One Kiss from the King of Rock (The One Book 2) Page 16

  She was one person in a sea of fifty-thousand, but it felt like Jay played for her alone. Her heart was so full it was a wonder it didn’t spill out of her chest, splash all over her feet. As it was, her feet might not have even been on the ground, she felt so high.

  Watching Jay was seeing her future tumble into bright relief. Nothing would separate them now. Not continents. Not his touring or her business. Tice Social was entirely portable. She could expand, hire an Australian market manager, work anywhere in the world, as long as she had an internet connection. She didn’t have to wait for Jay to be in one place. She didn’t have to give up any part of the life she loved. They’d work it out together, taking to the road as long as that’s where Jay needed to be and stopping wherever was most convenient.

  She could hardly wait to begin.

  It was as though they’d already had the conversation, made the decisions, chosen the path. Her backstage pass got her through security quickly enough that she was waiting when Jay came off stage, bathed in sweat, shaking from the exertion and shouting for her.

  Their secret relationship was well and truly out when they collided, bodies crashing together, lips locking. Jay’s hand firm in her hair, his kiss insistent and urgent, softening into easy laughter as his bandmates, management and crew orbited about them.

  “You’re here,” he said, forehead resting on hers.

  “Where else would I be?”

  “You’re mine.”

  She pulled on his neck to reach his lips to whisper against them. “Always. And you’re mine.”

  “I don’t even feel like barfing,” he said, which might’ve been a horror mood killer, but it was like a declaration instead. Everything was as it should be. And their life together started now.

  That life was a plant-killing, rent-wasting till her lease ran out, suitcase-living, bike-battery-flattening, time-zone adjustment departure from the norm for Evie as she traveled with Jay. Lucky, she’d never gotten around to letting Haydn talk her into owning a dog. Luckier, she’d made some new hires and her people stepped up to the reality that they’d have to do ground support without Evie as backup.

  She worked days while Jay slept, worked out, did interviews and attended to the business end of the tour. At night she was his most ardent fan, watching from the audience and sometimes the side of stage with Janina, who’d taken to hugging her often and making vague threats about what she wanted to do to Errol for breaking them up. Some of the threats were not so vague and sounded painful and embarrassing.

  And later, after Jay was wrung out but still wired, they made good use of all the luxurious- surfaces of five-star suites to make each other’s bodies feel good. Sometimes they even had good old-fashioned stick it in sex. Sometimes they simply curled up to sleep, wrapped in each other’s fresh-faced happiness.

  Jay didn’t barf after a gig and he claimed his pre-show nerves were more manageable, which Janina backed up. It made Evie feel even more comfortable they were going to get it right together this time.

  It made her use her free time to mess about on Suzy Q and tinker with lyrics. Most of them were sad, bad and godawful embarrassing, but there were three new songs that had a little something going for them. More importantly, the whole process engaged her imagination and made Teela smug when she confessed to it.

  Make that smugger, since Tee and Haydn we ready to move into their new home and Tee was sporting the largest diamond known to ever grace a finger. Evie was sure her left arm hung lower than her right.

  And with all that peace, happiness and goodwill flowing through her veins, she made it up with Errol. He schemed and manipulated, caused real and lasting damage and none of that was forgotten. But he was her dad and he’d thought he was doing the right thing at the time, and since being with Jay had wrecked her tolerance for grudge bearing, she forgave him for being a dickhead.

  Weeks later, back in Sydney for the final extra show, bags packed to fly out to New Zealand with Jay, she knew she’d miscalculated badly about her tolerance for grudge bearing.

  Miscalculated catastrophically about everything.

  She heard Jay say her name on stage, heard her own singing voice a little raw and breathy from the speaker array, her laughing face filling the video screens.

  It came roaring back with a vengeance that could stop her heart, if she didn’t use it to stop Jay’s first.

  TWENTY

  Playing Evie’s song on stage was a last-minute decision. Jay had dodged questions about the woman at his side all tour because management said it was a distraction he didn’t need. Blah, blah, it was better that female fans thought he was single, blah, blah.

