Chapter 1: The Lap Dance Tease
George grinned, her eyes crinkling. “More like those nature documentaries. The one where the seals mob the single penguin.”
“Which one of them is the penguin?”
“Bill, obviously. Tom’s the smug shark circling just outside the frame.”
They laughed, a private island of calm in the chaos. No one approached them. A few fans glanced over, but their eyes quickly slid back to the gravitational pull of the guitarist and drummer. It was a familiar dynamic.
Then a shift. A trio of guys, probably university students, huddled together, their eyes not on Tom but on George. They nudged each other, building courage. Finally, one broke away, clutching a tour program.
“Excuse me,” he said, bowing slightly. “Georgia? Could we… a photo?”
Her smile was immediate and genuine, not the polished stage version. “Sure thing.”
She stepped away from the table, sliding between the bodies to join them. They clustered around, the middle one holding out his phone with a shaking hand. George slung an arm around two of their shoulders. “Ready? Don’t blink.”
The flash went off. But instead of pulling away, she turned her head and planted a firm, audible kiss on the cheek of the fan to her left.
Time stuttered for a second. The boy’s eyes went wide as saucers. His friends erupted into loud, envious whoops.
It was like striking a match in a gas leak.
Suddenly, there was a line. A literal, forming queue of male fans, disentangling themselves from the edges of Tom and Bill’s mob, their programs and CDs suddenly held aloft. George laughed, a bright, unbothered sound, and obliged them, posing for each photo, delivering a quick, chaste peck on a succession of stunned and delighted cheeks.
Tom watched it over the head of a fan begging him to sign her arm. His playful smirk didn’t slip, but one dark eyebrow arched, his gaze tracking George’s movements with a new, specific focus. He watched the way she controlled the crowd with a wink and a laugh, the way the boys stumbled away grinning like lottery winners. He said nothing, just stored the image away, the seed of a future tease taking root.
A while later, the noise was a dull throb through the walls. The break room was a claustrophobic afterthought, lit by a flickering fluorescent tube that buzzed like an angry insect. It smelled of stale beer, fried food from a half-eaten bento box, and the sharp, clean scent of sweat-soaked leather.
Tom was sprawled on a worn couch that had seen better decades, one booted foot resting on a stack of unsold posters. George had claimed the other end, her head tipped back against the wall, eyes closed.
“So,” Tom said, his voice a low rasp that cut through the hum. “You running a kissing booth now? Should we set up a ticket system?”
George didn’t open her eyes. A smile played on her lips. “Someone had to entertain the neglected half of the fanbase. You and Bill were busy being emotionally devoured.”
“Looked like you were doing plenty of devouring. Or at least, tasting.”
She opened one eye, slanting a look at him. “Jealous, Kaulitz? Worried about your market share?”
He gave a short, dismissive laugh, stretching his arms along the back of the couch. The movement pulled his thin t-shirt tight across his chest. “Please. I’m just concerned for your lip health. All those nervous, sweaty cheeks. It’s a bacterial minefield.”
“My hero. Always looking out.”
The silence that fell wasn’t empty. It was charged, a quiet hum underneath the room’s ambient noise. Tom watched her, the way a strand of hair clung to her temple, the steady rise and fall of her breath. The memory of the lobby, of her power in that simple, cheeky act, fizzed in his veins.
“Seriously, though,” he said, his tone dropping, turning conversational but pointed. “That first kid. You kissed him and he looked like he’d been struck by lightning. What’s the going rate for a photo with a kiss? Do I get a family discount?”
That did it. Both her eyes opened. She turned her head on the wall to look at him fully, her expression unreadable. Then, without a word, she unfolded herself from the couch.
She didn’t walk around the low table littered with empty cans. She simply placed one knee on the couch cushion between his sprawled legs, then the other, lowering herself onto his lap in one smooth, deliberate motion. The worn leather creaked underneath them.
Tom’s casual sprawl vanished. His body went still, a wire pulled taut. He could feel the heat of her through both their jeans, the solid weight of her settling against him. His arms were still on the couch back, trapping her in a loose circle.
“What are you doing?” he asked. His voice had lost its teasing edge. It was just air.
“Showing you the premium package,” George said softly, her face inches from his. “Since you’re so curious about the going rate.”
She began to move. Not a squirm, not a fidget. A slow, deliberate roll of her hips, grinding down against the hard line of his zipper. The friction was brutal, exquisite torture through the layers of denim. A sharp, punched-out sound escaped him.
Her eyes stayed locked on his, watching the cocky smirk evaporate, watching his dark pupils swallow the hazel of his irises. Her hand, which had been braced on the couch behind his shoulder, slid down. It brushed over his chest, his stomach, and then her palm pressed, firm and knowing, against the aching bulge in his jeans.
He jerked, a full-body flinch. “Fuck, George—”
She said nothing. Her hand began to stroke him, a slow, relentless rhythm through the rough fabric, perfectly timed with the roll of her hips. It was clinical and incendiary all at once. The pressure built, a tight, painful throbbing that had him biting the inside of his cheek. The smells of the room—the stale beer, the old grease—were gone, replaced only by the hint of lavender from her skin and the raw, electric scent of want. His hands, still frozen on the couch back, curled into fists, the knuckles white.
Every nerve ending was on fire, focused entirely on the points of contact: her heat against him, the devastating pressure of her hand. He was painfully, unmistakably hard, and she owned every fraction of it.
Just as suddenly as she’d started, she stopped.
Her hand lifted away. Her hips stilled. She leaned forward, her lips brushing the shell of his ear. He could feel her breath, warm and quick. “That’s the price of the review, Tom.”
Then she was gone. Pushing off his lap, standing smooth and steady as if she’d just stood up from a chair. He sucked in a ragged breath, his body screaming at the sudden, brutal absence of pressure, the cold rush of air where her heat had been.
George looked down at him. He was a wreck—chest heaving, face flushed, a visible, straining outline against his jeans that he couldn’t possibly hide. A faint, satisfied smile touched her lips. She winked.
Then she turned and walked out of the break room, the door swinging shut behind her with a soft, final click.
Tom let his head fall back against the couch with a dull thud. He stared at the buzzing, flickering light. The throbbing between his legs was a visceral ache, a desperate, unfinished pulse. He was alone, surrounded by the silent junk of the green room, the distant thunder of the crowd nothing but background noise to the storm she’d left roaring in his blood. He was utterly, completely, and infuriatingly hooked.