by Emma Scott
Theo: Still at work?
Now I rolled my eyes, as the irritation took root. I jabbed a text. No, I’m out chain-smoking Marlboro Reds and eating raw steak.
Very funny. Home???
I sighed and contemplated the blank space, my thumb itching to tell him off, to quit hovering over me and leave me alone. I jabbed a few words to that effect, then backspaced the text away with a sigh. I didn’t get to be pissed off anymore. Not on the outside, anyway. Not at him or my parents. My whole situation was shitty enough without making them feel worse.
Yes, I’m home now, I texted. Goodnight, Theo.
C U at shop on Sun.
“I’m sure I will,” I muttered.
I silenced the phone and left it on the kitchen counter on the way to the bedroom. There, I changed out of my limo livery and laid it out on the bed that was neatly made and probably slightly dusty. I changed into a white wife-beater and sleep pants from the plain wooden dresser, then headed to the bathroom in the hall to take a piss and brush my teeth.
I brushed and made plans.
Take Kacey back to the Summerlin house first thing in the morning.
Return the limo to A-1 and get my truck.
Go back to my routine.
No problem. One little speed bump, that’s all tonight had been.
In the living room, Kacey Dawson looked to be sleeping comfortably—or as comfortable as one could get in leather and vinyl. I remembered from my own college days that being hungover and sweating out last night’s booze was a rotten combo. I turned the AC unit at the window on, and settled into the reclining chair across from the couch.
I had to laugh at the scene that would greet my guest should she wake up in the middle of the night: a dinky apartment instead of her mega-mansion, and a strange dude sleeping in a recliner not five feet away instead of in the bed like a normal person.
“Stephen King should take notes,” I muttered, settling into the half-way lying down position my doc recommended. “This’ll teach you to drink your options away, Kacey Dawson,” I muttered as my eyes drifted shut. “Everything in moderation.”
Like my sleep.
I woke up at six, my ass numb from sitting in the same position all night. Not being able to change positions sucked, but I never slept much anyway, and I always came awake sharp and alert. It was as if my body knew time was no longer a luxury I could afford to waste.
I steered my thoughts toward something positive. Sunlight—yellow and sharp—slanted in from the front window. The glass bottles and paperweights caught it, captured it, and sprayed it out on the coffee table in mottled reds, blues, and purples.
“Beautiful,” I murmured. And I had the entire Saturday at the hot shop before me to create more.
The figure on the couch moaned and sighed in her sleep, reminding me with a small jolt I had some unfinished business to take care of first. I threw off the light blanket and moved to the couch. Crouching beside Kacey Dawson, I studied her sleeping face a moment.
“Hey.”
She didn’t stir. Her mouth was slightly open. Dead to the world.
“I’m going to go take a shower,” I told her. “Don’t steal anything.”
I pondered writing her a note to tell her she wasn’t kidnapped but then this probably wasn’t the first time Kacey Dawson woke up after a hard night of partying not knowing where she was. I left it to chance and took my shower.
She was still out cold when I re-emerged, dressed in jeans and a plain T-shirt. My hot shop uniform. At precisely seven a.m. I took my meds, choking down one pill after another. Fifteen in all. My stomach complained instantly, and I got to work making the equally stomach-churning protein shake I drank every morning.
“Sorry, Kacey, this is going to hurt,” I muttered and hit the button on my blender, filling my small apartment with a god-awful buzzing.
The massively hungover Kacey Dawson stirred, groaned, and finally sat up, pushing her tousled hair out of her eyes. She looked around blearily, not seeing me in the kitchen behind her, watching her.
I didn’t know it then—I couldn’t have—but in that moment, the rest of my life, or what was left of it, began.
Someone was cutting down a tree. Fuck that, a whole forest.
What kind of sick bastard…?
I lifted my head, blinking hard. The whirring sound stopped and my hazy gaze was drawn to the coffee table and its array of colorful glass paperweights. They were pretty—beautiful even—but my appreciation was lost as they refracted the sunlight straight into my eyeballs.
