Good Girl for My Ex’s Brothers (Forbidden Hearts #13)

Chapter 1

LOU

Sagebrush Studio is smaller than I expected. Beige stucco baked flat by the sun, a sunburned lot with weeds, a guitar pick decal half peeled from the glass. I’ve never been here, but I know the type. The outskirts of Old Vegas are lined with buildings like this one.

The door sticks. Troy yanks it like it insulted him, then lets it swing too hard. Inside smells like old coffee and dust. A corkboard holds paper schedules from a long time ago. A Sharpie note says DON’T MOVE THE MIC STAND in block letters.

“Is that her?” I ask, pointing to a photo on the wall.

He cocks a brow up at the faded picture. “Yeah. That’s Mom.”

She holds a bass guitar head down, headphones on, blond hair draped down her back. Talia Turner is a legend at Sagebrush.

“Back to where it started,” I say.

He rubs both hands over his face and through his light brown hair. It goes in five directions. His blue eyes are tired. “It’s not the building, Lou. It’s me.”

“Sometimes a place helps.” I shrug. “You and your brothers learned music here. If you want to write a new album, this has to be the spot.” We’ve tried everywhere else. This has to work. We’re lucky no one had booked the place before I did. But seeing what’s here, I understand why they weren’t busy.

He sighs and drops a bag on the sunken couch, pulls out a laptop, and a notebook that’s more scuffed than used. He slings his guitar on and rolls the chair up to the desk.

A ficus has given up by the window. The carpet is older than both of us. The glass between the rooms is cloudy if you look from an angle. I sit on the couch and try not to breathe too deeply. I open Notes on my phone and stare at a blank screen.

It gives me a sense of camaraderie with Troy. I’m stuck creatively too.

I grew up two miles from here and a lifetime away.

I was left in a diaper bag with a locket and a phone number that didn’t work.

I left for San Francisco the second I had enough cash and a car that would make it.

Seven years of gray skies and cold weather later, I’m back in Vegas, trying to help my boyfriend get his mojo back.

And mine.

Troy strums, stops, scribbles, scratches out. He taps a beat with two fingers and frowns. I’d ask what’s wrong, but I don’t want to interrupt his process.

He hits record, sings a line, swears, deletes, and starts again. He cracks his knuckles, shakes out his hand, checks the tuning, blames the room, blames the strings.

“It’s flat,” he says.

“It’s a start.”

He looks at me like I’m the problem. “I can hear it, and it won’t come out.”

“Then give it time.”

“It’s been time, Lou.” His voice spikes and bounces off the dead walls. “It’s been nothing but time. It’s not coming.”

If I don’t keep my cool, he won’t either. I try for placid. “You wanted a reset. This is a reset. Not magic. You have to do the work.”

He spins the chair, pushes too hard, and bumps his knee. “You think I don’t know that?”

“I think you forget.” I remember the guy who wrote hooks in a kitchen and didn’t wait for praise. I don’t see him. I see someone waiting for a headline to land in his lap. Someone who wants things handed to him.

I miss the other guy.

His eyes fall to slits. “I need quiet.”

“I didn’t talk until you did.”

He sighs. Plays four chords too loud, like volume can knock a lyric loose. Sings, misses, swears. Throws the pick. It hits the glass and drops.

I can’t get anything done with him throwing a hissy fit. I am so over this bullshit. “You’re spiraling. Breathe—”

“Don’t tell me what I’m doing.” He points without looking. “You don’t even make art anymore.”

“Excuse me?”

“What are you even doing here?” He gestures at everything. “Why sit in a studio when you could be doing anything else? You used to be a designer.”

“I am a designer.”

“You used to be good.”

My jaw clenches without a thought. “You mean when I used my skills to build your site, your rollout, your merch, your singles, your everything? When you depended on me and listened to my advice?”

He opens and closes his mouth. “That’s not what I meant.”

“It’s what you said.”

“It’s not what I meant, and you know it.”

The ficus droops. The clock ticks like it wants to be elsewhere. Vegas keeps the bones and swaps the skin. New towers where old signs used to blink. Same heat. Same casinos that smell like air freshener and regret.

I can’t imagine staying here one minute longer than I have to. Especially not with him. “This is what you do. You push until I absorb it. Then you say I heard you wrong.”

He huffs at that. “I’m under pressure.”

“So is everyone.”

“Not like this. No one knows what it’s like to be me.”

“Right.” I roll my eyes. “No one has ever written a song before you.”

