Next to me, Dylan growled out a load of tension. “I’m so fucking tired of this shit,” he bitched, rubbing his hands over his face.
Yeah. Me, too. But it wasn’t like Dylan to lose his patience.
This was just plain bad.
“You really want Seth back?” he asked Zane.
“Fucking right,” Zane said. “I wish we never lost him.”
“You’ve all been here a long time.” Maggie intervened, maybe sensing she needed to shut Zane up. She was pretty good at knowing when that time had come. “Let’s just call it a day. I’ll talk to Brody and we’ll do whatever we need to do to find the right person.”
“Thanks, Maggie,” I said, when the guys just sat there in dark silence.
Maggie nodded, then turned and quietly let herself out. Zane got up to follow, but stopped to clasp hands with Dylan. “See you later?”
“Yeah,” Dylan said. “I’ll come by.”
Then Zane turned to me. He moved in for a hug, so I got up to meet him. We embraced, but I wasn’t exactly looking him in the eye when he asked, “You coming tonight?”
No, I wasn’t coming. Was kinda hoping I wouldn’t have to say so to his face, though.
Zane was throwing a belated birthday party for Woo at his place tonight. In reality, it was probably also a Thank-fuck-we’re-done-with-these-auditions party. But now, maybe we weren’t done. And I was still going to Kauai—the split second I walked out of here.
Zane held me out at arm’s length. He was staring at me, and when I hesitated too long to answer him, he accused, “You ghosting?”
“Yes,” I said, because what else could I say?
His hands dropped away. “What the fuck, Elle?”
“I’m done. For now.”
“What the fuck does that mean?”
“It means I’m done. Taking a break. You all should too.” I glanced down at Dylan, who was still sprawled back in his chair, tapping a drumstick against his skull and looking like he’d rather be having a root canal right now.
“Tell that to Brody and Maggie,” Zane said.
“I have. They’ll need time to work out the details with the network anyway. Extend shooting or whatever. Meanwhile, we can all take a breather.”
Zane stared me down, but he didn’t argue any further. We all knew this process was taking a toll, and I really didn’t care what he thought about me jetting off to Kauai. I was supposed to have this break months ago, but this never ending search for a new guitarist kept postponing it.
How many times had he bailed on the band over the years because he had something more important to do, like get drunk, or get sober, or get laid?
This was my mental health we were talking about. We’d been working on the new album and searching for a new guitarist non-stop for a year while I also worked on about nine hundred other projects. I was officially overworked, overstressed and over the bullshit between Jesse and Zane—not to mention the bullshit between Jesse and me. If I didn’t get some time away, I was gonna flip out, and it would not be pretty. Maggie and Joanie had been working, hard, to clear my schedule—a small miracle—and if Zane had a problem with me taking off, he could take it up with Brody. I was gone, and Zane could kiss my ass as I walked away.
But I bit that all back. Just barely.
He knew it, too. Those ice-blue eyes of his narrowed at me, a grin twitching at the corners of his mouth.
I smiled, grudgingly.
“Hope you find some hot dick in Hawaii,” he said. “And cheer the fuck up.”
My smile fell. He should talk; I wasn’t the one who used sex to make myself feel better.
Although, these past seven months… that’s exactly what I’d been doing. With Ash.
Zane didn’t know about that, though. At least, I was pretty sure he didn’t.
Either way, I probably should’ve been relieved. This was what everyone had wanted, ever since Jesse and I broke up, almost a year-and-a-half ago: for life in the band to go back to normal. And Zane used to talk to me like this—crudely—all the time. Since the breakup, though, he’d very conspicuously bit his tongue about my personal life.
It seemed the moratorium on that subject was finally over.
He smirked, because Zane loved having the last word, then turned and sauntered away.
“Hope you don’t accidentally screw any underage chicks at your party tonight and end up in jail,” I told his retreating back. “We’re gonna need you on the tour.”
He raised a fist and flipped his middle finger at me, then disappeared through the door.
