She was already gone.
I wondered how she’d gotten in.
She’d asked me if I heard the buzzer. I should’ve had my ringer turned on this morning, watched for her to arrive at the gate—if I was considerate enough to think ahead like that and respect the effort my sister had gone through to set up this meeting. But I’d totally forgotten about the meeting, pretty much seconds after Courteney texted me yesterday to let me know what time Taylor would be here. I was in the middle of listening to music.
And this morning when she arrived, I had music on in my headphones.
Did Courteney drop her off and buzz her in? Or did my sister actually lend her the remote for the gate? She’d given one to my former assistant, what was his name? Hard to remember when he only lasted a week.
No way Taylor actually scaled my fence to get in here. Did she? Somehow, I wouldn’t put it past her. She seemed… resourceful like that. The don’t-waste-my-time type.
The I-don’t-care-enough-about-the-rules-to-let-them-stop-me type.
Not my type, that was for sure.
Go. Stay.
I couldn’t decide which I wanted her to do. That was my first problem, as soon as I found the note she stuck under my cat’s collar. He’d trotted in here and rubbed against my leg, and when I didn’t take enough notice for his liking, he’d jumped up on the control panel in front of me to get in my face. He knew he wasn’t supposed to do that, but I kinda let him get away with it. His giant paws with the tufts of fur sticking out between his toes stepped gingerly over the buttons and he humped his back, looking for attention. I’d plucked him off to put him on the floor and there it was. A piece of folded paper, deliberately tucked under his collar.
I unfolded it.
I’m here, in your backyard - Taylor.
And then, underneath that, like an afterthought: Courteney sent me.
And that was when I remembered the meeting my sister set up.
Ashley Player’s wife’s best friend.
The executive assistant.
The note paper was purple and shaped like a star. For some reason, I smelled it. It just smelled like paper and my cat.
I’d half-considered just tearing it up and ignoring it.
But I went to the living room and took a look out, and there she was. Standing at the edge of the pool, a woman in a long black dress with pink hair.
I opened the door, because I wanted to see her better.
She turned, and I saw the pretty, round face. The round mouth and the puffy, dewy lips. She’d come right over and stood in front of me, looking up into my eyes. It was bright and sunny out, but we were in the shade, and the corners of her eyes turned up in happy little crinkles when she wasn’t smiling at all.
She introduced herself and said something about Courteney and I just stared at her. Her voice was soft but husky, not businesslike. Cool and maybe slightly aloof, but not cold. The breeze fluttered her long dress distractingly around her legs.
Is this a good time? she’d asked me.
Go. Stay.
Then I saw the tattoo. I saw what it said.
I made the decision to let her in. I told myself it was for Courteney. I’d get it over with. I’d make it fast.
As we sat down, I noticed there was a bunch of cat hair on her dress, which meant Freddy had rubbed his approval all over her, and his scent. Marking her like he already wanted her to belong to us.
She looked me in the eye as she spoke to me, but she didn’t smile too much. And she looked so at ease on my couch, as if she’d sat there a thousand times with her turquoise eyes like the ancient abysses of every truth, just there for the taking.
I wondered if she’d fuck me if I asked her to.
I wondered if she’d get down on her knees.
But then I stopped thinking about that, because you didn’t fuck girls like her and expect it to mean nothing. Girls like her were too easy to get hung up on, and I didn’t get hung up on people anymore. I just wanted to bury myself in producing this album, then the next album, and the next. My work would hold me together.
That girl with the ocean-bottom eyes would only tear everything I’d so carefully built apart.
In my world, you were in or you were out. And these days, it was a very small world.
Black. White.
I stayed behind my line. In the dark. Alone. Where I belonged.
I couldn’t risk getting attached to someone like her. Needing someone like her. I’d gotten over needing people long ago. Eventually. Sometime long after the one person I’d always needed most died.
I wasn’t going to need this girl, or any assistant she sent my way, or even my sister.
