The Daymakers, page 12
Laughter bubbled up from my chest and echoed around the room. I laughed and laughed, and I knew it sounded hysterical, but there was no one here to care. No one to tell me to shut the fuck up. No one to glare at me disapprovingly. No one to take my money and buy coke with it. And all I had to do was have the best sex of my life.
I wasn’t sure if this was something I was supposed to thank God for, but man, I was throwing out my thanks all over the place.
Dear Jesus, thank you for putting me in the way of a band of kind, somewhat degenerate men who’ll give me money to blow them.
Amen.
Whitt was right, though; I needed a bank account, because there was no way I’d feel comfortable carrying around this much cash. First thing tomorrow, I’d find a bank and take my first steps toward independence for good.
After taking a long shower and napping for a solid three hours, a knock at the door woke me. Looking through the peephole, I saw it was Shep. I was dressed only in a t-shirt and underwear, but whatever. The guy had seen me visiting the “Eiffel Tower,” so he’d probably get over seeing me in my underwear.
Opening the door, I stood to the side. “Hey.”
His eyes dropped to my legs, then quickly back to my face. “I brought you some stuff, and also a phone. Having to come down here like your bellboy is annoying.”
Leaving the door hanging open, I moved back into the room. “Thank you. I appreciate it.”
Kill ’em with kindness. I’d like to say that my grandma had always said that, but she hadn’t. She’d smoked so much, she sounded like a chainsaw, and the only thing she’d ever said to me when she was alive was, “Get out of the fucking way. I can’t see my shows!”
Shep’s eyes snagged on my face, and I felt like he was trying to drink in my features. He lingered in the doorway, and I quickly found my pants and dragged them on so he’d stop being weird.
“I know you just said you don’t want to be my bellboy, but I was wondering if I could ask a favor. Just a little one.” He raised a single eyebrow, but didn’t shoot me down immediately. “I need to open a bank account, and I don’t feel right carrying around that much money by myself. Could you, maybe, take me to the bank please?”
His jaw tensed. “How do you get to what, twenty-one? Twenty-two? And you still don’t have a bank account?”
I shook my head. I didn’t want to explain how I’d relied on Tom for money. How he used to give me an “allowance.” Before that, I’d simply had no money, so who needed a bank account? It was all so embarrassing now; I didn’t want to admit it out loud.
“I just don’t. Don’t worry about it. I’ll go myself.” I didn’t need him. I didn’t need anyone. I’d stuff it down my bra or something. It would be fine. I turned away from him and moved toward the only window. It overlooked a brick wall, but I’d pretend there was something interesting out there until he left.
A hand on my arm had me spinning back toward him. “Don’t turn away from me and pout. Just tell me I hurt your feelings. Use your words, because no one will stop to try and figure out what you want. Not in this life.” He was so close that I could see the flecks of gold in his brown eyes. “I’ll take you. You’re right to be worried about carrying around that much cash. My number is programmed in that phone. It’s got a pay-as-you-go sim in it, but you can switch it out at the end, if you want a clean break.”
I could buy a hundred phones at the end, if I wanted. My current phone was several models below this, so it was already an upgrade.
“Thanks. Again,” I whispered, because he hadn’t stepped back. His warmth was seeping into my chest, and I couldn’t drag my eyes away from his face.
Rising up on my toes, I brushed my lips across his. It was stupid. My brain screamed that I was being an idiot, but I couldn’t help it. Maybe it was some kind of savior worship. Maybe it was purely attraction, but when he kissed me back, I melted into it.
I just wanted this moment of no expectations. His lips were soft and full, and his hands hovered just above my cheeks, like touching me would make this something more. We didn’t touch anywhere else but our lips, and he was kissing me like wanted to catalog every moment.
I was helpless to resist. He was strong and safe. He made me feel safe. It didn’t even matter that trying to find safety in men was the reason I was in this situation to begin with.
