And finally, he couldn’t take it anymore.
“Jackson, can I talk to you for a minute?” he asked.
“Kinda busy here,” Jackson said, without turning his gaze from Miranda.
“It’s important.” Kane stood up and waited for Jackson to follow. “We’ll be back in one minute, Stevens. Promise.” He pulled Jackson across the deck to the other side of the pool, where the Marco Polo game had morphed into netless water volleyball. “What are you doing?” he hissed.
“Reeling in the catch of the day,” Jackson leered. “You were right, she’s as spicy as they come.”
Kane winced. This had to be handled delicately—but it had to be handled. “But all that stuff about Tolstoy, politics—where did you …?”
“You gotta play to the audience,” Jackson explained. “Let them think you’re on the same wavelength, and then—” He shook his head. “You think all this hippie crap is my idea? My girlfriend’s all peace, love, happiness, bullshit—but if it keeps her happy to dress me like granola boy, well, you do what you gotta do, am I right?”
“Your … girlfriend?” Kane wondered why his brain was moving so much more slowly than usual.
“Yeah, she’s getting in on Monday. But till then, I figure I can have a little fun, and Miranda’s perfect—or she will be, once she loosens up a little.”
“Look, Jackson, I know I said she was your type, but I really don’t think—”
“I owe you one,” Jackson said, clapping Kane on the back. “But now, how about you get out of here and leave us to it.”
Kane was stuck. He couldn’t afford to alienate Jackson—but he couldn’t just let Miranda walk into the lion’s den wearing a necklace of raw meat.
You don’t owe anything to anyone, he reminded himself.
Words to live by—words he always had lived by—but that didn’t make them true.
The Tonky Honk was half bar, half coffeehouse, and all hipster. The nexus of the Vegas indie rock scene—at least, according to Starla, a self-described expert—it was packed, even in the middle of the afternoon, with world-weary aspiring poets sipping anise and off-duty house bands knocking back shots. Papers lined with song lyrics and guitar chords lined the walls, a floor-to-ceiling tribute to a million impossible dreams. And, on a small stage in a dark recess of the bar, a four-piece band played interminable songs about flat tires and worn-out toothbrushes, each bleeding into the next in a tedious litany of trivial torments. According to Starla, the Tonky Honk was a Vegas institution, occasionally attracting legends like Tony Bennett for a post-concert drink. (Reluctant to admit she didn’t know who that was, Beth just ooh’d and aah’d along with the rest of them.)
Beth slumped in the corner of a back booth sipping a weak espresso while the guys drowned their sorrows in a seemingly bottomless bottle of whiskey. Starla, of course, matched them drink for drink.
She was regaling them with backstage stories about a bunch of bands Beth had never heard of, all of whom had apparently passed through Vegas—and through Starla—in the past year. Fish, Hale, and Reed couldn’t get enough of it.
“So, what kind of stuff do you listen to?” Starla suddenly asked Beth.
She flushed, and tucked a lock of blond hair behind her ear. “I, uh, you know. Whatever.” She wasn’t about to say the words “Tori Amos” or “Sarah McLachlan” in a place like this.
Reed nudged her. “You know you love all those weepy girls,” he told her. “Dar Williams. Ani DiFranco. And, of course—”
“Let me guess,” Starla said. “Tori Amos.”
Beth’s face turned bright red as everyone else at the table burst into laughter. She didn’t even get what was so funny—or so lame—about her taste, but that was probably part of the problem. “That’s not all I like,” she said defensively. She brushed some stray curls out of Reed’s face. “You know I love your stuff.”
Reed raised his glass in a drunken toast. “To Beth, our one and only fan!” He clinked her glass loudly, his whiskey splashing over the side and spattering into her cup.
Beth’s first impulse was to comfort him; Starla’s, apparently, was to ridicule. “Is he always such a whiny baby?” she asked Beth, as if to forge some kind of sisterhood. Beth just shrugged and looked away. “You know what you need?” Starla asked.
Reed, Hale, and Fish exchanged a glance, and then chorused, “Another drink!”
