He studied my face, like he was trying to follow what the hell I was saying. Clearly, he had no idea that the girl he’d met in Alaska had a twin sister.
Then I tried to start to explain about the twin thing. I really did. But the words just wouldn’t come. I was totally falling apart under the pressure of his blue eyes.
They were so damn blue.
Dear God, this was embarrassing.
I just didn’t want to embarrass him. Or hurt him or anything, like maybe my sister already had?
Why the hell did he want to see her again, anyway? She gave him a fake phone number, for Christ’s sake.
Hadn’t he figured that out?
I glimpsed Madeleine through the window, strutting in through the front door. She disappeared into her office, and I reached for my doorknob. “Excuse me one minute,” I said, gesturing at one of my chairs. “Please, have a seat. I’ll be right back.” Then I hurried out.
When I burst into Madeleine’s office without knocking, my stylish aunt was seated behind her minimalist retro-modern desk in one of her signature black figure-hugging dresses, her dark hair smoothed down to her shoulders. She arched an eyebrow at me but barely glanced up from her laptop. “Where’s the fire?”
“Shit, shit, shit,” I muttered under my breath as I shut the door. “I’m gonna have to kill her this time. Like really kill her. You’ll come visit me in prison, won’t you?”
“What did she do now?” Madeleine asked, her gaze on her computer screen as one manicured finger casually clicked at her mouse. She could’ve been online shopping. She didn’t even ask who I was referring to. She didn’t have to. Madeleine was well aware of my sister’s ways, so none of this alarmed her.
“Do you remember that bachelorette party Daniella went to in Alaska?” I asked her, flustered, overly-aware that Ashley Player was waiting in my office.
“No.”
“It was like four years ago. There were some rock stars involved. And some circus freaks?” Finally, I’d snagged Madeleine’s attention; she glanced up at me. “And maybe a tattoo?”
“Daniella got a tattoo?”
“I think he got the tattoo, actually.”
“Who did?”
“Ashley Player. The rock star sitting in my office right now.”
Madeleine leaned back in her chair and glanced through the window, across the reception area and into my office. I took a look, too. He wasn’t sitting. He was standing, studying the framed print on my wall, a Georgia O’Keeffe painting of a white trumpet flower.
“He asked Dani to marry him or something?” I went on. “I don’t know. There were a lot of salacious details and I tried not to hear them all. She definitely told me she gave him a fake number and ghosted him. You know how she is.”
Madeleine’s gaze returned to me. “And?”
“And what am I supposed to say to him? I ran into him the other night on the street and he thinks I’m her.”
Madeleine glanced through the window again, checking Ashley out. “So be her,” she said. “He’s pretty.”
“That’s not helping. Tell me what to do.”
Madeleine frowned. It took a lot to make Madeleine or any of my aunts frown. You know, wrinkles. The Vola family was comprised of beautiful, strong, sophisticated women. Unfortunately, despite the obvious genetics, I wasn’t always sure that I was one of them.
The personalities in my family—including my sister’s—were so strong, I’d become accustomed to doing whatever was expected of me from a very young age. Even as a toddler, Dani cried louder and got the lion’s share of attention—much like my mom—while I, because of my people-pleasing nature, was pretty much expected to do whatever it took to keep my high maintenance sister happy—like my dad did for my mom.
Madeleine knew all of this. For years now, she’d been the lone voice in my family urging me to grow a spine and tell the rest of them to shove it.
“I am not telling you what to do, Danica,” she said. “What do you want to do?”
“I want to go back in time and slap Dani upside the head.”
My aunt sighed. Then she got to her feet, smoothed her dress, and strode over to my office. I followed at her heels.
“Hi,” she said, offering Ashley her hand as we walked in. “I’m Madeleine Vola.”
“Ashley,” he said, shaking her hand.
“This is my office,” my aunt explained. “This is my beautiful niece, Danica.” Ashley looked at me. “Danica has a twin sister. My other beautiful niece, Daniella. As I understand it, Daniella was the one you met, in Alaska, was it? Unfortunately she’s not here. She doesn’t work here.”
Understanding was dawning on Ashley’s face as he looked from me to her. Gradually. “Oh.”
“They’re identical twins, hon,” Madeleine informed him.
Shit. This was awful. I was cringing all over.
Was he humiliated? Disappointed?
Angry?
“I hear you’re a musician?” Madeleine said, shifting gears, and he looked at her. She made a show of looking him over, head to toe, in that way she only did when she planned to swallow a man whole for her midnight snack. “Have you ever worked with an interior designer?” She even jutted her hip out, making her body into that sexy S-shape I could never quite achieve with any authority.
Great.
Ashley’s blue eyes flicked to mine again, and I blurted out, “I offer a complimentary consultation.”
Madeleine glanced at me. I didn’t look her in the eye, so I wasn’t sure what she thought of my offer. All I knew was I couldn’t let her scoop Ashley Player as a client.
Not. Happening.
Anyway, she’d forgive me for scooping him first, if that’s what I did. He was standing in my office, and even if he became my client, as owner of the firm, she’d get her cut.