But I wondered when Taylor would be talking to Courteney. I wanted to know what she’d say about me. What she thought about me.
I didn’t like it.
I picked up my phone. Among the notifications, there was a text from my sister—from this morning—that I hadn’t seen.
Courteney: Just a reminder, Taylor is coming today at ten.
I swiped it away and opened Instagram. I pulled up my sister’s profile and clicked on Following. I searched “Taylor.” And there she was. I recognized the hair and the lips in the tiny photo, even though the name on the profile was a generic TaylorInAMood.
I clicked on it and read her profile.
Taylor Lawson (Lawczynski)
Executive assistant. Earthling. Animal lover. No flex. Love not war.
I scrolled through the posts. Looked like she posted pretty regularly, maybe a few times a week. There were some photos of her with friends. And some of her with guys. Most of them pretty, clean-cut boys who looked like they spent more time styling their hair than she did.
Boys who didn’t look like they belonged with her.
The popular boys who wouldn’t admit they wanted her in school, but now hit on her at the bar and sent her selfies with their dicks out and ate up her attention, if they could get it.
Boys who probably treated her like shit because they secretly thought she was beneath them and hated themselves for wanting her approval.
She was smiling too brightly in most of those images. Mostly, I scrolled right past them.
Then I stopped on one of her and Ashley Player. It was from a few months ago. It was just the two of them, and the caption said: Happy Birthday you fuck.
They were both looking at the camera, their heads touching, her arm slung around his neck. They were in a dark bar or something, the camera lighting them up with a stark flash. Taylor looked happy and possibly drunk. Actually, they both did. Her eyes were narrowed in those pretty, curved slits, and she had that bright smile on her face. He had an unlit joint dangling from his mouth, and no one could miss who he was. The post had way more likes and comments on it than her other ones.
But the photo didn’t scream, Look who I know. More like, I love this guy and you should too.
I stared at it. How easily they were hanging out like friends, possibly in public. And how easily, how publicly she called him you fuck, when she was so polite with me, even in private, no matter how fucking weird I probably seemed to her.
Polite, because I wasn’t her friend. I was a stranger.
I kept scrolling. Travel images. Pictures of dogs. A couple of beaches.
A few selfies, but not many. And no other pictures of her with famous people.
The vast majority of her posts, though, were just words. Short sayings. Stark black words on white, like that tattoo on her skin. And as I scrolled through, I noticed they were all song titles. She always referenced the artist in the caption. Horns up if you’re here for Metallica, that kind of thing.
Be Yourself
Dog Days Are Over
Never Going Back Again
Lost Cause
Don’t Tread On Me
There seemed to be one every week, at least. Her mood for the week?
And they seemed to get progressively darker the further I scrolled back.
When I reached
the first post of this year, on New Year’s Day… there it was.
Gimme Shelter
Her mood for the year?
I started to scroll back to the top, letting the images blur by, an eddy of color—pinks, purples, blues—with the black around the edges being my life. My existence, here in this room.
I stopped partway and shut the app. Other than the song titles she’d posted, her whole account was a blur of color. Joyful and bright. Pretty and confusing, like her.
Because there was no way Taylor Lawson/Lawczynski’s life could be as perfect as it looked on social media.
Beneath the surface, there was always darkness.
Chapter Four
Taylor
Heaven Coming Down
No. Way.
There was no way I was taking on this assistant job myself.
Not happening.
I realized on my way to meet up with Courteney that I’d been thinking about it. In the back of my mind, the entire time I’d talked to her brother this morning, and ever since then, I’d been weighing the possibility of whether or not I could take the job as his assistant.
The answer, of course, was a resounding no.
No, no, no.
This one was a major fixer-upper, and I was totally done with fixer-uppers.
“Lookin’ good, baby.”
I shot the sun-leathered construction worker a look. He was standing at the edge of the sidewalk, leaning on a shovel, and unfortunately I had to walk right past him.
