18. Riot
Riot
As soon as we get on the bus she bolts for my private bedroom, slams the door and locks it.
I join the guys because she isn’t going anywhere and she isn’t going to find her things either since they aren’t in there.
Bronx is pouring Sambuca into glasses. Kodiak, hands full, brings the beer to the table. Golden is stretched out on one of the cushioned benches.
As usual Jasper has situated himself where he can keep an eye on everything but also stay out of our way. Good. He was supposed to be making sure my muse didn’t make a run for it. I should fire him for spoiling the bitch and giving her an inch of independence.
I won’t because he did follow her and alert me to her whereabouts.
And because he was Rook’s partner for that disastrous wedding weekend, which means he has a hell of a lot more insight into my relationship and fallout with Kelsey than anyone aside from our head of security.
And I can’t pull Rook into babysitting duties.
I take the glass of black liquor Bronx holds out to me.
“Everything okay?” Golden asks. When I left to find Kelsey, he’d had his hands full of tits and ass, but she mustn’t have made the bus cut.
“She’s the one that has been defacing all our posters.” I glare at the closed door at the far end of bunk alley. She can tear the room apart until she tires herself out.
Kodiak snorts. “The one drawing dicks on your face?”
“Yes,” I snarl.
“Figures,” Bronx says.
“Deserved,” Kodiak mutters to himself.
“Heard that, asshole.” I drain my glass and slap it back onto the table in front of Bronx.
“Well, now you know who hates you that much, you can move on, right?” Golden asks.
“No. She almost ruined the band. This. Our destiny.” I drop into the seat across from him.
“She literally stole from all of us.” They were angry too at the start.
Why are my bandmates ready to forgive and forget?
It would be different if she’d stuck around and fought the allegations.
Or at least explained why she was skimming money from the bands account. Why run away if she wasn’t guilty?
Golden rubs absently at the knuckles on his left hand. “I still struggle to find sense in that. Why try to ruin us if she was making bank stealing from us? Wouldn’t it have made more sense to keep her scheme going? Besides that—”
“She had good reasons to leave. She assaulted Sonatina. The record label accountants were onto her.” If she wasn’t planning on fucking us over completely why run away? Why not stay and try to make things right? The fact that she fled was telling.
“Are we certain it wasn’t a mistake?” Bronx asks. “Or that she didn’t have a really good reason for needing the money.”
“She only needed to ask.” That’s the kicker. I would have given her anything. Everything. But she chose to fuck me over in every way. “You saw the evidence, we all did.”
Bank statements that were much less than they were meant to be and she was the only one who had accessed it. Hundreds of thousands of dollars gone. Poof. Vanished.
“With my own eyes.” Bronx lifts his palms up and shrugs. “But I don’t know. We knew her, man. She wasn’t like that.”
Except she was. Our finances drastically improved after she left. All signs point to her. She was simultaneously screwing us over, stealing our money, and playing games with my heart. And we were all blind to it.
Not that the money lasted. That apartment she was living in... she was one step above homeless. For a second that fact sits like a stone at the back of my throat. Indigestible.
No, it’s what she deserved. If that’s why she came back... if she thinks she can take more...
“Why would she come back if it was all true?” Kodiak scratches his cheek with one finger. “She’d have to assume you know about it by now.”
“Yeah. That’s true.” Bronx peers steadily at me.
I focus on a torn bit of cuticle on my thumb.
Making me uncomfortable will not make me look deeper.
But perhaps I should. That way I can prove it to them and dispel the doubt they’re exhibiting.
“She probably took the two of you being obsessed with getting in her pants as the perfect opportunity to screw us all over again.” Figuratively and literally.
“That’s harsh.” Golden sits back in his seat, leveling me with a hard stare.
I take the refilled glass Bronx pushes my way and stare into the black depths instead of tossing it back.
I don’t care why she came back. I only care that I’m creating and writing again.
Since she’s been with us, I’ve written songs our fans are excited about.
It’s been purgative. And it’ll go some way to rectifying what she stole.
“Maybe you should ask her why she’s back,” Bronx says.
“It doesn’t matter.” I lift the glass and drain it. “Don’t you get that. She could crawl back on her knees and beg me to forgive her... it’s not going to happen.”
