by BB Miller
Live Your Dream
Copyright ©2017 by B.B. Miller and Leslie Carson
Chase the Dream excerpt ©2017 by B.B. Miller and Leslie Carson
ISBN: 978–0-9982462–2-2
This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and events are the product of the authors’ imagination or have been used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual locations, events, or persons, living or dead, is purely coincidental.
All rights reserved. Apart from any use as permitted under the Copyright Act, 1968, no part of this work may be reproduced, copied, scanned, stored in a retrieval system, recorded or transmitted, in any form by any means, without the prior written permission of the authors.
Cover design by:
Jada D’Lee Designs
Cover image by:
iStock Photo
Editing by:
Lauren Schmelz, Write Divas
Interior Design & Formatting by:
Christine Borgford, Type A Formatting
Contents
Live Your Dream
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Chapter 7
Chapter 8
Chapter 9
Chapter 10
Chapter 11
Chapter 12
Chapter 13
Chapter 14
Chapter 15
Chapter 16
Chapter 17
Chapter 18
Sneak Peek: Chase the Dream
Sneak Peek: Gable by Harper Bentley
Acknowledgements
About the Authors
Matt
A DULL JACKHAMMER beats relentlessly in my head as I slowly become aware of frenzied movement beside the bed. I can’t even imagine trying to open my eyes. The thought is painful. Why did I let the Brit talk me into tequila? You would think I’d have learned by now.
“You’re a stupid fuck. . . . Too dumb to remember to come home on time.”
I squeeze my eyes tighter, trying to drown out the memory of my mother’s shrill voice. No amount of time seems to let me forget my childhood. It’s always there, lurking in nightmares and twisted memories.
“Shit . . .” It’s a whispered curse from a panicked female voice, bringing me back to the torture of the morning. I turn my head in her direction and groan, trying to put together what happened the night before.
Redfall, my band, had played a concert in support of the What’s Your Dream Foundation. There’s no way I’ll ever forget it; Parker Jensen, an eleven-year-old kid fighting leukemia, had his dream fulfilled by spending a day with his idol, our front man and one of my best friends, Kennedy Lane.
We came close to losing Kennedy to the demons he’s battled since an accident took his sister’s life a few years ago. But being involved in something like What’s Your Dream changed him and made him look at life in a different way. I don’t think Parker will ever know that he’s the one who did the saving when it came to Kennedy.
Yesterday’s concert will stay with me for a long time. The rest of the night, though? A bit of a hazy mystery. I remember Kennedy heading off with Abby to their own private celebration, and Sean Murphy, our borderline insane drummer, dragging Cameron Chapman (or Three, as Sean likes to call him), our rhythm guitarist, and a group of us out to celebrate.
It started in the limo with a few members of the charity foundation’s team, including the delectable but equally infuriating Tessa Baker. I’ve never met a woman like her. Long black hair, curves that drive me insane, and a sarcastic mouth on her I’d like to put to better use. She’s challenged me since the moment we met in the lead-up to the concert for Parker. Questioning nearly every word that came out of my mouth, taunting me with her delicious curves and sharp wit. There’s no denying we get under each other’s skin. A more frustrating woman I have yet to meet. She seems to know every button to push to get a reaction out of me.
The limo cruised the steep streets of San Fran as we indulged in expensive champagne before Sean demanded that we stop outside a gentleman’s club. Cue the ensuing battle of wills with Tess where she accused us of setting the women’s movement back a few decades.
Snippets of the alcohol-induced rant rush back to me.
“We love women, all of them, don’t we, Grasshopper?” Sean was always so helpful.
“Come in and see it for yourself before you pass your high-and-mighty judgment.” And she did. Tess marched her sweet ass right up to the doors and demanded entry from the linebacker-sized bouncers.
I wonder if there’s anything she’ll back down from.
Being famous comes with a few perks I’ll never complain about, and one of them is getting in anywhere, anytime, no questions asked. So, our little entourage, already half shit-faced, spilled into the high-end club so that Tess could see for herself that the women weren’t being forced to do anything they didn’t want to.
That particular club was one Sean and I have been to a few times. It catered to the elite, to the rich, to the ones who needed and demanded confidentiality. You could get a five-star meal and the best liquor money can buy while enjoying top industry DJs, a high-quality burlesque show, and uber-exclusive lounge areas.
Tess probably expected sticky floors and drunken frat boys catcalling women chained to stripper poles. What she saw rendered her speechless, and what a fucking sight that was. It may be the one and only time in the couple of days I’ve known her that I’ve seen her at a loss for words.
Once we were safely tucked into one of the white leather VIP booths, we broke into the Tres Quatro Cinco. Sean had opened up a tab to pay for a few bottles of the expensive tequila, and rounds of whatever poisons anyone wanted. Everything after that point was a blur—a nasty, pinpricking, and painful blur.
I have bits and pieces here and there of hushed, wicked words whispered close to Tess’s ear, the touch of her hand against my thigh, her twirling beneath a lamppost under a cable car sign. But the blanks between are greater than the rest of the foggy picture.
