TAINTED: THE COMPLETE DUET

by Jenner, Carmen

“Can’t do what anymore?” Levi says, and I don’t know how I didn’t hear him come in, but he stands behind Cooper, arms folded across his chest and an angry expression I’ve grown accustomed to these last few weeks on his face.

  “Ali’s leaving,” Cooper says, and I don’t miss the painful edge to his voice.

  I take a deep breath. “I think it’s best for us, and best for the future of Taint, if I go home to Australia.”

  “Bullshit,” Levi says.

  “Hey look, Quinn and I finally agree on something. This is bullshit.”

  Levi ignores him, looking only at me with a tight-lipped expression. “So you’re just going to run away?”

  “I’m not running, Levi. I’m just trying to do the right thing here.”

  “So what? You think leaving is just gonna make this all better? Everyone just goes back to fucking normal?”

  “No. I don’t,” I whisper. “But I think eventually we’ll all be okay if the problem is removed.”

  “The problem?” he asks, with his brows raised, his gaze searching my face. “That’s how you see us? As a fucking problem?”

  “Levi—”

  “No, you know what?” he says, shaking his head. His body tenses. “I’m out. Problem fucking solved.”

  “Don’t—”

  “Don’t fucking what?” he shouts, as he backs me into the wall, much the way Cooper had just moments ago. His aggression is so much worse, though. “Don’t walk away? Don’t love you? Don’t tell you that my fucking heart has just been torn in two?”

  “Back off, Quinn,” Cooper says, as he grabs for Levi’s arm. Levi pulls back his elbow, connecting squarely with Coop’s jaw.

  “Stop it!” I shout.

  “Ah fuck!” Cooper cups his jaw, shaking out the dizziness, and then grabs Levi’s shoulder, spinning him and throwing a punch. He misses, though, probably on account of being drunk, and winds up smashing into the wall beside me.

  “Jesus Christ, Levi, what the fuck is wrong with you?” I say, crouching down and lifting Cooper’s chin up to the light. His eye is swelling, and a drop of blood trickles down his face from a tiny cut near the corner. “You’re bleeding.”

  “I’m fine.” Coop pushes my hands away and staggers to his feet. “You good now? You got it out of your system?”

  Levi laughs. “No, I’m just getting started.”

  “No, you’re not. This is exactly why I’m leaving,” I say, glancing between them. “Look at us—we’re tearing one another apart. Whatever this is, whatever we have here, isn’t worth it.”

  “Nice to see you care so much,” Levi says through gritted teeth.

  “God damn it, Levi, would you stop already?” I hiss. “This isn’t going to get any better. We’re just going to continue to hurt one another if I stay.”

  “We’re gonna fuckin’ hurt anyway, Red,” Levi shouts, his voice breaking on his nickname for me.

  I pull his face down to mine, resting my forehead against his. Tears trail down my cheeks and I glance back at Coop. “I can’t do this anymore. It’s not normal, to feel like this.”

  I step out around Levi, tugging my arm free from his grasp when he yanks on it.

  “Ali.”

  I close the door behind me and lean against it for a moment, and then I retreat to my bunk. In a few more hours we’ll drive through the Charleston city limits. I’ll pack my stuff when they’re in sound check and leave soon after, during the show.

  And then I’ll hop a plane back home and put this whole mess to bed, where I shouldn’t have taken the rock stars.

  CHAPTER TWENTY-EIGHT

  MAKE YOU FAMOUS

  ALI

  I sit in the kitchenette, sipping a glass of Jack to calm my nerves as I stare at my bag. I’d planned to leave during their show, but it felt all wrong. Everything feels wrong. I know now that I can’t leave without a goodbye; it may be the last time I see either of them, and I can’t have that. They deserve better than that. Looking back, it was foolish of me to believe that no one would become attached. I can’t choose one without hurting the other, without tearing the band apart. I wish this had just been about sex. I wish we’d been able to keep our feelings separate. I wish that the idea of leaving didn’t hurt so bad. I wish for a lot of things.

  I wipe away the fresh set of tears that spill over my cheeks, and pour myself another drink to steel my nerves. The familiar whoosh of the bus’s front door opening has my hands clenching into fists in anticipation, but when the sounds of the concert infiltrate the bus, I let out a sigh of relief, knowing that I still have another thirty minutes or so before their show ends.