She didn’t only steal my money. The band’s money. She didn’t just make Carmine consider having us blacklisted from the industry right along with her, which forced me to have to fall in line with every demand Sonatina made. She took my best friend away. Broke my heart. Shattered me.
For the first time in my adult life, I let a woman get close enough to hurt me and she did. Brutally. She walked out on me the same way my dad walked out on my mom. On my brothers. On me.
She solidified what I already knew. Letting people in comes at too high a cost. It’s a mistake I won’t make again. I rub at my chest while I put my glass back in front of Bronx. “Pour me another one.”
The three of them share a pressed lip look as Bronx provides me with another drink. They have more to say, and I want to hear none of it. They might be ready to give Kelsey the benefit of the doubt, but I’m not.
Scooping up my glass, I turn on the gaming console and kick Kodiak’s feet off the bench so I can take a seat.
Kodiak gets up. He stretches his arms above his head and yawns. “I’m going to get some sleep.”
I sit forward while I log into my game, eyeing him striding the length of bunk alley.
He knocks on the locked door. I can’t make out what he says, nor do I care.
I pretend I’m not paying attention at all while I mindlessly mash buttons on the controller.
I told him she was off-fucking-limits to the three of them.
Apparently he’s choosing to ignore that.
The door stays closed.
Eventually he gets the hint. He collects his shit from his bunk and disappears into the bathroom. Golden heads to his bunk a few minutes later.
Bronx grabs the other controller and drops down next to me.
I switch to multiplayer.
“Can I ask you something?” he asks after a while of playing in companionable silence.
I answer with a grunt.
“Did you sleep with Sonatina?”
“Yeah.” It hadn’t been my finest moment. I’d been drunk and pissed off and she’d been there. It meant less than nothing. She might as well have been another groupie. “It happened once. It was not an experience worth repeating.”
My mind kicks up those same images that usually hit me when I’m fucking. The ones that nauseate me and make my cock instantly soften. My chest tightens and I slide a finger inside the collar of my shirt, tugging it away from my throat.
Bronx is quiet.
It’s an uncomfortable silence, mostly because I’m stuck in my own head.
“How does Kelsey know you slept with Sonatina?” He’s terse.
How does Kelsey know... I turn off the console. “It doesn’t fucking matter.”
“Yeah, sure,” he stands and heads to his bunk.
I wait for a while. I told Kelsey I was going to get payback for her acts of vandalism. But it’s more than that. All this shit she’s dredging to the surface…all this shit I don’t want to think about... it’s because of her. I need her to understand how powerless she is.
Finishing my drink, I grab a knife and wander down bunk alley.
Kelsey is betting on me being unable to unlock the door. Or that I won’t. She’s expecting me to sleep in a bunk.
The handle doesn’t put up a fight when I use the knife like a flat headed screwdriver to pull it apart, rendering the lock useless a few seconds later.
Slipping inside, I close the door and wait for my eyes to adjust to the darkness. The shape in the middle of the bed doesn’t stir.
I turn the desk lamp on and grab an empty notebook to wedge the door shut with.
I gravitate toward the edge of the bed. Her purse is on my nightstand. It gives me an idea. I open it and take out the marker. Place it on the bed.
Her hair is splayed out over my pillow and her shoulders are bare, except for dark bra straps. Fuck. My breath falters. I used to love watching her sleep.
I tug the covers down a couple of inches, exposing her bra cups and otherwise bare skin.
She doesn’t stir.
She really should. I take out my phone and open the camera app. Leaning over her I press my thumb to the center of her pillowy lips and watch them part. I press the digit inside.
My cock stirs. The heat of her wet mouth going straight to my groin.
It’s clear that I’m not done with Kelsey Peterson. No matter how much I want to be. I won’t be done with her until I’ve used her up as a muse so thoroughly that I can’t wring another drop of inspiration from her.
I won’t be finished with her until I’ve gutted and poisoned her the way she did me. Leaving her unable to eat, or sleep, or be around anyone for months because no one could stand the pain I was in. That I am apparently still in.
I take a photo of her lips around my thumb. Then take more of her in her bra before tugging the covers all the way down past her panties. I snap a few more of her like that. Then flip the cups of her bra down and get those shots too.
