by Piper Lawson
Some musicians make their fans feel welcome, invite them into their lives and homes on social media.
Tyler’s always held them at a distance.
The paparazzi love him. The cleverer he gets at evading, the more they stalk. I empathize with both sides—him wanting privacy and fans dying to know more about this man who lights up a stage with his earnest talent.
They want to know who Tyler Adams is.
Can’t say I blame them.
Seeing him at the party affected me. Not in a jealousy kind of way, but because catching up with him after reminded me of the deliberate, thoughtful guy I grew up with. Except there was a new dimension to him, too. An ease, with himself and the world, that he didn’t have when we were together.
Just because we’ve barely spoken in two years doesn’t mean we can’t be civilized adults now. There’s no rule that say you need to hate your ex.
“Let me try.” I brush past him and tug the phone from the pocket of my jean shorts and set it down.
It’s a tight fit under the desk as I crouch, but there’s a hole to thread the cord through, and I work away at it.
“Thanks. Didn’t know this office came with tech support,” Tyler says, his voice muffled from above the desk.
I flip him off and he chuckles.
My phone rings on the desk.
“Ian,” he reads off the display, and I stiffen.
“Do not get that.”
“You playing hooky from work?”
I stick my head out, glaring up at him. “Tyler, I’m serious.”
“Not a work call. Boyfriend, then. Wonder if he knows you’re ducking him.”
The casual words drag me back to the past.
The first time we broke up, when he left me after high school, it was a rip. A violent tear.
The second time was a loosening, little by little. Day by day. My heart wasn’t ripped from my chest; it was pried—with a blunt, persistent instrument—worked under one edge at a time, until nothing remained to hold it in its place.
Unreturned phone messages thanks to demanding rehearsals. Half-hearted texts after long flights. Two months of slow descent, the beginning of the end.
But it was what I wanted when I told him to take that tour. For his life to go on, and mine too.
We’ve both moved on. I resist the urge to rub at my chest, the dull ache there as my fingers rush to finish what I started so I can get out of here, get relief from the way his presence affects me.
The cord finally clicks into place, and I grunt with triumph before I rock back on my heels to take him in.
“What about you?” I challenge, thinking of how I walked in on him yesterday. “Is that why you never post on social—so you can keep a bunch of women in different cities who want to think they’re the only one? It’s not original, but it’s effective.”
Tyler drops into the task chair. He props an elbow on the armrest, displaying the threads of ink that wind up his arm. I swear there are more than there were two years ago. I try to ignore the fact that his perfect denim-clad hips, those strong legs, are at eye level.
“I don’t post pics with women because it’s not my ‘brand’.” The self-mocking in his voice and the air quotes make me blink. “Marketing sent me a sheet with these adjectives about how the label thinks I should appear.”
I stand, then sink my hips back against the desk. I realize too late I’m still practically in his lap. “Let me guess—you’re mysterious but earnest. Intense. Maybe even repressed, except when you’re on stage.”
“How’d you get a copy?”
I can’t help laughing, and Tyler grins too. The familiarity of it washes over me.
“I didn’t. But I know you. I know how you are on stage and when you’re alone in a room. I know why fans go crazy for you, and I know the things they’d go crazier for if they knew.”
The laughter in his eyes fades at the intimacy of my words.
Okay, acting civilized is one thing. Don’t let this get weird, I chastise.
“So when are you heading back to LA?” I ask, dragging a finger along the surface of the desk for somewhere to look that’s not his handsome face, the lines of his strong arms, or the hand covered in scars and new ink.
“I promised to help your dad out with his new protégé for a couple of weeks while I’m on break.”
My gaze snaps to his. “You’re not staying at the house.” The horror in my voice would be funny under other circumstances.
“I have a hotel.”
Relief has me sagging against the desk. “I might be sticking around a couple of weeks, too.”
Those chocolate eyes spark so fast I almost think I’ve imagined it.
I’m here to clear my head for work and help Haley.
Tyler could be a distraction.
You think?
I can handle being around him for a few days. I’ll probably barely see him.
It’s not like high school, where we were bumping into each other in the kitchen, by the pool, every day in class.
“This place is pretty epic,” Tyler notes, looking around.
“Right? It’s so new. Haley told me they stripped it down to almost nothing before rebuilding.”
“Not nothing.” Tyler nods toward the ceiling.
I crane my neck to look up, spotting the same thing he has. “The rafter.”
One of the beams from the original pool house is still visible, painted to match the white ceiling and spanning this office and the next one.
“You can always start over, but you can never erase the past,” I murmur.
“Do you want to?”
I look back at Tyler, one brow lifted under a fall of dark hair.
Those words have me thinking of us again. How we might have grown up and moved on with our lives, but we can’t forget what we were.
“No,” I say at last. “I don’t.”
Tyler tugs at a drawer, which glides open to reveal nothing except a container of paper clips. He pulls out a paper clip and unbends the end of it. “This Ian of yours. He meet your dad and Haley?”
