Page 10 of Rock Giant

“Yeah.”

His lips pressed to the side of her neck, while his hand landed on her leg, then slid into the space between her thighs.

“Nash, is this really the place and time?”Lee hadn’t even closed the bus door after he’d left.Anyone could walk in.Balin was still only next door, and the mean security lady was in earshot.

“What other time is there?This is going to be our life for the next eight months.We’re going to be constantly on the road and surrounded by people.”

“You say that like I’m going to be with you.”

“Of course you’re going to be with me.Why wouldn’t you be?”He seemed genuinely puzzled.“Need you to keep me sorted.”

“Nash, you know I’m shy about…”

“About the fact you’re not as skinny as some women.So!I don’t mind, and it’s not as if I’m asking to livestream you going all reverse cowgirl on me or anything.”He curled a strand of her hair around one fingertip and used it as an anchor to draw her nearer, while his other followed the inner leg seam of her trousers upwards.Jodi shrugged him off.

“Is this because you had to wait around?”

“No.”

“It is, isn’t it?We were meeting Black Halo.Harry made sure we got a decent stretch of time with them.We’re hot right now, but we’re still small fry next to them.I don’t think you get how important it was that we put in the work sucking up to them.”

“It’s not about you meeting Black Halo or the fact I couldn’t get on your bus.It’s not about anything.It’s just… It’s… this is too exposed.The door’s open, anyone can fucking see in.It’s not sexy.It makes me anxious.”

“You know Balin got a girl off in a packed club the night before last.Put a hand up her skirt and frigged her in front of us and all her mates.And your bestie, Lee—”

She didn’t want to hear it.“It’s irrelevant, Nash.”She wasn’t some other girl, and she wasn’t engaged to either Balin or Lee, much as she loved them both.She stood.“I’m going to take a walk.”

“A walk?”He watched her from beneath his dark brows but didn’t get up from the seat.“I thought we were going to hang together.”

“You can come with me.I thought I might take a look at this stone circle.Make sure I know where I’ve got to be later while I stretch my legs.”

“It doesn’t seem like you’re all that committed to the idea.Don’t like the vows.Don’t like the timing.Not interested in anything intimate, which is saying something considering absence is supposed to make the heart grow fonder.”

Everyone knew that was a myth.

“I said yes, we should do it.I’m literally about to go and suss out the place.How does that make me not committed?Don’t be an arse, Nash.Just because I said no to sex in a public location doesn’t mean...”

He muttered something that she didn’t quite catch and couldn’t be bothered to ask him to repeat.“Maybe Jez has the right idea,” he huffed.

Great, now he was having a full-on strop.She knew better than to argue with him when he got like this.

She left him to get over himself.

Give him an hour and he’d be all Jo-Jo, please can you do this for me?And have you seen my thingamabob, and my hoogeewotsit.And, argh, my lucky marble’s missing, and I’ve looked everywhere, and I need you to work your lady magic to find it.

And because she loved him, she probably would.

CHAPTER 4

Paul “Rock Giant” Reed

Paul made good use of the nearby treeline, then took his time strolling back to the bus.With the sun having burned off the morning mist, he could see more of the band enclosure.Plenty of buses were still shut up with their curtains drawn, but there were pockets of activity, and the site management were already in full organisational flow, waving in additional buses and trucks full of gear.Roadies for various groups were trotting about, or else whizzing past on push bikes.A few had golf buggies and seemed to think that made them it.He spotted Ronnie’s manager setting up her deck chair under the awning of her camper van.He liked Lyra.Found her easy to relate to.For different reasons, they’d both had nomadic youths.

“Morning, Lyra.”

“Mr Reed.”She gave him a wave.It amused him that she always called him that and never anything else.“Hope you’ve not been leading my boy astray.”She always reminded him to look out for Ronnie too.No leading him into temptation and that sort of stuff.Not that the kid needed his hand held.He had a nose for trouble.Not for getting into it, but for sniffing it out before it began, so he was there as an eyewitness to all the important events.If he wasn’t also such a blabbermouth, then MI6 would surely have been on the phone by now eager to employ him as a secret agent.That, or Reuters.He’d have all the scoops.

“There was someone around a little while ago looking for you.”