Black Lilith: Book One (Black Lilith #1)

by Hazel Jacobs

  Dash beams. Slate and Tommy start booing. Logan just crosses his arms and watches the whole scene with his lips quirked up in the faintest of smiles.

  “I don’t understand why you’re even bothering with this… it sounds completely beneath you.”

  “It’s good money, Mama,” Mikayla says, trying to keep the sigh out of her voice as she shoves her passport into her purse and double-checks the suitcase which lays open on her bed.

  She’s only taking a couple of suits—her research had reassured her that there would be plenty of dry-cleaners on the tour. For the plane, she’s chosen to wear comfortable slacks and a blazer with her hair tied back in a loose ponytail so that she wouldn’t need to worry about it.

  “Good money,” her mother’s voice scoffs from her phone speakers. She grabs the phone and slips it down the front of her blouse and into her bra so that she can speak into the microphone and keep her hands free. “You’d be making better money if you actually got a job in events. What’s the point of getting a degree if you’re not going to pursue what you studied?”

  “I tried Mama, you know that—”

  “Obviously not hard enough,” her mother replies dismissively.

  Mikayla can picture her mother sitting on the patio of their family home in Vermont, sipping tea and smoking a cigarette, her hair styled in flawless curls and her eyes crusted with makeup as she stares out at the estate her second husband had bought for her. She’d probably be wearing white, Mikayla thinks. Her mother loves white, it’s the color of someone who never needs to worry about soiling their clothes.

  Her father had never worn white. He’d preferred dark blues. They kept their color longer.

  Mikayla zips up her luggage, grateful to note that there’s a little wiggle room—she wants to buy some souvenirs when she gets to London.

  “When I was at college the brightest students always walked right out of school and into jobs. If you can’t find work, then you’ve no one to blame but yourself—”

  Mikayla triple-checks everything, opening her travel wallet to make sure that her ticket is in there. She’d offered to carry the band’s tickets as well as her own, but Logan had vetoed it, insisting that he’d be responsible for the band’s travel documents. He’d been very cagey with her yesterday when she’d asked for access to the band’s accounts so that she could make sure all the bills were paid for at each venue. As a matter of fact, he’d almost leaped down her throat.

  Mikayla had been surprised, to say the least. Events managers always had discretionary access to funds, and she’d assumed that being a personal assistant would be no different. But Black Lilith must have its own way of doing things. Logan had sworn that he’d see all of the band’s bills were paid, and she would have to trust him.

  She’d discretely check with the hotels when they checked out.

  “Mikayla? Are you listening to me?”

  “Of course,” she replies smoothly. “I’m lazy, and I should try harder.”

  Mikayla wants to say—your generation left the economy in shambles, and now you’re blaming my generation because we have to adjust our lives and expectations to allow for that. But Mikayla’s mother can hold a grudge for decades if necessary, and she doesn’t feel like hearing a lecture every Thanksgiving for the rest of her life.

  “I just wish that you’d live up to your potential,” her mother said.

  “So do I,” Mikayla mutters with startling sincerity. “Listen, I’ve got to catch a cab. I’ll call you soon, okay?”

  “Don’t let that rock band take advantage of you,” her mother warns. “You hear horror stories—”

  “Bye, love you!”

  Mikayla hangs up before her mother can build up enough steam for a good rant. She’s a little bit disturbed that the rant began with the same words she’d used with Logan over a week ago, and makes the decision not to think too hard about it. She has a plane to catch.

  The band is, miraculously, waiting for her at the terminal. Dash looks hungover, but everyone else is wide-eyed and eager. Their instruments are checked in, and everyone gets ready to board. The roadies and techs are already in LA, according to Logan.

  “Everyone have their tickets?” she asks.

  “Yes, Mom,” Dash replies with a sneer.

  Logan’s hand whips out and smacks the back of Dash’s head, causing the younger man to stumble a bit.

  “Don’t take that tone with her,” he snaps.

  Dash groans and rubs his head. “Sorry, sorry.”

  “Don’t apologize to me.”

