Hot Mess: A Players Rockstar Romance (Players #1)

by Diamond, Jaine

  Taylor was heading off on a date, Dani had plans with some girlfriends, and I had no plans for the evening other than stripping down to my undies (my apartment got hot in summer), propping my feet up and eating pizza while binge-watching the last season of Girls, alone.

  So obviously, I said yes.

  As fabulous as they were, Ashley Player trumped pizza and Girls any day.

  He picked me up at my place just before five, in his truck. It was big and black and still smelled kind of new, even though the inside felt pretty lived-in. There were food wrappers, empty gum packages and random items all over the place. I saw a few lighters, a Vancouver Canucks keychain with no keys on it and what looked like a couple of packets of guitar strings, among other things, strewn around the floor and console before my butt was even in the seat.

  “Thanks for picking me up,” I said as I settled in.

  “Thanks for coming,” he said, as we pulled away from the curb. “You look gorgeous.”

  He’d already informed me of that when he met me at the door to my building, gave me a kiss on the cheek and looked me over.

  Then gave me a kiss on the mouth.

  And a butt squeeze.

  He hadn’t told me where we were having dinner, but I’d dressed up a bit in case it was anywhere fancy. Plus, I wanted to look hot for him, so he’d do that thing where he stared at me like he was thirsty. I’d worn my new sundress. It was a tangerine-colored maxi dress, strapless, with an asymmetrical ruffle down the front, and a slit under the ruffle so my legs showed when I walked.

  And my favorite strapless pushup bra and slutty panties, just in case.

  Ashley had rather adorably informed me, over the phone—complete with apology—that his dick wasn’t quite ready to get back in the game yet. But a girl could still hope.

  His hands worked just fine, and so did his mouth…

  As did mine.

  “You look gorgeous yourself,” I informed him.

  He tossed me a heated look that told me maybe I should can the flirting, for now. He was driving, after all.

  But I could hardly help checking him out.

  I loved the way guys showed up for dates. All freshly-showered and looking to impress. He’d definitely bumped up his efforts since meeting me. I’d noticed that he’d had his hair cut, sometime last week. It was shorter now, a little longer on the top than the sides; an edgy cut that suited him. He’d used some kind of hair product in it that made it intentionally messy, but I’d touched it when he kissed me, and it was soft, not crunchy.

  The black of his hair and eyebrows was such a striking contrast to his blue eyes. Some women would kill to have those eyelashes without mascara. And he was deliciously clean-shaven tonight.

  He had a couple of silver rings on and those little black stone earrings in, onyx, maybe. But I noticed he wasn’t wearing the ring I gave him. I hadn’t seen him wear it yet.

  I wasn’t offended. I was just glad he hadn’t given it back.

  Or mentioned it at all.

  As usual, he looked good enough to lick.

  And he smelled incredible, like clean laundry and some faint bodywash or something, and that sexy warm smell of his skin that I now knew so intimately…

  And he was checking me out, too. So far, he was paying at least equal attention to my legs, which were showing through the open slit in my dress, as he was the road.

  “Quit looking at me like that,” he said. “I’m trying to drive.”

  I giggled. “Okay. May I ask why your truck is such a mess when you’re so handsome and stylish, and your home is so sparse and relatively clean?”

  “No, you may not,” he said.

  I laughed.

  He smirked and looked a little unsure. “Actually, I have no idea,” he amended, like no one had ever pointed it out to him before.

  “It’s cute.”

  “It’s gross,” he said, glancing around the cab and frowning. He plucked several items from the console and tossed them into the backseat.

  “So, where are we going?” I asked.

  “We’re going to Chilliwack,” he said flatly, like he wished we weren’t.

  “Oh.” I’d never been to Chilliwack. I knew it was a town east of Vancouver. And maybe about forty-five minutes out of the city? I wasn’t sure. But I definitely hadn’t expected that answer.

  I looked over what he was wearing. “No sweatpants today?”

  “Wouldn’t want you to think I was a total slob.”

