Bad Boy Redemption (Bad Boy Rock Star #3)

by Candy J. Starr

  “Where’s Jack?” I asked.

  Tucker shrugged. “Haven’t seen him all day…” And he turned back to the sound desk.

  “But…” I didn’t want to say Jack had told me he’d be there. My pride wouldn’t let me ask. Tucker barely acknowledged me as it was without me looking like a fool.

  I walked out without saying any more, and realised I hadn’t seen Jack’s car in the parking lot.

  Evil thoughts crept into my mind, filling up all the spaces where the sex had been. He’d lied to me. He’d blatantly lied. Maybe something had come up on the way to the studio and he’d gotten sidetracked? Maybe there was a good reason for this. I’d get home and he’d be there with a perfectly good excuse. Like an anvil had fallen on him and broken his foot, or he’d been attacked by coyotes. Or his car had broken down. That would be reasonable.

  The recording studio was pretty much in the middle of nowhere, and the cab I’d taken had long since gone. I got my phone out of my bag but the battery was flat. It seemed every time I wanted to use this stupid phone the battery was flat. It had a battery life of about ten minutes. I would totally buy a new phone. And it’d be an Android phone, not a stupid iPhone.

  I hurled the stupid, dead phone at the building wall. It hit the side and ricocheted without breaking. I walked over and picked it up. The screen had cracked but it was fine. Dumb phone. Wouldn’t even smash.

  I remembered passing a train station when I’d been in the cab, so I started walking towards it. When I got to the main road, I could see the rail crossing in the distance.

  When I’d dressed for the meeting, I had not been planning on walking for blocks and blocks. Halfway to the station, my heel was rubbed raw with blisters. I thought about taking my shoes off, but I didn’t want to walk on the crappy footpath in bare feet. I didn’t have a Band-Aid in my bag, or anything for emergency first-aid, and there was nowhere in sight where I could buy anything like that. What kind of hell suburb doesn’t have a 7-11?

  I got out a tissue and folded it around the back of my shoe, hoping that would make the rubbing stop.

  That worked for about half a block until the tissue moved and I had to stop to fix it. A few more steps and I had to fix it again. I’d kill Jack when I got home. He could’ve rung me to let me know he wouldn’t be in the studio.

  Maybe he had called and I didn’t realise because my stupid phone was flat.

  I had to stop again. Tears welled in my eyes. A stupid blister would not defeat me, and I would not mistrust my boyfriend. I would be stronger than anyone. I had to be. I just had to make to the station and I’d be fine from there.

  I limped as I walked, trying to keep my weight off my foot. Finally, I saw the station up ahead. I’d punch Jack in the head. Then, when he’d explained why he wasn’t at the studio, I’d kill him some more, and then maybe I’d forgive him.

  Then it started to rain. I could either hobble to the station and get saturated or I could run. I saw a train pulling in so I pulled my shoes off and made a run for it, praying there was no broken glass on the ground. I ran as fast as I could but I was so unfit, my lungs burned from the effort.

  I made it across the road and up the ramp to the station when the train doors beeped and closed. I hurled myself at the carriage, trying to prise the doors open but the train took off without me. I kicked at it but just hurt my toes. I bet everyone inside that train laughed at me. Bastards.

  I looked at the board. Another twenty minutes until the next train. Fuck my life.

  My clothes were damp, and the wind blew through the station like razor blades slicing my skin. I pulled my jacket around me as best I could to keep myself warm. Jack and Eric and Angie, they’d all told me to get off the couch and get on with my life, but this is what getting off the couch did—it sucked. It made you cold and wet and hungry, abused by your maid, and stuck at a train station in the middle of nowhere with no phone and no boyfriend.

  I saw a vending machine on the platform and actually found enough change in my bag to use it. Even more miraculously, it wasn’t vandalised or not working. I got myself a bar of sweet, gooey chocolate and broke off a big piece. I’d never seen the point of comfort eating before but, as the sugar filled my mouth, I could totally see the reason people did this. Chocolate was awesome.

