Amber
After a while, since I was hanging out by the bar anyway, I tried to make myself useful by helping Katie make drinks. I was so totally uncomfortable without my camera as a buffer. That’s all it was. I did not know how to relate to any of these people without a lens between us. I did not know what to say, what to do with my hands… or how not to stare at them all.
Usually, my camera gave me permission to stare. Now, I just felt exposed and gawky.
Weirdly, I’d never felt this way around the famous or the beautiful before I’d gotten my heart smashed by Johnny O’Reilly. But the number he’d done on my somewhat-innocent self had changed that. I now doubted myself, questioned myself, and occasionally just plain felt like a freak in the company of people such as these ones. People who appeared to have their shit all together.
Ridiculous. I knew that.
But I still hadn’t been able to totally shake it off. The consequences of that breakup were, unfortunately, far-reaching.
So I just tried to focus on something other than my socially-awkward self.
I quickly discovered, from chatting a little with Katie and Maggie, that Katie was married to Dirty’s lead guitarist. Yet she seemed so… well, normal.
“Should I be here?” I asked her as she poured up a few bourbons for her husband and some other guys, and I popped open some beers for the biker-looking dudes in the corner. “Please, you can tell me. If it’s weird, I can just leave.”
She threw me a curious glance. “What do you mean? You’re the new girl, right?” She gave me a smile and Maggie handed me another cocktail.
“Don’t worry, we’ve got you,” Maggie said. “Just have some fun.”
I sipped gratefully. It was a paralyzer, and the Coke-and-cream mixture probably wasn’t gonna sit too well with the melontinis, but oh well. It was fucking delicious. “Um. What new girl?”
“You know… Dylan’s… and Ash’s…” Katie blushed as she trailed off.
Dylan’s and Ash’s what? I wondered.
“Ashley is an asshole,” I said bluntly. “Sorry if he’s your friend, but he’s definitely not mine.” Oops. Filter.
Katie and Maggie exchanged a look. Amused, maybe?
“Oh.” Katie didn’t seem to know what else to say to that.
“I’m just gonna run these drinks out,” Maggie announced, departing with a full tray.
Damn. Had I just put my giant foot in my mouth again?
I tried to change the subject, asking Katie what else we could make. It was an open bar with no real bartender; Katie and Maggie had said they were just making drinks because they felt like it. Anyone was welcome to come up and pour. But we kept passing the drinks out, at the ready. Katie seemed to know what everyone liked.
I helped her whip up a blender full of margaritas, garnishing them with strawberries and lime slices. I was pretty good at this assistant bartender gig. Especially when I kept sipping my own drink all along the way.
“I hate margaritas,” Katie informed me as the smell hit her. “Tequila.” She made a barfing gesture. “But Ash and Summer like them, so…”
“Summer?”
“Babe over there, on the music.”
I looked where she pointed. The DJ. The one Ashley was now talking to. He was standing in her booth with her.
“Elle likes them too, so we’ll make some virgin ones…”
“What?” I was distracted, watching as Summer put her hand on Ashley’s bare forearm while they spoke.
He was smiling. It was the first time I’d seen a smile on his face.
Ever.
It totally transformed him, taking him from gorgeous to blindingly-gorgeous.
Jesus.
“Virgin margaritas,” Katie was saying. “Because Elle’s pregnant.”
“Oh.” I helped her make the mocktails, and put out more bottled water in the tub of ice by the bar—apparently Zane didn’t drink, and neither did the on-duty security guys—while I tried to sort out who was who. “I thought Elle was blonde,” I said, looking from the platinum blonde I was pretty damn sure was Dirty’s bassist to the visibly pregnant brunette on the other side of the room. I was really trying to keep up, but my booze buzz and the lingering nerves weren’t helping.
“Elle is blonde. That’s her, there.” She gestured at the platinum blonde.
“Who’s that, then?” I asked, pointing out the woman with the giant baby belly.
“Come on,” Katie said with a smile, drawing me out from behind the bar. “Let me get you oriented. You really need the lay of the land.”
“Okay.” I grabbed my drink and followed her. “How well do you know Con?” I asked her, when I noticed him in the corner with the biker guys, looking over at me.