I wanted to wrap myself around him, like poison ivy curling around a solid oak. The problem was eventually I would cling to him too hard, dragging him down with me, poisoning everything I’d worked for and everyone who’d helped me in the process.
“Charlotte,” he breathed, stepping back when I couldn’t. He straightened to his full height, and I watched the emotions run across his face. Desire. Guilt. Need. Anger. Like an old-fashioned silent film, he was unable to shield his emotions from me as they played over his features.
He took a shuddering inhale, and the walls seemed to immediately snap back down on everything. A blank expression looked back at me, and I mourned the loss of the Shep who had kissed me. Because I knew that he’d never let himself get into this position again. I’d have this small taste and no more.
He turned toward the door and left silently, the soft snick of the lock feeling more devastating than it should.
EIGHTEEN
KNIGHT
“Maybe we should add bagpipes to the next album,” I told Hero quietly, but he just raised an eyebrow at me. “It worked for AC/DC.”
We were at the Musical Instrument Museum as just us. Not as masked band members. Not as part of the tour. Just because we wanted to go. Well, Hero and I had wanted to go. Poet and Royal were at a baseball game, probably dying in the heat. I didn’t like sports much, but I’d heard amazing things about this place, so I’d wanted to check it out.
Hero was playing the theremin, and I could already see him trying to figure out how to shoehorn it into the current setlist. We both loved experimenting with new sounds.
“We aren’t AC/DC,” he replied. “I don’t look good in schoolboy shorts.”
We’d been at this museum for hours, and I was pretty sure I could still spend a few more. We had to write a new album, and this place was basically a mecca of inspiration. My phone was filled with notes and sound clips that I’d take back to the others. We were established enough that we could be more experimental now, and the fans would come along for the ride.
I felt people’s eyes lingering, and I gritted my teeth. We both had baseball caps pulled low over our faces. Even though I wasn’t worried about being recognized as the rhythm guitarist of The Daymakers, none of us were without our own form of fame. Or perhaps infamy would be a better term.
Hero was the son of two of the most selfish socialites ever to be given a trust fund. His grandfather had run a lucrative meat-packing business, and had wanted to hand it over to his only son. Unfortunately, the son hated anything that even looked like responsibility. He’d knocked up the third daughter of a cosmetic company giant while on holiday in Belize. They’d been forced to get married, then pawned Hero off onto a grandfather who’d hated what he symbolized. Failure.
He’d shipped Hero off to boarding school, which was where I’d met him. Where we’d all met, except Shep. Hero’s grandfather had started to groom him to take over the business, but had died before he reached twelve. So Hero’s dad still got the business, but quickly sold it and spent every waking moment snorting drugs and throwing parties. Not like the parties my parents had thrown—far more detrimental to both their health, and Hero’s.
And for me to think it was bad, you know it was seriously fucked. My upbringing wasn’t sunshine and roses, but it wasn’t filled with neglect either.
It had been a big scandal for years, and even now, the tabloids liked to put him in articles about the world’s most attractive nepo babies. Occasionally, someone recognized him from this magazine or that. But we generally tried to stay out of the public eye, which was way easier when you spent every night in a mask.
We moved through the exhibits, up to the modern music displays. There was one there for Royal’s dad’s band, which was probably why Royal hadn’t wanted to come. Royal hated his dad, though not enough to give up music.
I paused, watching the small movie of his dad performing. You couldn’t deny genetics. Royal looked like his dad and moved like his dad—hell, he even sounded like his dad. Fortunately, he wasn’t a cunt like his dad. Not often, anyway. The guy had been an A-grade selfish prick back when Royal was younger. He’d mellowed a bit now he’d retired from the music scene, but the damage was done.
I looked over at Hero. “Should we set it on fire?” I murmured from the side of my mouth, and he chuckled.
“Tempting.”
We stayed another couple of hours at the museum, before catching a rideshare back to the hotel. I wondered what Charlotte was doing. I’d had dreams about her every night since spit-roasting her with Royal. I wanted to be inside her more than anything—if it was half as good as her mouth, I was in for a treat.
