by L A Cotton
“Levi, come on, man, you know the deal. The back bedroom is for—”
He flipped Hudson off over his shoulder and disappeared into the bigger of two artists bedrooms on the bus.
“That’s bullshit.”
“Leave it, Hud.” I let out a heavy sigh, my eyes fixed on the door now separating Levi and the rest of us.
“He seem unsettled to you?” Damon asked me.
“He’s always fucking unsettled.”
“Yeah, but there’s something else.”
“He’ll be okay.” He had to be. Our entire future was riding on this tour. Razorsharp Records had taken a risk signing a bunch of misfits like us. Between our group of four we had more skeletons in the closet than the paparazzi could handle. It’s why Alistair and the label had worked hard to bury that shit. Yet, we all knew it would only take one nosy journalist to poke his nose where it didn’t belong for our unstable kingdom to come crashing down around us.
“I don’t know, Rafe, maybe having her here wasn’t such a good idea.”
“Yeah,” I scrubbed my face, “well, it’s too late now.” Eva was here whether we wanted her to be or not.
Hudson got up, still grumbling to himself about Levi. “I’m going to take a piss and then I’m going to make some food.”
“So,” Damon said, the second Hudson was out of earshot, “how was it seeing her again?”
“I’m not doing this with you.”
“Come on, humor me. I saw you watching her during the meeting, watching both of them. You still have feelings for her,” he said as if it was the simplest thing in the world.
It wasn’t.
“I have no idea what you’re talking about.”
“No?” His brow quirked up. “You’re telling me that you—”
“That ship has sailed.” It had sailed so far it was nothing but a grainy dot on the horizon. “You need to let it go,” I said flatly.
Damon was the best of us. Compassionate and kind, he had this infectious energy about him. If Levi was the darkness, Damon was definitely the light, and he brought much needed balance to our little band of lost souls.
He let out a smooth chuckle. “I don’t think it’s me who needs to worry. Five months. That’s a long time to be on the road with a girl you don’t have feelings for.”
My eyes shuttered as I inhaled a shaky breath. What Eva and I had shared that weekend in Camdena was unlike anything I’d ever experienced. We’d connected. Not only over music but with the pain that lived inside us both. I never did get her full story, but I knew enough to know she’d battled her own demons. She was the only thing I saw that weekend. Her smile, her laugh. The way she handled herself around my brother and my closest friends.
But it was all a fantasy.
A dream I could spend my life chasing and never quite grasp. Let alone make a reality.
“You don’t always have to put him first,” Damon lowered his voice.
“Yeah,” I said grimly, feeling the truth of the words settle in my bones. “I do.”
“Rafe, come on. It doesn’t—”
“I’m going to check on Levi.” I shot up, wanting nothing more than to make him stop talking. Stop pushing me for answers I didn’t have. “Do me a favor though, yeah?” It came out exasperated. “Stop bringing up this shit with Eva. It’s done.” It’s over, the words echoed through my skull. “We have to focus on the tour. That’s all that matters.”
“Yeah, sure, man.” Guilt washed over his expression. “Listen, I didn’t mean to push.”
“It’s cool. I just don’t want anything else to cause problems between us.”
Because fuck only knew, we already had enough to deal with.
A little over four hours later, I stood in the vast and empty space of the Spectrum Center. It was hard to believe that this time tomorrow seventeen thousand fans would be filling up the seats, waiting to see us perform.
“Do you feel it, bro?” Hudson clapped me on the back and my brows pinched.
“Should I know what the fuck you’re talking about?”
“Don’t tell me you don’t feel it.” The corner of his mouth curved as he looked out to where the roadies were setting up the equipment on the stage. “Tomorrow night, we’ll be standing up there, listening to thousands of girls scream our names. That shit will never get old. This is it,” he went on. “This is the game changer. I can feel it in my bones.”
“You mean you can feel it in your dick?” My eyes dropped to his crotch.
