Never fall for a rockstar...
Julian Wheaton views the world through a kaleidoscope of synesthesia, seeing the colors of every sound he hears. His life as an iconic rock guitarist was a stressful psychedelic trip that nearly destroyed him. Now he’s abandoned the rock ’n’ roll lifestyle for the peaceful sanctity of his recording studio, but when fiery Cleo Compton comes to work for him, she brings chaos with her.
Cleo Compton has had her flings with rockstars—and it’s left her wary and bruised. Julian may have those sexy bedroom eyes and drool-worthy tattoos, but Cleo is determined to keep things strictly professional—until Julian turns out to be every dream she’s ever chased. When he risks it all to hit the road with a band again, Cleo fears he’ll return as the one thing she can no longer abide—a rockstar.
Table of Contents
Dedication
Chapter One
Chapter Two
Chapter Three
Chapter Four
Chapter Five
Chapter Six
Chapter Seven
Chapter Eight
Chapter Nine
Chapter Ten
Chapter Eleven
Chapter Twelve
Chapter Thirteen
Chapter Fourteen
Chapter Fifteen
Chapter Sixteen
Chapter Seventeen
Chapter Eighteen
Chapter Nineteen
Chapter Twenty
Chapter Twenty-One
Epilogue
Acknowledgments
About the Author
Check out more from Entangled Select Contemporary…
Rules of Protection
Far Too Tempting
This book is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents are the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual events, locales, or persons, living or dead, is coincidental.
Copyright © 2015 by Carol Pavliska. All rights reserved, including the right to reproduce, distribute, or transmit in any form or by any means. For information regarding subsidiary rights, please contact the Publisher.
Entangled Publishing, LLC
2614 South Timberline Road
Suite 109
Fort Collins, CO 80525
Visit our website at www.entangledpublishing.com.
Select Contemporary is an imprint of Entangled Publishing, LLC.
Edited by Karen Grove and Jessica Snyder
Cover design by Dana Lamothe at Designs by Dana
Cover art by Shutterstock
ISBN 978-1-63375-178-1
Manufactured in the United States of America
First Edition May 2015
To my sister, Janet, the queen of romance novels. Look what I did!
And to the men in my life: Jeff, who still melts my heart with a strum on his old Martin acoustic or the black Les Paul, and my father, who would like the world to know he raised me better than this.
Chapter One
“I’m not interested in shagging your friends, Addie, so don’t worry,” Julian said, pretending not to notice his sister’s nervous tics. He also pretended not to notice the clouds of green and blue mist floating in the air around them. It wasn’t cool to look at things other people couldn’t see. For one thing, it made them uncomfortable. For another, it labeled him a freak. Though he had to admit, “freak” was easier to say than “synesthete.”
They walked down the cracked and uneven sidewalk. It was dusk, a humid San Antonio evening, and the sounds Julian saw as swirling colors took on the shimmering quality he associated with a sweltering Texas summer. His long-sleeved shirt was already soaked through. He unbuttoned the cuffs and rolled them above his wrists, exposing the beginnings of the dark tattoos that snaked up the lengths of his forearms. He should have worn a T-shirt, especially with Addie’s insistence on walking in this heat, but a night at Slammers warranted a vintage sixties Van Heusen dress shirt—green and gold stripes—untucked to look casual.
Glancing across the street, he spotted the first dealer of the evening. And the dealer spotted him. The twitchy kid raised his eyebrows. Interested?
Julian lowered his gaze to his black Tony Lama boots and focused on putting one foot in front of the other. Addie marched along at his side, seemingly unaware of the young men on the corners slapping palms and hanging out. She didn’t notice the cars slowing to let passengers off, only to cruise the block and pick them up farther down the street. Julian’s nerves, however, sizzled with electrical currents from all the activity. He reached in his pocket for the comfort of his guitar picks.
“I’m not worried about you shagging my friends,” Addie said. “They’re hardly your type.”
“Of course,” he agreed, suppressing a grin. They’re probably pretentious, stuffy snobs.
“Don’t take that the wrong way. It’s the truth,” she added.
