Roxy (Pandemic Sorrow #3)

by Stevie J. Cole

  “Holy shit, Rox! Are you kidding me?” Her hands flew to her head. “This…is really his house?”

  “Layla,” I grabbed the door to her car and opened it. “Come on.”

  She’d already made her way up to the front of his house, leaping through the gate before it shut. She made a beeline to the window and peered inside. “Oh, my God,” she mumbled.

  “Layla!” I screamed, punching the code in again and opening the gate to go after her.

  That did nothing, she continued on her peeping Tom excursion, looking through windows and gasping. Finally, she came trotting down his driveway, pointing back toward the house. “I want a tour. You got the keys, right? Let me see inside.”

  “No. Are you insane?”

  “No, I’m a fan of the guy you are fucking. It’s a compliment, and I’m your sister so you’re supposed to appease me.”

  I shook my head. “Absolutely not. You are not going in his house.”

  “Come on, Rox. Just let me see a little bit of it. This is like MTV Cribs incognito.”

  Huffing, I yanked her arm and dragged her out of the gate. “No, he has cameras. I’ll look like a psycho taking you in there and showing you around a house that isn’t mine.”

  “But it’s Jag Steele,” she pouted.

  The gate slammed shut.

  “Oh, my fucking God! He is just a guy. You screwed his brother, go try to get in his house!”

  There we stood, in front of Jag’s house and yelling at each other, as a Hollywood Tours bus slowed down to allow the tourists to snap pictures. I felt every bit of life drain from my face when my eyes scanned over the bus.

  Directing my attention back to Layla, I pleaded with her, “Please, just get in the car.” I could feel my skin flush from embarrassment as people continued to take pictures. “Get in the car. Get in the car, now!” I growled at her through the fake smile plastered on my face.

  Layla rolled her eyes, huffed, and made her way to the car. “Fine. Be selfish.”

  She slammed the door and I slid down into the seat, listening to her bombard me with questions about Jag for the entire ride back to my apartment.

  This was not the normal I had been looking for. And it was just going to keep getting more “not normal” with each passing day.

  Chapter 15

  I tied my apron around my waist and grabbed a rack of glasses, listening to the rims clink together as I unloaded them under the bar. It felt like it had been months, not a week, since I’d been at work.

  Back to reality.

  “Long time no see, boo.”

  I turned and found Tess leaning against the end of the bar with a smirk on her face.

  I shrugged, grabbed my towel, and wiped a spot from one of the tall glasses.

  She accusingly narrowed her eyes on me. “Been sick? On vacation?”

  I kept wiping the glass, trying to decide how to handle this, because I sure as hell didn’t want everyone up in my personal life. “Just off,” I choked out.

  Tess laughed and tapped her pen over the granite. “Oh, you mean getting off. You’ve just been getting off, right?”

  Don’t look up at her. Just keep wiping these glasses off. “What?”

  “I cannot believe you!” She walked toward me, that smirk of hers now a full-on smile. “Jag Steele, you seduced Jag fucking Steele. God, I am so jealous of your pussy right now.”

  I felt heat fly all over me and I swallowed. “Uh, I didn’t seduce him…”

  “Oh. My. Fuck!” Her jaw dangled open. “I didn’t believe Carlos.” Her eyes narrowed and she tilted her head to the side as she took steady strides toward me and smacked me on the shoulder. “You bitch!”

  “What? Carlos? Why was he even talking about it?”

  Tess crossed her arms and shot another flabbergasted look at me. “Well, everyone wanted to know where the hell you’d gone and why people were having to pick up your shifts. People were getting annoyed with you, Rox. Carlos said it was because the Jag Steele said he didn’t want you to leave. And I quote, ‘Jag brings us a lot of business. If he wants one of my staff to be off so she can fuck him, I’m not gonna say no.’”

  I groaned. I couldn’t believe Carlos.

  “Whatever.”

  “So,” she hopped up on the bar and wiped her hands down her jeans, “please tell me, Miss He’s-Just-A-Guy, how in the hell you ended up alone with him. Last I remember, you hosed his ass down with the soda gun while groaning that you hated him.”

