But no. As soon as the thought crossed my mind, I knew he would never have done that. I remembered how roughly he’d pulled Carter off of me a few weeks before. Except that didn’t change the fact that Mark seemed to think he had some right to put his hands all over me.
He leaned in close, practically nuzzling my neck. “I don’t do this very often, but how would you and your friend like to come back to my place?”
I rolled my eyes, shrugging my way out from beneath his arm. Out of the corner of my eye, I noticed Jayson headed toward us. The look on his face was murderous and it sent a little thrill through me. Maybe I wasn’t the only one that had caught feelings.
Still, I tried to downplay the situation so as not to cause greater turmoil than there already was within the band.
“Sorry, I’m not interested,” I said.
“Oh come on,” Mark wheedled, apparently oblivious to the approach of Jayson’s wrath. “Who are you saving it for? Does he know what a cocktease you are?”
I scowled, unable to help bristling at his words. “As a matter of fact, I’m only interested in dating guys who have a shot at making it big, not some lazy hack singer from a local band.”
Mark looked confused at that, but before he had really had a chance to react, Jayson was there, grabbing him by the collar and yanking him away from me.
17
Jayson
I was about to lose it. As if the set hadn’t been terrible enough. Now, on top of that disappointment of an evening, I had to watch Mark try and flirt with Leah? That was just too much.
I didn’t know which of the three of us I was more pissed at, and that bothered me more than anything else could have. Was it Mark for always having to flirt with another girl, and another, and another, until it seemed like there was no one left in the whole city he hadn’t had his paws on? Was it Leah for allowing him to sling an arm around her shoulders like that?
Or was I just mad at myself for not staking my claim to her before someone else gave it a try?
The thing was, I knew I couldn’t be mad at Mark. I had never really cared before about who he hit on; I just cared that his insistence on hitting on girls at the moment seemed to be interfering with his ability to be the singer in our band.
No, it wasn’t Mark I was mad at.
I couldn’t be mad at Leah, either. As she slipped away from Mark and turned to look at him with fury in her eyes, I could tell that none of it had been her idea. She didn’t welcome his advances, and she certainly hadn’t invited them.
That made relief go through me. Even if it meant that the only person I had left to be mad at was myself. Leah was different. Leah was all mine.
I yanked Mark away from her, causing him to let out a little yelp of surprise. But before I could give him what for, Leah was laying into him.
“You might have a bunch of groupies now, but do you really think you’re still going to be relevant in a year if your band is just playing the same old songs in the same old smelly bars?” she snapped, folding her arms across her chest and giving him an unimpressed look. “No, you won’t be. That’s not how it works. You either get your shit together or there will be someone new and exciting, and you’ll be forgotten about.”
The words made me wince. It was everything I had been thinking for weeks now. All my worst nightmares, just what I dreaded was our band’s fate. Voiced out loud, in her scornful tone, I couldn’t help but want to go home to bed and pull the covers over my head for the rest of forever.
She was right. We were never going to amount to anything. If she knew it, all our other fans were bound to realize it sooner or later. There was nothing for it; might as well give up now.
Except that I’d always been stubborn when it came to something I really wanted, and Leah was proving to be as well.
“Yeah, I thought that might shut you up,” she said. “But just shutting up isn’t good enough. I hope you remember this in the morning, and I hope you pull your shit together. Because otherwise, it’s only a matter of time before you’re a washed-up nobody with no options.”
I could see Mark physically deflate before my eyes. I released him, trying not to laugh at the expression on his face. I couldn’t help but feel impressed by Leah. She certainly had a knack for getting people to do what she wanted them to do. I only hoped that where Mark was concerned, the truth spurred him into action rather than making him just give up like I’d momentarily wanted to do.
Mark didn’t seem to know what to say. Finally, he just turned and stalked off. I was surprised to see him brush off some of the groupies who flocked to his side. In fact, he walked clear out of the bar. He might just be going to smoke and cool down, but I hoped he might head home and actually get some sleep for once.
“What’s gotten into him?” Luke asked quizzically, joining us at just the moment that Mark left.
I shrugged, still eyeing Leah. “I guess he finally met a fan who didn’t melt when he looked in her direction,” I finally said.
“Huh,” Luke said, looking at first Leah and then Piper. He did a double-take, looking back at Piper, and I could see Leah’s friend blush and duck her head.
“Listen, we’re going to go get some air and talk about some things,” I told Luke, making a split-second decision that whatever the future might hold for us, I needed them all to know that Leah was mine. “Can you chat with…” I trailed off, realizing I didn’t know Leah’s friend’s name.
“Piper,” she supplied, smiling coyly at Luke.
“Sure,” Luke said, not looking back at me as I all but dragged Leah away.
I thought Leah might protest, but when I turned to face her backstage in the warm-up room, she looked like the cat that ate the canary. “Were you jealous, back there?” she asked.
I rolled my eyes. “Of course not,” I muttered. But I couldn’t help but say, “First Carter, then me, now Mark, though? You trying to work your way through the band?”
