Jet (Marked Men, #2)(61)

I knew something was off before I even opened my eyes the next morning. Normally, there were endless legs tangled with mine and a cloud of feather-soft black hair all in my face and spread across my chest. Not this morning. She was curled on her side, facing away from me. Her hands were folded under her cheek and she had makeup smudged under her still-closed eyes.

It almost looked like at some point in the night she had been crying.

Granted she was bound to be hungover after the tankard of tequila she had drunk, and I hadn’t been very gentle with her last night. But there was something else, something working that I couldn’t see, but sure as hell could feel. That was the only way I had been able to stop in the car last night. It felt like there was someone standing physically between us that I couldn’t reach around to get to her. It almost killed me; it had made my dick swear an unpleasant and ugly revenge on me, but I had known on some soul-deep level that all she needed was an excuse like that, a simple slip for a reason to walk away.

I was going to wake her up, kiss her bare shoulder and maybe some more interesting parts that the scarlet comforter covered, when my phone went off in an angry blast and the wailing strains of Mastodon filled the room. I scrambled to answer it before it woke Ayden, but it was too late. She moaned and grabbed her head, like that would help. By the time I answered, she had pulled the covers all the way over her face and was swearing at me in a way that would make all my boys proud.

I chuckled a little and tapped the round curve of her ass under the heavy blanket. It wasn’t like Von to call before noon, but the entire band was running at full speed to get our act together for the tour.

“What up?”

There was a lot of noise in the background, the clash of angry voices, and the wail of sirens combined with my guitar player’s panicked voice. A cold chill raced down my spine.

“Dude, you have to get down to the studio. Now.”

I was already on my feet and searching the floor for a pair of pants.

“What’s going on?”

I didn’t see Ayden poke her head out of the covers, but I could feel her bright eyes watching me as I scrambled into a T-shirt and my boots.

“Someone broke in. Everything is gone.”

I blinked because that didn’t make any sense. “What do you mean?” I probably sounded like an idiot but my head was spinning in a million different directions. All I could think was, if my old man was involved, no court on earth was going to stop me from killing him for real this time.

Ayden swung her long legs off the bed and I distractedly watched as she got back into her clothes from the night before. Only this time, she put on my long-sleeved shirt with the cow skull on it. I shouldn’t have been able to process that she looked superhot, but it was her, so I totally did.

“Everything. The instruments, the recording equipment, all of it. It’s like someone backed up a truck and cleaned the place out. I called the cops, and the rest of the guys in the band, but you need to get down here since you’re the owner and everything is in your name.”

I shoved my free hand through my hair and grabbed my keys. Ayden snatched them out of my hand and shook her head. She mouthed “I’ll drive” at me and pushed me out the door. Luckily, Cora was still down for the count, because I didn’t have the time or the inclination to explain why we were running out of the house like my bed was on fire.

“Tell the cops the entire building is alarmed, and there are also security cameras, if that helps.”

I saw Ayden cut me a look out of the corner of her eye that I couldn’t read, but I was too busy tallying up the total loss of equipment in my head. The instruments alone were close to twenty grand, but the recording equipment and all the high-end gear that went along with it easily tripled that number. I didn’t even want to start thinking about trying to replace everything in a pinch we would need to replace in order to go on tour. The idea made my blood boil and red streaks flash before my eyes. If it was my dad, there was nothing in the world that was going to stop me from burning his entire world to the ground and dance on the bare, bloody bones of our relationship.

I heard Von repeat the information I had just given him and heard someone close by in the background swear long and loud.

“The cops want to know if everything was insured.”

I snorted and tugged at my hair in frustration. “Of course it is. Even metal heads need insurance.”

That startled a laugh out of him and I sighed because I was suddenly exhausted.

“It doesn’t matter, though. We’re going to need to replace all of our stuff, at least to make the tour.”

“We can use backup equipment if we have to.”

“No. We committed to the tour, committed to be a solid opening act in order to make Artifice a worldwide name, I’m not going to let Dario down. We’ll just get new shit.”

“Can we afford it?”

“Probably not, but it is what it is. I’ll see you in a minute.”

I looked over at Ayden and noticed that she was worrying her bottom lip something fierce. She must have seen me studying her, because she looked back at me and forced a smile that I didn’t buy for a second. She was back to being all smoke and shadow, and the Ayden I was getting to know, the one I was pretty sure I was falling in love with, was gone, and in her place was this girl who was looking at me like we were merely strangers.

“You don’t have to stick around. Just drop me off and I’ll have one of the guys give me a ride when I’m done with the cops.”