Yeah. Back to normal enough.
I just stood here for a moment and sighed. I was officially off, and it was long past time. The crew was starting to reappear, discreetly tearing down equipment and packing out around me. I was off the hook. This thing was done—for now.
So why was I still standing here?
“How about you?”
I glanced down at Dylan. I’d kinda forgotten he was still here. “What?”
“Do you wish we never lost Seth?” he asked me.
I sighed again, a heavy, ragged sigh that came from somewhere deep inside. Somewhere wounded and so full of regret, I’d never been able to find the bottom of it. A place where I kept the two worst memories of my life: finding my friend unconscious, limp and pale, in a pool of his own vomit and blood… and a month later, turning my back on him.
“It doesn’t matter,” I said, my voice sounding small in the huge room. “It’s not the same thing anyway. Sometimes I still wish I never lost Jesse, but that doesn’t mean I want him back.”
When I met Dylan’s gaze, his green eyes were soft, his handsome face strained with worry. I couldn’t remember a time when Dylan had ever been in the middle of any kind of drama between any of us—Zane, Jesse, me. It was always the three of us raising a shit storm, and Dylan, the calm in the eye of the cyclone.
I bent to kiss him, lightly, on the cheek. “I’ll see you,” I promised him.
But as I walked out, I really didn’t know when that would be.
Chapter Five
Elle
Backstage was a total clusterfuck. Everyone was hurrying around, the production crew loading out and everyone else scrambling to get the hell out of the way of the band because, apparently, they’d all heard what happened in there and probably expected us to be breaking shit on our way out.
I saw Zane talking to Jude and Brody, but I didn’t go near them. Maggie and Liv and Joanie all converged on me as I was beelining down the hall, but I shut them down with a raised hand.
“No one gets in,” I told Joanie, and disappeared into my dressing room.
It was a storage room with metal shelving that housed bar stock—drink mixes and jars of olives—but they’d made it work for me, shoving everything up against the walls and bringing in a dressing table with a full-length mirror, portable lights, and a couple of wardrobe racks. I dropped into the chair at the table with a sigh. God, I just needed a minute alone to—
The door opened and Ash stepped in. I spun around to face him, but before I could get my mouth open, Joanie popped her head in behind him. “I… uh… assumed you didn’t mean Ash.”
Ash raised an eyebrow at me and I managed a half-smile. “It’s okay,” I told her, though it wasn’t. Just because Joanie had figured out that I was screwing Ash—on occasion—didn’t mean he got access to the inner sanctum anytime he felt like it.
I’d have to talk to her about it. Later.
She left, shutting the door and leaving me alone with Ash. When I met his eyes, he gave me an expectant look.
It was a look he’d been giving me a lot lately.
“How’d it go?” he asked.
I assumed he was being sarcastic, since he’d been in the room until Brody kicked everyone out; he’d been there when Seth got bounced.
“Awesome,” I said, equally sarcastic.
He came over and reached for me, drawing me up out of the chair. “I know you guys are struggling t
o find someone, but you’ll find someone. And, hey, if nothing works out…” He slipped his arms around me, gathering me close. “You can always hire me.” He hit me with his charming smile, and I felt myself stiffen.
It wasn’t the first time he’d said that.
The last few months, Ash had started dropping hints—at least, to me—about joining Dirty. And it wasn’t that he wasn’t talented enough. But in the past, we’d never even considered Ash, since he had his own band. He was lead singer of the Penny Pushers, and while the Pushers weren’t as big as Dirty, they’d been together a long time and Ash was their frontman. It never occurred to us that he’d actually consider leaving them to play rhythm guitar with us.
The thing was, now that I was sleeping with him, I’d never agree to let him join Dirty.
But how could I tell him that?
I just hoped and prayed he didn’t take the idea to Dylan. Because if Dylan got all excited about it and brought it to the band that Ash wanted in, and I said no, it would just get awkward. Everyone would demand to know why I was saying no.