It was a reflection of my earlier anger coming back. Even though I knew that wasn’t the way things were with her, there was a part of me that couldn’t forget that I barely knew her. Who knew what she was really all about?
Leah didn’t look angry, to my surprise. Anger was what I would have expected from her. Instead, she just looked sad and hurt. “You should realize by now that I’m not like that,” she said. “I’m not just some groupie.” She smiled wryly. “To be honest, a lot of my problems would be solved if you weren’t a drummer.”
I snorted with amusement. “I know,” I sighed. Then, plainly: “I didn’t like turning around and seeing his arm around you like that. No more than I liked seeing Carter get close to you.”
I never said the word “jealous,” but it was there in all of it. How would she take that? What did I mean by that?
For a moment, I let myself picture what it would be like to have a relationship with her. It was hard to imagine her wanting such a thing, though. She was a good girl, and I was the drummer in some local band. She had a career. We might both be focused on the future, we might both be driven, but that was where the similarities ended.
This wasn’t going anywhere. It couldn’t.
Did I want it to? I cared about her; I knew that. I couldn’t seem to get her out of my head, either. Maybe I did want something more with her. I knew it would be a doomed relationship, though.
It wouldn’t be worth going down that road just for both of us to get hurt in the end.
Fortunately, Leah didn’t press me for more. She didn’t tease me for my jealousy. She simply nodded once, slowly. There was something serious and calculating in her gaze, and I wondered if she was thinking along the same lines as me. I wondered if she had come to the same conclusions as me.
Suddenly, I couldn’t stand the distance between us. Who knew how long things would last? Who knew how long the window of opportunity would be there? I had to take advantage of it while I could.
I kissed her hard and long, my body still buzzing with adrenaline from the show and from the ang
er of seeing Mark with his arm around her. For her part, Leah kissed back just as ferociously, her lips jammed up against mine, her tongue a furious presence in my mouth. It was raw and just this side of painful, and somehow it was just another side of the sexiness that she always seemed to exhibit.
I didn’t want to let her go. I definitely didn’t want to watch her go back out into that bar where anyone else could see her. I wished there was some way I could let everyone know that she was mine. I had to settle with kissing her until her lips were swollen, her eyes dark with lust.
I didn’t want anyone else to have her. I wanted to be the only one.
I was in over my head, but I didn’t know what to do about it. She was my lifeline but at the same time, she was my kryptonite.
I kissed her again, sweeter this time. As she slowly smiled up at me, I had a flash of clarity. I knew I was hooked and that there was no going back.
18
Leah
My heart was pounding, just like it always seemed to be when Jayson was near. I had to admit, the whole evening had been thrilling in ways I had never experienced before. From dancing, watching Jayson up on the stage, to standing at the bar yelling at Mark, to being dragged back here, it was as though every small detail of each moment was seared into my brain.
Jayson seemed to hold the key to all the extremes of sensory pleasure for me. I had never felt like this before, and I knew inexplicably that I would never feel this way about anyone else for the rest of my life.
No, Jayson was special to me. And somehow, I knew that I was special to him as well.
That first kiss had my toes curling in my shoes. There was so much emotion in there, so much tension. I wanted him to drag me over to one of the questionable-looking couches along the back wall and take me right there, where anyone could walk in and see us.
This wasn’t me. Or this wasn’t a side of myself that I had ever known before. I wanted to feel ashamed of the way I gave in to him, but there was something about it all that was just so thrilling at the same time. And really, why should I be ashamed? We were two adults, and we wanted one another. We hadn’t talked about the terms of a relationship, but he clearly didn’t want to see me with anyone else, and that was good enough for now, wasn’t it?
He was a rock star, and he’d had had plenty of chances to bring someone else back here tonight, or even to watch someone else dancing around in front of the stage, but instead, he’d only had eyes for me. That was as good as anything that I could expect.
I was starting to wonder if maybe I had been too hasty in my judgment of him. Maybe we could make it work after all.
I shivered, my thoughts derailing as Jayson kissed his way along the tender skin of my neck. “You have no idea how turned on I was watching you dance,” he said, but as he rubbed up against me, I could feel just how hard he was, his bulge practically ripping a hole in his jeans. I reached down and stroked the fabric, and he groaned against my skin, his hips bucking toward me.
Things got hot and messy after that, our kisses turning sloppy, our hands groping and grasping. My whole body prickled with lust, and my chest swelled with emotions I didn’t dare name just yet.
Before things could go too far, though, the door opened. I yanked away from Jayson feeling embarrassed as well as annoyed at the interruption. Was it so much to ask that we could…
My thoughts trailed off at the look on Luke’s face. He looked genuinely apologetic as he averted his eyes from us. “Hey, man, sorry to interrupt, but I need a hand with Carter. I wouldn’t ask if he wasn’t making a total ass of himself.”
Jayson sighed and ran a hand back through his hair. For a moment, I could tell it was on the tip of his tongue to tell Luke to deal with it himself. But then he tucked himself back in and zipped up his pants, giving me an apologetic look. “Sure thing,” he said, heading toward the door. “What’s he up to now?”
