Groupie (Rock-Hard Beautiful Book 1)

by C. M. Stunich

  “You're heading out?” he asks as he pauses next to Michael and looks between me and him. “Because if so, I'd love to go with you guys. I want to buy Lilith some clothes.”

  “You don't have to do that,” I say, but Muse just shrugs, looking young and sexy in a white hoodie layered underneath that leather zip-up sweatshirt from the other night. His silver-black hair is already styled, and he's even got on some eyeliner.

  I feel a little ridiculous sitting in my old prom dress, shedding glitter and tiny glass beads everywhere.

  “If you're going, I'd like to go, too,” he says with another shrug, smiling at me and putting his tattooed hand in his pants pocket. “A coat and boots sounds nice, but aren't you like, seriously low on underwear? The roadies don't do laundry as often as you'd think.” His smile gets a little dirty and I feel myself running my tongue over my lower lip, unconsciously returning the flirtation. “And let's be honest: we haven't exactly been kind to your poor underwear.”

  “Mr. Practical again,” I say as I reluctantly pull my feet from Ran's lap and put them on the heated floors. Oh, that feels nice. Not as nice as the press of Ransom's rough thumb against my arch, but still amazing. “I guess I can't go another week with the three pairs I have.”

  “Hey, I was considering being completely impractical and buying you a lacy teddy and some garter belts, too. Maybe a pleather nurse outfit? A schoolgirl uniform?”

  I laugh as I stand up, finishing the last gulp of coffee in my cup.

  “I'll go,” I say as I rinse my mug out at the sink. “But I'm not letting you guys buy me anything. I can purchase my own underwear, thank you very much.”

  The boys bundle me up and we head into the city, leaving the venue tucked away in a suburb of Chicago. In the snow and the traffic, it takes our hired car over an hour and a half to get to this eight story mall at the base of an enormous skyscraper.

  When I first moved to Phoenix, the sheer volume of people in the city overwhelmed me to a point where Kevin had to really work to get me to leave the apartment. I mean, Gloversville, NY has a population of less than sixteen thousand people while the Phoenix metro area is in the millions mark. But I adapted, even if I never really liked the lonely anonymity of a crowd.

  Still, the sheer number of people inside the Water Tower Place shopping mall is almost staggering. I stick myself between Muse and Michael and follow along. Michael has some app on his phone that gives directions around the mall and shows him where all the shops are. I'm more than happy to be a backseat driver on this one.

  “Are you guys going to get recognized in here?” I ask Muse as I look up at him, at the four black piercings above his brow, at his black and silver mohawk. It's styled conservatively today, but there's just something about him that says rockstar. I can't decide if it's the eyeliner, the careful but confident smile, or the black boots with the white skulls all over them. Maybe all of the above?

  “Possibly,” Muse says as Michael steers us toward a jewelry store and my heart starts to thunder in my chest. “That gift better not be a ring.” Would Pax have even brought that up if it wasn't a possibility? As I watch Michael pause at the store's threshold and narrow his eyes on the glass cases and the slickly dressed salespeople, I feel myself wishing I could get to know him like I'm getting to know the other guys. And it's not just because I'm a crazy slut that needs to add another dude to her harem. He just … I don't know. There's more to him than meets the eye. “But our security team will take care of it if anything gets out of control.”

  “Security team?” I ask as Muse turns me around by the shoulders and points out a woman sitting on a nearby bench, a man window-shopping a few storefronts away. “You have bodyguards?”

  Muse laughs and shrugs his shoulders.

  “Yeah, the record label makes us take them out with us, but sometimes I forget they're even around. They have their own car and they don't talk to us unless shit goes down.” Muse tucks his fingers into his black and white pinstriped skinny jeans and watches the male guard for a moment before turning his attention back to me. “It's not like anybody's trying to shoot at us or anything,” he says with a small smile. “At least, nobody has yet.”

  “Were they at the club with us, too?” I ask as Muse and I turn back around and find Michael standing in the exact same spot, rubbing one tattooed hand down an equally tattooed arm. He started sweating in the car ride over and chucked his coat. Now that I'm standing in here, wrapped up in my only coat—the rest either got stolen or left in my damaged car—I wish I'd left mine, too. It's stifling.

