Chapter 3
Riot
Next week…
Today is the day. Today, I get to see Eloise again.
There’s been a strange knot in the center of my chest all day, growing larger with each passing hour.
I stumble through my morning lessons and have a pack of cigarettes instead of lunch—the thought of eating makes me sick.
I tell myself my nerves have nothing to do with her, but by the time four o’clock rolls around, I can hardly keep up the lie.
When she strolls into the shop, it shatters around me, and I’m left struggling to breathe in the presence of the woman who’s consumed my every thought for the past ten days.
“Hey,” I whisper. The vanilla scent is not as strong this time, mixed with notes of banana and something chemical—sunscreen, I realize on the next inhale. “Excited for your first lesson?”
Eloise’s eyes widen ever so slightly as she juts her chin up, meeting my gaze full-on. “I thought I was working with Mac…”
My heart clenches painfully, though I have no idea why. “You are. Just making small talk.” I turn from her, not understanding the hot wave of anger that washes over me. “Mac! Eloise is here!”
Mac rounds the corner, eyes as bright as his neon mohawk. “Hey, doll! I was getting worried you weren’t coming.”
Eloise twists her hands together anxiously. “Sorry. I, uh, got caught up with some things.”
“Not a problem.” Mac jogs behind the counter and pulls her guitar from its mount on the back wall. “Kept her safe for ya,” Mac says, proudly handing it over to Eloise. “Just like I promised.”
“Thanks.” Eloise smiles, though it’s not a genuine one like last time. “I really do appreciate it.”
She follows Mac to the practice room at the back of the store, and I just stare after them like a lovesick puppy, too consumed to look away.
Get your shit together, Riot.
I shake my head as I stomp behind the front desk, plopping down on the rickety stool set up behind the register with a sigh. I brace my elbows on the counter, resting my chin atop a fist and turning my head just so, so that I might be able to see Mac and Eloise in the practice room.
It starts off fairly normally, with Mac giving her the basics and showing her a few simple chords. After that, he takes a hands-off approach—far more interested in staring at her chest than in instructing her in any meaningful way.
Eloise is awkward with the instrument, and after thirty minutes of floundering, I can tell she’s getting frustrated fast. Her timid voice breaks the silence with a question, but instead of helping her, Mac grunts something unintelligible and licks his lips as he continues to ogle her.
Anger courses through my veins, strong and violent. The way he's behaving with her pisses me off, and it’s not just jealousy this time. It's obvious she wants to learn the instrument, yet he's too busy staring at her tits to teach her anything meaningful.
Fucking prick.
“Like this?” she asks again, positioning her wrist at an angle that looks uncomfortable even from across the room.
“Huh? Yeah, great.” Mac is all but drooling now, and a wave of rage overcomes me.
Fix her goddamn wrist, you moron.
But he doesn’t. Just mumbles something about her doing “really well” and lets her continue that way. I’m about to storm over there and have some choice words with my boss, but before I even rise from my seat, Eloise places the guitar down and asks where the bathrooms are.
Mac points them out, and Eloise disappears into the woman’s stall without so much as a look at either of us. I wait a few seconds to make sure she’s not going to immediately come back, then storm into the practice room.
I stop at the threshold, crossing my arms across my chest and leveling Mac with a glare.
“Hey, little rock star. Why the sour face?”
I frown, clenching my hand at my side. “You having a good time with your lesson?”
“So that’s what this is. You’re jealous.” He wiggles his brows. “I don’t blame you. Did you see the way her tits looked all pushed up against the guitar? The stuff of wet dreams, man.”
I fight the urge to shove my thumbs into his eye sockets. “I’m not fucking jealous. I’m concerned.”
“About?”
“About you being more interested in her tits than fucking teaching her anything!” I seethe.
“Oh please.” Mac waves me off. “You know you’d be doing the same damn thing if you had the luxury of being in my position.” He laces his fingers behind his head and leans back with a dreamy look. “You think she’d give me her number?”
“No,” I growl, turning toward the wall and picking a random guitar off the rack, pretending to scrutinize it for fingerprints so I don’t jump across the room and hit him.
“I think you need to get a hobby and worry about something other than pussy. And I know you need to stop being such a fucking creep to Eloise.”
“Oh, you don’t know shit. She’s clearly into it.
You see the big fuck-me eyes she was giving me?
” Mac chuckles, clearly not understanding that he’s seconds away from losing his precious eyeballs.
“Come on. You know you want to fuck her, too. Just imagine those big blue eyes looking up at you while her pouty pink lips are wrapped around your co—”
I slam the guitar back into its rack, the motion filling the air with a discordant clanging. “Stop talking. Now.”
A haughty laugh is his response. “Don’t be such a killjoy.
She’s famous for a reason, Riot—and you and I both know it’s not because she’s the most talented of the bunch.
She’s fucking hot, she knows it, and she leans into it.
Why? Because it makes her oodles and oodles of money.
She’s just a whore and a gold digger like the rest of them, and I don’t see the problem with having a little fun at her expense. It’s what she wants, after all.”
“Mac, I mean it. Shut the fuck up or I’ll—”
“You’ll what?” Mac taunts. “You’ll sucker punch me like that guy in Neon Valley and go to prison?” He rolls his eyes. “Your threats are empty, and you don’t scare me, little rock star.”
I stare at him, unblinking, my eyes darkening with barely restrained fury.
All his earlier bravado fades as he takes in my murderous expression, and he gulps audibly, taking a small step back.
A film of red casts over my vision, and I advance toward Mac with every intention to wrap my hands around his throat and end his miserable life.
It would be so sweet. So nice to watch the light fade from his eyes…
I’m broken out of my thoughts by a throat clearing, and I turn my head over my shoulder to see none other than Eloise Marquette standing in the doorway, her arms crossed and her foot tapping angrily against the floorboards.