And then I’d have to say something stupid, in front of everyone—in front of Jesse—about how I’d started sleeping with Ash to make myself feel better, when Jesse married Katie, even though I had no intention of actually being his girl… and now he was sniffing around to make me his girl… and he could never join Dirty because of my horny impulses.
Fucking embarrassing.
Not to mention everyone might be pissed at me for ruining our shot at an actually brilliant option for our new guitarist.
I could only hope Ash had thought that all through and planned to keep his mouth shut about it.
“Ash…” I started, not even sure what to say. How could I tell him not to say anything to the guys, not to ever ask them if he could join the band? He’d get mad. I knew that now. He’d take it as an insult; professional and personal rejection. Because for a while now, Ash had been trying to turn this thing between us into something it wasn’t.
At least, for me it wasn’t.
“Babe,” he said, his blue eyes searching mine and his hands sliding down my back, “I’m just kidding.”
But just like when he’d first offered to sleep with me to help me get over Jesse—Friends with benefits, he’d said—we both knew he wasn’t kidding.
His hands slid down over my ass and squeezed gently. Then he moved in for a kiss, and I let him. He brushed his lips against mine, and when I closed my eyes, he tilted his head and went in deeper. The kiss was warm and demanding, and I sighed softly as his tongue slid between my lips.
Then his tongue piercing swept over my tongue, and I felt tingles at the back of my neck. Not the kind of sweeping, all-over tingles I’d felt the first time he kissed me—in the dark, out in the woods, the night of Jesse’s wedding—but still… for a moment, I gave in to it. I was only female, after all.
And Ash was just so… hot.
He was the only man I’d had sex with in a long, long time… and it just so happened that he was really, really good at kissing.
And fucking.
As I kissed him back, he groaned and gripped my hips, pulling me against him and pressing his solid length against me; his cock, hard and eager in his jeans, jabbed against my groin. I felt the answering surge of lust in my own body, deep in my belly, between my legs. And for the first time ever, it felt off-putting. Alarming, somehow.
Uncomfortable.
I pulled away.
He tried to kiss me again, but I dodged, twisting out of his grip. His hands fell away. His blue eyes were hazed up with desire, but there was concern there, too.
“You okay?”
“No,” I said. “I’m not okay. Seth just auditioned to join Dirty.”
He shoved his hands in his back pockets and looked weirdly guilty. “Yeah.”
I crossed my arms and drew back, studying him, as it dawned on me; I didn’t think he could see the guitarists auditioning beyond the screen, but… “Did you know it was him up there?”
“Yeah.”
“You could’ve said something.”
He raised an eyebrow, slightly. “You pissed at me?”
“No. Of course not.” Though I kind of was. Unjustly.
He looked around the room at my things, like they’d somehow tell him something I wasn’t saying. He glanced at my giant Givenchy tote purse, the one I always traveled with. “You still going to Hawaii?”
“Yes.” Why wouldn’t I be going?
“You know…” he said, still looking around, suddenly fascinated with a trash can in the corner, “… I have a couple of days before I have to be back in Vancouver.”
Oh, God. Please, don’t say it…
“I could come with you.”
“Oh.”
He lifted his blue eyes to meet mine.
“I just… I need some time with Joanie, Ash. I told her… we’re going to go over my schedule and get organized, and…” I trailed off, because as much as Ash might be trying to kid himself there was more between us than there really was, he wasn’t dense. All I’d talked about for months was how badly I needed some time off, and now I was making excuses about Joanie and I needing time to work?
But it just didn’t seem cool to say, I need some time to lay around on the beach in a bikini and drink cocktails, and I don’t want to do that with you.
“Okay,” he said, his eyes tightening a bit. He knew I was making excuses. “You wanna grab some dinner before you go?”
“No. Thanks. I already ate a bit. And I’ll eat on the way.”
“You’re pissed at me,” he said. This time, it wasn’t a question.
“I don’t know,” I said, my agitation with both him and myself growing. “You should’ve said something, Ash.”
