“Nice to meet you, Chet,” she said. Before Chet lips could form a grin, she shot him down without breaking a sweat. “Not interested, so save us both the time and trouble. Understood?”
Chet’s mouth opened as if to argue, then closed. What could he say that wouldn’t further shrink his already withering balls? Wisely, he nodded, stood, and returned to work.
“You haven’t lost your touch.” Beck took a key from his pocket and opened the trailer door. He flipped on the light, standing aside to let Joplin enter. “Never at a loss for words, never intimidated. Even Kane, who was the master of the verbal putdown, met his match in you.”
Kane. Beck wanted to kick himself. Her glasses in her hand, Joplin tried to shield her expressive eyes with half-closed lids. But not before he saw the flash of mixed emotions
Pain, Beck understood. One way or another, Kane Harrison, larger than life, massively talented, tragically flawed, had torched them all. The lead guitar player didn’t singlehandedly destroy Razor’s Edge. However, his contribution to the band’s demise had been like the man himself—devastating and impossible to forget.
Yes, Beck could relate to Joplin’s pain. What he couldn’t comprehend, after everything Kane had put her through, was how love survived.
Maybe he was wrong, Beck thought, taking two bottles of water from the mini fridge. Love was a complicated emotion. He hadn’t understood her feelings then. Why should now, with so much time between them, be any different?
Gulping down half the bottle, clearing his throat and his mind, Beck motioned for Joplin to sit; he did the same. The trailer was on the small side—a desk and computer in one area, a sofa, upholstered chair and coffee table in the other. The back end housed a toilet, a shower, and a small room with a twin bed. Enough space to rest if necessary, but not get too comfortable. After all, Kramer and Son was a business first.
“Five years.” Beck settled into the chair with an outward calm he didn’t feel and asked the obvious. “Why now?”
“I wish my visit was purely friendly.” Joplin set her purse and glasses on the table, rubbing her hands on the legs of her lavender-colored linen pants in an uncharacteristic show of nerves. “I wish I’d reached out long ago.”
He could blame everyone involved for many things. A lack of communication, cutting his friends out of his life completely, was equally on him.
“Wishes go both ways. I’ve thought about you—Jax, Skye, Kane.” He paused before saying the last name. “Morgan. Thought about picking up a phone, sending a text.”
“We scattered to the wind. Though finding you—and Jax and Skye—was the easy part.” Joplin sent him a speculative look. “You and Morgan were close. I wondered if, after he disappeared, he might have reached out.”
“Guess we weren’t as close as you thought,” Beck said, shaking his head. As close as he thought. Losing his best friend on top of his dreams had been one unexpected blow on top of another. “You’re looking everyone up?”
“Yes.” Joplin slowly unscrewed the bottle top and took a sip. “Geographically moving west. I met with Jax in Los Angeles a few days ago, flew to Seattle to see Skye.”
“Then zagged down to Nevada for me.” Beck wanted to know why, but first… “How are they?”
“Jax is a rock star.”
“Tell me something the world doesn’t already know.” Beck might hate the way things ended—and Jax’s part in the debacle—but his happiness for his old friend’s success was genuine. “He always had the most focus and ambition. Seems logical he would pick up where Razor’s Edge left off and take a solo rocket ride straight to the top.”
“Have you been to one of his concerts?”
Again, Beck shook his head.
“Never seemed to find the time.” When Joplin cocked her head to the side, a knowing smile on her lips, he chuckled. She always could read him like a damn book, slogging through the bullshit to the truth. “Time wasn’t the problem.”
“You’re still angry.”
Beck nodded.
“Justifiable,” Joplin sighed. “Jax didn’t exactly greet me with sunshine and lollypops. There’s plenty of blame to pass around.”
Right or wrong, Beck didn’t miss the feeling, the helpless rage that haunted him during those first few months. Disillusioned, he hung up his drumsticks and set his music aside. For the longest time, he ignored the itch—the craving. He refused to pick up his drumsticks even in the privacy of his own home.
