“I hope you don’t mind if we have dinner in the suite, I want you all to myself all night.” Ty slid his hand around my back, holding me at the curve above my ass.
I picked up the room service menu. “That’s perfect, I’m starving.”
“No, no. I’ve got it all arranged.” Ty took the menu from me and led me out to the expansive private patio overlooking the water. Outside was a beautiful table set for two, white linen, roses, and soft guitar music playing in the background.
“Wow, when did you do all this?” I was blown away.
“Don’t you worry about it.” Ty leaned against the patio rail, so fucking handsome with his scruffy, unshaven face and long hair completely windblown from our drive.
“Come sit down with me.” I beckoned when I took a seat.
Ty immediately obliged, sitting in the wrought-iron, padded patio chair next to me. Playing with my fingers as we looked out at the sea. At some point, the sun finally disappeared over the horizon. We moved to the table and indulged in a delicious, romantic dinner, and my mind quieted.
Would this be my life now?
After a while, the breeze turned chilly and we moved inside to recline on the plush, gold sofa in the living room to watch a movie.
“I’m sad you’re leaving tomorrow.” Ty squeezed my hand, which rested on his stomach as I lay against him. “I love having you with me.”
“I love being with you too.”
“Could you stay longer?” Ty questioned. “I mean, no pressure.”
“I wish, but I can’t.”
“Okay.”
My mind spun again.
“People are going to find out it’s me, Ty.”
“Yeah, probably.”
“Is that what you want?” I had to ask considering we’d been out in public all day and now there were likely hundreds of pictures of us posted everywhere.
“Well, yeah. Of course. Although, Jace wants to get ahead of it first.” Ty let out a breath that he’d apparently been holding.
“It’s freaking me out, babe.” I sat up to face him. “I’ve deliberately kept myself out of the public eye for years, I don’t even have live socials.”
“So you don’t want people to find out about us.” Ty didn’t question, he stated and kinda sulked.
“You don’t get to do that.” I was annoyed at having to reassure him. “You’re not that insecure boy anymore, you know that’s not the case.”
Ty didn’t say anything, but I was not going to engage in game playing. “Just because you wanted to be a famous rock star doesn’t mean that I want everyone to know my name. You took that option away from me with the album.”
“And we took every precaution to protect you. I can’t help that we’re well-known, Zoey,” Ty grumbled. “That’s part of the gig.”
“Well, it’s not part of my gig. I’m in the middle of a job search while balancing a very competitive position at my firm.” I got up and strode over to the window, needing some space from my rocker. “Your fans hate me. They think I’m heinous. It’s all in the comments.”
Ty stretched out on the sofa, crossed his legs, and shut his eyes. It looked like he was practicing breathing exercises, but he remained silent. After a few minutes, his eyes opened slowly, and he found me gaping at him.
“No, Z, they want to be you, so they try to tear you down. It’s part of the fame game.”
“I’m not famous, and they don’t even know me!”
“Look, I didn’t think it through. I just wanted us to have a fun day out like we used to do back in Seattle.” Ty patted the space on the sofa beside him and beckoned for me to come back.
It was hard for me to be mad at his sentiment, but at the same time we were just getting to know each other again. Figuring out how and if our lives could mesh. It occurred to me that he was used to having every detail of his life catered to and fixed, maybe he forgot how it was for people who weren’t in the spotlight.
“I’m worried,” I confessed, my arms akimbo. “My reputation and integrity are vitally important in my profession. A careless photo or slimy article could take on a life of its own and destroy my career.”
“That’s why we have publicists.” Ty held his hands up. “They take care of that for us, and they will take care of that for you.”
“Isn’t their job to get you in the media?”
“Well, yeah. True.” Ty rolled his eyes. “But they do crisis management too, that’s why you don’t see any of the old embarrassing drunk footage of me around anymore.”
My stomach clenched.
“Did you take me to all these public places because you want me to be outed, Ty?” I sat on the edge of the sofa next to him. “Because once who I really am is out there, we can’t take it back.”
“I mean, I didn’t not want people to find out we are together. I already basically announced it on Sirius.” Ty stroked my back in a feeble attempt to calm me down. “Sienna thought it would be fine.”
Shrugging him off, I chewed on my thumbnail. “You talked about this with Sienna?”
“More like cleared my plans.” Ty was so nonchalant. But, of course, this was what he was used to. On the other hand, all of this was scary to me.
“I’m feeling very vulnerable and out of my league.” I picked at the thumbnail I was doing a good job of ruining. “I need to understand what say I have in all of this. Did Sienna consider what price I had to pay?”
“Butterfly, shhh. I’d pay any price