I frown at the sudden change in subject. “No.”
Tyler moves the chair toward me an inch, two, then hooks the end of the paper clip in the belt loop of my jeans. “A real man meets his girl’s parents.”
He’s close enough his scent invades my senses. It’s the sunshine and cedar I remember, with a smoky edge.
“Does a real man sneak out her window so her parents don’t find out he spent the night?” I counter, thinking of prom, when he took Carly to the dance—when I slept in his arms after and made him promise not to leave.
Tyler’s gaze narrows.
If I didn’t know it was crazy, I’d think he was worked up about Ian.
I don’t need to tell him we’re broken up, because that’ll only invite more questions when it’s none of his business and I really don’t want to talk about it with Tyler.
He rises from his chair, leaning in to murmur at my ear. “The next time I visit your room at night, I promise I’ll use the door after.”
He walks out, leaving the paperclip dangling from my shorts.
8
“Your pinch harmonics are sloppy,” I state.
From his seat on the stool across the studio, the kid Jax recruited stares at me with dead eyes. “Can’t you fix it with the board?”
“I could. But you’re playing it wrong. Play it right, no one’s gotta fix it.”
It’s my first day of babysitting, and the analogy’s not far off. I figured I’d help the kid get the guitar and vocals for a track, but everything’s either wrong or a pain in the ass.
When he gets up from his stool, I demand, “Where are you going?”
He holds up his hands. “Need a smoke break.”
Was this what I was like working with Jax?
No. No way.
Could be I’m pissier than usual. Probably because my hand’s been hurting more in the months since I left the tour—or maybe I have
more time to think about it—and Zeke called and left a belligerent voicemail to say he hadn’t heard back from me about the songs.
I followed up with an email telling him I’d thought he sent them as a joke and I was still laughing.
Fifteen minutes later, there was an email from marketing noting I hadn’t posted anything on social since a picture Beck took in LA and I’m overdue.
I go out to the front room to ask Shay about the schedule, and she pulls her headphones off her ears.
“What’re you listening to?” I ask.
“Local artists. There’s a lot of talent here. One of my favorites is actually playing tonight at Valor. And,” she goes on, both brows rising up her face, “they have two for one drinks. I can text you the details.”
“Thanks.” I’m not planning on going to a local gig and the appeal of two for one drinks has long stopped being a motivator, but I can’t shoot down her enthusiasm.
She punches my number into her phone, but I’m already looking up as the kid comes back in the front door, smelling like smoke and brushing past me to the studio.
I follow him in. “Let’s try the track again. And clean it up this time.”
“You wanna show me what you had in mind with your fucked-up hand?” the kid drawls.
I narrow my gaze. “Give me the guitar.”
He does, and I hook it around my neck.
I’m going to regret this for the next two days, but I don’t even care.
I play the passage like I’m on stage at MSG with no one to cover my ass—including the pinch harmonics.
My hand is on fire, and not in a good way. It hurts like hell. If I had to play an entire set like this, the muscles would give out and I’d have cramps for days.
Thank God I don’t. Only enough to shut this dumb kid up.
It won’t always be like this, I remind myself.
When I’m done, he’s silent.
I shove the guitar in his face. “I can play it with my fucked-up hand, so you can play it with your fucked-up attitude. Again.”
By the time we have something passable, it’s after dark, and I’m beyond ready to get away from this asshole.
For a moment, I debate calling one of the guys I toured with or the friends I met on the road. They’d remind me what it’s like to be around people who take their careers seriously.
On the way to my car, I almost run over the kid, who’s leaning into the hedge that runs along the iron fence separating the pool.
My gaze fixes on Jax’s patio, and I take in what he’s staring at—a woman swimming.
Naked.
The visual hits me like a knockout punch—not because it’s any woman, but because it’s one in particular.
“Keep walking.” I bite out the words, and he jumps, eyes widening as if he’s listening for the first time today.
“Chill, man. She’s swimming naked. Clearly she wants someone to look.”
“Let me guess. You don’t have a girlfriend.”
He shrugs. “Like to keep my options open.”
He heads for his car, where I should be going too, but I reverse directions and go back into the studio, using my swipe key to go out the side door.
Because I should tell her she might be spotted. Not for any other reason.
I let myself in the gate and cross to the cabana. I grab a towel.
When Annie rises up out of the water, shoving her long hair out of her wet face in a way that makes my throat dry, I’m there. “Run out of clean suits already?”
Annie takes me in, hands gripping the edge of the pool as her eyes widen in surprise. “It’s late. Needed to clear my head, and I didn’t think anyone would notice.”
“Just my shit-for-brains kid in the studio. You made his day.”
She smiles, a flash of white in the dark.
Earlier when she told me she was sticking around, I was glad and frustrated at once.
Because even though there’s nothing between us, sharing the same space with her felt right. As if part of me that’d been missing suddenly clicked back into place.
No matter what Jax said, I can coexist with the woman who ripped my heart out.
