Broken Records

by Cassie Mae

  We dodge in and out of the crowd and wind our way to a raised section of floor. We take the two steps up and follow Donny to the end table with a perfect view of the stage. There aren’t many tables, and I guarantee for anyone else they’d have to buy a five-hundred-dollar bottle to even step foot up here. It’s a luxury I can’t afford, but one that never bothers me.

  I don’t mind being on the floor with the rest of the music lovers. Bobbing our heads and swaying our hips in beat with the music. There is something about being surrounded by others who are losing themselves as much as you are. It is a truly euphoric experience.

  Donny waves over a blonde woman in a short black dress. “These are special guests. Please give them anything they would like,” he explains, then turns to us. “This is Elizabeth. She will be serving you tonight.”

  “Hi,” Jimmy says, and she drops a couple of napkins on the table.

  “What’s your poison?” she asks.

  “Start with a bottle of champagne. On the house,” Donny says and then disappears into the crowd. Elizabeth follows after him, weaving in and out of the dancers like a pro.

  “Champagne. On the house.” Jimmy puts his fist to his mouth as he lets out a huge laugh. “A boy could get used to this.”

  “Then don’t get used to it. This is a one-time deal, buddy.”

  “Well, maybe you should schmooze Mr. Boss Man and see if you can make it happen again.”

  “No.”

  “It’s just a suggestion.”

  “Not a very good one.”

  He’s making my mind sink back to those inappropriate thoughts—to think of Ethan in a way that is completely prohibited. He’s my boss—my insanely gorgeous boss—and everything I’m trying to get away from. Seeing Kevin and him in the same office, in nearly the same suit, was just like looking at a pair of twins—one more arrogant than the next. I’m done with over-privileged douchebags who think they’re owed the world simply because they’re in it.

  “Someone’s a little testy today.” Jimmy crosses his arms over his chest. He gives me that wide-eyed look that I swear opens any mental walls I’ve put up.

  My shoulders slump, knowing there is no use in trying to hide it. Might as well get it over with so I can enjoy myself. “I bumped into my ex today.”

  “Hold up.” Jimmy raises his hand at me. “The asshole you left back in New York?”

  “That would be the one.” I didn’t give Jimmy much detail about what had happened, but he knew enough to know that running into Kevin was my own personal nightmare.

  “Oh girl, you need more than champagne. We need to get you a shot or three.”

  “As much as I would love to drown myself in tequila, I have a job to do tonight. It’s my first real assignment. I don’t want to mess it up.”

  “A little alcohol never hurt anyone. Besides it’ll help enhance the music.”

  “Maybe after,” I say, remembering how earlier I was all ready to order as many martini’s as I could despite my empty wallet. That’s what credit cards were for anyway. But the only way to pay that credit card bill is to keep this internship. It doesn’t pay much, but it pays something.

  Besides, Ethan might not have handpicked me to come and listen to this band, but either way I’m the one he gave the tickets to, so he has to trust my opinion at least a little. We might have got off on the wrong foot in the beginning, and he might think that I don’t take my job seriously, but it’s time I prove him wrong. Time to show him and everyone else at that company that I am serious and I mean business.

  Elizabeth returns and places two champagne flutes on the table. She carefully removes the decorative foil from the top of the bottle before popping the cork and pouring a generous amount in each glass.

  “Enjoy,” she says and pushes the bottle back into the bucket of ice.

  I hold my glass up to Jimmy and smile. “To the music.”

  He clinks my glass with his. “To the music.”

  A few minutes later the lights in the club dim, and the band takes the stage. It’s always my favorite part of any show—that moment when I know the music’s coming, but I’m not exactly sure when. The anticipation zings through my whole body, causing me to inch to the edge of my seat. I close my eyes and listen as the band gets into position on the stage. Listen to the drummer count off on his sticks and then the explosion.

  There it is.

  The first note snakes out and wraps around me, pulling me into the world they created through their music. Everything around me ceases to exist. It’s just me… and the music.

  There’s something so precious in these moments as the buildup grabs its hold, and the first note has the potential to change your life forever.