“Not well,” Katie said, as Con grinned at me. I gave him a little salute.
A salute? Since when did I salute people?
Gawd, how did I get so awkward?
“How about Ashley?” I asked her.
“Hmm. Not well.”
“Dylan?”
“Oh, he’s a real sweetheart.”
Great. Not gonna help my crush.
“How about Zane? Does he always stare like that?”
“Yes. He’s just trying to figure you out,” she explained, pulling me right past Zane and over to the far side of the pool. “My best advice? Ignore him. He’s harmless enough.” She turned to give me a meaningful look. “As long as you don’t stare back.”
“Um… and what if I do?” I asked, staring at him a little. I was fairly inebriated by now, and he was still watching me. He was smirking at me, actually.
“Don’t,” she said, turning me around so I couldn’t see him. “You came with Dylan, so he’s just feeling you out.”
“Oh. Like to see if I’m worthy of hanging with his friend? Like a bro thing?”
“Right…” she said, twisting her lip in her teeth. “Let’s just call it that.”
Okay?
“I know,” Katie said, “believe me. It’s intense when you’re the new girl. I’ve been there.” She drew me over to a dark-haired dude in leather pants. “Hey, Jesse…” When he turned to her, he immediately threaded his fingers through hers and before she could go on, he yanked her to him and laid a thorough, very intimate, very deep kiss on her.
Wow.
When she recovered, Katie said, a little breathless, “Um… this is Amber. Amber, this is my husband, Jesse.”
Katie’s husband grinned at me and extended his hand. I fumbled to take it as his dark eyes and million-megawatt smile blanked out my brain. I hardly had time to shake his hand before Katie turned me toward the guy he was standing with, a big, muscular dude with almost-black hair, sleeve tattoos and the kind of unmistakable alpha presence that had probably made more than one girl swallow her tongue.
Holy shit.
“Amber. Jude,” Katie introduced us. Jude shook my hand but said nothing. “My husband’s best friend,” she explained. “Also, head of security for Dirty.” When we’d drifted past him and out of earshot, she added in a hushed voice, “He’s also a biker. Don’t ask.”
“Ask what?”
“Anything. They don’t like questions about the biker stuff.”
“Oh.”
“That’s Piper,” she said, pointing out another giant biker dude, with blonde hair, sitting with Con. “Jude’s brother. He’s a biker, too. Don’t ask.”
“Okay…”
“You already met Maggie,” she said, as Maggie rejoined us. “Dirty’s amazing assistant manager.” Maggie waved the compliment off, sipping her martini and dropping onto a couch by the pool. “That’s Brody, Dirty’s manager,” Katie said, pointing out a hot brown-haired dude on the other side of the pool, as we settled in next to Maggie. “He’s with Jessa.” She pointed out the extremely pregnant, extremely gorgeous brunette next to him. Like if Victoria’s Secret had a maternity line, she’d be modeling it. “My husband’s sister.”
“Oh. Wow.” Good genes.
“Y
eah. That’s Seth.” She pointed out yet another hot dude with brown hair and a short beard, who stood with his arm around Elle’s waist. “He’s the new rhythm guitarist, who’s really the old rhythm guitarist… long story. He’s with Elle, Dirty’s bassist. She’s my husband’s ex-girlfriend… Also Ash’s ex-girlfriend, more or less. They had a thing earlier this year. But it was kinda on the down-low.”
“Oh. Wait.” I swallowed my mouthful of paralyzer, confused. “I thought Ashley was…”
Katie waited.
Shit, did I have to say it? What if he was in the closet or something?
“You know,” I said, awkwardly, then whispered, “gay.”
Katie grinned a little. “Um… no.”
“But. He has a boyfriend.”
“He does?” Maggie smirked at me over her drink, seemingly amused.
“Dylan?” I ventured.
Katie laughed. “Mmm… Nope.”
I looked from one girl to the other. They were both grinning. “Are you sure?”
“Pretty damn sure,” Katie said.
Maggie waved her hand in the air. “Ash just, you know, dabbles. But Dylan doesn’t dabble that way.”