  “They were,” Muse says as he smiles at a pair of giggling girls and gives them a wave. I can't tell if they just think he's hot or if they recognize him from the band. Then, of course, I see that the girl on the right is wearing a Beauty in Lies t-shirt. Wow. I keep forgetting how popular these guys are.

  And I'm fucking them all. Well, except for Michael.

  I smile as we approach the guitarist in question, looking like your typical hot as hell but totally dickish metalcore prick. My sister used to date guys like this; I was never into them. Until now, I guess.

  “What's wrong?” I ask as Michael narrows his violet eyes on the salespeople, keeping them all safely at bay. I notice a few of the girls—and one of the guys—checking him out. I can't blame them; Michael looks damn good today. His body is tight and muscular, but he's not bulky. He's tall and lean and his hair is razored and dark as night, a startling contrast to the soft color of his eyes. His face is hard and masculine, and he's just dripping with well-placed tattoos. All the shapes and colors blend together in this seamless line from one hand, up and across his shoulders and chest, and down to his other hand. In the blue band tee he's wearing, a lot of them are invisible, but I remember them. That first night, looking up and seeing him in the shadows of the Bat Cave's doorway, I felt my heart skip several beats.

  Vanessa is a lucky girl.

  “You don't have to get her jewelry, you know,” I say as he turns his attention back to me and Muse. Well, mostly to me. He stares into my eyes and makes my heart do that same skittering, stopping thing again. I pretend not to notice, pulling the black knit cap off my head and shaking my long hair out of its loose knot.

  Michael watches it cascade down my back and glances away suddenly.

  “Vanessa's old fashioned; she'll want jewelry,” he says matter-of-factly, but not at all like he's excited about it. I remember his good mood from the bus and feel my lips turn down slightly. Maybe the whole idea of getting her a gift is stressing him out?

  “If she loves you, she won't care what you get her as long as you put some thought into it.” I try not to think of Kevin, but I don't have any other real relationship to compare it to. My first boyfriend was nice, but we were so young and we only dated for three months before he moved away. Still, I remember this one time he picked me flowers on his way to school. Stuff like that totally counts, you know.

  “Right. You've definitely not met Vanessa then,” Muse says with a small laugh, drawing Michael's ire in his direction. “What? It's just … Lilith wouldn't say that if she'd met the girl.”

  “I cheated on her, Muse,” Michael says blatantly. “While she was pregnant. She has a right to be angry.”

  “Sure, but at some point she has to stop punishing you and move on or else she should break up with your ass. Besides, you didn't know she was pregnant.”

  I stand there and listen to them argue, but the word pregnant gets caught in my mind on a loop.

  “You have a kid?” I ask and Michael shakes his head.

  “She miscarried pretty early,” he says and then he moves into the store and stares at the sea of shiny jewels like he's never seen anything like them in his life. Or maybe like they could grow legs, break out of the glass, and glom onto his face, suck the life right out of him. Yeah, that's more or less what he looks like right now. “What about a bracelet?”

  “A bracelet?” I ask as I step up beside him and think about the last bracelet Kevi
n bought me. It was beautiful, ridiculously expensive. He tore it off my wrist when we broke up. I saw one of his new girlfriends wearing it once when I came to get the last box of my stuff out of our apartment—the apartment that I painted and tiled and replaced the bedroom carpet in.

  I'm such an idiot.

  “Definitely not a bracelet,” I say as I sigh and Michael reaches up a hand, giving my shoulder a squeeze.

  “You are tense as fuck,” he tells me and I blink sharply up at him as he gives me a weird look. “What the hell are my friends doing to you? When I was having as much sex as you are, I could barely stand up I was so relaxed. My body was like fucking jelly. The only part of me that was hard was my dick.”

  A laugh bursts out of my throat and I clamp a hand across my lips as Muse slides a finger along the gold rim of the cases, moving in a circle around the room and pausing next to a case on the far side, squinting and leaning in to examine the jewelry.