“Not quite.” Starla hopped up from the table. “Be right back.” She jogged toward the bar and began an animated conversation with the bartender. The boys watched, though Beth was unsure whether they were wondering about her plan or admiring the way she filled out her jeans.
Reed’s hand was resting on Beth’s inner thigh, and the warm pressure on her leg should have been comforting: He was with her, and that’s all that mattered. But his mind was somewhere else.
“It’s all set,” Starla said, bounding back to the table. “The guys are a little sensitive about other people touching their instruments, but they’ve got no problem with Reed doing it.”
“With Reed doing what?” Beth asked.
“Jamming with them,” Starla explained, as if it had been obvious.
“You crazy?” Reed asked.
“Do a couple songs,” she urged him. “Get back on the horse. They’ll play anything you want—they know no one’s listening. Hey!” she turned to Beth. “Why don’t you go too?”
“Uh … what?” Beth cringed under Starla’s gaze, feeling herself slide down a bit in the seat and wishing she could go all the way, right under the table.
“A duet!” Starla exclaimed. “It would be great. Like karaoke, right?”
Beth winced at the word, but the guys burst into laughter.
“Awesome!” Fish said, apparently—and unusually—not too stoned to follow along with the conversation. “Go for it.”
“Yeah, man, you and your girlfriend, rocking out,” Hale agreed. “That’s hot.”
Hale thought everything was hot.
Reed turned to her, a questioning look on his face. “It could be …”
“No.” The word slipped out before she had a chance to think; but really, it was the only possible option. Beth didn’t sing in public. She didn’t even sing in the shower. Not that she had a terrible voice—but the thought of anyone hearing her sing, much less watching her stand up on a stage, under the spotlight, staring at her, judging her, laughing at her—even imagining it made her want to throw up. “I can’t.”
“Sure you can,” Reed encouraged her. He stood up and tugged at her arm. “It’ll be fun.” She could tell by his glazed look and careful enunciation that he was drunk. Otherwise, she was sure, he would never push the issue. He should, by now, know her well enough to understand why going up on that stage would be a walking nightmare for her. “It’ll be fun. You and me. C’mon.”
“I can’t sing,” she protested, shaking him off.
“Anyone can sing!” He grabbed her again, pulling her out of the seat. She stumbled into his arms.
“No!” She shook him off. “I can’t!”
“Let it go, Reed,” Starla said, touching his shoulder. “She doesn’t want to.” She turned toward Beth and apologized, but Beth barely heard—she was too busy wondering why a single word from Starla had been enough to get him to stop. And wondering whether Beth had really wanted him to stop. Maybe if he’d kept pushing, she would have given in and followed him up to the stage. And maybe that would have been for the best. “Come on,” Starla said, guiding him away from the table. “I’ll go with you.”
Of course she would.
Reed took the stage and, giving a few quiet instructions to the band, leaned into the mic and began to sing. Beth expected him to do the same number the Blind Monkeys had performed that afternoon, but instead, the band launched into a Rolling Stones cover. “When I’m driving in my car,” Reed sang, “and that man comes on the radio …”
Beth drew in a sharp breath. It was the perfect song for him—his voice, scratchy and low, m
assaged the words, rising and falling with the melody, sometimes straying off the beat, forging ahead and then falling behind. She closed her eyes, letting his voice surround, drawing it inside her. He stumbled over the words and as the music swept past him, a rich, deep, female voice took over, picking up where he’d left off and carrying the song until Reed could join back in.
Beth opened her eyes and there they were, hunched over the microphone together, voices melding together, faces beaming, Starla’s dreads whipping through the air as she flung her head back and forth, his curls flying, their hands both gripping the mic stand, nearly touching, their bodies dancing them toward each other, then away, then back again, ever closer to embrace.
