Make Me: The Black Lilith Series #3

by Hazel Jacobs

  Mikayla and Sersha find Harper back at the hotel and, thankfully, don’t ask. Instead, they take her into Mikayla and Logan’s room, which is just like everyone else’s room except they have a balcony and a hot tub. Mikayla swears up and down that it’s just the luck of the draw, but since she was the one who’d booked the hotel the rest of the band thinks that she’s making her own luck.

  Either way, Mikayla and Sersha immediately start telling Harper what she’d missed at the gig. Acting as though she’d had to leave because she got a headache and not because she’s a total mess of a human being.

  “It was a great show. Dash kept checking his phone between songs, which got a bit distracting.”

  “How can he even play guitar with that massive cock swinging between his legs?”

  “For the love of… Sersha, Dash is well-endowed, get over it.”

  “I can’t get over it. I can’t unsee it. That penis is indelibly inked in my brain. And what’s worse is that it’s Dash. This is the guy who body-slammed Slate for stealing his chicken nuggets and cried over Marlee and Me.”

  Harper immediately gets a mental image of both of those scenes, and can’t help but snort out loud.

  “It’s like everything I ever knew was a lie. Am I Irish? Are you a natural brunette? Is Logan secretly a furry?”

  “Logan’s not a furry.”

  “That’s just what his furry mistress would say.”

  “You seem to be taking this really personally.”

  “I’m just so baffled is all.”

  Harper gazes out at the view from the balcony. She can just see the side of the Eiffel Tower and the Colosseum from there, and the long stretch of mountains in the distance. This is actually her first time in Nevada, and she thinks it’s a shame that her drama with Slate has pretty much ruined any enjoyment she could have gotten out of it.

  “What are you thinking about?” Mikayla asks Harper softly.

  Harper shrugs. “Just enjoying the view.”

  “You’re not thinking about quitting, are you?” Sersha asks.

  Harper smiles and shakes her head. “No,” she says. “Even if I weren’t stupid lucky to get this job, even if I wouldn’t be literally insane for turning it down, I still wouldn’t want to leave. I love you guys. You guys are the best. I think I’m just going to have to get used to being around Slate again, that’s all.”

  The three of them fall silent. Mikayla’s phone dings and she quickly pulls it out of her pocket, with such haste that it makes Harper raise her eyebrows.

  “Everything all right?”

  “Why wouldn’t it be?” Sersha asks.

  Mikayla gives Sersha a nod and Sersha disappears into the bedroom, leaving Mikayla and Harper alone on the balcony. Harper watches her go with a raised eyebrow and, for some reason, starts to feel anticipation building in the air. Just like it had the night that Slate had pounced on her after the wedding. Which is weird, because Harper’s pretty sure that Mikayla’s not going to take this opportunity to try and get in her pants.

  “Mikayla? What’s going on?”

  “Nothing. Hey, have you ever seen Pretty Woman?”

  “Is this a joke about me being an almost hooker?”

  Mikayla purses her lips. “I wouldn’t joke about that,” she says. “But for the record, I don’t think it’s a big deal. We’ve all done jobs we didn’t like because we had bills to pay.”

  “Why do you ask?” Harper asks since she doesn’t want to get into the philosophical differences between Bass Note intern and whore.

  Mikayla shrugs. “Just curious,” she says, in a tone that isn’t fooling anyone. “Do you remember the name of the Opera that Edward took Vivian to?”

  “La Traviata?”

  And, as if her voice is the on switch to some cosmic record player, an ear-splitting blast of Opera music comes drifting up to the balcony from down on the street. Harper nearly jumps out of her seat as a swelling crescendo of orchestral music, helped along by a deep, powerful tenor voice, fills her ears.

  She recognizes the song immediately. It’s the song from that final scene when Edward is trying to win Vivian back.

  Mutely, almost afraid to look, she steps over to the balcony edge and peers over.

  A white limo drives down the street toward the hotel, drawing curious looks from passers-by, though no one seems particularly interested in taking pictures or lingering to watch. This is Vegas, and everyone has done something ridiculous at one point or another. But Harper can see the man standing in the sunroof of the limo, and she feels her jaw drop.

