by Vivian Lux
Her tongue slid against mine. The bright, minty shock of her mouthwash took me by surprise, but her fingers on my zipper weren’t a surprise at all. My hand was heavy as fuck, but I managed to lift it anyway, sliding it into her hair the way I knew she liked. She liked it when I left marks. She wanted people to see what we had done.
She let out an appreciative little moan and then opened her eyes. “I’m so happy you finally came to your senses.”
I blinked for a second until it dawned on me that she was talking about the duet. “Right,” I said. “Yeah I guess I did.”
She sighed happily. “It will be so nice to finally work together, don’t you think?”
“Sure will, baby. Now come here with those lips.”
Kissing her reminded me of the vision I’d had of her last night. Of her wearing a white dress and telling me ‘I do.’ I pulled back a little, trying to imagine her in Crown Creek. “Babe?” I asked, suddenly curious. “What’s your favorite place we’ve ever been?”
“Bali,” she replied immediately.
I felt something sinking and sliding in my chest and I didn’t know why. Of course she loved Bali, I knew that, but I had sort of been hoping she’d pick somewhere more…familiar.
She got up and reached into the bag she’d dropped on the floor. “I need a little something,” she said, shaking the sparkly, rose-gold flask. I watched her tip it to her lips and lick the little droplet hanging at the corner of her mouth, mesmerized. “Bali, for sure,” she repeated, nodding her head, and I almost succeeded in ignoring the sinking feeling again.
Her eyes grew distant and I could tell she was reliving the four days we’d managed to sneak away together last winter. “It was so warm, and we could have just laid around with no clothes on all day but no,” she complained, striking up a familiar refrain. “Always wanting to do stuff. You scared me to death with that kitesurfing.
“Aw come on, baby. It was a blast.”
“I just wanted to lie there on the beach.”
I sat up and slid my hand under her shirt. “And you looked damn good doing it too.”
She grinned and straddled me. “That’s still our moved loved post on Insta.”
I chuckled. “And I’m not even in it.”
“Does that bother you?” she asked, all pouty-voiced again.
“Not even a little,” I promised. “You’re a star.”
She smiled proudly. “And maybe people will finally realize that once we do this duet, right? When can we get to the studio?”
I took a deep breath. Her eyes could get so big sometimes and she looked right into my soul. “Soon,” I finally sighed. “I’ll talk with Bennett. Hopefully your pretty voice will drown out my bad one.”
“Gabriel!” she squealed, wrapping her arms around my neck. I sank gratefully into her kiss, tasting the cherry whiskey on her lips. Something went ding inside of my head. “Mm, you taste good.”
“I saved you some.” She shook her flask with a wicked look in her eyes. I leaned in, but she snatched it away and poured it into her mouth.
Then she kissed me.
I drank in her sweetness, the cherry red of her lips now tasting like cherries too. “I could eat you,” I told her.
She giggled and poured the rest of the flask into my mouth. I swallowed again and again, the burn feeling just like relief in my stomach. I leaned in to kiss her…
Just in time for the door to fly open.
“The fuck, man!” I shouted, adrenaline suddenly pounding. A guilty stab of something I didn’t want to feel made my chest hot and I was sure in that moment I was capable of murder.
But Jonah didn’t even blink at my guilty anger. “I knocked,” he said, all crisp business. “Several times.”
I really hated him sometimes.
“What do you guys want?” I sighed as I saw Finn and Beau slid in behind him. Fuck. Three against one. I could usually count on having Beau in my corner, since he was the biggest softie on the planet, but even the nice brother was glaring at me right now. “What’s going on?”
“We go on in,” Jonah looked at his phone. “Twenty minutes.”
“Bullshit,” I slurred. Noelle giggled into my neck.
“We’ve been looking for you everywhere,” Beau piped up as Finn glowered.
“Leave him alone,” Noelle huffed. “You guys are such a bunch of tight-asses.”
“Stay out of this,” Jonah said dismissively.
