The Girl's Got Secrets (Forbidden Men #7)(8)

I really didn’t expect the room to respond. So when it said, “I had a bad feeling you didn’t get it,” I yelped out a startled scream.

Whirling toward the doorway of the kitchen, I scowled at my roommate for scaring the crap out of me. She’d piled her flaming red hair into a mop on top of her head and sported a green cami and shorts that barely covered her crotch—her usual around-the-house gear, regardless of whether it was summer or the middle of winter...though it happened to be November.

Cradling a steamy mug that smelled like cappuccino with both hands, she carried it into the front room and curled onto the couch beside me to give me the ultimate sympathetic sigh. “You would’ve called hours ago, screaming and ecstatic, if there’d been good news.”

My lower lip trembled. I never could handle pity well. “Fuckers wouldn’t even let me audition.”

“I’m sorry, puta.” I have no idea why Jodi always used the Spanish word for whore as a term of affection for me, but ever since I’d taught her the translation, that’s what she’d affectionately called me. Today, it only made me cry harder though, because it reminded me how much she loved me, and I really-really needed some love right now.

Damn ovaries.

“Was it because you’re a girl?” she asked.

“Yes.” I wiped at my eyes, only to pause and give her a sharp glance. “Wait, how did you know that?”

She shrugged. “Because their name is Non-Castrato and castrato means—”

“I know what the f*ck castrato means,” I snapped, feeling a mite bit testy...and pathetic...and fairly worthless. But music was my life; I’d majored in it in college for a good three semesters before I’d dropped out at Fisher’s insistence that he needed me on hand for his band stuff. I’d even written a paper about how young boys in the 1700s had been castrated before puberty so their voices would remain high, leading to the very term, castrato. I wasn’t a complete idiot—just maybe half an idiot. Fine, three-quarters. Whatever. Still. I did know what castrato meant.

“Of course you do,” Jodi cooed, patting my leg. “But what I can’t figure out is why you’re sitting here, letting those pricks make you cry.”

Leave it to my roommate. She was quick to sympathize, but just as quick to give me the kick in the ass I needed to end my pity party.

I blinked and wiped my face. “Because I’ve dreamed my whole damn life for exactly this kind of opportunity. I have practiced, and sweated, and bled to be the best goddamn drummer there is. And they wouldn’t even f*cking listen to me!”

“Exactly,” Jodi said. “You have worked at this for years. Why are you giving up now? Non-Castrato isn’t the only band. I’m sure you can— “

“But they’re the one I wanted to join! They were good and going places. And I want to be a part of that. It’s just...something about them felt right.” Until they’d treated me like crap and told me to git.

“Then make yourself a part of it, damn it.”

“Whatever. I don’t want anything to do with the scumbags now. What I’d really like to do is force them to listen to my talent and then laugh in their faces and deny them when they beg me to join their sucky band.”

“Ooh, yes. I like that idea.” Jodi pointed at me before taking a sip. “Do that.”

“As if I could.” Defeated, I tossed my hands into the air. “Bastards won’t listen to a girl drummer, remember?”

“Then don’t be a girl drummer,” Jodi rolled her eyes and muttered, “Gah.”

I froze, staring at her. “Wait. What? Do you mean, like...” I flashed my eyes open wide as I flew off the couch to grip my head in both hands. “Oh, my God. You’re a genius. Do you think you could do it? Do you think you could make me a man? Like...just for an hour?”

Jodi shook her head, obviously not following my train of thought. “Huh?”

“This is exactly what you’re going to college for. To make special effects for movies. That includes masks and such, right? Could you make me a guy? You know, like they made Robin Williams into a woman in Mrs. Doubtfire?”

“Um...” Trilling out a nervous laugh as if she wanted to believe I was joking but feared I wasn’t, Jodi shook her head. “I don’t think you realize how much time and work would go into making something like that. And it’d be even harder to make it in any way realistic.”

Desperate, I grabbed her hand, my gaze beseeching. “It only has to be believable long enough to get me through one audition. After that, when they hear how great I am, then I’ll rip the mask off and tell them, ha, a girl can be good, so go f*ck yourselves.”

When leery temptation loomed in my roommate’s eyes, I knew I had her. I just needed one more good solid beg to break through her resistance. “Jodi, please, I need this. I’m counting on you and your amazing talent to help me find a little justice in the world...for all women.”

And... Jodi melted. I held my pleading stare as her internal conflict crumbled to dust. “Oh, all right. But if tomorrow is the last day they’re holding auditions, we need to get started, like, right f*cking now.”





Strange fact about me: I totally dug strange and unusual facts.

I knew the term for killing your uncle was avunculicide. Your sister: sororicide. Your wife: uxoricide. Slaughtering everyone in the hopes of wiping out humankind in general: omnicide. But I did not know what it was called when you wanted to murder your fellow bandmates, and I really thought I should become familiar with that term since I was seriously considering employing it.