Music was in his blood, drove his waking hours for so long; going cold turkey proved impossible. Eventually, he realized his self-imposed exile only made the misery of his lost dreams, his absent friends, worse.
“I had to release the constant pinging of songs in my brain or go crazy.”
“You still write?” Joplin seemed pleased. “If you’re interested, I could—”
Beck held up a hand, stopping her before she could make an offer he might be tempted to accept.
“My professional musician days are over,” he assured Joplin, and himself. “These days, I use my hands to build buildings. I’m a contractor, a damn good one.”
“No doubt.” Joplin nodded, letting him know, on her side, the subject was closed.
“You didn’t answer my question. How is Jax? Other than wildly successful and filthy rich?”
“Good. Handsome as ever.”
Beck always pictured Jaxon Cross the way he looked the first time they met. Twenty years old, clean-shaven, dark hair kept short, blue eyes bright with a contagious kind of ambition that infected everyone around him—Beck included.
“The beard and long hair are new.”
“Suits him.” Joplin smiled, but the tinge of sadness in her eyes told a different story. “The screw you attitude, not so much.”
“Jax never hesitated to bring the badass attitude.” Beck sobered. “The last day Razor’s Edge was together is a perfect example. Though I wouldn’t call his blowup necessary. Just the opposite.”
“He thought one of his best friends and the woman he loved slept together.” Joplin shrugged. “How would you have acted?”
Beck didn’t answer because he didn’t know. Unlike Joplin, he wasn’t about to make excuses for Jax. The anger, the hurt, the betrayal came rushing back as though minutes had passed instead of years.
“All he had to do was listen. Skye wanted to explain. Instead, he chose to blow the band—our friendships—out of the water.”
“Do you honestly place all the blame on Jax?” When Beck only shrugged, Joplin leaned closer, taking his hand. “By the time Razor’s Edge broke up, everyone was a mess. Jax and Skye. Morgan. Kane. Me. Surrounded by chaos, you were the only one who kept his cool. The one who stayed the same wonderful, levelheaded man until the end.”
“What did we have to worry about?” Beck still didn’t understand. “We were young, after a lot of hard work and sacrifice, the top of the world was right there for the taking. We had what millions of starry-eyed hopefuls dreamed about.”
“Money and success don’t make the problems in your life disappear, Beck. At best, they can temporarily mask the issues but eventually, the pressure gets to be too much, and the top blows.”
Six years ago, after limping their way across the country playing every dive bar and on-the-cheap wedding they could find, Razor’s Edge had been handed an unexpected, unbelievable gift; the opening act—first class all the way—for The Ryder Hart Band—the biggest rock group in the world.
Relishing the year on the road, treating the experience as an extended visit to an amusement park, Beck hadn’t realized while he had the time of his life, his friends were on a different path, spiraling downward into their individual versions of hell.
Time and perspective gave Beck the ability to see things he’d been too busy enjoying himself to notice. The growing tension, the fact they spent less time together when not on stage.
“Deep down, I knew the band was in trouble. At first, I tried to discover
what the hell was happening. I stopped asking because getting answers was harder than pulling teeth. And, if I’m completely honest, not knowing was easier.” Beck learned to live with his mistakes. “Nobody wanted to tell me what was going on. But they told you.”
Beck saw the flash in Joplin’s eyes. He couldn’t miss the way the green of her irises deepened, darkened. A wave of guilt—old and new—traveled across his skin and burrowed deeper, close to his heart.
“Wasn’t fair.” Beck rubbed her hand, hoping to soothe. “We were all a bunch of wet behind the ears kids, but you were younger by a few years.”
“Except for Skye.”
“Right.” Beck nodded, his lips tipping into a half-smile. “She was twenty, almost a baby compared to you at the ripe old age of twenty-one.”
“Skye lived a sheltered life. Me, not so much,” Joplin reminded him. “My job was to keep Razor’s Edge on schedule, happy, and out of trouble. In the year we were together, the only thing I can say is the group was never late. One out of three is nothing to brag about.”