  Slate. In a white button-down with a handful of red roses. He’s squinting up at the balcony and when his eyes meet Harper’s, he breaks out into a brilliant smile.

  Harper spins around to Mikayla. “You knew about this?”

  “Who do you think helped him plan it?” Mikayla asks with an arched eyebrow.

  Sersha appears with the help of one of the roadies Harper recognizes and pushes a massive roll of what looks like coiled rope ladder out onto the balcony. It’s mounted on a metal frame with a complicated winch system attached to it. “Of course, we had to improvise because this hotel doesn’t really do fire escapes.

  The limo pulls up to the hotel and Slate climbs out of the sunroof. The men of Black Lilith use the doors, standing around Slate like an honor guard. Sersha kicks a brake onto the wheel, then unrolls a strong-looking rope ladder and flings it over the balcony and down all three storeys to the street. The three women put their hands on the railing and watch as Slate grabs the ladder and begins to climb.

  “I’m not, I’m not sure about this,” Harper says. But even as she says it, she’s laughing. Because this is, without exception, the cheesiest thing she’s ever seen. It melts her heart a little bit even as her brain reminds her over and over of all the shitty things Slate had done and all the reasons that she’d decided not to pursue anything with him after all.

  “Okay, here’s the stitch,” Sersha says, with one eye on Harper and another on the man climbing up to them. “After we left the club last night, Tommy dutifully beat some sense into Slate. With an umbrella, I believe. Then they came back to the hotel and watched Pretty Woman with Logan and Dash. I don’t know why. Slate, in his infinite wisdom, decided that this…” she gestures at the ladder, “…would be the best way to win you back.”

  “But why would he even want to win me back?”

  Mikayla and Sersha both shake their heads at her, apparently at a loss for words and giving her looks like they think she’s dumb as shit. Slate is almost halfway up the ladder, moving with the ease of a man who’s paid special attention to his arms in the gym. Mikayla takes Harper by the shoulders.

  “You should not feel pressured to do anything,” she says seriously. “But… I think you should hear him out. We’ll be downstairs if you need us.”

  And with that, she and Sersha disappear, leaving Harper alone to wait for Slate.

  Her mind is racing, and yet it is staying still. She feels like she ought to be planning what she’s going to say and figuring out a strategy for how to approach this conversation. The Pretty Woman reference is a sweet gesture, but it doesn’t really make up for how badly Slate had hurt her. It’s almost as if her mind is on a bad Wi-Fi connection—she’s buffering, and she’s still buffering when Slate finally pulls himself over the balcony.

  As soon as she realizes that he’s there, her brain is moving again.

  “Are you insane?” she asks, rushing forward to grab him by the shoulders and pull him to safety. “That’s a three storey drop, and you don’t even have a safety line.”

  “My personal trainer has been helping me work on my arms lately,” Slate says easily, straightening up.

  Harper’s got her hands on his shoulders. She quickly snatches them back and puts a little distance between them. Slate sways forward as though he means to follow her. Instead, he hands her the roses. She takes them because she can’t think of anything else to do.

  “You… this is an ag
gressive way of trying to say you’re sorry.”

  Slate nods. There’s no cheerful smile in his eyes, no roguish grin or wink. He looks deadly serious. “Mikayla and Sersha told me everything you told them.”

  “Those bitches,” Harper says without venom.

  “They’re worried about us. I think they have a right to be, don’t you?” He takes a deep breath. He’s barely even panting from the climb and Harper wonders if she can take any credit for that. “They told me about how you said that you wished you’d never told me your name, and how you were Googling pictures of me with other women…”

  Harper takes a moment to be mortified. “Slate,” she begins.

  But Slate doesn’t seem to be listening. He’s rummaging around in his pocket. “Tommy wrote some notes for me.”

  “Tommy wrote some notes for you?”

  “He’s better with words than I am. My head’s not really… I’m not good at getting my thoughts out in words. I beat my drums and I wink at people, that’s what I’m good at.” He pulls a scrap of paper triumphantly from his pocket.

