Catching Lucy

by Terri Anne Browning

  In the four months that they had been playing here every Thursday night, Tainted Knights had made their own following along with attracting offers from other managerial firms that they’d had to turn down. Tainted Knights was a smart band. They knew that having Emmie Armstrong as their manager would be their best option. Hell¸ she was my dad’s manager and she had done a kick ass job for OtherWorld’s career.

  Jace and I talked business for another twenty minutes before I finally forced myself up and out of my office. It was only eight thirty but I needed to make the rounds. Jace flanked me as I took my private elevator up to the VIP floor. As soon as we stepped off, people started tossing greetings at us both.

  I shook hands, made sure that the big-wigs who thought they were hot shit because they were in my VIP lounge were having a good time, and started toward the bar.

  Seeing me, Nate left two chicks at the other end of the bar and brought me over my usual beer before pouring a glass of whisky for Jace. “Jenna’s looking bad, boss. And she’s been making friends with angels.”

  I grimaced. “So she’s here?” Nate nodded his head across the room and I turned to look for my friend and roommate. The place was filling up so I didn’t see her immediately. “Is she high?”

  “She’s in an entire different galaxy, she’s so high, man. I gave her one glass of champagne, but told her that was all she was getting.” Nate gave me an apologetic look when I turned to glare at him. I’d told him that Jenna wasn’t allowed any booze when she came in. After the last time she’d gotten drunk and nearly fallen over the banister onto the first floor, I’d put my foot down about her drinking. I wasn’t going to be responsible for her killing herself while in my club. “Sorry, boss. She was making an ass of herself and I didn’t want someone going out to tell the paps that Jenna Stevenson was in here Lindsey Lohan-ing it up.”

  I scrubbed my hands over my face in aggravation. “Yeah, okay. I understand. I’m going to go put her in a cab. After tonight I’m not letting her in here until she gets her shit together. So if you see her, I want to know immediately.”

  “Sure thing, boss.”

  Jace tossed back the rest of his drink and set the tumbler on the bar top. “Let’s get this over with,” he grumbled and I pushed my barely touched beer toward the bartender before turning to follow my friend. “You need to talk to Natalie about her, Harris. She’s falling deeper into Tessa’s bullshit more and more every day.”

  My eyes roamed around the room, trying to spot Jenna and whatever new friends she was making. What had Nate said? She was with angels? Knowing Jenna, that could mean about anything. “Tessa said that she wasn’t touching coke anymore. She doesn’t know how Jenna keeps getting it.”

  Jace made a disbelieving sound but didn’t say anything else as he helped me look. Jace hated Jenna’s girlfriend, Tessa. I wasn’t a big fan of her either—fuck, I hated her—but if she made my friend happy, I wasn’t going to alienate her and give Jenna a reason to think I didn’t support her.

  “I think I see her over there.” Jace pushed past a few girls who were just standing in the middle of the room talking.

  I offered them a smile and a wink as I excused us and followed after him. The two chicks giggled and lowered their eyes to look at me flirtingly through their fake lashes. I recognized them as the new Victoria Secret models and I might have stopped to talk to them if I wasn’t in such a rush to find Jenna and get her out of the club.

  My eyes were still on the two models as I followed after Jace. The tightening of my jeans reminded me that I hadn’t gotten laid in weeks because I’d been so busy with work. After I got Jenna in a cab, I was definitely going to have to rectify that.

  “Jenna, close your fucking legs,” I heard Jace snap and my head snapped around to find my friend sprawled out on a couch with her eyes half closed and the glass of champagne tipped at an angle so that it was dripping onto the expensive piece of leather furniture.

  I raked my hands through my short dark hair, mussing it up. She looked like what she was turning into: a drug addict. My gut clenched as I stared down at the girl who had been my friend for so many years. She hadn’t always been so broken, and really she wasn’t now. She didn’t have a hard life; the biggest thing she really had to deal with was her judgmental mother who called every so often. Jenna was just bored and that made her growing addiction even worse in my eyes.

