Page 1 of One More Made Up Love Song (Midnight Rush #2)

CHAPTER ONE

Ivy

It’s not lost on me that at least half of all single women between the ages of eighteen and thirty would probably kill to have my job.

As they should. It’s a good job. The pay is great. Benefits are comprehensive. It includes a lot of travel to destinations all over the world, and I meet famous people on a regular basis.

But it is not all glitz and glamour.

A lot of my job is ridiculous. Tedious. Exhausting in the worst way possible.

I do not have regular work hours. I basically have no work hours. My entire life is just…work.

Twenty-four hours a day, seven days a week, three hundred and sixty-five days a year.

I live in my boss’s house. I sleep on his tour bus. I manage every single detail of his life with what, I am proud to say, is exceptional precision .

And, because I am not at all recognizable and my boss is recognized by almost everyone, I’m the one who has to go inside the twenty-four-hour drugstore even though it’s well past two a.m. just to hunt for Freddie Ridgefield’s favorite flavor of Starburst Minis.

I glance at my watch as I steer my shopping cart into the candy aisle. “FaveReds,” I say to myself as I scan the numerous colorful bags decorating the shelves. “Come on. You have to be here somewhere.”

There are plenty of other Starburst variations. Starburst Gummies, original Starburst, Starburst Jellybeans…seriously? Jellybeans? How many different ways can we eat a Starburst? And why are there no Starburst Minis here? Everyone knows they’re the best kind.

I crouch down to look on a lower shelf, my muscles groaning in protest. Twenty-six feels much too young for groaning muscles. Then again, I have been awake for almost twenty-four hours. Maybe I should cut my muscles some slack.

“Found you!” I say as I reach to the back of the shelf. The bag of Starburst Minis isn’t the FaveReds variety, but it’s better than nothing. I’ll eat all the yellow and orange ones if Freddie really cares that much.

I toss the candy into the cart, then wheel toward the back of the store where I pick up tampons, the cinnamon toothpaste I like so much, and some curl cream that should not work so well for how inexpensive it is.

No matter how many fancy creams and serums and sprays I’ve tried, I always come back to the one my older sister taught me to use.

“Ivy, you’re a teenager now,” Daphne said the night before my thirteenth birthday. She guided me to the edge of the bathtub and sat me down, then raked her fingers through my shower-damp hair. “You have to start acting like you care about your hair.”

For the next twenty minutes, she scrunched and shaped and tamed my curls until they looked as good as hers, talking the whole time, teaching me all the methods she’d learned from online tutorials and curly hair guides.

It felt very ceremonial, this process, like she’d specifically waited until the eve of my thirteenth birthday to bestow the wisdom and knowledge of curly-haired goddesses.

I don’t always remember everything Daphne taught me. The list is way too long.

But I do have really exceptional curls—and that’s all thanks to her.

I drop the curl cream next to Freddie’s candy as a sharp pang of longing cuts across my chest. I rub at my sternum, like I’m rubbing the ache away, but mostly I just need something to do with my hands.

Some action to remind me that I’m still here, still living…

and that’s exactly what Daphne would want me to do. Live.

Even if she couldn’t.

At the end of the aisle, a couple of women break into giggles.

I look up, immediately noting their attire.

Sparkles, glitter, stars on their cheeks, and yep, they’re both wearing Freddie Ridgefield t-shirts.

Well, one of them is wearing a Midnight Rush t-shirt, a throwback to Freddie’s boyband days before he went solo, but it’s clear these women were just at Freddie’s concert.

I duck into the next aisle and head toward the self-checkout at the front of the store, hoping I haven’t taken so long that Freddie comes in looking for me. It’s exactly the kind of thing he would do—despite Wayne’s constant efforts to keep him in check.

After last year, when Freddie rented a black sedan and drove himself from his home in Nashville over to North Carolina to visit Adam, one of his Midnight Rush bandmates—totally alone—his head of security has been a lot more serious about his responsibility to keep Freddie safe.

The fact that Freddie even made it out of his house without alerting Wayne was, in the security guard’s mind, a personal failure on his part.

But Freddie is too charming for his own good. Whether it’s Wayne or me or the entire global female population, he just has a way of winning people over. And that usually means he gets what he wants.

“Did you find them?” A deep voice asks right next to my ear.

I startle and spin around to see Freddie smirking at me, face shaded by a turquoise Appies Hockey baseball cap.