“Don’t fucking talk to my girlfriend that way!” I shouted. “I’ll kick your ass!” I stood up, but my legs didn’t seem to be working right. I slid to the side, catching the leg of a chair and sending it crashing backwards. “Fuck!” I shouted as bright pain flared in my hip.
Noelle made to help me but Jonah was there first, yanking me up by my shirt collar. “Get your hands off of me!” I yelled.
“Hey, hey, hey!” Bennett was suddenly in the doorway, all smiles and placating hands. He seemed startled to see Noelle there, but quickly shook his head. “What’s going on with my favorite boys?”
Jonah shot a murderous look at him. “Did you give him something?” he demanded. I glared at Jonah, what was he getting at? What did he know about - ?
“You boys don’t know - ” but Bennett fell silent as Jonah let me fall and strode over to him. He was faintly muttering something about “you boys” even as Jonah stood a head taller than him.
“We’re not boys,” Jonah growled. He held Bennett’s gaze for a moment.
“Jesus, you’re way too intense,” Noelle giggled.
Jonah turned to her, silent and dangerous. I knew that look. I hadn’t seen it too often, but I knew to be wary of it growing up.
But I wasn’t a boy anymore, either. Jonah forgot that. “Watch it,” I growled at him, trying to stand in front of Noelle, but stumbling again.
Jonah looked disgusted. “That’s it. Band meeting,” he announced. “Everyone not in the band needs to get the fuck out.”
Noelle’s eyes went wide. “Are you really going to let him kick me out, Gabriel?” she pouted. “I have just as much right to - “
“Band. Meeting.” This time it was Finn talking and if I was wary of Jonah’s temper, I was downright scared of my younger brother’s. Beau put a placating hand on his twin’s shoulder, gently holding him back.
Noelle shot me a piteous glance, but all I could do was shrug. “I’ll be out in five minutes,” I promised her, glaring at my brothers. “This won’t take long.”
She silently retreated, holding her head high as she passed Jonah. Bennett watched her leave for just a beat too long. Then he turned, all smiles. “So what did we need to meet about?”
Jonah shook his head. “You need to leave too.”
“You said ‘band meeting.’” Bennett was still smiling, but it no longer reached his eyes. “I’m the manager of this band. In case you forgot.”
“Fine then,” Finn piped up. “Brother meeting.” He raised his voice louder. “Anyone without the last name King needs to get the fuck out.”
Bennett looked suspicious, but he finally backed down, shutting the door behind him.
As soon as he did, I slumped back into my chair, watching the way the haloes around each individual light on the makeup table melded together into one shimmering beam.
“Why are you fucking this up?” Jonah’s voice swam up out of the depths.
I blinked at him. He looked angry, but it was real anger, rather than his usual irritation. Which threw me.
Jonah was always some variation of annoyed, which made his complaints easy to ignore. But he got angry the same way our mom got angry.
She only lost her temper when you really worried her.
The concern on his face made me feel panicky…and paranoid. Like he knew something I didn’t. “I’m not fucking it up,” I protested.
“Look at you. You’re a mess. What did he give you?”
I shrugged.
“You can’t keep taking pills, man. Drinking is one thing, but you’re g
oing to a place I can’t reach you.”
I closed my eyes. It was scary how nice that sounded. “Maybe I don’t want to be reached,” I said. My voice sounded off and I remembered how Bennett hadn’t told me what he’d given me this morning. I’d just swallowed them without question.
“Gabe,” Jonah said.
“What?”
This time it sounded like he was pleading with me. “Come on,” he said, sitting down on the couch next to me. “What’s up? You haven’t been right in weeks.”
I watched the haloes. “I’m trying,” I whispered. Suddenly it all felt like way too much.
“Trying…?”
I opened my eyes, feeling that guilty stab again. Hot in my belly. “I know this means everything to you guys.”
There was a beat of silence where my words just hung in the air. I had a feeling like I could reach out and snatch them back, stuff them back in to my mouth. They were hot and guilty, just like the rest of me.
But then Finn cleared his throat. “It doesn’t mean everything,” he corrected in a sharp voice.