  “Sorry, Mik,” Dash says, looking genuinely apologetic as he casts his bloodshot eyes up at her.

  “It’s okay,” she replies without a second thought.

  She hadn’t taken it personally. Dash clearly isn’t in the mood to get on a plane, and she’s not so thin-skinned that she’d let a comment like that bother her. But she is surprised at how quick Logan was to defend her. Surprised and just a little bit pleased, though she did feel bad that Dash’s headache had probably just gotten worse.

  “I’ve got some aspirin in my purse?” she offers.

  Dash gives her a soft smile, but he shakes his head. “I’ve already had half a bottle.”

  “I hope that’s an exaggeration,” she says. “I don’t want to deal with an OD this early in the trip.”

  “Don’t worry, Mik,” Tommy says, coming to stand at her side and giving her a serene smile. “We in Black Lilith have a very strict ‘No OD’ policy.”

  “Excellent.”

  They board the plane. The band has first class seats, but Mikayla’s ticket is a last-minute economy seat. Clearly, Bass Note wasn’t willing to shell out big money on someone who’d only been working with them for a week. She doesn’t mind, she’s flown coach her whole life. But the band looks annoyed.

  “Hold on,” Slate says, eyeing one of the pretty young flight attendants with intent. “I’ll get you a seat.”

  “You don’t have to—”

  But he’s already gone, sidling up close to the flight attendant and laying the charm on thick. Mikayla is almost fascinated as she watches him work—smiling shyly, dipping his head, looking up at the flight attendant through his eyelashes, and stepping close under the pretense of wanting privacy. In moments, the flight attendant is looking flustered and pleased as she nods along, encouraging him in his behavior.

  “I’d feel bad about the way he does that,” Tommy mutters behind Mikayla. “Except the girls never seem upset. After, I mean. When he sends them home. He’s a player, but it’s all above-board. It’s frustrating.”

  “He should go into politics,” she replies. “He’d have the whole world eating out of the palm of his hand.”

  “Thank goodness for music, then,” says Tommy. “He’s too distracted banging drums and groupies to realize the power he holds.”

  Dash is steadily turning green behind them. Mikayla hopes that Slate uses his powers to make sure that Dash has all the sick bags he wants.

  Slate returns with the flight attendant in toe, and Mikayla is duly upgraded to first class. She watches as Slate brushes his fingers across the back of the flight attendant’s hand, bringing it up to his lips for a chaste kiss and looking at her with a promise. The girl looks delighted.

  The seat she is given is right next to Logan’s. The singer immediately takes out his iPod, so she takes out her laptop. This plane has Wi-Fi, after all. She’d be a fool if she didn’t take this opportunity to send a few emails to the venue and make sure that everything will be ready for their arrival at LAX. Across the aisle, Dash clutches his armrests as the plane takes off, then pulls down his tray table the moment they hit cruising altitude and lays his head down on it. Mikayla reaches over and rubs his back soothingly. He mutters his thanks and relaxes against the table.

  “Don’t coddle him,” Logan says from beside her. “It serves him right for getting fucked up the night before a flight.”

  “I’ll remind you of that the next time you’re hungover,”
Mikayla replies. She keeps rubbing the younger Todd’s back in slow circles. “When you’re begging for a backrub while you try not to vomit everywhere.”

  “I don’t beg for backrubs.”

  “You’d beg for mine.” And as soon as she says it, her cheeks heat up. “That sounded more innocent in my head.”

  “Sure,” Logan says. There’s a slight smirk on his lips. “That sounds unlikely but sure.”

  She shoves him. Their seats are close enough together that she can reach him easily, but far enough apart that they could have easily ignored each other for the entire journey.

  It’s a good sign that he spoke to her, right?

  “Assaulting the band?” Logan asks, rubbing his arm in mock outrage and giving her a grin. “Not a great start to your tenure, Mikayla Strong.”

  “Not a single member of the band would blame me, Logan Todd,” she replies.

  He snorts at her. Across the aisle, Dash lets out a soft snore and she lets her hand drop.

  “That was fast,” she says.

  “You’re not the first woman to say that to him,” Logan says.