  I pride myself on the ability to know when someone has what it takes to bring it to the next level. This band? They have it. I could tell from the very first note that is still warmly wrapped around me.

  It breaks my heart that I’m the one here and Ethan isn’t. I can’t make any decisions for this band’s future. As of right now, I’m a little intern, a peasant on the totem pole of the industry.

  The only thing I can do is go to Ethan and convince him that this band can be the next big thing.

  “Twenty bucks on you picking her up,” Grant says, nodding across the room to a table full of women, presumably out for a celebratory drink by the constant “woots!” we’ve heard from that direction. I try to zero in on which woman he’s referring to, but a few shots of Jameson have made my eyesight unreliable.

  “The blonde?” I ask. I’m sure there is more than one blonde over there, though.

  Grant snorts around his beer, his gut jiggling under our table. “Any of them over there would do.”

  I shake my head and let out a drunken laugh. He’s not that bad a guy, if I’m honest, but alcohol may have clouded my judgment. I don’t give half a shit right now. I set my drink down and push my chair out.

  “Double if I get one of ‘em upstairs in less than ten,” I challenge. He takes another long pull of his beer around a drunken grin.

  “Hell, I’ll give you triple if you get more than one.” His graying hair swings down in front of his face, his oil and grease losing effect after a long day and a hard night of drinking.

  My mouth turns up in a lazy smile, and I fix my wobbly walk into a suave swagger. My mind is hazy, practically blank, which is exactly what I want. Today was supposedly a good day, but I don’t think I actually felt that way until I got a bit of alcohol in me.

  I make it to the table, four sets of intrigued eyes glancing in my direction. Even in my stupor I notice how easy it’s going to be finagling one of them to join me for some VIP room festivities.

  “Ladies,” I say, spreading my arms wide. I’m rewarded with four fantastic smiles. My drunken mind decides to imagine any of them around my extremely deprived dick—only there is a glitch somewhere up there, and suddenly I’m imagining one of them with a lip ring and long red hair.

  I blink against the image and try my best to focus on the task at hand. “I’ve had one hell of a day, and I am in the mood to celebrate. Any takers?”

  I’m met with a round of giggles and lovely blushes. The one nearest me practically leaps from her seat, much to the dismay of her three compadres. Her teeth slide out over a full bottom lip, pulling me into a further intoxicated trance. It feels like an eternity since I’ve fallen victim to a good time, when it’s only been a mere seven weeks. With her soft curves hugged by a black and pink airtight dress, the girl fits the bill.

  “You’re Ethan Davis,” she says in a seductive, knowing lilt. It seems my reputation precedes me once again, but at least this time it plays in my favor.

  I take her hand and spin her around until she’s fallen flush against my side. A playful giggle flutters from her lush lips, and I give a nod to her companions. “I’m stealing this one for the night,” I tell them, and I’d offer up another invitation if I was completely sure it would work, but since I never can tell who would be into that a
nd who wouldn’t, I don’t risk it. “But enjoy the next round on me.”

  The cacophony of squeals that follow hurts my head, but it otherwise feels good to spoil women with my money. Lately it’s only been used to spoil my dog. No wonder he’s so pudgy.

  I steer my distraction of choice over to the bar to order up her friends’ drinks. She leans back against the bar top, resting her elbows up on the lacquered wood. Her head moves in a playful tilt, and her done-up eyes flutter.

  “How are we celebrating?” she asks as if she already knows the answer.

  “Oh… lots of ways I imagine,” I tease. “I require a name, though.”

  “Any name?” She grins. “Or would you like mine?”

  I take my card back from the bartender, fumbling to get it into my wallet with drunken hands. “I think I like you,” I tell her. It’s not a lie—the witty ones are my drug of choice. Whenever I was out, I’d find the girl who had a brain behind the money and plastic and spend time with her. It’s most likely why I’m finding myself so amused when it comes to Paige.

  I shake the thought from my buzzed mind and watch as the girl slides along the bar to get closer to me.

