“I was ashamed, could you really blame me?”
“Yes, I can damn well blame you! This is solid evidence that he threatened you. If he does anything, we can use this in court and he can go to jail for years. This is revenge porn. This isn’t some low charge. This is a felony. He has no fucking clue”
“I don’t want him to leak this, Evie. The photos are one thing, it was so horrible to go through. You know, you saw me crumbling when they came out…. what everyone said about me. What they still continue to say about me every single day. What do you think a video will do? It’ll make it worse. How will my reputation ever recover from something like that?”
“The same way Johnny Depp bounced back after his scandal with Amber. The same way President Clinton survived the affair with Monica. My point is, this kind of shit happens every single day. Your sex tape will not be the worst thing that ever happens, it will only feel that way to you for a time, and then we’ll move on. The important thing is that I know about the situation and we now have a leg up for whenever it does leak. This…right here, is evidence. Solid. Concrete. Evidence.”
“It’s a gun pointed at my head with a loaded bullet, Evie. That’s what that is, and I hate just standing around waiting to get shot.”
“There’s only one answer then, and I highly advise against it.”
“What?”
“Leak it yourself. We can either have full control over what happens, or we can wait for Zac to do it and then press charges against him. Those are your options, and honestly, I’d love to see the bastard suffer for everything that he’s done to you. There aren’t many people I wish would rot in jail, but Zac is one of them, and that little bitch is gonna scream like one in the slammer.”
There’s a light rap on the door and in comes one of the guys. “You realize you’re up in less than 5 right?”
Crap! I jump up off the couch and dart out, following him through every turn, up every stairwell until I’m backstage. I thank goodness that I always make sure I’m changed into the proper attire well before it’s time to sing. As he adjusts my mic, I mentally prepare myself for the very high that I live off of.
The crowd.
The energy.
The hoots and hollers.
At the end of the day, this is who I am. I’m not a victim, or some woman scorned.
I’m Bellamy Frickin’ Mason, super talented bitch.
Chapter 11
Your fingers entwined slowly with mine, and suddenly, life made sense.
-Perry Poetry
Butch
Watching Bellamy perform was so much more than I ever envisioned it to be. I partly thought that the hype surrounding her was just based on what I’d heard about her nude photos being leaked. Who knew that the girl had undeniable talent? Shit. She’s hot as fuck and talented. Every moment I’m with her I’m becoming more and more fucked. The kicker is that she doesn’t even know how much I want her.
Today I plan on changing that, I want to take her in ways that she’s never been taken before, showing her exactly just how much I want her.
Bellamy and The Stones performed last night, and we’ve got plans to leave in just a couple of hours, heading towards Pittsburgh. We’re lucky in the sense that it’s only about a five-hour trip, and the weather couldn’t be better. It’s still in the mid-seventies, which gives us a great day of riding ahead of us.
I’m sitting in the chair off to the side in the hotel room that Bellamy, Slash and I are all sharing. My phone starts to buzz quietly, as I lift it from the bedside night stand I see Elena’s name plastered across the screen.
“What’s up?” I ask her immediately.
“Nothing. I’m just checking in, to see how things are going and all that,” she mumbles, a nervous wreck if I’ve ever heard her.
“You’re a shitty liar.”
“Yeah, well you’re shitty period.” There’s a good ten second pause before she begins to speak again. “Is everything going okay?”
“It’s going as good as it can. Luckily for me, your sister is a pretty chill girl.” I wasn’t lying, I couldn’t even if I wanted to. Every word that I told Elena was nothing but the truth. There are definitely parts of Bellamy that I don’t know, I’ve only known her for a few days. It’ll take much longer than that for me to get the full picture, to get to know everything there is that makes her tick the way that she does. I guess part of me that I’m still struggling with, is the fact that I want to know more about her. I haven’t wanted that since my ex. Deep down, it scares the shit out of me. I’d be the first to admit that I have trust issues, especially since I put all my trust in one woman and she let me down on the most important day of my life – the day that was supposed to be the beginning of our life together.
