Play (Stage Dive, #2)(9)
“Let me guess, that was your friend, Reecy, calling earlier?” Her voice dripped with disdain. Lauren and I started spending time together when Ev got married and moved out. Often on weekends Nate would wind up needing to work. Lauren had a low boredom threshold for her own company. So we’d grab a coffee or go see a movie. It was good. Especially since Skye had taken to avoiding me the past few months. It had been on the pretext of spending time with her new boyfriend but now I had to wonder.
I hated doubting everything that’d happened. The feeling of losing all trust. It was skin crawling and noxious.
“Reece’s date bailed on him,” I said. “Did Ev say something about pizza? I’m starving.”
“One day, you’re going to stop being that boy’s back-up plan.”
My spine straightened. “We’re just friends, Lauren.”
She steered me into the kitchen. A vast array of pizza boxes had been spread across the marble benchtop.
“Please,” she huffed. “He’s a cunt tease. He knows you like him and plays on it.”
“No, he doesn’t. I repeat, just friends.” I’d only recently finished embarrassing myself in front of Malcolm Ericson. Thoughts regarding my possible foolish behavior around Reece Lewis could wait for another time.
Or never. Never would also be fine.
“You could do better if you bothered to,” she said.
I made some vague noise. Hopefully it was enough to end this topic of conversation. Then my stomach rumbled loudly. Yum, melted cheese. Earlier, I’d been so worried about the talk with Skye, I’d skipped lunch. With two beers sloshing around inside my belly, food was long overdue. Though the toppings laid out weren’t what I expected. “Is that artichoke and spinach?”
“Probably.” Lauren shook her head and shoved a piping-hot piece of ham and pineapple at me, taking the time to sit it on a napkin first. “Here, try this one. Evelyn hasn’t wrecked it with any of her vegetable nonsense. I love her, I do. But the girl has the strangest taste in pizza toppings of anyone I’ve ever met. It’s unnatural.”
I bit into it immediately, scalding my tongue and the roof of my mouth. One day I’d learn to wait until it cooled down. Not today, but one day.
Out in the living room, the music suddenly jumped in volume by about a billion decibels. My ears started ringing. The walls shuddered. Black Rebel Motorcycle Club thundered through the condo. Someone else managed to be louder. “Par-tay!”
Lauren smiled and leaned in closer to be heard. “Mal’s decided to join in!” she shouted. “Now the fun begins.”
***
Ben Nicholson, Stage Dive’s bull-necked bass player arrived, blowing my mind just a bit more. He and Mal started pouring shots. I stuck to my mostly full beer. Holding it gave my hands something to do. What followed was pretty much everything I’d ever expected from a rock star party. Well, there weren’t really drugs or groupies so much. But plenty of pretty people getting drunk and lots of noise. It was a bit like the college parties Lizzy talked me into attending now and then. Only instead of cheap beer in red Solo cups, they passed around bottles of C?ROC and Patrón. Most everyone’s clothes were top-of-the-line designer goodies and we were sitting in a million-dollar condo instead of some crappy student apartment.
So, actually, it was nothing like the parties I went to with Lizzy. Forget I said that.
Lauren, Ev, and I had danced and chatted earlier. It’d been fun. For certain, Lauren had done me a favor dragging me out tonight. I’d had a hell of a lot better time than I ever would have sitting at home all by my lonesome. Mal had gone off with David and Ben to another room for a while. Not that I’d been keeping an eye out for him.
For a while I’d hung out in the kitchen, talking to a sound technician by the name of Dean. Apparently he worked with someone called Tyler, who’d been with the band for forever and was basically a family friend. Dean was nice, intelligent, with cool black hair and a piercing through his lip. Yes, he was sort of hot. He asked me back to his hotel room, and it was tempting. But all of my current stresses were running on a loop in the back of my mind. It would basically take a Sex God to make me unwind right now.
I bid Dean good night at the kitchen door.
Then Mal and the guys returned and the music got turned way up again. As inevitably happened, everyone had started pairing up. David and Ev disappeared. No one commented. Lauren sat on Nate’s lap in the corner of the couch, their hands all over each other. I stifled a yawn. It’d been a blast, but it was nearing three in the morning. I was running out of steam. We’d probably be leaving soon.
I hoped we’d be leaving soon. In a few hours I had to rise and shine. The shining part might be problematic with the way Mal’s words were beating around inside my brain. Overly trusting and broke? Yes. Doormat, my ass.
“Benny boy,” hollered Mal. He was dancing on top of the coffee table with a long-legged brunette. The girl seemed hell-bent on wrapping herself around him, strangler-vine style. Somehow he managed to keep her at a polite distance. Well, almost.
“Yo,” replied Ben in a very manly manner.
“You met my girl, Anne?” Mal nodded to where I sat perched on the end of a couch. I froze. For hours he’d been otherwise occupied. I’d thought he’d forgotten about me entirely.
“You got a girl?” asked Ben.