20. Tom Cobalt #3
“I was always going to test it out,” I tell him, since we’ve agreed to entertain each other’s ideas, no matter if we personally think they’re shit. I’ve swayed him about as much as he’s swayed me on this album, so I can’t even claim being right all the time.
Even though I know I’m great, I’m not looking to be right. I’m just looking for the best sound possible. Which means I can accept being proven wrong.
“Ready?” Phoenix asks, antsy. “You fix it?”
I test out the pedal first. “Yeah, it’s working.”
Then Phoenix drops in with a gritty beat that pairs perfectly with the voice filter while I sing. When I pick my foot off the pedal during the chorus, my pulse is in my throat hearing the shift in my voice. The contrast wrecks me.
That feels like raw sex. Way too good.
At the end of “Dirty Rise,” my voice fades, and Phoenix finishes with a rapid, thrashing drum beat, his arms moving at lightning speed. Then it just abruptly stops. That song feels like being fucked. Officially.
Phoenix is chasing after breath. Sweat drips down his temples, and he wipes his face with the heel of his palm. Our eyes latch as this ragged, stimulating feeling stirs the air. He doesn’t have to say anything. I know he feels it too.
“Again,” he says in a deep, husky pant.
Again.
I nod, and after we play the song three more times with the filter, I give Phoenix his flowers. “It’s good.”
“It’s better than good.” He swigs from a water bottle.
I switch out guitars. “Yeah, you were right.”
He waits for more, but I end there. “Wow, a compliment,” he says. “You sleep on the right side of the bed or did you come hard this morning?”
I’m about to respond when he stands, just to fist the back of his shirt. He brings the sweaty gray fabric over his head. As he throws the shirt on his duffel, his inked chest comes into view.
The scatter of tattoos traps my gaze, but none more than the upside-down black rose. The thorny stem starts at his sternum and slips down the direct center of his body, petals blooming over his abs. The symmetry entrances me every time.
I want to explore all of his ink. In the least friendly way possible. That cannot happen. I force myself not to groan out in frustration, but I’m gripping the microphone on the stand too hard and I’m two seconds away from knocking my forehead into it.
Phoenix skates a hand through his damp hair. “Or are you coming right now?”
I lift my head. “Came this morning, but thanks for being concerned about my needs. Appreciate it.”
“Let me guess, you were alone.” He sits back on the stool. “But I didn’t peg you as a porn guy.”
“Then you pegged me right. I wasn’t watching porn.” I shouldn’t go further, but I desperately want to taunt him. So I add, “Was not alone though.”
He goes rigid. “Who was with you?”
I stay quiet. My body is up in flames already.
I must like this feeling too much if I keep volunteering for it.
He glares and presses his hands to his thighs. “You did not call RJ.”
“No, dude.” I adjust the mic stand. My pulse is racing as I continue to mess with him. “Maybe I picked someone up.”
“When?” he asks coarsely, but his eyes narrow in disbelief, not buying it. “I was with you until two a.m. last night.” At a dive bar, he means. We were finalizing the lyrics to “Dirty Rise.”
“After that,” I say.
“I walked you home.” I remember.
“Maybe I met him in the lobby.”
Phoenix cocks his head, eyeing me up and down, and his jaw tightens, a part of me hopes he can’t stand the idea of me with another dude—that the mere thought causes him internal distress.
“Bullshit,” he says. “You came in the shower. Or in your hand. Daydreaming about me.”
I feign confusion. “Are you sure that’s not what you were doing this morning? This sounds like classic projection.”
“What was he like?” Phoenix asks, nodding toward me. “Did he kneel at your feet, Cobalt god? Did he deep throat every single inch of you?”
Holy shit. I should not be having this back and forth with my bandmate. But it’s become apparent that Phoenix wasn’t exaggerating when he said he liked pushing boundaries too.
“Wish you were there?” I volley back.
“You would’ve liked it more if I had been.”
I clench the microphone. Breathe. Phoenix drinks me in, and I curl my fingers tighter. My body is a million degrees of scalding need.
I manage to tell Phoenix, “I’m not into threesomes or being watched by a third party, so I definitely wouldn’t have wanted you around.”
“I just meant me and you. I wasn’t including your hookup. Who, by the way, is imaginary—”
“That you think, dude,” I interject. “He could exist.”