My eyes widen as I look past him and down the aisle to where his fans are still trying on sunglasses. If they look this way, they’ll absolutely see him.

I abandon my cart and grab Freddie’s arm, tugging him to the opposite side of the store. I don’t stop until we’re standing between the condoms and the adult diapers. Perfect.

“What are we doing?” Freddie says, his voice at full volume. “Did you forget something?”

“Can you please stop talking?” I whisper-yell. “What are you doing in here?”

“Looking for you,” he says. “What’s taking so long?”

“I was searching every stupid aisle for your stupid candy,” I say. “Also there are two women four aisles over who were at your concert. Feel like chatting with them right now?” I give him a pointed expression, and his face immediately shifts.

“Definitely not,” he says, his voice finally at a volume to match mine.

“Then stop talking,” I whisper, but it might already be too late.

“Are you serious?” a woman’s voice says. “Could it really be him?”

Freddie winces. He’s honestly so great with his fans. But he’s been on all night. He shouldn’t have to interact with anyone at two a.m., let alone women he doesn’t even know.

I breathe out a sigh and tug him toward me, backing us directly into the wall of diapers. “Please don’t hate me for this,” I say. Then I hook one hand around him and pull his head into the crook of my neck, twisting our bodies so his back faces out.

“What are we doing?” Freddie whispers, his mouth close enough for his breath to tickle my earlobe.

Goosebumps skitter across my skin, and I bite my lip, willing myself to think of something, anything, besides how good it feels to be this close to him.

I’ve got years of practice ignoring my feelings for Freddie, but this is a lot, even for me.

“Just play along,” I whisper back. Then I pitch my voice high enough that I hope the approaching women can hear me.

“Here, Johnny? You want to kiss me here?!”

Freddie practically snorts, his body shaking with suppressed laughter. “Johnny?” he whispers. “Is it 1967?”

“Shut up,” I say through clenched teeth. “Hug me a little closer. ”

Freddie’s arms tighten, his body curling around me as he tucks me closer to his chest. “You know, this could backfire.”

Ha. He has no idea. It’s already backfiring because I can’t stop thinking about unzipping his hoodie and crawling inside, latching myself onto his body like a baby koala.

I knew going in that a tour would be tough.

So. Much. Togetherness. Time on the bus and time in his dressing room and time hanging out after concerts.

I prepared myself mentally. Made a commitment to minimize touching as much as possible. Promised myself I would set clear boundaries and handle Freddie’s Living Out Loud Tour with the utmost professionalism.

Doesn’t exactly sound like pretend make-out sessions in drugstore diaper aisles, but Freddie is the one who came in here in the first place. This is on him.

Or so I will tell myself.

And if I happen to enjoy the physical contact, well, I’ll at least never admit it out loud.

“Freddie Ridgefield caught making out with unknown woman in the diaper aisle,” Freddie continues. “It’s a good headline.”

“It isn’t going to backfire,” I say, but I tug him a little closer anyway, letting one hand skim up and down his back. “Just don’t look up.”

He nestles even closer. “You smell good,” he says into my hair.

His words send an immediate, pulsing heat racing through my body, but no, nope. No heat allowed. I force my brain to think of ice water. Buckets and buckets of dousing cold water raining down onto me, cooling whatever fire this man triggers.

Except, now I’m wondering what it would be like to kiss him in the rain, so I’m not sure if my mental gymnastics are helping or hurting.

“You smell like sweat,” I say, even though it isn’t true. Freddie showered after his show, and he smells amazing. Like the orange and oatmeal goat milk soap he always makes me order from Stonebrook Farm.

He chuckles. “I do not.”

For a split second, I wonder if he knows what I’m doing. Deflecting. Refusing to accept his compliment. Holding us firmly in the friend zone.

Not that he should question. He was the one who made it clear how important it is that I not fall in love with him. He might as well have written it into my contract.

When I don’t hear the women talking, I peek an eye over Freddie’s shoulder to see if they’ve left, but they’re standing directly at the end of the aisle, looking our way with curious expressions.

I lift an eyebrow in challenge, then I pointedly turn my face and tilt it toward Freddie’s, hoping against hope that the way we’re angled, my hair falling just so, it looks like we’re kissing.

In reality, my lips are pressed against the side of his jaw just below his ear.

I slide my hand up and tangle it in the hair at his nape.

“Johnny, they’re watching us,” I say. “Isn’t that weird?”

One of the women breathes out a huff. “Let’s go,” she says. “It definitely isn’t him.”