“Are you kidding me? All that fresh puss—”
“Soundcheck,” someone yelled, and an unfamiliar riff blasted out of the speakers.
“Well, would you get a look at that?” Hudson tapped his feet involuntarily, no doubt hearing a beat in his head. “She looks good up there.”
He wasn’t wrong. Eva came to life with her guitar in her hand. Her soft Southern accent was almost pitch perfect.
The music stopped and Letty ran on stage, the two of them studying her clipboard.
“Letty hasn’t left her side since we got here. She was never that attentive with us,” Hudson grumbled.
“Can you blame her? We didn’t exactly make things easy on her.”
“You mean Levi didn’t.” His eyes slid to mine.
“We all played our part.”
Our first tour had been chaos, but what had the label expected? They’d plucked four guys out of a relentless cycle of dead-end jobs and shitty paid gigs and thrown them into the studio and then sent them on the road. No one could have predicted the way Black Hearts would have blown up. We’d dived head-first into a world of sex, drugs, and rock and roll. None of us had doting parents behind the scenes, warning us of the vices that came hand-in-hand with fame. We had Alistair and the label. Looking back, it was a miracle we’d survived our debut tour. Levi had been high or drunk for almost four months straight. Hudson had slept with enough fangirls that I was almost positive he’d have a whole football team of mini Hudsons up and down the East Coast. Damon and I hadn’t indulged the way the two of them did, but we’d still partied too hard and pushed our bodies too far.
Eva’s guitar strummed again, silencing the thoughts flooding my head. It was the first time I’d ever seen her play on stage. At the talent showdown I’d heard her, but I hadn’t seen her, and even though she was only performing for a handful of roadies and staff, she still gave it her all. It was breathtaking.
She was breathtaking.
“You have a little drool,” Hudson’s hand shot out toward me, “right—”
“Fuck off,” I growled, swatting him away.
“My bad. I can see it for what it is.” He smirked. The fucker actually smirked at me. “One musician appreciating another musician’s... talent.”
“Hud,” I warned. It had been months since I’d ghosted Eva, and yet, Damon and Hudson were treating me like I was the one ghosted by her.
His eyes burned into the side of my face as I watched her switch gears and play Zombie by The Cranberries in the arrangement I’d helped her with all those months ago. Fuck. That song was imprinted on my brain. I couldn’t listen to the original version without seeing her face, hearing her voice.
“Holy shit,” my friend breathed as she reached the bridge. “Your girl brought her A-game.”
I didn’t even correct his slip about Eva being my girl. I couldn’t. She’d pulled me into her performance; taken me hostage with her words.
Hudson was wrong though.
Eva wasn’t my girl, she never was.
And nothing I said or did was ever going to change that.
“Fuck, we sound good.” Levi grabbed his t-shirt and pulled it up to wipe the sweat from his face. We were an hour into sound check and we’d never sounded better. Levi was killing it on vocals; giving me, Damon, and Hudson the energy we needed to nail song after song, even the newer ones we’d added to the set.
“Charlotte won’t know what’s hit ‘em,” Hudson said, resting one of his sticks behind his ear.
“Yeah?” I asked, still buzzing. We’d switched up a few things for the new set. Same songs from our debut album, but with some added twists here and there.
“I liked it,” Riley added. “It sounded very… hip.”
“Hip,” Hudson mumbled beneath his breath as me and Damon stifled a laugh.
“Oh yeah, Riles,” Levi stalked to the edge of the stage, crouching down. “Which part specifically did you like?”
Everyone stopped to watch their exchange; road crew, stagehands, even the cleaning staff watched the infamous Levi Hunter as he stared down at Riley like she was nothing more than dirt on his boot.
“Levi,” I hissed. She was our PA now. We needed her, even if my brother thought otherwise. Not to mention the fact she was most likely banging our manager.
“It’s only a question, Rafe, no need to get your panties in a bunch.” He shot me an amused look before pinning Riley with another hard stare. “I’m waiting.”
