by Vicki James
“I’m going to be staying again, right?” he asked, with caution in his voice he didn’t need.
“I’d like that. You can leave your car in the spare parking space next to my garage around the back of the yard if you like? That way nobody will know you’re here.”
“I don’t care who knows, but I’ll do it for you.” With a kiss, he snatched his keys off of the small table by my front door, and he went to move his car.
It didn’t take him long before he was pushing back through the front door, running a hand through his hair and smirking at me. I was rubbing my lips together after applying a small coat of red lipstick and throwing my phone into a shoulder bag when I came to a halt and took him in.
“All set?” I asked, quickly scowling and pointing at his cocky smile. “Wait. What’s that face for?”
“What face?”
“That face. That smug, I-know-something-I’m-not-meant-to-know, face.”
Danny shrugged, glancing from side to side and turning his smile upside down, but I wasn’t buying it.
“Daniel Silver… what’s going on?”
“Nothing.” He shook his head, reaching out for me and pulling my hips closer to his. Our bodies banged together, and I leaned back, studying his face. “I just find it really cute how you pretended you hadn’t bought the blue Scirocco, when the window to your garage shows a very sparkly, unused car that looks exactly like a blue Scirocco parked inside it.”
My face fell. “Oh shit… I didn’t… that’s not what you…”
“You are so busted.”
“I barely drive it,” I said in my defence. “It… it wasn’t like I bought it to remind me of you or anything. They’re a good car. Reliable. I like reliability.”
“Sure.” He nodded, pushing his bottom lip out.
“You can be a real jerk when you want to be, can’t you?”
Danny laughed and swept me up in another kiss. “I’m not trying to be a jerk,” he mumbled against my mouth. “I find you fucking adorable, that’s all.” His hands roamed to my arse cheeks. “Adorable, sexy, irresistible, and—”
“If you carry on, we’re not going to make it out of the house.”
With a groan, Danny pulled back, readjusting himself in his trousers quickly before he stood me back on steady feet. “Sorry. I’m finding it hard to not think about being inside you every second of every day.”
“Let’s go, superstar.” I jerked my chin and pushed him towards the door. We were outside in no time, and I locked up behind me before pushing my keys into my bag. “Where are we headed?”
Danny pushed his hands into the pockets of his skinny black jeans. “Well…” he started, “how do you feel about heading to The Hideaway for a drink?”
The Hideaway was the livelier place to socialise around here. It occasionally turned itself into a live music venue with unknown indie bands offering performances to a small crowd. The local musicians earned good tips off the tourists, apparently. The building sat right off the beach, only fifty yards or so away, and it was somewhere Danny and I used to love going to when we’d been together.
Walking in there together would make a statement. It would also draw eyes to Danny from every angle.
“Unless you don’t want to.” His smile rose, and those strong shoulders curled into his chest, making the muscles in his forearms pop. “I’m not exactly Mr Popular around here now. It could be awkward for you.”
Stepping towards him, I hooked my arm through one of his, and I pressed myself against him. “You’re popular with me, and that’s all I care about.”
Sure enough, it hadn’t taken long for heads to turn and the whisperings to start once Danny and I stepped through the doors of The Hideaway. The guy behind the bar took one look at Danny, and his eyes sparkled at the realisation that the lead guitarist from Front Row Frogs was there in his establishment. Danny didn’t seem to mind, but unease rested in my gut at the way money signs lit up in people’s eyes whenever he was around. He’d almost become a brand, and everyone within reach wanted a piece of it. They were unable to see him as a person—a human, now. He was nothing more than a cash machine, and I hated the thought of anyone not seeing how real he actually was.
The barman served us quickly, offering up a table in a corner, but Danny waved him off and said he’d find his own… politely, of course. He didn’t want any special treatment around here, and he said hey to anyone who greeted him with a smile or came over to shake his hand.
It wasn’t long before a small crowd had formed around him, and I was getting pushed farther and farther back, clutching my glass of wine against my chest while the men looked at Danny in awe, and the women looked at him like he was a Sunday roast dinner they wanted to gobble up.
