RUTHLESS: The Complete Rockstar Romance Series Boxed Set

by Vivian Lux

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  COPYRIGHT INFORMATION

  Please respect the work of this author. No part of this book may be reproduced or copied without permission. This book is licensed for your personal enjoyment only.

  This book is a work of fiction. Any resemblance to persons living or dead is purely coincidental. Any similarities to events or situations are also coincidental.

  The publisher and author acknowledge the trademark status and trademark ownership of all trademarks and locations mentioned in this book. Trademarks and locations are not sponsored or endorsed by trademark owners.

  (C) 2016 by Vivian Lux and Velvetfire Press

  All Rights Reserved

  About this book:

  True:

  Ruthless has been my favorite band forever. So when the fiercely beautiful brunette stomped into the bar where I'd been licking my wounds, I instantly recognized Piper Stowe.

  What I can't figure out is what she's doing here. It's like she's purposefully putting herself in danger.

  Someone needs to protect her from herself.

  I'm a down-on-my-luck nobody, dirt poor and stuck in a go-nowhere life. But I protect her. Again, and again and again.

  She's cold and cutting. She rarely talks. She won't let me touch her. She's a f*cking mess.

  So why the hell do I want her so badly?

  Piper:

  F*ck you if you think I'm running from my past. I'm fine. My band is back in the studio and we're on the top of our game. I've got it all under control.

  But just to prove it to myself, I go looking for danger.

  If Cash Truman wants to play white knight, that's his problem.

  I don't need his help. I don't need him or the way he kisses me. I don't want to feel the feelings he brings to the surface. Not after I've spent my life burying them inside.

  I've built a wall around my heart. What makes him think he can tear it down?

  Trigger warning:

  While there are no explicit scenes of abuse in this book, it does contains descriptions of assault/rape that may be triggering to survivors. Please be advised and stay safe.

  Prologue

  True

  All damn day Conway ignored me.

  My brother's silence was thick. Somehow, without saying a word, he managed to lay everything out there until it coated you like a blanket and started weighing you down. Con's laughter didn't boom through the garage, it hadn't for the past two days.

  Ever since I'd come and told him that Lizzy was finally moving out.

  Maybe he thought I was fucking kidding when I said the divorce was final? I dunno, Con had a pretty fucking rigid view of the world, and when he was faced with things that didn't fit in it -- things like his baby brother reneging on his marriage vows -- he didn't even bother to try to reconcile them with reality. He just flat out created his own fucking reality.

  I'd told him two days ago that Lizzy was moving out for real now. That I'd been up late with Rory because my daughter had a nightmare about Mommy leaving and insisted I sleep all crunched up in her bed and that's why I was moving so fucking slowly.

  His mouth pressed in a thin line. His eyes blazed. I'd fucked with his reality and I figured he was going to hit me for it.

  And honestly I was ready.

  How many times had we sworn those vows to each other when we were kids? We would never put our kids through what we'd been through with our parents. With a dad who flitted in and out of our lives like a devastating butterfly. He'd float in on a manic high, ready to shower his sons with the love they'd craved since his last disappearance. But as soon as the high wore off and he was faced with the humdrum task of actually being a fucking father to the kids he'd sired - day in and day out, no time off for good behavior, no trophies or tangible fucking rewards, just the day to day slog of being a family - he fucked on out of our lives again. He'd disappear, flitting on to the next distraction and leaving us heartbroken once more.

  I hated him. I hate him still.

  And now I'd turned into him, according to Conway.

  Or at least that was what I had to infer from the silent treatment he gave me.

  No wife at home and as soon as the custody agreement kicked in, no daughter either. And on top of everything else, my brother wasn't talking to me.

  How fucked is my life right now? How much more fucked up could it get?

  As if on cue, Con walked by. "Yo Con, what's shaking?" Miggsy called from his bay. "You ready for the weekend?"