I tried not to feel too disappointed as he walked out of there without saying another word to me. I knew how important the band was to him. I shouldn’t feel slighted. They had to come first. Still, standing there alone in the backroom, straightening my clothing and feeling the dampness between my thighs, I couldn’t help but feel cheap.
If I was going to have Jayson, I wanted him to lay me down on soft sheets, to take his time with me. I wanted to lie together all night, his arms around me, his body warm against mine. I wanted soft caresses and sweet kisses.
I wanted the promise of something more. That was what I was really missing here, and what I was really craving. Standing there alone in the backroom, I knew that things were no more resolved than they had ever been. We hadn’t talked about the terms of a relationship. There was no relationship. He was just a guy I had slept with a few times.
I took a deep breath and let it out slowly, trying not to feel disappointed with it all. I remembered what Piper had told me: if I wanted him, I could have him. I had something that the rest of the groupies didn’t have.
I had felt that way earlier in the night, anyway. I tried to cling to that feeling now.
I headed out into the bar, pasting a smile on my face. I knew that if Jayson was dealing with Carter, it was probably going to be an all-night thing with Carter crashing at his place again. I tried to tell myself that that was fine. There would be another time.
In any case, it sounded like Luke was involved in things too, which meant that Piper probably wasn’t getting anything more out of him that night, either. We would head home and do this again another night. No big deal.
As I was on my way back to Piper, though, a cute bottle-blonde stepped into my path. “Hey, new girl,” she said in a way that was anything but friendly or welcoming. “Listen, I know you don’t know how things work around here, but there’s a bit of a hierarchy where it comes to us. I’ve got dibs on Jayson.”
I blinked at her, barely believing the words had just come out of her mouth. She had dibs on him? Like he was just some toy for them to squabble over. I made a face of disgust. Who was this chick?
“I think that’s up to Jayson to decide,” I said.
The woman narrowed her eyes at me. “You might be having fun with him now, but you know it won’t last,” she said coolly.
I rolled my eyes. “You have no idea what Jayson and I have, so why don’t you just butt out?”
She loomed closer. “I’ve seen a lot of bands, and I’ve never seen a musician be faithful for long. That’s not the kind of thing that a girl like you is looking for, and we both know it. So why don’t you leave him for someone who can handle him?”
I bristled, but before I could say anything else, she turned and sauntered away toward the bar, not giving me a backward glance.
I frowned. I didn’t want to believe what she had said to me, but on the other hand, she had given voice to some of the same fears I’d had about Jayson from the start.
And hell, I had seen him come home with Mark and those two girls, hadn’t I? I didn’t even know if he had been faithful since the first time we had slept together, and that had only been a matter of weeks. Granted, we had never outright talked about fidelity. How could I ever expect it from him, though?
They weren’t even famous yet. They might be a big enough thing to keep playing shows and to have a coterie that followed them from bar to bar, but they weren’t a huge sensation like they could potentially be if they pulled it together and were heard by the right people.
How could I compete against all the other women who would throw themselves at him once he really made it? I just couldn’t do that.
It wasn’t that I lacked self-esteem, I was just realistic. I was some girl from a small town in the middle of nowhere. My life had been somewhat sheltered, now that I thought about it, and I knew that I lacked a certain sophistication and worldliness. I was destined to wind up with someone quiet and gentle and small-town just like me. That was just the way things worked.
In any case, I had to admit that there was a reason we had never discussed the relationship thin
g, or even discussed whether this fling was a thing that would continue. It wasn’t just that we could barely be in the same room with one another without ripping off one another’s clothes. No, the real reason was that I knew exactly how that conversation would go.
Even if he promised to try to be faithful to me, there was no way I could expect him to uphold that end of the bargain. Just like I couldn’t trust him not to wake me up in the middle of the night with his drumming. It was just the person he was, and there was no changing that.
I didn’t have any right to try to change that.
No, that groupie was right. He would be better off with someone who could handle the lifestyle that he lived. That person wasn’t me. I had surprised myself with everything I had done since I had come to LA, but there were certain things that would never change about me. I would never be with someone I couldn’t trust to be faithful to me. That was all there was to it.
I couldn’t help but feel a little depressed as I headed back to where I had left Piper before.
“Are you okay?” Piper asked immediately, seeing the expression on my face. I didn’t want to talk about it, though, so I waved the question away.
“I’ve got early meetings tomorrow,” I told her. “I think it’s probably time to call it a night and head home.”
Piper frowned. “Do you want to at least wait for Jayson?” she asked. “Sounds like they’re just going to stuff the guitarist in a car; I’m sure it won’t take long.” I could hear from the hopeful note in her voice that she was hoping I would stick around so that she would have a reason to hang around waiting for Luke.
I just wanted to go home and forget that tonight had happened. I couldn’t seem to get the blonde’s words out of my head. This thing that Jayson and I had, there was no way it could last.
I still didn’t know the rules of the game, but all the other players did. Not only that, but I was sure they knew how to take advantage of the rules to make sure I could never win.
The Boy Next Door: A Standalone Enemies-to-Lovers Romance Page 9