“You’re not listening,” he says, breath fast as he starts to pace. “I need to get this before people forget my name.”

“People forget their own names every day. You’re not special because you’re spiraling.”

He barks a laugh, sharp. “Right. I forgot. You do fonts. You wouldn’t understand real creative work.”

I stand. “You didn’t say that when I built your brand from nothing.”

He squares up to me. “I was never nothing. I had the name.”

“I gave it shape. I gave it something people could link to you.”

“You gave me a logo. Congratulations.”

The heat in my face is controlled. I plop back down because I choose to. I don’t have much fight left in me for this conversation. “You asked me to be here, Troy. I am here. You want quiet, ask me. You want me gone, ask me.”

He stares, chest moving like he just ran stairs. He reaches for the laptop, opens a fresh session, names it Untitled Again, hesitates, renames it Start Over.

Which is probably what we should do.

He sings a verse under his breath. It could work. He stops and deletes it. “Nothing,” he barks.

“It’s not a crime to be stuck.”

“You can say that because no one cares what you do.”

“Go to hell.” But I say it without bite. I just… I’m not even sure I care about his insults anymore.

He’s looking for a fight because he’s got nothing else. He stares at his hands. His nails are bitten down. The tattoo on his wrist disappears under his sleeve when he flexes. “You make everything sound simple.”

“It is simple. Not easy.”

“Same thing to you.”

“No. I’ve done hard. I just don’t dress it up like it’s more than it is.” I hold his gaze. “Like you do.”

“That’s your problem, you know that, Lou? You think you know everything because you drew some pictures. You have no idea the pressure I’m under for this fucking album! A five-year-old could do your job—”

The front door opens. Voices.

Troy freezes, then bristles. “What the—”

Knox Turner walks in first. Medium height, solid, brown hair a little shaggy with streaks of silver at his temples, deep brown eyes that miss nothing. Tattoo sleeves with edges that trail beneath his T-shirt.

Houston follows, tall enough to block light, sandy-blond ponytail, green eyes steady and watchful. Looks younger than Knox, but still has a dusting of gray in his roots. It just makes him look distinguished. More handsome in person than in his music videos.

Salem brings up the rear. Shorter than his brothers, still taller than me. Ripped. Black Caesar cut that’s turning to salt and pepper, sharp goatee, bright blue eyes that telegraph mischief as if he plans anything he does.

For half a second, I’m fifteen with posters on my shared wall in one of my foster homes, fighting with my roommate about taking them down. Then I’m here, twenty-five, with a boyfriend about to make a scene with either me or his older brothers.

“What are you doing here?” Troy snaps.

Knox takes in the tipped chair, the shut laptop, my face. Not surprised. “Recording. We’re booked for the hour.”

“I’m here now. Get out.”

Houston nods at me, a silent hello. “Troy, we can share the space.”

“I don’t share with you.”

Salem’s mouth curves. “You never knew how to share in the first place.”

“Don’t start with me,” Troy says, moving like he’ll square up. He doesn’t get far. Houston’s stance shifts half an inch.

The threat is clear.

Knox clears his throat. “We’re not here to get into it. We’ll use Studio B.” He nods at me. “You must be Lou.”

I swallow. “Hi.”

“Want coffee?” Houston asks, voice low. “Machine works.”

“I’m fine, thanks.” My inner fifteen-year-old is squealing.

Troy cuts a hand through the air. “Don’t talk to her.”

I frown at him. “What did you just say?”

“We’re in the middle of something. They don’t need to talk to you.”

“We were in the middle of something, but then you were a dick to me, and I’m not having it.”

Knox exhales. “We can come back.”

“No,” Troy snaps. “You always come back. You kicked me out and still manage to be everywhere.”

“Wait, what was that?” I look at him. “Kicked you out?”

His gaze flicks over my shoulder. “It was mutual.”

Salem snorts. Houston gives him a look. Salem lifts his hands, innocent-ish.

Knox looks tired. “If I knew you were struggling this hard, we would’ve gotten you anger management instead of kicking you out of the band.”

Clean words. No spin. They redraw the room. I look at Troy. “You told me you left. You said it was creative differences.”

“Same thing.”

“No, it’s not. You lied to me.”

He shrugs. “Does it matter?”

“It matters if the person I sleep next to tells the truth.” I turn to the brothers. “Two months ago, he told me he was in Tokyo with you on a secret project. Was he?”

Houston shakes his head once. “No.”

Knox says, “We were in Tokyo. He wasn’t.”

