by Cari Quinn
Modest mouse. Christ. Being around his girls was making his vocabulary into that of a Sunday school teacher’s.
“My name is Glory.”
He snorted. “First name Ol’ or last name Hole?”
Ignoring him, Pink Mini crouched and slid her hands along the outside of his legs. “Come on, baby. I know about your problem. Let me help you solve it.”
Though it made him feel a little like an annoyed toddler, he bounced his legs to get her hands off him. “Hello, I’m fucking married. Not interested.”
Big brown eyes swept up to find his and she gripped his thighs with searing purple nails. “I know all about your wife,” she murmured, licking her already glossy pink lips. “I’ll do everything she won’t do. Everything.”
He’d gotten similar offers too many times for the words to have any effect. Even his dick knew better than to care. “Not interested,” he grated out.
“Hey Nicky, problem?” Simon appeared at Nick’s side and casually draped an arm over his shoulders as he grinned at the still crouched Glory. “How’d you get back here, sweetheart?”
Her gaze sharpened and she lifted a hand off Nick’s leg to caress her cleavage. “I can handle both of you.”
Simon laughed. “Oh, I sincerely doubt that.”
She flicked a fingernail against her mouth. “Try me.”
“We gave at the office.” Simon patted Nick’s arm and Nick bristled. Did Simon think he needed his help? “Right, man?” Simon prompted.
“Go to hell.”
Simon didn’t blink. “Just making sure all was good over here.”
Nick let out a disgusted growl. Damn, did he look that starved for sex that his best friend thought he’d just randomly forget his marriage vows? Not going to happen.
“Really? You think I need a damn rope around my dick?”
Glory smiled and leaned forward, showing off her tits practically to the nipple. “I know Shibari too.”
“Jesus, back off, all right?” Nick shook off Simon’s arm and the creeping hand about to dive between his legs and surged to his feet. He sidestepped the girl and moved toward his best friend. “Both of you.”
Simon stepped back and lifted his hands, palms out. “Do what you do, brother.”
Nick barely resisted giving him the finger. What the fuck was that supposed to mean? Did Simon think he’d been encouraging this chick or something?
“Take your places, people!” Lance, their new road manager, called. “Soon as they finish this encore, it’s showtime.”
Simon melted into the melee backstage, and when Nick glanced back, Glory and her holes had vanished.
Or so he thought until a moment later when he caught the whiff of pungent lavender perfume and a hand sneaked between his legs. This time, she didn’t mess around and went right for his dick. “There’s still time,” she whispered.
“Fuck, are you really that goddamn oblivious? I said no.”
When he would’ve shoved her back, she slipped away and flashed him a smile over her shoulder. “I’ll see you after the show, lover.”
“Not if I see you first,” he muttered under his breath.
Childish taunts for the win. Yep, his daughters’ programming was definitely rubbing off on him.
A few minutes later, Warning Sign bounded off the stage, their energy like liquid gasoline. Their lead singer, Molly, jogged into the back, full of excitement. She waved to her older sister, Jazz, as she aimed for a cooler.
Juliet, Margo’s younger sister, stopped to chat—and cry?—with Margo then hurried to the side stage to pace. It seemed as if she was looking for someone. A minute later, she rushed off to the lighting board where her boyfriend, Harper’s brother, Randy, was in control.
Well, one of her boyfriends. She had two. Maybe she’d been searching for her other boyfriend, Tristan.
Back in Nick’s day, threesomes had been a one night deal, but there was no accounting for kids today.
Lila’s stepson Michael set down his guitar and pulled out his phone, presumably to call his pregnant wife, Chloe. She must still be at home.
At least someone had an inkling of how Nick felt, being so far from most of his family.
Warning Sign’s drummer, Michael’s brother, Mal, remained separate as usual. Their jack-of-all trades, Ryan, and the boy in the ball, their keyboardist West, scattered in different directions. West conferred with Jazz before he disappeared, which made Nick smile in spite of his general discontent.