“I mean… if you’d like to redecorate your home or something,” I added, trying not to squirm.
He just kept staring at my face, like he was trying to mentally rearrange the pieces of a puzzle that wouldn’t quite fit.
Again, I couldn’t look away.
He said nothing, for way too long… And I wanted to disappear.
Or maybe just grow another face.
One that looked exactly nothing like my twin sister’s.
Chapter Six
Ash
The muffled drum intro to Van Halen’s “Hot for Teacher” woke me from a dead sleep.
Dylan’s ringtone.
I groped for my phone in the blankets, my eyes still closed. All I knew in my half-conscious state? He was calling from Europe. Denmark? Spain? No idea where he was right now.
“Huh,” I managed to grunt when I picked up.
“Hey. You up?”
“Yeah.” I cracked my eyes and slowly blinked them open.
“You’re asleep? It’s almost noon over there.”
“I guess…” It was dark in my bedroom, a thick blanket tacked over the window.
“Rough night?”
Yeah. You could say that.
I kicked off the covers and tried to sit up. Getting out of bed had never really been a top priority in my life, but ever since Dylan and Amber dumped my ass about six months ago, it had definitely slipped lower on the list.
What time was it…?
I glanced at the clock on the floor, the one I’d knocked off the bedside table a few weeks ago. 11:56 a.m..
“You ever get that feeling you made out with the wrong twin?” I mumbled, dragging myself gradually more vertical and finding the floor with my feet. I was feeling every one of the beers I’d put back last night. The tequila shots, too. My mouth was all sandpapery.
Dylan laughed. “What the hell did you do now?”
“Nothing.” I swiped a hand over my face and turned on the lamp. “Went for brews with Brad again.”
“I heard. Don’t corrupt him too bad, okay? Julie will kill me.”
“What? Turn him into me?” I scrubbed my hand through my hair. “Not likely. He’s
neck-deep in your sister’s pussy. The dude doesn’t even look at anyone else.”
“Let’s keep it that way.”
“Don’t you have a show to play or something?”
“Yup. In a few.”
“So what’s with the wake-up call? Kindness of your heart?”
“Nope. Don’t you ever check your messages?”
“Not really.”
“Elle had her baby last night.”
Yeah. I’d seen those messages, late last night.
“You hear me?” he said.
“Yeah. I got the message from Brody. And Seth. And everyone the fuck else… Just had some beers to sleep off.”
“Well, you can go over now,” he said. “They’re at the Women’s Hospital. Seth says visiting hours are noon to two.”
“Yeah. Maybe.”
I could totally hear the inaudible sigh in the silent pause. “Ash, don’t be an asshole on this. Just go by. I can’t.”
“Okay.”
“Are you getting up?”
“I’m up.” I creaked slowly to my feet. Stretched out my aching body. My head was telling me that the rest of me was in pain. It was telling me to drink some water, eat a vegetable or two and sleep for a couple more days.
I trudged toward the bathroom.
“Are you going to the hospital?”
“On my way there now.” I turned on the shower in the dark, yawning. “Almost there.”
“Give Elle my love and send me a pic.”
“Yeah.”
“Ash?”
“Yeah.”
“See you soon, okay?”
“Uh-huh. Soon.”
I hung up. Put the phone on the counter, took a piss and guzzled some water. Then I showered in the dark, by the faint light of the lamp from the bedroom. Gradually came back to life.
I’d read all the texts last night, about the baby. Like seven different people had messaged me about it. All of them excited.
Couldn’t say I was.
I actually wasn’t sure how to feel about it.
But then there were beers and tequila shots, and feeling anything about anything became irrelevant.
Now, hungover and gradually regaining sober consciousness, I still wasn’t sure how to feel about it.
Okay, I wanted to feel happy for Elle. And Seth.
I’d always liked Elle. A lot. Even when she ditched my ass. Didn’t love the way she did it, but I still liked her. Still cared about her.
I’d always liked Seth, too. Kinda felt like punching him in the face a few times when I heard he’d knocked up Elle like several nanoseconds after she dumped me.
Got over that, though.
I also wanted to get my head out of my ass. It was one thing to feel jealous and slighted when she was pregnant, and avoid that whole scene because of it. But now there was an actual tiny human who was relying on Elle and Seth and their whole support system, and me being a dick about it wasn’t gonna help anyone.
Including Dylan, who was a million miles away and probably really wanted to be here, for Elle. Dylan and Elle had always been tight, kinda like brother and sister.
Yeah. I had to deal with this.
Fuck.
And then there was that other fucking thing…
As the warmth of the shower soaked in and I gradually became more coherent, the events of yesterday wormed their way back into my head. And under my skin.
I wanted to just forget about the whole fucking thing.
Decided to, right before I started pounding beers. Just blow the whole thing off—like Danny had blown me off.
But it kept coming back to me… Itching at my brain like some persistent fucking rash I couldn’t scratch away.
Daniella.
Danica.
Fucking twins.
You’d think I might be elated to stumble across a pair of super-hot twins. Didn’t exactly happen every day.