“I…yeah. I don’t know much about her yet, and I’m hoping that you guys can bring her to the Halloween party in a few days. Can you? I’d love to get to know her more. Please try to get her to come. If she can’t, I totally understand, but I’d really like the opportunity to get to know my sister. So, please try to convince her that I’m not as awful as I was the first time I spoke to her. Ugh, I was such a bitch.”
“When are you not a bitch?” I chuckle into the phone, waiting to hear Elena berate me. Her giving me shit reminds me of home. I may have only been gone a few days, but that doesn’t take away the fact that I’m already home sick.
“What have you found out about her?” Elena asks me. I think a moment before I speak.
“She’s been through a lot, maybe a lot more than we should ever go through, but despite that, she continues to follow her dreams; she’s relentless.”
“I’m relentless, am I?” Looking over to the left I see Bellamy’s eyes glued right to my body. I don’t know how much she’s heard, but from the looks of it, she’s heard it all.
“Your sister’s on the phone,” I tell Bellamy, handing her my cell as I rise from the chair. The only thing that I want to do right now is getting some air. Somehow, the room felt as if it was closing in around me. I grabbed my cigarettes off of my duffel bag and head towards the balcony. At least I can smoke in peace out there.
With every drag of the cigarette, I become more and more restless. Usually, smoking has the opposite effect. It makes me wonder why I’m so antsy. What in God’s name is making me like this? Is it something within me or is it the mere fact that there is something I can’t explain when it comes to this girl?
Maybe it’s fear.
Fear because I want her, and I shouldn’t. Fear because this girl has no idea what it’s like on my side of the train tracks. She doesn’t have the knowledge or understanding to know how dangerous I am, or even being tied to me is. Does it make me an awful person that even though I know she doesn’t acquire the ability to truly understand what the MC life is…that I still want to pursue her.
It’s not just her looks, it’s her aura. The energy that floats around her. Fuck. I sound like some jackass who thinks he’s found his soul mate.
But what if I have?
There’s only one way for me to find out, and it won’t be by smoking a cigarette and avoiding her.
***
Bellamy
“What is that look on your face for?” Evie asks, smiling like the Cheshire cat. She caught me red handed. I was thinking of Butch and I in the woods, how his lips felt against my own, the way he held me in place like I was his little rag doll, and good lord, the things he said to me. No matter what I do, I can’t get him out of my mind. I just want more. The only thing is, I’m not sure if he does.
We’ve both talked a bit since then, and especially last night when we had our heart to heart – if that’s what we can even call it, but he didn’t make a move, he didn’t try to kiss me or fuck me.
I’d pretty much figured out that if the man wanted to, he would have. But why didn’t he?
I shouldn’t even be thinking about this crap, that I know. I should be getting some work done, thinking about the name for my album, lyrics, something. Bas
ically, there are a lot of things I should be doing instead of daydreaming about that caveman and how it felt to have his paws all over me.
“Just getting some new ideas for songs,” I lie, now trying to come up with something quick to tell her.
“What kind of songs?”
“A revenge song,” I blurt out, not fully thinking about what I just said. “I…I want to write something that other girls can listen to after they’ve been betrayed by the one person they never thought would do it to them. I want them to relate, and to know that they aren’t alone in someone completely destroying all of their trust, and…”
“And?”
“And I want them to know that even though they’ve been through something and think that they may never trust or love again, that they will, and when it happens – it will be the most beautiful thing on the planet.”
I’ve just shocked myself. No way did I have plans to do anything like that, but now I’m here…with a great idea. Something that will help thousands of girls who may not have gone through exactly what I did, but something similar.