  With her thick makeup smeared all over her face, it was hard to see the beautiful girl underneath. The hooker clothes she was wearing exposed a body that would have had most men hard in a second at just one look, but the way she was spread-eagle for the world to see made her beautiful body just look cheap and used.

  “Yeah, I told her to do that five times already. She’s so out of it that I don’t think she heard me,” a voice that was achingly familiar bit out and my eyes slowly lifted from Jenna in disbelief.

  But there she was, in the flesh, and I realized exactly what Nate had been talking about when he’d said Jenna was with angels. I wouldn’t have called Lucy an angel, however. Her sister Lana was nicknamed angel by her husband and that was what the paps called her in most of the tabloids when they printed their shit about her.

  No, there was nothing angelic about Lucy Thornton. She was too fiery to be such a creature. She was an entity in and of herself, her beauty surpassing any mythical being. That wild, curly, dark hair that fell down her back and those nearly black eyes in a face like porcelain made a man want to fall to his knees and spout poetry. I’d never seen another girl as beautiful as Lucy. Believe me, there probably wasn’t one out there, because I’d been looking.

  I hadn’t seen her except in random pictures in tabloids for years now, and they hadn’t done her justice. Tonight she was dressed in a Demon’s Wings shirt with black leggings and boots that did nothing to hide the fact that she was only five foot four. She had on just a little makeup that made her lips look swollen and her eyes even darker than I remembered.

  Without looking at me, she spoke to Jace. “So, is she like this a lot?”

  Jace shrugged. “More often than not, lately.”

  “Is he into it?” she asked, nodding her head in my direction. I stiffened at the tone of her voice. It was full of anger and disgust and I thrust my hands into my front pockets. She couldn’t ask me or—oh, I don’t know—look at me? There had been a time when she would have asked me anything, but that was another lifetime ago.

  The sudden thrill that I’d felt at seeing her vanished in a puff of smoke. The stab of hurt that felt like it cut me in half quickly changed to anger as I glared down at the girl who had once known my every secret. Someone’s turned into a total bitch over the years. When had things changed so much? I’d been wondering that a lot lately. When had I lost my best friend and, more to the point, why had I lost her? But mostly, I wanted to know how I could get her back.

  In that moment I was too pissed off to care if I ever did. “If you answered an email ever or actually called me every now and then you would know that I’m not into drugs. But it’s nice to know that you care enough to immediately think I would do something like that, princess.”

  Brown eyes turned pitch black as she took two steps closer to me. I towered over her by twelve and a half inches, outweighed her by at least ninety pounds, but that didn’t seem to matter as she met my glare boldly. “Call me princess again, I dare you.”

  Lowering my head, I smirked at her. “Princess.” Even in the dim lighting I saw the fire that sparked in her eyes. I knew I was being a dick, knew that the paps had hurtfully labeled her the over-privileged rock princess who thought she was too good for her dad’s world, but I was too pissed to care. “If I’d known you were coming I would have rolled out the red carpets and—”

  The crack of her hand against my cheek stopped whatever my dumb ass might have continued to spew at her. Regret washed over me as I saw the shimmer of tears before she turned away. “I knew coming tonight was a mistake. Thanks for proving me right.” She shook her head,
causing long curls to dance wildly around her shoulders. “Nice place you have here, and it’s awesome that you’re turning our friend into a cokehead. That’s just about perfect. But now I’m bored, so I think we’re going to head out.”

  She glanced behind Jace and I followed her gaze to a man in a suit as big as any of my security men walking toward us with a tall chick with long red hair. I recognized the man as Lucy’s bodyguard from the few pictures I’d seen over the years of her in the tabloids. The girl was someone I’d seen in recent papers as Scott Montez’s daughter. “I’m so ready to get out of here, Kin.”

  Kin pushed past me and wrapped her arms around Lucy’s neck. “What’s wrong?” I heard her murmur.

  “I just want to go.” The tears were gone now and her voice was full of steel. “Do you mind?”

  “No, of course not…”

  Jace made a choking sound and I forced my eyes from Lucy to the Tainted Knight’s front man. “Kin?”