“I can’t get no, satisfaction,” they howled, and Beth looked away, suddenly feeling like she was the interloper, catching the two of them in an intensely private moment, invading a closed-off world. “’Cause I try, and I try, and I try, and I tryyyyyyyy …”
Reed would never cheat on her, but nothing he could do with Starla behind her back would be as raw and sensual as what he was doing right now, onstage, in front of all these people, letting himself go and charging through the music, stomping with the beat, losing control, with her. Beth and Reed were never that free with each other, that close, swept away, because Beth couldn’t afford to lose control. She always had to keep a piece of herself—the most important piece—locked away.
But that’s just an excuse, Beth thought, placing her mug carefully on the table and standing up. Fish and Hale, mesmerized, didn’t even notice. Her reluctance—her inability—to get up on that stage didn’t have anything to do with keeping secrets. She had to admit it to herself, as she slipped quietly away from the table, moving toward the exit, knowing she wouldn’t be missed. She wasn’t holding herself back for the sake of caution or self-protection.
It was just fear.
“So I have to ask—what’s with the tie-dye?” Miranda didn’t even hesitate to say it. For some reason, nervous paranoia had yet to set in. Maybe because she was on vacation, in a strange place with a strange guy, with no baggage and no expectations for the future, nothing to risk and nothing to lose—or maybe it was just Jackson. She felt comfortable with him, free to speak her mind. It wasn’t like they’d settled into some cozy conversational groove, pretending they’d known each other forever; it was more that there seemed no danger that she could say the wrong thing. She could somehow tell that he was enjoying everything that popped out of her mouth. The feeling was mutual.
He was fascinating, funny, and—once you got past the wispy goatee and overgrown hair—adorable.
“You know Berkeley.” He shrugged. “It’s illegal there not to wear some kind of tie-dye or peace sign on at least one part of your body.”
In fact, she didn’t know Berkeley—pretty much didn’t know anywhere beyond the claustrophobic confines of Grace, CA. Which was why she couldn’t believe that this guy, this college guy, was wasting his time on her.
“Hate to mention this to you, but you’re not in Berkeley anymore,” she pointed out.
If this had been Kane she was talking to, he would have immediately wondered whether that was a veiled invitation to take his shirt off. And then he promptly would have obliged.
But it wasn’t Kane—after hanging out for a few minutes he’d obviously decided he had something better to do. Jackson just plucked at the edge of the multicolored shirt. “Yeah, but it’s all I’ve got,” he said without a hint of self-consciousness. “I’m just not that into clothes. Or appearances, you know?”
Maybe that was why he was still talking to her, Miranda concluded, despite the fact that she was wearing a bikini that exposed more of her flab and cellulite than she’d ever allowed anyone to see. (She had intended to cover up before Kane and his friend arrived, determined not to let him see the humiliating bulges and sags, but—unwilling as ever to accommodate her hopes—he’d arrived early.)
“So what are you into?” she pressed. “Other than Tolstoy and world peace, of course.”
“What am I into?” Jackson tipped his head back to catch the fading light of the afternoon sun. “The taste of cold beer at a baseball game, when the score is tied and your team has one man on base and two outs,” he said. “Discovering a new band, just after they’ve found their sound, but before they sign away their souls to the radio gods. Poems that make no fucking sense but still manage to blow your mind. And”—he gave her a mischievous smile—“good conversation with pretty girls.”
Miranda felt the heat rising to her cheeks. “In that case, what are you doing here?” she joked.
He didn’t laugh. “Having an amazing afternoon,” he told her, with a totally straight face.
Miranda didn’t know what to make of it. A cute, smart, older guy, giving her two compliments in a row as if it was nothing? Guys her age didn’t talk like that—at least, not to her.
So, instead of responding, she just laughed nervously and turned toward the pool. “The water looks so tempting when you can’t go in, doesn’t it?” she asked. “Even though you know it’s just going to be cold and over-chlorinated, from here it looks so insanely refreshing, like we’re in some kind of beer commercial.”
“Who says we can’t go in?” Jackson asked, appearing not to care that she’d randomly changed the subject.
“Well, I guess I could,” Miranda allowed, though she had no intention of doing anything of the sort. “But I think you’ve got a small problem.”
“And that would be?”