The last time I took photos of her it was to tell L.A. Riot’s fans that I’d got the girl. This time the photos I take are a reassurance.
She groans and her eyes open. Then open wider. She scrambles up the bed. “What are you doing in here?”
I grip her ankle and tug her back down the bed. “Hush, Little Vandal. Unless you want the others to witness your punishment.”
“Don’t fucking touch me.” She kicks and punches, lashing out but it doesn’t have the desperation of true fear. When her arousal starts to scent the air, I’m certain she’s not as scared as she is turned on. “Let go of me.”
Pinning her arms above her head with one hand, I straddle her thighs. “You’re a brat, Little Vandal. I told you I was coming for payback. What should your punishment be, hmm?”
“You already spanked me,” she snipes, trying to buck me off. “You’ve made it so the others don’t want to be around me. You won’t give me back my things. You’re writing hate songs about me. Isn’t that enough?”
“You broke my fucking heart,” I growl.
She stops wriggling. Her breath catches. The air between us grows charged. It’s almost unbearable.
“I... You broke my heart.” Her watery eyes grow wide as I cover her mouth with my free hand, stopping her words.
“I’m not interested in your pretty lies.” That’s all it ever is with her.
Everything she says is a lie or an excuse.
I flip her bra cups back over her tits then pick up the marker and uncap it with my mouth.
She fights harder, desperately trying to get me off her. She bucks and twists, but I don’t budge. I clamp her hips with my thighs and tighten my grip on her wrists, rendering her immobile. I press the felt tip to the space below her tits, scrawling traitor in thick black across her heaving ribs.
Her eyes narrow on me. “What did you write on me?”
I choose to ignore her question. She’ll find out soon enough.
The flesh above her left hip is the perfect space for ‘bitch’, on the right I add the word ‘thief’.
I admire my handiwork. “This will make a great album cover. Of course we’ll need a better model.”
I take a photo then lean in closer, pressing the weight of my body into her more as I show it to her.
“You dick.” She struggles beneath me. “Delete it right now.”
“Tsk. Stay still or I’ll flip you over and spank that ass again.” I put my phone aside. I liked the way she reacted when I did it earlier. Did I leave a mark on her sensitive skin? I’m dying to see.
“Asshole.” Her hips buck under me, causing her belly to brush against my cock. It twitches with the contact.
Whimpers escape her. They must surprise her because she scrunches her eyes closed. But then she changes her mind and meets my gaze head on. “I hate you. Touch me again and I will scream bloody murder.”
Is she trying to push my buttons on purpose? “Do you expect Kodiak or Golden will step in to protect you? Or perhaps your Drummer Boy?”
“Yes.”
“They won’t.” What they’ll assume is that we’re fucking through our issues. They’ll hear her scream and assume she’s coming on my cock. “They’ll think you’re enjoying it.”
“Bullshit.” Her gaze skates down my body to where my weight holds her in place. Her tongue darts out over her lips.
“Try me.” I start one last graffiti across the top of her chest, HEA—
She grits her teeth and turns motionless. Not giving me the satisfaction of any response.
Fuck. I want her to cry out. I want them to hear her the way I was forced to hear her with Bronx and then Kodiak.
Did she want me to hear her? Was she trying to make me jealous? Did it turn her on? Would it turn her on to know they can hear us?
When I’m finished, I put the cap on the marker and take one last photo. She turns her face away in this one.
“If you fuck me over again in any way, I will share these photos on social media,” I warn her before I get off her and release her wrists.
Chest heaving, she crawls out of my bed and gathers her clothes to her chest. She doesn’t bother getting dressed before she tries to open the door. She yanks on it a couple of times. “Asshole. Prick. Piece of shit. You better delete those photos.”
“Yeah, I’m not going to do that.”
“Fuck you.” She notices the notepad and kicks it out of the way. Dragging open the door, she bolts from the room.
I pick up the notepad and place it on the desk. It’s open to some lyrics I’ve been working on.
It’s your turn to bleed for me
Your turn to shatter
Threatening to release these pictures is one more thing that will keep her right where I want her.
Until I’m ready to put her back in the gutter she crawled out of.