Copyright © 2014 Samantha Towle
All rights reserved.
Cover Designer: Najla Qamber Designs
Editor and Interior Designer: Jovana Shirley, Unforeseen Editing, www.unforeseenediting.com
No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, or by any information storage and retrieval system without the written permission of the author, except for the use of brief quotations in a book review.
This book is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents either are products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, events, or locales is entirely coincidental.
Visit my website at www.samanthatowle.co.uk
Other Contemporary Novels
by Samantha Towle
Trouble
The Storm Series
THE MIGHTY STORM
WETHERING THE STORM
Paranormal Romances
by Samantha Towle
The Bringer
The Alexandra Jones Series
FIRST BITTEN
ORIGINAL SIN
For Mally Towle.
Heaven’s got a plan for you.
Forever in our hearts.
Prologue
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Chapter 7
Chapter 8
Chapter 9
Chapter 10
Chapter 11
Chapter 12
Chapter 13
Chapter 14
Chapter 15
Chapter 16
Chapter 17
Chapter 18
Chapter 19
Chapter 20
Chapter 21
Chapter 22
Chapter 23
Chapter 24
Chapter 25
Chapter 26
Chapter 27
Chapter 28
Chapter 29
Chapter 30
Chapter 31
Chapter 32
Chapter 33
Ten Months Ago—Backstage, Madison Square Garden, New York City
“Dex! Chad! Cale! Sonny! Where the hell are you?” I call out as I wander down the empty hallway, my voice echoing back at me.
I’ve been wandering around—actually, where in the hell am I? I’m somewhere backstage. It’s like a maze back here. I think I might be a bit lost.
Shrugging to myself, I lift the half-empty champagne bottle I snagged earlier to my lips and take a drink.
I also might be a tad drunk.
But I’m celebrating.
My band, Vintage, just opened for The Mighty Storm in Madison Square Garden! That’s where I am now, lost in this place. My band won a radio contest, and the prize was to be The Mighty Storm’s opening act. This was a huge thing for us! I’m not ashamed to admit that I nearly peed my pants the moment I found out we won the competition.
So, now, I’m celebrating—alone. I can’t seem to locate a single one of my band members or my boyfriend. In the excitement and crowd of people, I managed to lose them when we went offstage. I mean, seriously, I’d think my boyfriend or brother would have at least waited for me.
I bet Chad is getting shitfaced with Sonny and Cale, and Dex is probably hooking up and getting his rocks off as I speak.
I cup my hands around my mouth. “Dex, I know you’re probably on third base with a hot piece of ass, but come on! We just opened for The Mighty Storm! The. Mighty. Effing. Storm!” I punctuate the words, still unable to believe it.
I take another swig of champagne, stumbling in my heels. I steady myself on the wall with my hand before I resume walking.
“Dex, I want to celebrate with my big brother! Can’t you just leave your sexcapades until later…please?”
Dex is lead guitarist in our band, and he’s a total whore. When I say whore, I mean, he likes to whore around with men.
I love my brother more than anyone else in the world. I’m lucky to have him. He takes care of me, and I do the same for him. We’re a team, the best team.
Turning a corner, I spy a door off to my right. It looks like it could be a janitor’s closet.
Dex has a thing for having sex in closets. Hall, coat, janitor’s—any closet really will do. He’s not fussy.
“I bet you’re in here!” I sing. “Well, zip up your pants, bro, ’cause I’m coming in!” The champagne bottle clangs against the door as I grab the handle. “Oops.” I giggle.
I yank open the door, but the closet is empty. Just mops and buckets. No Dex. On a sigh, I close the door.
I’m never going to find anyone at this rate. I haven’t seen another person in quite a while. This is starting to get eerie, like bad-horror-movie eerie. It’s all very Freddy Krueger back here. Just endless hallways.
Resigned to my potential death by a fictional serial killer, I carry on down the hall, and I take a left at the end, hoping for some sign of human life. I clamp a hand over my mouth, stifling a giggle, when I see a couple of people going at it a little farther on. The lighting is bad, so I can’t see much, not that I want to, but from the sounds of things, it seems like they’re having a really good time.
Lucky bastards.
I’m about to turn and leave the sexy-time couple to it when one of them speaks.
“That’s it, baby. Take it all. You know you love my big fucking cock.”
My heart slams into my rib cage. The floor drops out from beneath me.
Chad.
No. It can’t be.
I’m moving toward them before I realize it. Then, he turns his head and—
Chad.
God, no.
I’m going to throw up.
I freeze to the spot the instant his eyes meet mine. I watch in abstract horror as the shock of my presence reverberates over his face. We stay locked in a suspension of time where neither of us does or says anything.
Then, it breaks, and Chad kicks into movement. He pushes away from the person he was screwing, yanks his pants up, and tries to fasten them before he advances toward me.
And that’s when I see exactly whom my boyfriend was screwing. The person turns, and our gazes meet.
I feel like I’ve been punched in the face. Hard.
I can’t breathe.