  “Hey, Ali,” Leif says as he walks through the curtain-offed driver’s area and into the bus. “You’re missing the show.”

  “Yeah. I didn’t feel up to it tonight.”

  “I get it. Those groupies are pretty intense, huh?” He grabs a glass from the cabinet and sits opposite me, filling his cup with Jack. He attempts to refill mine, but I shake my head. I’d do plenty of drinking on the way home, I’d drink for all three of us, but I’d had enough for tonight.

  “You going somewhere?” Leif asks. I glance at the bag sitting on the seat beside me, and then I give him a half smile and set the bag down at my feet.

  “Yeah. I am.”

  His eyebrows knit together as he studies my face. “Where?”

  “Home.”

  “What do the boys have to say about that?”

  “It’s not really up to them.”

  “You don’t think you owe them for bringing you along on this tour? I mean, they went out on a limb for you. That bitch at the record company was going to fire you—Cooper kept that from happening. He’s paid your airfare and your wages the whole time you’ve been here.”

  I still, with my drink halfway to my lips.

  “What?” I ask, certain that I didn’t hear that right.

  “He told me. Or he told the others, and Zed mentioned it to me.”

  “That’s not right. My flights were paid for by the record company, and the payments came from them, not Cooper.”

  “Yeah, but he was the one paying your wage to them.”

  “Why would he do that?”

  Leif shrugs. “Beats the shit outta me. Seems like an expensive way to keep some pretty pussy around.”

  My stomach roils. I was already concerned enough about getting paid for this job while sleeping with two members of the band. When the record company had tried to milk what we had to make a buck, I’d felt even worse, but this?

  He’s been paying me the whole time?

  He may not have intended it this way, but by paying me a wage and fucking me at the same time, he made me a whore. His whore.

  Another thought occurs to me—perhaps this had been his plan all along. One last fuck you to the girl who broke his heart, and if you make a few bucks out of it in record sales in the meantime then it’s all gravy, right? Dread slowly creeps into my heart. I don’t want it to be true, but how can I tell any different? What if it had all been fake? What if it had all just been a bid to sell more records?

  I’d like to believe that that wasn’t the case, but how can I be sure? The answer is I can’t. And that kills me, because everything I felt for the both of them was real. Everything I feel is real.

  “You didn’t know any of this?” Leif asks, pulling me from my reverie. “I thought for sure you knew.”

  I shake my head. I replay all of the times we’d been alone. The times when he had said that I meant something to him. All of the time he’d had to tell me about this, and didn’t. My gut twists, and I get up and run for the bathroom, retching into the bowl. When I’m done emptying the contents of my stomach, I brush my teeth and splash my face with water, and then I exit the bathroom.

  “Hey, you want something to drink?” Leif asks, and I graciously accept the water he offers.

  “Thanks,” I whisper, dazedly staring at the contents of the cup.

  Leif runs a hand over the back of his neck. “Lis
ten, I feel shitty being the one to tell you all that.”

  “It’s not your fault, Leif.”

  “I know, but—

  “It’s okay, really. I just need to talk it out with Cooper.”

  The roar from the stadium can still be heard, loud and clear. I contemplate leaving right now, but if I do I’ll regret it to the day I die because I have to see his face. I have to see the look in his eyes as he tells me that what Leif is saying is not true. It can’t be true. I sit down heavily in the booth and sip more of the water Leif gave me. I bury my head in my hands. It’s pounding from all the vomiting and the questions I have.

  “You feeling okay?” Leif asks, and his voice washes over me as if I’m underwater. I shake my head as if to clear it.

  “What?”

  “You wanna come lie down?” Leif crouches down in front of me. He’s close. Too close. His breath is on my face, the scent of Jack Daniels washing over me. My stomach lurches again. It cramps painfully, and Leif asks again if I want to lie down.

  “No. I’m fine,” I say, though I feel anything but. My tongue is thick in my mouth, heavy as it butchers my words.

  “You look tired, Ali,” Leif says, rubbing his hands up and down my arms. “Come on, I’ll take you in the back. You can sleep.”

