She could tell by looking that he’d been better. His hair was starting to thin, and that was a shame. His dirty blonde hair had always been one of his nicer features, but he was losing the battle. Megan could tell he’d be completely bald by forty…if he was lucky to make it that far. He also had a slight belly, but nothing too extreme. She could tell, though, that he liked his beer.
“Not bad. What about you, little lady?”
Seriously? Megan tried not to grimace. She could play nice for a little while longer. She surveyed Brad a little more closely. He had a tan going and had a wedding band. Maybe she could get him to talk about family instead of making her feel like the “weaker” sex. “Fine. So…what have you been up to since high school?”
He leaned over toward her, and she saw the slack jaw. He’d already had one beer too many. “You know, I’m getting tired of answering that question.”
Megan decided to lighten the mood. “Maybe we should have sent out biographies to everyone before tonight, right?”
He started laughing. “Yeah.” He nodded. “But…to answer your question, I’m an assistant high school football coach in Colorado Springs and I’m married to a woman I met in college. We have two kids and the third one is on the way.”
“You teach anything?”
“Yeah…history.” She nodded. “So what about you, Miss Megan?”
“I’m an assistant librarian here in town.”
His eyes narrowed and then he brought his beer up to his mouth, draining the glass. “No kids or anything?”
She shook her head. “Nope.”
He pulled his lower lip into his mouth and allowed his eyes to drop to her lips…and lower. Megan started to feel uncomfortable. “What say you and I blow this joint and I give you the chance to say you sacked the quarterback?”
The bartender placed her new drink on a napkin in front of her and she handed him her money. Then she turned back to Brad and wondered if she should be flattered or offended. She chose the latter, assuming that she wasn’t the first woman he’d hit on tonight. “Thanks, but I think I’ll pass.”
He raised his eyebrows but said nothing. She saw him move his eyes to behind her. “Oh. I should have known.”
She wondered what he was talking about until she turned around to see what he was looking at. Tyler had approached and was on the other side of her, playing the role of knight in shining armor.
Chapter Seven
PART OF MEGAN was relieved that Tyler had come to “rescue” her, but the rest of her felt upset that he couldn’t take a hint. She looked back over to Brad, ready to tell him he didn’t know what he was talking about. Before she could speak, though, Tyler started talking.
“Well, if it isn’t the star QB. How’ve you been, man?”
Brad stood and offered his hand to Tyler, just behind Megan’s back. “Great. You?”
“Can’t complain. What’ve you been up to?”
“Aw, just raising a family. You finally got a band going, huh?”
Tyler grinned. “You listen to Madversary?”
“No. Don’t take it personally. Never was much into that headbangin’ stuff.”
Tyler nodded. “To each his own.” But Megan knew what he was thinking—the guy must have terrible taste.
“Good seein’ ya,” Brad said and stood, probably ready to start prowling for someone more available. “Good to see you too, Megan.”
She nodded and smiled. As Brad walked away, Megan decided to be polite and turned to look at Tyler, but Tyler was already moving to take Brad’s empty seat. She turned her head back to face him. He looked at the bartender. “Bud, please.” Then he sat down. “What about you, Megan? You gonna tell me you don’t listen to metal anymore?”
She grinned. “Hell, no. I still love it.”
He looked down at his hands, still grinning. “Have you heard my band?”
Oh, he was gonna do it. He was going to make her talk to him, make her remember how much easy conversation they’d engaged in when they were younger. Well, he still had his life and she had hers, and having a conversation didn’t put them back in each other’s circles. “Of course. I have all three CDs too.”
He raised his eyebrows as his smile spread wider. “Glad to hear that.”
She took a sip of her drink as the bartender placed the bottle of beer in front of Tyler and collected his money. “It’s great stuff, Tyler.”
“Thanks.” He tilted the bottle to his lips and took a swig. Then he looked back at her. “Means a lot coming from you.”
She shrugged, because liking Madversary was a no brainer. But she didn’t want the two of them getting too cozy. “Oh, come on, Tyler. You have millions of fans and my admiration is all you need?”
His jaw slackened but he maintained a steady, cool gaze. “Is it so hard to believe that I care what you think?”
His words made her feel like maybe she’d been too harsh. “No. I guess not.”
“I’m not saying it’s not cool having thousands of fans. It’s nice to know people love my music.”
“Well, it shouldn’t be surprising, though. You’re talented.”
Tyler took another drink from his bottle and then looked at Megan again. “So what about you, Meg? What have you been up to all these years?”
“Nothing nearly as exciting as you. I graduated from CSU-Pueblo and then came back here. I got a job as an assistant librarian at the public library and have been doing that ever since.”
“Do you like it?”
She hadn’t expected that question. It took her off guard. “Yeah, I do, actually.”
“You know, I’ve always pictured librarians as crusty, gray-haired ladies who have those chains hanging from their eyeglasses, and if you so much as say one word, they’re telling you to be quiet.”
Megan laughed and shook her head. “Well, that’s the outfit I have to wear to work every day.”