  He was wearing black cargo pants, sexy on him, more loose-fit than his usual jeans… but I couldn’t imagine they were much more comfortable where it counted.

  “You look great,” I said. “But I wouldn’t want you to be in pain just to look good for me.”

  “Not in pain,” he said in a low voice. “As long as you keep looking at me like that.”

  “Like what?”

  “Like you want to undress me.”

  I did want to undress him. He was wearing a black shirt with gray three-quarter sleeves that hugged his gorgeous body something yummy, and I wanted to slide it right up and bite his nipples…

  “You look nice,” I said lightly.

  “Stop saying that.”

  As we rolled to a stop at a red light, he looked me over, slowly.

  I smiled as his eyes met mine. “Am I overdressed?”

  “Definitely,” he said, and licked his lip.

  * * *

  “Hey, Ashley. Why are we in Chilliwack?”

  Of all the things we’d talked about on what turned out to be the hour-and-a-half drive out here—our favorite restaurants, what TV shows we liked, how politely he’d skirted the issue when my cousin Charlotte asked if we were getting married—he hadn’t filled me in on that.

  “I grew up here.” He tossed me a slight smile. “Don’t judge.”

  “Why would I judge you for where you grew up?” I watched houses, trees, and commercial buildings pass by my window. It was a bigger town than I’d thought. According to a sign I saw, there was a hospital, and we drove past a pretty big courthouse. Plus, I spotted two Tim Horton’s. “They have two Timmy Ho’s. Everyone knows Tim’s has the best coffee. How bad can this town be?”

  “Said the girl who drinks tea,” Ashley said, as we headed right out the other side of the downtown area and kept driving. “And it’s a city, not a town. I’ll forgive you for not noticing.”

  I smiled at him. “I’ve never been here before. For all I know, it’s the greatest place on Earth.”

  “I think that’s Disneyland.”

  “I think that’s the happiest place.”

  “Either way. Not here.”

  We continued on through the small city… and then right back out of it again. About five minutes later, we were on a long paved road with quaint countryside homes off to either side. A few minutes after that, we turned off onto a long dirt road.

  “Hey, Ashley. Where are we now?”

  “We’re heading out the ass end of Chilliwack. To my dad’s place.”

  One dirt road became another, and another. The houses got farther apart but not necessarily smaller. There were a few older, shabbier ones here and there. A few big, beautiful ones, too.

  Then we turned into a dirt driveway, into the shabbiest yard of the shabbiest house I’d seen so far. Ashley parked us partway up the driveway and turned off the truck, threw me a look that I interpreted as apologetic, and got out.

  I opened my door just as he came around, and slid out as he took my hand.

  “This is where you grew up?” I definitely tried to keep anything that might sound like judgment from my tone, but honestly, it wasn’t judgment. It was sympathy. This place felt pretty sad.

  “No. Thank fuck.” He tugged me toward the house, if you could call it that. It was small, weather-beaten, in disrepair. Neglected. It looked like it could barely survive the winters out here.

  “My dad moved out here several years ago,” he said. “After my mom left and I moved out and he couldn’t k
eep up with rent on our old place. And before you think I’m an asshole for not helping him out—”

  “I don’t,” I said quickly, because clearly there was more going on here than I could know. I could feel it in the air in this place. In Ashley’s tension.

  From the moment he’d picked me up tonight, he’d been a little tense. Now I knew why, more or less. Since we’d pulled into the driveway, he’d been even more tense. His shoulders were tight. His jaw set. The look in his eyes was guarded, shadowed, as he looked up at the house.

  “Trust me,” he said, “he smokes and drinks anything I ever give him anyway. He’ll end up homeless with or without my help, if he wants to.”

  “Okay.”

  He stopped at the foot of the three crumbling stairs to the front door and hit me with his serious blue eyes. “You sure about this?”

  “Um… how could I be sure about this? I didn’t even know we were coming.”

  He stared at me. Then the corner of his mouth quirked up. “You’re right. Fuck it. Let’s go.”

  To my shock, he turned and started right back for the truck, tugging me along with him.