  “No. I don’t want to. James,” I murmur. “James is sleeping.”

  “Fuck,” Leif says, his voice sounding so angry and far away. He stands, and his blue eyes gaze at me with such hatred. He’s nothing like his brother. “James is here?”

  “Sleeping.” I close my eyes, because sleeping sounds so good right now.

  “Shit,” he says. I blink up at him, but I can barely keep my eyes open. “We’re moving this thing forward.”

  “What?” I say, but at this point I’m not even sure I’m making words so much as just thinking them. I open my eyes. Leif has his phone pressed to his ear and he’s whispering into the receiver, staring down at me with such contempt that I shrink back. Or I try to shrink back, but I only end up slumping against the booth.

  “Then find a way to get past security,” he hisses into the phone. “She’s leaving. This is our only chance.”

  “Only chance for what?” I ask, but my thick tongue swallows the words, and I can’t keep my eyes open. My mouth is dry and my limbs are heavy, but they’re floating, too. I’m weighed down, yet weightless. My skin tingles. I close my eyes, and then I really am weightless. I drift. I float.

  “No, move her to the couch.”

  I blink up at Leif, but it’s not his face I see. It’s someone else’s. He’s middle-aged, with sandy-blond hair and deep-set lines in his overly tanned face.

  “I know you,” I say, but I don’t know if it comes out as anything at all.

  “Gonna make you famous, sweetheart.”

  “You need to fucking hurry up. Another fifteen minutes until they’re done, and then we’re both dead if they come back and find us when she’s high as a fucking kite. Where’s my money?”

  “You’ll get your money after the shots.”

  “Sh—” I close my eyes.

  “Shh, that’s it, sweetheart. Just lie back and relax, we’ll do everything else.

  “What? No. I have to go. I’m leaving.” I try sitting up, but I can’t. My body is too heavy, too tired. Something tickles my lip—powder, I think, as it’s brushed across the tip of my nose and my upper lip. Someone pushes a finger into my mouth, and there’s more of the bitter-sweet powder rubbed across my gums. I have a vague recollection of Levi doing this to me once before, when I smile. “You finished early?”

  There’s a pause, and I want to open my eyes so I can see his gorgeous face as he smiles down at me, but my lids are so heavy, and my face feels numb.

  “Yeah, I did. Now, let’s get you out of those clothes, Ali.”

  I laugh. “It’s weird ... you said my name.”

  His hand freezes against my stomach, but a second later he pulls my jeans down my legs. Cold air dances along my bare thighs. He runs his hand over them. “Fuck, she’s gorgeous.”

  “The deal wasn’t touching her. It was getting her picture,” Leif says. His tone is sharp and bitter, angry again.

  I blink in confusion, attempting to cover myself with my hands, trying to sit up. I can’t make my body do anything though. I’m weighed down with leaden limbs. My breath squeezes painfully through my lungs as I try to fight against the tide of sleep threatening to drag me under.

  “Keep your fucking panties on. I’m just testing out the merchandise,” the other voice says.

  “Don’t,” Leif hisses.

  “What?” I murmur, but my voice is small and strained, and my mouth is dry, so, so dry. My head spins when I try to sit up, so I lie back and close my eyes. “Where’s Levi?”

  I’m aware of a loud clicking noise, over and over. It’s like a mechanical wasp buzzing around my head. That thought makes me laugh. I bring my arms up across my face, covering the bright light, but someone removes them.

  “Come on, Ali,” Levi says, placing my hands back over my stomach. I like how warm they are, so I press them against me, but he shakes me off. More buzzing. More mechanical wasp. I shoo it away, feeling my whole body growing heavier.

  A raspy unfamiliar voice says, “Camera fucking loves you, babe.”

  I don’t know what that means, but my head spins. I feel as if I might be sick again, and then I must pass out, because I don’t remember who was talking and where I am.

  When I wake, it’s to shouting voices. I’m cold and trembling, and the acrid stench of vomit fills the room.

