Rock All Night(6)

“That’s Riley you’re thinking of.”

Riley… the drummer… the little punk-rock chick…

“Riley can handle her booze. You can’t, you stupid git.”

Riley can ‘andle ‘er booze. Yew can’t, yew stewpid git.

Then he turned to me. “I assume you’re comin’ up to meet the band?”

“Yes,” I nodded, a little afraid of getting him angry at me.

Too late, he already was.

He was probably born angry.

“Well, come on, then!” he snapped. “Get on the lift!”

I hurried into the elevator. Derek sauntered along behind me.

Miles hit the ‘Close’ button on the control panel once we were inside, then turned to me as soon as the door was shut and we were in motion.

Like he’d been waiting to get me trapped.

“There’s some ground rules, Ms. Reynolds.”

“Um… okay…” I said, though I looked at Derek as I said it.

Derek smiled indulgently. “It’s Miles’s world. We just play music in it.”

“An’ don’t you forget it,” Miles said, jabbing a stubby finger at Derek’s chest. Then he turned to me and stared me down. “First off, you f*ck with the band, you f*ck with me. And nobody f*cks with me.”

I looked at Derek with more than a little trepidation.

“Miles is like a Great White shark in a suit,” Derek explained. “Except he’s our Great White.”

“Not the band, I’m assuming,” I said, trying for a little joke about the 80’s metal group.

Derek caught it and grinned. “No. He’d have longer hair if that were the case.”

“A great BLACK shark, an’ don’t you forget it,” Miles said to me. “You f*ck with this band, I’ll bury you. You f*ck with their music? I’ll bury you. You f*ck with their schedule? I’ll – ”

“ – bury me. Got it.”

I was losing my fear of him with the constant repetition. I mean, he was almost a caricature, he was so ridiculously over the top.

But as soon as I talked back to him, his eyes narrowed into slits, and I could see the muscles in his jaws clench.

I looked over at Derek, who gave me a cool, slightly amused shake of his head like, That was not a very smart move.

The elevator came to a smooth halt and the door slid open. I moved to exit – to get anywhere, so long as it was away from Miles – but he shot out one hand and punched the ‘Open’ button and then held his arm there, blocking my path.

“You think I’m joking,” Miles said in a cold, controlled voice. “Do you think I’m joking?”

I was suddenly (and very unpleasantly) reminded of that scene in Goodfellas where Joe Pesci is terrorizing Ray Liotta – but in my head they all spoke with British accents now.

You think I’m funny? You think I’m a clown? Do I AMUSE you?

In the movie, it turns out Joe Pesci was just messing with Ray Liotta.

I didn’t think that was the case with Miles.

“N-No,” I stuttered, contrite as could be.

He edged his face closer to mine. “You must think I’m a joke.”

“No. God no.”

“Because I’ve got some rope and a shovel in the boot of my car, just waiting to be used.”

I said it without thinking:

“…boot?”

“British for trunk,” Derek said helpfully. I could tell he was getting a massive kick out of the whole scene.

“And if you f*ck with him, or any other member of the band, I will use that shovel and I will bury you,” Miles snarled. “Are we clear?”

“Yes,” I assured him. “Yes we are.”

Miles paused, glared at me for a moment – then nodded his head once. “Right.”

Then he walked out of the elevator.

“Holy shit,” I whispered under my breath.

“Way to make friends,” Derek joked.

“Is he your friend?” I asked in disbelief.

“More like a very useful enemy.”

“Where’d you dig him up?”

“ Killian brought him over from England to manage the band.”

“And you let him?”

“He may be an *, but he’s damn good at what he does.”

“What’s that, scaring the shit out of everybody?”

Derek laughed. “That’s part of it. Come on, let’s go meet everybody else.”





5




We walked from the elevator into a luxurious hallway lined with works of art. Miles had already disappeared through an open doorway at the end; I could hear a young woman’s voice laughing and chatting loudly in the next room, along with a few thumps and crashes from a drum set.

There was some sort of brief conversation, including a few explosive phrases in a British accent, and then a familiar face met us at the door.

Ryan.

Except radically different from how I remembered him.

He was just as tall, but now he had longer, shaggier hair that was perfectly tousled and styled. His face was leaner, with more pronounced cheekbones, and he sported a couple days’ worth of fashionable stubble. He wore high-end jeans, pointed-toe leather shoes, a black t-shirt with the union   Jack and pictures of four band members on it, a fancy leather jacket, and a small rawhide necklace that looked like he’d picked it up surfing in South America or on some other exotic adventure.