Tourists, I thought. No way would the locals behave that way.
Danny remained polite until he caught sight of me drifting, and he leaned through two guys to reach for my hand, guiding me to him when I took it. Wrapping an arm around my shoulder, he pulled me to his side, and I saw the look of disappointment flash across some of the women’s faces.
This kind of attention made me uncomfortable, and I looked up at Danny with flaming hot cheeks and pleading eyes.
This was a bad idea.
“Nice to meet you guys,” Danny said, addressing the small gathering, “but I’ve got one night left here, and I plan on spending it with my girl, if you don’t mind.”
My girl. That made my heart race.
With a nod, the men and women parted like the Red Sea, letting us pass through.
“I don’t know how you deal with that,” I muttered, slipping into place across from him when he found a table by the window, overlooking the ocean.
“They weren’t so bad.” He took a sip of his pint before he dropped his glass to the table and leaned closer. “Although I saw a few of the locals sitting at the bar looking at you like they thought you were stupid to be here with me.”
“Are you talking about Evelyn Welsh? Because I don’t think I’ve ever seen her not look at someone that way. Talk about your resting bitch face.”
“Her, and those Harrison brothers.”
I glanced back over to the bar to see Jordan and Kian Harrison staring over their shoulders at us, only to look away quickly when they saw me staring back. “I hate those guys,” I whispered. “They’re so creepy.”
“That’s because they’ve both had a thing for you since we were fourteen years old, Zee.”
“What?” I turned back to him. “Me? Eww. They’ve never even spoken to me properly.”
“Stage fright. The best of men get it.”
With my nose turned up, I looked at the brothers again. “I wish you hadn’t told me that. Now I’m going to be even more awkward around them.”
Danny laughed, glanced at his watch, and he ran his tongue over his bottom lip before he took another drink of his beer. We made idle talk for a good thirty minutes, unable to stop ourselves from glancing around when we heard the giggles and whisperings of a few younger girls. When a not-so-subtle camera flashed, I rose to stand and give whoever had taken a picture a piece of my mind, but Danny reached over to place his hand on my forearm. With just a shake of his head and green eyes that said so many things, he had me sitting back down slowly, but not before I threw a spiteful look at the people staring at us.
“Seriously. How do you deal with this?”
“It’s part of the package.”
“It shouldn’t be.”
“You’d be surprised what you can adapt to. It helps when I stay away from small-town pubs for a start.”
“Then why come here tonight?”
“Because… this is my home.” He rubbed his lips together in thought. “I’m done hiding behind trees at funerals, hiding away at Gran’s house, sitting at the beach at midnight when no one else is around. I did nothing wrong to these people, Zee. They don’t deserve an explanation from me just for running off and chasing a dream. Only you and Gina ever really needed that. Now I’ve gi
ven it, the rest can, quite frankly, go fuck themselves. If I want to come to my old stomping ground for a drink, you can bet your arse I’m going to make that happen.”
I smiled, unable to stop myself, and I was about to open my mouth to say something when I heard the commotion pouring into The Hideaway.
“Damn, that was a long arse drive!” Halo cried as he stepped into the pub, making the whisperings turn to full-blown adoration when he threw his arms in the air like the performer he was, and he walked up to the bar as though he owned the place. “Woo, I see a bar. Time to destroy my reputation!”
My eyes were bugging out of my head, and when I turned to Danny, he was as casual as ever, his smirk in place as he shook his head and watched Halo make his entrance.
A high-pitched scream went up, and Theo stepped in, as cocky as ever, throwing winks the girls’ way before Fletch sauntered in behind him, high-fiving some guy who held his hand in the air in waiting. Archer arrived soon after with Saffron in tow.
At the sight of Saff, my shoulders relaxed, and I looked back at Danny. “Did you…” I pointed in their general direction. “Did you know about this?”
He simply shrugged and smirked.
