Rock Addiction (Rock Kiss #1)(42)

Uh-oh. “Did you do something Thea’s going to have to wrangle?” Her sister had flown in late last night to be on hand for media interviews the band was doing today.

Lifting his head, David groaned. “Yes. Mary, Joseph, and the saints combined, yes.”

“She’s been working since genius here called me.” Fox bit into a piece of toast. “He was too chickenshit to call Thea himself.”

“Shut the f*ck up.” Strong words, but the drummer’s tone was morose. “God, could I have screwed up any worse?”

Molly thought about it, then leaned in to whisper in David’s ear. “You might as well tell me your side of the story so I can spin it for you when Thea calms down.”

Shooting her a considering look out of a bloodshot and blackened eye, he slugged back his coffee and blew out a breath. “I decided to walk around the city last night. It’s something I do night before a concert.” He rubbed his hands over his face. “On the way back, I ducked into a bar to have a drink. It never crossed my mind that I’d be recognized. I’m the drummer—nobody ever pays attention to the f*cking drummer.”

Fox snorted. “Bullshit. I’ve seen the stacks of fan mail.” Thigh pressing against Molly’s, he reached for the pats of butter beside her plate. “Mind?”

“Of course not.” Feeling playful and happy to see him, she closed her hand over the muscled strength of his thigh under the table, close to the zipper of his jeans.

It earned her a warning look that told her he’d get his revenge. Stomach tight, she stroked her hand lower down, leaving it there in an intimacy that coiled around her heart, and returned her attention to David. “So, someone recognized you?”

“Yep. The f*ckwits decided they didn’t want a ‘* rock star’ in their fine establishment.” The insult was rife in his voice. “Like I was an airbrushed pop star, not a real goddamned musician.” Snarling at his toast, he bit off a hunk. “I had to defend my honor, didn’t I? Not my f*cking fault the f*cking bartender decided to call the cops just ’cause we broke a cheap-ass f*cking table.”

Molly had never heard David swear before this morning, not even in interviews or going up against pushy paparazzi. “Hold on,” she said, wondering how much of that was leftover anger, and how much frustration at what this would do to his chances with Thea. “You were on your own, and you only came out with a black eye?”

David shrugged. “I was consistently the shortest guy in my grade until I hit seventeen. Shrimps get picked on—and my dad, he’s old school. Decided to teach me how to kick ass. No one ever picked on me a second time.”

His physicality something she would’ve never guessed at, Molly might have followed the conversational thread, but David fell to his breakfast with the concentration of a man who was done talking. She looked across the table to Justin. “Are you on call all the time?”

“That’s why I get paid the big bucks.” The lawyer’s teeth flashed bright. “Good thing David’s victims were too embarrassed to press charges—I mean, what hard man gets beat up by a * rock star?”

Giving him the finger, David stayed focused on his bacon and eggs.

Fox, his thigh continuing to press intimately against hers, jerked his head at Maxwell. “You feel good about tonight?”

“Setup’s tight,” the other man said, and the conversation drifted in another direction.

It was maybe ten minutes later, while Molly was having her second cup of coffee, that she ended up alone with David, the others having gone to pick up more food from the buffet. “You don’t seem like the kind of man who gets into bar fights.”

No response.

“You’re crazy in love with her, aren’t you?” she said softly, having grasped the depth of his feelings yesterday when he’d oh-so-casually asked her about Thea when they were backstage. The painful need in his eyes had resonated with the emotions growing inside her.

David paused with his fork against the plate, his eyes staring out into nothing. “Until I can’t think. I need to get over it.”

“Did you—”

“I asked her out. Had this whole argument worked out about how we’d be perfect together, but she never even gave me a shot.” Fingers turning white on the metal, he said, “She cut me off so smoothly it was like being sliced off at the knees. Professional smile, distant eyes, gentle hand on my arm as she ushered me out of her office.” He shook his head. “It was such a kick in the teeth that I just went.”

Thea, Molly thought, was a smart woman who’d grown up cherished by two people who loved her and each other. The man Thea’s mother had married when Thea was two had always treated Thea as his eldest daughter, “and no damn ‘step’ about it,” as Thea had once quoted, love bright in her expression. Her two “baby” sisters, fourteen and fifteen respectively, saw her as their big sister and that was that—complete with teary phone calls about boys and complaints about being grounded.

Molly had met Thea’s family over video calls and thought they were wonderful.

However, Thea had also had the bad luck to fall into a long-term relationship with a man who hadn’t been able to handle her strength and growing success. Thea’s ex had cheated on her, then blamed her for it, saying she wasn’t woman enough to satisfy his needs.