“Are you and Poe going to fuck around with Lottie?” I asked Hero lightly as we sat in the back of the rideshare, keeping my voice down, though the guy in the front was blasting French hip-hop so loudly, it was a wonder he could hear anything.
Hero shrugged. “We talked about it. We’re both open to the idea. Me and Poe aren’t exclusive or anything.”
Yeah, maybe, but there was no doubt in my mind that they fucking loved each other. More than they loved us, anyway.
“Doesn’t mean you’re not interested in this girl,” I needled. I wanted to know where he really stood, and Hero was a hard one to pin down.
He slid his eyes toward me, flicking them from me to the driver, before sighing. “I am. She’s interesting. Different…”
“Hot as fuck?”
He snorted. “Exactly. The arrangement doesn’t sit right with me, though.” He shrugged again. “It feels like exploitation.”
I heard what he was saying, but I wasn’t sure which of us was being exploited. It had been her idea; we definitely hadn’t manipulated her into it. Hell, if anything, Shep had tried to manipulate her out of it.
Why would I resist accepting the thing she was so freely offering? Or, not so freely I guess, given she was being paid an insane amount of money to fuck us. I’d had my lawyers look the contract over too, and the Cliffsnotes version was insane. Six figures for silence was a lot of money.
I spread my thighs wider, letting my head fall back against the headrest. “Yeah, but that’s because you’re thinking of her as some poor, unfortunate soul. She wanted this. She searched it out. She put forward the idea. You’re infantilizing her just because she’s a woman. If she were a man, and we were an all-girl group, would you still feel the same?”
“Infantilizing is a big word for you. Was it the word of the day on that phone app?” Hero teased, but he pointedly didn’t answer my question. He looked out the window, and I’d known him long enough to know he was probably turning the question over in his brain. He was the quietest of us all, the being seen and not heard mantra still heavily ingrained from when he was a kid.
The rideshare tore into the drop zone of the hotel, and I pulled my cap down as low as I could without being conspicuous. There were The Daymakers fans loitering around, but none really paid attention to the two dudes pulling up in a Toyota Corolla. People expected black SUVs and super tinted windows.
We made it to our room without a hitch, and I sent a picture of Hero playing the harp to the group chat. Poe sent one back of Royal with a beer in his hand, and some pretty girl trying to chat him up.
The fucker couldn’t go two steps without someone trying to climb on his dick. Didn’t matter if he was the masked singer or the damn golden boy. He was just stupidly attractive, meaning women—and men—flocked to him like moths to a flame.
Tell him to keep it in his pants.
Poet
Pretty sure she might just hump his leg anyway.
I laughed and threw my phone down. Walking to the nightstand, I grabbed my mask.
Hero watched me, his face impassive. “You’re going to visit her?”
His tone was disapproving, and I narrowed my eyes at him. I didn’t need his judgment. “Yes. You’re welcome to come and make sure she wants it as much as I do, though I’d like to think you have more faith in me than to believe I’d have sex with anyone if it wasn’t one hundred percent consensual. She’ll be a fucking joyful participant, and I promise to make her come at least twice before I even fuck her.”
He blew out a breath, displacing his fringe, and I could see the temptation on his face. Finally, he shook his head. “Nah, not without Poet.”
I rolled my eyes at him, flipping him off as I left. Yeah, sure, they “weren’t exclusive.” They were so much a couple, it was almost sickening. They spooned, for goodness’ sake. You didn’t spoon with a person overnight if you didn’t have feelings for them. You hit it and quit it, just moved on to the next piece of ass who wanted a ride on your disco stick.
Taking the elevator down, I told the rest of the guys in the group chat, just in case she went full Carrie and murdered me in the bathtub to sell my organs. Or in case they wanted to join me later. That was something Shep had drilled into us, right back when we’d been angry teens. Always take someone with you; you’re safer in pairs.