She just wouldn’t give up.
Last but definitely not least as far as Nick was concerned, his twin sister Elle—she would always be Ricki to him—jogged backstage. She handed off her guitar to a roadie before making her way to her brother. He hauled her off her feet and soaked up her laughter, immeasurably glad she was there.
“From that roar, I can tell you did fucking amazing,” he shouted above the din.
“We did! Did you see?”
The glow on her face and excitement in her voice was infectious, and he wished he hadn’t let his bad mood about Lila’s change in accomodations kill his desire to see Ricki play. That his twin had found the same joy in the guitar as he had—and used her love for the instrument help her battle back her demons—was something he should never take for granted.
“I was your first fan, remember?” He hugged Ricki again, because it was true. And to distract her from the fact he couldn’t reply to her question.
He hadn’t watched. Hadn’t done anything but stew until that girl had come on to him and pissed him off even more.
Lila should be with him. He knew she couldn’t be, and God knew he wanted her home with their girls too. He just missed her. It was selfish, and he was a bastard, but dammit, he needed his wife.
Needed to touch and taste her and hear her call out his name while she broke around him.
Right now, that wasn’t going to happen. He’d just have to deal with it.
Just as quickly as Warning Sign had dispersed backstage, the catcalls from the audience summoned them back. Molly corralled all of them to the curtain and as one, the members of Warning Sign stared out into the madness.
Then they were lured back into it for another couple of minutes before it was his turn.
Oblivion’s turn.
Somehow Nick managed to shake the night’s frustrations off when he stepped onto the stage and faced the huge screaming crowd waiting for them. Warning Sign had revved them up and the outdoor venue was practically rocking from the energy of the audience. The buzz of nerves under Nick’s skin turned into pure adrenaline racing through his veins as he gave that first testing lick of the strings that led them into “Ripcord.”
At his side, Gray grinned and answered him back, setting the pace for the night.
This was what he was meant to do. No matter how many times he had to hunch his shoulders and fight through the nausea and sweaty palms that came along with going out in front of thousands of fans, he would do it.
The battle was always worth the sacrifice.
Even as Nick played, his fingers climbing the frets faster than his brain could keep up, the three faces he loved most in the world flashed through his mind. His fingers faltered.
Was it all fucking worth being here, so far from the people he adored on Christmas Eve?
There he was, backed by the giant holographic wreath on the gigantic screen behind them instead of a real one. Seeing lighters and the shimmer of cell phones in the audience instead of the glistening lights of a tree. Listening to a bunch of strangers yell instead of hearing the sweet music of his girls’ laughter and the teasing voice of the woman he loved.
For once, playing music was the last thing he gave a shit about.
Gray leaned his head close, his fingers blazing up and down the strings without cease. “You okay?” he mouthed to Nick.
Nick nodded and played on, because what else could he do? This was his job, and he’d do it for his band even if he couldn’t do it at that moment for himself.
A
s the song wound to a close and Simon gripped the microphone and slung an arm around his wife Margo’s neck, the twinge in Nick’s chest turned into a throb.
They all had their people with them. Simon had Margo, Gray had Jazz, Deacon had Harper off handling the food as she always did. In the old days, Nick might’ve had Lila with him too. She hadn’t always accompanied them on road shows, but she had on occasion.
Now she was home with their girls, and he was by himself other than his friends and his sister. As much as he loved them, they weren’t the same as his wife and kids.
Nope, he was as good as fucking alone on Christmas Eve, though he was surrounded by thousands of people screaming his name.
Simon grabbed a Santa hat from someone in the front row. “How the hell are you doing out there, Berkeley? You feeling good tonight? Ready to jingle some fucking balls?”
Nick rolled his eyes at Simon’s version of humor, but the crowd ate it up. They laughed and responded with stomping feet and cheers, which of course made his best friend take it up a notch.
If Simon was any more of a ham, he would’ve oinked.
