One Wicked Lick from the Drummer (The One Book 3)

by Ainslie Paton

  “All I’ve done is make mistakes with you,” she said. “I left you after we first met to keep a promise to myself. I lied to you for my career. I meant to tell you, I tried, but I was too busy falling for you all over again and I left it too long.”

  He wanted to bang something over and over again. Play until his fingers ceased and his head was emptied of emotion. “You meant to tell me. When? When I wondered if we’d met before? When I told you I’d lost someone I loved because I wasn’t paying enough attention? When I asked you all those questions? When you knew I meant you? You were never going to tell me. You were lying the whole time.”

  “I’m not lying now. I did this, came here, talked my way in to see you, to tell you how sorry I am, that I will never forgive myself for being less than you deserve, for losing you.”

  “You never had me.” But if that was true, why this storm inside him?

  “I can see by the way you played that I only had a part of you. I was right about something at least. You have changed. Just not the way I’d expected, but out there tonight on that piano—you’re the one who’s extraordinary.”

  Walk away, walk away before the storm breaks. Walk away before she makes a fool of you all over again because she knows you, all the parts of you, she hears you through all the noise and she can use that as a weapon.

  “Being Philly was a joke to you.” He’d fallen for a fake. Groupies were trophy collectors and she’d collected him twice.

  “It was never a joke to me. But I couldn’t be Philly forever. My mistake was making my career my whole life, the thing I valued more than truth, than love, and that’s how I lost you.”

  “Once a fucking liar.” He didn’t need to finish the sentence, he needed to finish the encounter before he said something to hurt her that he’d regret forever.

  “I wasn’t lying when I said I’d fallen for you.”

  That was such a deceit he should be able to smell it on her. He closed the distance between them, leaned into her, smelled only the same complicated perfume of her hair, the scent of her luscious skin. She took an audible breath, eyes wide, lips parted. Everything about her pulled at him. If he kissed her, would he taste her duplicity?

  He bent his head, grazed his nose over her cheek and took her mouth, softening under his, tasting of nothing but memories, lingerie and piano lids, spas and moonlight, shared laughter and rumpled sheets.

  She gasped when he released her and he would’ve kissed her again for revenge, for sadness, for forgiveness, but he had changed. This time he knew he was being manipulated, knew it would cost him dearly, and he walked away.

  He didn’t get far before he ran into Jay, questions in the guy’s eyes Grip didn’t want to answer. “I’m too old and mean for groupies,” he said, clapping a hand to Jay’s shoulder, intent on blowing past.

  “She’s the one.”

  Jay’s words slapped him in the head, and he stopped and turned back. Mena was gone. And that was what he needed. “She’s no one.”

  “You’re a fucking terrible liar, Grip. You didn’t kiss her like she was no one.”

  “Oh yeah. How did I kiss her?”

  Jay raised a brow. “Like you’re dying inside.”

  Grip scoffed. It only just covered a wounded groan. “Mate, that’s fanciful even for you.”

  “You wouldn’t have lost it if she meant nothing.”

  “What exactly do you think you saw?” Two miserable people having an argument at best.

  “Lover’s quarrel.”

  Exactly. “And it’s over and done with.”

  Jay did the brow thing again and added a sympathetic head tilt and Grip couldn’t pretend he wasn’t dying inside anymore.

  “She lied.” He slapped his thighs for emphasis. “The whole time I’ve known her she was lying to me about who she was.”

  “Why?”

  “What does it matter?”

  “If it didn’t matter you wouldn’t look like you’ve been gut punched.”

  He tugged at his hair, stiff with product and sweat. He didn’t want to talk about this. He never wanted to talk about it. He wanted to go home, take a long shower, sleep late, adopt a dog, foster a cat, avoid pasta, hang out with kids who needed to bang things and imaginary friends who didn’t get up in his business. “She lied. She came to apologize. We’re done. I’m not seeing her again.”

  “That’s baller, quitting on someone you dig with no second chances.”

  “A second chance to lie to me?”