“Happiness can’t be anyone’s responsibility but their own. As for trouble, I can’t recall anything major.” Beck searched his memory and came up empty. “Surprising considering Kane’s penchant for alcohol, drugs, and following every whim, no matter how self-destructive.”
To Joplin’s credit, she didn’t argue with Beck’s assessment of the wildest member of Razor’s Edge. He squeezed her hand.
“You gave us a place to go, a person we could trust to listen without judgment, to keep our secrets. Jesus,” Beck scoffed. “We were a bunch of self-involved jackasses.”
“What you were, all of you, was human.” Joplin sat back, crossing her legs. “I didn’t mind. Not that you had anything major to get off your chest.”
“I was boring.”
“You were sweet,” she corrected, her gaze sincere. “Thinking about your mom. Sending money home.”
Beck remembered hanging around Joplin like a lovesick puppy. She had to know. Unlike now, with Sawyer, he hadn’t developed the ability to mask his feelings.
“Shrug it off if you want. The fact is, we dumped our personal crap on your shoulders, and you didn’t complain. Not once, even though the weight was more than anyone should have to bear.”
“I don’t regret lending a sympathetic ear. However,” Joplin sighed, her body slumping against the chair. “The secrets I kept eventually tore Razor’s Edge apart.”
Joplin blamed herself? Well, shit. Beck didn’t see that one coming. In his opinion, she was the least culpable.
“Can you picture yourself sharing information given in confidence?”
“Then?” Joplin shook her head. “Now, knowing the consequences, how things turned out? Maybe.”
Beck spent too much time contemplating the what ifs, wondering what he could have done differently. The answer was nothing. No going back, no fixing their mistakes. All they could do was live with the consequences.
“Hindsight’s a bitch.” Beck tossed his empty bottle into a bin marked recyclables. “You have to forgive yourself. I have—mostly.”
“What about everyone else? Did you forgive them?”
“Nothing to forgive where you’re concerned,” Beck assured her. “As for the rest? Ask me again in another five years.”
“Ah.” Joplin sent him a sheepish look. “I hoped for a resounding hell, yes. Followed by, I’m over the breakup. Bring on the reunion.”
Certain he misheard, Beck snorted. When Joplin didn’t laugh or send him a gotcha wink, he froze, then quickly heated up.
“Hell, yes?” he snorted. “More like, hell no! Not now, not ever.”
“Why did I think you’d be the reasonable one?” Joplin muttered.
Because where she was concerned, he was always a pushover. Beck was happy to discover those days were over.
“Let me guess. Jax didn’t jump at the idea?”
“He was, shall we say, less than receptive.”
“I’ll bet.” Beck almost laughed. “And Skye?”
“Not as hostile. In fact, we shared a meal, a bottle of wine, and caught up on life.”
“But she still said no.”
“She did.”
No surprise. Razor’s Edge didn’t simply break up, the group imploded, leaving the ex-members—the ex-friends—shell-shocked. Other than Jax’s high-profile existence, the rest of them stayed under the radar and out of the spotlight. By choice.
Beck lost count of the offers and promises of money that were tossed his way to write a tell-all or spill the beans to a tabloid. One enterprising auteur offered him a part in a porno/rock opera. At least the last one gave him a chuckle.
A reunion? Now? Ever? After the way they parted? The idea was beyond ludicrous. Yet, as crazy as the idea was, Beck couldn’t deny he heard the words, straight from Joplin’s mouth.
“Who’s dying?”
“Excuse me?” Joplin sputtered.
“Can’t think of any other reason for you to float the idea. Someone’s imminent death strikes me as the only explanation.”
Beck meant her to take his quip as a joke. However, the distress in Joplin’s eyes, her shaky indrawn breath, erased his teasing smile.
“What’s going on? Who’s sick?” When she didn’t answer, his stomach dropped. “Jesus, who died?”
“No one. I’m sorry for worrying you,” Joplin spoke in a rush. “Someone is sick, though. Uncle Danny has been diagnosed with an inoperable brain tumor.”
