Chapter 20
Chapter twenty
Hendrix · Now
Hold On Till May – Pierce The Veil
My feet sink into the carpet as I pace the length of mine and Riley’s hotel room. Steam wafts through the cracked en-suite door, the pitter patter of the shower blending with Riley’s quiet humming as she showers.
“It’s just so fucking awkward.” I drop into the chair at the vanity with a groan. “Why the hell did I think I could do this?”
Talia’s face crackles on my phone screen. “It was always gonna be awkward, babe. You can’t just walk in after ten years of silence and expect everything to go back to normal.”
“I know, I just—” I scrub a hand down my face and sigh. “Carter won’t even look at me. Axel is acting as if everything is fine and a day hasn’t passed. Saint is just Saint. And Cole…”
“Cole…” she echoes. “Cole, what?”
I shake my head.
There are no words I can think of to explain Cole. The way I feel him watching only for him to tear his gaze away as if burned every time I dare look at him.
“Nothing,” I say. “Everything’s just so tense. I don’t know how we get past it enough to actually work together.”
“You said things with Saint went okay, right?” Talia asks.
I bite down on my thumb. “Yeah, I guess. As okay as they can do.”
“And Axel is fine?”
“Yeah.”
“Maybe Carter just has his own shit going on,” she muses, but her hopeful tone tells me she knows that is not true. “And you and Cole have so much history. It wouldn’t make sense if everything was hunky dory on day one. But, he reached out. He wants to work with you. That means something, Hendrix.”
I tip my head back and zero in on a crack in the magnolia ceiling. “I’m sure you’re right.”
“I always am.” She winks when I glance at her. “Though, I’m still miffed you went without me.”
I laugh. “Trust me, you did not want to be in that room today.”
She hums thoughtfully. “How did Riley get on with them?”
“Really good,” I tell her. “Pretty sure they fell a little in love with her the second she opened her mouth. Especially when she asked if Saint and Axel’s parents hated them too because their names are as strange as mine.”
Laughter sprinkles down the speaker. “God, I love that woman.”
“Me too. Couldn’t do it without her,” I say.
“Home tomorrow?”
I sigh, tapping my fingers against the wooden desk.
“No. Cole wants to try and get some ideas down before I leave. So, another day in the stilted studio.” I force my lips into a half grin. Pretty sure it’s closer to a grimace.
“Oh, babe. Have you thought about just saying sorry? Look I’m always the first person to say you don’t owe anybody your excuses. But a simple apology can go a really long way.”
A tear spills over my lashes.
“How do you apologise for ghosting the people you called your family, Talia? It doesn’t matter how good I thought my reasons were. There’s not an apology in the world that makes any of it okay.”
Talia’s face falls, her lips twisting in sorrow as she watches me through the camera. “I don’t know. But you can't go back and change anything. All you can do is move forward. And whatever happens, you are still Hendrix Moore. So go and show them that.”
I push my elbows onto the wood, and prop my head in my hands.
“Write them a kick ass album, and make them listen to you,” she says. “Maybe they’ll forgive you one day, maybe they won’t. But at least you’ll know you tried.”
Dressed in my favourite wide-legged black jeans and tight black crop top, with sharp black winged liner and midnight-black lips, I’m ready to take on the world. Or face four rock stars and hold my own in a room where I no longer fit in.
Same thing, if you ask me.
Riley slipped out of the hotel room early this morning, leaving me only with a text to say she had plans.
God knows what she’s up to.
She hates London with a passion. I can’t imagine her popping into the palace for a cuppa with the king.
I push down the studio buzzer, steeling my shoulders.
It’s less than thirty seconds when I hear the click.
I shove the door open and step inside.
There was enough dilly-dallying yesterday. Today is about work. No need for small talk, no need to pretend things are okay. All I have to do is listen to the guys, take notes, then go and write that kick ass album Talia told me to.
I have got this.
The door to the lounge swings open.
Cole leans in the frame, an arm above his head holding the wooden beam, legs crossed at the ankles.
He’s wearing black joggers with a fitted long-sleeve shirt, and a baseball cap twisted backwards on his head. A silver hoop glints in his nose, the black and grey ink wrapping his neck my attention when he tips his chin up.
My knees turn to liquid.
I curl my fingers around the doorframe and lock my muscles so I don’t fall to his feet in a puddle.
I clear my throat. “Where is everyone?”
“Not a fucking foggiest,” he says, blowing out a breath as he takes a step back. “They disappeared somewhere between last night and this morning, and not one of the fuckers is answering my texts.”
