Chapter 3
THREE
Pretty fucking pathetic turned out to be pretty fucking awesome.
After a fun Saturday night drinking peach wine and snacking on cheese and crackers while making fun of a marathon of What Not to Wear reruns, Lincoln was pretty sure he’d found a friend for life.
Her sarcasm level matched his own, they shared a mutual hatred of soy sauce on Chinese food—egg rolls and ketchup were on point!
—and she didn’t press him about his hookup the previous night.
She also didn’t try to hug him when she left that night, and he adored her for it, even though he wasn’t entirely sure why the idea of a hug bothered him. He was fine hugging Zelda good-bye in the morning.
Whatever.
He and Melody texted frequently over the next couple of days, not about anything too super important, but she always managed to make his jobless status seem a little less awful.
On Tuesday, she brought over homemade lasagna for dinner, and then stayed to watch TV.
Wednesday, Lincoln wowed her with boxed macaroni and cheese with cut-up hot dogs, and the earnest way he served up the meal made her cackle with laughter.
By Thursday, Lincoln felt normal enough to give in to her pleas to attend open-mike night at Off Beat.
Walking into the dim bar, shades firmly in place with no questions asked from Melody, made his stomach squirm. So many people, so close together. Not something that used to bother him, and he hated that it bothered him now.
Van waved a greeting from behind the bar. When he was able to take their drink orders, he gave Melody a curious look.
“Switch hitter?” he asked as he scooped ice for Lincoln’s requested Coke.
“New friend,” Lincoln replied. “Can always use more of those.”
“True story.”
Van made quick work of his soda and of Melody’s vodka sour, and Melody insisted on paying. Instead of hanging at the bar, she led him to one of the small round tables in the rear. Lincoln said a silent thank-you. Their position put them pretty far away from the distracting stage lights.
And the bulk of the crowd.
A stagehand was putting together some equipment. Lincoln tracked a second body moving in that direction. Familiar. The guy said something to the stagehand, then turned to face the crowd.
Pale Eyes.
Lincoln’s heart kicked. Even from a distance, the guy was as cute and enticing as last week. He practically scampered across the slowly crowding room to the safety of the bar.
Skittish thing, isn’t he?
Lincoln couldn’t explain his fascination. He didn’t get a chance to pursue it, though, because bar owner Beatrice Westmore stepped up to the center microphone.
“Welcome to another open-mike night, here at Off Beat!” she said.
Lincoln winced at the cheering’s roar level. For a small place, the acoustics were amazing. He could only imagine how spectacular Dominic had sounded last year when he stepped up onstage to play his violin.
“We have a pretty packed schedule for you guys tonight,” Beatrice continued. “A little bit of this, a little bit of that. First up is a homegrown boy from Sixty-first Street who wants to show you what a QChord is all about. Please welcome Ritchie P.”
A fucking QChord? Really?
The electronic synthesizer was a dummy guitar combined with a keyboard, for all intents and purposes.
Not even a real instrument that most people played in public.
It was meant for learning chords and arrangements before moving on to an actual guitar.
Lincoln had seen them advertised but never experienced one in person.
And “boy” was right. The guy couldn’t be older than sixteen. He brought out a folding chair and the oddly shaped, button-covered instrument. After he sat, he placed the QChord across his lap and started fiddling with settings.
Lincoln expected mediocrity.
Ritchie P. started playing, and the room filled with a spot-on version of “Somewhere Only We Know.” He could have been plucking at the strings of a Gibson guitar for the sounds he made on that little thing, without a single actual string.
No vibrations. Only gentle movement over the buttons and a flat gray surface.
The more songs Ritchie P. played, the more mesmerized Lincoln became with the instrument.
Maybe I could play guitar again. Maybe.
He didn’t dare dream or hope. He clapped loudly for Ritchie P., and then stared at the stage door so hard he didn’t hear Beatrice announce the next act.
“Linc?” Melody snapped her fingers near his nose.
He blinked her into focus. “What?”
“You looked like you were going to have a spontaneous orgasm. You okay?”
“Yeah. Yeah, I am okay.”
“I’ve never seen one of those things that guy Ritchie was playing.”
“I’ve heard of them, but I never saw someone play one. It sounded so real.”
She didn’t seem sure how to take his comment. “For a second you looked like you wanted to chase him down and steal his harpsichord.”
“QChord.”
“Whatever. That thing you’re lusting over.” Her perfectly penciled eyebrows shot up. “That is what you’re lusting over, right? Not the guy?”
He laughed. “No, definitely not the guy.”