  “Wait. No, wait. Ashley. You brought me here for a reason, right?”

  I dug my heels into the dirt and finally he stopped. He blew out a breath and turned to me. He looked up at the house over my shoulder and frowned, squinting into the evening sun that was starting to descend past the mountains beyond.

  “Are you sure about this?” I asked him. “About whatever made you bring me here? Because if so, take me inside. If not, then we can leave, if that’s what you really want to do.”

  He stared at the house. Something dark and heavy passed over his features. He dug in his pocket, found a piece of gum and tossed it in his mouth. And started chewing furiously.

  He’d already mentioned to me that gum was one of his coping mechanisms since trying to quit smoking. That if he was chewing gum, the situation was dire.

  I took his hand.

  “Alright,” he said. “Let’s do this.” His blue eyes flicked to mine. His eyebrows were drawn together and he looked… vulnerable. Like a little boy, somehow.

  I pulled him to me and hugged him.

  “If you want to leave, we can leave,” I whispered.

  “Too late,” he said, just as the door behind me creaked open.

  I heard it, heard the shuffle of feet, and turned to look up at the old man who now stood on the front stoop, looking down at us.

  “What the hell is this?” he barked, his sharp gaze scraping over me from head to toe. “Christ, boy. For a minute there, thought you’d brought home another one of those light-skinned—”

  And then some ugly, ugly words came out of the old man’s mouth.

  * * *

  “Um… what did he say…?” I whispered to Ashley as he escorted me up the steps. I was maybe a little in shock. It had been a long time since I’d heard words like those.

  Actually… had I ever heard anyone say something like that in real life?

  The old man had already disappeared into the house, barely even listening as Ashley attempted to introduce me, the screen door banging shut in his wake.

  “I had a girlfriend for a while in high school who was aboriginal,” Ashley informed me. “Arturo really played the nasty old racist bastard card on that one. Ran her off pretty good.”

  He opened the door for me and I followed him inside. Slowly. What the hell was I walking into here…?

  My fingers were laced through his and I tightened my grip. It was dark inside, and it took a moment for my eyes to adjust to what I was seeing… which was basically a hoarder’s paradise.

  There was a small living room, which I could only tell was a living room because of the old recliner and TV. I glimpsed them through a narrow corridor between the stacks and stacks of boxes overflowing with junk. There was a door at the far end of the room that led beyond. And a small kitchen off to the left. The whole house was tiny and bursting at the seams with junk.

  It made the interior decorator in me absolutely itch.

  “Arturo?” I whispered, clinging to Ashley’s hand.

  “My granddad,” he said, nodding at the old man, who was now settling awkwardly into the recliner, muttering something hateful-sounding to himself.

  “Oh.”

  “What’s that, granddad?” Ashley prompted. “I can’t hear you.”

  “I said, there’s too many Chinese around here now,” the old man grunted. “Did you know we got a Muslim family right down the road here? Next thing you know, the gays move in, and there’s a holy war on the block.”

  “Yeah,” Ashley said, sounding bored. “Would really suck for you if the gays moved in and drove down the property value on this place, huh?”

  “Damn right.”

  I met Ashley’s eyes, and he drew a deep, silent breath.

  “I thought gay people moving into the neighborhood drove up the property value,” I whispered, hoping to make him smile. He hadn’t really smiled since we’d turned off the highway into Chilliwack.

  I was rewarded with a small smirk.

  I pointed at my sandals, like Should I take these off…? But he shook his head and drew me into the kitchen.

  A curtain was drawn over the lone window, and the room was dank, lit only by a greasy light over the stove. “What is he, senile now?” Ashley asked the man sitting at the kitchen table. I hadn’t even noticed him at first. “He’s bitching about property value and you don’t even own this place.”

  “Yeah, yeah,” the man said, then glanced up. He’d been reading a newspaper spread out on the table, one of about a million that were stacked high in the corners of the kitchen. He looked at Ashley, and then me, his eyes widening. “You didn’t tell me you were bringing a girl. I would’ve cleaned up a bit.” He closed the newspaper and folded it, as if that made the room more welcoming.

