Vanni: A Prequel (Groupie Book 4) Read online

  She pulls her hand from mine. “Pam,” I start again.

  “I need you to go, Vanni. I need you to go and never come back. If you care about me at all, you have to let me go. I have the life I want. I’m not emotionally equipped to sign on as a lifelong groupie, trailing you around wherever you lead. That’s never what I wanted for myself.”

  “Then we can be friends,” I offer. I’m desperate now. She’s about to sever some of the last fragile strings to my old life–the old me.

  She shakes her head. “No, we can’t. We’ll always wonder what if, and you know it.”

  “What if we don’t have to wonder?” I say. If she came looking for me on Thanksgiving, going to my house, feeling the way she does, then wasn’t that a real possibility? That we could be together at last? “If this thing is too big to fight, why don’t we just give in to it?”

  “Because that’s not the person I want to be, Vanni. And if that’s the person you want me to be, then you were never really my friend at all.”

  I stare at her, speechless. She’s admitted that she wants me. She’s admitted that she can’t stay away from me. Yet she’s kicking me to the curb?

  “Now, if you’ll please go. I have to get back inside.”

  “No,” I say at once. “I’m not going anywhere.” I lean forward, grab her face in my hand. I hold her close for a moment, memorizing every lovely detail of her face. She trembles against me. I know it’s what she wants and what she fears most. I can’t stop myself. My lips crash upon hers and I kiss her hard. She fights me by clenching her mouth closed, pushing at my chest with her hands. She’s fighting for her integrity, but I gave mine up a long time ago. I indulge that kiss, even though it’s stolen. Not just from another man… but from her.

  When she finally pulls away, she slaps me hard across the face. “Get the fuck out of my car!” she screeches. “Get the fuck out of my life!”

  I’m rooted to the spot as she hits me again. She bursts into more tears as she pummels my chest, calling me every name in the book.

  I say nothing else as I grab her hands and hold her still. My gaze never wavers from hers. I pull her close one more time. Her eyes widen as I stare at her mouth, red and puffy from my stolen kiss. “One day you’re going to change your mind.”

  I slam out of the car and head back into the bar for two things. I want a stiff drink, and I want to find Chelsea.

  Pam is right. I am a star. And I’ll be damned if I go home alone.

  Pam doesn’t come in right away. When she does, her eyes are puffy and her makeup is gone. Our eyes meet as I finish off the first of six shots, all bought for me by my new friends. I keep the adoring Chelsea under one arm, cuddling her close. I even kiss her where Pam can see. If she was ready to throw me to the curb, then let her take the consequences that follow.

  I was ready to love her… honestly and legitimately… and she pushed me away. Once again I’m abandoned by one of the very few people left in this world to give a damn about me. Fuck her. Let her go home to her boring husband and her boring life. I’m alone but I’m not lonely. Plenty of women want to be with me, including the cute young thing at my side.

  I wave to all my fans as I corral Chelsea from the club. I hold her close as we walk back to the brownstone.

  I barely get us in the front door before I’m all over her. My hands roam her familiar body as I kiss her deep and long. I slam the door shut behind us, where I press her against the door. “You want me?” I ask and she nods. “Tell me.”

  Her voice is soft and sweet in my ear. “I want you, Vanni.”

  “Good,” I say as I nudge her bare knees apart with mine. “Because I want you.”

  I reach down to release my cock from my jeans. Before I can slip a condom from my back pocket, we both hear someone clear their throat.

  I spin around to find Tina sitting on my sofa. “What the fuck?!”

  Tina just smiles as she stands to her feet. “Surprise.”

  I quickly zip up and stumble away from Chelsea, who pushes down her dress. Tina looks from one of us to the other.

  “Care to introduce me to your friend?”

  Though I was feeling no pain thanks to the six shots at the bar, I’m shocked into sobriety by this new development. “This is Chelsea,” I stammer. “She’s an old friend.”

  “Old?” Tina repeats as she gives Chelsea the once over. “Certainly not the word that comes to my mind.”

