Light Me Up

Seth. A tingle of anticipation she could never quite control went through her. “Hi, there.”

“Hey, someone sounds cranky. What’s going on?”

“Long day.” She wasn’t in the mood for Seth. Or rather, she wasn’t in the mood for their complicated relationship. Past lovers, now uneasy friends. Bonnie had come to terms with the fact that while she might never meet anyone who fitted her so well, Seth wasn’t and might never be able to commit to a relationship.

“I just finished a song. I’d like to play it for you. Wanna come up?”

“I’m up already, just closed the store.” Bonnie slumped against the wall. Yes, she wanted to see Seth if he’d take her in his arms, declare undying love and make all her problems go away. But being in Seth’s arms had the unfortunate effect of creating many more problems than it solved. At least she’d figured out that much. Since they’d both lived at Come to Your Senses—nearly two years now—they’d been able to maintain a relatively peaceful and platonic truce. Though lately he’d been acting … odd.

“I’ll feed you, too, and pour you a short or tall one of whatever you’d like. And …” Seth did a credible impression of a drum roll. The guy had talented lips. She should know. “For dessert I have mint chocolate chip ice cream.”

Oooh, playing dirty now. Bonnie took a moment to consider. Her choice lay between morose, quiet loneliness here, and free food and drink with fun if slightly crazy-making company.

Sigh.

“Give me twenty minutes to rejuvenate and I’ll be over.”

“Cool.” As always, he spoke as if he didn’t care whether she came or not. Seth had a talent for making it seem he cared about nothing. Not the kind of thing you craved in a partner, though he’d had a hell of a childhood with an alcoholic father who hadn’t exactly made loving support or emotional sharing the rule of the family.

Yes, Bonnie was learning.

“Seeya.” She ended the call, slipped her phone back into her pocket. Seth had another talent, one she truly respected. He’d written music for some commercials and TV shows, sold a few songs and was in talks with a producer to score a movie soundtrack. He worked hard. Given that he had inherited enough family money to buy his own Hollywood movie studio, Bonnie respected him for that. If she had all that money in the bank, she’d be tempted to go on a tour of the world’s most beautiful beaches and hone her lying-in-the-sun skills.

After showering and putting on a comfortable sundress of pale brown and sunshine-yellow, she felt more human. Only occasionally did she succumb to fear like this over her financial situation. Something would work out, she was convinced.

Down at the other end of the rose- and tank-strewn hallway, she knocked on Seth’s door, and it opened immediately to the tall, model-gorgeous man whose fierce gray eyes seemed to glow in his face. Even now, after all the years of pain and exasperation he’d caused her, Bonnie got a fresh thrill every time she saw him.

Masochist.

“Hey, Bonnie. Come in, come in. Bar’s open, buffet’s open. I made pot-sticker dumplings and bok choy with ginger and soy.”

She groaned with pleasure. “You are a god among men.”

“Well, yeah. What’ll you drink with it?”

“Beer. Whatever you have.”

“I have Tsingtao, imported from Shandong province, a brewery started by Germans in nineteen hundred and—”

“Psssht.” She stopped him. “If it’s got alcohol and bubbles, I’m in.”

His grin turned him from tough-guy gorgeous to goofy farm boy—still gorgeous—a transformation that never ceased to charm her and, sigh, women everywhere. “It does, my little plum blossom.”

Bonnie rolled her eyes and pushed past him into his combination apartment and studio. He was the only one of the Come to Your Senses occupants who didn’t have commercial space on the first floor with public access, so the group had ceded him the largest unit, which had probably at one time been two apartments.

Seth closed the door and followed her toward the kitchen. “How was your day?”

“Not bad.”

“Business blooming?”

She didn’t want to talk about it, though Seth was the only person in whom she’d confided the extent of her financial troubles. “Not bad.”

“Uh-huh. I’ll get you that beer.” He squeezed her shoulder as he strode to the refrigerator; in that touch she felt his sympathy and understanding. What a complicated and frustrating man. All that great empathy for some of her feelings, a huge block against others and an even bigger one when it came to understanding and processing his own.

“So what’s this song you wrote?”

Seth pulled two beers from his state-of-the-art stainless refrigerator, popped off their tops and handed her one, then hit a button on his microwave, which started whirring. “Love song.”

“Really.” His songs tended to be about failed relationships, thwarted dreams and other forms of misery. Ironic for a man who had everything. “Happy love? Like, ‘I love you and it’s great’?”

“Yeah, like that.”

Bonnie took a long swig from the bottle, maybe not the greatest way to soothe her suddenly agitated stomach. Had he met someone? She wasn’t really excited to hear about how much he loved someone else. “How’d that happen?”

“A friend of mine was talking about marrying this girl he met after dating one disaster after another. He got me thinking.”

Bonnie took another nervous swig, shorter this time since she’d skipped lunch. “Got you thinking about what?”

“About a song I could write.” The microwave dinged and he moved toward it.

Bonnie shook her head. Trying to get Seth to talk about feelings … well, why the hell was she trying?

“Here you go.” He handed her a heaping plate of dumplings and bok choy, steam releasing a fragrance that made Bonnie’s stomach lurch with hunger instead of stress.

“All for me?”

“I ate earlier. Bring it in with you. And I’m not letting you leave until you finish it. You’re skeletal.”

“Yes, Daddy.”

He shot her a scowl over his shoulder and headed for his studio. Bonnie followed, grinning, touched that he was worried about her. She had dropped weight. At first she was thrilled. Who didn’t celebrate when pounds came off? But while her new body might be fine for a magazine shoot, she wasn’t out to join the scary-thin crowd, and shouldn’t lose any more.

“Now.” Seth seated himself at his Bösendorfer grand, having put his beer carefully down on a nearby table. The piano and his extensive array of recording and soundengineering equipment were the only things he was meticulous about. His bedroom and bathroom looked as if a fraternity had moved in and partied for two weeks.

He rubbed his hands on his long thighs, picked out a note or two, rubbed his legs again. He was nervous. Interesting. This drill was totally familiar for both of them. He loved playing his songs, she loved hearing them; they did this all the time. Bonnie had never seen him like this.

“Ready?”

“I’m ready.” She stuffed a warm pot sticker, dripping soy sauce, vinegar and chili oil, into her mouth and groaned ecstatically. Seth’s mom had been an incredible cook and passed along that passion to Seth, the youngest in a family of five boys and the only one who’d been interested. “No, wait, I can’t listen right now. I’m having an orgasm.”

“No, you’re not.”

She stabbed another dumpling with her fork and stuffed it into her mouth, moaned again. “Yesh, I am.”

“Nope.” He started playing a classical piece. “You’re much louder than that.”

Bonnie glared at him, sitting at the piano wearing an I-know-you look that made her lips twitch. Did he have to say stuff like that? “You’re terrible.”