Another beat of silence. I opened my eyes and saw barely suppressed panic in Jonah’s eyes.
“Yeah,” Beau finally said. “I’m just here for the chicks.”
Finn snorted, and the tension drained from the room. Beau lived like a monk. As far as I knew - or at least cared to know - he was still a virgin at twenty. I opened my eyes and felt my mouth turning up into a smile.
Jonah was nodding. “We’ve worked too hard to fuck this up now, though. Right, Gabe?”
I swallowed. I hated him right now. But I also loved him. I loved my brothers.
So that’s the only reason I tried to stand up. Jonah caught me under one arm, Beau under the other. “You good?”
I shrugged. “I can be.”
“There you go,” Jonah encouraged. “You’re a real Prince, you know?”
I grinned at the old joke. How many times had we made it? Who else could I make it with? Only these guys. Only my brothers. “I’m not a Prince,” I declared, straightening up. “I’m a fucking King.”
Chapter Four
Finn
“Now Finn, I don’t know what happened in Tulsa,” Darla said, spitting out the word like it had offended her. “But try not to have a repeat of that, okay?”
I glanced at Gabe, who seemed to be having trouble staying upright. Jonah looked annoyed and my twin looked like he wanted to run from the room. The Tulsa incident was still a sore spot, apparently.
The camera crew was setting up for the Exclusive Behind the Scenes Interview with the King Brothers while Darla, our publicist was drilling us. Or more specifically, drilling me.
I shoved my hands in my pockets and gave her my most winning smile. “Why, Dar? What happened in Tulsa?”
“Finn,” Jonah warned me, then turned to Darla “We’re good there,” he said, speaking for all of us as usual.
“Did something go wrong in Tulsa?” I asked innocently. “What happened in Tulsa, Darla? Is there a problem with Tulsa?”
“Oh my god, stop saying Tulsa,” Beau sighed, looking heavenward. My twin shook his head, ignoring me poking him in the ribs, chanting “Tulsa, Tulsa, Tulsa.”
“She’s right,” Bennett added, stabbing his phone and glancing up at us from the metal folding chair. This green room was a piece of shit. “You demanded to know who the interviewer voted for and then challenged him to a fistfight in the back alley when you didn’t like his answer. Keep it light this time, Finn. No talking about sex, politics or religion.”
“Then what’s left to talk about?” I wondered. But everyone ignored me. Darla reminded us of the interviewer’s name, which I promptly forgot, and then begged Gabe to remember to mention the tour sponsors. He smiled at her, nodding slowly as he swayed on his feet.
“Jesus fucking Christ,” I muttered, watching my second oldest brother, who was clearly shitfaced. Beau shot me a look, and I lifted my chin at Gabe. Beau’s eyebrow went up and he sighed. Then lifted his left shoulder in a fractional shrug.
“Stop doing that twin mind reading thing, you’re creeping me out,” our manager complained. “Finn, come over here, I need to talk to you.”
I glanced at Beau again. He gave me an angelic grin and I scratched my nose with my middle finger. He laughed as Bennett took me by the upper arm. “Finnegan’s in trouble!” Beau chanted. “Finnegan’s in trouble!”
“Grow up and act your age!” I taunted him.
“What, five minutes older than you?” he shot back quickly. Of course it was quick with twenty-one years worth of practice.
Of all the people I wanted to talk to before this interview, Bennett ranked just below the scary librarian with the mole at my grade school. “He’s got me! Hurry! Save yourselves!” I cried, reaching out my hands to my brothers. “Don’t worry about me!”
“We’re not,” Jonah deadpanned, but the side of his mouth was twitching.
Good. Fucker needed to loosen up.
“What do you want, Bennett?” I grumbled, once I’d allowed him to pull me into the hallway.
His face slid into that smarmy smile of his that he always put on whenever he wanted us to do something. “I got you a present,” he said.
This morning’s interview was going to be our forty-ninth morning show appearance on this tour. “Tell me it’s a hunting cabin in the Pacific Northwest, fifty miles from any sign of humanity,” I sighed.