Shifting my gaze, I saw a glass filled with water, two aspirin tablets beside it. I sat up ever-so-slowly and a hideous orange and green knitted afghan fell off my shoulders. I glanced down at myself. Still 100% dressed. Even my boots.
Dignity intact. Score one for me.
But the thought didn’t bring me any comfort. Here I was again, waking up in strange surroundings after a night of drinking I didn’t remember. On a couch this time, but it could’ve been a trash-strewn alley. Or the proverbial ditch mothers are always warning their kids they’d turn up in if they weren’t careful. I wasn’t careful. I was never careful.
It hurt too much to move or look around. It hurt to blink. I focused my attention on swallowing the aspirin down, chasing them with water. My mouth felt as dry and dusty as the Nevada desert. I would have chugged the whole glass if I thought my stomach could handle it, but I had my doubts. I took a few deep breaths and waited until the churning feeling in my gut subsided, then glanced around at my immediate surroundings.
A small apartment, sparsely decorated with plain, mismatched furniture. On the other side of the coffee table and its glass knick-knacks was an old Laz-y-Boy chair facing a flat screen TV. The walls were bare but for two framed degrees from universities I couldn’t read from the couch, and a half-dozen photos. The front windows showed a view of a busy Vegas street. Nothing about the place made any kind of impression on me. Nor was it familiar.
“Well, I’m not chained up and the door is three feet away,” I muttered to myself, and raised the water glass for another drink.
“True, on both counts.”
I coughed the water all over my chest, and looked around. “The hell…?”
A guy stood in the tiny kitchen behind me. His dark hair was wet, fresh from a shower and his sharp brown eyes regarded me with dry bemusement. He was tall, super cute and totally not my type. I liked the thick, loose curls of his hair, but he was too clean-cut for me. My men were tatted and pierced and came with an exit strategy in their back pocket after I slept with them. The guy in the kitchen looked liked he made breakfast for any woman who stayed over, and instead of kicking them out, told them to ‘make themselves at home.’
Nice Guy, all caps.
But god, he had a sweet face. A face I could have sworn I’d seen before. I searched the boozy depths of my memory for when and where…
“I’m your limo driver,” he said. “I took you and your band to the Pony Club last night?”
“Oh, right,” I said. “That’s it.”
The guy came around to the front of the kitchen counter, facing the living room, and leaned against it, arms crossed. “Jonah Fletcher.”
“What?” My brain thudded behind my eyes in time to my pulse.
“My name,” he said slowly, “is Jonah Fletcher. In case you were wondering on whose couch you were sitting.”
“Oh, sorry,” I replied, my cheeks burning. “I was just…listening to my headache. I’m Kacey Dawson. Though you probably already knew that.”
Jonah’s eyes widened slightly in to bemusement, and I shook my head—a movement I regretted instantly. “I don’t mean because I’m famous or anything, I mean because of your job. My name’s probably on some paperwork… Eh, forget it.”
I held my aching head in my hands and tried to recall something from last night. A vague sense of Something Not Very Good happening added to the misery of my hangover.
I peered up at Jonah Fletcher. “So uh
…last night. Did we…?”
He arched one eyebrow at me, perfectly. The other didn’t even move. “Did we…what?”
I huffed. “Do I have to spell it out?”
The stiff, sharp expression on his face softened slightly. “We didn’t. You were passed out.” He cocked his head. “You don’t remember anything?”
“Not much.”
“Happens a lot?”
I snorted. “I can’t see how that’s your business.”
“And yet, last night it became my business.” He shrugged. “Seems like a dangerous habit, is all. Not all guys are as nice as me.”
“That has yet to be determined,” I muttered and glanced around. “This is your place? Why not take me back to the Summerlin house?”
“Oh, believe me, I tried. Bringing you here isn’t exactly work protocol. I could lose my job.”
“What happened?” I asked, mostly because I should, not because I wanted to know.
This guy, Jonah, rubbed his chin thoughtfully and came to sit across from me in a beat-up reclining chair. The chair’s upholstery might’ve been brown leather but I’d guess it was more likely vinyl—cracked in places and well-worn. Jonah sat in it and hung his arms off his jean-clad knees. A heavy silver bracelet ringed his right wrist. His t-shirt fit tight around his shoulders and biceps. Nice muscles. Lean but defined.
