Seattle Sound Series, The Collection: Books One to Five

by Alexa Padgett

  I rubbed the spot absently, shocked at the memory. Dad had hated the piercing so much I’d taken it out just to get him to stop complaining. God, I’d nearly forgotten.

  Ten pages in and the pictures stopped. My life—my mum’s knowledge of it—ended with a write-up in the Sydney paper. We’d just signed our first record deal. Within two years I’d be here, a rocker at the top of the world stage, trying hard to keep his emotions together as he held his mother’s pitiful attempt to stay connected to his life.

  I flipped through the rest of the pages in quick succession. Not a note. Nothing to apologize for beating the shit out of me that day or for leaving my dad to raise a child alone. No mention of her bipolar disorder. Not a whiff of concern at the possibility of passing the disease on to me.

  I shut the book and leaned my head back against the uncomfortable armchair. Crikey. She’d thrown me with this.

  Because within the albums, I sensed her love, her need to connect, just as she’d said yesterday. But she hadn’t done the one thing I needed—contact me. Let me know she cared.

  She didn’t wake the rest of the time I stayed there.

  I stood, stretched my stiff joints, and walked down the hall. Briar was laughing with her friend. My smile was instantaneous and caused me to pull up short of the door.

  Briar had managed to burrow deep inside me so quickly. We probably wouldn’t last, because this much emotion would flame out. Wouldn’t it?

  Probably. I rubbed my eyes. I didn’t know what to think about any of this. I stepped forward, needing to get out.

  “Hey,” Briar said from the chair across the room. My chest compressed with a thick ache at the sight of her. She waved me in. “Rosie, this is Hayden.”

  “I saw you perform in Melbourne years ago. That’s when I still traveled, obviously.” Her eyes sparkled, yellow edged into her healthy complexion.

  My mum was further along this same path. I swallowed as the realization struck: my mother mightn’t wake back up.

  “G’day, Rosie. Hope you liked the show, then. Met your cat, Princess. She’s prickly as.”

  I glanced over at Briar, still unprepared for her searching look. I didn’t need that now. The ache in my chest was building into a burn. If I didn’t do something soon, the pain would consume me.

  “Mum’s not waking and I need a bite. Can I grab you something?”

  “Briar was just coming to find you. It’s my nap time,” Rosie said, her voice full of sardonic humor. “Dying people have similar schedules to toddlers. We don’t always act much better, either.”

  Her eyes were full of understanding and sympathy as they met mine. I didn’t want a person I’d never met before to feel sorry for me.

  “Right-o. I’ll be out front,” I said to Briar. “Come out when you’re ready.”

  Briar nodded, but hurt crept into her big blue eyes. Dammit. I’d already fucked this up.

  Briar leaned down to hug her friend, undeterred by the wires and the frailty of Rosie’s body. I shuddered.

  I strode through the building, needing away from the stale, antiseptic air. Shoving through the doors, I didn’t bother to stop when I hit the light mist.

  My mum could’ve figured out a way to make spending time with me happen. People with bipolar disorder developed and maintained strong, healthy relationships with their kids. One of my friends in high school struggled with the disorder until she was properly diagnosed and treated. I’d looked her up on social media during the interminable wait for those bloody photo albums. Now, Julia was a doctor with a six-year-old son. That’s what medication did—gave Julia a life. My mum could’ve chosen that route, too.

  But she hadn’t, so she couldn’t have wanted me. Not if she’d never contacted me. No matter how painstaking her collection of my life’s work—she hadn’t tried once to contact me.

  I was a bad mother.

  My fingers tangled in my hair. She ruddy well was. Deathbed confessions and changes of heart were too little too late.

  Briar’s hand slid up my shoulder to tangle in my hair. I pulled her into my arms, my nose buried in her neck. My shoulders shook.

  What. The. Hell?

  “They happen,” Briar said, voice low, soothing.

  “What happen?”

  “Bad days. Especially here. Shows you just how unfair life is.”

  “She drops that shit on me yesterday, and she can’t even wake up long enough to explain her reasons. Not that there’s one that’ll make sense.” I stepped back. Grabbing her hand, I pulled her toward her car.

