One Last Shot (Blood Stone Riot Book 2)

by Julie Archer

  “You okay with that?” the singer asked. “Probably the biggest gig you’ve ever done, right?”

  Richey nodded, barely able to speak. Excitement and adrenalin coursed through his veins as it sank in. He couldn’t wait to tell Eva and headed off into the main body of the club.

  Joanne and Gavin were working the bar. They both asked Richey if he would be joining them and he laughed, saying that he didn’t think he’d be working there much longer. He decided there and then that he wouldn’t go back and made a mental note to speak to Caro or Nic that evening. Eva joined him.

  “Ah, the last time you have a free pass,” she said.

  “Trust me, I am looking forward to spending every day and every night with you,” he said. He kissed her forehead.

  Eva made a face. “Every day? Really? I don’t get time off for good behaviour?”

  “You know what I mean.”

  “Lucky for you I do. So can we celebrate properly now?”

  “We certainly can!” He picked her up and whirled her round. “You’ll never guess where we’re playing...”

  Eva squealed. “Put me down! And you’re right, I won’t guess. Tell me.”

  He did as she asked and leaned down to kiss her properly. “Only the Wilde Park Festival.”

  She grinned. “I don’t know much about it, but I know it’s somewhere you love and it will be amazing.”

  “It certainly will be,” said Alik. He and Caro joined the couple.

  “Richey, congratulations!” Caro kissed his cheek. “That song is amazing, and Alik has been telling me about the progress on the new material as well. I guess this means I’ll be losing a member of staff, but you know there’s always a shift or two waiting for you if you ever need it. Which you won’t because Blood Stone Riot are back and stronger than before.”

  “Thanks, Caro, that means a lot. You gave me an opportunity when things were pretty shit for me, just like Alik did, and I’ll never forget it.” Richey grinned and kissed her back.

  “And me,” said Eva. She linked her arm with Richey’s. “I’m looking forward to seeing what happens next.”

  Poppy had been on edge the whole evening, worried about seeing Nate. She hadn’t told him about her burgeoning relationship with Parker. Parker had been spending more and more time with her and India in North Ridge but still travelling back and forth to London, which was slowly starting to drain his energy. She felt guilty that she couldn’t go up to London as much as she might like without a babysitting plan of military proportions. She wondered if it might be time to approach the idea of moving in together. Poppy spent some time chatting to Caro and Eva, all the while keeping an eye out for Parker. Caro told her about the plans she had for redesigning and relaunching The Indigo Lounge and The Roca Bar, turning them into more of a chain. She had suggested that Eva and Olivia get involved in the branding and PR. Selfishly, Poppy thought that if Eva had to be away in Mallorca, having Parker in the house would be wonderful.

  Poppy excused herself and sought out Parker in the VIP bar, where he was waiting for a drink. “Hey, have you got a minute? I wanted to talk to you about something.”

  Parker frowned. “That sounds serious. Should I be worried?”

  Poppy took a deep breath and decided to just come out with it. “I wondered what you thought about moving in?”

  “Into the house?”

  “Well, yes, although I can see by your reaction that you’re not overly impressed with the thought.”

  Parker grinned. “Who said I wasn’t? I’m just surprised that you suggested it so soon.”

  Poppy sighed in relief. “Well, it was actually India’s idea. She quite likes you, you know.”

  “And I quite like her too. Not to mention her gorgeous mother!”

  Parker pulled Poppy towards him and kissed her deeply. A kiss that almost blocked out the rest of the world, but not quite.

  “What the fuck do you think you’re doing? Get your hands off my wife!” Nate pulled Parker away from Poppy and raised a fist, ready to fight.

  “Nate, stop!” Poppy wrestled her body between the two of them. She stood between them, her back to Parker, shielding him from any further attack.

  Nate stopped abruptly and glared at her. “Why are you protecting him?”

  Parker gave Poppy a pointed look. Now was the time to come clean. One of them had to tell him what was going on.

  “Because we’ve been seeing each other,” she said.

