Page 61 of Finding Grey

THIRTY

______

DANTE

“I used to imagine you travelling the world with a backpack and a camera. Taking backstage photos of all the music greats.” Threading my fingers through Sean’s, I stroked his forearm with my other hand. We had yet to make it out of bed and I couldn’t seem to stop touching him. “I looked for you at every festival for years, hoping to see you again.”

“There was no chance of that,” he said, shaking his head. “I didn’t go to another concert for ages, and I never went backstage again.”

Frowning, I rolled onto my side, so I could see his face. “Why?”

“Soon after that night, my dad retired from the circuit, so he could open this place. He said he was tired of travelling and being away from us. You should have seen the tantrum I threw when he announced the big news.” Sean gave a quiet laugh. “My fury knew no bounds.”

I grinned, imagining the slender boy I’d met going off his nut at Phil. “Did you break anything?”

“No,” he admitted with a sigh. “But I would have, if I’d thought it would help.” He turned his head to look at me. “I only went with him during school holidays, so it would have been a while before we crossed paths again, but I’d already started plotting ways to accidentally run into you when the opportunity appeared.” He came up onto his side as well, sliding one hand over my hip. “I daydreamed about what I would say,” his mouth ghosted over mine, “how I would seduce you into making out with me again.” Tilting his head, he kissed the side of my neck. “I was planning some sweet moves. You would have been impressed.”

“All your planning would have gone to waste,” I said with a laugh, loving that he’d thought about me as much as I’d thought about him. “I would have abducted you on sight and been all over you the second we were alone.” Grabbing a handful of his hair in my fist, I brought his mouth back to mine. “You wouldn’t have stood a chance.” I breathed the words against his lips before capturing them in a kiss, at once languid and fiercely possessive.

“Damn it,” Sean murmured when we parted. “For a musician, my dad had a crap sense of timing.”

Putting aside regrets for a past that had never been, I instead focused on enjoying the man in my arms. For so long, I’d wanted the opportunity to learn everything there was to know about Grey. Now my wish had been granted, I didn’t want to squander such a precious gift.

“Did you miss it?” I asked, thinking of all the photos he’d taken in those teenage years. “Travelling with your dad, being a part of it all?”

“Hell, yes.” Turning onto his stomach, he propped himself up on his elbows, and I couldn’t resist the urge to trail my fingers over the curve of his bicep. Yep, that whole obsession with touching him wasn’t about to end any time soon.

“I’d spent my youth eating cold pizza with musicians most people only knew as voices on the radio and taking photos of bands on sell-out tours. At the time, I planned to live my whole life that way.” He snorted at the dreams of his younger self, as if they’d never stood a chance. “Granted, there’s a hell of a lot more to being a successful music photographer than taking the photos. But at fifteen, all I knew was the high of seeing the world through my lens.” The elation in his voice told me he still loved the fantasy, even if he didn’t believe it could come true. “I missed the rush and the chaos—and the music. Going to school, living a normal life with no possibility of parole, seemed so boring by comparison.”

“I could have used a little of that boredom,” I told him. “I stopped going to a regular school at fifteen and had tutors for everything, including a couple who travelled on the road with me. I didn’t miss the dingy classrooms or the routine, but I missed being around other kids my age.”

“You didn’t keep in contact with your old friends?” he asked.

“I tried for a while, but it didn’t take long for our lives to fall out of sync. They were getting drunk at backyard parties while I performed concerts for thousands of people at a time.” It didn’t help the kids I’d once hung out with quickly became jealous of the lifestyle I lived. They assumed it was all wild parties and throwing money around. It was supposed to look that way from the outside. The idea that I worked freaking hard to make my success look easy didn’t occur to them. “After a while, we didn’t have anything to talk to each other about.”

Sean’s fingertips stroked the ridge of my brow as he frowned at me. “I hate that you were so lonely.”

“It was what it was,” I said, shrugging one shoulder. “I got used to it.”

“But if I’d given you a way to contact me…” He rolled his eyes, made a frustrated sound in the back of his throat. “I thought about it,” he admitted, “but I knew if I gave you my phone number, I would have spent months jumping every time the phone rang. I didn’t want to be that person.”

“I wouldn’t have kept you waiting,” I assured him. “But how was planning to run into me accidentally-on-purpose different?”

Sean gave a wry grin. “Because it would have seemed coincidental. If you hadn’t been interested, I could have pretended I didn’t care, and you wouldn’t have known I’d made an idiot of myself acting like a stalker.”

The last part made me laugh out loud. “I would have stalked you to hell and back if I’d had the chance.” My left hand spread out across his bare back before stroking up between his shoulder blades. “None of it matters now we’ve found our way back to each other.” I traced the length of his spine down to the top of his crease, before ascending once more. “Maybe that’s how it was supposed to happen, so we could have this.” Sean’s back arched as my hand continued its leisurely journey up and down, descending a little further each time. “This is everything.”

He brushed his lips against mine in a feather light kiss before touching our foreheads together. “I wish we had more time,” he whispered, his eyes closed. “You’ll go back to Melbourne soon and then, after the album’s done, you’ll be on tour for months. All this will be over.” His head lifted, revealing the regret in his eyes. “I don’t know how to go back to living without you.”

My arm curled around his waist, pulling him against me as denial rammed into my chest. I couldn’t walk away. There had to be some way for us to make this work. Then, I realised there was a way, and it suddenly seemed so obvious, almost inevitable. “What if we could be together?”

Sean looked up at me with confused eyes. “How?”

“There’s nothing tying me to Melbourne, not really,” I began, my heart rate spiking as the idea took hold. “I could finish the album up here, and when I go on tour…” I paused to take a deep breath before continuing, “I want you to come with me.” His mouth fell open in shock and I rushed to explain before he had a chance to respond. “We always have a tour photographer with us. That could be you. You said you missed music photography, this could be your way of getting back into it.” Grabbing his hand, I held on tight, desperate for him to say yes. “We’d get to travel the world together, both of us doing what we love.”

He sat up, excitement flaring. “You’re serious?”

“Of course, I’m serious,” I said with a laugh, leaning forward to kiss him. “We’ll be together every day, sleep in the same bed every night.” I kissed a path up his neck and along his jawline. “We’ll have to be careful, but I can make sure our hotel rooms are always right next to each other, so we don’t have to worry about getting caught.”