“Shit,” I breathed, taking them in as Halo ordered half of the bar, and the guy behind it called all his servers to service. “We’re going to need a bigger table.”
Before I knew it, the guys were standing over us with a drink in their hands while the barmen rushed several buckets of ice and champagne our way. I’d barely moved, but chairs were being dragged over, and space was somehow made, with Saff cosying up next to me and nudging my shoulder casually.
“Hey, girl. Nice to see you again.”
“H-hi…” I said, a little surprised still. “What are you guys doing here?”
“Didn’t Danny tell you? He lost a bet to the guys.”
“What bet?”
She rolled her eyes, but her amusement was obvious. “They said he couldn’t last the week without sinking his claws into you again when he came back to this place.”
“And Danny said he could?”
“He said it wouldn’t happen because you wouldn’t want it to.”
I looked over to see Danny standing over his stool, slapping Archer on the back with the brightest smile on his face. Sure, I made him happy, but they did, too, in equal measure.
“When you showed up at the gig the other night, the lads cashed in their end of the bet.”
“And that was…?” I asked, turning back to her.
Saffron pressed her bottle of cider to her lips, taking a long drink before she raised it and tipped the end towards the guys. “That they could come to Danny’s hometown and shake shit up a bit. Danny always told them it was like a cove filled with zombies.” Her eyes found mine. “And these lot love nothing more than riding in and raising the dead.”
Thirty-Six
“And then Fletch throws himself off the platform—for no other reason other than he’s young, dumb, full of come—and he’s obviously expecting this big, burly guy in the front row and all his mates to catch him. But Fletch is a thick fuck, and he’s high on some shit, totally misjudging his jump… and he… and he lands straight on top of this bird.” Halo laughed as he stood over the table, holding our attention, one hand in the air waving around a glass of Jack Daniels. “She’s this skinny, petite thing, and Fletch knocks her back, and his face lands right in between her big, fake titties. It’s like a really bad scene that’s been set up from Naked Gun, part a million.”
“It was pretty funny,” Fletch added, looking at me.
“The girl starts screaming. The big burly guy who Fletch wanted to catch him lifts him from her. Fletch goes to thank him and this guy—who paid fifty quid to see us play, I might add, and was wearing a Frogs T-shirt—smashes his fist straight into Fletch’s face before he points at him and says, ‘You just had your face in my wife’s tits!”
The whole table starts laughing, while I’m staring at Fletch with wide eyes, admittedly unable to stop my smile from erupting. “Did that really happen?”
“Oh, yeah.” Fletch nodded, swallowing down his drink. “Security got involved. There was a big fight. The show had to stop. I had this bulging eye that made me see three of everything.” Fletch glanced over at Danny. “Which city were we in?”
Danny scratched the side of his head. “Moscow.”
“Moscow.” Fletch laughed. “I shit myself. Thought I was about to be rushed off to some dingy prison over there or sold to the Russian Mafia.”
“He’s watched too many bad Liam Neeson films,” Danny said to me.
“Fuck off. You can never watch too many Liam Neeson films,” Fletch argued.
By this point, Halo was doubled over laughing with tears rolling down his cheeks. “You should have seen him,” he squeaked. “All night long, he jumped every time someone walked into the trailer. ‘Let’s just get on the bus, man, and head back to the airport, for fuck’s sake. I don’t wanna die out here.’ Jules had to calm his arse down.”
“Slapped me straight across the cheek,” Fletch interjected, wafting the back of his hand over his face. “Stung like a bitch. That was the last time I ever pissed Jules off.”
“It takes a lot to get her to that point,” Archer added from where he was standing with his arm around Saffron’s shoulder. She didn’t look fazed by anything they were saying. The roll of her eyes and shake of her head told me so.
So far, I’d heard about Archer’s drum kit falling to pieces halfway through a set at a small venue and the crowd booing the band, to which Halo’s response was to whip his cock out to the crowd. The women screamed, and it wasn’t until after thirty seconds of him being on display that he remembered this wasn’t strictly an adult-only event. Jules had had her work cut out dealing with that PR nightmare.