I spend the rest of the long journey to Pittsburgh with my headphones in, writing lyrics down on my notepad as they come. A lot of musicians can’t write their own music and end up enlisting a ghostwriter or even co-writing. I can’t relate. No matter what has ever happened, I can always find a way to pull together some lyrics for a song. One of my favorite things about myself, is the authenticity of my music, and luckily my label loves that part about me as well. They’ve never once encouraged me to add another collaborator into my creative process, trusting that I’ll come up with the songs that speak to me the most.
I have spoken with Jase about co-writing a song, and we’ve been putting ideas together the last couple of months. I’ve put a spin on it, and it’ll be a surprise single that releases a few weeks before my album, of which I still need to decide on a name. I’ve been getting pressure from Evie to figure it out because we have to get a start on the cover art and branding for when I go on my tour.
I’m hoping that by the end of the tour we’ll have a solid game plan on exactly what it is that we’re going to co-write. I immediately think of a love song, because…who wouldn’t? Honestly, I’m my own worst critic. The songs that I have released are about the boys at the bar, death, or going out with the girls. I am early in my career, and yeah, maybe singing covers is how I was discovered, but I have plans to dig deep into myself for this album.
It’s my debut, and I want it to scream everything there is to know about me. Every dark and dusty part of me I want to showcase because my past isn’t just part of me, it’s also my inspiration.
Chapter 12
She’s never seemed shattered; to me. She was a breathtaking mosaic of the battles she’s won. -Anonymous
Butch
“I’m calling dibs.”
I know I heard him right, and still, I have to ask, “What did you just say?”
“I said, I’m calling dibs on that sweet ass little thing we’re sharing a room with. Hands off, brother.”
One look from me is all it takes. Slash and I have known each other for years, and never have I ever argued with him about a woman. Bellamy is different, this girl has been mine since the moment I laid my eyes on her, and I’ll be damned if Slash doesn’t know that.
“You’ll do one thing, and one thing only. If you so much as come near Bellamy I will make sure the rest of your face matches your name,” I hiss, determined to get him to leave her be. She’s mine, even if she doesn’t quite know it yet.
“You have a thing for the girl, don’t you?”
“I’ve had a thing for the girl, you just don’t pay attention.”
“Mister ‘I’ll never be in love again’ has a thing for Elena’s baby sister.” Slash laughs, leaning his head backwards. “Shit. I thought your ex fucked you up pretty good.” No one knows how far I really went with my ex, how she left me on our wedding day. They didn’t even know I was going to marry her, the only thing I let anyone know is that we broke up. I didn’t give them the gory details. It’s not like they would care much anyways. There was this fierce determination inside of me to look like the guy who didn’t give a fuck, and I played the part well. I acted like I couldn’t give two shits about her, yet on the inside, I was barely holding it together. Love does that to you, or more specifically, heartbreak does. He’s one nasty mother fucker.
The door to the bathroom flies open, and I immediately forget that there’s a good chance she could’ve heard everything that Slash and I just said to one another. Deep down, I’m praying that she didn’t hear anything, that her blow dryer drowned out the words we were speaking. When she doesn’t utter a word, I know we’re safe.
“What’s with you two?” She laughs, putting her hair up in a bun on the very top of her head.
“Nothing. We were just talking real quick,” Slash tells her, walking over to her and offering his arm to her like some chivalrous bastard – of which we both know he isn’t. “What’s on the plan today?”
“Not too much. I go on at 7:30 to warm up the crowd for the boys, then after that, I don’t have anything planned except maybe working on a few of my own songs.”
“You write your own?”
“Yep. I muster up some really deep stuff for my fans. I’m…,” she pauses for a second, before biting her bottom lip, leaning against Slash. “I’m not the kind of girl who only writes happy go lucky stuff. In the beginning, I tried to be that girl because, in the end, I knew that it would give me the most fans and the most money in the bank. However, I can’t fake it. I just can’t be someone I’m not. Sometimes I don’t know why I went through the things that I did at such an early age, but then I realize that there’s a reason, and that reason is my music. I was always supposed to be this girl, the one who pours her heart out into her songwriting and lyrics. I’m not what everyone expects, but, at the end of the day this is me.”