“You’re sure looking good out there tonight.” Simon cupped his hands around his eyes and the shouts reached maximum decibel. “Yeah, yeah, I can see you. Can you see me?”
Screams—and more than a few flying panties—reached the stage. Nick had to laugh as Gray grabbed a pair of leopard print ones and draped them from the neck of his guitar. Not more than a second later, a single glow-in-the-dark drumstick came sailing through the air and hit him in the back of the shoulder.
“Damn, she’s got some aim,” Gray muttered with a grin as he tossed the panties back toward the sea of faces.
“We’ve got an old friend in the crowd tonight. Well, make that my buddy Nicky has an old friend in the crowd.” Simon swung his guitar Cherry behind his back and pointed to Nick.
Nick didn’t have to fake his scowl. “Who?” For a second, hope stampeded through the hole in his heart for Li and his girls.
But before he could even ask the improbable question, Simon answered it for him.
“Tori was a good friend of Nicky’s for a while, and she did her part for band relations, if you know what I mean.” The crowd laughed and clapped and Simon continued, undaunted, as Nick flicked a guitar pick at his head. “She’s here in the audience with a new close friend of hers, and we wanted to play something with special significance to them in the spirit of friendship.” Simon pulled Cherry back around to his front and glanced at each of his band members in turn.
All except Nick, because hey, why did anyone need to let him know of any setlist changes ahead of time? Though he was happy Tori was in residence, he didn’t get what song would have special significance to her new dude.
“This is ‘Born To Be My Baby’,” Simon shouted out, playing the telltale first few licks on his guitar. “Maybe you know this one and can help us sing it. One-two-three now.”
“Fucking hell,” Nick mumbled, trying to keep up with Gray. He didn’t know this song. Simon knew he didn’t know it.
His best friend was a total jackass, but somehow Nick couldn’t help smiling anyway as he fumbled his way through.
Having to concentrate to try to stay with his bandmates dragged him out of his bad mood. Soon enough, he didn’t have to fake having fun. He actually was.
Song after song, he forced everything but the music out of his head. Out of his heart. The only moment that mattered was this one.
Standing back to back with Gray, they laughed in between trying to outdo each other. He crossed the stage to Deacon, enjoying the hell out of trying to get the big man out of his rhythm. Impossible to do. Nick propped a foot on the riser for Jazz’s kit and laughed as she mimed tossing another one of her sticks, but he knew she didn’t have another to spare. She only kept one extra beside her. So he tormented her for a few minutes, racing ahead so that she slammed the kit to add her own punctuation to his shrieking solos.
Before he went back to his usual spot by Gray, he flipped another one of his spare picks at her, making her giggle in that way that never failed to make him smile. Make anyone smile. She was damn sunshine in a pint-sized shape.
Moving close to Simon, Nick pressed his head close to his best friend’s. They were both soaking wet with sweat and he knew the gleam of madness in Simon’s eyes would be reflected in his own.
Grinning like loons, they sung lyrics at each other that they’d written back when the only time they had two nickels to rub together was when they found them on the damn sidewalk.
Margo came over to join them, sliding her bow across her violin with such manic speed that Nick had to focus on his own playing just to keep from watching her.
Their band was full of insanely talented people. From the response of the crowd, they agreed. The place was on fire.
His only wish was that Lila was there to see it. At least her wish came true in the form of Oblivion’s extended encore with Warning Sign.
Seriously extended. They rocked out for a while, and God, what a charge it was to play with his sister. To not only duel with Gray but his twin onstage on a night when the capacity crowd of thousands felt like millions was a dream come true. He’d been lucky enough to achieve a lot of his biggest ones. Even some he’d never believed could be his.
Like linking arms with his bandmates and his sister and her band, and listening to the roar of the audience. Shouting for them. For him.
Ignoring the champagne being passed around, he walked offstage to call Lila. He had to tell her how they had absolutely killed it tonight. Also, he needed to make sure his babies were sleeping and waiting for Santa like they should be, probably dreaming of giant dollhouses like the one Simon had helped him put together just yesterday.