I stand there, my world shattering around me for the second time in my life. I’m helpless to do anything as I stare into the contrite eyes of my brother.
Two Weeks Ago—Hospital Waiting Room, Cedars-Sinai Medical Center, LA
Seeing Jake cry is not something I ever thought I would witness—let alone, be the one to hold him while he cried.
He never broke apart in front of me when Jonny died, and I didn’t with him either. None of us did.
I know why this has broken him. It’s Tru, the woman he’s loved his whole life. The fact it’s broken him as badly as it has is scaring the absolute shit out of me.
Jake isn’t as strong as he likes to make out he is. I get that. In the past, he relied on coke to get him through bad times. I could never berate him for it because we all have our ways of coping. I had—have mine, and he had his.
But he’s clean now. Tru is his everything. And if she goes, then I’m worried what will—
“What if she dies?”
The sound of Jake’s broken voice turns my head to him.
I look him in the eye before I attempt to say anything. And that’s when I see it—the look.
Fuck no.
I’ve seen that look only once before—moments before I lost everything that mattered to me.
It’s there in Jake’s eyes. A l
ook of fear and pain and desperation and confusion are all banded together, creating a darkness so crippling that the person feeling it can’t see anything beyond it. The pain is so bad that the person gives himself over to it. And that’s when a person will do things that he wouldn’t normally do.
Irrational, desperate, terrible life-altering things.
That’s the look that Jake has in his eyes right now.
Fear kicks me hard in the gut. I haven’t felt a fear like this since that night.
I don’t look away from him. I stare hard into his eyes because I need him to hear me right now. “Tru’s a fighter, Jake. She kicks my ass daily. She’s going nowhere.”
“But what if…”
No, Jake. Listen. Hear me.
I shake my head, not breaking eye contact for one second. I can’t lose him right now. “Don’t what-if. Don’t do that to yourself.”
His eyes fill with tears, seeping from the blackness that’s owning him right now.
“I don’t know what to do”—his voice breaks—“what to think, what to say.” He buries his face in his hands.
Staring at him as his body shakes from grief, I wish on everything to take this away for him, to fix this.
The day we lost Jonny, it was bad…horrendous. Nothing can ever prepare a person for losing someone that you need above all others. Tru is that person for Jake.
Some people have the strength in them to carry on when they lose that one person they love most above all others. I did. I found my way to carry on.
Some don’t. And those are the people who have that despairing, dark look in their eyes that Jake has right now.
I lost someone I loved to that darkness. I won’t lose Jake the same way.
I take a deep breath and say, “Don’t think of the bad, Jake. Think of the good. Think of the moment you get to hold your boy in your arms. Think of the moment you get to put that ring on Tru’s finger when she finally sees stupid and marries your sorry ass. Think of all the amazing fucking things the three of you are gonna do together. And while you’re thinking of all that great stuff, I’ll pray to the big man upstairs. I’ll promise to make some serious lifestyle changes in exchange for you to have all that, to have what you were always meant to have.”
I can’t remember the last time I was in a church, not that the hospital chapel is actually a church-church. I take a seat on the pew up front. The place is empty. Thank fuck. I don’t want an audience while I’m here.
I lean forward, resting my forearms on my thighs, and clasp my hands together.
“Okay,” I start. “I don’t pray, like, ever, which you know. I’m not exactly what you would call religious, another thing you know, but I made a promise, and I have to see that promise through—hence, why I’m here, talking to you.” I take a deep breath. “There’s a girl in this hospital—Tru Bennett. You need to save her. Aside from the fact that she’s amazing, by saving her, you’ll be saving someone else. If Tru dies, Jake won’t survive. I saw it in his eyes earlier…the same look as my…”
Emotions I haven’t felt in years claw to the surface. I scrub my hands over my face.
“Look, I know how this stuff works. I ask for something, and I give in return, right? You might realize what a bastard I am. I’m not great. I’m pretty fucking horrible to be honest. I treat people like shit—mainly women. I use them like inanimate objects made for me to stick my dick in. I haven’t killed anyone…but I wouldn’t put it past me to do that at some point in the future. I have a shit temper. I’m one motherfucking bastard of a man. Case in point, I can’t even manage not to curse while I’m talking to you.
“One less bastard on this planet would work for you, right? Cross one more off your shitlist. So, I’m saying, if you save Tru’s life, I’ll change mine. Completely. I’ll stop the fast living. No more fucking random women in inappropriate places, like when I screwed that nurse in the medical supplies closet after I visited with the sick kids. There’ll be no more married women. No threesomes or foursomes or orgies. I’ll even stop going to strip joints. I won’t look at women in a sexual way. Fuck, I’ll live the life of a goddamn monk if you save Tru. I swear, I will only have sex with a woman if she really means something to me.”
Did I actually just say that—out loud?
Christ.
I break out in a cold sweat at the thought. I wipe my brow and take a deep breath.
“I’m promising all this because I know Jake won’t survive losing Tru. I saw it in his eyes. He looked exactly the same as…well, I’m sure you know who I mean.”