Uncle Danny? For a moment, Beck wasn’t certain who she meant; why he should care beyond the sympathy one human felt for another in times of trouble. Frowning, he waited as the computer searched for the answer.
Finally, the name clicked. Joplin’s Uncle Danny was DANNY GRAHAM. Known in the music industry as the maker of stars and the man who six years ago, plucked Razor’s Edge from obscurity.
No wonder it took awhile for the name to click. Though at the time, Danny Graham was technically the group’s manager, Beck had little to do with him after their first meeting. But he remembered a small man who filled the room with his big personality and energy. Graham convinced a bunch of kids he could turn them into richer than Croesus rock gods. And to his credit, he almost succeeded.
In retrospect, Danny Graham could have taken him—all of them—to the cleaners, and he wouldn’t have been the wiser until well after the fact. Now, with a business to run, he was all about the bottom line. Back then, too busy having the time of his life to worry about the fine print, he blithely let someone else handle the group’s finances.
“Royalties from the songs I co-wrote still arrive in my bank account every month like clockwork. Guess I do owe your uncle.”
“Enough to show up for the reunion?”
“No.” Beck felt no need to elaborate. By now, Joplin knew how he felt. “Besides, if a big tribute concert is planned, the absence of a marginally successful, mostly forgotten band like Razor’s Edge will go unnoticed.”
Joplin’s gaze followed him as he crossed the room, watching as he took a beer from the refrigerator. She shook her head when he offered her one.
“You misunderstood. Danny doesn’t want a star-studded salute. He asked me to reunite Razor’s Edge. One group, one night, one last concert.”
Frowning, confused, Beck slowly sank into the sofa.
“To what end?”
“He’s always felt responsible for the way things ended.”
“Danny wasn’t there.” Beck tried to understand. “Why should he feel guilty?”
“Because he wasn’t there.” Joplin shrugged. “He feels if he’d paid more attention, provided more of his one-on-one experience, things would have turned out different.”
“He threw you under the bus.”
“No—”
Beck cut Joplin’s protest off with a slash of his hand through the air.
“Bullshit,” Beck said with a frustrated growl. “Letting us vent, list
ening to our crap, shouldering our problems. Plus, you watched out for us, handled the day-to-day drudgework of schedules and hotel reservations and media interviews. You did the work of ten people without blinking an eye.”
“You make me sound like a saint—or a machine. A saintly machine.” Unruffled—as always—by the less-than-flattering description, Joplin casually tucked a stray piece of blonde hair behind her ear. “I made my share of mistakes.”
Falling for Kane topped the list. Beck kept the observation to himself. He didn’t blame Joplin. Historically, love had a way of sneaking up on people, ramming them in the gut and sending them to their knees for their trouble.
“The man is dying, and I’m truly sorry. However, Danny has no right to blame you for the failure of Razor’s Edge. We had our chance and fucked up royally without anyone’s assistance.”
Rather than jump to Danny Graham’s defense, Joplin chose to explain her unwavering loyalty.
“My uncle gave me my start. Guided me, encouraged me. Yes, on occasion, he can be an egotistical, self-involved asshole. Show me one successful person who isn’t.”
Beck snorted. He recalled Joplin didn’t curse often. When she did, the description was concise, to the point, and accurate.
“You have reason to be loyal.”
“I have reasons—many, many—to love him. Some you know—remember our drunken night in Amsterdam?”
Smiling, Beck nodded. He wasn’t likely to forget. Joplin’s booze-fueled confessions about her childhood humanized her, dotting her perfect façade with a few appealing chips—and deepened his unrequited love.
After that night, they were forever in the friend-zone. At the time, the knowledge ate at Beck. Now, his feelings mellowed to wistful nostalgia, he was glad nothing happened beyond one bittersweet kiss.
“When I decided to open my own public relations firm, Danny let me go with his blessing.”
“What a prince,” Beck muttered, sarcasm dripping from each word.
“He could have poured on the guilt. I still would have left,” Joplin said with a touch of steely determination in her voice. “But Danny helped me make the break clean and easy instead of messy and painful.”
ALMOST BLUE Page 3