They’d hidden it under a blanket in the spare room after managing to get the damn thing wrapped up, though they’d used about a roll of paper and like fifty bows. Lila would laugh her ass off when she saw it.
And she wasn’t answering her phone. What the hell?
He left her a quick message and called the house. She insisted on still having a landline, and right then, he was grateful to have another way to contact them. It was probably stupid, but his already tense fingers from a night of playing had gone ice cold with every unanswered ring.
What was going on? Was Lila taking a bath or something? She never let calls go to voicemail. Hell, she even got up in the middle of the night to answer calls from whatever fucked-up rockstar on her roster needed her to bail him out now.
Just when Nick was about to pitch his phone against the wall, a voice he knew all too well answered.
“Hello, Nicholas. How was your show?”
He frowned. “Mom?”
Of course, Mrs. Ronson wasn’t actually his mother. His own mother had split for parts unknown when he and Ricki were in second grade. She’d left no forwarding address, and he’d long ago given up caring where she was. But Lila’s mother and father had sort of adopted him after he’d gotten together with their daughter, and despite the weirdness he’d felt the first time he called Lila’s mother Mom, he’d grown to like it. She was family.
He had a family for the first time since he was a kid, and now all he wanted to know was why the hell he couldn’t be with them.
Or even reach them now, apparently.
“Yes. It’s me. I’m here with bells on and spiked eggnog in my moose mason jar.” Relentlessly cheerful, that was Mrs. Ronson. “So tell me about your show.”
“In a second. I didn’t know you were coming.”
Why didn’t I know you were coming?
“It was a spur-of-the-moment visit.”
Nick waved off the people trying to talk to him backstage and made his way to the locker where he’d stowed his stuff. He’d planned to change, mainly to swap a clean shirt for the sweat-soaked one he’d shoved in the back pocket of his jeans. Then he decided not to bother. No time for changing now. He yanked the damp shirt back on and grabbed his bag.
&
nbsp; He’d had just about enough of the oddness that had infiltrated his life. He’d book it back to the hotel, grab his luggage out of his suite, and find a way home even if he had to charter a damn plane himself on Christmas.
Impossible or not, he was going to find a way home to his girls.
“How spur?” he asked Lila’s mom when he realized she’d stopped talking. “Is Dad there too?”
“Yes, he’s upstairs sawing them off. Fred always turns in early.” She laughed. “No waiting up for Santa for him.”
“What about Li and the girls?”
“The girls are just fine. Fred read them a story in front of the fire before we tucked them in ourselves. Avery just loves that story about the mouse who’s an elf, so she asked for it twice.”
Nick stopped halfway down the flight of stairs to the exit, unable to squelch his grin. “She does. I read it to her twice yesterday too. She’ll be reading it on her own soon enough.”
“Probably a ways to go there yet, son. She’s only eighteen months old, and barely that.”
“My child isn’t the usual kid. She’ll be reading in no time, I’m sure.”
“Of course.”
He resumed walking down the steps and made his way out to the waiting line of SUVs. The hotel wasn’t far, so he’d just head back and get his shit.
Assuming he could convince the driver to take him alone separately without waiting for any of his bandmates.
There were plenty of SUVs to go around. Bad enough he’d have to wait through traffic. He wasn’t going to make small talk—or even worse, celebrate—while his gut was in knots.
“What about Li? Is she still up?” He aimed for the last SUV in the line and motioned to the driver to unlock the vehicle. Quickly, before he got swarmed by the fans roaming around the place.
The driver nodded and let him in just before Nick was pounced on by a trio of screaming girls. He shut the door in their faces.
He rolled down his window long enough to wave to them and flashed a lackluster peace sign in apology before rolling it back up and instructing the driver to get them out of there.
Said driver’s attitude was surly at best, but he pulled out of the line of cars and started the torturous drive back to the hotel. The relatively short distance didn’t matter when there were vehicles and fans everywhere, slowing everything to a crawl.