  “This is Tina,” I tell Chelsea. “She’s a friend.”

  “Oh, darling. Don’t be shy,” she says as she walks over to me and links her arm with mine. To Chelsea she says, “We live together.”

  Chelsea’s eyes widen as she glances between us. I turn to Tina.

  “What are you doing here?” I demand in a low voice.

  “I came to hear all about the show, of course.” Her cool gaze slides to Chelsea. “I’m afraid you’ll have to excuse us, dear. We have important business to discuss.” She pulls out her cell phone and calls for the car. “My driver will take you anywhere you want to go.”

  Chelsea looks up at me, as if expecting me to step in. And I probably should, but in my new sober state, I realize now that everything that I’ve done to further the band could crumple in a heartbeat if I piss off Tina Nunes. All my eggs are in her basket, and she could crack them all with a snap of her finger. The last thing I want to do is give her any reason to back out of her promise to let us perform on NYE. “I’ll call you,” I offer to Chelsea instead. I know it sounds lame, but I don’t know what else to do.

  She nods and then slips through the front door, humiliated and frustrated. Tina steps away from me to lock it behind her.

  “What the hell was that about?”

  She snickers to herself. “Oh, darling. I have so much more work to do with you. That girl? Really? She looks twelve.”

  “She’s nineteen,” I grit through clenched teeth, pissed I feel even remotely compelled to defend myself.

  “Yes, well. That’s still too young. The more attention you get, the more of a target you put on your back for young silly girls who want to snag themselves a rock star.” She walks over to the sofa and plops down. “Now come tell me how the show went.”

  My jaw drops open as I stare at her. “Are you serious?”

  “When I talk about business, I’m always serious. You should know that by now. Or has one night in the sticks warped your reality?”

  With a sinking gut I think about Pam. “My reality has always been warped,” I tell her before I stalk to the kitchen to find something, anything, to drink.

  I’ve halfway guzzled a fifth of whiskey by the time she saunters in to find me. She pulls another bottle of vino from the shelf, before digging around in the drawers for a corkscrew. Eventually I help her find it.

  “So what was all that about anyway? Are we supposed to be exclusive now?”

  “Heavens no,” she laughs. “You were off duty tonight,” she adds with a smile. “But, if the choice of bed partner is me or some pathetic groupie, you should always pick me. Friends are hard to come by in this business. You’ll do well not to burn any bridges if you can help it.”

  I lean against the table. “So… what? You just came here to fuck?”

  She rolls one of her shoulders. “Among other things. I wasn’t lying before. I really am interested in how your show went.”

  I chug some more whiskey. “It was a smashing success. Everyone loved us. And I hated every minute of it.” I kill the bottle. She simply crosses her arms and waits. Finally, “I did it for a girl, okay?”

  “Of course you did,” she says as she puts her glass on the counter. “My sensitive, tender-hearted Romeo. But oh, foolish boy. Haven’t you figured out love has no place in the spotlight?” She walks over to me, running her hands along my arms. “Sex, drugs and rock and roll. That’s the lie you’re selling. You don’t want to fuck it up with the truth.”

  “I’m not lying to anyone,” I tell her.

  “Of course you are,” she
says. “You’ve never stopped. You’ve lied to the guys in your band. You’ve lied to me. Hell, you’re even lying to yourself. You think there’s this ordinary guy underneath it all, one who can go visit regular families in Queens on Thanksgiving, watch a little football on TV and play with a couple of kids, and that’ll make it easier to stomach selling your soul for fame and glory.”

  I glared down my nose at her. “So you know about Sasha, too.”