“Sweet baby Jesus,” Letty breathed, shooting me a look that said, ‘do something’. But he wouldn’t back down, not until he had an answer.
Rolling back her shoulders, Riley met my brother’s glare with a fierce one of her own. “I liked Deep Waters. It’s great on the album but this had a darker edge to it. Rafe’s solo really amped up the feeling of despair.” Her eyes slid to mine, flashing with something I couldn’t quite decipher.
Levi dragged his thumb across his bottom lip, twirling one of his piercings. “Interesting,” was his only reply as he stood up again and nodded at Hudson, “Let’s go over Tomorrow’s Just Another Day again. I want to nail that second verse. It felt... off.”
It wasn’t off. It had been note-perfect. But my brother was his own worst critic at times.
“How are we looking?” Alistair approached Riley and Letty as we got into position.
“Great,” Riley said, sounding a little smug. “They’re looking great.”
Clearly, she thought she’d won the war with my brother, but what she didn’t realize was, Levi didn’t quit. And he rarely lost.
“Everything okay?” Alistair’s eyes asked her the words he didn’t say. Riley offered him a small smile before folding her arms across her chest and waiting for us to start.
Hudson hit the opening beat and everything fell away to the music. I watched as my brother came alive. Eyes closed for most of the song, he sang the lyrics I had penned as if they were his own, as if they’d been forged on his very soul. I might have been able to hold a note or two, but Levi had the voice of an angel. A fact that both inspired and haunted him.
My eyes found Alistair and he nodded, approval etched into his serious expression. He saw it too. Levi was born to perform, to seduce an audience with nothing more than a microphone and lyrics and presence.
When the song ended, a moment of silence fell over us. My heart thudded, adrenaline coursing through my veins. It was nothing compared to how it would feel tomorrow with the cacophony of thousands of fans echoing throughout the arena. But there was something about performing to a small crowd that hit me right between the chest.
“Let’s take five,” the production manager yelled.
I slid the strap of my Zemaitis off and placed it in its stand before grabbing a bottle of water and chugging it down. “Right, I need to go take a leak,” I said, heading for the backstage area.
I figured Eva had returned to the bus. I didn’t expect to find her in the dimly lit hall with her head tipped back against the wall. Half-wondering if I should turn back around and find another bathroom, her voice caught me off guard. “You sounded good out there,” she said, her eyes sliding slowly to mine.
“You weren’t so bad yourself.”
“Oh, I don’t know about that.” She gave me a wry smile. “I thought I was going to puke at one point.”
“Wait until tomorrow.”
The blood drained from her face and I found myself chuckling. “You’ll be okay.” Turning on my heel, I went to leave, but my name on her lips pierced the air.
“Rafe, wait.” Steeling myself, I turned around and met her weary gaze. “I just wanted to say, whatever happened between us... well, I’m not here because of that.”
Her words sliced through me, but I didn’t flinch. “Your point?”
“I get the impression you don’t want me here, and that’s fine.” Her eyes darted to the floor as if the words were hard to say. A sting of guilt shot through me, but this was our reality now.
“Look,” Eva looked at me again, sadness radiating from her. “I’m here and I’m not goin’ anywhere. I owe my parents that much at least. So I figured we should probably try to at least find a way to be around one another.”
Parents? What the fuck was she talking about?
“Eva, I’m not—”
“Yo, dude, hurry the fuck up.” Hudson burst into the hallway, sucking in a harsh breath when he realized Eva was standing right there. “Shit, my bad. I’ll just be—”
“It’s all good,” I said. “Eva was just leaving.”
The second the words left my lips I regretted them. She’d offered me a get out of jail free card. An olive branch toward peace. Yet here I was trampling all over her attempt at starting over. Because seeing her standing there reminded me too much of another time. A time when I’d been captivated by the girl with pain in her eyes.
Part of me wished things could be different, but when you’d grown up in a living nightmare, I knew better than to believe in fairy tales.
