I didn't want her to go. I wanted to wake up to her every morning. I wanted her watching me on stage. When we were together, we were stronger than I'd ever been alone. But what could I say to that?
"I don't like the idea but if you think that's what you need, then you should do it."
With every nerve in my body screaming to hold her tight and not let her go, I still said that. I had to think of her, not me. That's the only way this would work.
She just nodded.
"We're too intense together. I can't think."
I pulled her to me. At least we'd have tonight. It was too late for her to leave.
"Don't ever think that I don't want you beside me. I need you here. No matter what. I'd fight tigers for you. I'd climb mountains. I'd swim to the bottom of the ocean."
"I don't think those things are any use to me," she said. "I don't want any of those things. I don't want expensive gifts either. I want you to be honest with me. I need that as the basis of our relationship. Without it, we have nothing."
She might be right about that but there was nothing else I could promise. All my money, all my fame, all my good looks, that was what I had to offer.
She hugged me back.
"I don't want you getting into any more trouble."
"Leaving won't change that," I said.
"Promise me," she said. "No matter what, you won't hit anyone else."
"I promise."
I kissed the top of her head. I'd never find another woman like her. Those fiery green eyes would haunt my dreams.
"You'll be fine on the tour without me?" she said.
"If I said no, would you stay?"
She shook her head. "I'd just worry. And tell Frankie to keep an eye on you."
"He'll do that anyway. Unless you want me to send him home with you. I want to make sure you're safe."
Her heart beat against my chest.
"I don't need protecting. You need to understand that. You need to understand a lot of things before we can make this work, and I'm not sure if my words are enough to make you understand."
Her voice seemed to be torn from her. Maybe it was better to let her go than to hurt her by begging her to stay.
Alice
I GOT HOME AND THREW my bag in the corner.
First, I had to sleep. I hadn't had a proper night's sleep in forever. Even though I missed Savage beside me, it felt so comforting to be in my own bed, with my own sheets and my own smell.
I'd only intended sleeping for a few hours but, when I woke up, it was daylight. Morning. I'd slept the whole day and night. After having a shower, I spent a moment reveling in having clothing options, a whole wardrobe of them, before slipping into my familiar jeans and t-shirt. I guess options were wasted on me.
I opened a window to air my apartment out, then I went through the fridge to see what food I had. Not much but there were a few frozen meals. That would do me until I could get some groceries. I wouldn't starve to death. I put one in the microwave and made a coffee.
I fired up my laptop and found that folder I'd hidden away. Like Frankie had suggested, I'd taken photos of my injuries after the attack. I had no way of proving that Kit Molloy had caused those injuries but then it was a helluva lot more than most internet rumors had behind them.
Instead of dwelling on it, I needed to clear my mind. Getting out of the apartment was the best idea. The sun shone and the skies were clear. I started walking down the street. This was going to be a hard time and it'd do me no good to ignore my mental health.
That reminded me that I hadn't been in touch with any of my friends for a while. I should make a few calls and actually socialize, like a normal person.
By the time I returned home, I was starving. Screw frozen dinners. I picked up the phone and ordered pizza.
I had no more answers than I'd started with. Could I see a future with Savage? That's what I wanted and what I craved but I had no idea if such a thing was possible. The two of us together was the best thing I'd ever had in my life but how much of myself was I willing to sacrifice to make that work?
The two of us both needed to stop keeping secrets from each other. We needed stop protecting each other too. Protection was fine in its place but it also didn't give the other person space to grow.
I needed to sleep more before I found any answers to that question.
As I drifted off to sleep, I remembered that I'd left my car at Savage's house. He'd changed the codes to the garage and I'd never bothered getting them off him. It hadn't been an issue at the time. If I got my car, I could go for drives, take some photos, get away from myself.
I'd have to call him to get the code and, while everything in me yearned to hear his voice, it was too soon. If I called him now, I'd weaken. I got up and moved my phone a long way from my bed.
Alice
I CALLED JASMINE AND booked in to get my hair cut.
"Wow, this is the second time this year. That's not like you," she said.
"Yeah, well, maybe my hair is growing faster this year," I replied.
"Maybe."
I was sure once she had me in her chair, she'd get information out of me but I didn't want to spill my entire guts. Things were too tender to talk about much.
I went in the next day.
"Cut it all off," I told her.
"No way."
"I'm the customer and I want it all off."
"Whoa, there is some big love trauma going on."
"Is not. I just want a haircut."
Jasmine folded her arms.
"I've been cutting hair for ten years. I know that when someone comes in with that look on their face and wanting a drastic change, it's not a change of image they really want. It's love trauma. Every single time."
She wouldn't budge, I knew that.
"Okay, just a trim."
She began cutting.
"So, who is it? Last time I saw you, you were about to start an assignment with Ash Savage."
I didn't answer. What could I say to that?
She jumped back.
"No way."
"What?"
"Ash Savage?"
"Huh?" I didn't want to deny or confirm a thing. "That is a crazy conclusion to jump to."
"So, it's true. You have a face that can't lie. You and Ash Savage. Is it true? All the rumors, are they true?"