“Oh. Um. I guess I read that wrong…” How, exactly?
A kiss was a kiss… Wasn’t it?
“No girlfriend, either,” Katie added with a little smirk, eying me. “They’re both single, actually.”
“Oh.”
“There’s really nothing going on between you and them?”
Them?
“Um… no.”
“Oh. Well, I wish there were more single guys here to introduce you to, then. But most of them are taken.” Katie looked around, seeming to come up short. “I mean, there’s Zane… but you really don’t wanna go there.” She looked at me. “Unless… maybe you do…?”
“No,” I said. “Thanks.”
“Smart girl,” Maggie muttered, sipping her drink.
Katie looked over at the security guys. “Or Con…?” she suggested. “He’s single, I think.”
“No, thanks. I’m good.”
“Or Flynn… but he doesn’t talk much. He might be a little too…” Katie glanced at Maggie as if to confer. “Serious?”
“Boring,” Maggie concluded.
“Or Jude,” Katie said, raising an eyebrow and looking me over, speculatively. “But he’s—”
“Oh, God,” I said. “He’d break me in half.”
Katie giggled.
“Really. I’m not in the market.”
“You’re seeing someone?” she asked.
“No. And I’m not really looking to. I’ll be leaving town soon.”
“Oh.” Katie’s shoulders dropped; she looked disappointed. She was still eying me, but it was a friendly perusal. “So… you can tell me to leave it alone if this is rude, but… Haven’t you been staying at Ash’s place?” I was about to ask how she knew that, when she added, “Thin walls,” and rolled her eyes a bit. “No walls, actually. These guys gossip worse than housewives.”
“True story,” Maggie concurred.
“Con let it slip,” Katie explained. “Oddly enough, the security guys have the biggest mouths sometimes. I think it’s because they spend so much time standing around, just waiting for drama. Con is Dylan’s bodyguard, sometimes. He’s a biker, too, if you didn’t notice. That’s Flynn over there. He’s Elle’s bodyguard. He’s not a biker, though he kinda looks like one… And that’s Shady.” She pointed out the beefy dude who’d answered the front door with Zane, the one who was more overweight than built but still looked like he could split my skull with his thumbs. “He’s Zane’s newest bodyguard.”
“He goes through them like chewing gum,” Maggie muttered.
“Wouldn’t know it to look at him,” Katie added, “but Shady’s about the nicest guy you’ll ever meet. He’s a biker too, though, so—”
“Don’t ask?” I finished for her.
“Right.”
“Trust me, though,” Maggie said, “you run into trouble at a party, you go straight to Jude or Shady. Flynn’s solid, too. Con will flirt with you, but if the shit hits the fan, he’ll have your back.”
Katie nodded in agreement. “As for Piper, he doesn’t work with the band and I’d just steer clear of him.”
I glanced at Maggie for her take on this, but she just shrugged.
“You don’t trust him?” I asked.
“I wouldn’t say that,” Katie mused. “He’s kinda like my brother-in-law now. But let’s be honest, the dude is scary.”
Fair enough.
“Don’t get me wrong. I now have Christmas dinner with him, and he’d probably take a bullet for me. Actually, I know he would. It’s all about family loyalty with these guys.”
“True,” Maggie said. “The guys in the band grew up together. And now we’re all a big family. Dysfunctional, sometimes, but there’s a lot of love in this room.”
“I’m one of the newest members, I guess,” Katie said, “and some days I’m still figuring it all out. And you haven’t even met any of the crew guys yet…”
“Jesus,” I said.
“Yeah.” Katie giggled. “This is just Zane’s VIP list. Like the members of the band, and their closest people. But these are all good people, I promise you. Even the ones with the guns.” She said it in a way that I could tell “the guns” made her nervous, but she’d made her peace with it. “At least, if you’re on their good side.”
Yeah. I definitely planned to be…
I glanced at Maggie, who sipped her cocktail and smirked at me, appearing unfazed. Then I looked around, wondering who, exactly, was carrying guns. Like right now, they were carrying guns? Was it legal to carry a concealed weapon here? I’d grown up in Vancouver and I didn’t even know. I’d never really had to think about it before.