  “Marcia,” she says, and then her smile widens, revealing a straight, sparkling white set of teeth. “You know… my son’s name is Ethan.”

  My hand stops halfway to my back pocket, her words somewhat sobering me enough to come to some sense. She brings her manicured nails to her lips to cover a laugh.

  “I’m messing with you.”

  My shoulders relax, and I let the enjoyable buzz invade my mind again. “Yeah,” I tell her with a half grin, “I like you.”

  We take our mutual like for each other upstairs, and I catch Grant’s eye on the way up and salute him with a laugh. He won’t be seeing me until tomorrow; he can bet on that, too.

  The bouncer at one of the VIP rooms nods us in when I flash him my business card—and a fifty—then I slap him on the back like we’re old friends and say with much exuberance, “Speakers off. We’ll make our own music.”

  Marcia’s soft, warm, womanly body shakes against my black t-shirt as she chuckles—I shed the monkey suit back at my place before meeting Grant and a few of his buds at the club—and the sensation runs straight to my head. Both of them.

  The backroom lights dance in my vision, blurring the room, but this isn’t my first time here, and I remember what it’s supposed to look like. A mirror ball hangs overhead, the beat of strong bass thumping through the room until it’s silenced by my request. I slump into one of the black velvet half circle seats, leaning into the high back and gesturing Marcia over with a wave.

  Reflected light from the mirror ball cascades over her wicked eyes, giving them a more seductive glow. Instead of sitting next to me, she hikes her skin-tight dress up to her hips and comes down on me in an achingly slow straddle.

  “Easy there,” I say, my voice laden with sexual frustration. Casual flings weren’t the only things I’d gone cold turkey in—drinking, partying, screwing around… yeah, all of it has been non-existent in the last month. When I fall off the wagon, I fall hard.

  My hands smooth up her exposed thighs, gripping her soft skin, reveling in the feel of a woman’s pliant body. My senses are on a delay, registering her scent and her touch and pretty soon her taste, but unable to truly appreciate them. It’s a shame I need ten shots in my system to relax enough to enjoy the company. Before my father’s death, it didn’t require any mind-numbing juice, even though I often used it anyway.

  Marcia tilts her eyebrow, dropping her gaze to my lips. One of my hands begrudgingly moves from her luscious thigh to the nape of her neck, bringing her closer. I taste her breath—the sweet tang of margarita lingering between us, surprising me; for some strange reason, I was hoping for the taste of peppermint.

  I let my tongue seek for satisfaction first, raking over her bottom lip. A field of goosebumps rises under the hand remaining on her thigh, and our slow spill into celebration transforms instantly to a frantic need to be pleasured.

  Her hands are practiced, her body fluent in the language of lust. My drunken state has a hard time keeping up with her pace, but her reactions to my touch, my kiss, tell me I’m giving her as much, if not more, satisfaction. My urgency to get her even closer has me running a hand over her hip, fingers grasping her soft and plush ass. I shove her hard against my neglected body. A blissful cry slips from her mouth, and her hips gyrate without any direction from me.

  My brain’s disappearing even more than it already had, and my eyes roll into the back of my head, images flipping in my mind that match the sensations running through my body. Only, flashes of red hair enter in, a slender, luscious-looking neck, a glint of a lip ring, and a tongue that is as wickedly talented in kissing as it is in speaking.

  Heavenly expletives roll off my tongue in harsh, relentless tones, urging her onward. My brain pictures someone else completely, and if it was functioning, it would know what a dick move that is, but at the moment, I don’t give a shit. My fingers dig into the bunched material at her hips, and I imagine a wholly different outfit than the one I’m actually touching.

  “Ethan,” she breathes between my commands, and my dick grows with need, pulsing as I picture a different set of lips that let my name tumble off them so seductively. “I need… I need…”

  Her hand finds one of mine, lacing our fingers together as she guides me to her full tits. I shove the material down, unlocking our lips and opting for a more sensitive exploration of her body, only opening my eyes for a split second to see what I’m doing before I slam them shut and see another body under my hands.

