Worthy of the Harmony (Mountains & Men Book 2)

by Martin, R. C.

  “Knock, knock!”

  I’m startled out of my thoughts at the sound of her voice. Lindsey grins at me as she invites herself into my office and plops down into one of the chairs in front of my desk.

  “Hi, Lindsey,” I manage, trying desperately to clear my mind of anything and everything that reminds me of Sage.

  “I know you know why I’m here, Mill.” She wiggles her eyebrows at me playfully and I stifle a groan. “You managed to escape me yesterday, but I haven’t forgotten that dark haired, blue-eyed Adonis of a man who was lurking around your office Tuesday.”

  “Oh,” I mutter, wishing I could claim ignorance. “He’s—” My conscious prevents me from assigning him the title of nobody. Every part of my body, every part, knows that would be a huge-ass lie. He’s not nobody…

  I fear he’s becoming the exact opposite.

  “He’s…what?” asks Lindsey with a devious smile. “Hot? Sexy? Lickable?”

  Yes. Yes. And absolutely, yes, I think to myself, still unsure what to tell her. He’s not my boyfriend. We’ve only really been on one real date, in spite of the fact that over the last three, almost four weeks, he’s made me come more times than I can remember. He’s the only man I’m sleeping with, sure, but he’s not my boyfriend.

  He’s also not a friend. I’m certain I’ve never had any friends who bite my—

  “Millie!” she cries with a laugh. “Spit it out already. The suspense is killing me, over here.”

  “His name is Sage,” I spit out with a self-conscious shrug.

  “And you’re…?”

  “Undefined.” I let the word hang in the air for a moment before I nod, sure that that’s the best answer I can provide. “We’re undefined.”

  “Hmm,” she hums, narrowing her eyes at me. “And what does one do with Sage in the realm of undefined?”

  We have sex. A lot. Earth-shatteringly, amazing sex.

  I don’t say the words aloud, but I can tell by the look on Lindsey’s face that my silence eradicates my need for words. Then I feel the blush that fills my cheeks and I know I couldn’t be anymore obvious even if I tried.

  Fuck.

  “I don’t want to talk about it,” I murmur, averting my gaze as I look into my lap.

  “Why, Millie Valentine—I do believe you’re smitten.”

  I flinch at the word, my heartbeat picking up speed as I bring my eyes back up to meet hers. I shake my head, but I can’t find my voice. Now, I really wish that she would leave. I can’t have this conversation. I won’t.

  Just then, there’s a light knock on my open door and we both look back to see one of my students standing in the hallway. “Professor Valentine? Am I interrupting? I had a few questions about our last assignment.”

  I breathe a sigh of relief and Lindsey looks at me with a raised eyebrow. “We’re not finished,” she whispers, and I believe her. For now, though, I’ve been saved, yet again, by my love of numbers. They’ve never let me down and for that, I’m eternally grateful.

  “Hi, Saundra. Come on in. Professor Clark was just leaving.”

  IT’S BEEN ANOTHER long ass afternoon. I look around the garage at the guys and the weight of our dilemma weighs on me even more. We just said good riddance to yet another wannabe bass player. It’s the fifth one this week and I’m really starting to stress the fuck out. We all are. With this agent coming to see us play next weekend, now is our time. We need to have our shit together or we could miss our chance. Who knows when the next one will come around? These things don’t just happen.

  I slump down into one of the warn, comfortable couches we keep out here and tilt my head back. This place is home. And I don’t just mean that in the sense that the garage is attached to our house. Never once have we parked a car in here. It’s like our sacred place—meant only for the creation of music. We keep most of our shit out here, except for in the winter months when we store the instruments inside, where it’s insulated and the cold won’t get to them. But we’ll practice out here no matter what the temperature.

  Violet was the one who suggested we pick up a couple second hand couches and make the place a little more cozy. Sometimes, when any of us want to get away, we’ll come out here and chill. Lately, it hasn’t so much felt like an escape out here—more like a marooned ship. As time passes, we drift farther and farther away from civilization—farther away from any chance of finding a decent guy to make our band complete again.

