Chapter 2
PHOENIX
DECK THE HALLS WITH NERVOUS BAND ENERGY
“How hard is it for people to answer their fucking phones!” my manager Travis barks, bursting backstage like the place is on fire.
The door slams against the wall, the crack of it like a hammer to my skull, still throbbing from last night’s welcome home party.
A dull, relentless reminder that being back in my hometown, surrounded by old friends from high school, was bound to cause a little harmless chaos.
Axl doesn’t flinch. He’s stretched out on the couch, holding hands with our boyfriend, Zane, both just as hungover as I am. Axl doesn’t spare Travis a single glance, not giving a fuck that we’re about four hours away from being snowed in, which is typical of my brother.
He and Zane are having a moment before we go on stage, while Travis looks like he’s one missed call away from a damn heart attack.
“If we're not in Florida in six days, the label will have our fuckin’ heads,” Travis snaps, his jaw locked tight as he paces backstage like a madman with his phone glued to his ear.
“Then they’d better aim high, and make it count,” Axl mutters, leaning forward to grab his bass. He starts to tune it, and the low, muted hum of strings cuts through all this negative tension in the room.
“Relax, Travis,” Zane murmurs, his voice smooth like velvet, and it only does naughty things to my cock.
Now is not the time for that. “We can’t control the weather any more than our label can afford to lose us.
We make them way too much fucking money,” Zane says before reaching up to run his fingers through Axl’s hair, grounding each other in the quiet before we’re caught up in the madness of the fans and the stage.
We're six months into our tour, and somehow, the one gig that was meant to be the smallest and easiest—the hometown show our sister threw together—has turned into a full-blown clusterfuck. Jovi is MIA, the snow’s rolling in fast, and we’ve got a bar full of locals prepared to wait two hours for a set we’ll have to cut in half so they can get home before the snowstorm hits.
They’ve been dying to hear us play since Stone Cold made it big, and when Jovi suggested it, the guys and I said yes without hesitation.
“You fuckers ready?” I shout over my shoulder, walking over to the curtain at the side of the stage.
“Christ. Look like you actually want to be here, for fuck’s sake.
You’re the assholes who dragged me all the way out here!
Now. This might be your hometown, but don’t think for a second that these people wouldn’t sell your pictures to the media the minute they leave this shithole bar, so do not take your masks off!
Also, stay the fuck away from the local pussy. ”
“First of all, not cool,” Zane says, pushing himself off the couch and walking over to snag his spare drumsticks from his bag. “Carol’s is a good fucking bar.”
“Don't look at me,” Axl says, throwing the strap of his bass over his shoulder before walking over to wait at my side. “I’m not interested in local pussy. Been there, done that, and I have the scars beneath the tattoos on my back to prove it,” he adds, shooting Travis a wink.
“You’re all gonna kill me.” Travis scrubs a hand down his face before he and Axl get into another PR debate.
I have no interest in fucking anyone in this town, either.
As Axl said, we’ve been there, done that, and left the wreckage behind when we got the fuck out of here six years ago.
Groupies are a dime a dozen, no matter what city we’re in, but if I’m being honest, we’re not interested in them either.
They all want their five minutes of fame and are more enamored with the rockstar than the man behind the mask.
They don’t understand the three of us. Not our relationship, or the connection we share.
We all breathe the same air, feeling everything without saying so much as a word to each other.
People tried to define it. Pull it to pieces until they were satisfied that the three of us were finished. Joke’s on them because nothing can tear my brother and me away from Zane.
In the past, whenever we let someone in, they either got jealous or tried to cut the other out after a while.
Over my dead body was that ever going to happen.
Besides, there is only one woman who has ever seen us for who we are, who had our attention from the very first moment we laid eyes on her.
Someone who, deep beneath the surface, carried the same recipe of darkness we did, effortlessly drawing us in without even knowing she was doing it.
She looked at us like she knew who we were beneath it all.
As if she could see straight through the noise and into the parts we were too afraid to show back then.
Shiloh Fox.
Our muse.
Our obsession.
My sister’s best friend.
The biggest regret we have is keeping our distance.
Pretending we could ignore the pull, the magnetic current that had always drawn us to her.
Shiloh was far too quiet and innocent for our brand of poison, and to hurt her would have been the greatest tragedy.
Plus, her folks were always strict as fuck, and we weren’t in the business of pissing off the Fox family by corrupting their only daughter.
It’s funny how time and distance don’t mean a damn thing when up against something that feels like it was written beneath your skin.
I mean… fuck. She’s in every shaky breath I take before the first line of every song I sing.
Every note that scrapes the edges of all the words left in me, and I might as well be cursed, because she’s never going away.
Guitar strap slung over my shoulder, I toss Zane and Axl a nod before sliding my mask down over my face.
At first, the masks were a joke. Years ago, when we first left Blue River, we were itching to prove to our town that we were more than what they made us feel.
We wanted to get so big that one day we could look them in the eyes and show them that the band they worshipped was the very same delinquent kids they used to despise.
The faceless rockstars blasting on the radio when they drove to work each morning?
That was us. The kids they judged for being different, for loving differently, went on to become one of the biggest rock bands in the world.
And now that they know who we are, courtesy of our mother’s proud bragging, they’ve done a complete one-eighty, supporting us at every turn.
We hide in anonymity, and we come alive every time we hit the stage. Believe it or not, Blue River has kept our identities secret, which is why coming back here and performing for them is an unexpected honor.
I step through the curtain and out onto the darkened, black lit stage.
The place is fucking packed, which is awesome for Carol’s.
The local businesses around here always take a hit when the snowy season sets in, and my sister Jovi figured this was a way to slip a little money into their pockets, just enough to tide them over until spring.
All thoughts fade to the back of my mind as I stand before the mic. The crowd hasn’t even seen us yet, but the adrenaline is already burning through my veins. I stretch my neck and roll my shoulders back, tense with the weight of my guitar biting into my skin through my leather jacket.
I close my eyes, surrendering myself to the electricity humming through my veins.
There are so many artists that we know and look up to who still get nervous before they perform, but not me.
I mean, the mask helps, but the world around me fades whenever I’m on stage, and the only thing that matters to any of us is the music.
In my mind, there’s only one woman out there listening, and if I close my eyes, eventually the crowd fades, the noise dies, and all I see is her. I only wish that when I open them, she wouldn’t fade too.