I was gonna assume not, though.
I looked at Katie and Maggie. Despite the fact that I maybe didn’t need to know the thing about the guns, I was kinda moved by how nice they were being, telling me all this stuff to help me feel like I fit in. Even after I’d told them I wouldn’t be sticking around long.
“Um, to answer your question,” I offered, “I am staying at Ashley’s place. For a few days. But just because my sister Liv set it up.”
“Oh!” Katie perked up, which was saying a lot. She was already pretty perky. “You’re Liv’s sister?”
“Yeah. Dylan’s hired me to photograph his house.”
“You’re a photographer? That’s amazing. I’m a painter,” she said, like it really was amazing.
I smiled. I really liked this girl. “Really? Can I see your work? What kind of stuff do you paint?”
“She’s ridiculously talented,” Maggie said. “It’s kinda sickening. You should see the paintings she’s done of the band…”
“I’d love to.”
“I’m having an art show next weekend,” Katie blurted, “and I’m so nervous. You have to come. Maybe you could even take photos…?”
“Oh. Sure…”
I didn’t have the heart to tell her that there was a very real possibility I’d be on a plane to Thailand by next weekend. She’d already whipped out her phone to show me some of her work. She was ridiculously talented. And as we sat by the pool looking at her art and sipping cocktails, I got to know Katie a whole lot better.
I also got pretty drunk.
Then Dylan—finally—scooped me up, taking my hand and pulling me over to a few people he wanted me to meet. I got to chat with everyone in his band a bit, though if I hadn’t had so much to drink, I honestly probably wouldn’t have.
Con grinned at me a lot, and at one point, when I was sitting with the biker guys, he put his arm around my shoulders. I let him, for a moment or two, then drifted away. I was still confused about the Are-they-gay-or-are-they-not-gay thing, and if Dylan wasn’t gay, I was also confused about the Is-this-a-date-or-is-it-not thing.
Last thing I wanted to do was kill any possible chance I might have with Dylan Cope bec
ause I let his bodyguard feel me up. Even if Con did smell all yummy, like leather and man-soap.
I also kept wondering if he was carrying a gun, and it was freaking me out a bit.
I lost both Dylan and Katie somehow, even though it wasn’t that crowded.
The music got louder.
A few more people showed up.
The drinks seemed to get stronger, though maybe I was just drinking them faster.
At some point, someone shoved Zane, fully clothed, into the pool. Then a bunch of other people got pushed in, mainly by Zane himself.
I was one of them, though it was Ashley who picked me up and leapt in with me.
When I woke up in the morning with a man’s heavy arm draped over me, my first thought was, Oh, fuuuck, no.
Because the arm had tattoos all over it. A mermaid with white-blonde hair on the muscular forearm, and scripted lettering in a band around the bicep that said: Fuck Bitches.
I must’ve stirred, because a rough, sleepy voice growled from behind me, “Damn… that was good.”
I stiffened.
Ashley chuckled. “Relax, flower child. Nothing happened.”
I knew that.
I remembered.
But all I could think as I lay here spooned against him with his arm over me was, Now he knows I’m hot for him.
I managed to slither, eel-like, out from under his arm while barely touching him. My brain slopped around in my head when I moved, the room spun angrily, and I collapsed back on the pillow with a groan.
Ashley rolled onto his back, away from me, but I could still feel the heat of his body inches from mine.
His naked body.
It was way too fucking bright, but I managed to peek under my half-lidded eyes at the naked expanse of his chest, his chiseled abs, his hips… the tattoos that ran down his side, right under the sheets… and the X-rated glimpse of dark, trimmed pubic hair at the base of his—
“I should get to work before Dylan comes looking for me,” I blurted. The sheet was covering Ashley’s cock, but there was no doubt in my mind he was naked under there. And it wasn’t so much that I was worried Dylan would be upset that I was late to photograph his kitchen. More like I needed to get out of here, get to work and get lost behind my camera—where the world made sense to me.
Dirty Like Dylan_A Dirty Rockstar Romance Page 13