  I was a little embarrassed because I’d always made so much fun of the girls who bent over and gave their dignity away to guys just like Jag.

  “Well…” I had now moved on to furiously wiping the spotless bar down. “Uh,” I felt a blank stare fall over my face and stopped cleaning, “I’m not even really sure.”

  She looked completely unamused. “Uh-huh.” Her tongue skimmed over her teeth and she huffed. “Look, you can’t go fuck the hottest rock god in the world and not be prepared to dish out the gritty, most likely filthy-as-fuck details of it.”

  Placing my hand on my hip, I narrowed my gaze on her. “Who said I slept with him?”

  “Uh, hello, Rox, it’s Jag Steele. You were held hostage by him for two damn weeks, you fucked him. A lot. And you must have some mad skills for him to call your work and tell Carlos you couldn’t come in.”

  I jerked the bar towel off the counter and tossed it in the soak bucket before wiping my hands on my apron.

  “Well, he’s not like you think he is!” That comment was hostile, defensive. I knew she wouldn’t be able to get past the fact that he was famous, so there was no point even discussing this with her.

  I turned to walk off, and Tess hurled herself from the counter, tripping and grabbing onto my shoulder. “Look, every girl here has been talking about this shit. You are the talk of the damn club, and I have a feeling you’ll be the talk of the fucking tabloids pretty soon. So you better be ready to answer a lot of questions.”

  “Well, I don’t have to answer any of those questions, now do I?”

  “Seriously? I mean, no, but shit…”

  I shrugged. “Shit, what? Tess, it’s my life.”

  She took a step toward me, her eyes narrowing as she studied me.

  Suddenly, her eyes popped and her jaw gapped open. “Oh. My. God. You like him. You like him, Rox?” She covered her mouth with her hands. “Holy shit. He likes you, doesn’t he? Oh, my God. You are Jag’s Steele’s motherfucking girlfriend?” She grabbed me again and violently shook me. “Roxy, do you realize how cool that is? A fucking legend likes you.”

  I rolled my eyes and shook my head. “He’s just a guy, Tess. He’s just a guy…”

  I walked off and heard her sigh. “No, he’s not. He’s fucking Jag Steele, Roxy. That is not just a guy!”

  And there it was.

  To me, most of the time, he wasn’t Jag Steele, he was just Jag. Take him off the stage, take that eyeliner off of him, and the guitar out of his hands, and he was just a guy—a really sexy guy—but a guy nonetheless.

  That entire night people asked me about Jag, and it got old really quick.

  I finally got fed up with all the questions, and at one point, I was tempted to stand up on the bar and shout that I’d fucked that pierced cock of his all over his house, but instead I just groaned and dumped ice in the bin.

  I fully expected that he’d go on tour and I would never hear from him again, and by the end of my shift, I’d thought about it so much that I’d pretty much accepted it.

  Just when I laid down to go to bed, I got a text message.

  Jag: I miss you!

  I bit down on my bottom lip and typed: I miss you too.

  I sunk down under my sheets. My apartment seemed so small. My bed was stiff, and the sheets were unbelievably rough compared to Jag’s expensive designer ones. I rolled over and caught a whiff of him. We’d spent the night at my place one night, and I guess his expensive cologne had seeped into the cheap fabric.

  I laid there
fighting to find sleep, but my mind was too busy beating me up to let me rest.

  I was fucked. I liked him, I missed him, I couldn’t stop thinking about him, and he was everything I said I never wanted.

  I was the complete opposite of him. I was not stylish, I was not unnaturally attractive, I bordered on poverty, I didn’t like being around people, and I absolutely hated drugs.

  It was one of those moments were I had confused the hell out of myself. How had I gotten so involved with him in such a short amount of time? What was it about him that I just couldn’t say no to?

  I spent at least an hour fearing that I was one of those girls.

  Maybe it was the fame; maybe that had clouded everything and made me fall for him.