  Mikayla lets out a bark of laughter and quickly covers her mouth, glancing at the sleeping man to make sure that she didn’t wake him. He doesn’t stir. On Dash’s other side, she can see Tommy with his head bent over a notebook, tapping his foot to a silent beat and pausing every now and then to write something down, oblivious to the world around him. Pressed up against the window on the other side of the cabin, Slate is entertaining the flight attendant, who leans her hip against his seat.

  When Mikayla turns back to Logan, she can see his eyes light up with quiet amusement. Then something flickers in his eyes and he sobers up.

  “Listen,” he says, leaning over so that his fringe falls in his eyes and she can smell his minty breath. “I wanted to apologize for thinking you were a groupie.”

  “Oh,” she says. Not terribly eloquent, but the apology had come out of nowhere and she hadn’t been prepared for it. She’s close enough to count the tiny freckles on the bridge of his nose. “That’s okay, really… I’m over it.”

  “It wasn’t right,” says Logan. “Probably just wishful thinking on my part.”

  And Mikayla had to stop herself from doing a double-take. Did that mean what she thought it meant?

  But Logan sighed and kept talking, “Anyway, the four of us agreed that we wouldn’t date the PAs. So I was out of line when I hit on you.”

  “You guys have a lot of rules,” she says, grateful to hear that her voice is strong even if her heart is racing. She realizes that there are little flecks of gold in his brown eyes, bursting from the pupil like fireworks. “I’ve noticed.”

  “When you’re together for as long as we’ve been, you learn how to keep the peace,” he replies. His eyelashes are almost light-blond. How did she not notice that before? “I know I’ve been kind of an asshole to you… I just wanted you to know that there was a reason for it. I’ll try to be better.”

  Mikayla squirms in her seat, aware of the effect his gaze is having on her, and desperately wishing that her mind and her body would accept that Logan’s off-limits. But she’d never thought that she would be off-limits to him. It was gratifying to see that he seemed at least a little bit regretful about it.

  She reminds herself—for what must be the thousandth time—that her body’s response to him is purely physical. He’s handsome and sexy, with gorgeous tattoos and cheekbones that could cut someone, and lips that look like they were made for kissing. She’d have to be blind not to find him attractive. But she doesn’t have to act on that attraction, and that’s the crucial point.

  “Well, thanks for clearing that up for me,” she says.

  He nods and sticks his headphones back in his ears, leaving Mikayla to reflect in silence.

  Dash wakes up halfway to LA to throw up. Slate sneaks away with the flight attendant and returns to his seat looking smug. Tommy fills an entire notebook with scribbles, and Logan and Mikayla sit in near-comfortable silence until the plane descends through the clouds and lands in LAX.

  “I’ve arranged for a ride to the Getty,” Mikayla explains as the aircraft taxis into the terminal. She slides her laptop into her purse and stretches her shoulders. “Unless there’s anything you guys want to do before we go to the venue?”

  “We usually stop for ice-cream on the way,” Logan replies. His eyes linger on her as she stretches, and she pretends that she doesn’t notice.

  “You’re kidding?” she replies.

  He shrugs. “It’s tradition. Remember… we started this band in high school.”

  Mikayla shakes her head. “I don’t think Dash will want ice-cream.”

  “Ice-cream?” Dash states next to her, his blurry eyes perking up. There’s an unused sick bag resting in his lap and a sheen of sweat on his forehead.

  She reaches over and brushes the back of her hand against his forehead, feeling the slightly feverish heat and frowning. “Aren’t you a little sick for ice-cream?”

  Both Logan and Dash answer at the same time, “You’re never too sick for ice-cream.”

  “He’ll be fine once we’re on the ground,” Logan says, leaning over to whisper into Mikayla’s ear. She has to suppress the shiver that runs through her when his breath brushes against the sensitive skin on her neck. “He bounces back quickly. It’s just because we had to fly this morning.”

  “Right,” she says.

