Page 1 of Claimed By the Rockstars: Part One
Chapter
One
BELLS
Twenty thousand throats scream my name in perfect synchronization.
BELLS. BELLS. BELLS.
The chant pounds against my ribs harder than Mike's drums, and I lean into it, letting their worship wash over me like absolution I don't fucking deserve.
"Seattle!" I growl into the mic, and they lose their goddamn minds.
I straddle the mic stand, leather pants creaking with the movement, and wrap my fingers around the metal pole like I'm about to fuck it. Sweat trickles down my spine, pooling where the compression shirt binds my chest flat. Six inches of medical-grade silicone presses uncomfortably against my thigh, but I've learned to move with it, make it part of the performance.
"You beautiful fucking degenerates ready to sin with me tonight?"
The arena erupts. Twenty thousand sets of hands thrust masquerade masks into the air—cheap plastic things that came with admission, turning the crowd into a sea of glittering anonymity. They don't know I wear my own mask everygoddamn day, and mine costs a hell of a lot more than twelve ninety-five.
Jake's guitar screams to life beside me, the opening riff of "Golden Crown" cutting through the chaos. I grip the mic and let my voice drop to a whisper that somehow carries to the nosebleeds.
"You think you know me..."
The crowd goes silent. Twenty thousand people holding their breath.
"Think you own me..."
Jake steps closer, his six-foot-one frame dwarfing mine. Alpha pheromones roll off him in waves, but the cocktail of suppressants and scent-blockers I mainline keeps me from reacting. Just another beta male up here, playing at being dangerous.
This is what they came for. This is what they paid good money to see—Bells, the enigmatic frontman who might kiss his guitarist, might strip off his shirt, might crowd-surf into their waiting hands and let them tear him apart. They want to consume me, and I feed them just enough to keep them starving.
Jake's hand finds my throat, fingers wrapping around the leather collar that never fucking comes off. The one that hides the crescent-shaped scar some psycho gave me in another life, when I was still stupid enough to think fame meant something other than painting a target on your back.
He leans in, close enough that his breath ghosts across my cheek. The crowd loses their collective shit, thousands of phone cameras capturing this moment that means absolutely nothing. His lips hover an inch from mine, and I can smell the whiskey he knocked back before we went on, the cigarettes he thinks I don't know he still smokes.
"But baby, I'm NOBODY'S fucking prey!"
I scream the last line and shove Jake back so hard he stumbles. The lights cut to black. The crowd explodes and I stumble off stage in the dark, laughing from the adrenaline of the roar behind us.
"Fuck, that was incredible," Jake breathes, slinging his arm around my shoulders. "That thing with the mic stand? They ate that shit up."
I shrug him off. "Yeah, well, that's what they pay for."
Backstage is chaos. Roadies rushing to break down equipment, security holding back the few fans who managed to slip through, various music industry vampires waiting to suck us dry. I push through it all, heading for the dressing room with single-minded determination.
"Bells! Yo, Bells!" Mike catches up, bouncing on his toes like he's still feeling the adrenaline high. His gauge earrings catch the harsh fluorescent lights, and there's a wildness in his brown eyes that makes him look younger than his twenty-five years. "We're hitting up Graveyard Shift for drinks. You in?"
"Can't." I don't slow down. "Got stuff."
"Stuff? What kind of stuff?" He waggles his eyebrows. "Secret Illuminati meeting? Sacrificing virgins to the rock gods? Oh wait—" He snaps his fingers. "You're Batman! You're going to go fight crime!"
"Something like that."
Jake appears on my other side, still shirtless because of course he fucking is. "Come on, man. One drink. You've been ghosting us after every show lately."
"Maybe because I don't want to watch you eye-fuck every barely legal omega, beta,andalpha that throws themselves at you."
He laughs. "Jealous?"