“I am not your baby,” I informed him.
He looked stricken at the unexpected backtalk and averted his eyes. His friend snickered.
I walked on by, sighing.
Men.
Couldn’t live with them… couldn’t really stand to be without one for too long. It was nature’s cruelest joke, really. The last time I’d gotten any action at all had been a drunken shit show under some mistletoe with a rock star, and way too much spiced eggnog in my system. And that was six long months ago. Those construction workers could probably smell it on me.
Lust.
I hadn’t even noticed them standing there until one of them decided to hit on me. I’d had Allan Rayman playing in my earbuds while my mind drifted in a hot daydream about no one in particular. Just some faceless Adonis who’d lost his shirt… and okay, who kinda-sorta looked like Cary Clarke… and was definitely about to lose his pants. Yup. This was the stuff I entertained myself with whenever I was doing such mind-numbing things as riding the bus.
Music and sex fantasies.
I’d hopped onto the bus at the bottom of Main Street, near my place, and hopped off here in Mount Pleasant to walk up to my favorite café. Nudge Coffee Bar was on a residential street lined with big, leafy trees, the café located in the front rooms of one of the beautiful heritage homes. I walked up the wide front steps to the porch—convinced that I would never work with Cary Clarke, that I wasn’t sure I could actually find anyone to work with him… and fortifying myself to be completely, even painfully, dead honest with his sister about it.
And I already felt bad about it.
I wasn’t sure if I felt worse about the fact that I was planning to be completely honest with her about things she might not want to hear… or the fact that I was never going to see her brother again.
It was really fucking bothering me that it bothered me.
I’d met the guy once. I had no reason to ever see him again.
Why did I feel this strange sense of disappointment that that was the case?
When I walked into the café, Courteney wasn’t there yet. It was just after lunch and there was a lineup at the counter, so I got in line.
Nudge was owned by Katie Mayes’ sister, Becca, and her husband, Jack; Katie was basically a local celebrity because she was married to a rock star, but she also happened to be a dear friend to my best friend, Danica. In the last few years, Nudge had become something of a hangout for local hipsters who wanted to pretend they had access to rock stars because they sipped lattes here. But I had actual access to rock stars, so that wasn’t why I came. I’d chosen the location for this meeting with Courteney Clarke because I felt comfortable here. Ever since Danica first brought me here months ago, I’d loved it. Awesome menu, local art on the walls, and Becca had great taste in music. If nothing else good came out of this meeting, at least I could get a fantastic coffee.
A Dirty song was playing; a ballad called “Somewhere,” off their last album. A few of Katie’s paintings hung on the walls, portraits of Becca’s kids. There were a couple of signed photos of Dirty on display, too. Becca and Jack made no secret of the fact that Katie used to work here or that she was now married to Dirty’s lead guitarist, Jesse Mayes. They were obviously proud as hell of Katie and Jesse.
I’d heard that Becca and her family used to live in the backside of the house, but that after Katie’s relationship with Jesse went public, they’d moved to another house. For privacy.
That must’ve been strange. Your whole life having to change because your sister married a famous guy, and now people were knocking on your windows wanting to talk to you—and maybe see if he was over for Sunday dinner.
Very strange.
“Hey, Taylor.” I heard a familiar voice and turned to find Becca, down at the end of the bar, where she was pouring coffees into takeout cups. I waved and she beckoned me over. “Katie’s here with the baby. Wanna say hi?”
“Yes, please.”
“Go on back.”
She nodded for me to come around the bar, so I did. But when she pointed me into the back, I paused and asked her, “Hey, Becca. What’s your favorite Rolling Stones song?”
“Hmm. I’d have to say ‘Paint It Black.’ Why?”
Huh. “No reason.”