Unlike Julian’s, Addie’s clipped British accent hadn’t been softened by her years in the States. While Julian was a natural chameleon and could adopt a convincing Texas drawl whenever he wanted, Addie’s accent was sharp and pronounced. The southern men she encountered thought they were being scolded by her attempts at light conversation. Texas women, however, were another story. Julian’s accent charmed the pants right off them.
A kid with his jeans halfway to his knees slunk out of an alley and squinted in their direction. He started to retreat, but then his eyes met Julian’s, and he hesitated for a second.
Keep walking, brother—I’m not buying.
Julian breathed a sigh of relief as the kid disappeared back into the shadows.
It sucked that Addie walked this old neighborhood alone. Her dye studio, which also served as her flat, was in a revitalized area. But the line separating upscale and renovated from rough and unsafe was blurry. You had to be careful where you stepped, and Addie didn’t always pay attention. He needed to have a talk with her about it, but she didn’t accept helpful suggestions very well. She sure as hell could dole them out, though.
He looked one block ahead. That’s all it would take before the grimy windows of the pawnshops and taquerias, with their advertisements of musical instruments, jewelry, and barbacoa, gave way to the restaurants, bars, and live music venues of Southtown. Already, the blues and greens of the perky rhythm of the conjunto squeeze-boxes, accented by the chest-rattling bass beats from cruising lowriders, were morphing into the reds and maroons of the bustling strip nearby.
“So,” Julian said as he grabbed Addie’s arm to steer her clear of a wino. “Tell me about these friends of yours and why I won’t be interested in shagging them.”
“Real breasts,” she replied.
“Come again?”
“Real breasts. They’ve got them.”
“Hey, I’ve got nothing against natural breasts. They’re just usually not attached to women I’m attracted to, is all.” That wasn’t true, but getting Addie worked up was a habit.
“Real breasts are not attached to women, Juli,” Addie said.
Julian cringed. “Please stop calling me that.”
He hadn’t been mistaken for a girl in thirty years, but Addie clung stubbornly to the nickname she’d used when he was a rosy-cheeked baby with dark curls and long eyelashes.
“And in addition to unaltered bodies,” Addie continued, as if he hadn’t spoken, “they’re intelligent, so that’s another deterrent for you. Sherry’s a curator at a museum downtown, and Cleo is about to resume teaching at a local college.”
“The smart ones are troublesome. Thank God they tend to avoid me.”
Addie rolled her eyes. “There you go, then. No worries.”
What were these new friends of his sister like? Addie was hard on friends in the same ways
she was hard on brothers: overbearing and judgmental with a tendency to hover. One needed a high tolerance for henpecking and meddling to go the distance with Addie.
Soon they were jockeying for position among the throng of sweaty people milling about Slammers’s outdoor patio. More people than usual were crammed into the small space due to the lure of a popular local band. Julian scanned the crowd with Addie, though he didn’t know who they were looking for.
The band was fucking tight, which was a relief. Bad music was painful. Sloppy riffs and out-of-tune instruments produced a visceral mess in his mind—colors that blended together into a sludge that settled in the pit of his stomach.
“Oh!” Addie said, pointing at the tiny space a few drunks had turned into an impromptu dance floor. “There they are.”
Expecting to see a couple of awkward librarian types bouncing around, Julian’s eyes almost popped out of his head at the sight of a tall, striking brunette doing a bump and grind with two guys. She looked up and waved at Addie, who waved back with enthusiasm.
The definitely not a librarian continued shaking it like the rent was due, and a sensual maroon pulse tugged at Julian’s abdomen…and lower. Maybe shagging wasn’t out of the question this evening, after all. “Is that the birthday girl?”
“No, that’s Sherry. Cleo is right there behind her. See?”
The tall brunette moved over to reveal a commotion, the center of which was a redheaded whirling dervish in a pair of ridiculous gangbanger jeans at least four sizes too large. Birthday Girl was written across the front of her black T-shirt in rhinestones. She was either having a horrible fit or suffering from an inexplicable lack of rhythm. Her dance partners were laughing at her expense. Under the circumstances, he had no choice but to hit the sorry excuse for a dance floor and offer his assistance. He wasn’t the kind of man to ignore a damsel in distress, even if she did seem to be enjoying herself.