“Oh.”
Maybe I don’t quite got this, after all.
I can handle the phone calls and the group settings. But being alone with Cole in a small, hidden room is something else entirely.
“You want a drink or anything before we get started?” he asks.
I slip past him, the faint scent of vanilla and cinnamon tickling my nose and stirring a memory that I shove down fast.
There was a time, after we broke up, where I’d sit in my room and sniff the aftershave he always wore like an addict craving a fix. Pathetic of me, I know.
I clamp my mouth shut, and hold my breath as I escape to the other side of the room.
“Tea, please,” I tell him. “If you have it.”
Cole nods and moves toward the small coffee station in the corner of the room without another word.
I tuck myself into the over-sized black leather armchair and unclip my guitar case, following his every move from the corner of my eye.
His shirt stretches across his back, straining against the rippling muscles as he reaches up to grab down two mugs. My fingers still on the last clasp, heart thumping as the shirt slides upwards, revealing an array of black and grey ink etched into the skin of his lower back.
He always wanted to cover his body in ink.
I’m curious to know if he got that far, or if there’s still any of the skin I spent hours rubbing my hands all over left.
I duck my head and swallow.
Not remotely what I’m here for.
I empty my backpack, and spread my notebooks on the black, oval table. Hooking wired headphones around my neck, I prop a pen behind my ear.
Cole places a mug in front of me.
Steam ripples over the edge, heating my face as I lean forward. “Thank you.”
“Welcome.” He drops onto the couch, legs spread, a black mug hugged between his hands. “So, how have you been? I realised I haven’t really asked you that yet.”
Small talk, great.
“Good,” I tell him, shrugging. “Busy at the studio, you know. You?”
“Yeah good. Busy.” His lips twist down and his nose wrinkles. “Not in the studio, obviously. Touring, shit like that.”
I nod, drumming my fingers on my thighs. “Hopefully, you’ll be studio busy soon.”
“Hopefully.” He sips his drink.
I try not to stare, but tattooed hands catch my eyes. I trace the rings on adorning his fingers.
I’ve followed Reckless Abandon’s career since its inception, but they’re notoriously private men. There are so many things I don’t know about them now. About him.
Things I’m not sure I want to because there is only so much heartbreak a girl can take in her lifetime—I maxed out on mine the day I walked away from Cole.
I rip my eyes away from the sparkling silver jewellery and sip my drink.
The tea scolds my tongue, but I choke it down in the hopes of clearing the lump in my throat. “We should probably get cracking, if we plan to have you studio busy soon, then.”
“Right.” He leans forward, gaze avoiding mine as he glances over the Hummingbird. He tilts his head. “You still have that old thing?”
“Couldn’t get rid of it even if I wanted to.” And there was a time I really wanted to. “I did all my best work on this thing, you know?”
I trace the dipped contour of the ebony body, a smile curving my lips.
A soft breath leaves him. “Yeah.”
I look up at him, our eyes colliding. “Cole, I—”
“I was thinking,” he says and my stomach sinks. “We need a concept. Think Black Parade style.”
I purse my lips and snatch up a pen. “You want to tell a story?”
“Yeah, all my favourite albums are concepts. Yours too, if I remember correctly.”
“You do.” I flick my notebook open.
“It makes sense,” he continues. “We’re starting out as two people who haven’t written in a while. Let alone written together. We need something a spark to get us going.”
“Yeah, that’s not a bad idea. It gives us a baseline, then if it’s not working, we just shift the concept.”
“Exactly.”
“Okay, so what are your ideas?”
He sinks into the couch. “That, I don’t know.”
I chew my pen, scanning Cole as he tips his head back.
His hand curls around his wrist, his thumb pressing into his jumper right over his pulse point.
Make them listen to you…
I launch myself off the ledge before I can be talked into safe ground. “Ghosts!”
“Ghosts?” Cole peeks at me through dipped lashes, a line marring his forehead. “You think the concepts should be ghosts?”
“Yes.”
“Okay… Why?”
“I dunno, it just feels right.” I nestle my guitar into my lap, and strum a simple three chord progression. “Reckless Abandon as the world knows it is dead. Ghosts linger, but they’re different. It’s not a resurrection. Just something entirely new.”
He brushes a thumb over his plump lip, his eyes dancing over my face.
Then, his lips curve into a grin that stops my heart.
“Yeah, why not. Something new it is.”