  “Why do you even let him out of the house?” Ashley said. “He’s gonna get shot one day with all that garbage he spews.”

  “Ah, good riddance,” Ashley’s dad said.

  This man had to be his dad; the resemblance was there, even if you had to look for it. He had similar striking blue eyes and a sharpness to his features, but where the lines of Ashley’s face made him beautiful, his father’s just made him hard. His hair was a dull gray and he didn’t look like he’d ever been the beauty his son was.

  Maybe the years had been unkind to him?

  When he started clearing away a pile of newspapers from the chair closest to me, Ashley told him, “We’re not staying. I’m taking you out to eat, remember?”

  His dad’s eyes fixed on me. “You’re not gonna introduce us?”

  “This is Danica.” He was still holding tight to my hand. “My dad, Franco,” he told me.

  I smiled. “Nice to meet you—”

  “Dani—What?” Ashley’s dad interrupted me.

  “Danica,” I said.

  “What is that? Hebrew?”

  “Uh… it is. But… I’m not.” It felt weird to say it. Like, would there be a problem if I were Jewish?

  “She’s pretty,” he informed Ashley, still staring at me.

  I had no idea what to say.

  There was an open beer on the table and maybe a half-dozen crushed cans strewn around the countertop. I really couldn’t tell if Ashley’s dad was drunk, socially inept, or just plain rude. What I could tell, from the look in his eyes and their similarity to his son’s, was that he wasn’t stupid.

  Why he lived like… this… was beyond my comprehension.

  “Let’s go.” Ashley tugged me toward the front door. “Scrape the old man out of his chair if he’s coming, and get him in the truck,” he said over his shoulder. “I’m buying, I’m hungry, and I’m not waiting around.”

  * * *

  A few hours later, after we’d dropped off Ashley’s dad and grandfather at home, and we pulled back out onto the highway, I told Ashley, “Chilliwack seems like a nice little city. Why do you dislike it s
o much?”

  He hadn’t told me he disliked the place, exactly. But I could definitely feel him relaxing as we drove away and left it in the rearview mirror.

  He hadn’t said a word when we’d dropped his family off.

  They hadn’t said a word to him, either, when I’d said goodbye to them. Though his dad had shaken my hand and told me it was nice meeting me.

  “It’s not the place. It’s the people,” Ashley said. “Like the two you just met.”

  “It wasn’t that bad,” I told him. Honestly, it wasn’t that great meeting his father and grandfather either, but I was glad he brought me anyway.

  “How about I take you to Colorado next time?” he said.

  I smiled. “Sounds lovely. I’ve never been. But why Colorado?”

  “You can meet my aunt Ginny. I swear to you, she’ll make up for today.”

  “You have an aunt in Colorado?”

  “Yeah. She’s my dad’s sister. But trust me, there’s very little resemblance. You’ll like her.” He glanced over at me. “She’ll like you.”

  I studied him, the stupid smile never leaving my face. “I don’t know. This feels like a big step, Ashley. How many girls have you introduced to Aunt Ginny?”

  He squirmed a little in his seat. “None, yet.”

  Whoa. What?

  My smile faded a notch.

  Okay, this was a big step. I wasn’t even his girlfriend. Though I’d like to be. We’d barely had one date—well, three, if you counted today and brunch with my family—and I’d made his penis bleed.

  How had I made the cut—absolutely no pun intended—when his girlfriend of two years didn’t?

  “What’s wrong?” he asked, picking up on my unease.

  “Honestly, I’m just not sure I’ve earned Aunt Ginny.”

  He smiled a bit. “You’ve definitely earned it. You just endured my dad’s hoarder shack and dinner in the company of my granddad.”

  Actually, I’d barely endured it. The man was awful. He’d left the table at least five times to have a cigarette outside, had barely looked at his grandson, had made more than one random comment about homosexuals and earrings, and the most he’d had to say was some racist rambling behind the waitress’s back that she had, unfortunately, overheard.