...
Cleo forced one eye open and looked around. Thanks to the blackout curtains, there wasn’t much to see except a rogue ray of sunshine streaking through the room. She opened the other eye and considered sitting up. Her bladder was full, no doubt the reason she was awake in the first place. With a huge exhalation that could peel paint off walls, she kicked the covers aside and went for it.
The room spun and her head pounded as she bravely swung her feet over the side of the bed, seeking the floor with a tentative toe. Standing up was a momentous occasion. She felt like Heidi.
“Look, Grandfather,” she said to the pile of clothes on the armchair. “I can walk.”
Grabbing her phone off the nightstand, she began the short hangover shuffle toward the bathroom. An unfortunate glimpse in the mirror revealed insane hair, smeared mascara, and an Aerosmith T-shirt on backward. Because having a shirt not on backward would have lent entirely too much class to the scene. Oh, Jose Cuervo, you are such a bastard.
She grabbed her toothbrush and pulled up last night’s photos on her phone, looking through squinted eyes to lessen the shock of whatever was about to pop up. She’d hoped to turn over a new leaf on her thirtieth birthday, but there she was in the first picture, brilliantly balancing a lime wedge on her nose. She sighed, set the phone down, and turned on the water.
Fresh from the shower, she towel dried her hair and frowned. Her parents were hosting a birthday dinner for her tonight. She’d have to tell them she hadn’t gotten her teaching job back. It would be one more disappointment.
As if she needed confirmation of her many disappointments, her eyes lit on the small stack of Rock ’n’ Spin magazines sitting on her old cedar chest. The six issues represented her short-lived career at the famous music and entertainment publication. She hadn’t the slightest idea what to do with them. Burn them? Frame them? Rip them to shreds? For now, she’d settle for putting them out of sight. Into the cedar chest they’d go.
It was some kind of irony that the monstrous chunk of furniture was romantically referred to as a hope chest. She’d received it on her twelfth birthday, a traditional southern gift from her traditional southern mother. She’d asked for an electric guitar. “Don’t be ridiculous, dear,” her mother had replied before filling the chest with what she considered a respectable trousseau.
Cleo ignored the bone china resting on top of the heirloom monogrammed napkins and looked down at the huge stack of Rock ’n’ Spin issues she’d saved since she was fifteen. Eddie Vedder and the rest of Pearl Jam stared up at her. She dropped the latest six issues on top of Eddie and shut the lid, watching John Mayer and his sleepy eyes disappear with a set of Oneida stainless and an embroidered linen tablecloth folded neatly at his feet.
Coffee. She needed coffee. She inhaled the rich and promising aroma wafting out of her kitchen. Wait a minute…she hadn’t made any coffee.
Frantically, she racked her brain. Only certain parts of the evening were retrievable from the old memory banks, but she definitely remembered hot, sweaty dancing and a guy with a British accent. Oh, boy. She swallowed hard. She’d met Addie’s brother.
She followed her nose, sneaking down the short hallway on her tiptoes. Would he be in her kitchen in his underwear? Would he be in her kitchen without his underwear? With a deep breath, Cleo peeked around the corner.
The kitchen was empty. As was her trusty French press. The coffeemaker in the corner, however, steamed away with vigor, and there was a note taped to it. You’re welcome. The flowing script was Addie’s.
Cleo melted into the countertop with relief. She vaguely remembered Addie driving her home last night, the two of them singing along with Depeche Mode while a heavily tattooed party pooper groaned and muttered in the backseat.
At some point in the evening, Addie’s brother had turned from a charmer into a grouch. And Cleo had the uncomfortable feeling she’d had something to do with it.