  “Is this Alex guy still coming?” asks Knox. He’s sitting across the room on the other couch, his feet propped up on a small table as he absentmindedly plucks at his guitar.

  “Yeah,” I mutter, reaching into my pocket for my phone. Brandon had followed through, giving my number to Alex, who reached out to me yesterday. “He said he’d be here at four-thirty.”

  “It’s four-twenty-nine,” Maddox grumbles. “Fucker better show.”

  “Hey,” pipes in Derrick.

  We all look in his direction, where he sits behind his set. He tips his chin, signaling for us to look out of the open garage door. We watch a car pull up across the street. When the driver side door opens, I furrow my brow in confusion.

  “Who’s that?” Derrick asks.

  I shrug, not even bothering to look back to see if he noticed the gesture. I’m too focused on the pretty girl reaching into her backseat to pull out—Fuck. Me—her bass guitar.

  She straps the instrument across her back and then looks both ways, making sure there’s no traffic before she crosses the street. The closer she gets, the more details I notice. She’s got long dark hair, the curled ends died a rich purple, the front held back with a rolled up, yellow bandana. She’s a tiny little thing, too; can’t be more than an inch taller than Rosy, and probably weighs one-twenty soaking wet. In grey combat boots, jeans, and two tank tops—white over teal—she appears completely casual. I can tell, as she walks between the cars parked in the driveway, that she doesn’t dress to draw attention to her body—but that doesn’t mean she doesn’t have a body worth looking at.

  “Hey,” she says hesitantly, offering all of us a small wave. “I’m guessing you’re Mountains & Men?”

  “Yeah,” Maddox answers. “Who the hell are you?”

  “I’m Alex. I talked to Sage about an audition? Sorry—I don’t know which one of you is Sage.”

  “That’d be me,” I say, raising a finger.

  “Right,” she mutters, lightly tapping her fingers on her forehead, as if to express her thoughtlessness. “Brandon did describe you—dark hair, tats, glasses...I should have known.”

  I look at the guys, each of them studying Alex with a different dubious expression, and then meet her gaze once more. “Uh, funny you should say that. Brandon didn’t tell me too much about you. Actually, he didn’t tell me anything about you. Like, that you’re a girl.”

  “Oh.” She coughs out an embarrassed laugh and then shrugs. “Is that some sort of problem?”

  “Look, Alexandra? Alexandria? Whatever your name is—no offense, but we’re a bunch of dudes called Mountains & Men,” Knox explains.

  “Huh,” she scoffs, propping her fists against her hips. She looks around at every one of us before she speaks. “Are you sure you’re not just a bunch of sexists jerks called Mountains & Men? And my name is Alex, by the way. Just Alex.”

  “Hold on,” I say, standing to my feet. I lift my hands up slightly, hoping to stop the sudden rise of tension in the room. “Look, we’re just surprised, okay? All Brandon told me is that you could play. How do you know him, anyway?”

  “We go to the same church. I play in the worship band.”

  “Oh, fuck no,” Maddox replies emphatically. “You brought us a fucking church girl? This is not going to work.”

  I sigh, reaching up to run my fingers through my hair. I’ll be the first to admit, Brandon left out quite a few important details about Alex, but we’re kind of desperate. I told Brandon not to fucking mess with me and he assured me that he wasn’t. I trust him. The least we could
do is see if she can play. I open my mouth to say as much, but Alex speaks before I can.

  “Goodness, I don’t know why I’m about to defend myself. Lord knows you’ve insulted me enough that I should turn around and leave you high and dry, but here I go.” She pauses, claps her hands together, and weaves her fingers as she lets her arms drop in front of her. “The way I heard it, you need a bass player. I get it that you’re all dudes, but this is about music, is it not? You might be taller, bigger, stronger, with an extra appendage that I don’t have, but none of you have what the one with the boobs has—” She points at her tits and my eyebrows shoot up in shocked amusement. I also can’t help but look. “And that is,” she continues, drawing my focus back to her eyes, “the ability to play the bass like a badass.

  “I’ve done my research. Granted, I might not be able to put names to faces, but I’ve listened to everything you have online. I’m ready for this audition. I’m looking for a band—you’re a band. I can play anything you want. Now, are we going to do this or not?”