Speaking of guys, Pale Eyes had emerged from the behind the bar with a gray basin in his hands. He eased his way around the sea of patrons, carefully bussing tables of empty appetizer plates and glasses. Lincoln guzzled the rest of his soda, then nudged the glass to the edge of his table.
Eventually Pale Eyes worked his way to the back.
He snagged the glass without making eye contact, and Lincoln had no earthly explanation for why that disappointed him.
Never the most subtle person in the room, he decided to hell with it and got up for another Coke.
A waitress would have brought him one, but he needed to get closer to the bar.
One person jostled him on their way past, and Lincoln held back the unreasonable urge to shove them away from him.
Pale Eyes wasn’t there while he waited for Van’s attention. “Sure you don’t want something stronger?” Van asked as he poured the soda.
“Too early,” Lincoln replied. The last fucking thing he needed was to get hammered and risk a repeat of last Friday. “Who’s the guy bussing tables tonight?”
“Beatrice’s nephew Emmett. He moved here last summer.”
Nephew. Interesting. “Not local?”
“Nah. Used to live across the bridge, someplace around Baltimore, I think. Why?” Van plunked down his soda, a wide grin betraying his thoughts. “Didn’t get enough from that blond number you took home last week?”
Lincoln’s gut twisted, and he forced back a grimace. “That guy was a grade-A mistake. I’m just curious about Emmett, that’s all. He seems . . . skittish.”
“He is.” Van listened to another drink order, then set about mixing and gossiping. “Kid has some severe anxiety or something, and Beatrice thinks that working a job like this, instead of staying holed up at home, will help him socialize.”
“She’s not afraid it will make the anxiety worse?”
“Guess not.” Van raised a stainless-steel shaker over his head and gave it several hard knocks. The orange liquid inside went into two ice-filled rocks glasses. “Been here three weeks and I can’t say I’ve seen much improvement.”
“Does he have any friends?”
“No idea. Beatrice’s son Adrian is about his age. They probably hang out.”
Van’s information was both helpful and incredibly irritating in what he didn’t know about Emmett.
The object of Lincoln’s curiosity chose that perfect moment to appear behind the bar with bottles of liquor in his hands. He deposited them into the female bartender’s service well one at a time, after uncapping and adding a pour spout to each.
On his way past a second time, Van barked out, “Emmett.”
Emmett took two steps to the side and kind of shrank under Van’s intimidating stare. “What do you need?” His gaze raked over the counter in front of him, as if he was trying to see what garnish he’d forgotten to restock.
“Say hello to someone for me,” Van said.
“What?”
Van pointed. Emmett followed the direction right to Lincoln. Lincoln stared into those pale eyes, uncertain of their exact color because of the sunglasses, but damn they were pretty. Emmett was pretty all over, with soft cheekbones and kissable lips.
Emmett blinked hard several times. “Um, hi?”
“Hey, nice to meet you,” Lincoln said. “Lincoln West.”
He gave a slow nod, up and down, then back to center. “I know. You played with XYZ.”
Lincoln grinned, impressed the kid had surprised him with that. “Yeah, I did, until last summer. Car accident kind of cut that career short.”
“I know. I’m sorry.”
“Not your fault.”
Emmett flinched, but maintained eye contact. “What are you doing here? I mean, not that you aren’t allowed to come here, but, um, aren’t you from Philadelphia?”
“Yeah, but Trey is letting me and a friend use his apartment this summer while he and Dom are on tour.”
“Oh. That’s really nice of him.” Emmett cast around, as if determined to keep the conversation going but unsure what to talk about. It was all kinds of endearing. “Um, how do you like it?”
“I love the area, but I’m bored out of my mind. I can’t get a job, and I can’t play my guitar.” Lincoln hated how self-pitying that sounded. “At least I’m alive, right? I was a quarter inch from being a vegetable.”
Emmett’s eyes widened. “Wow, really?”
“Yeah.” He hated talking about the accident. “So Van mentioned you’re staying here, working for your aunt.” Time to turn on a little charm and feel the boy up. So to speak. “You do anything for fun?”
“Fun?” He practically squeaked the word. “Not much. I don’t really know anyone, except the people who work here, and they’re all older than me.”
“How old are you?”
“Nineteen.”
Damn, he was still a baby. “College?”
“Online courses. I’m not big on crowds of strangers, so a college campus . . . couldn’t do it.”
Lincoln wanted to point out that he was surrounded by about a hundred strangers right now, and he seemed to be okay. “Do you work tomorrow?”
Emmett blinked. “Like during the day? No, we don’t open here until seven.”