Astrid had told me not to let the threats get to me, despite having hired a burly Romanian bodyguard named Bogdan who had started escorting me everywhere and stood outside the door of whichever room I was in at any given moment, including the dressing room I was in before the photoshoot. Astrid’s advice was to be vigilant—to be alert rather than alarmed—but not to let some psycho ruin my career.
I had told Astrid after the second letter that I needed a break from the whole fame thing, which is when I called my dad and organized my trip to Mulligan’s Mill.
Astrid reluctantly agreed, although she warned me not to stay away too long. After all, as she had often reminded me time and again—“What it takes to step out of the spotlight is one thing, my darling boy. What it takes to step back into it is something else entirely.”
Lying there on the dressing room floor, I pushed thoughts of my stalker out of my head and answered Astrid’s question. “Up. Pull them up.” I was talking about the red leather pants. I knew it was the answer Astrid wanted to hear.
She smiled, hitched up my pants, and said, “That’s my boy.Rolling Stonecover, here we come.”
“We’ll be finished before my flight leaves, right?” I tried not to sound too panicky.
“That depends.”
“On what?”
“On how ready you are to make love to that camera. I want you dripping with sex for this shoot. I want you to ooze with desire. I want copies of this magazine hidden under the mattress of every horny teenage girl and raging queer in the world. Deliver me that, and I promise you’ll make your flight to Hillbilly Hicksville.”
“Mulligan’s Mill.”
“I’m teasing.” She buttoned up my leather pants for me, then decided to undo the top two buttons.
I eyed her suspiciously. “You’re not doing that so I can tuck my shirt in, are you?”
Astrid winked. “What shirt?”
Ten minutes later, I was sitting on a wooden stool with an electric guitar in my hands and a plain white scrim behind me. My red leather pants, unbuttoned at the top, hung low around my hips. Although I’d been told to “ooze with desire” before, I was anxious about my flight and was having trouble summoning the level of sensuality Astrid wanted from me.
“Darling, you’re tense,” she said, even as the photographer continued snapping away. “What’s the matter with you today? You’re getting caught up in your thoughts again, aren’t you?”
“Yes. Maybe. I don’t know. I’m sorry.” Ididknow. I was thinking about my flight. I was thinking about the letters from my damn stalker. I was thinking about… Harry.
“Darling, put everything out of your mind that’s stressing you. Make room for nothing else but the one thing you desire the most. The one thing that drives you wild. The one thing you want more than anything else in the world.”
I put the flight and the letters out of my head.
I closed my eyes and thought of the night in my room back in Mulligan’s Mill, when Harry came up with the word “hammer” and suddenly a hit song was born.
I threw my head back and with one hand I positioned the guitar between my spread legs.
With my other hand I ran my fingers through my wild blond hair, then down the side of my face.
I touched my fingers to my neck, my chest, my nipple.
For a few more seconds I heard the camera clicking furiously, then the sound faded away as I completely lost myself in the moment, the images in my mind stretching beyond a simple memory, pushing their way boldly into fantasy.
I imagined Harry sitting beside me on the bed…
Taking me in his arms…
Laying me down on the sheets and planting his lips on mine, forcing a loud, ache-filled groan from deep within.
I suddenly realized the groan wasn’t just in my imagination.
I threw my head forward and opened my eyes, my gaze happening to find the camera in that exact moment, my entire body quivering with longing.
Lust.
Hope.