Tyler grinned. His voice dropped. “I can’t picture you that way.” Suddenly, she felt warmth radiating from his body, and everyone around them at the reunion seemed to just disappear. It even felt quieter. No, Megan, no. She couldn’t let herself fall for him again. He was here for just a couple of days and gone, and she couldn’t spend the next ten years wondering what could have been. “So what all do you do in your job?”
“Probably everything you’d imagine and then some. I check books out for people and shelve books that have been checked in. Once in a while, I cover books and sometimes I work in the Reference section. But my favorite thing is the book club I started.”
“Yeah? What’s that?”
“Well, every Thursday night, a bunch of us get together in a meeting room in the basement of the library. We read a book and then talk about it at our meetings. I usually either find discussion questions online or make up my own. The bookstore downtown sells us books at a discount, and we read at least a book a month, sometimes two or three, depending on the size.”
He nodded. “Sounds pretty cool.” He finished his beer. Megan noticed she still hadn’t finished her second drink. She probably should have, though, because it might help her relax. “What are some of the books you guys read?”
“We read a lot of popular fiction. We’ve read lots of Stephen King, but over the last year, we’ve read books by Chuck Palahnuik, Stieg Larsson, Alice Walker, Richard Ford, Philip K. Dick, and Michael Crichton, to name a few.”
“I know a couple of those but, I have to admit, not all.” He flagged the bartender down and pointed at the empty bottle. “I hope you don’t think less of me.”
She smiled. Just the fact that he thought a book club was “cool” was enough to save him from her scorn. In fact, he was the first guy in a long time whose eyes didn’t glaze over at the word librarian. “You kidding? Of course not.” She took another sip of her drink. “I gotta tell you, though. Some of these books are pretty therapeutic. I mean…you’ve had a bad day, and you pick up a good book and get lost in its pages…all of a sudden, your life doesn’t seem so bad an
ymore.”
Tyler nodded. “I like that.” When the bartender brought Tyler his next drink, he asked Megan, “Wanna go find a table somewhere? It’s crazy up here.”
He was right. There were lots of people, and they kept interjecting hellos here and there without actually starting a conversation. People kept leaning over her, nudging and jostling her, and she was tired of it. “Sounds good.”
Of course, Tyler was stopped a lot more than Megan, but Megan hadn’t become a rock star since graduation. Megan had forgotten more people than she’d remembered from school, and it made her feel like she had Alzheimer’s. As they made their way through the crowd, she looked around for Lisa and couldn’t see her or Randy anywhere. That didn’t mean anything, of course, but she couldn’t even throw a glare her friend’s way.
It took them fifteen minutes to cross the room. More women that she couldn’t recognize from high school stopped them on their way across the room. “Tyler? Love your band.” “Tyler Green. I need a new autograph.” “Hey, Tyler, we’ll be your groupies.” And there were lots of giggles.
She was impressed with the smooth way Tyler handled them all, making no promises but keeping them happy just the same. Watching him work the crowd, she remembered that she and Tyler had been semi-friends before they’d dated and now that they were reconnecting, she thought she was okay with it, even if it was on a just friends basis. Especially if it was on a just friends basis…but it had to stay that way.
They found a table out of the way and sat down. Megan noticed Tyler made sure his back faced the crowd so there would be less chance of being recognized on the fly. As he took a drink of his beer, Megan asked, “So what was the inspiration behind some of your songs?”
He shrugged. “Oh, most of them…you can’t just tell?”
“I have suspicions.”
“Then you’re probably right. There’s not much mystery behind them. A lot of the songs are just about how I was feeling at the time. Like ‘Shut Up,’ that’s about an argument all of us in the band were having at the time. But there are a couple that are just kind of about the whole lifestyle and adjusting to it, and, you know, some fighting songs, and some songs about the current political climate. Some about pain. Any certain ones you’re curious about?”
“No, not really. But I gotta say, I like the direction your band is going. Madversary sounds a lot more mature than your first band, but it also sounds freer and…I don’t know—it has a raw, edgier sound to it.”
“Thanks, Meg. I appreciate that.”
She couldn’t stand it anymore. She had to know, had to just get it out of the way. “So…anyone special in your life?” Her mind was toying with a weekend tryst. She didn’t know that she could have Tyler nearby and not touch every last inch of him, but all bets were off if there was a girlfriend in the picture. Of course, she was assuming a lot. He might not give a shit.
He’d been looking at the last inch of liquid in her glass and his eyes stayed there as he formulated some sort of answer. He licked his bottom lip and raised his eyes to meet hers. He shook his head. “That’s pretty unlikely now.”
Another unexpected response. She felt her brows furrow. “What do you mean?”
He smirked. “Well…there’s not much chance of forming any kind of genuine relationship once you’re in a well-known band.”
“Really?”
“Yeah. I wouldn’t have expected it, but it kinda sucks. At first, it was really cool. Swimming in…” He cleared his throat and took a swig from his beer. “Let’s just say it was most guys’ dream. Women would literally just throw themselves at us. And that was awesome for a while, but then…it kinda loses its charm.”
Megan raised her eyebrows. “I find that hard to believe.”
Tyler pushed his tongue against his teeth. “What’s that supposed to mean?”
“I just never thought I’d know a guy who would say he didn’t like having sex constantly.”