I can even do it without staring at her ass as she bends under the desk. Or peering over the edge of the pool to see how much of her body is lit by the soft blue lights.
“You coming out?” I ask lightly.
“You turning around?”
“Nothing I haven’t seen.”
“Maybe it’s changed.”
Those three words have me dying to know if she’s right, if she’s different since the last time I touched her, held her, made her pant my name.
I shut my eyes and hold out the towel.
I hear the sound of water dripping as she shifts out, then her voice, inches away. “Thanks.”
She steps closer, and I wrap her in the towel. “You’re not wrong, though. I only packed for a weekend. I’m going to have to raid my old closet, assuming anything in there still fits.”
Her breasts are nearly pressed against my chest through the towel, and I imagine using the terry fabric to drag her body against mine.
“I’ll give you ten bucks to wear your Oakwood uniform for a day.”
She laughs. “Make it twenty and I’ll think about it.”
I open my eyes to find her studying me. Water drips over her shoulders, and there’s a drop on the middle of her lower lip I want to brush off.
It’s hard to remember why I can’t, especially with the visual of her in a pleated skirt and tight shirt firmly in my head.
“So, how’s it going in the studio with my dad’s protégé?” she prompts, and I force myself to focus as she takes the towel from me and knots it around her breasts.
“Brutal. Kid’s a pain in the ass. So why’d you need to clear your head? Your dad? Or the boyfriend?” I ask.
The boyfriend was not part of the updates Beck gave me, something he’s going to eat shit for the next time we talk.
Though now I’m wondering why he didn’t tell me. If he thought I’d be jealous, I’m not. Not even close.
I’m over us, but that doesn’t mean I want her with some guy who doesn’t deserve her. And if she’s avoiding him, it means something’s wrong.
I will always want the best for her, because I loved her once. For a time that feels boundless, until I remind myself it’s over.
Annie pulls her hair over one shoulder and wrings it out, sending drops of water splattering on the patio.
“Both,” she answers at last.
It sounds like what she really needs is to get out of her head. I know that look, not because it’s classic Annie, but because it’s classic me.
I can be around her without rehashing the reasons we broke up, without obsessing over the messy perfection of the times we were together.
I’ll prove it.
“Shay told me about a local concert. Go with me.”
“Like a date?” Her brows shoot up.
“No, music police,” I chastise. “Like I’m going out of my mind and something tells me you are too.”
It’s not an invitation—it’s a challenge. She lifts her chin, like she knows it too. “Fine.”
Annie meets me in my black Lexus nine minutes later.
As she shifts inside, I run my gaze over her black skinny jeans, little heels, black tank. Her hair’s still wet and piled on her head, but it looks intentional, especially with the addition of the dark rims around her eyes and red lips.
Play nice.
I force my attention to the driveway.
It’s a quiet drive to the music hall, and we talk about easy subjects like who was at Jax’s party, the crazy new sponsors Beck got for his Hollywood Life vlog, and whether Haley’s new baby will be a boy or a girl.
“It’s a boy,” I tell her. “I have guy intuition.”
“Definitely a girl,” Annie decides. “Then Dad will have three and his head will literally explode.”
I grin.
So far, so
good.
I pull up halfway across the parking lot as I see the line of music fans waiting to be admitted. “I’m going to get mauled.”
“You’re not that famous,” she scoffs.
“I’m pretty famous.” I say it mostly to watch her roll her eyes.
I grab a jacket out of my car and drag it on over my T-shirt and jeans.
She inspects me and frowns. “The hair…”
“What’s wrong with my hair?”
Annie dives into her little bag and comes back with something that looks like gel. She slicks back my hair. “There. No one would ever recognize you without this mess all over your face.”
“Tell me how you really feel.”
She laughs as we head for the doors. In the heels, she’s tall, almost as tall as me. She nods to security, and it takes me a second to realize she’s actually protecting me, standing between the line of people and me.
It’s oddly sweet.
There are people whose job it is to keep me safe when I’m on the road. But when Annie does it, it feels different.
Once we get in, we head to the bar.
“The real reason I brought you is the two for one drinks.”
“I see. Are you drinking tonight?”
“No. More for you.”
She laughs and we both end up ordering water.
It feels good to get out. Having Annie next to me doesn’t suck either.
No one knows me here, or her for that matter. It’s freeing in a way I haven’t felt free in months.
The headline act starts to play, and I focus on their up-tempo opening number instead of the woman at my side.
“They’re not bad,” I say to her when they pause between songs.
“They’re better than not bad. Look how much they want to be up there. It’s pouring off them.”
I study the band, their energy. “Maybe these kids need a deal. I could fire Jax’s dumbass kid and take them instead.”
“Miranda Talbot, my writing partner, always says to find someone with a voice. That the rest you can develop.”
“It’s not enough to want it. You have to put in the work.”
“Whatever your recipe, it’s effective. I’ve seen your show.”
I straighten in an instant. “Where?”