Especially Poet, though he hated the thought of being weaker than us. Still, we’d almost lost him once, and no one was willing to take that chance again. Though the threats were no longer getting our ass kicked by bullies or thugs on the boardwalk, and more like some girl stealing condoms or trying to unmask us.
Which meant I’d sometimes had to stand outside the dressing room while Royal nailed one or more groupies. It was also why we were so comfortable sharing, because we’d all had to get real comfortable with fucking in front of each other real quick.
Knocking on the door to Lottie’s room, I put my finger over the peephole. I wasn’t going to be responsible for her losing her money.
“Who is it?” she called through the door.
I looked left and right, leaning closer to the door so I didn’t have to yell my name so loud. I already missed being on the tour bus, which was unusual. If we didn’t have to sneak around with masks and bullshit, this would be much easier.
Maybe we should abandon the need for masks and just let her see our faces. The NDA would still hold, and I could watch her face as she came on my tongue.
A moment later, she flipped open the door, the silk mask from Royal over her eyes. It annoyed me more than it should. She was in another little skirt, this one tight and black, with a band tee tucked into the front.
Stepping into the room, I closed the door and pulled my own balaclava on. “Take yours off. I want to see your pretty face as I fuck you, Lottie.”
She removed the silk mask, and I could see her smile. “What, no small talk? I’m shocked, Knight. Woo a girl first.”
I knew she was teasing me, but it did make me feel a little guilty. Watching her ass as she moved into her hotel room, I noticed she had paperwork spread out on her bed.
I sat in the armchair by the window. “What’s that?”
She grinned, and it hit me in the chest like a thunderbolt. “Bank account details. Shep took me to get a bank account and deposit my first paycheck.”
I tried not to think about the fact she was getting paid to have sex with me, not because she wanted it. Though, I didn’t think she’d been faking the orgasms we’d given her the other night.
Kicking off my shoes, I propped my feet on her bed. “You know, it’s an unwritten rule that you have to blow your first paycheck on frivolous things. I bought a bike and way too much cocaine.”
She frowned hard. “You guys do drugs?”
I mean, this was rock and roll. Everyone did drugs. Well… “Not anymore. One of our support acts died a few years ago in a freak accident. Walked out in front of a car, right in front of his heavily pregnant girlfriend. Died right there on the scene. It shook us, and we all got clean. Life is so fucking short—you could lose it in a blink of an eye, you know? I don’t want to spend it in a numb haze.”
That shit had fucked us all up at the time. Even now, I still thought about Jackson Harper and his girlfriend. She’d had the baby, I knew that, but then she’d kind of disappeared off the face of the planet.
Charlotte chewed her full lower lip, making me want to do it too. But she was right. She deserved conversation before sex, and maybe I also wanted to know her a little.
“I don’t know. I’ve never had money before. I’ll probably save it.”
I scoffed. “Boring. Come on, Lottie. There has to be something you want to buy. Something you’ve always wanted, but it seemed too frivolous? Or something you want to try? Collect? A dream? An interest? Something!” Her cheeks flushed. Oh, there was something. “Okay, spill.”
“I’d like to make book nooks.”
I blinked. “What?”
She went even pinker, and I wanted to bend her over and spank her until her ass went that same pretty shade of pink. It might be my favorite color now. I dragged my thoughts back to what she was saying.
“It’s stupid.” She slid her eyes away from me, and something clenched in my chest.
“It’s not stupid. Show me.”
She pulled out her phone, bringing up a shopping website. I mentally added buying her a tablet onto my to-do list, because how could you see anything on this thing?
Poet kept saying I needed glasses, but those weren’t very punk rock.
I moved over to the bed and sat beside her, looking at the different kits. Fairyland ones, library ones, ones like little laneways. There were nooks themed to particular book series, like Sherlock Holmes, and ones that were just little glimpses into everyday life. I had to admit, they were kind of cute.