  Conway grinned at Miggs, and then looked over to my workstation and the grin slid off his face like an avalanche. He clammed up and walked past me, ignoring me like I didn't even exist. Because until he figured out how to deal with this change, I may as well not.

  Miggsy looked up from the Ram he was elbow-deep in and hissed at me. "Yo, True, what crawled up your brother's butt and died?"

  I set down my wrench and sighed. Miggsy had been friends with my father, that piece of shit. And even though there was nothing true about that man, even though everything he did was fake and a lie, he still strutted around town letting people call him True. Jasper Truman was a piece of shit and being named after him was an insult, but people always seemed to want to believe otherwise and thought I should be honored to share a nickname with my old man.

  Fuck it.

  "Con's being a dick because he's pissed at me," I explained. Quitting time was in literally three minutes and I would need at least thirty to go into detail about why the hell Con was pissed at me. Well, you see Miggsy, it all goes back to when I was born... "He'll get over it," I said instead. Or else I'll knock him over it.

  He had no right. Fuck, the guy had no idea how relationships worked, or didn't work in this case. My brother was so fucking hung up on not messing up his kids that he barely even tried to have kids. Meaning, he fucked sparingly and cut ties ruthlessly.

  But he still thought he had the right to judge me.

  When Lizzy came to me, seventeen and scared out of her mind, I thought I was doing the right thing. I put my guitar down and picked a wrench up and I provided for her and then for our daughter. That was love. That's how I showed love to her. By doing what was right.

  But Con seemed to think I hadn't done enough to keep me and Lizzy together. He also thought Roar was running the show. Which she was, a little. But I kind of liked it that way. My girl had balls of steel. Lizzy got upset about the calls we'd get home, saying our precious girl had knocked a tooth out of some kid's head. But I was proud of her once she said she was sticking up for her friend. Then I took her out in the side yard and showed her a few more moves she could use when she needed to.

  The lion tattoo on my chest, over my heart, that was supposed to be me, ferocious in my love for my baby girl. Later I'd learned two important things. One, that the lioness is the true protector of the pride. And two, my baby girl was more ferocious than I could ever be.

  I was going to miss having her around all the time. Sharing custody was going to be tough as hell. But not as tough as heading home tonight.

  Lizzy had promised she'd be gone when I got there. I didn't want to see her leave. I didn't know what I would do when I saw her packing and I didn't want to find out.

  I needed to stall. Give her time.

  "Yo Miggsy, you wanna grab a drink?" I called.

  Giles Mcgowan wouldn't have been my first choice of person to kill time with. My first choice would have been my brother. But he was being a dickhead.

  Miggsy looked startled. "Nah man, I'd love to, but Helena, she likes me home for dinner." Then he fucking winced, like talking about wives and shit was something that could hurt me.

  "Hey no problem, man." I grinned.

  I could feel my brother walking by with his ever-present clipboard. Eavesdropping, because Con was freaking incapable of minding his own fucking business. Well fine, let him hear this. I wasn'
t going to invite him out tonight. Fuck him.

  Instead I punched my timecard and headed straight to my truck without saying goodbye.

  My truck was an old piece of shit, but it still drove and I was broke as shit so I kept it running. I might be the only sorry son of a bitch who still had a cassette player, but I didn't give a fuck. That meant I could get my music for cheap.

  "Desolation City," Ruthless's second album, was my absolute favorite. I fast forwarded the worn-out cassette until it landed on my favorite track. "Basic Desires" had been my first pick for my first dance with Lizzy at our wedding. But she'd nixed the idea about dancing to a song about fucking, and chosen some sappy ballad about Forever instead.

  We both liked to tell lies to ourselves.

  I pulled out of Truman's garage. I wasn't pissed that my uncle had willed it to Con instead of me. Con deserved it much more than I did. And it still had my last name on the front. So, I could pretend I was more important than I actually was.