I have no idea how we made it back to the Fairmont. I run a shaky hand over my face, hearing more rustling from beside the bed. “Where is it?”
My mouth feels like it’s full of cotton. Something definitely happened last night. I get snapshots of Tess practically pouncing on me in the elevator, and drunken, uncoordinated limbs grabbing at my shirt while the pair of us stumbled into the hotel room.
I can smell her on my fingers, still taste her on my tongue, and feel her hand clumsily reaching into my jeans.
“So stupid . . .” It’s the last thing I hear before the door clicks shut.
“Grasshopper!” It’s Sean beating on the door. I ignore him and throw a pillow over my head. I’m used to lack of sleep. Lack of sleep and a hangover from hell, though I could do without. “Open up, Matty!” He bangs some more. He won’t give up. He never does.
“For fuck’s sake.” I roll my sorry ass out of bed, shuffling across the floor as he knocks out a continuous rhythm on the door. I find my jeans in a pile on the floor and tug them on. “Enough!” As I whip the door open, Sean’s there filling the space, his ridiculous blue hair styled up to perfection. It’s tempting to stick something in it just to piss him off. He tries to peer over my shoulder into the room. Always so fucking intrusive.
“You alone?”
I grip the door, trying weakly to push him out of my face.
“Christ, yes. I’m fucking alone.”
Sean barrels past me, and I shut the door behind him, leaning against it.
“It smells like sex in her
e.”
I try to shake off the lingering effects of the alcohol swimming in my veins, and the memories that seem to haunt me. Everyone has their own demons. Kennedy’s rest in the bottle and guilt. Sean and Cameron’s have been the most convenient drugs of choice. Mine are dark and twisted memories I can’t escape. “Tell me again why you’re here?”
“I’m hungry, and we have shopping to do.” He turns to size me up, shaking his head as he takes in my half-dressed state. “You fuck her?”
“Again. Why are you here?” I meet his stern look with one of my own.
“You heard me.”
“Since when are you so interested in my sex life? You not get any lately?”
He laughs and moves to one of the windows across the room, tearing back the curtains to reveal a cloudless, blue sky. Another stellar San Fran morning. The room floods with the harsh light, doing nothing to dull my headache. The Brit sinks down into one of the leather chairs by the window, making himself at home.
“I get plenty, mate. And I’m interested because, for once, she’s not a random.”
“Fuck off.”
“No, you fuck off. She works with Abby. If things go sideways with you two, it could make it uncomfortable between Abby and Kennedy, and we just got him back.” I cringe. Sean’s right. Kennedy’s just found the love of his life with Abby Walker, the director of What’s Your Dream, and Tess’s boss.
“I mean, have I not taught you anything?” he rants, jabbing a finger at me. “Law Number 27—don’t shit where you eat.” Since his last name is Murphy, Sean’s developed a hideously long list of his own brand of ‘Murphy’s Laws’ that he’s constantly exhorting us to follow. Not that we listen much.
I shake my head. It was one night. No more, no less.
“There’s nothing to go sideways, Dr. Phil. Get over your fucking laws.”
He lets out a laugh, leaning forward to pick something up from the floor, leveling me a knowing look as he swings a bright pink lace bra from his fingers. “This doesn’t look like nothing.”
Another fragment of the night comes back to me. Tess, swaying her hips to some music heard only in her head, reaching around to unclasp her bra.
“Fuck.” I can feel her full, heavy breasts filling my hands, my tongue piercing rolling over her hardened nipples.
“You did fuck her. You asshole,” he rants in an accusatory tone.
“No. I didn’t.”
“You sure?” He lifts his brow before starting in on his inspection of the bra. “Damn. Forty double D. You are the luckiest fuck on the planet.”
“I think I’d remember fucking someone like Tess.”
“I sure as hell would.” He twirls the pink lace around his finger.
“Hey. Watch it.”
“Mhmm. Nothing happened, my ass.” He tosses the bra on the rumpled sheets of the bed. “Look at you, all defensive . . . protective even.”
Pushing away from the door, I start for the bathroom and grumble under my breath, “I’m taking a shower.”
“Make it quick. I’m hungry.”
He gets a door slam for an answer.
“Look at this place. Are you always such a pig?” he hollers from the other room. I switch on the shower, trying to drown out his voice. As the water warms and the room fills with steam, I lean against the counter and avoid looking at the sorry fuck in the mirror.
Yesterday, everything was so different. Being with Parker, seeing the kind of support he has, was both inspiring and a reminder that I never had any support—not until the damage had already been done. I know I can’t change my past. And, somehow, despite the clusterfuck of my childhood, I’ve made it. That doesn’t mean I’ve forgotten.
Some scars never really heal.
Sean’s voice booms through the door, preventing another unwelcome trip down memory lane. “It looks like a gale went through here. No wonder she left you before the morning.”
That’s the thing about women. They always leave.
“You guys were like, so hot up there.” This glowing review comes from the run-of-the-mill, half-dressed groupie we find lingering outside a diner with her equally enthusiastic friend. At least we got to eat breakfast in peace.