"What rumors?"
"Well, for starters, he's huge." She held out her arms indicating a penis size that would be physically impossible.
"Not that big."
"It is true then?" Her eyes were like saucers.
I nodded.
"You are officially my hero. There have been rumors that he's settled down but I had no idea it was you. Alice, you've tamed the Savage."
I wasn't so sure I'd tamed him. I wasn't so sure about anything.
Since we were the only ones in the salon, I ended up telling her the whole story. Every single bit. I'd been determined not to spill my guts but my guts were well and truly spilt. But I'd known Jasmine for years and even though she liked to gossip, she knew when to keep her mouth shut.
"And you left him?"
I nodded.
"Don't nod when I'm cutting. Not unless you want some funky shape happening here in the back. I can't believe you left him."
"What would you do after that stunt? He lied to me, stole my phone, kept me in the dark about things."
"You did too," she said.
"Huh?"
"You would never have told him what Kit Molloy did if he hadn't found out. You did the exact thing you're angry with him about."
Damn Jasmine. It wasn't the same at all. Couldn't she see that? I'd done it... Hell, I'd done it to protect him. I didn't want to think about that, though. My motives were pure. My intents were true.
But then, Savage could say the same.
Could you get any more screwed up than we were?
"Is it worth losing him over? You can be a bit... unyielding. Maybe, just this time, you need to bend a little.
"
"It's more than a little."
"Maybe. Maybe it's not as much as you think."
"He's horrible to his mother too. I worry about that. Maybe he's nice to me now while things are fresh and glowing but if we stay together, he'll treat me like that too."
She pursed her lips, as though cutting my hair took all her focus.
"Maybe his mother is a bitch."
"She's not. She's so lovely and she seems a bit lonely. And, even if she pushed him when he was young, she seems to only care him."
Jasmine checked that my hair was even, then cut some more.
"People aren't always what they seem."
"I think I know people."
"You think that but I've got this customer who came in every week to get her hair set. Lovely old duck, you'd think. I always gave her a big discount because she seemed to be struggling. She really got to me with her hard luck stories. Well, she died recently and the bitch was loaded. She had zillions. I could've been charging her full price the whole time and it'd have not hurt her a bit." Jasmine laughed. "Bitch," she said again. "Those discounts could've paid for a nice tropical holiday. For a year."
I got a break from her advice while she dried my hair at least. Friends are all well and good, until they start telling you things for your own benefit. I wanted sympathy, not a look at things from Savage's side.
"Think about it, Alice," she said, while I was paying up. "If everything was as perfect as you said, you have to meet him halfway. Admit your own faults. Otherwise, you'll die a lonely old lady."
"At least I'll get discounts from my hairdresser," I said.
Alice
THE NEXT DAY, I STAYED at home and did research. First, I got the scrapbooks and magazines from the back of my wardrobe - all the stuff I'd collected on Kit Molloy back when I'd been young enough to think that was cool.
I wanted to find something to discredit him. I wasn't sure what I needed to look for, but if I could find some bit of dirt to sully his image, it would help. I could at least do that much, since I'd been too gutless to report his attack. If I'd done that in the first place, Savage would be in a much stronger position now. He'd have not needed to try to protect me.
I'd read every article a million times but I'd read them from a fangirl perspective, full of wide-eyed wonder. This time I looked for something else, some sign that there were cracks in Molloy's facade.
As I read through them, the words that I'd thought were so poetic and deep a long time ago took on a whole new edge. Like his song lyrics, words about wanting to possess a woman and make her his, that kind of thing, became ominous rather than romantic.
That was one thing I'd learnt with Savage. You couldn't make someone become yours. They gave themselves willingly.
I'd marked a few places in the magazines, then I turned to the internet. I hated reading all that stuff about Molloy but I needed background information to hand my friends.
The stories about Molloy were all the same. He'd been busking on the street when he was seventeen years old, when he'd been discovered. He'd been offered a recording contract, so he'd dropped out of school and had put together his band. From there, he'd gone from success to success.
It made a great story but I wondered now how much of it was true.
There were mentions of charities he'd worked with, how generous he was with his time and money. I'd follow that up. The real Kit Molloy did not seem like a generous man.
There were a few rumors of ex-girlfriends too. I wondered if any of them would talk.
I got up and made a coffee, then got back to it.
Then the doorbell buzzed. I hated people coming to my door. Unless they had pizza. Then, I handled it but, since I hadn't ordered any pizza, it had to be a salesman or someone equally as unwelcome.
It wouldn't be Savage. No way would it be Savage. I didn't even want to see him. My heart might have stupid cravings but I did NOT want to see him.
Not that it would be him anyway. He had shows to do a long way away.
He wouldn't be that stupid.
I opened the door.
"Delivery for Alice Cain," the post guy said.
I hadn't been expecting a delivery. I was about to hand the parcel back when I saw the return address. The camera shop I'd gone to with Savage.
My camera?
My precious baby?
I shut the door and went inside, looking for a knife to slit the packaging.
Yep, it was my baby, looking better than new.