My eyes drifted to the collar of his shirt, to take in some of his chest. A quarter inch of a fleshy red line peeked above the seam. Some kind of gnarly scar.
I quickly averted my eyes.
“I tried to take you back to the house,” Jonah was saying. “Tried to get in touch with your manager, too. No luck. It was either bring you here or back to the Pony Club, but your bodyguard seemed pretty insistent I get you away from that scene.”
A lump of dread joined the churning in my guts. “What scene, exactly?”
“Not sure. It sounded like there was some sort of riot going on.”
“A riot.”
Whatever blood was left in my face drained out. A vague memory, blurry and soaked in booze swam up. Me, urging a bunch of fans to the green room. I couldn’t remember the actual moment but the sound of so many cheering voices thundered in my head and made it ache harder.
“Did, um… Did Hugo—the bodyguard. Did he say what happened? How it started?”
Jonah shook his head. “You don’t recall anything?”
“Pretty sure I don’t want to,” I said, my voice hardly a whisper.
I fished around in the top part of my boots for my pack of smokes. I shook a cigarette out and was fumbling with the little matchbook when Jonah cleared his throat.
“This is a no smoking zone, if you don’t mind.”
“Have mercy,” I said with a wan smile. “Besides, everyone smokes in Vegas.”
“I don’t.” The hard tone in Jonah’s voice froze my hand. He offered a small smile. “Sorry. House rules.”
I set my pack down longingly on the table. “You picked a tough city to live in if you don’t like cigarette smoke.”
“And yet somehow I manage.” He rubbed his hands on his thighs, impatiently. “You don’t need to call your people? They might want to know you’re okay. In fact, I would prefer they know that you’re okay. I’m sort of half expecting a SWAT team to bust down my door any minute now for kidnapping you.”
“I guess…” The very last thing I wanted to do was call ‘my people’ but Jonah was watching me.
Just get it over with.
“Can I use your phone?”
Jonah handed over his cell and I started to punch in Jimmy’s number. I was 99% sure whatever catastrophe had happened at the Pony Club was my fault, and 100% sure I didn’t want to know how bad the scene really was. I chickened out and called Lola instead.
She answered on the third ring. “Yeah?” she said, her voice full of sleep.
“Lola? It’s me.”
“Kacey?” She yawned. “Where are you? Are you calling from in the house?”
“Um, no,” I said. “I’m not…there.”
“Well that narrows it down,” Lola said, sighing. “Jesus, Kace. Do I need to send a search party? On second thought, you’d better lay low where Jimmy can’t find you. He was pissed last night. Jeannie too. Then again, she’s always pissed.”
I closed my eyes at the accusation and braced myself. “Why is he pissed?”
“You don’t remember, do you? You fucking drank yourself into a Jagermeister coma right after inviting half the audience into the green room. But instead of sticking around to deal with your mess, Hugo saved you. He put you in the limo, right? Yeah, we had to cab it home. Jimmy was not happy about that.”
I twisted a lock of hair around my finger. “That’s why he was pissed? Because he had to take a cab?”
“Kace, you think he was worried about you? Hon, he figured you were fucking the limo driver.” A pause. I could hear the unspoken words. We all did.
Another ugly flush of red colored my neck. I steadfastly refused to look at Jonah.
“Well, I didn’t. I was in a Jagermeister coma, remember? You can tell him that.”
“Whatever. Does it matter? Jimmy called the company and gave them an earful for not picking us up. That limo driver is going to be up to his ass in hot water. Hugo too.”
“No, no, he didn’t do anything wrong,” I shifted on the couch away from Jonah and lowered my voice. My headache ratcheted up ten notches. “Neither of them did. Tell Jimmy it wasn’t Hugo’s fault. I’m all right.”
I heard Lola light a cigarette. I found my fingers inching toward my own pack and had to sit on my hand.