  Chapter 22

  When I got back home, Jack wasn’t around. I put my phone on the charger, figuring I’d have a message from him. But it did nothing.

  “Come on, phone. I promise I’ll be nice to you from now on.” I pushed a few buttons and jiggled it. Finally, a picture came on the broken screen.

  “Jack,” I called out again. Still no answer. Maybe he was out the back, working on his car. I went out to see if I could see him. The garage was empty. My stomach sank. No car and no Jack. Still, there had to be a logical reason. Maybe he’d gone to get food. Maybe he’d had some kind of emergency. I would find out soon enough.

  The bad voice in my head had other things to say though. Things about how he’d gotten sick of me moping around the place, and how there were hundreds, if not thousands of other women who’d gladly step into my shoes. He could be with one of them right now; kissing her, caressing her skin, telling her she was the only one, sinking himself into her…

  I shook my head to get rid of that voice. I didn’t need those kinds of thoughts. I headed for the shower, wanting to get warm. When I got out, I dressed in my warmest track pants and an old T-shirt, then put some cream and Band-Aids on my foot.

  Then I checked my phone. No message. Maybe it wasn’t working properly after all. I didn’t want to message Jack, not if he was off having fun times. I’d look like the desperate woman, waiting at home for him.

  I sent Angie a message to see if Jack was with them. She replied saying he wasn’t. The phone worked fine.

  I turned on the heater and waited for Jack to get home. Actually, screw him. I wouldn’t wait. I’d just do my own thing. He could do whatever the hell he liked.

  I got out my laptop and downloaded the lectures I’d missed. No point wasting time.

  Halfway through the first lecture, I heard a car. I turned down the volume, trying to hear if it was Jack home, but it didn’t sound like him.

  I tried to watch the rest of the lecture, but my mind kept wandering. I wouldn’t ring him. I would not be that person. I’d play it cool. Women dangled themselves like fruit ripe for the picking in front of Jack and I couldn’t watch over him every minute of the day. Either he loved me enough not to cheat or he didn’t. And, if he didn’t, I’d walk.

  I hoped I’d walk.

  Maybe, being with him, I’d stopped being the kind of woman who walked. Maybe I’d become the kind that would stay with him, clinging desperately and making excuses. The kind who ignored that growling feeling in the pit of her stomach, even when it started to scream. The kind of woman I’d always despised.

  I made myself a coffee and forced myself to study, trying to switch all the other parts of my mind off. If Jack was cheating now, knowing what I was going through with my dad, he’d have to be the biggest bastard imaginable. He could be a prick about some things, but he was an annoying prick, not a cheating, lying bastard type of prick.

  To help me focus, I put on my headphones and listened to the lecture through them. Then, when I finished listening to my lecture, I put on some music. I would not check my phone. I would not listen out for him. I had a steely will and I had work to do. If I wrote the rough draft of my next assignment without checking my phone even once, then that meant he’d be home with a logical story.

  It was only 2,000 words. I could churn that out easily.

  I pasted the topic into the top of a document. That was 200 words. Only 1800 to go and he’d be home for sure.

  I got out my notes and my highlighter pens and started writing. I wrote a lot of words. Then I checked them. Only 500! I sighed and kept writing. When I checked again, it was up to 1200 but I’d said all I had to say. My gaze moved to my phone, but I could make it. I just ha
d to add in more examples.

  With a deep breath, I kept writing. I typed until my fingers hurt. I’d done 2,200 words and it’d only taken me two hours. I’d be right on target once I deleted the topic question.

  And Jack still wasn’t home.

  I got up to check my phone. No message, either. I got up his number, but before I pressed the button I put my phone down. Then I picked it up. A war had broken out between my two hands—the “call Jack” hand and the “keep my dignity” hand. Then the door opened as I literally struggled with myself.

  “What’s up?” Jack said.

  I shrugged. “Nothing. Just taking a break from study.” That was cool. He needn’t know how glad I was to see him.

  “Sounds fun.”

  “Yeah,” I replied. I gulped. “How was your day?”

  My hands clenched into tight fists as I waited for his answer. I hoped he couldn’t see how nervous I was about his reply.

