last Christmas we’d spent together. It wasn’t an expensive piece of jewelry. Neither of us had much money then. But it had meant a lot that Christmas morning, especially when he said that he knew I needed to spread my wings and fulfill my dreams of university.

  We stopped outside a shiny white door. A burly security guy stood against it with his thick arms crossed over his colossal chest. He gave Sylvia the smallest of nods and stepped aside as she reached for the handle.

  Beneath my faded denim jeans, my knees turned watery. I didn’t know if I could go through with this, seeing Robbie after all this time. He wasn’t the boy next door anymore. The guy I’d lost my virginity to in the tent at the bottom of his garden. He was an international musician, known all over the world for his talent and his good looks. He dated supermodels and Oscar winners. He wasn’t “my” Robbie Harding anymore. He belonged to millions of adoring fans.

  I tugged at my bottom lip with my teeth and dragged in a deep breath. I was a little dizzy, a little nauseous.

  He’d lost his virginity to me too. We’d traded. We’d done it so we were even. We both wanted to be each other’s first—and last, if I remembered the conversation correctly.

  Sylvia pushed open the door and took a step inside. I stayed still. Out in the corridor where the lights were harsh and the air stuffy.

  But I wasn’t the girl next door either. Not anymore. I was “Dr.” Calahan and I’d just been involved in important research into the prevention of malaria. My name, along with the results of my study, had been splashed about several medical journals. I no longer collected butterflies in jam jars any more than he still had a snail farm in an old fish tank in his garage.

  We’d both changed.

  “Come in,” Sylvia called to me. “Come in, they don’t bite.”