Savage must've got the shop to deliver it here.
I stroked it, wanting to cry. That day had been so perfect. At the camera store with Savage. I laughed, remembering all the crazy things he'd tried to make me buy. And he'd picked out that cheesy photo frame. I'd never taken a photo of the two of us together to put in it. All he had was an empty frame.
It broke my heart to think of that frame sitting empty but I'd always been behind the camera. I hadn't even taken a selfie of us together.
Having my camera back made me feel like part of my soul had returned. Until I thought of Savage. Then I realized I'd lost the greater part of myself.
We needed to talk, to work things out. Surely, we could do that.
I reached for my phone. I had to call him. I had to thank him, at least. The call rang out, though.
He'd be setting up for a show or sleeping. Something, somewhere, that I didn't even know about.
I sent a message instead but that seemed cold and empty. A hollow thank you.
Then I returned to my research. I started searching for information about Kit Molloy before he was discovered. After all, this was the internet. You could find out anything about anyone. But there was nothing. No record of him before he turned seventeen. Well, no record except the official ones.
Why had no one checked into this kind of thing before?
I guess because he gave out so much information in interviews. He kept up that image of being such a nice guy, the rest of it stayed hidden away in the shadows. I guess the media needed its heroes as well as its villains. They'd just picked the wrong guy to be a hero.
Kit Molloy had dark secrets. I knew that but it seemed there was so much more to it. I couldn't be the person to write this story. I wasn't a journalist. I did have contacts, though. I got on the phone and rang a few people. People who would be very interested in following this up, if it meant a juicy scoop. I just needed to put Kit Molloy on their radar.
Savage
SINCE ALICE HAD LEFT me, everything had gone wrong. Mostly, that was my fault. I moped, and moping didn't make for good shows. Every time I came off stage, I knew I hadn't done my best and that made the moping worse. I hated being anything but first-rate but I didn't have the energy in me to give the crowd.
The only thing I'd heard from Alice was one little message saying thank you for her camera. Then nothing. I'd wanted to call her back but I wasn't sure she wanted to hear from me.
It didn't help that I'd become the worst guy in the world, according to the internet. I had my phone out back stage.
"Stay offline. Don't read that stuff," Gary said.
"That's easy for you to say. I need to know what people think of me. I'm the one being attacked here."
"Well, for Christ's sake, don't respond."
Again, that was easy for him to say. He wasn't the one being called a washed-up psycho. According to Molloy's followers, I'd pretty much laid in wait for him, then tried to kill him. As if I had time to stalk a loser like that, when I had my own shit to do.
"Come out drinking after the show," Buzz said. "That'll drown your sorrows."
"That is the worst idea ever," Gary told him. "He'll get drunk, then he'll go online and say shit he'll regret. Just go home and sleep. Or ring that photographer chick and do what it takes to get her back. Or, if all else fails, get yourself a groupie after the show. That will take your mind off all your woes."
Gary's stupid suggestions just proved he didn't understand the complexity of the situation. I c
ouldn't just call Alice and make up. I needed to give her space. And groupies held no attraction for me. I couldn't believe in my times of trouble, my oldest friend had failed me, but when I thought of sleeping with anyone but Alice, my cock didn't have a twitch in him.
"What's the crowd like tonight?" I asked Gary.
I had nightmares of playing to an empty room, or a crowd wearing those "Molloy basher" t-shirts I'd seen a few people wear online.
"Not too bad," Buzz said. "Almost a full house."
"Yeah, but most of them would've bought tickets before this news broke. It's the shows next month I'm worried about. Ticket sales are slowing. This story isn't going away. Molloy seems to have fans throwing fuel on the fire," said Gary.
"Don't I have my own fans with their own fuel?"
Surely, people supported me as much as they did Molloy. Where were my people?
"Wouldn't that be water, not fuel?" asked Buzz. "I mean, we want to put out the fire, not add to it."
Technically, he was right but that didn't help my general feeling of shit. I needed to go out there and rock. No one wanted a brooding rock star. Well, that wasn't actually true, either. People loved a brooding rock star but this wasn't sexy brooding. It was just being a bucket of misery.
"Hey, check this out," Buzz said, holding up his phone. "Molloy's getting dragged through the dirt. Emo singer's dark secrets."
I grabbed his phone and chuckled with glee.
Any dirt on Molloy made me look better. I mean, it wasn't a one-on-one trade. His reputation going down didn't make mine any better. Well, in theory it didn't. But the reality felt like that. And, maybe, if he had enough dirt dug up on him, he'd have better things to worry about than having me charged for belting him.
"Suffer, bitch," I said to the phone.
Buzz laughed.
"His whole past is a lie. He's not some down and out kid, discovered on the street. He's a rich little private school boy with connections," I told Gary.
"Molloy is going down," Buzz added.
"I wouldn't get too excited," Gary said. "It's one little story."
Trust Gary to kill the excitement. He could've let me gloat for a minute. Then I realized, Molloy hadn't actually done anything legal to me.
Rock Mayhem: 8 Complete Rock Star Romance Novels Page 24