  “Maybe it’s just as well, Hayden. You’re really upset.”

  “She left me a box. My bloody inheritance to show she’d kept up with my musical career. As if that’d make up for her lack of interest for nearly twenty years. You drive. I’m still trying to remember which side the steering wheel’s on.”

  She shook her head as she clambered into her car. I slammed the door shut, catching the faint glint of a telephoto lens. I turned from the paparazzi, refusing to give them more than they’d already managed to take.

  Briar waited until I was buckled into my seat before starting the ignition. “What’s your eating pleasure?”

  I discarded the idea of telling her about our photo tail. Not much I could do about it.

  “You’re the Seattle expert. Surprise me.”

  “I know the perfect place.” She pulled out her phone. Her thumbs moved over the screen with surprising speed. A moment later, her phone beeped with the distinct ding of an incoming text. She smiled. “Perfect. The pap won’t be able to follow.”

  “You saw him.”

  Briar rolled her eyes. “You can call it reporter instinct. Now, let’s see if I can lose him.” She touched the side of her nose, and for some unknown reason, I smiled.

  Briar drove through the city, eyes intent on the traffic around her. After many twists, turns, and last-second u-eys, she pulled into the lot behind a rambling wooden warehouse. No signage. She opened her car door, so I did, too. Getting out, my arms prickled with the faint chill from the light breeze. So different from Sydney’s muggy, drugging summer warmth.

  “Here we are. The original bottling location for Dogwash Brewery.”

  “I think you brought me here to kill me. Looks creepy enough.”

  She edged in closer, and I threw my arm across her shoulders, bringing her in tight to the line of my body. I wanted her closer, me inside her, but she hadn’t offered. Plus, we were out of the car, here in this hellhole of a parking lot.

  “I know Dan, the owner. I wrote a piece on him years ago, when he’d just started brewing. He has a small kitchen on-site. His club’s killer.”

  “All this talk of death. Let’s try something else for a mo’, shall we? But eating, I’m good with that. The muffin was great but not filling. I’m close to gnawing off your pretty fingers.”

  “It’s especially good when paired with their Golden Retriever Blonde.”

  “What is it with you Yanks and pets?”

  Briar shrugged. “We like animals in the Pacific Northwest. We also recycle everything that we can—and some things we probably can’t just to feel superior—and refuse to fluoridate our water.” She led me around some crates and to a back door. She knocked twice, hard. “It’s part of our charm. Along with gray skies, cool temperatures, and some of the most vibrant greenery in the country.”

  We waited. The alley was clean but narrow. Too dark and secluded, especially for a woman alone. Briar slammed her fist against the door again.

  “This better be good,” growled a voice. The door flung inward, revealing a large man. He must’ve weighed in at one hundred and fifty kilos, maybe more. I edged in front of Briar when he frowned. She elbowed me back and fell into the man’s arms.

  “Good, it’s you! I haven’t seen you in months,” the man howled, a grin splitting his wide, jowly face. “So glad you let me know you’re back in town. How’s your sister? What’s Abbi up to? Simon—he and Ella good?”

  I cleare
d my throat, feeling like an arse, standing here while Briar was mauled by a guy with a good fifty kilos on me.

  “Dan, this is my boyfriend, Hayden.” Briar pulled out of the hoss’s arms to beam at me.

  Boyfriend. The title settled with surprising ease, especially when I wrapped my arm around her waist.

  “Briar’s got herself a man.” Dan clapped his hands, rubbing them together like villains do in movies. My stiff shoulders tensed more. “Oh, this is too good! Wait. You aren’t a doctor, right? No God complex?”

  “No, mate. I’m a musician. Very human. Probably neurotic.”

  “And you’re foreign. You play country music?”

  “Some influences, sure, but mostly alt rock.”

  “Meh. Not my thing. Still, glad you’re not a doctor.” Dan pulled me into a bear hug that was even tighter than some of my wrestling matches in school. More like the full body plaster I loved to give Briar. He leaned down and I worried the yobbo was going to kiss me. Instead, he whispered, “Hurt her and I’ll kill you.”