She poured a cup of coffee and glanced around the tiny boxed-in room. She missed her old apartment in Southtown. It had been small, and the ancient plumbing had ensured a refreshingly cold shower every morning, but it had oozed character from every nook and cranny. This unimaginative one-bedroom unit in a sprawling urban complex was all she could currently afford. Actually, it was more than she could afford. The not-so-friendly reminder about the back rent she owed stared up at her from the counter. Her stomach churned.
Just as she set the mug down, her phone chirped with a text: DON’T PANIC. WE’VE GOT YOUR CAR, REMEMBER? WE’LL POP BY AROUND NOON.
She looked out the window. Sure enough, her Honda Fit was missing. Her palm smacked against her forehead. Of course Addie had her car. How else would she have driven home? She and her brother had walked to Slammers.
Grabbing the phone, Cleo zipped through the frames, stopping when she came to a picture of Addie’s brother. His dark hair was wavy and shoulder length. Thick eyelashes framed chocolate eyes that turned up at the corners, like his sister’s. But that was where the resemblance ended. It was inconceivable that prim and proper Addie could have a brother so deliciously wicked. Thank God he lived on another continent. She didn’t need to get tangled up with anybody’s brother, wicked or otherwise, especially now that she’d met Josh, who was delightfully stable and thrillingly normal, two attributes she was determined to appreciate.
She opened the refrigerator and considered breakfast. A half-eaten fajita taco stared up at her, unearthing the memory of the post-bar sojourn through the Taco Cabana drive-through. Addie’s brother had self-righteously lectured her about the evils of eating meat. Oh dear God, he was a holier-than-thou vegan.
The half-eaten taco did not tempt her in the slightest, and she shut the refrigerator, frowning a little as she remembered how grabby he’d been on the dance floor. In fact, she hadn’t been felt up so thoroughly since her junior prom and… Oh, boy. That brought it all back. He’d made a brazen grab at her ass during a slow rock ballad, the final song of the evening. She’d pushed him away and then, for good measure, had punished him with a pinch through his shirt, twisting his nipple.
A familiar heat rose in her cheeks. Why hadn’t she just slapped him like a normal person? Why was she so freakishly bizarre when drunk? And how in the world was she supposed to have known his nipple was pierced? She winced at the memory of his unmanly squeal. No wonder he was pissed.
She deleted every picture until all evidence of birthday debauchery was destroyed. Then she glanced at the text again.
DON’T PANIC. WE’VE GOT YOUR CAR, REMEMBER? WE’LL POP BY AROUND NOON.
Two things immediately stood out as alarming. The first was the word “we.” The second was the word “noon.” She had five minutes.
She bolted to her closet and spun in circles. Everything was wrinkled or dirty. She dug hastily through a basket—not even a clean bra to support the troops! Oh, what the hell. He might not even come, and if he did, she wasn’t going to be taken in by sexy bedroom eyes or drool-worthy tattoos. For the first time in her life, she would repel trouble instead of sucking it toward her at warp speed. She stepped out of the closet, ran her fingers through her curly, damp hair, and went to the kitchen to wait by the window. Barefoot, no makeup, and a Rudy’s BBQ T-shirt, complete with stains. If the wounded warrior from their dance floor battle showed up, he was about to see her in her natural habitat, with her natural hair and her natural, unsupported boobs—the trifecta of trouble repellent.
...
Julian winced beneath his dark shades. Fucking sun. He was going straight home as soon as he could. He needed one of two things: complete silence or a wailing guitar. Silence would get rid of the swirling colors that bled together in his head until his mind floated in a sea of pea soup. Playing guitar wouldn’t get rid of the colors, but it would force them to stay where they belonged, separated into a candy-coated rainbow of flavor, which he much preferred to pea soup.
The colors were only a problem if he was stressed or, like today, exhausted. He’d been in no condition to drive after Slammers and had spent an uncomfortable night on Addie’s couch. She’d insisted he follow her to the redhead’s flat so he could take her back home. He’d considered arguing, but his curiosity as to what kind of shape the woman would be in had won out in the end. He hoped she was worse off than he was. Drunk or not, there was no excuse for the humiliation—and pain—she’d dealt out on the dance floor.
Color Me Crazy Page 1