  “Ali, baby,” Cooper says. His hands are warm and sweaty on my body. A blanket covers me. In the background, Levi shouts and a brief flash shows him punching Leif. Zed is behind Leif, and for a minute I think he’s protecting his brother, but he’s not—he’s holding him still while Levi busts up his brother’s face. Deb screams. Like a wild animal, she launches herself at Leif. Levi snags her around the waist and pulls her back. I close my eyes because watching their movements back and forth hurts my brain.

  Cooper touches my face and I blink up at him. Sweat beads on his brow, his lips, those beautiful lips that are turned down in a frown. “Coop. I don’t feel good.”

  “Shh, it’s okay,” he says, wrapping me in his arms. His body is trembling, or maybe it’s mine? No, he’s shaking too. His breathing seesaws out of his lungs as he squeezes me tightly. “An ambulance is coming; you’re okay. You’re okay.”

  But I don’t believe him, because my head spins as if it’s on a tilt-a-whirl. And I have to leave him. And that’s not okay.

  That will never be okay.

  CHAPTER TWENTY-NINE

  THE GREAT PRETENDER

  COOP

  Ali lies on the bed, her head propped up against a fluffy pillow, consumed by sheets and bedding, her small body swallowed by the hospital gown she wears. Her face is pale and dark circles rim her eyes. If I ever find Leif, or that Gainy fucker who did this to her, I will strangle every breath from their lungs. I tremor with rage as I think about how afraid she must have been, how lost, and alone. She’d needed me and I’d been on stage, singing my heart out to thousands of nameless faces, gyrating my hips and pretending as if I wanted to fuck each and every one of them. Some days my job just feels so surreal. Some days I don’t even feel like a whole person, but just the shell of a man who pretends to be fine. The great pretender.

  If I had a normal job, none of this would have happened, including meeting her. She would have been better off.

  Ali’s whole body jolts, and her hands ball into fists. Her eyes flutter. I lean forward and gently stroke the inside of her wrist.

  “Hey,” I whisper, and her hands unclench as she slowly opens her eyes. I run my fingertips over her forehead, tucking a strand of her hair behind her ear.

  “Hey,” she says through a raspy throat. She lifts her free hand to her neck, but stops halfway when her movements tug on the IV in her hand.

  “What happened?”
she croaks.

  I scratch at the stubble that lines my chin, I haven’t slept, and I’m still wearing the stinking clothes I wore on stage at last night’s concert. I let out a strangled grunt and glare at our interlocked hands.

  How do I tell her this? How do I tell her that Leif, a kid I looked on like my own brother betrayed us, betrayed her in the worst possible way?

  “Do you remember anything?” I ask, chewing my lip.

  She shakes her head, but I know she’s holding something back from me.

  “What is it?” I ask.

  “Nothing. Where’s Levi?”

  “Getting coffee.”

  “Ali,” I say softly, placing my free hand over our joined ones. “Do you remember anything about what happened?”

  “I was sick, and Leif gave me a glass of water. I don’t know what happened after that.” She takes a deep shuddering breath. “There was another man ... I thought Levi was there, but he wasn’t. Was he?”

  “No. He was on stage.”

  Her resolve cracks, and then her expression crumples, tears track down her cheeks and slide off her jaw. “What did they do, Coop?”

  “Baby, I’m so sorry,” I whisper, and she flinches.

  “What did they do?” she bites out.

  “We came off stage, and exited out the back door when Deb said you hadn’t been backstage the whole show. I had this weird feeling in my gut; I can’t explain it. None of us felt like partying, but there was a crowd at the back door.” I rake my free hand through my hair, staring down at the bed. “I caught that Gainy fucker lurking alongside the groupies. He was snapping pictures of us as we signed autographs. Security knows not to let him near us, and by the time we got through the crowd he was gone. And then we found Leif, bailed up by James. And you were lying naked on the couch, tanked up to the eyeballs, your eyes rolling back in your head.”

  She sobs, her hand squeezing tightly in mine. “They didn’t—”

  “No, the doctors checked you over, you weren’t ... assaulted.” But she had been. Not in the physical sense, but this lifestyle had raped her. It had chewed her up, used her and spat her out. All for the sake of a fucking magazine article. So people could buy a copy and read all of the bullshit within its pages and somehow feel as if they were closer to me. As if they knew me, or her, or they felt they were worthy to judge her.