  After two hours of self-reflection, I punched my mattress, groaning. The fame wasn’t it, because when I’d fallen for him he had been completely removed from that. It had just been the two of us. I’d fallen for him when we had both been rubbed raw from confessing our demons, uncovering our pasts and weaknesses. I’d fallen for him simply because of who he was, and that meant this was real.

  Finally, when I could see the dark outside turning to a light navy blue, I drifted to sleep, completely worn out from fear of what I’d gotten myself into.

  I never wanted to love anyone, and I was pretty sure it was too late. Love doesn’t have a time frame, it doesn’t make sense. It’s like a storm you can’t escape, and that storm will either strip every piece of impurity from you, making you clean and revived; or it will destroy you, leaving you raw and twisted, snapped in two like a twig.

  Chapter 16

  BAM. BAM. BAM.

  My eyes flew open, my heart racing as I sat straight up in my bed. I looked around, slightly disoriented. When I realized I was in my shitty apartment, alone, I flopped back down on my bed, and the old, worn out springs screamed from the sudden movement.

  BANG. BANG.

  I jumped again, and it took a minute for it to register with me that the racket was someone beating on my door. I took several breaths to calm my pounding pulse then stumbled the few steps out of my room and to the front door.

  WHAM. Another pound over the door.

  “Hang on a second,” I yelled through the pressed wood as I turned the deadbolt.

  A young guy stood outside my door holding a large bouquet of pink and purple roses. Each petal had been trimmed in glitter. He peeked around the arrangement, still staring down at the card in his hand, his mouth dangling open when his eyes rose to meet mine.

  His brow wrinkled and he took a step back to glance at the number on my apartment. “Roxy Slade?” He sounded uncertain.

  “Yep.” I drummed my nails over the doorframe.

  He shoved the flowers at me, still slack-jawed. “You know Jag Steele?”

  I snorted and let out a sigh. “Yep.” I nodded.

  “Holy shit. I love him! They’re my favorite band. Is he here?” He took a step toward my door, peering around me to see if he could spot anyone.

  “What?” I blocked his view of my apartment. “No, he’s not. Don’t you think if he were here he would have brought me the flowers instead of having them delivered?” I shot a smile at him. “Thanks.”

  I shut my door, amused at how crazy people will act, and looked down at the flowers. They were gorgeous, and honestly, the first flowers I’d ever gotten that weren’t wrapped in cellophane with the orange grocery store price still stuck on them.

  I read the card and snickered: “You’d be amazed how pissed someone gets when you demand they put glitter on some flowers. I promised I wouldn’t hurt you, so just don’t go sticking yourself on the thorns. Okay, princess? Jagger (Jag Steele, your boyfriend who is the lead singer of that band you hate).

  I set the flowers on my coffee table, then plopped down on my couch and stared at them.

  I was so fucked.

  *****

  Standing in line at the grocery store, nothing too amazing ever really happens there, right? My trip to the store had been uneventful, aside from the elderly man in the electric cart knocking over the entire display of toilet tissue and proceeding to blame me for making him swerve too far to the right.

  While I was in the check-out line I glanced over the magazines, just like I did every time I waited. There on the cover of Rolling Stone was Pandemic Sorrow, Jag front and center on the spread, shirt off, necklaces draped around his neck, eyeliner on, and a fake stage scream twisting across his face.

  Talk about one of those fucked-up moments of surrealism.

  I was in a check-out line with a loaf of bread and milk, staring at my boyfriend on the cover of a magazine. Looking at the picture, I could close my eyes and taste him, smell him, hear him whispering filthy words into my ear before slamming his dick into me. I shuddered and heat washed over me.

  The lady behind me reached in front of me to grab the magazine. “Oh, Jag, baby. Love me some Jag Steele. Mmmph.” She made a sated moan, and I struggled not to laugh.

  My eyes fell to the magazine on the left, and just as I was placing my items on the belt I saw a picture of Jag and River with one of those little fissures representing a split ripped through it. My jaw dropped and all the air rushed from my lungs when I noticed the blurry picture in a bubble next to it.

  “That’s me!” I almost shouted, snatching the tabloid.

  The woman in line chuckled behind her opened magazine. “We’ve all got our fantasies about him, I guess, huh?”

