Rock All Night

36




The Le Baron pulled up in the Doubletree’s parking lot. Derek and I piled out of the car, but not before he took about a dozen selfies with Gary, Anabelle, and Scott. I got drafted into being the unofficial photographer, and I used Anabelle’s cell phone to snap a couple of pictures of them all together. Predictably, Derek hammed it up for the camera.

We said our goodbyes and left his adoring fans in the car, looking dreamily after their hero.

When we got to the front desk of the hotel, nobody was in the lobby except the clerk behind the desk. Thank God she was fifty-something and had no idea who Derek was – I’m not sure I could have taken another fan freak-out. Though she did keep looking at him from out of the corner of her eye, like she’d seen him somewhere and couldn’t quite place him.

Oddly enough, he registered as ‘Arthur Lee’ and claimed he didn’t have a driver’s license.

“Who’s Arthur Lee?” I whispered when the desk clerk was out of earshot.

“Lead singer of Love, this awesome, underappreciated band from the ‘60s. I always register as him when Miles isn’t handling things.”

I frowned at him. “Why?”

“Why not?”

“What if they look him up?”

“Then they might hear some really great music.”

The clerk came back asking for payment. Pessimist that I am, I was half expecting Derek not to have any money on him – after all, he was a rock star, right? Don’t they have people like Miles taking care of their every whim?

And I had left my purse on the bus. So part of me was waiting for everything to crash down, like it had been too good to be true.

That was when Derek whipped out a wad of bills thick enough to choke a mule. After a bit of back and forth about not having a credit card, he slipped the desk clerk a hundred bucks, and we were on our way to the best room in the hotel with a warning to be out by 11AM.

“You carry around that much money on a regular basis?” I asked as we stepped inside the elevator – right before he pinned me up against the wall playfully. My heart thumped hard with a rush of adrenaline as my back hit the mirrored wall.

“Uh oh, you’re not a golddigger, are you?” he teased as he leaned in close for a kiss.

I gave him an acid little smile, then nipped his lip as punishment.

He just laughed. “I was poor for years. Now I don’t walk around with less than a thousand bucks, ever… just in case.”

After that, all talk of money ceased.

In fact, all talk ceased, period.