  She’s instantly reminded of those hours she’d spent defending him from everyone who’d ever thought an unkind word about him. “Jesus, Slate, you’re good at a lot of stuff,” she says without thinking. “You are good at reading people. You’re kind and generous, and you’re so supportive.”

  He looks dumbfounded. “That’s… maybe you should have written this.” He waves the paper. He’s clutching it like it’s his lifeline.

  Harper stares at him. The way he’s chewing his lips, the way he shifts his weight from foot to foot, the way he makes deliberate eye contact with her even though she can see that he’d rather not. He’s nervous as hell.

  “Go on. Read it to me.” She’s feeling generous after the Pretty Woman entrance.

  “Okay,” he says gratefully. He unfolds the note and, with one last, hesitant glance toward her, he starts reading in the clear, slow-moving tone of a man who learned public speaking in high school and hasn’t needed to use the skill since. “Harper. I’m sorry that I agreed to be non-exclusive. I was surprised when you suggested it, and agreed because it felt like the easy option, and because I was afraid that I wouldn’t be a good boyfriend to you because I’ve never been in an exclusive relationship before. That anxiety made me weak.” He swallows. Tommy has a way with words, but these ones don’t seem to suit Slate. He presses on anyway. “I’m also sorry for making out with another woman right in front of you. I am a total c— Um… wow, okay… I didn’t know he wrote that part.” He glances over his shoulder, over the balcony railing to the street below, where the band must still be waiting. “Prick.”

  “But you mean it, right?” Because it’s not the pretty words. It’s what he’s saying. Harper can feel her resolve starting to waver.

  “Yes, yes, this is what I mean to say,” Slate says earnestly. “Just, you know, words. I don’t do words. I mean…” He starts to falter again, turning back to the paper in his hands and then back to her. “Harper… I…” he hesitates again, before blurting out, “Jordan.”

  “What?”

  “That’s my name. Jordan Nicholls.”

  “Oh.” How… ordinary, she thinks. She hadn’t expected it to be so ordinary.

  Slate looks down at his boots. “Never told anyone that before,” he mutters.

  She immediately feels warmth rushing through her chest. “It’s nice.”

  “I know. But it isn’t me. It never was. Just like Tiffany was never you,” he adds, with a significant look. “My mom and dad, I love them, but all they ever wanted was for me to meet a nice girl and make a nest behind some white picket fence and I just hated that. And I didn’t know how to tell them, so I just kept fucking up all the time, until I embarrassed them so much that they sent me to live with my aunt in Jersey. That’s where I met Logan. That’s where I became Slate.”

  Harper licks her lips and his eyes follow the motion. “Why Slate?”

  “Clean Slate. You know? It’s a metaphor, I guess.” He shrugs self-deprecatingly. A breeze blows through the balcony, moving his hair into his eye and wafting the now-familiar scent of chocolate and leather into Harper’s face.

  “And you say Tommy’s the only one who’s good with words.”

  His lips quirk up in a not-quite-smile. “I didn’t want to be White-Picket-Fence guy, so I became the Sex, Drugs, and Rock and Roll guy. It was easier, I guess.” He shoves the paper into his pocket, sighing and tossing his head to get the hair out of his eyes so he can see her properly. “But now I’m kind of freaking out because I know you deserve better and I don’t know how to be anything but… him. Slate.”

  Harper immediately feels a sting of apprehension. Because she knows—she knows—what it’s like to feel like you have to play a part for someone. And she hates it.

  “Slate, we don’t have to be anything for each other.” He looks dejected at the expression and she hastily adds, “I don’t want you to play a role. This isn’t about playing parts. We should just be able to be ourselves.”

  Slate looks up at her again, and his eyes have a hopeful tint to them. He takes a step closer to her, his eyes flickering nervously across her face, and she wants to drag him into a hug. Because nervous and hesitant doesn’t suit the image she’d had of Slate when she’d met him, but this is clearly him. No persona, no mask. This is Slate at his most vulnerable. And Harper gets the feeling that very few people have had the privilege of seeing him like this.