  For a moment, none of us says a word.

  “You’ve listened to our shit?” Derrick asks, appearing intrigued.

  “Pretty much non-stop for the last twenty-four hours. And don’t call it shit. You know it’s not. It’s really good. Great, even. But you know Contortion wouldn’t sound half as sick without that bass.”

  “Wait a second,” JJ says, speaking for the first time since Alex arrived. “You’re telling us you learned Contortion? In the last twenty-four hours?”

  A small smile pulls at her lips as she nods once. “Remember the part about me playing like a badass? I don’t boast about much. In fact, I suck at a lot of things; but playing the bass is the one thing I’m most proud of. It’s my gift. I practically live to play. So…”

  “She says she can play Contortion, I want to hear it.” JJ stands from the couch and makes his way over to his keys.

  I look to the rest of the guys, hoping to feel them out. Derrick spins his sticks between his fingers and tips his chin at me. Maddox shakes his head, but gets up and plugs into his amp anyway. Knox shrugs and then does the same. I turn my focus back to Alex and gesture with a sweeping motion of my hands for her to come on in. She takes her bass out, straps up, and plugs in. Once everyone is set, I step to the mic.

  “You sure you’re ready for this?”

  She takes a deep breath and squares her shoulders before she responds. “Yes. Let’s do it.”

  “Okay,” I say with a smirk.

  The song starts with just vocals and keys. JJ and I kick things off simultaneously. When I begin to sing, the words come as effortlessly as my next breath. Then, after I finish the opening phrase, Derrick clicks the beat and everyone joins in at once. Alex falls into the mix as if she’s been here all along. Suddenly, I actually have to think about the words to the song as I continue to sing; all the while, Knox, Maddox, JJ, Derrick and I are exchanging glances. She wasn’t lying. She’s a fucking badass.

  When we get to the middle of the song, there’s a bass solo. While she plays, her focus glued to her fingers as they glide along her fret, I watch her intently—the way she moves with the beat, her right shoulder marking time—and the way she seems to get lost in the notes. When she nails it, the garage erupts with our roar of astonishment. We don’t even finish the song. JJ pulls his headphones from over his ears then reaches over to clap her on the shoulder. I think in his excitement, he nudges her harder than he intended, and she stumbles forward a step. She catches herself and laughs it off just as Knox comes over and offers her his hand.

  “You can rock my world any time you want, little mama.”

  “Um, thank you?” she says warily, reaching out to accept his gesture.

  “Someone’s got the shakes,” he says, pulling her closer. “Do I make you nervous?”

  She laughs again, pulling her hand out of his grasp. “You in all of your giant glory?” she asks, motioning to their height difference. “No. You and all of your talent? Yes. You all make me nervous.”

  “Better get used to us, Alex,” says Derrick, pointing at her with a drumstick.

  “Wait just one fucking minute,” calls out Maddox. “That’s it? She’s in without any discussion whatsoever?”

  “Maddy—she just played circles around all the losers we’ve heard so far! What more do you want?” asks Knox.

  “Cut the Maddy shit, I’m serious. It’s about more than just playing. We’re not so desperate that we’ll take any hot little number off the street without doing our due diligence.”

  “Mad Lips is right,” I admit.

  The five of us guys have been through a lot together. We’ve been Mountains & Men for years, pouring our sweat, tears, and blood into our name. We can’t adopt someone who won’t be willing to go through the ups and the downs with us. It’s obvious that Alex knows her shit backwards, but can she be family?

  “Take the floor, man,” I tell him, folding my arms across my chest. “Ask what you want.”

  “First of all, we’re a fucking rock band. We play, we drink, we swear, we party, then repeat. We don’t need a little church mouse coming in here trying to clean us up or some shit.”

  “Is that what you’re worried about?” Alex murmurs. “Look, I’m a Christian, yeah. But that doesn’t mean I’m going to come in here and hit you over the head with my bible. It’s like I said before, this is about the music. I won’t judge you if you won’t judge me. Even if you do judge me. I play, I drink, I swear, and I party, too. Maybe not as much as you, but to each his own.”