  I nodded the little bit I could manage against his massive chest. “Got it, mate. How about a little less manhandling? I prefer the women. Well, one lady, anyway.”

  Dan released me. I stumbled back. The man was as high as the koalas that nibbled Eucalyptus leaves all day.

  His laugh rumbled across the room. I turned wide eyes toward Briar. Why the hell did she bring me to meet this nutcase? She smiled and shook her head.

  “Relax.” She took my hand, and, damn me, I did. I trusted her. The weight in my chest eased, but my brain fired a million reasons why trust was stupid, making me dizzy.

  “Like I said in my text, we could really use one of your sandwiches.” Briar batted her long lashes over those big blue eyes, and Dan melted even faster than I did. Good to know I wasn’t the only one, but, at the same time, I didn’t like the way he reacted to my girlfriend.

  “Beer first. I’ve got a new one you need to try, Bri.”

  Dan pirouetted—something I never would’ve believed possible if I hadn’t seen the move with my own eyes—and trundled across the room, weaving between about ten battered oak tables. The chairs were sturdy, clean, but the faint smell of spilled beer leached from the floor.

  “Dan’s part of the Northwest’s microbrew movement. I met him about eight years ago just after he’d leased this place,” Briar said as we followed Dan, her fingers entwined with mine.

  “This girl has one helluva beer nose on her. Hasn’t missed one yet.”

  Dan set us up in the spotless industrial kitchen bristling with stainless steel. At one of those huge, clear-glass fridges, he pulled out a cask. Setting it on the counter, he poured three froth-topped pints and shoved one in Briar’s hand before handing me mine. Lifting his glass, he waited.

  Briar sipped, smacked her lips. Her brow wrinkled as she sipped again. “Wheat and rye?”

  Dan boomed out a laugh, reminding me again of an angry bear. “Nothing gets by you, Bri.”

  “Lemon?”

  “Yeah, the peel.” Dan turned to me. “Well? What do you think?”

  I took a tentative sip, let the liquid roll across my tongue. “I’m Aussie. We love beer. Practically raised on the stuff. This, though, this is special. Better than a lot of the drub I’ve tried.”

  “My summer special now that it has Briar’s stamp of approval,” Dan paused, eyebrows raised. At Briar’s nod, he smiled. “I’ll put it on the menu at our place.”

  “So this isn’t your restaurant?” I asked.

  “This is my brewery. Where I try some recipes to see if I want to put them on the menu for my restaurant. About that lunch.”

  Dan busied himself in the kitchen as Briar’s phone buzzed. She fumbled to pull the case from her pocket. A quick smile flashed across her face, her eyes all lit up bluer than Sydney Harbour.

  “My sister just confirmed she and Asher are coming into town. Asher’s set up an acoustic jam at The Vera Project. It’s a local music venue. Lots of bands play there. Want to come with?”

  “Of course! Well, if I’m still here.”

  Her face fell, a frown building, but she ducked her head and responded.

  “Hey,” I said. “I hope to be. I’m really interested in what Asher will do to arrange his big electric pieces to acoustic.”

  She finished her text. “I told Lia we’d meet up with her some time tomorrow if you’re still around. She said she hopes to meet you.”

  “Is she like you?”

  Briar shrugged. Dan slid a couple of plates in front of us and I picked up a crisp to munch.

  “Nah. Lia’s quieter. More of a watcher even than our Bri. She’s got this aura,” Dan said, narrowing his eyes as he considered. He set his own plate down, gulped his beer. “Zen-like.”

  “Just like you, then. An angel of calm.” I bit into my sandwich. “This is really good.”

  Briar’s lips lifted up in the semblance of a smile, but she seemed worried.

  18

  Briar

  Watching Hayden come close to unraveling earlier was hard, but not as hard as when he’d pulled back from me in Rosie’s room. He’d been ready to bolt when he met Dan. Thankfully, the food and beer relaxed him enough to enjoy the meal, even crack a couple of jokes.

  This wasn’t the same man I’d seen last night at Rosie’s, or even this morning in his hotel suite, and little shivers of worry crept up my spine.

  “Bye, Dan. Thanks for lunch. And the beer.”

  “Any time, Briar. You know that.”