He scowled. “Think what you want. It’s not all it’s cracked up to be. It’s nice to make a connection once in a while.”
She’d forgotten her ex-boyfriend had a sensitive side and she’d touched a sore spot. So she lifted her glass and poured the remaining liquid down her throat. She could see the appeal and knew why women would just want to have sex with Tyler Green to say they had. There was something about rock stars, and most women Megan knew had a rock star fantasy of some kind. Rock stars, especially ones like Tyler who wrote songs about their emotions, had the bad boy appeal but a softer side where they bared their souls. It made them human. And there was something that felt dangerous about most rock stars, making them quite a conquest. More than that, though, for good girls like Megan, rock stars were forbidden fruit, to be looked at and never touched. But sometimes forbidden fruit was impossible to refuse.
So she could understand why women found him irresistible. But she was continuing to remember what she’d felt for him long ago. It was more a “what if” kind of feeling, a feeling of unfinished business. Sitting here now, though, and thinking about the women Tyler had likely encountered, she was seeing him in an all-new light. And that gave her an even more important reason for her to leave as soon as possible. Because if she gave in to the way she felt, she’d sleep with Tyler again and give him her heart and soul…and then he’d be out of her life again for another decade, and she didn’t believe she could take that.
Chapter Eight
AH, BUT THE best-laid schemes…. Instead of letting Megan leave once her drink was finished, Tyler kept ‘em coming, and by the time midnight rolled around, she was feeling too relaxed, too content, and not guarded enough.
He’d spent the evening regaling her with tales of the last few years of his life since fame had taken over. He told her about recording sessions, filming videos, visiting cities she’d likely never see. He told her about tours and his encounters with some of her favorite bands. He made her smile and laugh, and she couldn’t remember the last time she’d had this much fun. But he kept her talking about herself too, so she didn’t once feel like a captive audience. He asked her too if she had anyone in her life, and she admitted that there was no one. She didn’t want to elaborate.
She hadn’t seen Lisa since they’d first arrived, and she knew she’d have to call a cab. She could call her friend’s cell phone, but she didn’t want to potentially interrupt anything her friend had going on. Considering she hadn’t seen her friend all night long, she assumed Lisa was having the time of her life.
“So who are some of your favorite artists nowadays?” Tyler asked.
“I could go on and on, but I’ll narrow it down. My top three favorites are…” Megan paused, trying to narrow her picks down to just a few. “That’s hard. Hmmm. I still really like Metallica, but…” She smiled. “Well, I think I’d have to pick Lacuna Coil, Seether, and, um…System of a Down.”
“What? No Madversary?”
She laughed. “Well, wasn’t that a given?”
He smiled and waved his hand. “No. Just kidding. You said you have my CDs. What more could I ask for?”
“My undying love and adoration.” He chortled. She said, “Seriously, what I like about you guys is how different you are. You don’t sound like everybody else, and that’s big in my book. And you’re always trying new things. It’s cool.”
“Thanks. I mean that.” He leaned over the table. “So, get this. Penny…that’s her name, right?”
“The organizer?”
“Yeah.” Megan nodded. “She asked if we could play a few songs at the dance they’re doing tomorrow night.”
“Who? Madversary?” Tyler nodded. “Can you blame her?”
He grinned and shrugged. “Well, we are.”
Megan felt her jaw slacken. “You are? Are you kidding me?”
He shook his head. “No. The guys’ll be here tomorrow afternoon. We’re not on tour right now, and the guys didn’t mind committing to something small, so we’re gonna do a little set.”
“What all are
you going to play?”
“I’m not sure yet. We haven’t decided. Probably just three or four of our most popular songs. That way people who don’t know our music very well might still recognize a song or two.”
She nodded and smiled, resting her chin on the palm of her hand. “So that means you’ll be singing ‘Wake the Dead’ then, right?”
He finished the beer in his hand. “Probably.”
Megan noticed the noise had died down and she looked around. There weren’t many people left. She stretched. “Guess we’ve overstayed our welcome.”
Tyler shrugged. “Guess so.”
Megan kept looking around. “Do you remember Lisa French?”
“Your best friend in high school, right? How could I forget?”
“Well, she’s still my best friend, and she doesn’t look much different today. You’d recognize her. Have you seen her tonight?”
“No. Is she here?”
“Yeah. She’s my ride, but I haven’t seen her since we got here.” She stretched her back and then her neck, rolling it around. “Guess I’ll have to call a cab.”
Tyler slid his hand across the table and covered Megan’s hand with his. Oh, shit. She’d managed to keep most strong feelings for Tyler at bay all night and had, in fact, enjoyed how sweet he was. She’d started feeling that friends only was just fine, but feeling the heat radiating from his hand…
She looked up from his hand to his eyes. She thought he was feeling the same way now too, that there was a chemistry between them they’d forgotten about, and all it took was one touch. She looked in his eyes and forgot about him as an old high school boyfriend or even as a friend. She felt her pulse quicken and she was surprised he couldn’t feel it through her wrist. Her beating heart felt loud in her ears. She parted her lips to say something, but the words wouldn’t come. He asked, “Do you want me to call one for you?”
MADversary Page 4