My dick, for one, was fucking thrilled. Just now, in the shower, it was already half-mast just trying to recall exactly what Daniella had looked like so I could side-by-side comparison shop her with her twin sister in my head. Like how identical was identical?
Did they taste the same?
Did they both like getting drilled the same way?
Were they into threesomes?
Yeah. My dick definitely wanted to know.
The rest of me, not so much.
Maybe if Daniella hadn’t blown me off so hard—fake number and all—after I got her name tattooed under my balls.
Who the shit does that?
I mean, sure, I knew she left the tattoo parlor at some point while I was getting the tattoo. I never saw her again that night like I thought I would. And I found out she’d jetted the next morning; checked out of the hotel, got on a plane and left. I knew she left me a fake phone number, one that belonged to an auto repair shop in Jersey and sure as shit didn’t belong to her.
But now I knew.
There was a tiny little dumbass part of me that had always wondered if it was all just some misunderstanding. She was drunk when she wrote down the number and just got the digits wrong. The area code was 640. One of Vancouver’s was 604. Maybe she lived right here, in the same city as me, and she’d just inverted the numbers accidentally.
She didn’t. I’d tried it both ways.
Like an idiot.
I’d already messaged Danica at the number she gave me yesterday—late last night, after the first few beers went down the hatch—to cancel my appointment with her. Maybe I just wanted to know if she’d actually given me her real number.
She was supposed to come by to view my place sometime today. Her free consultation thing. I was supposed to text her my address, but fuck that.
Wasn’t even sure why I’d agreed to that shit in the first place.
So I could get the fuck out of her office and away from her Daniella-looking face? And her hot aunt, who kept undressing me with her eyes?
They’re identical twins, hon.
Shit, even she felt sorry for me.
The fact was, Daniella Vola—that was Danny’s real name, apparently—didn’t give a fuck about me. She’d blown me off, and she’d done it on purpose. No big fucking deal, other than the fact that I was left with a super lame tattoo as a permanent reminder, and now had reached a new humiliating low by stalking her sister.
Every time something reminded me of that tattoo between my legs, which I otherwise tried to forget—like one of my dickhead friends asking to see it when I was drunk—I got wondering about her again. Wondering if I’d fucked up. If I’d somehow missed the boat with the elusive Danny. You know, two ships passing in the night… Maybe I should’ve dropped anchor, locked that shit down?
Or at least fucked the shit out of her a few times, found out if she really was my dream fuck.
Not so much.
In reality, I’d wasted how many hours of my life since running into her sister buying roses in the rain, thinking about her, again? Thinking maybe she was my dream girl? Thinking maybe she was my destiny or some shit?
Pathetic.
There was no “Danny.”
There was some shit show in Alaska four years ago with a chick who ghosted me.
And there was her identical twin, who now wanted to redecorate my condo, because she’d sniffed out that I might have money—or fucking worse, because she felt sorry for me.
She sure as shit looked like she felt sorry for me in her office.
The poppy, too-bright, keyboard-driven opening to George Michael’s “Too Funky” started echoing through the bathroom. I had the pleasure of hearing it pretty much daily, whenever Summer called me.
I groaned.
I got out of the shower and toweled off, but by then I’d missed the call. I picked up my phone to call her back… but then opened my texting app instead.
I found the conversation I’d had with Danica last night. Wasn’t even sure why I’d let her have my number. My real number.
Or why, as soon as she�
��d texted me back, I’d programmed her name into my phone: Danica (twin #2).
But I did.
And… shit. The conversation was longer than I remembered it being.
When I’d blown off the appointment we’d made, she’d messaged me back to say she could come the next day instead—tomorrow—if that worked for me.
I didn’t reply.
At least, I thought I didn’t.
But like two hours later, at almost one in the morning, I did text her back.
And she texted me back.
Fuck me…
I scrolled through the conversation, which I had zero recollection of having.
Me: Checked my calendar. Totally full. Srry
Danica (twin #2): Another time could work? I’m really flexible.
Me: Love to see that
Danica (twin #2): Do you have any dates in mind?
Me: I have dates in mind
Danica (twin #2): Great. Send me your thoughts and we can work it out.
Me: R u in bed?
Danica (twin #2): It’s late. We can talk tomorrow.
Me: Where do you live ?
Danica (twin #2): In Railtown. Why?
I didn’t answer her. That was the end of the conversation.
I must’ve been too drunk, distracted and/or annoyed that she didn’t seem to pick up on the fact that I was trying to flirt with her.
Was I flirting with her?
What the fuck was wrong with me? Since when did I need an interior decorator anyway?
My phone rang in my hand. George Michael again.
“Answer your goddamn phone,” Summer said when I picked up.
“Just did.”
“Elle had her baby last night.”
“I know.”
“Come to the hospital with me. I’ve been calling you all morning. It’s visiting hours, like, now. I’m on my way out the door.”
“Yeah. I just got out of the shower, so—”
“Ash. Maybe you didn’t hear me correctly. Elle had a baby. Last night. What did you do last night?”
Hot Mess: A Players Rockstar Romance (Players #1) Page 8