  The redhead stiffened and turned her head, and when her bright eyes landed on the rocker they widened for a moment before frosting over. “Jace.”

  I watched as Jace swallowed hard and took a hesitant step toward the taller girl. “What are you doing here?”

  “Lucy invited me.” If a person could catch frostbite from someone’s tone of voice, I was positive that Jace would have needed medical attention right then. She looked less enthused to see Jace than Lucy was to see me at the moment.

  Jace ignored it and shook his head, his eyes seeming to eat up the sight of the beautiful redhead. “No, I mean… what are you doing here… in California.”

  A flash of something that looked a lot like pain crossed her face and she lowered her eyes to her clasped hands for a second before clenching her jaw and meeting his gaze once more. “I’m sure you have better things to do than listen to my life story since I last saw you.” She took hold of Lucy’s hand and turned away. “Let’s go.”

  “No.” Jace moved until he was blocking their path. He caught her free hand that she quickly tried to jerk away from him, but he held firm. “Don’t go.” His throat bobbed as if he were having trouble swallowing, which amused me. In the few months that I’d known Jace and become friends with him, I’d seen him score with one girl after the other. That this chick was tossing him off his game was beyond funny to me. “Fuck, I’ve missed you.”

  With her back turned toward me I couldn’t see the look on Kin’s face, but from the way her shoulders stiffened I knew that she either didn’t like his admission or didn’t believe him. “Yeah, I could tell from all those phone calls and text messages you didn’t send. I’m not in the mood to listen to your bullshit, Jace. Move or be moved.”

  Lucy’s bodyguard stepped up behind the two girls and whatever expression Jace saw on the guy’s face must have told him that he would definitely not want to be moved. Jace glared at the bodyguard for a long moment before finally stepping back.

  I had the sudden urge to take his place. I didn’t want Lucy to leave. Even though she had pissed me off and yeah, hurt me more than a little, I still wanted her to stay so that we could hang out and catch up. I missed my best friend so damn much.

  I took two steps to follow after them as they left but Jenna chose that moment to tune into what was going on around her and promptly vomited all over the couch.

  Fucking perfect.

  Chapter 4

  Lucy

  The sound of the doorbell woke me.

  I groaned as I turned over in bed and pulled my extra pillow over my head. From the way the sun was shining through my window, and the noise coming from my brothers’ room down the hall, I knew it had to be between midmorning to early afternoon.

  Last night had definitely not gone as I’d expected. Kin hadn’t even wanted to sleep over after that whole scene with Jace St. Charles. She hadn’t said more than a few words on the drive home. Most of them had included her telling me who the hot guy who had been so surprised to see her at First Bass was, and her asking Marcus to take her straight home. She had spent the majority of the ride home frowning out the side window as Marcus had gotten us out of the city.

  I’d been okay with her quietness. After seeing Harris again, I didn’t want to talk much myself. Had he always been such an asshat? Exhaling long and hard, I tossed the pillow at the end of the bed and glared up at my ceiling.

  I was surprised Mom had let me sleep that long. She normally liked to have us all at the breakfast table on Sunday mornings. It wasn’t like I’d gotten home overly late the night before. Ten on a Saturday night was definitely not late, especially when she liked for me to be home no later than one as an unenforced curfew. Unenforced, because I rarely stayed out later than eleven on the rare occasions that I did go out.

  Even though I’d gotten home at an uncool hour and gone straight to bed, I hadn’t fallen asleep until nearly dawn. My mind hadn’t wanted to shut up and I’d been helpless to make it comply with my wants and demands. All I could think about was Harris and how good he had looked. My crush had definitely not been smothered out in the four-year exile I’d kept it in from my old friend.

  If you’d seen Harris Cutter, then you couldn’t blame me for my infatuation. It was possible that he was the most delicious piece of male specimen to walk to planet. At six feet, five and a half inches he stood even taller than my dad. His dark hair was cut short, something that he’d always been a stickler over. Aquamarine eyes were startling against his natural tan complexion and those damn dimples were enough to leave a girl speechless when they were flashed at her.