  “And you’ve never lied.”

  Not where it counted. “Transparent as fucking glass. You know that. You just said I was a terrible liar.”

  “Except for what happened tonight.”

  No. Screw you, Jay. No. He’d kept a secret. It wasn’t the same thing. When he frowned it kicked a headache off, a dull throb behind his eyes. Yes, it was lie, you fuckwit, you know it. You are done with lies and liars. “You knew I played piano.”

  “Not like that.”

  “You mean like a trained musician.”

  “What you did out there tonight isn’t anything like any of us can do. You lied, Grip.”

  “Nope. I didn’t share the details, that’s different.”

  “That’s not a small thing. You just added a whole new dimension to what Lost Property can achieve and for whatever reason you held that back all these years. Did she lie to you or did she not share the details?”

  She had a secret, but it was his secret too and it was wrong to keep it from him. The two things were not the same. Nowhere near. “It was a pretty fucking big detail she left out.”

  “I could say the same thing to you.”

  That was like a whole load of bricks falling on his head, knocking his sense about, making him taste his own rage.

  Jay’s hands came up, palms flat. “Okay, okay. You never get like this. You’re never pushed off your balance. Not with all the drama that goes on. You’re always steady. You’re Switzerland. But not the last few weeks. You’ve been distant. Irritable. Not yourself. That woman means something to you, and I know about fucking up on that score. I made assumptions about what Evie wanted because my pride was wounded. Missed a lot of time having her in my life. Almost didn’t get her back. I don’t want the same thing to happen to you.”

  “Once a liar,” he repeated, but the phrase felt empty of meaning now. Once didn’t mean shit. Once he was going to be a concert pianist. Didn’t make being a drummer a lie. Mena had tried to tell him something, he’d shut her down at least twice with kisses. He’d seen this business, the fame, the money, the drugs, the whole ride, change so many people, it was only fair she held back with him. Fuck, he was so tired, he couldn’t think straight.

  “Let it go, Jay.” He needed to take his own instruction.

  Jay fished his phone out and texted his driver, Hassan. “I don’t know what’s really going on with you, but I know something pushed you into letting go some truths tonight. Wicked licks I’ve never heard from you before. I hope I hear them again.”

  Jay’s phone rang and Evie’s face came up on his screen. The man’s smile said everything that Grip’s body pained for, his mind craved. He wanted what his friends had together. That singular connection. Trust and desire. Clarity in all the commotion. Each other’s best interests front and center like a bass drum. A strong beat to create a lifeline, to lift up the good times, to hold steady though the worst.

  His face must’ve given his thoughts away.

  “Maybe you need to hear her again,” Jay said.

  He gestured towards the party still raging in the backstage area. “Plenty of fish.”

  “Plenty of songs. Most of them aren’t hits. None of my hits started out that way. Sometimes I only had a line, the barest idea to work with.”

  “How do you know when a line is worth working on?” He’d thought Mena was worth it. That they’d work out what they could be. Give it a name and grow together inside it.

  Jay’s eyes shifted to the vision of Evie making her w
ay to them, tugging a beat-up leather biker jacket over her arms. She might’ve been turning backflips for the way Jay lit up. “You feel it,” he said, tapping his chest, “here.”

  Grip watched two of his best friends in the world reunite as if they’d been apart months not minutes, as if they were sun and earth, rain and fire, their own universe.

  The only thing he felt in his chest was grief.

  TWENTY-ONE

  Mena buttoned her jacket, popped a mint in her mouth and collected her laptop, business-card holder, a pen and the Paradiso file. She was meeting with Mr. Lostal Paradiso. Another of the firm’s problem clients.

  She’d been back at work a week and every day with her new client portfolio had been like a visit to one of Seven Gates’ hellish experiences. Confusing, frustrating, and full of hidden traps. The only thing missing was the threat of spiders.

  And Grip to hold her hand and promise to chase them away for her. It was no fun at all and it was still better than she deserved.