“It’s okay, if you two need to—”
“Rafe’s right,” Eva said coolly. “I was just leavin’.” She moved around Hudson.
“Okay,” he said the second she was out of earshot, “what the hell was all that about?”
“Nothing.”
“Rafe...”
“Hud...”
“Shit, man, this is why I always told you never to get in deep with a girl. It screws everything up.”
I pressed my lips together, refusing to humor him. I wasn’t in deep with Eva, I was in deep with life. Trying to hold together the fragile pieces of everything.
“Come on, lover boy.” Hudson roped his arm around my neck. “Levi wants to go over a couple more songs.”
Of course he did.
I didn’t protest though, I knew the drill by now.
What Levi wanted, Levi usually got.
Eva
“Now for the fun part.” Letty waggled her brows as she stepped to one side, revealing a rack of outfits. “What do you think?”
“I... wow.” I stepped closer, running my fingers over the denim and leather, plaid and lace. There were jackets and miniskirts, jeans and shirts, even a dress or two.
“It’s awesome, right?” She could barely contain her excitement. “I mean, I had fun helping style the guys last year but I’m itching to get to work on you.”
My eyes widened as Letty grabbed a denim shirt off the rack and held it up against my body. “It’s not usually an assistant’s role to help style an artist, but I told Alistair you’d probably feel more comfortable with me than a team of stylists.”
“Thank you. I feel so out of my depth,” I admitted.
“Get a couple of shows under your belt and you’ll be fine. You sounded great out there during soundcheck.”
“It’s like a switch flips and the music takes over. But performin’ to a few stage crew, and you and Riley, isn’t a crowd of seventeen thousand people.”
Seventeen. Thousand. People.
The words ricocheted around my head like gun fire. It seemed unquantifiable. Impossible. Too surreal for words. But tomorrow night, I’d perform my opening set for not a few hundred people, not even a few thousand. Seventeen. Thousand. People. Sure, they were coming to see Black Hearts. I was just the unknown special guest. But they would still be out there, listening to my songs, casting judgment
on my performance, probably my worthiness to be on the same stage as their idols. The four guys they worshipped.
“Whoa, are you okay?” Letty touched my arm. “You’ve gone as white as a sheet.”
“How am I supposed to do this?”
“Try on a few outfits?” She frowned.
“Perform, on stage, Letty, to all those people. People who paid good money to see them, not me.”
“Listen to me, and listen good, Eva Star Walker. You really think you’d be stepping foot anywhere near that stage if Ali and the label didn’t see something special in you?” Her brow rose. “Well, do you?”
“I… I guess not.”
“Pfft,” she muttered. “I can handle you being overwhelmed. I can even handle you denying there’s anything between you and Rafe, but what I can’t handle is you pretending you don’t know how talented you are.”
I smashed my lips together to stop myself from saying something that was only going to make Letty more irritated. She draped the shirt over the back of a chair and grabbed my shoulders. “This is your moment to shine, Eva. Do you know how many people would kill to be in your position right now? Don’t go out there thinking you don’t deserve it; go out there with something to prove.”
“Has anyone ever told you you’d make a great motivational speaker?”
“It has been said before.” She grinned, backing up to give me some space. “Feeling better?” I nodded. “Ready to pick out some killer outfits for the opening show?” Another nod. “Good. Because by the time I’m finished with you, the guys won’t know what’s hit them.” Letty winked before snatching another outfit off the rack and ushering me behind the changing screen. “We should pick out something for tonight too.”
“Tonight?” I asked as I shimmied out of my jeans.
“Yeah, for the launch party.”
“Funny, my assistant never mentioned any party to me.”
Letty’s soft laughter filled the room. “You should ask Alistair for a better one.”
“Oh, I don’t know, she’s growin’ on me.”
“You’re not so bad yourself.” Letty appeared around the screen and I scrambled to pull down the shirt.