  There was a second of silence before Nate responded. “Say that again.” His voice was dangerously low.

  “Parker and I are in a relationship.”

  Nate looked between Poppy and Parker.

  “When did this happen?”

  “Nate, what does it matter when it happened? You and I have been over for a long time, not just because you said so a couple of months ago.”

  “But that doesn’t give you the right to hook up with my manager!”

  “I think it gives me every right! I, at least, had the decency to wait until after we were separated before I started shagging someone else!”

  Nate stopped in his tracks. “Who told you? How did you find out?”

  Poppy crossed her arms. “It doesn’t matter who told me. I can’t believe I was naïve enough to sit at home looking after our child when you were out doing God only knows what with some woman called Rach. And I felt guilty when you were home because we weren’t doing enough as a family.”

  She and Nate stood there, glaring at each other until Parker stepped in.

  “Look, I know this is hard to take in right now, but at least don’t make a scene here. Why don’t you come around to the house in the morning when you’ve had a chance to cool off?” Parker said.

  “Come around to my own house? Yeah, sure Parker, why not?” said Nate. “Fuck you.” He stalked off.

  Poppy came up to Parker. “I’m so sorry.”

  He brought his hand to her lips. “We had to tell him at some time, and we knew he wouldn’t take it well. But I didn’t know he had cheated on you. I’m sorry too.”

  She sighed. “You’ve nothing to be sorry for.”

  “Why don’t we head home? I’m sure no-one would notice.”

  “Sounds like a great idea.”

  Chapter Thirty-Eight

  Richey couldn’t wait to get home. It had been an amazing end to the tour. He and Eva had enjoyed a great evening with the team from The Indigo Lounge after the bar had shut, an impromptu leaving do for him. Now he needed to sleep. They walked in through the front door and were met in the hallway by Poppy, carrying a fractious-looking India.

  “Everything okay?” he asked. He headed for the stairs, pulling Eva after him, not really caring what the answer was.

  “Richey, you have a visitor,” said Poppy. Her voice cracked slightly. “In the living room.”

  “Who on Earth would that be?” He turned and headed into the other room, Eva a couple of steps behind him.

  “It took me some time to track you down, Richey. No-one knew where you had gone,” a voice said.

  Richey ground to a halt, and Eva barrelled into his back. The texts, the calls, now this. He stared at the woman standing in the centre of the room, unable to speak.

  “I needed to see you,” the woman replied.

  Eva intervened. “That’s nice and everything, but we’ve just got in and I’m just about ready for bed now.”

  The woman ignored her and continued to speak to Richey. “You weren’t answering my calls or texts.”

  “So you’re the one that was pestering him,” said Eva. “I think it’s obvious he’s moved on.”

  Poppy put her hand on Eva’s arm. “I think we should let them talk.”

  “Richey?” Both Eva and the other woman said at the same time.

  He looked between the two of them, as if looking at two different lives. There was the life that had been tinged with heartbreak and pain versus the one that was filled with laughter and light, not to mention fantastic sex. He wasn�
�t ready to deal with the former.

  But it appeared that he wasn’t going to get a choice in the matter. He listened, helpless, as everything came tumbling out.

  The woman addressed Eva. “I’m Kim. Richey and I are together. Or at least we were until he did a runner. Not the ideal way to treat the mother of his child.”

  Richey watched Eva’s jaw drop.

  Eva looked between the couple. “You have a child?”

  Richey pressed the heels of his hands into his eye sockets. He didn’t want to listen to what Kim was saying, and he didn’t want Eva to hear it.

  “I lost the baby.” Kim paused, directing the rest of her sentence at Richey. “I lost our baby.”

  His hands dropped from his face just in time to see Eva crumple at Kim’s revelation. She ran from the room, closely followed by Poppy, leaving him alone with Kim.

  Kim ran a hand through her short, blonde, pixie-cut hair. Hair that Richey remembered as being long and flowing, one of the things he had first loved about her. She had lost that carefree, fun spark that had been prevalent in the early days of their relationship; that had faded a few days before she miscarried. He hadn’t been strong enough to see it through with her.