“Shirt? Jeans? Shoes? Unless you’re going to dive in like this, or—” She stopped, realizing that she didn’t know this guy well enough to suggest a skinny-dip, even as a joke. “I’d say swimming is out.”
“You don’t think I’d jump in with my clothes on?” Jackson asked.
“Now that, I’d love to see,” Miranda said, laughing. The only people left at the pool were a few little kids and their nervous mothers, who she guessed wouldn’t take too kindly to some random college student throwing himself in fully clothed. (Although this was Vegas—surely it wouldn’t be the first time.)
“What do I get?” Jackson sat up and leaned forward. Their knees were almost touching.
“Get for what?”
“For jumping in the pool and soaking myself, just for your amusement,” he explained, staring at her so intensely, she had to force herself not to look away.
“I don’t know. A dollar?”
“How about you go out with me tonight?” he suggested, his grin stretching nearly to his ears.
“I barely know you,” Miranda said, as her brain furiously tried to process the request. He wanted to go out? With her? Like, on a date? Would it be a date? What else could it be? “For all I know, you’re some psychotic ax murderer trolling cheap hotels looking for redheads to chop up for your salad. I watch CSI.”
“I don’t think your buddy Kane would have introduced you to an ax murderer,” Jackson pointed out. “And I’ve never seen CSI, but I can assure you that I’m a vegetarian. Only thing in my salad is lettuce and tofu.”
She was supposed to meet up with Harper for the night—although, Miranda reminded herself, Harper had ditched her that morning and probably never looked back. And she would be the first person to urge Miranda to go on a date. She always pushed Miranda toward every guy who crossed her path—every guy, that is, except Kane. The ultimate lost cause.
Miranda had to admit that she’d been hoping to spend the night hanging out with him—along with Harper and Adam, of course, but that was a coupling-off waiting to happen and, if it did, she’d be left alone with Kane. In a place where, according to him, anything could happen.
Anything like what? she asked herself. What the hell am I waiting for? Kane had, several months before, finally seen her as something more than boring Miranda, just one of the guys. He’d taken her out, he’d kissed her—and that had been the end of it. The moment she’d spent all those years dreaming of had come, and then gone, almost as quickly. So what did s
he think was going to happen next? That one day, he would just wake up and realize what he’d been missing?
In less than eight hours, she would be eighteen years old. Did she really want to kick off another year of her life sitting in a corner, waiting for Kane to notice her?
Hadn’t she had enough?
“Okay,” she said finally. “If you actually jump in that pool, then yes, I’ll go out with you tonight.”
With a holler, he jumped up and raced toward the pool. Miranda felt a warm tingling spread through her body at the thought that this guy was really going to go through with it, just to get a date with her. He stood on the edge and turned to face her, flashing her a peace sign.
“You won’t be sorry!” he shouted, then spun around and, with an enormous splash, did a perfect belly flop into the deep end.
She was only sorry she’d hesitated.
The balcony was too high up for Kane to hear what was going on.
Still, he managed to get the general idea.
Bad enough that their conversation stretched on for more than an hour. Worse yet that, after the lame pool stunt, Miranda rushed to the edge holding a towel, then wrapped it around him, rubbing his back for warmth.
The final blow: Jackson ditched the towel and, still dripping, took Miranda’s hand. She let him, and they walked off together.
Kane had tried to call her cell, hoping to whisper a warning in her ear, but she wasn’t answering. Too engrossed, apparently, by Jackson’s pathetic sideshow. How could she fall for his act? She was too sharp for that, too guarded. Maybe, Kane thought, she was just playing Jackson, waiting for the right moment to make her move.
But Kane was forced to admit it was unlikely. Miranda might have been sharp when it came to calculus homework or Trivial Pursuit, but when it came to guys, she was clueless. He knew that firsthand.
Kane tightened his grip on the balcony railing, choosing not to wonder why he cared, or why it sickened him to see that slimeball holding Miranda’s hand. This wasn’t jealousy, and it certainly wasn’t self-sacrifice—he wasn’t planning to risk his own standing with Jackson to protect Miranda from her own mistakes.