Outside, the night air hits me like a blessing. A cool, dry, quiet in a way arenas never are.
I weave past a line of semis, compressor engines humming quietly. Our buses are parked farther down, near the chain-link fence. The path is lit with those awful industrial floodlights that make everything look like a prison yard.
I’m halfway to the buses when movement catches my eye. Someone leaning against a trailer. No, not someone. It’s Dean. Of course it is. He’s got one foot braced behind him on the metal bumper, a cigarette dangling between two fingers, hair wild from the show. Sweat is still drying along his neck, leaving a faint sheen on his collarbones where his shirt hangs loose. His head is tipped back against the trailer, eyes closed.
He looks wrecked. Not in a bad way. In a dangerous way. The kind of wrecked that makes my stomach dip. I should keep walking. But when do I ever do what I should?
He must hear my steps because he cracks one eye open. Just one. A lazy, slow drag of his gaze up my body like he’s taking inventory.
“Well,” he drawls, voice rough from the show. “If it isn’t camera girl.”
“Don’t call me that.” My nose crinkles.
He smirks. “Then quit acting like you don’t love when I say it.”
I stop a few feet away from him, resting my shoulder against the side of the trailer. I don’t trust myself to get any closer. “Are you drunk?”
“Little buzzed.” He shrugs. “Celebratory shot after the show. Or three.” He lifts his hand, wiggling his fingers. “I might’ve lost count.” His voice is warm. Loose. Not sharp like earlier. Not armored. This version of him is worse, because it’s tempting.
“You shouldn’t be smoking,” I toss out because I’m at a loss to say anything more sensible.
He glances at the cigarette. “Why? You gonna save me from my vices?”
“No interest in saving you,” I shoot back.
“That’s such bullshit.” His mouth lifts, slow and sinful. “You tried earlier.”
“That was me trying to be a decent human being, not your personal therapist,” I clarify, crossing my arms over my chest.
“So, you do think about my well-being?” He chuckles around the cigarette, which lights the edges of his words in smoke. “Noted.”
God, he’s infuriating. And God help me, he knows exactly what he’s doing.
“I’m going to bed.” I roll my eyes.
“Of course you are.”
“What does that mean?” I tut in annoyance.
“It means,” he pushes off the trailer in one lazy movement tossing the cigarette away, “you walked over here like you hoped someone would stop you.”
I freeze. His steps are slow as he approaches, not crowding me, not touching me, just reducing the space between us until the air between us is hot enough to melt steel. He smells like sweat and stage lights and bourbon.
“You’re imagining things,” I spout, but my voice thins at the end.
He hears it. Of course he does.
“That’s part of the problem.” His voice almost a growl. “I’m trying not to imagine things.”
My pulse stumbles. “Dean-”
“You keep looking at me,” he continues softly. “Side stage. Backstage.” He pauses, stares directly at me. “Right now.”
“That’s my job,” I sputter.
“Bullshit.” He takes a couple steps closer. Too close. Not close enough. “I see everything, Sadie.” His voice drops, low and private. “And I know when someone’s looking like they want something they shouldn’t have.”
Heat flashes through me so fast I’m sure he can see it. “You’re drunk.”