  He’d done a terrible, terrible thing.

  He had simply upped and left her just a couple of weeks after she lost the baby.

  Kim perched on the edge of one of the sofas as Richey paced around the living room, looking anywhere but at her. His head was a wreck. He was still trying to work out what to say when Poppy came back in.

  “I made some tea,” she said. She placed the mugs on the low coffee table between the sofas.

  “Tea? You think fucking tea is going to fix this mess?” Richey kicked the leg of the table, causing liquid to slosh out of the mugs, forming a stain on the untreated wood.

  “Thank you, Poppy. That’s really kind of you,” said Kim.

  “If you need anything else, let me know. I’ll be in the kitchen.”

  Richey watched her go.

  “Richey, sit down.”

  There it was. Kim telling him what to do again. That was one of the reasons why he had left. He was capable of making his own decisions. He didn’t need her input or to have his life mapped out for him. He supposed she did deserve answers after everything she had done for him. But he wasn’t sure he knew them himself. Reluctantly, he sank down onto the sofa opposite her.

  “I just need to know why. After everything.” Her large, watery blue eyes sought his.

  He didn’t respond straight away. He couldn’t. Couldn’t tell her that from the moment she told him she was pregnant, he felt trapped. Trapped like a teenager who had been fooling about with his first girlfriend and been careless, been caught out. They should have been more careful, but accidents happened. He hadn’t always been thinking straight whenever they had sex. Particularly if he’d been off his face which, at that time, was more often than not. The thought of settling when he hadn’t had the chance to experience the life he wanted, when he had been on the verge of success once, made him feel dead inside. Joining Blood Stone Riot and meeting Eva had been the second chance he needed, that one last shot at making things work. He didn’t know what Kim wanted to hear. He was sure she didn’t want to hear the truth.

  “One minute we were happy, planning for the future. Then one of the worst possible things ever happened and I woke up one morning, alone. No note, no message, no clue as to where you were. Richey, I thought you were dead!”

  “Well, you know I’m not dead,” he said.

  “Nobody knew where you were. I tried everything, called everyone I could think of. I even went to people’s houses, the people I thought I would never have to see again. They thought I was a crazy woman.”

  Kim was anything but crazy. She was focused, headstrong, and capable. All the things Richey hadn’t been.

  “Did you ever think about how it made me feel?” asked Kim. “Even for a minute?”

  Richey hung his head. He hadn’t given Kim another thought when he’d left. He needed to get away, to be as far away from the situation as possible, start again somewhere new. After he’d escaped, he saw that things in his life needed to change.

  Kim glared at him, the softness in her fading. “I gave up a lot for you. I lost friends because of my druggie, errant boyfriend. I nearly lost my job when I had to look after you.”

  Richey didn’t want to think about those times. They were in the past. Kim had always said her bosses understood and allowed her to take that time off. He didn’t know she had got into trouble. But if he had, he doubted he would have acted any differently. Kim had still lost the baby. And he had still left.

  “I might have lost the ability to have a baby because of the miscarriage,” said Kim. Her voice was quiet, laced with blame.

  Richey hadn’t thought about the consequences of her miscarriage. He hadn’t really taken in much when the doctors were talking to him and Kim about the future. He had already made the decision that he wasn’t going to be there. “I’m so sorry.”

  “What?”

  “I’m sorry,” he said. “I don’t know what more you want from me.”

  He stood up and bolted for the door, leaving Kim alone. He headed upstairs to his room and slammed the door behind him. Going to the wardrobe, he searched for the holdall he’d taken on tour, hunting for what he wanted. The thing he’d been resisting for so long. Finally, his hand closed around the small plastic bag. He tipped the contents on the desk and used his credit card to chop the cocaine into lines. It might have been a long time since he’d done it, but some things you don’t forget. He pressed a finger against one nostril and snorted the substance, waiting for the hit.

