Overdue - A Rockstar Romance

Chapter 30 - Phoebe

"What are you doing out here?" Cara's voice startles me awake and I jolt upright.

I look up at her blearily, trying to get my eyes to focus. "What?"

"I have a spare room. Why are you sleeping on my sofa?"

"How was I supposed to know that?" I yawn and stretch, "It didn't exactly come up before you abandoned me there."

"I didn't abandon you. And if the pictures are anything to go by? You look like you had quite the night anyway." She says with a sly smile shooting me a wink.

Pictures? That wakes me up. I blink hard to clear the sleep from my eyes and focus on her,  "What pictures?" I whisper.

Cara's face pales, "You didn't know there were paparazzi there?"

I shake my head mutely.

"Pheebs, you were out with a celebrity in London." She says softly, sinking into the sofa beside me.

"Where? I...I..." I can't finish the thought and only manage the couple of strangled words.

"Elliott should have known better. Why would he kiss you there?" Cara jumps up, pacing back and forth around her living room.

I pull the fluffy throw over me as I remember how Elliott tried to get me to leave the club.

"It was my fault." I whisper.

"No, Phoebe. No it wasn't." Cara has her fierce mama bear voice now as she marches over and pulls me into a hug.

I hug her back but I'm numb. "He tried to get me to leave, and I said I didn't mind him kissing me there. He tried to warn me. It's my own fault."

The words come out stilted and expressionless. I can't cry, I can't move. I can't work out how to react.

"You weren't to know. Don't worry, we will get someone to manage this. One of those people we interviewed."

The interviews feel like a lifetime ago now. I scrunch my eyes up as I try to remember which of them I had actually liked.

"Sam." I say after a moment.

"Sam Choa? The one with Halo?" she asks, grabbing her phone.

I nod and she starts tapping furiously. I need to see the pictures. See how bad it really is.

I reach slowly for my phone where I abandoned it last night on the coffee table. My thumbs hover as I try to work out where to look. Twitter seems like a good bet and I open it quickly. The top suggested news story headline, 'True Outlaws, True Love?' catches my eye and I click it.

There's a dull roaring in my ears as I gaze at the photos. In some ways I love them. Candid captures of the end of our incredible night together. That looks in his eyes as he gazes at me in the moment before our kiss. Our faces lit by the pulsing red, blue and purple lights. The one with our foreheads pressed together in the seconds after the kiss.

We are both smiling and I smile too as I remember it. And then I remember that our private, amazing moment is splashed across magazines, newspapers and the internet across the world and my stomach rolls.

My phone buzzes with a text in my hand and I refocus my attention on it, 'Do not look at the news. Can we meet?'

An ache builds in my chest and I try to remind myself it was one date. One incredible, mind blowing date that had no other date could ever beat but still just one date. He had delivered what he had promised. He didn't owe me anything more and despite what the headlines were saying, I didn't expect anything from him either.