Shit. How long has she been listening?
“So, I’m a whore and a gold digger, am I?”
So basically all of it. Fuck.
Eloise throws her hair over her shoulder with a glare directed at Mac. “I won’t be coming back. You can keep the guitar for all I care.”
Without another word or glance back, Eloise turns on her heel and storms out of the shop, letting the door slam closed loudly behind her.
Before I have the chance to talk myself out of it, I race after her, my heart thudding so loud it drowns out the sounds of Mac’s protests. I can’t let her leave. If she goes, I’ll never see her again.
“Eloise, wait!”
At my frantic call, she whips her head up, the motion causing strands of pale pink hair to fall forward over her face.
She deftly swats it away with one hand while using the other to stabilize a brightly colored bike at her side.
Orange, pink, and pale purples cover the metal frame, the hues arranged to resemble a sunset. Beautiful and unique, just like Eloise.
“What do you want?” she demands, startling me out of my thoughts. “If you’re going to try to apologize for him, you can save your breath. I don’t want to hear it.”
She rolls her bike forward, moving like she means to mount it and speed away. Forever.
I can’t have that.
“Wait!” I wrap my hand around the center of the handlebars, desperate to keep her here until I can change her mind. “Just… please. Don’t go. Let me make it up to you.”
She narrows her eyes in suspicion. “Why would you want to do that?”
I rub a hand over my face. “Because…” Because you intrigue me.
Because I need to understand that sadness in your eyes.
Because something inside me aches for you, and I don’t think it’s ever going to stop.
“Because what Mac said in there is fucking disgusting. You didn’t deserve any of it, and I just… I want to make it right.”
“But why?”
I struggle for reasons that don’t include I’m fucking crazy and fairly certain I’m obsessed with you.
“Look, you clearly love the instrument and want to learn. I couldn’t live with myself if I let Mac ruin that for you.
Please, just let me make it up to you. I promise you’ll never, ever have to see him again. ”
Her eyes soften at the desperate note in my voice. She contemplates my offer for a moment, and then says, “I’m listening…”
I note the way her gaze catches on the lip ring at the corner of my mouth, her pupils expanding. My head fills with a buzzing warmth that makes it hard to concentrate, but I push onward. “How would you feel about free lessons for the next five months? With me instead of Mac, of course.”
I conveniently leave out that I won’t be in Saltbloom at the end of those six months, and also that I have to teach lessons for free as part of my community service.
I tell myself it’s because she doesn’t need to know—when in reality, it’s because I’m terrified of her reaction if she were to find out about my sordid past.
“Well? What do you say?”
“You must feel really bad about what he said.” A small, genuine smile tips the corner of her mouth as she takes in my hopeful expression. “I really won’t have to interact with Mac again?”
“Never. I promise. Fuck, I pinky promise.”
She giggles as I shove my pinky toward her, but I just stand there with a raised brow and a deadly serious expression. “I don’t see what’s so funny. Do you deny the sacred pinky promise?”
Eloise shyly gestures toward my many piercings and tattoo-covered skin. “You just… don’t really seem like the type.”
“Well, I am. Give it here, Eloise.” I lean toward her with a devilish smirk. “Unless you’re scared?”
She scoffs, reaching her hand up and wrapping her pinky with mine. Before she pulls away, I lean forward, keeping eye contact as I press my lips to my thumb.
“What are you doing?” she whispers, her voice slightly hoarse.
“Sealing the deal.” I stare up at her unblinking, daring her to pull away while hoping she doesn’t. “Well?”
Eloise lets out an irritated huff, but I don’t miss the slight tinge of pink that heats the apples of her cheeks.
Quick as a heartbeat, she leans in and presses her lips to her thumb, never looking away.
Instead of pulling away like I expect her to, Eloise stays frozen, her fragile features morphing into an expression I have no idea what to make of.
From this distance, I notice a spattering of freckles across the bridge of her nose and cheekbones, so light they might as well be invisible.
Her eyes are ringed with a thin copper line, drawing out the blue and making them seem impossibly deep.
I watch her pupils blow as electricity crackles between us, slowing time and stretching the moment into eternity.
All too soon, it ends. Eloise blinks and pulls away, letting her hand drop to her side and forcing her gaze to the floor. I clear my throat, all too aware of the heat rushing through my veins, filling me with an urgent sense of need.
“So…” She clears her throat, taking her bottom lip between her teeth. “We should probably decide on a day and time.”
My mind is suddenly blank. “For what?”
“The lesson?”
Fuck. That’s right. “Mac’s only day off is Thursday, so it will probably have to be then…”
Eloise's face brightens. “That’s perfect! My g… my manager has yoga on Thursday starting at 5:30, so we can do a lesson then! If that works for you, that is.”
Her sentence strikes me as odd. Why would her manager’s yoga class have anything to do with her lesson time? I decide it’s best not to pry. “Of course. Thursday it is.”
I resist the urge to step forward and wrap my arms around her lithe frame. I want to touch her again, to feel that delicious electricity, but I’m not sure if I could stop from coming in my pants. Seriously, what the fuck is wrong with me?
Eloise pats the handlebars of her bike with fondness. “Okay, Gloria. Time to head home.”
“You named your bike?” I don’t know why I find that so fucking cute, only that I do.
She gives me a weird look. “Yeah. Why wouldn’t I?”
I just laugh, stepping back out of the way to clear a path for her. “I’m looking forward to our lesson next week, Eloise.”
She smiles, and it’s like the skies open, filling my head with a million beautiful, heart-stopping melodies. I watch her round the corner out of sight, but my gaze lingers on the last spot I saw her long after she’s gone.
Thursday can’t come fast enough.