He made a zipper-like motion over his lips. “I can’t promise Jay won’t say anything or that the others aren’t already noticing something there, but I won’t say anything else about it. I’ll tone down the flirting, though, even if I was just having fun with her. You know I wouldn’t step on your toes like that.”
I smiled warmly at him. “I appreciate that, lil bro.”
“Besides, she seems to be the only one who is able to shake that damn stick up your ass loose,” he said as the grin returned. “Hell, maybe she'll even be able to pull the whole damn thing out of there!”
I gave him a playful smack on the back of the head.
“Come on. Let’s get settled into the suite,” I suggested. He hopped down from his bunk with a loud thump and followed me out with the others to grab our bags. Nalia already had a couple of luggage carts waiting for us and had the bellman loading our bags. Little things like that made me especially thankful for an assistant — and waking up with her curled up next to me made me especially thankful that I had chosen her.
“Come on, boy
s, let's get moving. We’ve got a couple hours to rest up, then a busy, but fun-filled, day ahead of us,” she said in a chipper, but somewhat sarcastic manner, causing groans of dissent from the others.
I couldn’t help but laugh, as I’d actually slept great and wasn’t tired at all. Nalia had already gotten us checked in, so we headed straight for the elevator and upstairs to our suite. As soon as the doors opened, Talon and Jay headed for the bedrooms, and I heard the distinct flop of Talon throwing himself on a mattress. The others did the same, just tossing their luggage on the floor and not bothering to unpack anything. It seemed that nobody else, besides Nalia and I, had actually gotten much rest on the bus. I hung back and tipped the bellman, then turned to Nalia.
“You going to get some rest, too?” I asked her.
“Nah. I feel pretty well rested,” she shrugged. “Anyway, there are a bunch of things I want to check on for our next stop and a number of other small details about things that I just want to double check. And, I was definitely thinking of taking a nice, long, relaxing bubble bath before the guys dirty up all the bathrooms, too. I bet the tub here in the penthouse is amazing, you know.”
“Mmm, a bubble bath with you sounds amazing right about now.” A wicked grin crossed my lips, but she put a hand up.
“I said a relaxing bubble bath, and that means alone. The only company I'd want for that would be a book,” she said with a wink. I gave her a playful pout.
She added a teasing, “Maybe later,” before disappearing up the stairs. I watched her go up, wishing I could join her, but in truth, I had some more emails and other business matters to take care of myself. Despite that, a “maybe later” sounded great and was enough to keep my spirits up.
I headed to one of the rooms myself and pulled out my laptop, getting lost in emails and looking over our set list for the night. It wasn’t until Nalia knocked on the door that I realized over two hours had passed.
“You might want to get in one of the showers before the other guys get in. You know, freshen up and wash the road off of you.” She leaned against the open doorway.
I pulled my shirt off, smelling it, and my eyes certainly did not miss the once-over she gave my bare chest.
“Do I smell?” I asked. She leaned toward me and took a sniff, in the process letting me get a nice whiff of how sweet she smelled.
“Not really, just figured you’d want to get a shower in after being on the road for so long. Get yourself all refreshed feeling,” she said as she pulled her hair out of her towel. I grinned, just imagining her enjoying her bath. Sadly, she was already dressed. Otherwise, I might have offered to drag her into the shower with me.
“Yeah, probably a good idea,” I nodded, shutting my laptop and getting up off the bed. She tossed a clean towel at me.
“Let me know if you need anything.” She winked, then disappeared to finish getting ready.
Once everyone was showered, clean, and mostly awake, we headed downstairs to the lobby. Nalia had already arranged for our gear to be taken to the venue we were playing at and had a fully-stocked limo waiting for us. I climbed in last and sat next to her, feeling a lot more excited about the show that night and formally kicking off the tour. It was easier to be excited since Nalia had taken care of all the details..
Granted, the tour was just beginning, but things had never run so smoothly before. There had always been hiccups when I had tried to take care of everything myself. Sure, they made for good tour stories, but it was much better and so much less stressful having her by my side to catch anything that threatened to fall through the cracks.
Talon gave me a look when I settled in next to Nalia, but true to his word, he said nothing. We headed out to the venue, everyone buzzing with excitement and energy. We were so ready to kick off this tour. Nalia just sat silently, soaking in everyone’s excitement, but having a glass of wine to celebrate with everyone else.
When we arrived, we all piled out of the limo and headed in backstage to meet with the lighting and sound crew. There wasn’t too much to go over with the lighting crew since Nalia had sent the plans over ahead of time and had made sure the road team already had all our gear set up on stage for us. I could only imagine how amazing she’d been on the other tours she’d organized. If she kept this up, I’d definitely find a place for her with Young Records. We were only on day one of the tour, and she was already proving herself invaluable.
She disappeared backstage to follow up on a few last minute things with the crew while we headed to the dressing room to hang out and have lunch before sound check and rehearsal.
“Okay, I know you might hate me for saying it, but I think I’m in love with Nalia,” Talon announced as he set his eyes on the delectable spread of food the caterer had laid out in our dressing room.
I laughed, understanding why he’d said it. Somehow, she’d managed to find out all of our favorite foods to have before a show and had them laid out before us with all our favorite fixings, right down to Talon’s favorite brand of gummy bears.
“If she doesn’t watch out, she’s going to need to make up a workout regimen for us while we’re on tour, too, bringing out all our favorite foods like this.”
“Dude, she’s probably already penciled that into our schedules and packed our workout clothes,” Talon said as he patted me on the shoulder. Come to think of it, he was probably right, I thought with a laugh. Still, I wouldn’t mind working out with her. I could definitely get used to seeing her in those yoga pants she’d been wearing last night.
“Owen, you all right, dude?” Talon waved a hand in front of my face, pulling me from my thoughts.