  My lips tightened across my face. I was mortified, even though no one would have recognized me from the grainy picture. I knew that was me, and I was floored.

  My eyes scanned the headline: Jag and River: an end to an era? The text above the picture of me and him at Chanel read: Jag splurges on his new flavor of the week.

  “Flavor of the week?” I growled, heat flooding my face and ears. I’m almost certain there may have been a little smolder of steam swirling from my head.

  I shook my head, slamming the magazine on top of my bread, denting the middle of the soft loaf. The strap of my Chanel purse slid from my shoulder and I jerked it up. I couldn’t help but laugh. This was not my life. My boyfriend was splattered across just about every magazine on that rack, and I was pitching an internal fit over his ex being referred to as an era while I had been dubbed the flavor of the week.

  *****

  As soon as I got home, I tossed my purse onto the floor, my keys on the counter, and shoved both the bread and milk, still in the plastic bag, inside the fridge. I threw myself down on my couch and furiously flipped to page thirty-three, muttering about how stupid this was.

  I was in the safety of my home, where no one could observe me and say I was being jealous, so I freely gasped when I realized they’d interviewed River.

  “Oh, my God! You’re kidding me. Up close and personal with Jag’s ex-lover, what a fucking article title. My God!”

  Now I’m talking to myself. Fucking great. He’s really driving me crazy!

  I could feel the snarl on my lips deepening as I read over her responses about their relationship.

  “It was full of love and need, but we just grew apart. His music came first.” Yeah, right. That’s why you screwed one of his band members.

  “We had a relationship based on togetherness and trust, only problem was I never should have trusted him. He isn’t a one-woman man and never will be.” You don’t even know him, I bet. You look too damn shallow to have tried to get into anything besides his wallet and his clothes.

  Jealousy welled inside me like a rogue wave as I stared at the woman. Her hair was platinum blonde, her face looked like it had been modeled after a Barbie, and I doubted that much of her was real. She was thin. Too thin.

  I studied her, each detail of her Photoshopped face, unable to veer my eyes away from her red lips that had no doubt sucked Jag off countless times. She’d had Jag—for years, and that bothered me because if this was what he was used to, if this sex idol couldn’t keep his attention, well, who the hell was I
kidding? I was in no way her, and I wouldn’t want to be, but the fact that she’d had what I now couldn’t deny I wanted more than anything else made me envious.

  I continued reading the article and came to her comment on me and Jag.

  “I wish Jag only the best. I think it’s cute he’s playing fantasy maker to a fan. Almost charitable, but I only hope this new girl is ready for a ride and doesn’t expect to come out of it without some nasty scars, because I have plenty. Jag wounds you. Jag Steele is a womanizing heartbreaker.”

  I tossed the magazine across the room.

  I should have kept being a bitch and blocked him out of my life because there is no way this will end in anything other than a fucking mess. He is a fucking mess, this entire thing is a mess.

  My thoughts were interrupted when my phone buzzed in my pocket. I quickly dug it out and opened the text. Jag had sent a picture he’d taken in a mirror in their dressing room. “Being good. Wish you were here, princess.”

  I studied the picture. His pupils were blown out, not to mention I could see Rush in the background leaning over a table, I assumed snorting coke.

  I’d tried to end it with Jag the second I realized I loved him, but he wouldn’t let me. In that moment I had grasped for the one thing I thought would make him tell me to just fuck off, his drugs; but instead of him ushering me out his door, he begged me to stay and said he’d stop using.

  But I knew he wouldn’t.

  I had been there too many times in my life, and I knew the willpower of his addiction was far more powerful than the one he had to be with me. He just didn’t realize that yet.

  They always promise they’ll stop, and I’ll be damned if my brother hadn’t been amazing at hiding when he used. Addiction sometimes forces people with good intentions to lie, and I knew that’s what Jag was doing. I just chose to ignore it because no matter what I did—break up with him or stay with him—I was going to lose him.

  Chapter 17

  A week after he went on tour, and even with him a thousand miles away, my life was nowhere close to normal. He’d poisoned me.