Exhaling, I lean back in the pew.
“Jake loses Tru…we lose him…I can’t lose him. Jake and Den are all I’ve got left in the world. And you’ve got enough good people up there as it is. You’ve taken enough from us. You don’t need her. She’s needed here more…so I’m making this promise. You save Tru’s life, and I’ll completely change the way I live mine.” I lift my eyes to the ceiling. “What do you say?”
Present Day—Studio, TMS Records, LA
“Your vocal is off.”
Um, what?
The voice in my ears halts my singing. I tilt my head to the side, looking around the huge microphone perched in front of my face to see through the glass.
I stare at the face of the voice—Zane Fox, Vice President of TMS Records, the label my band is signed to.
Total hottie, if I were into that kind of thing, which I’m not.
I don’t like men. No, I’m not a lesbian.
I’m asexual. Celibate. Have been for the past ten months.
My history with men isn’t good.
All of the important men in my life, barring a few, have let me down—hugely. When it comes to relationships with men—well, let’s just say I’m a colossal failure.
Boyfriend One cheated on me with the only close female friend I ever had.
Boyfriend Two stole money from me.
Boyfriend Three was an aspiring singer, whom I found out was only dating me because he knew who my father was. I overheard him telling his friends. It was a sucker punch because I hate my father.
Boyfriend Four dumped me when I refused to have a threesome with him and his best friend. I kid you not.
Boyfriend Five “borrowed” my car. I still haven’t seen him—or my car—to this day.
Boyfriend Six—my longest relationship and with a guy I stupidly thought I might love—screwed my brother on the biggest night of my life. After I caught them in the act, I later found out, he’d actually been screwing my brother for the last month of the eight months we were together.
That one was the killer, the final nail in my sex coffin.
After that, I realized that I only ever seem to be attracted to men with issues. I’m sure any good psychologist would say that I’m drawn to this kind of man because of my father and the problems I have with him, being that he’s a completely crap dad.
Basically, he was the sperm donor who helped create me.
So, I stay clear of men. Seriously, the closest I get to a man nowadays is sharing a drink with my best friend, Cale.
In my past, I was always a relationship kind of girl—albeit, an unsuccessful one. Casual sex was something I never could do. I tie too many emotions to sex to be able to sleep with a guy and not see him again.
Taking relationships off the menu for me also removed the dessert menu, meaning no more sex for Lyla.
I’ve been totally okay with it—well, about ninety-five percent of the time.
Okay, if I’m being totally honest, it’s more like seventy-five and climbing with the help of ASBOF.
ASBOF—Asexual Battery-Operated Friend. The ultimate G-spot–finding, mind-blowing O-giving, can-do-everything-a-man-can-do, except cuddle and break my heart, vibrator.
ASBOF is my electronic way to a much-needed orgasm.
I use the term asexual for my vibrator, so I don’t think of it in a male sense in any way. I don’t want to think of men in a sexual way at all—well, except when trying to
reach the O with ASBOF. Of course I need some mental stimulation, so yes, on some occasions, I do visualize a faceless man, or maybe the hot guy who serves my coffee at Starbucks. But I promptly scrub the guy from my mind as soon as me and the O are done.
Anyway, back to the now…and the fact that I’ve been staring at Zane for a ridiculous amount of time, like he’s got three alien heads on his shoulders.
“I’m sorry. What did you say?” I’m hoping my hearing is off, and I misheard him.
Zane leans forward and speaks into the microphone again, enunciating each word as he says them, “I said, your vocal was off.”
I’m guessing he’s annoyed at having to repeat himself.
And, no, I didn’t mishear him.
My back stiffens.
My vocal was not off. No freaking way. It was so not off that it’s on the other side of the Not-Off Bridge.
I know my songs. I know this song inside out. There’s no way I was off.
Face pricking, I stare down at the Keds on my feet, trying to control my rush of anger.
I don’t do criticism well. It’s not my friend. And to hear this criticism from Zane stings badly because I respect his opinion.
I’m passionate about my work. I love my job. I love singing. I live for it. My band, this album—they’re everything to me. My whole world.
I spent years and years singing in shitty bars and clubs, chasing the dream. Finally, I hooked that dream and then spent months and months working on the album—seven days a week, day and night, barely sleeping. I was so desperate to perfect it that I thought I might have a nervous breakdown.
Now, to hear I’m flunking—from Zane of all people—is not good. He hasn’t had a problem with my vocals on any of the other tracks. And today of all days, I could do without hearing this.
I feel like I just got an F on my paper from my favorite teacher, and like a child, I want to have a colossal temper tantrum about it.
Not mature, but I don’t care.
Deep breaths, Lyla.
This is Zane Fox. He won’t take kindly to a creative temper tantrum from a small-time singer who just signed with his label.
Taking a calming breath, I force nicety into my voice. “Okay, so maybe my pitch was a teeny, tiny bit off”—I don’t mean that at all—“but—”