  “Okay, the mastering is going fine.”

  He’d done it. He’d lied to me. He’d totally lied.

  “Did you do anything else?” I asked. I mean, he might’ve gone to the studio after I’d left.

  “Nope. Was at the studio all day. What did you think I’d do?”

  His voice didn’t sound quite right as he said that. Should I confront him on this? My blood pounded in my ears. If I confronted him, he’d lie again. One lie leads to another until all you get is a pack of lies.

  “Oh, maybe that you’d stop and get some dinner or something…”

  That sounded pathetic to me. I had become a coward. I’d become this person too scared to say what I thought.

  “Damn. I should’ve done. How did the meeting go with the recording company?”

  Again, he didn’t sound right. I guess it was a good sign that he couldn’t lie easily to me. Some small consolation, but it’d get easier and easier the more he did it.

  I pulled the schedule they’d given me out of my bag and went through it with him. The hurt stayed inside me; I had to act professional. I had to be the manager. Jack didn’t seem focussed though, and I wondered if he even cared.

  “Have you thought about looking for another drummer?” I asked, knowing it had to be said.

  He glared at me.

  “You have to do it some time, especially if you are going to be doing all these launch gigs. You need to find someone soon, and get them up to speed. We can’t rely on the session guy.”

  He didn’t answer for a while then he turned from me and walked to the kitchen.

  “It’s easy for you to say, Hannah.”

  I wanted to wrap my arms around Jack and hold him tight. I wanted to say it was okay to wait, but his lie still hung in the air between us, and if I had to act professional I had to be tough.

  “This is your job, Jack. Even if it hurts. Even if it hurts like hell, you have to get another drummer. You can’t throw this chance away. It’s not like you are disrespecting his memory.”

  Jack didn’t answer. He left the kitchen and went upstairs, running away again.

  I saved the work I’d done on my assignment then stared into space. It was okay for Jack to retreat to his room. I had nowhere in this apartment to go to. I had no place for me.

  As I sat there, the anger built up inside me. I couldn’t stand for this. He couldn’t treat me this way. I wasn’t just some bimbo he could whore around on then come home to, acting like nothing was wrong. He was becoming exactly the kind of person Spud had wanted him to be. Maybe now that Spud was dead, his words held more weight. My anger caused a pressure to build up in my head. I couldn’t focus. I couldn’t go back to my study. All I could do was sit on that couch with the thoughts getting hotter and hotter until they burned me.

  Until I slammed my way up those stairs and flung the door open.

  “I know you weren’t at the studio. Why are you lying to me? What the fuck were you doing, Jack? Do you really expect me to wait around here until you finish screwing some other woman?”

  “I was NOT—What were you doing at the studio anyway?” he said, his voice like ice. “Checking up on me?”

  I wanted to say so much, but it felt like the words were all in such a hurry to leave my mouth that they tangled up in each other, so I could only make a gurgling sound. I wanted to smash him. I wanted to let all this hurt out of me.

  I picked up the closest thing to me and hurled it at him. It was only when it crashed to the ground, I realised it was his new guitar.

  “You bitch,” he said, his voice low and cold. “Don’t you have any respect for me? You think you can smash up anything you like.”

  He kicked the broken body of the guitar across the floor.

  “You’ve had it so easy.”

  I couldn’t believe he had said that, knowing all the pain my father had caused. He knew what I’d been through. It wasn’t like Vera, the maid, who only saw my surface. If anyone should understand, it would be Jack. Maybe he just pretended to love me like Vera had. The hurt welling up inside me pushed away all my sense.

  “Surely you must have known what your father was up to? Even you couldn’t be that stupid.” His eyes dared me to hate him.

  “Did you know?” I hurled the words at him.

  “Know what?”

  “With your father? You know who he is, right? Surely you can’t be that stupid.”

  Jack stared at me with his mouth open.

  “You don’t know a thing.” He turned as if to dismiss me.

  “Frank is as much mixed up in this shit as anyone. Maybe worse than Dad. Why do you think you got signed with Megastar Management? How do you think you got the gig at the Metropolis? Your daddy has been behind it all.”