  She leans close. “I know everything, Vanni. I told you I was going to make you a star. I’ve invested a lot of time, money and effort into this endeavor. And I’m not going to sit back and allow you to wreck everything I’ve managed to do for you. You’re going to have to make up your mind what you want to do, Vanni. You can stay here in this run-down house, go back to slinging pizzas at Cynzia’s. Chase after some doe-eyed groupie who will land your ass in jail if you’re not careful, or wind up giving you some screaming brat you have to support. You can crawl into every whiskey bottle in Brooklyn and live out the rest of your ordinary life with nothing but your unrealized dreams to keep you company. Or,” she says as she steps even closer, “You can be a good boy. You can listen to what I’ve trying to teach you. You can make the world stand up and take notice that you are goddamn Giovanni Carnevale and that means something whether they know it yet or not. You can stop trying to piss away everything I’m doing for you to make you a fucking legend. But you better make that choice quick and stick to it. Because if I walk away, good luck trying to find anyone who can do for you what needs to be done.” Her eyes capture mine. “You just need to ask yourself one question. Who do you want to be?”

  I can’t decide whether I love her or hate her as I stare down into her deceptively beautiful face. I know everything she is saying is the absolute truth, and it takes someone who really gives a damn to say it so bluntly. She’s invested in me, way more than anyone else had been, except for maybe my aunt. She’s willing to move mountains and hand me the life I want practically on a gold platter. With her I get to attend important parties, meet influential people, and live in a fucking high-rise apartment on goddamn Park Avenue.

  Fuck yes that’s the life I want.

  I grab her by the waist and pull her to my body, molding her to every sinewy line. I capture her mouth in a severe kiss, where I bite at her lips and practically choke her with my tongue. I reach around her to slam everything that is on the table right onto the floor, lying her down on her back on the old scratched table where I used to eat oatmeal and do homework.

  I hike up her skirt. There’s a primal growl in my throat as I discover she’s not wearing any underwear. Of course she’s wet for me, holding my life in the palm of her hands has always turned her on. And making her scream has always turned me on, so I unzip my pants and release my hard, pulsating cock before I climb between her spread legs and impale her with precious little preamble.

  There’s no lovemaking about it as I ride her hard. One hand clasps handfuls of her hair as the other squeezes her breast. I bend to take a bite out of her skin. I know how far I can go with Tina, farther than I’ve ever gone with anyone before.

  The more aggressive I get, the wilder she gets. She’s screaming for me to fuck her harder and faster. The sound bounces off the fading wallpaper. I grunt like an animal as I comply. Thanks to the liquor I’ve been guzzling, I can see the ghosts of my past, including Old Vanni himself, linger in the shadows of that kitchen.

  Let them get an eyeful of the New Vanni in all his glory. I put all the missing pieces together with every powerful stroke, filling in the full picture of the man who will lead Dreaming in Blue right into 2006. I unload in her with a victorious yell.

  The shadows scatter back to their corners. This is the only truth that matters now. This is who I am. This is who I was meant to be. And if anyone doesn’t like it, they can go straight to hell.

  From now on, I live for no one but me.

  CHAPTER TWENTY:

  The rest of 2005 is a blur. I barely notice my first Christmas without my aunt because I’m busy preparing for the NYE show.

  This is not an accident.

  Tina’s not exactly a holiday person, so the house is never decorated, which helps. Aside from a couple of parties, we can throw all our energy into the upcoming show and not think about Christmas at all.

  I don’t even make it back to Bensonhurst to spend any more time at the brownstone. That’s part of another life now, with painful scars that have only just begun to scab over.

  Instead I rehearse the band to the point of exhaustion. Tina is very hands on with the project. She’s got dozens of tips and hints to make it better.

  “I want you to make an entrance,” she tells me. “Let them start the intro while you’re back there behind the fog machine. Then, when that spotlight hits you, you fly out of that cloud of blue smoke and attack that stage like you mean it.”

  I nod and we set up the intro again. Like always, she’s completely right. That it makes it better.

  If Sasha notices that I’m not talking much anymore, she doesn’t say anything. But I can tell she’s watching me. I can feel her concern.

  Too little, too late. I’ve got shit to do, and convincing everyone that I’m okay is not high on my list of priorities.

  Of course I’m okay. I’m living with a sexy, powerful woman in a luxury penthouse, I’m about to play one of the hottest venues in town on one of the biggest nights of the year. I’ve got the next six months set up for me, with a regular gig at Sedução and six, count ‘em, six, out-of-town shows.