  “I'm just thinking about my ex,” I respond honestly and Michael wrinkles up his face.

  “Pax told me about him,” he says and then sighs, letting go of my shoulder. “The cheater, right?” I make a face and he shakes his head. “Don't worry about being politically correct with me. I know that what I did was fucked-up. Your ex, he's a royal fucking asshole. I'm one, too, so I get to say that.”

  “Well, thank you for that,” I say as I breathe out a long sigh, studying the curve of Michael's lower lip. It's full and pouty when it's not curled up in an angry scowl. “So, tell me, how long have you and Vanessa been together?”

  “Five years,” Michael says and I feel my mouth twitch a little.

  Five years. That's how long Kevin and I lasted; I wish someone would've helped me cut that cord sooner.

  “Five years,” I repeat as I walk slowly and reach up to unzip my white leather jacket. I layered one of Ransom's black hoodies underneath, partially because of the snow but mostly because I wanted to smell violets while I was out shopping today. “Tell me what you love about her,” I say, and I'm not just asking because I want to help him pick out the right gift. I truly, sincerely want to know; my curiosity's gotten the better of me.

  “What I love about her?” he echoes, like I've asked a question that's virtually impossible to answer. I glance back at him, at the tightness of his navy blue band t-shirt, the words Beauty in Lies stamped across the front in big, block capital letters. Underneath, there's a sketch of that convertible with the five stick figures inside of it, the same drawing I saw projected on the curtain at the show.

  “Yeah. Tell me why you'd pick Vanessa over any other girl.”

  I stop walking and watch him expectantly as I slip my jacket down my shoulders and then shrug out of the hoodie, putting both items in the crook of my elbow.

  “I love that she has the power to forgive,” he says, and I smile. But Michael doesn't. In fact, he looks pissed off when he tears his gaze from the brightly lit cases to stare at me.

  “I like that,” I say as I mull his words over in my head. The power to forgive. I wish I could say I had that, too, but when I think about what Kevin did to me … What's even worse is the way he handled it. I was upset; I was crying. I'd just been diagnosed with a disease that he gave me and yet he had the audacity to treat me like I was the one who'd done something wrong.

  No, I'm not ready to forgive Kevin. Maybe someday I'll be as strong as Vanessa, but not now.

  “My mom and dad got married way too early, but somehow they made it work,” I tell Michael, saying the words but not really feeling them. How could I? Could I really stand here in this busy, crowded mall with all these breathing, laughing, smiling people and think about my dead parents? All of this life, all around me, and the dead cling to my heart like ghosts. “On their five year anniversary, my dad bought my mom a charm bracelet with a rhodonite crystal on it, in the shape of a tear drop.”

  I look up and make my mouth smile, even though inside I'm dying a little bit.

  I lift my left wrist and jingle the charm bracelet around, touching the splotchy pink and black gemstone with a finger.

  “Rhodonite stands for love and forgiveness,” I explain as Michael walks over to me and wraps his fingers around the pale skin of my forearm, gently pulling on my arm until I extend my wrist toward him. “Some people also believe it helps heal emotional wounds and scars. My dad said he chosen it for her because he wanted to make the clear distinction that this would be the last teardrop he'd ever give her.”

  Michael smooths his thumb over the pulse point in my wrist, using his other hand to gently turn the bracelet and study the other charms hanging from it. I've collected a lot of them since Mom died. In fact, the only ones she ever added to the bracelet were little birthstones—one for me and one for Yasmine.

  It makes me sick that out of the four people this bracelet used to represent, I'm the only one left alive.

  My eyes well with tears, but I blink them back as Michael lets go of my wrist and I spin back to the jewelry case, rubbing and tugging at my tear ducts with my middle fingers and trying to keep the moisture in my eyes from running down my face.

  “You could get her a teardrop necklace,” I suggest in a slight sniffle as Michael steps up next to me. “As a promise that you'll never make her cry again. Or maybe just something out of rhodonite?” I point out a shiny heart wrapped in silver leaves. “That's rhodonite right there. It's a unique stone; I'm surprised they even sell it here.”