  When I was twelve, however, it hadn’t just been his appearance that had made me crush on him. I’d been privileged enough to get to know the soul underneath the killer looks. I’d known how kind his heart could be and how deep the scars from his childhood hurts had gone.

  Maybe I hadn’t understood what I’d lost when I’d let our friendship fade into nothing four years ago, but after last night I didn’t know if I ever wanted to find it again.

  Seeing Jenna so trashed had been bad. I didn’t know what I should do about her coked-out state. Sure I knew what I wanted to do and that was to get Shane, Drake, and Natalie together and tell them what I’d seen the night before. But what if Harris was into that shit, too? What if…

  What if he was supplying her the drugs?

  Jenna obviously needed help, but did Harris need it too? Would me going to Jenna’s siblings destroy his chances of continuing to keep his club going so successfully? If he really was the one hooking her up with the drugs, I knew that Drake and Shane wouldn’t think twice before having Aunt Emmie crush him into dust.

  She would do it without a second’s hesitation.

  After Harris had shredded me with just a few well-placed barbs that he’d known would eviscerate me, I was left wondering why I should still show him such lingering loyalty.

  A tap on my bedroom door had me sitting up and pulling my comforter tighter around me. “Yeah?” I called out and the door opened.

  The big man with his head shaved smoothly bald stuck his head inside. When he saw me sitting up, his ever changing brown eyes turned to amber and his face softened as he smiled. I smiled back and it was only slightly forced. I loved my dad more than any other man in the world. He might not have been my biological father, but he would always be the man I called Daddy. “Hey, baby. You have a guest downstairs. Feeling up to it?”

  I pushed my curly hair out of my face. “Sure, Daddy. Give me a few minutes and I’ll be right down.” Tossing back the covers, I stood. “Is it Kin?”

  Jesse Thornton’s eyes switched just as suddenly as his emotions, darkening to licorice. “No. Get dressed. Take as long as you need.” He gave me another smile, but his eyes didn’t turn back to amber. “Love you, Lu.”

  As it always did, emotion tightened my throat at hearing my dad telling me he loved me. He said it so often but it never failed to affect me when I heard the words. “Love you, Daddy.”

  When he shut the door behind him, I hurri
ed into my bathroom and jumped into the shower. Twenty minutes later I was clean and my hair was a tangled, wet mess. I ran my fingers through it, put in some detangler so that I could actually get my wide-toothed comb through the monstrosity, then pulled it back into a ponytail. I didn’t bother with makeup, just smoothed on some moisturizer before tossing on a pair of yoga pants and a matching hoodie. Most likely whoever had come to see me wouldn’t want to stay in the house with all the craziness that went on with my brothers, and I always got cold walking on the beach.

  I bounced down the stairs, feeling slightly more human after having my shower than when I’d first woken up. I heard my mom laughing and turned toward the happy sound. It brought a smile to my lips. I loved the sound of Mom’s laughter. It was so happy and contagious that it infected everyone within earshot of her.

  I walked through the living room, where Lyric was sitting on the couch with Luca and… I stopped when I saw the little girl sitting between the twins. Trinity was two years younger than my brothers. She spent a lot of time at my house since she was a friend of the boys and her parents were close to mine.

  She was also Harris’s little sister.

  “Hi, Lucy,” Trinity greeted me with a happy smile as she shared a bowl of popcorn with the boys. “Are you better?”

  I frowned. “Better?”

  “Yeah, Harris said you weren’t feeling good and we came over to check on you.” Her blue-gray eyes darkened with concern. “Was it a tummy ache? I hate tummy aches. Do you feel better?”

  I brushed my fingers over her long, dark hair. “You know what, sweetheart, I’m feeling a lot better. Is Harris with you?”

  “He’s in the kitchen with your mommy. I think she’s giving him cookies.” She rolled her eyes at me and shook her head. She was the spitting image of her brother and father, but those eyes were one hundred percent her mother. “Harris is always getting cookies.”