One Wicked Lick
from the Drummer
The One
Ainslie Paton
This story is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places and events that happen are the product of the author’s vivid imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual events, places, organizations or people, living or dead is purely co-incidental and beyond the intent of the author and publisher. Copyright © 2019.
One Wicked Lick from the Drummer
Ainslie Paton
As the wildly exciting drummer in an up-and-coming band, Grip was at the top of Mena’s list of hot drummers to hook up with.
She’d promised herself that after she nailed him, she’d quit her groupie life, finish her finance degree and become her own rock star.
Fifteen years later, she’s right on track, a polished professional investment advisor, her goth look and the name she used back then a distant memory.
Except the new client in the boardroom is her old obsession, sexier and more famous than ever, and her promotion to partner depends on making him happy.
With her clothes on.
He’ll never guess who she was, so her secret is safe, until her obsession comes roaring back.
And Grip remembers the one girl he could never forget.
Do you know why they call a drummer's seat a throne? Because drummers are kings and queens.
-Ed Thigpen
A drummer is usually like the backbone.
-Brody Dalle
The drummer's always going to be there. They're the floor of the whole deal and everyone can stand up on you.
-Ringo Star
But primarily, the drummer's supposed to sit back there and swing the band.
-Buddy Rich
CHAPTERS
ONE
TWO
THREE
FOUR
FIVE
SIX
SEVEN
EIGHT
NINE
TEN
ELEVEN
TWELVE
THIRTEEN
FOURTEEN
FIFTEEN
SIXTEEN
SEVENTEEN
EIGHTEEN
NINETEEN
TWENTY
TWENTY-ONE
EPILOGUE
ONE NIGHT WITH THE SEXIEST MAN ALIVE
OFFENSIVE BEHAVIOR
About the Author
ONE
Shock made Mena lose her breath, take a step back and collide with the heavy wooden door as it closed. It boosted her forward, forcing her to take an awkward little jump. She wobbled as her stiletto-clad ankle rolled and everything she’d been balancing on the flat of her laptop went flying: phone, notepad, pen, business-card holder.
Thank Joseph Pilates she didn’t land on her arse, legs over her head, date-ready Agent Provocateur underwear on show.
But it was a close thing.
Ow, her ankle hurt. Wow, this could not be happening. She wasn’t supposed to walk into a new client briefing in the boardroom and meet her number one score.
She especially wasn’t supposed to find that the past fifteen years had been enormously kind to him, and he was sexier than ever. Still had a smile that could power a concert venue and make her insides turn to goo. And it was total bullshit that seeing him again had made her knees go weak, her mouth fall open and her body flash hot.
He could still rock her, and he hadn’t done anything but glance up and smile as she’d staggered in.
“Mena, oh no. Are you okay?” Caroline wrenched her eight months and nine days pregnant self out of her chair to help Mena and the two of them bumped, grabbing onto each other to steady themselves.
“I’m fine. Goodness.” Hell. No, she was not fine. She was regretting every good decision she’d made since leaving his bed all those years ago. “Please sit down, Caroline.” If he recognized her, everything she’d worked for after her retirement as a good-time girl, the partnership offer she expected to receive, the security she’d earned, the amazing life she’d built herself could come to a crashing halt.
Swire & Yallop did not promote former groupies who’d slept their way around every concert venue in Australia to seriously fabulous, life-changing salaries.
“Mark Grippen, this is Mena Grady,” Caroline said with a smile towards their guest as she eased into her seat. “She’ll be taking over my clients while I’m on maternity leave.”
Caroline had said they were meeting a new client, MG Holdings, and the last thing Mena thought MG would stand for was Mark Grippen, the drummer from Lost Property.
Grip had been at the top of her list of drummers—always and only drummers—to sleep with when she’d been young and reckless and lost.
He was talented, athletic, and magnetic on stage, and so aspirational that she’d promised to quit the groupie lifestyle and make something of herself if she could bag him.
And bag him she did. One glorious night that morphed unexpectedly into seven days of tour bus riding, backstage privileges, incendiary, soul-scoring sex in cheap hotels and falling inconveniently in love.
A good groupie never overstayed her welcome and never expected more than her lust object offered. Grip had a plane to catch and another stage to conquer and Mena had a finance degree to finish and a shot at becoming her own rock star.
More than a decade later, she was one successfully managed maternity leave support stint away from achieving her goal and she wasn’t about to jeopardize that because of the inconvenient reflex action of regret and damp underwear.
She put her laptop on the boardroom table and scooped to collect her notepad and cardholder, her pen wasn’t in sight and her phone was, heck, where was it—uh, under the table.
“Excuse me,” she said to the room at large, not yet prepared to look at Grip. She went to her knees, only to find herself crawling toward him as he was on his, reaching for her phone from his side of the table.
“I’ve got you,” he said, laughing sea-green eyes meeting hers, cheekbones showing off, big hand grasping her phone and disappearing it in his enormous palm.
Oh, he so did have her.
He’d had her in that week all the ways it was possible to have a person you’d plucked from a lineup of random hopefuls, and it had been glorious. There
