Page 54 of How NOT to Seduce a Rockstar
Adingannounced the arrival. Tess flung the door open just as a man’s voice echoed from the hall: “Yeah, it’s him.”
Tess stepped back, her gaze sharp as ice. “And you are?”
“Ryder’s security team.”
“Uh-huh. And how exactly am I supposed to know that’s true?”
“Ryder’s downstairs, waiting in the car.”
“Proof?” Tess tilted her chin in challenge. “You bring me a piece of his ear? A photo of him in the limo holding today’s paper? Otherwise, forget it. This bird only leaves my hands for Zane Ryder himself.”
“We’ve got the ten grand in cash.”
“Stay right there. Don’t come closer.” Tess’s voice was low, razor-sharp. “You think I’m tempted by ten thousand dollars? If this bird isn’t found, tomorrow the reward’ll be twenty. The next day? Thirty. I don’t trust you. If you’re really Ryder’speople, bring him up here.”
And without waiting for their answer, she slammed the door in their faces, leaving them stranded on the landing with nothing at all.
“Holy hell,” I whispered, keeping my voice low. “You were amazing. Straight out of some hardboiled flick with Humphrey Bogart.”
Tess smiled without parting her lips, the cigarette still clinging to the corner of her mouth. “The best part’s still coming.”
The elevator groaned its way down, metal grinding against metal. From the street below came a scatter of voices, the slam of car doors, the low thrum of an engine idling in wait. Then—again—the elevator’s rise.
Every sense of mine snapped on like dressing-room bulbs. The sound shifted: slower, heavier, as though the very air was bracing itself. Footsteps rang on the landing—steady, deliberate, the kind that belonged to cowboy boots striding through Brooklyn without apology.
The apartment door stood wide open. No one spoke.
Tess didn’t move, shoulder tilted just so, Rimbaud nestled in her arms like a living trophy. The silence thickened, weighted with expectation.
And then the doorway filled. Not just a man—an arrival. A flash of silk and sun-burnished skin, a scent of wood and smoke announcing him beforehis voice did. I forced myself to glance only once, as quick as staring at the sun.
Zane Ryder.
In our living room.
His voice—husky, cracked in a way that sounded dangerously sincere—split the silence. “Rimbaud…” It wasn’t a word so much as a wound set to music.
I pretended to watch TV, but my body betrayed me, every cell buzzing with curiosity. From the corner of my eye I caught everything, like an actress sneaking a peek through the curtain, storing every detail to pour onto the page the second the door closed behind him.
Tess didn’t hand him over right away. Rimbaud stayed tucked against her, and she stroked his feathers with the unhurried tenderness of someone guarding a secret. The traitorous bird buried his head against her chest with blissful surrender. Not even a commercial actor could’ve played it better.
“Oh my God…” Ryder’s voice washed over her like whiskey too strong to swallow—warm, gravelly, unmistakable. “He never lets anyone touch him. Ever. Not like this…”
“He’s an angel,” Tess murmured, finally passing the bird with a gesture so smooth it bordered on regal.
Ryder took him, lowering his chin to graze Rimbaud’s head instead of reaching with his hand. “Thank you… thank you so much. The concierge said you found him in Central Park?”
“Alone and lost.”
A slow nod. His eyes, hidden behind dark lenses, gave nothing away—whether he was measuring her or the bird. “I’ve got your reward.”
Tess turned without hurry, as though she’d just heard the price of a handbag she’d never consider buying. She flicked ash into a half-empty glass, smoke curling around her profile like a silk scarf.
“I insist.”
“I’m not interested in filthy money.”
The words didn’t drop—they landed like a knife, gleaming and final, wedged between them.