  Finally Tina proves true to her word, which makes me even more loyal to her, even though there are already some grumblings in the band.

  I want to remind them that they wouldn’t have all these opportunities if it wasn’t for me, but I’ll hold onto that little nugget until I need it.

  Instead I focus on the business, on the music, and on Tina. Even in the bedroom, she’s refining this new Vanni’s hard edges. Since she’s older than me, she teaches me things that I never learned before. She’s up for anything, no matter how raunchy. There are always new toys to try out. I thought she might shatter into a million pieces with the orgasm I gave to her after I handcuffed her.

  Nothing is forbidden with her. She even suggests that we could invite other women into our bed, provided that she gets to select them. “No teenagers,” she repeats again as we prowl around a swanky party full of the most beautiful, successful people in the city.

  We take home a model who is so beautiful she doesn’t even seem real. Watching her with Tina is all the Christmas gift I need.

  By December 31st, I’m so ready to hit that stage for my Sedução debut I feel like I’m going to burn up in my own skin. And this time, unlike before, we’re actually on the roster. Dreaming in Blue is scheduled to perform between two up-and-coming musical acts. The crowd in the joint is insane. They go even crazier as I jump out of that smoky mist and assault them with a sexually brazen act that has all the party girls down front ready to hop up on stage with me, which of course I allow because who doesn’t want to dance with sexy, beautiful women?

  Our set is a resounding success. By midnight, I’m on stage with my band and the rest of the talent booked that night, counting down to an amazing new year. I sweep Tina up into my arms for a deep, long kiss. I can’t wait to see what happens next.

  We head down to Atlantic City in January, where we’re booked in one of the hottest resorts. We draw the groupies like flies, but I resist any after-parties. Tina is right. I don’t need to follow my dick around anymore. “Leave them wanting more,” she advised as her fingers trailed down my body. “As long as they love you more than you love them, they’ll never stop coming back.”

  But that’s not the real reason I have to abstain. I know now the one painful truth: The sweet, normal girls I always seem to favor want more than the life I can give them, especially now.

  Pam is certainly proof positive of that. I wouldn’t give up this life for anyone, and the girls wor
th having understand that. Best not to open that can of worms if at all possible.

  I just save it for Tina when I get home, no matter how much Bobby pouts about it.

  With me in groupie lockdown, he has lost his best wingman to seduce pretty young things by the dozen. Felix has no interest playing the field, neither does Yael. They both find Bobby’s behavior sophomoric and dangerous. I finally give him the same warning Tina gave me, to be careful with girls who are so young, who might have expectations that he won’t be able to meet.

  He just shrugs me off and finds a couple more girls to hit on.

  February we hit the road again, this time heading to Boston. I keep my nose to the grindstone, trying to figure out ways to improve our performances. I’m writing like a fiend, so generally I spend road time in the back, head in a notebook, jotting down lyrics. I usually bring Yael into the process once I get the melody down, and we end up collaborating on several songs. We’ve got our eye on recording a demo now, though Tina thinks it’s premature.

  “You need more experience,” she says. “We’ll talk about it after June, when things slow down.”

  Only things don’t slow down. For Spring Break we’re in Florida, where we book at least three more gigs for summer.

  It’s May before I make it back to Bensonhurst. I don’t bother with Fritz’s. There’s no point. Instead, I decide to renovate the brownstone. I’m not living in it, so I can pretty much gut it and change it into something a little nicer. It’s my biggest investment, after all. I want to add to its value in a way that poor Aunt Susan could never afford to do.

  I’m doing well by this point, with some disposable income outside of what I want to spend on the band. I even have my very own car. Of course, it’s actually Tina’s. She bought a brand new sports car for me to zip around town in, so the whole city knows she’s grooming a star. With the expensive clothes and the fancy car, plenty of girls try to hit on me. I just tell them to come see me at a show and I’m done with it.