Then there’d been the time that Theo secretly got videoed by two women who wanted to extort him for some serious cash by releasing a sex tape he hadn’t known was happening. Only halfway through the act, the rest of the guys from the band had barged into the room and disturbed Theo’s manage-a-trois, ‘blowing’ the girls’ plans to smithereens. Another PR impossibility that only Jules seemed capable of handling.
“And what about Danny?” I asked the guys with a smile on my face.
Halo sniffed back his tears of laughter, a long sigh blowing out before he glanced at Archer, who glanced at Saffron, who glanced at Fletch, who glanced at Theo, before all eyes landed on Danny sitting opposite me.
He showed no concern whatsoever, and when the silence got too intense, eventually Halo laughed, and Danny shrugged. “No flies on me,” Danny said with confidence.
“I’m pretty sure we could dig down to some shit,” Halo warned.
“Nothing… I don’t know… rock star-ish? Nothing scandalous? Nothing stupid?” I went on, very aware that I was walking on a very thin tight rope of happiness here.
Theo scoffed. “The most stupid thing he’s ever done was fuck JJ Jones.”
Danny’s face fell instantly, and he glared at Theo as though, if I hadn’t been there, he’d have jumped on him and beat him to a pulp.
I had no idea who the hell JJ Jones was, but from the mutterings going on among the others, she was someone they definitely knew.
Theo looked up from his drink, sensing everyone’s eyes on him. “What?”
Archer smacked him up the back of the head, while Fletch scratched his own eyebrow, and Halo pushed his fist to his mouth to stop himself from laughing. Danny looked angry as all hell.
I turned to Saffron. “Who is that? That JJ person?”
“Don’t worry about her, honey. She’s just some celeb who gets around a bit.”
“You’ve never heard of JJ Jones?” Halo asked, his scowl deep when I turned his way. “She’s one of the biggest actresses of the last decade.”
“More known for her nasty cocaine habit and ability to sleep with anything erect than her actual acting skills, I might add,” Saffron cleared up, be
fore she shot a sharp glare at Halo and muttered something under her breath.
“Yeah, but she’s fit—Ouch! Fuck, Saff!” Theo cried, rubbing the back of his head where he’d just been whacked.
My attention drifted to Danny again, who had his eyes closed and was rubbing his eyebrows.
“Well, she sounds… nice?” I offered quietly. He looked up at me, full of apologies I wasn’t sure he needed to make. I smiled to reassure him. It was a weak smile full of fake strength, but I gave it to him anyway. “Anything erect, huh?”
“It’s a long story, and one I regret,” Danny assured me, his voice quieter than it had been for days.
“You don’t have to explain anything to me.”
A weird tension drifted over the table, and I hated it. I hated that all eyes were on me, wondering if I was about to blow up in some kind of jealous rage I clearly had no right to feel. We hadn’t been together. Danny could see whoever he wanted to see. I’d been sleeping with Ben. But something about him lowering his standards to someone who would ‘sleep with anything erect’ made me feel somewhat sad inside. I thought he was better than that.
“Holy shit! Is that all of Front Row Frogs?” a voice I recognised cried out.
Jackson charged over to our table, and by the time he pushed his way to me, he was panting, with wide eyes that travelled around the group.
“Hey, Jax,” I said, pulling his attention down to me. “You okay?”
“Aunt Dais, you have the coolest friends.”
“You know this kid?” Halo asked. Jackson turned his way, swallowing down and running a hand through his hair. “Hey, man,” Halo said with a smile. “Nice to meet you.”
“Me?” Jackson’s eyes went impossibly wide. “Nice to meet me? You’re… you’re…”
Halo laughed. “Yeah, I am.”
Jax pointed at Archer. “And you’re…”
Archer nodded. “Yup.”
He pointed at Fletch and Theo next, doing the same, before his eyes drifted to Danny and he smiled. “Hey, Danny. You didn’t tell me the band was coming to HC. I would have told my friends. I would have told—”