We tend to garner more attention when we’re out with Kennedy, since he’s our front man and a favorite of the paparazzi and their associated trashy magazines. It’s not unusual for us to get noticed without him, especially after a concert like the one we put on last night. It’s moments like this that I think about how different my life used to be.
Everyone has issues, baggage, or whatever buzzword of the day. Having no idea which of my mother’s clients was my sperm donor, and living on the streets between foster homes after mom ended her own life when I was twelve, is mine.
I was more than a handful in those early teenage years after her suicide, so I don’t blame the foster system or the families who had all the good intentions in the world. But I’ve learned hell is paved with good intentions. When it comes right down to it, people will disappoint you, so now I keep my expectations low. I expect nothing. Nothing is what I get and what I deserve.
I finally found a bit of normalcy—or my version of it—when I was sixteen. I thought I was old enough to be on my own. The reality was I had no idea what the hell I was doing. I had a chip on my shoulder, angry at everything and everyone.
And then Tom Logan found me.
I had been trying to hotwire his vintage Shelby—an initiation ritual for a gang of thugs I had no business being involved with. I should’ve been enjoying high school, dating some nice girl, maybe figuring out what college to go to, but somewhere between tenth and eleventh grade I dropped out—not just out of school, but out of life. I was living on the streets at the age of fifteen.
Learning to stay alive as a homeless teenager in the seedy neighborhoods of LA made you grow up pretty damn fast. It’s survival of the fittest where every day is a fight for food, for shelter, for the right to take a breath.
By the time I found the gang with its vague promises to keep me safe, I had been to twelve different schools, a handful of group homes, been arrested for more petty thefts than I could count, and was introduced to the fine art of dealing drugs.
I had become somewhat of an expert at sneaking into dodgy hotels and rundown stairwells of apartment buildings to sleep—if you could call it that. “Always sleep with one eye open” is the only piece of good advice I got from a dude named Hades, the self-proclaimed badass leader of the gang.
I learned early on that the only person I could count on was myself. Hades and his gang of equally lost souls scattered like the rats they were, back to the underbelly of LA when Tom confronted me in front of his Mustang.
This initiation ritual wasn’t random. Tom was targeted. He worked at one of the local group homes for teens and at one time had kicked Hades out for his continual disregard for the rules. This was payback.
“You don’t want to do this.” Those were the first words Tom ever spoke to me, and I’d be lying if I said I wasn’t terrified. If I were arrested again, I’d likely be doing some serious time in juvy. And, while a solid roof over my head and three squares a day was wildly tempting, even I didn’t want something like a prison sentence following me around.
Tom was an imposing man next to my rail-thin, sixteen-year-old form. At least six five, he was obviously in love with the gym. He was bald with a thick goatee and dressed entirely in black. In the nearly empty parking lot, he was like something out of a bad dream.
Tom took a step toward me, and my back pressed against the car. Trapped with nowhere to go seemed to have become commonplace for me. “I can help you.”
“Fuck off.” It was the only response to his words. On the street, “help” could mean a thousand different scenarios, some of which were a one-way ticket to an early grave. I looked around frantically for Hades, for anyone to have my back like they promised they would. Only the faint echoes of shoes hitting the pavement greeted me. Alone again.
�
�When was the last time you ate? Slept in a bed?” Tom leaned forward, getting into my space, and I could see the hard lines on his face, a thick scar next to his mouth, a nose that had obviously been broken a few times. But more than that, it was his eyes that I noticed. There wasn’t any judgment there, no ill-placed sympathy, no look of disgust or shame, all things you get used to seeing from strangers once they realize you’re homeless.
“Why do you care?”
“Because I was you once. And I know what it feels like.”
We stared at each other for a while as LA continued around us. A police siren squealed in the distance, car doors were opened and closed, a bus sped by the parking garage. “Get in the car . . . please.”
It was the first time I had heard that word in a very long time, and he sounded sincere. Now, Tom could’ve just as easily been a serial killer or some sick fuck who preyed on kids like me. Maybe I was incredibly stupid and naive to get into a complete stranger’s car that night, but I did, and that changed everything.
“Grasshopper?” Sean waves his hand in front of my face, bringing me back to the present. “The gorgeous Danielle here would like an autograph.” A Sharpie is thrust into my hand, and I blindly sign my name on her barely there Redfall tank top.
“Does it look good?” Danielle asks, practically sticking her tits into my face.
Leaning back, I nod with a grin. “It looks great.” Her friend beside her jumps up and down, letting out an ear-shattering squeal.
Sean tries his best to quiet them down, his voice dropping. “If you could keep where you saw us to yourself, just for a while, we’d really appreciate it.”
Danielle nods so fast, I’m afraid her extensions are going to fall out.
“Thank you, darling.” Sean winks at them before we pose for a few more pictures, and we’re on our way once more.
“I think the days of you shopping at the mall are coming to an end.” Sean scoffs at my statement, leading us down the street.
“It’ll die down, Matty. It’s always mental right after a show.”