  Jack crumpled to the ground. I’d said too much, way too much, but so had he. He made me wonder why I’d ever wanted him.

  “Get out,” he said, staring up at me with cold, dead fish eyes. “Just get out.”

  Chapter 23

  I sat on a doorstep in the cobblestone alleyway behind the apartment, wondering what to do. I’d fled from the house with just my shoes and my handbag but I’d forgotten these shoes were the ones that had given me massive blisters earlier in the day. I couldn’t move far when all I wanted to do was walk and get the anger out of my system. So I’d gone half a block then collapsed against the front door of some building.

  It wasn’t like I could just go back inside and change my shoes. Not with Jack in that mood. Who knows what would happen? Although, to be honest, I didn’t think things could get any worse. I’d left my phone on the charger too. I picked up a rock and hurled it against the road.

  Even though the alleyway was deserted, I wouldn’t cry. I would not cry. I would be strong and consider my options. There was Angie but, since she was having special Angie-and-Eric time, I didn’t want to disturb her. I’d cut off just about everyone else I knew, with good reason. Everyone I’d known had proven themselves to be selfish and unreliable. I had not one other friend in the world I could call on. It sucked. I needed more friends. It was times like this you realised how few shoulders you had to cry on.

  I couldn’t sit on the doorstep all night though, like a homeless person. I hobbled down to the supermarket and got a pair of shoes. They were the ugliest pair of runners I’d ever seen but it wasn’t like I had a lot of options. I wandered around aimlessly, putting random things in a basket, not even thinking what I needed.

  The lights of the supermarket were far too strong and they played music that cut through my head when I needed to burrow into somewhere soft and dark.

  Leaving the supermarket, I flagged down a cab then realised I had no destination. The cab driver stared at me, a mess of smeared makeup and emotion, without a clue where I wanted to go. I pulled a name out of my mind—the hotel I’d stayed at once, a long time ago. I couldn’t afford it but tomorrow… well, tomorrow I’d work out what to do. Either I’d make things right with Jack or I’d figure something.

  The guy at the front desk gave me a funny look when I checked
in. I only had a plastic bag filled with the things I’d bought.

  “Is your luggage turning up later?” he asked.

  “No. I like to travel light.” I just wanted him to give me my key so I could be alone.

  I think they wanted me out of their reception area as quickly as possible. I could imagine that my outfit lowered the tone of the place, but they didn’t refuse me a room so I filled out the paperwork then grabbed the key off him.

  When I got to my room, I thought about running a warm bath and soaking in it but I really didn’t have the will to even get up from the bed.

  I did get up to make myself a drink. That was as much energy as I could muster.

  Already I regretted what I’d done. I should’ve been more aloof and restrained instead of letting my temper control me. I went back over everything in my mind, replaying every moment from when I got to the studio. Could I have done anything differently? I thought I trusted Jack. I thought what we had held some value to him. That was the core of our relationship. But then he’d been a man-whore before I met him, and maybe those habits never died.

  I took another sip of my drink but there was nothing but melting ice cubes left in the glass. I poured in some more vodka, too lazy to get up and add any juice to it. Straight vodka would do.

  As the drink took hold, my body warmed up. Maybe things weren’t so bad. Maybe I just needed to call Jack and explain. We could work this out.

  No. I couldn’t call him. That was just the drink making everything seem fuzzy and okay. I couldn’t call him anyway. I didn’t have my phone, and I could never remember phone numbers. Meanwhile, I’d just rest my head for a moment.

  I woke up in the dark room, just a sliver of moonlight coming through the curtains. I had no idea where I was, and for a moment I felt happy. Then it all came flooding back to me. I curled into a ball, like everything within me was broken. I’d thought Jack would realise how fragile I was and help me deal with it all. He’d be the one to rescue me from the mess. Instead, he’d just added to it. He’d acted guilty. He’d definitely been lying to me, then gotten angry with me to cover it up. It had been his fault; all his fault. If he’d been at the studio when I’d gone there, none of this would’ve happened.