I headed into the small, industrial kitchen. And there was her sister, Katie Mayes, hanging out in a back corner with her baby, out of the way of the bustling staff. Some biker guy was leaning on the counter a few feet away, looking at his phone; he wore a plain, black T-shirt and jeans, which didn’t say much, but the ink all over his arms and the jagged look he gave me when I approached Katie sure did.
“Hey, Taylor!” She greeted me, and when she reached to give me a hug, her security dude seemed to relax.
“Hey.” I gave her a squeeze. I’d met Katie Mayes plenty of times now, but I’d only seen her baby boy, Madsen, a couple of times when he was much smaller. “How’s the little ladykiller? Holy crap, he grew.”
Katie beamed. “Yeah. He just turned six months.” He was trying to stand on his chubby legs on a chair, with his mommy’s help. He had thick whorls of dark hair like his daddy did, and he wore little baby jeggings over his diaper butt with a button-up shirt that had rhinestone buttons on it. He looked like a tiny little rock star.
He reached out and tried to grasp the skull-and-crossbones on my necklace, and when he looked up at me and smiled, holy Christ. He had Katie’s big, blue-green eyes and Jesse’s smile. “Whoa. You realize the girls of future generations are fucked if this is what you’re sending their way.”
Katie laughed. “I know. He’s so much fun.” She peppered kisses on his face and he squirmed and grunted, laser focused on my necklace. “Is Danica here?”
“No, just me. I’m meeting Courteney Clarke for a coffee.”
“Ah. Nice.”
“Hey,” I asked her, as Madsen played with my necklace, “what’s your favorite Rolling Stones song?”
“Oh, I love the Stones. How did you know?”
“I didn’t.”
“Well, ‘Start Me Up’ is up there… and ‘Beast of Burden’… and ‘Wild Horses’… Damn, there are so many good ones. But I’d say ‘Paint It Black’ is my all-time fave. Why do you ask?”
“Just wondering.” I glanced at the security guy, who’d gone back to his phone and was pretending not to listen. “Is that a new one?”
“Oh, there’s an endless supply of them. We’re going shopping with Auntie Becca today, so we get an escor
t.”
“Cool.” I wondered if it was cool. If she was used to it by now or not.
Madsen tried to stuff my necklace into his mouth and Katie lifted him away; he lost his grasp on it as she swung him up in the air. His face crumpled and he emitted a little squeal that he probably hoped was wrathful.
“Ooooh, little temper on that one, huh?” Courteney remarked as she swept in.
“Oh, he’ll definitely let you know when you’ve pissed him off.” Katie swung her son onto her hip. He immediately reached for my necklace again and grasped it as she leaned in to give Courteney a hug.
“Is the temper from his daddy?” I teased. “Or from you?” I really didn’t know Katie or her husband well enough to know the answer to that.
“Hmm.” Katie considered that. “Actually, I think he got it from Aunt Becca.”
“What!” Becca had just walked in, followed by Katie’s best friend, Devi. “I heard that!” Becca set a couple of takeout cups on the counter by Katie’s purse and frowned at her sister.
“Oh, but it’s true,” Devi said. She greeted me, Courteney and Katie with hugs, then plucked Madsen from Katie’s arms.
“Okay, it’s probably true,” Becca conceded. She turned to me and Courteney. “You ladies want some coffees before we head out? You can skip the lineup.”
“You know, it really pays to know the VIPs,” I said, and Katie smiled.
Courteney and I put in our drink orders, gave Madsen a goodbye kiss, and the two of us headed out into the café. The tables were all taken, so we sat at the bar along the front window on a couple of high stools.
“That is one lucky kid,” Courteney remarked as we got settled. “Pretty sure he’s got permanent dibs on whatever he wants in life.”
“Maybe. I hope they don’t make it too easy for him, though. A little struggle is good. Builds character.”
“Right.” She looked at me with a question in her eyes. She was probably wondering what I was about to say about her brother and his… struggles.
Lovely Madness: A Players Rockstar Romance (Players, Book 4) Page 6