  Even Mum agreed, although he could see she was torn. She kept touching him and hugging Evie.

  Evie said she preferred being a mystery, so that settled it and she’d had fun with wigs and sunglasses to give the paps something to shoot, but it didn’t sit right with him.

  He wanted to declare his love and it was a criminal act not to share Evie’s talent with the world. Especially as she was writing new stuff often now.

  He had the recording he’d made of her that first night she’d picked up Suzy Q. It was raw, perfectly imperfect, and her talent shone through. Paired with footage of Evie he’d shot on his phone as they messed about in each city, she would be the surprise star of World’s End’s last show of the Australian tour.

  “Sydney, you’re a trip,” he growled into the mic at the end of a bracket. He waited out the shouts. “I’m sorry it took so long to get it together and come back home.” More cheering. “Before we finish up tonight, I’ve got something I want to share with you.”

  There was heckling. He couldn’t make it all out, but he knew it was there. Crude suggestions mostly. “Now play nice, because if you think I’ve already opened my veins for you up here, you’ve got a surprise coming.”

  There was a boom tish from the drum kit and he went on. “You see, I left town because I lost my love.”

  “He was devastated,” said Tex, dropping to his knees and making his guitar wail. It went on and on until Tex was lying on the stage, legs kicking in a protracted death scene and everyone was laughing.

  “Yeah, it was sad,” Jay said, and waited while the crowd played along making aw sounds. “It was my fault too. The whole reason we’re named World’s End is because that’s how I felt when I lost my girl. Like my whole world had come to an end.” There was more shouting, and he had to pause.

  “The thing is, I got a second chance.” A murmur started to build. “I’m standing here tonight declaring my love for the one girl who has always had my number.” Without turning, he knew vision of Evie filled the screens behind him and the murmur became a roar.

  “You think she looks good, you should hear how she sounds when she writes her own songs. This is my wild thing, my world’s end. This is Evelette Violet Tice.”

  The stage lights dropped him and the band into darkness and Evie’s voice rang out into the night.

  And the fans ate it up. It was a huge highlight to introduce the love of your life to fifty-thousand strangers on stage and God knows how many watching the television broadcast. And a special pleasure that had him throwing everything he had left at their show close to know they wanted more of her.

  He came off stage after two encores, adrenaline still burning in his blood, eyes only for Evie, his car waiting so he could get them out of here and be alone with her as soon as possible.

  He was ill-prepared for Abel’s fury.

  “What the fuck was that, you bastard?” Abel shoved him so hard he almost lost his footing. Isaac helped out, jerking him upright and into the path of Oscar’s punch. It caught him on the shoulder and spun him backwards.

  He came back, fists swinging, shouting incoherently, utterly bewildered. Security would’ve stepped in, but Grip got there first.

  “Fucking stop,” Grip said, putting himself between Jay and Abel. He held a hand up to stop security moving in. “Family fight,” he said. “Tell them to ba
ck off, Jay.”

  He did with a nod, the three uniformed men remaining close enough to intervene if things got more out of control. They were already way out of order.

  “What’s the problem here?” he said.

  “How could you do that to her, you son of a bitch?” Abel said.

  Jay shook his head, his brains rattling. What was up Abel’s arse? Where was Evie? Abel tried to get to him again, but Grip held him off.

  “She would never want that,” Isaac said.

  “You don’t love her if you don’t know that,” Abel said.

  “You self-aggrandizing fuck,” said Oscar.

  “What?” Jay pushed Grip aside to get in Abel’s face. “I just told half the country, half the world I’m in love with Evie. She’s extraordinary. Everyone should know that. And they would if you weren’t holding her back.”

  “What the fuck does that mean?” Abel said.

  “She is always there for you. Doing a thousand little things you don’t pay for and never notice. She puts you guys and the band first over everything else in her life. You don’t deserve her.”