  Chapter Thirty-Nine

  “What do you think’s going on in there?” asked Eva. She paced around the kitchen, trying not to think too much.

  “We should let them talk,” replied Poppy. “Sort things out.”

  “I mean, I knew he had an ex, but he never mentioned she’d been pregnant. She’s the woman in the pictures that I saw when I first met Richey. She’s even more glamorous in real life.” She slumped over the breakfast bar, her head rested on her arms, hair pooling out around her.

  “Do you want some tea?” Poppy asked.

  Eva’s head snapped up. “Tea? How is that going to make things better? Richey’s been lying to me since the start and you think that tea is going to solve it?” Her eyes shone, tears threatening to waterfall down her face.

  “I’m sorry.” Poppy busied herself making the tea anyway. “What else do you want me to do?”

  “You shouldn’t have let that bitch in the house for a start. Or you could at least have warned me she was here.”

  Poppy passed her a mug. “She’s not a bitch, Eva. How could I turn her away after everything she’s been through? She lost a baby. I could hardly send her back out onto the streets. It was obvious she needed to talk to Richey.”

  Eva exhaled slowly. “You could have told her to come back another time. Or told Richey that she’d been here and he could have made his own decision about what to do,” she said. “He’s been backed into a corner now.” She stood up and made for the fridge. Maybe there was some wine there. It would certainly do a lot more good than tea.

  Poppy stopped her as Eva’s hand closed around a bottle. She took it away and placed it back where it had come from. “I don’t think that’s going to help tonight. If Richey wants to explain things, then keeping a bit of a clear head would help.”

  Eva sank back down onto the stool by the breakfast bar. She sipped tea and pretended that everything was all right, that an almighty bombshell hadn’t just been dropped.

  She heard a door slam and Kim’s voice calling after Richey.

  Poppy jumped up and made her way into the living room, Eva hot on her heels. Kim was sobbing her heart out on the sofa. Poppy rushed over to the blonde woman and embraced her, holding her as she cried. Eva couldn’t look away. She ought to find Richey, but she wanted to know what Kim ha
d said to him and whether she had tried to win him back.

  “Sweetheart, I’m so sorry, are you okay?”

  Eva shot daggers at Poppy. It hadn’t been that long since Poppy had comforted her over everything that had happened with Jed. She watched Kim try to compose herself, but Poppy’s words only seemed to bring a fresh wave of tears.

  “He... he... doesn’t want anything to do with me.” Kim rested her head on Poppy’s shoulder. “I don’t know what to do. I thought he’d want me back, try to make another go of things.”

  “As he’s been happy with me, I doubt that would be the case.” Eva’s tone was harsh, and she meant for it to be. “He never even mentioned you or the baby, so you can’t have been that important to him.” She ignored the look Poppy gave her. “We’ve been together for ages and the fact he chose not to talk about you speaks volumes.”

  Poppy stepped in. “Look, Kim, why don’t you stay here tonight? It’s too late for you to go and find somewhere else. You’re not really in any fit state to be on your own either, are you?”

  “Oh, Poppy, I couldn’t! I mean, thank you and everything, but I don’t think it’s really the right place for me, do you?”

  Eva knew that Poppy wouldn’t have been able to see the look of triumph that crossed Kim’s face as the two made eye contact. This definitely wasn’t the fragile little flower that she was making out to be.

  “Don’t be silly,” said Poppy. “Everyone just needs some sleep and maybe you and Richey can talk again in the morning, when everyone’s calmed down. Come on, you can borrow some of my things.”

  Eva watched, helpless, as Poppy led Kim out of the room. After a couple of minutes, she followed, heading instead for her own room. When it was empty, she crossed the corridor and faced Richey’s closed door. Hesitating for a moment, she rapped on it.

  “Richey?”

  Silence. She pressed her ear to the door but couldn’t hear any movement. With a frustrated sigh, she went into her own room and curled up on the bed. She pulled the covers around her, wishing Richey was there. She wanted to know the truth about him and Kim. She wanted to know everything.