He blinked a little at that, but recovered quickly and pulled out the engraved flask with an expectant glance. I stared at it as he waggled it in front of my nose. “Aren’t you going to take it?”
I wrinkled my nose. “What is it?”
“A flask.”
I could feel the heat starting to claw up the back of my neck. I glanced over to check in with Beau. He was way better at knowing when I was about to explode than I was.
But he was wrapped up with some last minute make-up bullshit and I was on my own to deal with my rising anger on my own. “I can see that,” I said to Bennett through gritted teeth. “I guess the question now is, why?”
He pressed it into my hand, but I did not close my fingers around it. “It’s good stuff,” he said.
“You want me to drink it?” I pressed him. Let him say it. “Like, now? We have an interview.”
Bennett nodded like it made a modicum of sense. “Right. That’s why. You need something to mellow you out.”
I grimaced, thinking of Gabe’s spaced out smile. “No,” I said, keeping my right fist balled tightly at my side.
“Fi-inn.” He stretched my name out to two sing-song syllables. He was warning me even as his smile widened. “You remember Spokane?”
I was getting pretty fucking tired of being reminded of these places where my “lack of polish” had gotten me-us - in trouble. “That wasn’t fair,” I reminded him. “They trapped me.”
“They were just interviewing you. They asked you about your love life and you jumped down their throats. If Beau hadn’t…”
“Beau didn’t do shit,” I hissed. “And I fixed it. I sent flowers, just like you wanted.” My fist was fucking itchy. “I was a good boy, Bennett.”
He smiled and I realized my flaring temper was only proving his point. I swallowed hard as he said, “I still think you should have something to steady you. This is an important appearance.”
I glanced back into to the green room and at my older brothers. Beau was hanging back quietly of course. Watching. Jonah looked like he was ready to jump out of his skin with eagerness to get on with it.
But Gabe was on the couch. Just lying back, smiling.
If he was drunk or high, it was good shit. Way too much good shit.
Now I’m no angel. And I wasn’t about to look down on my brother for whatever it took to get through these things. But… “How much has Gabe had?” I asked Bennett.
Our manager scoffed. “He’s a big boy.”
“How much, Ben?” I repeated, stepping closer.
Bennet
t hated when I shortened his name. So of course I tried to do it as much as possible. His nose twitched as he looked up at me, no longer able to go eye to eye since I had about five inches on him.
He blinked slowly and stepped back.
I fucking knew it.
The heat was working its way across my face now and I acted on my hunch. “And how many pills did you give him?”
For a second I thought I had the slippery fucker. It was high time to send Bennett Vaughn packing, and this was the push we needed. I already knew I had Beau’s vote because he and I were a team about this shit. Gabe probably wasn’t going to want to lose his pill hook-up though, and Jonah had some kind of fucked-up loyalty to the guy who’d been managing us like a demented stepfather for the past ten years. I’d need something pretty big to prove my point, so that’s why I raised my voice. “How many, Bennett?” I bellowed. “How many pills did you give Gabe?”
Bennett stepped back again, and with one quick glance into the green room, he rearranged his face back into that bland, smarmy smile. “Don’t know what you’re talking about, Finn. You really do need to calm down.” He raised his voice. “Don’t want a repeat of Tulsa, now.”
Chapter Five
Gabe
“An interview within an interview,” I muttered to no one in particular. “Interview-ception.”
“Gabe,” Jonah hissed, elbowing me in the ribs.
I stood up straighter. The heat of the lights belied the claim that this was a “candid backstage chat,” but that’s what they were calling it. A backstage interview before the real sit-down interview. Post it on YouTube, get a billion clicks. We knew the drill.
My veins felt like they were singing. I couldn’t keep the smile off my face even if I wanted to. These pills were goooood.
I glanced up and realized the interview had already started without me noticing. “Right,” Jonah was saying, his eyes flitting expertly between the interviewer and the camera. I always wondered how he did that. “It’s truly an honor to play the GardenMax Arena tonight.”