Salem leans on the frame. “We’d have noticed. Troy makes a mess wherever he goes. He would have left Tokyo like Godzilla.”

I look back at Troy. “Where were you?”

“If you must know…” He folds his arms over his chest, smirking. “Ibiza.”

“Doing what?”

“Partying. Yacht. Making connections. Things you’d understand if you were in the business. That’s why I didn’t tell you. You never understand me, Lou.”

I think about those two weeks. I waited at his house like a pet at the door. I watered plants. Picked up his mail. I turned down work because I didn’t know when he’d walk in and tell me to drop everything. I need quiet to do my best. I can’t start if I’m waiting to be interrupted.

He knew that. He counted on it.

“You lied to me.”

“It’s the business.”

“This isn’t business. This is you on a boat with strangers while I keep your life from falling apart.”

“You want to see business?” He swipes, grins, holds the screen up, and shoves it in my face.

Girls in bikinis with his arms around them. Touching them. Kissing… What the fuck?

He swipes again, proud like a kid with a good report card. “I don’t remember their names. But I remember what they looked like naked.”

Something old in me folds up and walks out. “It’s not the first time, is it?”

He doesn’t blink. “No. I figured you knew.”

I look at him and see the person I kept drawing on top of him. He isn’t here. Maybe he never was. “Thanks for telling me.”

He frowns. “That’s it?”

“You said you thought I knew. What reaction did you expect?”

“I don’t know.” He looks so disappointed. “Something else.”

“Well, now we’re both disappointed.”

There’s a glint in his eye. “You knew what this was, what I am.”

“I wanted a grown man. Instead, I got you.”

Salem’s eyebrow kicks up. Houston’s mouth flattens. Knox doesn’t move.

Troy steps toward me, fists balled. “You bitch—”

“Nope,” Salem says, straightening. “It’s time for you to go.”

Troy laughs. “Make me.”

Houston doesn’t raise his voice. “Don’t do this.”

Knox puts a hand on his shoulder. “Come on.”

Troy jerks away. “You don’t get to—”

“You’re done here, Troy Boy,” Salem says. Softer. Worse.

I didn’t see when he grabbed Troy’s other shoulder, but his hold is firmer than Knox’s. Gripping. When Troy squirms, he can’t get out of it.

“Fine, I’m fucking going,” he grumbles. Only then does Salem release him. He grabs his gear and storms out. The door hits, rattles, stops.

“You okay?” Houston asks.

“No,” I say. “But I will be.”

“Do you want water? A ride? Space?”

“I don’t know what I want.” Didn’t realize I was shaking until now. I’m not upset about losing him—honestly, I lost him months ago. But I’m pretty sure he was going to hit me. Actually hit me, not just get in my face.

Knox perches on the desk, not crowding me. “I should’ve said it different. About the band. You didn’t need to hear it like that.”

“He told me he left because the groupthink was killing him. He said he had to take risks. I believed him.” I take a deep breath. “I’m an idiot.”

Salem whistles, low. “He’s good at lying to himself and to everyone around him.”

I huff a laugh that doesn’t rise. “I built my life around him. I said no to projects so I could be on call…” A professional girlfriend.

Now that I’m no longer a girlfriend, what the hell am I?

Houston’s jaw flexes. “I’m sorry.”

“It’s not your job to be sorry.” I pick up my bag. Light. Most of what I own is in his hotel room. “I’m not your problem.”

“You’re in our place,” Salem says, gesturing around us. “That makes you our problem for at least tonight.”

“That’s sweet, but—”

“You don’t have to do it alone.” Houston says it simple.

“I’m good at alone.” Or I was. Before I met Troy. “Don’t worry about me.”

“Or,” Salem says, drawing it out, “we take you out. Debauchery on the Strip. Sticky floors, loud music, bad decisions. You pick the bar. We can be your consolation prize.”

Houston snorts. Knox shakes his head but says nothing.

I laugh at first, but they’re serious. I weigh the picture. Me in a cheap room, thin pillow, the ice machine rattling through the wall. Or me out with three men who haven’t been lying to my face for the past few months.

I’m not stupid. I’m also done auditioning for martyr. “One night?”

“One night,” Knox says. “No pressure.”

“No Troy.” Salem smirks. “We’ll run interference if he shows up.”

“No cameras,” Houston adds. “We’ll keep an eye out.”

“You pick the place,” Knox says. “If you change your mind at the curb, we turn around. No questions.”

A night out with three guys I’ve crushed on for ten years, paid for by them? I can think of worse ways to handle a breakup.

“One night. Let’s go.”