  She tries to move away without looking as though she’s moving away, and then she realizes how ridiculous she’s being. If Logan has apologized for hitting on her, then didn’t that mean he wants their relationship to be professional? Maybe even friendly, like her relationship with the other band members? So she stays put, patting Dash on the cheek and saying, “If he throws up in the car you’re cleaning it up.”

  “Wouldn’t be the first time,” Logan replies, sitting back in his chair and throwing a smug look at his brother, who sticks his tongue out in retaliation.

  It amazes her how these men could be talking about drugs and groupies one moment, and sticking their tongues out at each other the next. Each one of the band members was a curious mix of wayward child and rebellious teenager. She wonders where they all live, who pays their bills, and who shops for groceries. Her instincts tell her that it must be Logan—the older brother and leader of the band—but she has seen him tackle his brother to keep the younger man from embarrassing him. Maybe they live in a permanent state of adolescence, and their parents are the ones who pay their bills. But neither of the Todd boys had mentioned a mother or father.

  She realizes that she doesn’t know anything about these men, beyond what they’ve told her in passing. She’s going to be working closely with them for months, but she doesn’t even know if ‘Slate’ is the drummer’s real name. She decides that she’ll need to ask those fundamental questions soon, or risk leaving it too long and making things awkward when she finally needs the information.

  The plane eventually comes into the terminal, and they’re let out. Tommy is smiling pleasantly, clutching his notebook to his chest, and Slate winks at the flight attendant as they disembark.

  “Mile High Club’s technically illegal,” Dash mutters to Slate as he wobbles out of the plane and down to the tarmac.

  “That’s how you know it’s worth it,” Slate replies with a shrug. “Would’ve gotten you a friend if I thought you’d keep your barf down long enough to show her a good time. Third time’s the charm!”

  Dash punches him in the arm, and Mikayla raises her eyebrows at Logan.

  “Do I want to know?” she asks.

  “Probably not,” Logan answers with a grin. “It’s a good story, but it’s also kind of gross.”

  “I’ll pass,” she says. Then she raises her voice so that the rest of the band can hear her. “Who wants ice-cream?”

  They all cheer. She feels kind of like Miss Clavel with her orphans as she shepherds the band into the waiting car and through the LA streets to th
e nearest ice-cream parlor. Once they’re all happily eating their cones—Mikayla doesn’t get one—they’re back on the road and heading to The Getty.

  She has never been to LA. She’s always wanted to. For event management majors, LA is ground zero, but she could never afford to visit. For the first few years of college, she had sent every spare coin to her father in Wyoming, and then later she’d poured all of her extra money into her student loans and her unpaid internship. She still had a crippling debt, but with this new job she hoped to put a dent in it.

  As they drove along the freeway, pausing every few minutes to wait for the traffic ahead of them to ease through, Mikayla stared around at the palm trees and sunlit paths and wondered what it would be like to live here. Probably noisy as hell, she thinks as a massive semi-trailer screams past them, honking its horn.

  “Looking for the Hollywood sign?” Logan asks, leaning into her.

  They’re squashed together in the back seat, and she can feel every inch of his side pressed against hers. She can feel lean muscle, and her forearm is brushing against his tattoos. His chocolate ice-cream is half-finished and starting to melt in its cone. Dash is on Logan’s other side, while Tommy and Slate are sharing the bench which leans up against the driver’s seat.

  “Do you think we’ll see it?” she asks.

  “Maybe from a distance,” Logan replies. He licks around the ice-cream cone, and she can’t help but watch the pink tongue’s progress. “It’s a shame we won’t have time for sightseeing.”

  “We’re not on vacation,” Mikayla reminds him.

  Slate snorts from the seat in front of them. She hadn’t realized that they were speaking loud enough for the rest of the band to hear them.

  “You’re going to be one of those strict, time-keepy PAs, aren’t you?” he asks. He’s got a smudge of boysenberry on his chin. Tommy rolls his eyes and offers Slate his napkin.

  “Time-keepy?” Mikayla questions.

  “Time-keepy,” Slate agrees, nodding sagely.

  “You’re the one who hired me,” she tells him. “And what, exactly, is a PA supposed to do if not keep time and make sure you’re all where you need to be?”