  “Are you okay?” he asks in a quiet voice. “Do you want to grab a shake or something?”

  “I want to help you pick the perfect gift,” I say on the end of a long sigh, dropping my arms by my sides and dropping my coat and hoodie to the floor on accident. Michael and I both bend down at the same time to pick them up and almost bump our heads together. When I glance up, I see him looking right at me, his lips just a few careful inches away.

  “He must've been a real romantic, your dad,” he whispers. “I wish I had some of that in me.”

  Michael gathers up my hoodie and jacket, but he drapes them over his own arm instead of handing them back to me.

  “Romance isn't about jewelry, Michael,” I say as I nod my chin at the coat and sweater. “It's about meaningful gestures.” We look at each other for a long time, long enough that I know something could happen between us if either of us let it.

  Neither of us will.

  I rise to my feet and glance over to find Muse watching the two of us with a strange smile on his face.

  “Did you pick something out yet?” he asks as I brush off the knees of my white leggings and glance over at Michael.

  He glances inside the case one more time and then flicks his violet eyes over to mine, stealing my breath away. He doesn't look so mean or angry in that moment. Just … hopeful. His smile, when he does give it, is heartbreakingly beautiful.

  “Is it okay if I have a few minutes alone to think?”

  “Sure thing,” Muse says, curling his fingers around mine and drawing my attention back to his face. “Lilith and I still need to pick out some underwear.”

  He drags me away from the jewelry store, and I squeeze his hand tight, trying to cool the sudden aching in my heart. There are so many painful emotions fighting for supremacy in there that I feel sick. There's the fresh bloody red hurt of Dad's passing, the old scabbed wounds of Mom's cancer and Yasmine's murder, the dark purple bruise of Kevin's betrayal. And something else, too. I have no idea what that is. But it aches and sloshes and burns my insides when I walk.

  God.

  Maybe I shouldn't have told Michael that story? I feel exposed and open now, like maybe some of my pain is dripping in a red trail behind me as I walk, just this bright ruby sparkling of blood from all of my emotional wounds.

  When he catches up to us, he's got a shiny black bag held loosely at his side and a decidedly romantic smile on his face. I smile back at him when he glances over at me. And he didn't think he had it in him … I wonder what he picked out for her or if he'll show it t
o me?

  “Where to next?” he asks as Muse pauses outside a women's lingerie store and points a finger at the gold and taupe striped walls inside.

  “Panties?” he asks with a slight smirk.

  “Or a coat,” Michael says, pointing over his shoulder at a different shop. He's still holding my leather motorcycle jacket and Ran's hoodie for me. He makes no effort or sign that he wants to give them back. “It's fucking snowing outside.”

  “Oh come on, underwear is so much more fun that outerwear,” Muse says with a sigh, like he already knows he'll give into whatever Michael wants. He gestures with the tattooed bats at his friend. “Whatever. Let's just get this over with so he's not scowling and bitching at us the whole time.”

  “Which I will fucking do if I don't get my way,” Michael says, leading the way into the shop as I shrug my shoulders at Muse and we exchange an amused look.

  “See how he is? Aren't you glad he's not a part of our, uh, ménage à cinq?”

  “Ménage à cinq?” I ask, our hands still laced as we walk into the store behind Michael.

  “You know, like a ménage à trois but with five people instead of three?” Muse winks at me and starts helping me navigate rack after rack after rack of beautiful—and expensive—clothing. He seems dead set on making me pick a few things out.

  I try to resist at first, but eventually figure that it's just easier to give in and try a bunch of stuff on. Anyway, if buying me new clothes will make him happy then where's the harm in it? It doesn't feel like he's trying to patronize me or pay me off or make me his whore. Nothing at all as sinister as any of that. My pride demands that I turn him down, but my heart refuses.

  Honestly, it feels like I'm on a date with my boyfriend.

  “Muse and I have a new girlfriend …”

  Ransom's words ring in my head as I slip out of my clothes and pull on a tight green sequin minidress that my dad would've absolutely hated. Oh God, he could barely get past that red glimmering bodycon dress I wore to prom, and it didn't plunge between my breasts like this one does.