  I stood on tiptoe and kissed Dan’s cheek, surprised when Hayden shifted closer to me. I bit back a smile. He was staking his claim. On me. Hayden’s fingers curled into my waist as he held out his hand.

  “Thanks, mate. The beer was fantastic.”

  Dan beamed. “Maybe I’ll make something and name it after you. Even if you don’t play good ol’ country.”

  “If you do, I’ll send you some autographed stuff.”

  Dan’s smile grew. “Well, then, that’s mighty nice. An Aussie rock star in my brewery. What a day.”

  Hayden walked me to the door, opened it, and waited for me to step out. I sighed at the drizzle. I pulled my sweater tighter at my neck.

  “How do you handle this weather?”

  “You get used to it.” Which was true. Used to didn’t mean like.

  “Don’t women worry their hair will frizz and their makeup will smear?”

  I opened the car door, and Hayden waited for me to climb in before shutting it and sliding himself into the passenger’s seat.

  “My hair is always frizzy, and I don’t wear much makeup, just in case.”

  Hayden turned to look at me. “I like the way you look, Briar. You’re beautiful. The little beads of water in your hair give you a halo. I meant what I said earlier. You’re my personal angel.” He leaned forward, his large hand cupping my cheek as he brought his lips to mine. It started sweet, but the desire we felt burst across our skin. I leaned closer, needing more, as Hayden plundered my mouth.

  I moaned low and deep in my throat, my hands cupping his cheeks.

  “I want you,” Hayden breathed against my lips.

  “Yes.”

  “I’d take you here, in this car, if I could get away with it.”

  “Yes.”

  Hayden shook his head, a smile tugging his lips. I pressed mine to his again, licking across his bottom one before dipping my tongue into his mouth. Once again, he broke the kiss off. I whimpered.

  “Much fun as illicit sex would be, I don’t want anyone else getting an eyeful of your tits.” He slid his hand down over my needy chest, massaging the area with his large palm. I couldn’t get enough of this man. “Take us back to the hotel. Now.”

  “Bossy.”

  Hayden bent his head to bite the side of my neck. “You like it.”

  “I do,” I breathed.

  He leaned back into his seat. “Buckle up, Briar. We have deals to complete.”

  I sat back and clicked
on my seat belt. “I’m just a deal, huh? Merger, I guess.”

  Hayden rubbed his finger over his upper lip. “I have a feeling you’re too much to be categorized.” He glanced out the windshield, his thick blond brows pulling into a tight V over his nose. “I don’t do this with women. I’m not much for affairs, and I’m definitely not into relationships. Not with my work schedule.”

  I gripped the steering wheel, my stomach burning as I stared straight out the front, too. “So you’re telling me you want to keep this thing casual.” I bit my lip, fighting back the tears building behind my eyes. “I shouldn’t have introduced you to Dan as my boyfriend.”

  Hayden’s large hand slid, warm, safe, over my white-knuckled one. “No, love. That’s not what I meant. This is special. But it’s not how I do things.” He blew out a breath and leaned his head forward into his hands. “Crikey, I’m making a blow of this.”

  I smiled, feeling more settled. “Good. I’ve never slept with a man until we’d been dating for three months. My own personal rule after Lia got pregnant at eighteen. I didn’t want to end up with a child tying me to a man I didn’t like.”

  Hayden leaned back in his seat. “Makes sense. Glad you made the exception for me.”

  That burn rekindled low in my belly. This time from desire. “Not sure I had a choice.”

  “Right-o. Let’s find that bed.”

  I started the car and pulled out of the lot. “I have to feed Princess. Clean clothes would be a good idea, too.”

  “To Rosie’s then. Don’t you have a place here?”

  I shook my head. “I lived with Ken.”

  Silence.

  I braved a glance. Hayden wasn’t happy. “So you just broke up.” His voice was filled with censure.

  “No. I stayed with Lia for a while.”

  “So how long have you and the wanker been off?”

  “A couple of months.”

  “He was there yesterday. Talking to you.”

  “Actually, he threatened me and called me names. We didn’t talk at all.”

  He grunted, his scowl fierce. “I want to shove his head up his arse.”