“You realize you totally trashed the place, right?” Lola asked on an exhale of smoke. “According to Jimmy, the Pony Club is talking potential lawsuit to pay the damages.”
I nearly dropped Jonah’s phone. “Did anyone get hurt?” I asked in a small voice.
“No,” she said, the anger deflating from her voice. “But the green room is trashed. Beyond trashed. It looked like a war zone when we left.”
“So… What’s happening now? Is tonight’s show cancelled?”
Lola snorted. “Hell no. Not with sixty grand worth of ticket sales on the line.”
“Oh.”
“I’ll tell Jimmy you’re okay but maybe…I don’t know, Kace. You might want to lay low for a couple of hours. At least until Jimmy gets over his own hangover. I mean, to be fair, everyone was pretty wasted last night.” Now I could hear a small smile on my friend’s lips. “It was an epic show. Epic.”
“Was it?”
“Oh girl, you don’t even know. We’re on the verge of mega stardom and you’re missing it. No, you’re almost wrecking it.”
“But I didn’t, right?”
“Nope. The show must go on.” Lola sighed again. “Get some rest. Sober up for tonight’s show. You’re still good to go, right?” she asked, and I could hear the warning tone in her voice. This wasn’t just my big break, but hers too.
“Sure,” I said weakly. “Thanks, Lola. And tell Jimmy—”
“That you’re sorry? Yeah, yeah. Time for some new material, Kace. Talk to you later.”
I handed the phone back to Jonah. “Thanks.”
“Are the cops going to be busting in the door any minute now?” he asked darkly. “Or am I going to lose my job? Or both?”
“No. Well…maybe.”
Jonah’s eyes widened. “Maybe which?”
Shame and humiliation flushed my skin red. “The second one. Listen, I’ll talk to your boss at the limo place…” I started as Jonah bolted out of his chair with a curse.
He ignored me and began jabbing at his phone.
“Harry? It’s me, Jonah. I—” He shot me a glare as he listened to whatever was being said on the other end.
I held my aching head in my hands as Jonah tried to explain the situation. Finally, a cell phone appeared in my line of sight.
“Would you mind telling my boss why I couldn’t finish the job last night?
” Jonah asked tightly.
“Yeah, sure.” I took the phone. “Um…Hi. Harry, is it? I’m Kacey. From Rapid Confession. I had…a bad night and Jonah was nice enough to let me crash on his couch. Nothing happened,” I added, prompting a strange look from Jonah. “He wanted to go back to pick up the rest of my band but I wasn’t doing so hot. He took care of me. Okay?”
Harry promised not to fire Jonah and barked that he wanted the limo back, ASAP. Then he hung up.
Jonah glared at me. “Well?”
“You’re not fired. But Harry wants the limo back. Like, now.”
He nodded. “Okay, fine. Let’s go. I’ll take you back to your band’s house on the way.”
“Um…” I plucked at a stray thread on the afghan.
“What?” Jonah snapped. “You heard my boss. I gotta return the damn car.” He cocked his head at me. “Don’t you need to get back?”
No, I thought. I really don’t. I just wasn’t up to facing it. None of it. Not yet.
I offered Jonah a weak smile. “The aspirin hasn’t made a dent in this headache. Would it be okay with you if I took a nap while you take the limo back? I’ll call a cab later and be out of your hair, I promise.”
Jonah’s dark eyes widened. “You want me to leave you alone in my home while I return the limo—a limo you puked in, by the way—so you can take a nap?”
“I promise I’ll just nap and go,” I said, then felt my stomach drop. “Wait. I puked in your limo?”
Jonah looked like he had a smart-ass retort ready to go, but he must’ve felt sorry for me because he said in a gentler tone, “Don’t you have a show tonight?”
“I have some time before I have to be back.”
Jonah rubbed his chin, looking torn. “After I return the limo, I was planning on going to work. My other work,” he added. “I have a tight schedule, a really tight schedule and I need to keep to it.”
“I’m sorry. I don’t want to interfere.” I looked up at him and offered a smile. “What do you do for your other work?”
Jonah waved a hand at the glass on the coffee table.
“You’re a collector?”
“No, I make these.”