“Hm. I dig that. Do you have an EP out now or something?”
“Yep. There’s six songs on it, and I think it gives everyone a taste for me as a musician.”
“Can’t wait to hear it.” He steals the words right from my mouth, and I’m just standing here thinking he’s trying to make moves on my girl. We both know that I’ll be damned to let that happen. Shit. Maybe Slash wants his face to be ripped apart.
The day went by in the flash of an eye. Bellamy was supposed to go on at seven thirty sharp, but due to some technical issues, she didn’t go on until almost an hour later. After that, she ended up staying on stage longer because Jase requested her to sing a couple duets with him. I stood from backstage watching her, how she shined bright like a star when she sang. There was much I didn’t know about the girl, but the longer I was around her the more I began to like what I was seeing.
Slash escorted her down to a dressing room where she’d change into normal clothes, and in the meantime, I stood in the venue, leaning against a wall when my cell phone vibrated in my jeans pocket. I pull it out, reading Reed’s name across the screen, quickly answering.
“I didn’t expect to hear from both you and Elena so soon,” I tease. They’re making me feel like a watch dog. If they wanted reports back every twelve hours, or daily, I could’ve done that, but they never said anything to give me the inclination that they did.
“I’m not calling about Bellamy,” Reed tells me. I can hear the stress in his voice, Slash and I have only been gone a few days, and I can hear that he’s beginning to crack under the pressure. Sure, he has all of us to lean on, but he’s the one who makes all of the big decisions at the end of the day. I can’t imagine how stressful that must be, to not only be responsible for everyone in the club but for the additional girls that he’s purchased as well. Honestly, I can’t believe that Reed is still buying the girls from that Russian dude. We’ve hardly got space for the ones we have, and I overheard him talking to Elena about purchasing more a couple weeks ago.
“We still haven’t found my father; his s
hit is here and it’s like he disappeared into thin air. This is shady as fuck, Butch, I know something’s up, and I can’t figure it out. Bones disappeared and then my Dad. This isn’t right. None of this is a coincidence, and I want to find out where they are.”
Reed and Kyle’s Dad came to the clubhouse a few weeks ago. None of us knew he was coming, he just showed up. I don’t remember too much, but what I do remember is that he sat around telling stories of the good old days, then we all partied together. I drank half my body weight in alcohol and found a bed to crash on, and that was that. The next morning Will Michaels was nowhere to be found. Poof! Gone in thin air. I didn’t know enough about the man to know if it was out of the norm for him, but this guy hadn’t been around the club in years. I believe Reed said it had been nine or ten years since he last stepped foot into his old club. “He hadn’t been around in a long time, Reed. Maybe all the talk of the good old days brought back some memories that he didn’t want to remember, and he scrammed?” I suggest, trying to ease my worry ridden Prez.
“You don’t think I know that? My dad was never really the stick around and stay kind of type unless it was about the club. He loved the club more than anything, so the fact he just left without saying anything throws up red flags. Even if he didn’t say goodbye to me, he would have to the group of you. He may be a dick, but he is not disrespectful.”
“Have you tried texting or emailing?” I ask, wondering about the answer I’m going to get.
“Both. I texted him the first couple of weeks, then I started to call. Now, whenever I call, I get a message that the phone number has been disconnected. None of my emails are being answered either.”
“Elena. Have you asked-”
Before I can even finish my question, Reed is answering me.
“No. I’m not trying to bother her with my shit when she has enough to worry about. I’m going to call Lucien and see what he can find out. He’s better than all of those fuckers at the FBI anyway, and I trust him. The only agent I trust is my wife.” Lucien is a hacker, I’ve seen him around once and have heard about him lots since that time. It seems that Reed has a liking for him, which means that he’ll be doing a lot of business for the club soon.
Relentless (Skulls Renegade Book 4) Page 7