  As the guitars crunched on my tinny speakers, my fingers moved along with them. I knew all the chords. I could play every song on this fucking album, and I used to strum them all for Roar, pressing my guitar right up to Lizzy's big belly and playing my heart out for my unborn daughter.

  I'd sold that guitar to buy formula when Lizzy's milk never came in.

  Stuck in a fucking rut. Impossible to break free. I tried to drown out the sadness with my favorite fucking song, but some hurts are too deep

  I took the back way home from the garage just to add an extra five minutes to the ride.

  Give her that much more time to be gone by the time I got home.

  But when I turned the corner into our run-down subdivision, Lizzy's white Cavalier was still sitting in our gravel drive.

  Chapter One

  Piper

  Heavy footsteps crunched along my front walk. There was no reason to go stiff with fear. I knew who it was.

  But in the split second it took my brain to catch up with my fear, I was frozen in place.

  That was bullshit, of course. It was over. I wasn't afraid anymore.

  And to prove it to my body - to prove that there was no need for the racing heart, for the closing throat, for the dry mouth - I pushed through the membrane of fear that enveloped me and flung the door open.

  And hugged my brother.

  "Happy Birthday, Pep," Lowell mumbled into my shoulder. He pulled back and held out a little wrapped package.

  "Tell me you didn't wrap this. You've never wrapped a present of mine in your life," I chided. But I was happy.

  "Nope," my brother grinned. "That's all Zoe."

  "I like her. What does she see in you?"

  He shrugged.

  I tore open the paper and sighed. "You ass."

  My brother grinned. "What? Pink is your favorite color!"

  I shook out the pink marabou scarf and wound it around my neck. "I was four when I said that."

  He tapped his head. "I remember things."

  I looked down at my outfit. Black Converse. Black jeans. Black belt. Ribbed, long sleeve knit black top.

  Black heart.

  "It's perfect," I said, rolling my eyes.

  Lowell laughed so hard he nearly doubled over.

  "Shut up and open your present," I ordered him, shoving the plastic bag into his hand.

  "What, no wrapping paper? And after I went to all that trouble?" Lowell teased.

  "Fuck off and open it."

  Lowell reached into the bag and pulled out a picture frame. He ran his finger along the smooth pebbles I had glued along the edge and looked up at me in confusion.

  "River stones," I explained. I looked down at my feet and wiggled my toes. I had no idea what possessed me. It was stupid. A fucking kindergarten craft project. Nothing you give to your twin brother on his twenty-fifth birthday....

  "Holy shit," Lowell breathed, pulling me in close. "You kept them?"

  I nodded against his chest. I hadn't cried about... anything, in a long, long time, but I came pretty close right then.

  "Wow, Pep," my twin exhaled, pulling back and looking at the picture. The two of us, arms slung around each other's shoulders, aged eight. Lowell was taller than me, even back then, but our smiles were the same. We were standing in the river that ran through the campground where we had spent every summer of our childhoods. The stones were ones I had plucked from that very same river. I'd carried one home every year we'd spent there.

  Twelve stones in all.

  "Hey, uh..." Lowell blinked and brushed something away from his eye. "I wanted to ask you something." He did that thing where he started grinning like an unhinged maniac, something he always did when he got nervous. Though I had no idea why he should be getting nervous. "Zoe wanted me to see about the three of us getting dinner."

  "Zoe did?" I asked, folding my arms across my chest, leaning against the doorway.

  "Yeah, well, I want you to come too." Lowell was tapping his foot on the ground. Tap tap tap.

  "There we go."

  "You're such a bitch."

  "Yup."

  "Do you want to tell me something?"

  "Yeah. At dinner." Tap tap tap.

  "Why don't you just tell me now?" I wondered.

  "Because," tap tap tap, "Zoe wants to be there too. We both want to tell you."

  "You're freaking me out."

  "Don't freak out," he urged, though his tapping was doing nothing to calm me down. "You'll find out soon. Anyway dinner, okay? After practice tomorrow?" Tap tap tap.