  Abel’s head jerked back at that, but he jabbed a finger in Jay’s chest. “We never asked her to. Whatever she does for us is her choice,” he said.

  He knocked Abel’s hand away. “You fuckers. You don’t have to ask. You’re family. She’s been there for you her whole life. Are you jealous of your own sister? She’s twice the songwriter you are. Wasn’t enough I played with you, out there every night, you have to tear Evie down.”

  Abel shoved him again. “You don’t fucking get it.”

  Jay shoved him back. “What the fuck is this about then?”

  “It’s about what Evie chooses, you entitled motherfuck.”

  Evie wanted music in her life. She was happy. She was excited to write again. He could see it in her. He didn’t have to be told. “She—”

  “Never wanted to be on stage. Never wanted to be a star,” Abel said.

  Oscar sneered. “But you can’t handle that.”

  Jay rounded on Oscar. “I’m the problem?”

  “Yes, you fuck,” Oscar said.

  “You quit on us, that was one thing. You quit on Evie, you changed her, man. She wasn’t the same. And now you’re using her, and it will fuck her up all over again,” Isaac said.

  Using her. “The fuck I am. I want the world for Evie.”

  “No. You want your world for her, and in your world it’s all about the money and fame,” Abel said.

  Oh, fuck that. He lurched forward, going for Abel, but not fast enough to get away from Grip’s restraint. “That’s not—”

  “You’re fucking not good enough for her,” Abel shouted.

  “Lost Property would be history if Evie wasn’t peace-keeping for you,” Jay yelled and nothing Grip could do was going to prevent him taking Abel down. He didn’t fight for Evie the first time, he wouldn’t make that mistake again.

  He broke Grip’s hold and crashed into Abel and everything got close and hard, hot and loud. You could smell the anger and taste the vitriol, and security were in the mix pulling everyone apart. And when there was distance between them, when there were reddened jaws and aching hands and they were all breathing like heart attacks and waiting for a chance to have at each other again, there was Evie.

  She said his name and her voice dripped ice and he knew.

  Wrongness curled in his gut, displacing the rage.

  A wizard had once warned him never to make decisions for someone else.

  He didn’t have to have it beaten into him. He only had to look at her, body held rigidly, expression frozen into a bland winter, to know he’d fucked up.

  “Evie, I—”

  “You made a decision for me once and you’ve done it again. I might’ve forgiven a different mistake.” She shook her head. “You know . . .” She looked away. “You know what hurts the most?”

  “Let’s talk about this alone.” Where he could touch her cold anger and make it his own pain. Where no one else had to witness his soul curdling.

  “I don’t want to be alone with you,” she said, ice crystals tinkling in her voice. Slipping. She was slipping away.

  “You don’t even have to speak to this fuckhead,” Oscar said. He went to shoot his mouth off again and Evie silenced him with a glance.

  Jay felt the frost in her as a blade though his side. “I can—”

  She cut him off. “What hurts the most is that you don’t know me.”

  He could explain. He could take all the emotion down ten octaves and fix this.

  “Give them space,” said Grip, but the only ones who backed off were the men Jay paid to protect him.

  In this, no one could protect him. His face throbbed. He could feel his hand swelling. The back of his throat was tight, and he was hot and a little dizzy; too much adrenaline, or being smacked in the head, or the creeping knowledge that he’d irretrievably fucked his life up and he was going to lose Evie again.

  “Evie, please, give me a chance to explain.” He blinked, put his hand to his forehead. It wasn’t supposed to be like this. The last thing he wanted to do was pressure, her, hurt her.

  “What’s not to get?” She closed her eyes, wrapped her arms around herself. “You blasted my face, my name, my music everywhere without my permission.”

  “I was—”

  She cut him off. “You thought you were doing me a favor. Kickstarting my career with a grand public gesture. But I have a career and now everyone who was thinking about hiring me is going to wonder what kind of commitment I’m going to give them.”