  “Yeah. To each his own, douche. Damn. Show some respect,” mutters Derrick, throwing his stick. It hits Maddox square in the chest. He scowls back at the drummer, but one look is all it takes for Maddox to fold. We all know Derrick believes in the Big Man Upstairs, too.

  “Is there anything else you want to know about me?”

  “Look,” I begin. “Here’s the thing. We can’t afford to lose another bass player again. Not now. We’re trying to get some things moving and we need someone who is going to be in this—rehearsals, gigs, all of it. Can you commit? Like, really commit?”

  “I’m a full-time student. I have worship band practice on Wednesdays and church on Sundays. Outside of that, I’m in.”

  “And if we start expanding our reach? Hitting the road and all that shit—you’ll be missing school. What then?” asks Maddox.

  “Taking a semester or two off never hurt anyone. You only live once, right?”

  “With the way you play, why aren’t you in a band now? Why us?” JJ asks.

  “Honestly?” She looks down at her feet and then up at all of us. “I get a little stage fright. It’s something I’ve been working on, though. I just—I’m getting too old to hide and I don’t want to anymore. I want to play as much as I can and as often as I can—I just want to play.”

  We all fall silent, and for a moment, I give everyone a chance to process everything that’s happened in the last few minutes. I wait, leaving the floor open for anyone else to say what they need to before we put this discussion to bed.

  “Alright. Let’s take a vote, yeah?” I say, ready and willing to give this girl a shot. “All in favor of giving the broad a chance, say aye.”

  All at once, we each agree.

  “Aye.”

  I WORK INTO the evening, in need of a little catch up time after last night with Sage—and I won’t even mention the level of distracted he’s had my thoughts all day. Regardless of the reason why, I don’t leave campus until six-thirty before I head to the gym. I’ll admit, every time I walk into the building, I wonder if I’ll see Keith. This is where I met him, after all. I’m not sure what I’d do, given the chance to confront the bastard who tried to date rape me. As my eyes scan the floor on my way to the locker rooms, I’m not sure I’ll be finding out tonight, either.

  I change into my snug, black sports bra and matching yoga running shorts, throwing on a pale blue, loose fitting, racer-back tank top. I lace up my tennis sh
oes and stow away my bag before I start heading back out to the floor. Slipping my phone into my bra, I reach up to pull my hair into a ponytail. Just as I’m finished, my phone starts to ring. I pull it out and my stomach tingles when I see his name light up the screen.

  “Hello?” I answer.

  “Come over, doll face.” I hear laughter in the background and I wonder what he’s up to.

  “Come over where?”

  “The house. We’re celebrating! Mountains & Men has a bass player, baby.”

  “Oh, wow. Congratulations,” I reply.

  “Yeah. You’ve got to meet Alex. You comin’?”

  I look around me, remembering where I am and why I’m here. “I’m at the gym. I just got here.”

  “Fuck the gym. I’ll give you a workout later. Violet just got off work and she’s bringing us pizza. We sent Mad Lips and Knox on a beer run—I told them to pick up a bottle of wine…” He sings the last part in a coaxing manner that causes an ache between my legs. For a moment, my rational thought decides it’s on hiatus. “Millicent, come over. I want to see you. Want to taste you.” He whispers the last sentence and I about face, heading straight for the locker room.

  “Okay. I’m coming. I just need to change and—”

  “Don’t bother. Get that sexy, little ass over here. See you soon.”

  He ends the call without another word. I stare at the phone for a minute before I reach for my bag, securing the strap over my shoulder. On my way to my car, it occurs to me that all he had to do was call for me to come running. The truth has my stomach in knots, but my feet don’t stop my forward progression. I want to see him. Touch him. Taste him.

  I will survive this fall. I will.

  Or so I keep telling myself.

  When I pull up to the house, parking in the street, I notice that everyone is in the garage. As I walk up the drive, I see Violet standing with her back to me, two pizza boxes poised against her hip as she listens to the band play. Sage’s voice makes my stomach flutter and my pussy pulse. When he sees me, he grins around his words, making my heart race.