“In your head, yeah.”
I give him a middle finger. “My head is a beautiful place. You keep trying to get in there.”
Phoenix doesn’t deny. “Let’s go again.” He grabs his drumsticks. He’s breathing harder, sweat tracks down his inked chest like rivers that I want to follow with my tongue. “Same tempo as the last round.”
The last round. I cup the mic with two hands, my forehead resting to the bulbous end. My lungs are in my throat just imagining going through this song again.
“You ready?” Phoenix asks.
I push a hot hand through my hair. “You must love getting right in it.”
“Sorry, you need me to work you up to it?” He sounds pissed off, per usual.
I blink and remind myself he’d be awful in bed.
Too fast. Too inconsiderate. It would probably hurt like hell.
I bet he doesn’t use lube. I bet he just drives right in there and takes whatever he wants, then leaves the other guy lonely and cold.
It’s exactly the reminder I need to power through the thickest sexual tension I’ve ever waded in.
Cupid’s arrow, gone. I pulled it out.
“No, don’t need that,” I say with an exhale. “I’m good. Drop in.”
The beat is filthy. The lyrics, rip-roaring.
The last drum section is a pressure point I can barely, barely handle.
Especially as Phoenix daggers his eyes on me while he attacks the drums with a visceral ferocity.
I almost expect him to let go of the sticks and barrel toward me with the same fire beneath his feet that exist in his hands.
When he doesn’t, I’m in a state of yearning I should not be in—not in this way, not for him.
“You think you can go again?” Phoenix asks in a pant, sounding more curious than challenging. “Or have I run you ragged?”
Fuck me. He knows what he’s doing. My body is so tightly wound, I’m craving a moan-inducing release. I’d like to think this is mutual—that I’m also destroying him.
Phoenix is someone who likes living very close to an edge, and I’m starting to feel him pushing me there this time.
“Last round,” I tell him.
“Can’t take it anymore?” he taunts.
The truth is, no. I’m flirting with disaster just going through this again. “You have me where you want me yet?” I ask back.
“Where I want? Not even close.” He wets his lips, takes a few deep inhales and braces his hands on his thighs.
Am I breathing?
I push my hair back again and whip the cord of the mic away from my feet. I feel him watching my movements. But I don’t stare at Phoenix when I start singing.
We tear through the song one more time, and when we finish the three-minute track, his labored breathing is enough to make me hard as a brick.
It’s fucking painful against my jeans, and I adjust myself.
His nose flares, and a rougher groan fights its way out of his lips. “Tom.”
“Dude, you did this.”
“Fuck,” Phoenix swings his legs off the stool, but not to approach me. He keeps his distance and snatches his towel from his duffel. The long length of his shaft bears against his pants, and seeing him fully erect (what has to be full because goddamn) is lighting all my nerve endings on fire.
I shut my guitar in its case. “I should go.”
Phoenix releases a strangled breath. “Wait, let me take you.”
“You’re not taking me,” I snap.
He glares. “I didn’t mean like that, Tom.” He picks up his motorcycle helmet and extends it to me. “Here. I’ll drive you back.”
“You only have one helmet,” I realize.
“I’m fine without it.”
“No way.” I make a face like he’s insane. As much as I’m loving the idea of being behind Phoenix on his Suzuki, I will not be the reason my drummer suffers a brain injury or death. “See you tomorrow. I’ll text you.”
He texts me first, about ten minutes later when I’m in the back of a cab.
PHOENIX WOLFGANG
Sorry. Seriously. I went too far. Are you ok?
I swallow hard and fight an incoming smile before sending a response.
TOM CARRAWAY
Not too far. No damage done. Impenetrable.
PHOENIX WOLFGANG
Impenetrable? That tight, huh.
I put a palm to my burning cheek, sliding it against my jaw. I’m going to need a thirty-minute cold shower. “Fuck you, dude,” I mutter under my breath, then send a new message.
TOM CARRAWAY
You’ll never know
PHOENIX WOLFGANG
For the best
“Agreed,” I breathe out, shoving the phone in my pocket. I fit in my AirPods and listen to the songs we’ve already recorded for the album. The complexity of each arrangement lures me into a trance.
I’ve come to realize, I don’t despise all the extra layers of sound Phoenix wants. For as much as I keep resisting, I’ve started really loving them.