  “Harper, I’m the drummer. I’m at the back of the band, watching everyone else’s backs and keeping them from fucking up, so I never learned how to be the one who needs help.” He shrugs. “And then I didn’t realize I was fucking things up with you because I don’t know how to do this, and it was too late to ask. I’m an asshole for what I did to you last night,” he adds, in a serious tone which leaves no room for argument. Not that Harper would be compelled to argue over that particular point. “I should never ever have agreed to keep it casual, but I thought that was what you wanted.” Which is ridiculous, because that was what Harper had thought Slate wanted. “I don’t want casual with you.”

  “Even though I’m your employee?” she finds herself asking, even as her mind is spinning. Because if what he’s saying is true, then they could have hashed it all out last night. If she’d just said, straight out, that she didn’t want him kissing other women, then he wouldn’t have been kissing other women. It feels like she missed something terrifically simple that anyone else would have seen, and now she’s kicking herself for not noticing sooner.

  “I’m not going to worry that you’re my employee if you’re not. It’s worked for everyone else in the band,” Slate says decisively. “Ever since the wedding I’ve missed waking up beside you. The girls you saw in those pictures you Googled…” Harper is stung by the memory but Slate plows forward, “… that’s the Sex, Drugs, and Rock and Roll guy. And that’s… mostly me. Not all of me, but it’s a big part of me, and it’s not always my favorite part.” He reaches out to take her hand, brushing his fingers against her skin as if he’s testing cold water, trying to decide if he’s welcome. “I can’t promise I won’t fuck up again, but I think if we both put all our cards on the table and just… agree to help each other out… I think we can make a go of it.” She doesn’t pull her hand away, so he takes it in his. “What do you think?” he asks hopefully.

  Harper looks down at their hands. Holding hands isn’t as intimate as kissing, but it’s close. She’s had Slate pin her to a bed and fuck her, but holding his hand is starting to make Harper blush. She clutches the roses he gave her to her chest.

  “I think… that you really hurt me,” Harper says. Slate’s face falls. “And maybe I hurt you a little, too?” He visibly hesitates before nodding. “So… yeah. Let’s just agree that this has been a shitty twenty-four hours. We’ll do better next time. Right?”

  Slate finally smiles. It’s the kind of smile that lights up his whole face from the inside. He reaches out
with his other hand, burying his fingers in her hair and tilting her head up so she can look deeply into his chocolate-colored eyes. She feels herself answering his dazzling smile with one of her own as the roses are crushed between their chests.

  “Sounds perfect,” he says.

  The speaker is playing on the bedside table and Slate hums along “Love You To Death” while he traces lines on Harper’s bare thigh.

  Harper found the hard, almost gritty music off-putting at first, but she likes the lyrics. She likes them even better when Slate whispers them in her ear.

  “Type O’Negative is no Lenny Kravitz,” she tells him as she curls up against his chest.

  “They’re not trying to be,” Slate mutters. He rolls over onto his back, away from her, reaching over to change the radio station. Harper rolls with him and bites the edge of his hard pec lightly. “But the lady’s wish is my law.”

  He rolls through the playlists until he hits on one that starts Kravitz ‘Again,’ which Harper loves, before rolling back over and burying both of his hands in her hair. The gentle drum and guitar fills the room as he stares into her eyes like he’s trying to decide if she’s really real.

  After they made up on the balcony, Harper and Slate had gone to their room. They’ve been there ever since. Harper isn’t sure how Dash feels about being sexiled from the suite, but since they did it in the middle of the day she’s hoping that he’ll be a good sport about it. Once or twice, she’d even considered suggesting sneaking into his bag and raiding his stash of sex toys. But Slate doesn’t need toys. They’ve gone through three condoms since they locked themselves in the suite, and they’ve got two more before they have to leave for more supplies. Or maybe they can just get the Concierge to send for some? Surely he’s had weirder requests than that?

  Slate had worshiped her body. Harper can’t even begin to try and replay the memories now, lying in bed beside him while her body still hums from the pleasure he gave her. He’d already apologized on Mikayla and Logan’s balcony, but that hadn’t stopped him muttering apologies into every inch of her skin for most of the afternoon. Harper had returned the favor, though. She had a lot to make up for, too.