  Jesus suffering fuck. This was a disaster, a bomb he’d detonated in his own face. “I can—”

  “No, you can’t fix this, Jay. You made it about what you wanted. I thought you knew me. I thought you, of all people, had my back.”

  “I do have your back. I want you to have everything, Evie.”

  She opened her eyes and locked on him, her hurt a thousand mirrors reflecting his crime. “If I wanted that, I’d have gone for it. You had no right to push me, to make that decision for me.”

  His guts clamped his, his chest squeezed. He had to force words out past the panic. “This doesn’t have to change anything.”

  “It changes us. And you know what, I made a mistake. The thing that hurts the most is that I had everything I wanted. I had you, and now I only have the idea of you because I can’t love a man who sees me as someone I’m not.”

  He had to stop her leaving. He reached for her, but she stepped away, taking shelter between Abel and Isaac.

  “And you only have an idea of me,” she said, as she turned away, her brothers and Grip shielding her.

  He might’ve lost his tongue down the back of his throat; he was voiceless.

  He watched her leave him, bile in his mouth, white noise screaming in his head. He only just made it to the bathroom before he convulsed, sick to the heart, vomiting up a whole universe of wrong intentions, crashed hopes and dreams.

  TWENTY-ONE

  Teela failed so badly at whispering, Evie, pretending sleep under a soft blanket on Tee’s couch, had a new reason to be annoyed.

  “Jay tried to Star is Born Evie,” Tee told Haydn.

  That was one way of putting it. It made Evie tear up again and that wasn’t on. She was not crying over Jay freaking Endicott or her own stupidity in thinking they had a second chance together.

  Before last night, she’d loved Jay with a strength so deep, she’d been able to deny there was an edge of dread to it. She didn’t deserve the happiness of having him back, had done nothing to earn it, and there was no way she’d be able to fit into his world and hold on to him.

  Some of that dread had a basis in reality. They’d failed each other once. They lived on opposite sides of the world and Jay’s life was fame and touring. The rest, well the rest of it was her own messed-up head and lack of self-worth.

  Hearing the applause for Lost Property every night for weeks and knowing Jay had wanted
to lend them his fame despite the additional hassle had made her pack that dread away. She’d been left with the purest glow inside her. Love in the shape of a man who understood what was important to her, and who’d never let her down. Toxic dopamine overriding common sense.

  Until the moment he’d betrayed her in front of the world.

  That was when her world ended.

  “I can hear every word you’re saying,” she called to Teela.

  “Shhh,” Teela hissed. “Evie can hear us.”

  Haydn said something indistinct and Evie yelled. “At least the sexiest man alive knows how to whisper.”

  “He knows how to do a lot of things,” Teela said, appearing in the doorway with a box on her hip. “And so does Jay.”

  Evie put her hands over her ears. She could not handle Teela talking about the many wonders of Haydn Delany. “La, la, la, la, la.” And she never wanted to hear Jay’s name again. “Can’t hear you.”

  Teela dumped the box and made for the couch, where she sat on Evie’s feet. Evie uncapped her ears to hear Tee say, “Are you going to be all right here?”

  “I may never walk again, but I’ll be fine.” Teela’s now unoccupied apartment, still furnished, was the ideal place to hide out.

  “You can stay as long as you like. Whatever you need.”

  As if that didn’t make her eyes burn all over again.

  “And if you decide to stick around, I know a great dog that needs a good home,” Haydn said. He had a last load of Teela’s clothing over his arm. Sexy, could whisper, loved dogs, and was useful. He was way too much.

  “I wish you’d come and stay with us at the new house,” Teela said.

  Evie’s feet were going numb. If she asked nicely, maybe Teela would sit on her chest and her heart would stop with the incessant aching. “I need to brood a bit longer.” Like forever might not be long enough. “But I promise to come see you soon.”

  “You know we’re moving back in with you if you don’t keep that promise, Evie,” Haydn said in a way that was so completely believable, Evie did tear up.