  I took a deep breath. There was always that little tickle of worry. Going out meant I'd be tempted. But I'd be with my brother. He'd look out for me. There was no way he'd let anything bad happen to me. There was no way he'd let me do anything bad to myself.

  "Yeah sure, okay."

  "You happy about heading back into the studio?" he asked me, eyes darting back and forth across my face like I was a book and he was trying to read between the lines.

  "It's fine."

  "I liked the downtime, but now I'm antsy." Tap tap tap.

  "You're just naturally antsy, Lowell. And stop tapping your foot on the ground, you're making my eyelid twitch."

  Lowell looked down at his foot. "Oh, yeah. Sorry."

  "I don't know how Zoe puts up with you."

  He grinned. "Me neither. Just lucky I guess."

  "Clearly."

  "So you're coming, right?"

  "Didn't I already say yes?"

  "Yeah, but... you know how you are."

  "How am I?"

  Lowell pursed his lips like he was testing his words out before he actually spoke. "Mercurial."

  "Zoe teach you that word?"

  "Yup. It means changeable."

  "Well good. I'd be boring otherwise."

  "Pep, you're avoiding the question."

  I heaved a sigh. "You don't need to be hovering over me like some kind of mother hen I said I was coming and I mean it, so stop badgering me, okay?."

  Lowell's eyes shone and for a second I hated how damn happy it made him. Like he was fucking ecstatic to have a sister that suddenly acted like a normal, functioning human being. "I'm holding you to that," he said in a voice that was half happiness, half warning.

  "I reserve the right to change my mind, though."

  "But you'll already be in the studio with me, and I'll drive you and everything, so there'll really be no excuse. I know you've got nothing else going on."

  Yeah, you only think that, I wanted to say. But I didn't, because he was right. And it really had been a while since my last lapse. I was being good. I was being careful.

  So instead I just rolled my eyes. "Fuck off, Lowell."

  He grinned even wider. "Happy birthday, sis. Enjoy your pink scarf. I expect to see you wearing it at the studio tomorrow."

  "I'm only bringing it in case I need a quick way to hang myself."

  "That's the spirit." Lowell turned and headed down my front walkway in that easy, casual loping way he had, wh
ere you just knew the guy didn't have a fucking army of demons in his head to weigh him down. My brother was a happy-go-lucky, easy going guy, genuinely nice and helpful and the only reason I didn't hate him for being naturally lovable was that he somehow found me lovable too.

  Not many people could do that.

  I wound my scarf around my neck a few times, feeling the scratchy, cheap feathers dig into my skin, and waved to him, sending him off with an upraised middle finger just like he was expecting. Then I stood there, taking deep breaths.

  With each breath, the scarf seemed to wind itself tighter. I closed my eyes, willing myself to keep it there. A test. If I could keep this fucking scarf around my neck, then that would mean I was okay. I was a normal person. I wasn't getting strangled, that was absurd, never mind what it felt like, that wasn't real. All I needed to do was wear the fucking scarf and...

  With a choked cry, I flung it off me. The feeling of being closed in didn't leave, even after I'd taken a few deep, calming breaths.

  I'd failed the test.

  I should call my therapist, tell her about this, my rational mind chastised me. She'd warned me about this. Progress was incremental, she said, a product of doing the hard work necessary to be healthy again. These compulsive actions didn't prove anything. Passing arbitrary tests I made up on the spot meant nothing...

  But then the other part, the hidden part, the part that told me I was all better, that I didn't need to be careful and hyper vigilant all the time, said relax, everything is fine. The test was skewed. We'll just come up with a better one, and once you pass that one, you'll be fine.

  As I closed the door and headed into the house for another long night spent alone, both of those voices were equally loud in my head and I honestly didn't know which one was right anymore.

  *****

  The next morning found me kneeling over the toilet-bowl.

  I only threw up twice, I thought to myself as I flushed it. That's not so bad.