  She’d thought being back in the office, being drowned in complex work and the attempt to repair her reputation would stop her thoughts wandering to Grip so often.

  Bzzzt. Wrong answer.

  Yesterday Rebecca Greenling had dropped a data stick in the boardroom and Mena had flushed hot at the memory of crawling under that table, meeting Grip’s eyes, then their hands touching briefly as he passed over her phone.

  When she looked out the window, she could still imagine his ridiculous monster truck with its humorous number plates, parked illegally in the street.

  Eat pasta. Forget it.

  She couldn’t listen to music either, without hearing piano, without closing her eyes and seeing Grip tear up the stage at the charity concert, a guest appearance nobody expected and everyone in the music scene had been talking about since.

  He’d played with a kind of divine intensity, his brilliance unmasked. He was fearless and unforgettable and for the rest of her life she’d regret the wrongheadedness that had caused her to lose him.

  The event had been her one chance to see him again, but after experiencing his performance, she’d known her mission would fail and almost turned back. Grip had conquered his old fear. She’d watched him remake himself on stage. If he’d ever needed a muse, he didn’t need one now. He didn’t need her apology either. Dressing up like her old self was as much about showing him she wasn’t ashamed of the tattoo on her hip as it was about reclaiming her own life. One where she didn’t dress so stiffly, changed her hair color from time to time, and pursued interests outside of work. One where she was more realistic about what she’d achieved already and not so frightened of being able to manage in the future if she lived a little in the now.

  She’d rocked that updated goth look, flirted her way backstage to prove she still could and because if she didn’t try she’d never hear the end of it from Vera, and then Grip’s stone face and harsh words had made her lose the last of her confidence, had shut her down.

  A bad groupie didn’t take no for an answer. Didn’t let rejection stop them. Mena had been a good groupie, respectful, worshipful even, but never to the point of not reading the room and Grip had made it perfectly clear that there’d be no encore opportunity.

  All things considered; she didn’t blame him.

  But she did fantasize about him, and this time around she had the new memory of his hands and his mouth and his touch to inspire her.

  Shame that Lostal Paradiso would be more likely to inspire very late nights at her desk untangling balance and loss statements instead of bent over it unraveling in a perfectly messy orgasm.

  At the door to the boardroom, Mena took a breath to center herself. Mr. Paradiso needed to see her as competent, professional, the answer to his problems. He did not care that she felt weighed down by sadness and slept badly.

  He was younger than she expected, standing by the window with his back to her when she pulled the big wooden door open and stepped into the room, an unaccountable nervous trill running up her spine. When he turned, she nearly fell through the floor.

  “You kept your hair dark,” he said, voice velvet low.

  The part of her still-functioning brain thought regrowth will be a bitch, but she said nothing. Stared at Grip. The breadth of his chest in a Violent Femmes T-shirt, his hair longer, spikey with product. Those talented hands hanging loose at his sides. His green eyes dulled with caution, hooded by his lowered brows.

  She was in the wrong room.

  “I’m sorry for interrupting. I didn’t know you were coming in today. I’ve got the wrong room. I thought I had a meeting in here.” She took a step back, her ankle wobbling.

  “With Lostal Paradiso.”

  They knew each other?

  “I didn’t know if you’d want to see me, Mena.”

  Her pen rolled off her laptop and bounced on the floor. A gear inside her shocked brain clunked. “You’re Lostal Paradiso?”

  “It’s a name I use when Mark Grippen will be a nuisance. Good old Lostal can book a table at a restaurant or a seat on a plane and no one pays any attention to him. People have been paying a bit too much attention to Grip since he trashed a piano.”

  “You didn’t trash it, you made it art. It was an iconic performance.”

  He came around the table and picked up her pen, his vibrant eyes on her the whole time. “You think so?”

  There were few certainties in life. This was one of them. Breath coming too fast, she said, “I know so.”

  He took her laptop stack from her hands and placed it on the table, his warm fingers brushing hers as she resisted and then let go. “Have you been googling me?” he said.