“Why? You wouldn’t have let him play?”
“I don’t know. But it’s not your call.”
“No. It was Liv’s call. But if it was up to me, I’d let him play.”
“Ash—”
“He’s Seth Brothers,” he said, as if I didn’t know.
I turned away.
I didn’t expect him to understand. I didn’t expect anyone to understand, really.
No one else was there when Brody alluded to what happened between Seth and Jessa. Just the band, Jude and Maggie. We’d never said, publicly, why Seth was dismissed from the band—again.
The truth was, we didn’t really know. Brody and Jesse had more or less decided it was so, and no one else really wanted to argue with Brody or Jesse when it came to Jessa. Dylan didn’t have that kind of fight in him, and at the time, I didn’t have it in me to challenge Jesse. I could barely be in a room with him if we weren’t playing music. Whenever the music stopped, I was gone. I’d only recently begun to hang around for any more than that, and mostly because of my contractual obligation to the documentary series.
Zane had tried to argue, at first, but it was clear Jesse wasn’t having it. He wasn’t having Seth in the band anymore. And from the look on Brody’s face when he’d attacked Seth at the church, Seth had been lucky he’d only been fired, and not worse.
I really would’ve killed him…
That’s what Brody said as I held him, bleeding, just before he puked and passed out from the concussion he’d gotten, hitting his head on an amp while he and Seth struggled.
So much animosity. Over Jessa.
And I still didn’t understand why.
I’d asked Jessa myself, a few months ago. After the dust had seemed to settle and she and Brody were all blissed out on being in love, I’d asked her point blank if she’d asked Brody and Jesse to kick Seth out of the band—and she said no. She told me, actually, that she felt bad Seth had cleared out without any kind of fight.
Which made two of us.
And I knew for a fact, as of today, that Zane would agree.
So why were Brody and Jesse still dead set against Seth, as if they were protecting her from him?
“Hey.” Ash slipped his hands around my waist
and pressed up against my backside. “I’m sorry. Maybe whatever’s going on between you guys and Seth is worse than I thought. I guess when I saw him backstage, I just got excited. Like if he had the balls to show up here he must really want back with the band, and maybe you guys would want to see that. I don’t know.” He kissed my neck and I pulled away without even thinking about it. I turned to him.
“Ash… I really can’t talk about this right now.”
It was true, but mostly I just couldn’t talk about this with him. It was Dirty stuff, and Ash wasn’t part of Dirty.
Thanks to me, he never would be, and that just made me feel shitty. Because if anyone had told me, back before I got naked with him, that Ash was willing to leave the Pushers for Dirty, I might’ve been thrilled.
“Can you just give me some space on this?” I asked him. I could barely look at him, much less take his kisses like I deserved them right now. Not only did I feel shitty about—quite literally—screwing him out of a chance to join Dirty, I felt even shittier about what just happened with Seth. Ash was right. If he had the balls to show up here he must really want back with the band.
And why would he do that if he felt the least bit guilty about whatever happened between him and Jessa in the past?
“Sure.” Ash said. “Of course.” He was still hovering, though. “You want me to wait for you outside?”
“No, thanks. I don’t know how long I’ll be. I need to talk to the guys.”
And with that, Ash went silent. It was a dark, cold silence.
Then: “Jesse already left. With Katie.”
And there it was.
Ash was always here to remind me, in any way possible, that Jesse was with his wife. As if he was making sure I wasn’t going to do anything stupid—like fall for Jesse again.
“Ash… I just need some time, okay?”
He nodded, grudgingly. He took a step toward me, but it was hesitant. He kept staring at me like he was waiting for me to say something else, but I didn’t.
Then he leaned in and kissed me softly on the lips. “Call me when you land? So I know you’re okay.”
“Sure.”
I watched him leave, then exhaled. When did we get here? Ash, worrying about me? Wanting me to call him when I got wherever I was going and check in?
Dirty Like Seth_A Dirty Rockstar Romance Page 5