  The end of her slicked-back ponytail tickles my knuckles as she tips her head back in euphoric pleasure, exposing that neck that I just can’t get out of my damn mind. Her tempo has quickened, and I ride along with her until she slinks into my lap, resting her head on my shoulder, the margarita scent jolting me back with a gut-wrenching jerk.

  “I need more,” she says, warm breath soaking into my shirt. Her fingers lazily make their way to my belt.

  I sweep her ponytail over her shoulder, tugging on it to get her to gaze up at me. I need a minute… need time to process what my mind just did, and contemplate where I’m drawing my morality line. Sleeping with a stranger, not unusual for me. Picturing someone else? Completely foreign.

  “Not here,” I tell her.

  “Then where?”

  “You got a place nearby?”

  She nods, but there is a disappointment that flashes across her expression. I don’t even have to wonder—I know she expected a nightcap at the rich boy’s mansion. If I was my previous self, there’d be a good chance that expectation would’ve become reality. But I am tired of that space. I’m tired of the suits in the closet, the empty bedrooms, the dusty piano in the sitting room… Paige would most definitely creep back into my head. I need a space that is just Mabel’s… Margaret… shit, what was her name, again?

  “My roommates might show up,” she says, dragging the excuse out in case I offer up an alternative. When I don’t, her shoulders slump, and she continues, “But we… have a system for ‘celebratory’ nights.”

  “You’ve sold me.”

  She sighs, but ends it with a smile and slides from my lap. I help her fix her dress while she attempts to unruffle my hair, but I’m going to bet that’s a lost cause.

  We order a few more drinks—I’m feeling the need to buzz back up, and I’m glad we do because one of her roommates comes up and says her name before telling Marcia—it’s Marcia—that they’re heading to another location before going back. Good. Plenty of time to be alone, then.

  Marcia points out some half-harried directions to her apartment building, walking distance for sure, but with both of us wobbly on our feet, we call a cab anyway. I’m privy to a car service, and man, did I make use of it. Poor Reg has been witness to more backseat shenanigans than he’s bargained for. I figure I’ll give him a break tonight, not to mention he’d most likel
y give me a hard time for reverting back to my old habits.

  Marcia giggle-snorts as she trips her way out of the cab. I laugh with her, tossing an arm around her shoulder. We have to climb an endless staircase to get to her apartment, and we’re stupidly laughing and groping each other the entire way up. She shushes me as she slips the key into her front door, and I take that as an invitation to keep both of our mouths quiet.

  We stumble into a softly lit room, drunken laughter floating between us. The door shuts with a jolting slam, jerking me away from her lips enough to notice another person in the room.

  “Oh God,” the girl says, her voice sounding faintly familiar. “Can any of you keep it in your pants for more than a week?”

  My eyes lift as I pull away from Marcia, only to land on the glint of a lip ring that I’ve been imagining all night long. Paige’s annoyed expression turns into one of confusion as I watch her mind try to place who I am. Then it zaps into complete and total shock.

  A sobering shot sinks into my chest, and I subconsciously try to loosen a non-existent necktie. Paige slowly reaches for her earbuds, tugging on the wires until they pop from her ears. I know exactly what she’s thinking—I passed off work to her so I could get laid. Explanations weave their way into my mind before I realize I don’t owe her any sort of excuse. She should be grateful for the opportunity I handed to her, and I… can sleep with whomever I please.

  Well, I can’t sleep with the girl I’ve been thinking about, but I shove that thought away before it gets the better of me.

  Marcia grabs hold of my belt loop, dragging me down a long, narrow hallway. “Keep those headphones on, hun!” she calls back to Paige. “I can’t promise we’ll be quiet.”

  ***

  I can feel Marcia’s body growing lazy underneath me, her kisses lacking their previous zeal. At first I thought it was me, the knowledge of Paige just down the hall putting a thick wedge in my performance. I can’t keep my thoughts from running out there with her, my traitorous imagination seeing her wickedly beautiful smile instead of Marcia’s lips underneath me.