  She should be googling what to do when you get another chance with the man you’ve been in love with your whole adult life. All she could do was take him in and nod, while her heart became a monster truck and roared around in her rib cage.

  “So you’re still a fan?”

  Another nod and then a rush of words. “Lostal Paradiso. Lost Paradise.” A Property of Paradise and Lost Property mash-up. “I should’ve guessed. I’ve had this appointment in my calendar for a week. You waited a week to see me when you knew you wanted to.” That couldn’t be good.

  “Stage fright.” He held his hands out. “Sweaty palms. A lot could go wrong here. No rehearsal. I figure I’ve got one shot. I wasn’t fair to you. I didn’t give you a chance. I wanted to see you the day I told you to go. I wanted to see you every day after that until the night you showed up again and every day after that. I didn’t know what to do with all the feelings in my head,” he touched his chest, “and in my heart. I fucked it up.”

  He took a step towards her and she held herself tightly. He’d kissed her that night backstage and even through his anger he’d been tender. It was a devastating combination. If he came too close, she might hyperventilate.

  “I was greedy and afraid too,” he said. “Greedy to have you, though I knew it was sensible to keep our distance. I tried, but not hard enough.” She’d used the same words. She felt the drag of them on her conscience. “You built a rhythm under my skin and I couldn’t let it go. When I figured out who you were, I was afraid you were playing a twisted mind game with me. Making me a dumb sucker all over again.”

  Greed and fear. What a mess they’d made of things. “I never meant you to feel that way. I wasn’t thinking clearly. I didn’t know we’d be so good together.”

  “I know you tried to tell me, but I got so carried away by the sensation of us, I didn’t let you talk. Got so fucking angry when I realized that was my fault. Then you showed up to give me another chance, looking like all my fantasies brought to life and I got scared and fucked it up again.”

  Grip looked away for the first time. “Since then it’s like I swallowed pain, and I was choking on it. Had to work on coughing it all up before I came to see you.”

  Comforting him was a reflex action. Two steps brought her close enough to touch his chest, feel the air of his sigh. “We fucked it up. I
didn’t trust you. I wasn’t honest with you and I was playing a game. I thought we’d be hot and fast, a good time and done and no one would get hurt, but I played myself into a corner and I didn’t know how to get out.”

  He put his hand over hers, engulfing it. “Had to open all the doors to find the right room.”

  “All my doors are open now.” Would he believe her? Lies dug deep, went dormant only to rise up and infect a relationship all over again. “No more secrets. No more lies.”

  Grip closed his hand around hers. “The only thing I’m interested in is who you could be to me now.” Her knees were rubbery, her throat was full of cement. Another chance felt dangerously real.

  “What do you want, Mena?”

  She looked up into his handsome face, disguised by a solemnity that made her ache. “Everything.”

  That awful mask slipped as he grinned crookedly. “Eighty plus twenty. All of it. Yeah, me too. What does everything mean to you?”

  She owed him honestly. Even as it might not be enough. “My nice house, the security of my mum, my great job, my partnership.” She gulped a breath. “You.”

  He brought his other hand to her hip, right over his brand as though sealing it into her skin with his palm through the fabric of her skirt. “In that order?”

  She’d had a lot of time to think. “The house is negotiable. But I need my work and I’m one hundred percent in love with you, so I need you too. What do you want?”

  “My band, my drums, my piano, my new Percussion for Life Foundation that my talented investment advisor recommended I set up. Gotta get a puppy. My first love. You. I need you to be happy, Philomena Grady, so yeah, you need your work, because I’ll have to tour and being a rock star isn’t all hanging about in the sun, so if you say you’d like to try again, see what we can make together, then I have everything I ever wanted.”

  There was gaping flaw in all this, he had to know it too. “Will you ever trust me again?”

  He lowered his head, lips almost to her forehead. “Every day I’ll learn to, just like the guys are learning to get over my secret life. Gonna take them about a million years. I think I could learn to trust you much quicker.”