Flirting with Sin (2 page)

Everett Graves
.

The hissed name stroked his eardrums, and the insidious caress had his stomach clenching, threatening to rebel.

He stepped under the punishing, hot spray, but the steady, heavy drum of the water couldn’t purge the stealthy voice from his head.

“Hey!” The bathroom door vibrated under a thunderous pounding. “Get your ass out of there. We got some partying to do!”

Sighing, Ari tipped his head back, ignoring the loud order and the continued banging. A reluctant smile tugged at the corner of his mouth. He’d endured the same hammering at a bathroom door since he was old enough to piss by himself. Darius, older by two years, wasn’t known for his tact or his manners. And if patience was a virtue, then his brother’s soul was condemned to hell. In gasoline drawers.

“All right, dammit!” Ari jerked the shower curtain aside. “Give me a minute, asshole.”

Because his brother had to have the last word or something horribly evil would befall him, Darius hit the door one more time before leaving Ari to his shower. Sometimes it was hard to believe the motherfucker was twenty-nine.

Bone-deep weariness crawled inside him, weighed him down so even breathing required more concentration, more effort. He was so fucking tired. Of the road. Of the demands of the record company. Of pretending to be happy.

Of himself.

Maybe because all four had ripped the thing he’d loved most from him, leaving a gaping hole in his chest that was incapable of ever being filled or healed.

Everett Graves. Parole
.

Gritting his teeth, Ari shut down the thought so hard, he winced. No. Not now.

Maybe later tonight, after he got out of this fucking city.

When his father, brother, bandmates and the circle of people always surrounding them were finally gone.

When he lay exhausted in another strange hotel room next to another nameless, faceless woman after trying to fuck his mind into a blank numbness.

When he couldn’t escape from himself.

Moments later, he emerged from the bathroom, a towel wrapped around his hips, skin still damp, and stepped into a roomful of people. Groupies, execs, roadies and countless others. Irritation surged through him. Jesus, didn’t any of them ever go home? He’d forgotten what the hell being alone felt like. God knew, he missed it.

“Here, Ari.” Jack Riley, their manager and one of his best friends, handed him a pair of jeans and a black t-shirt. “And get dressed in the back room over there. Checking out your bare ass is not on my list of things to do tonight.”

“Don’t kid yourself.” Ari accepted the clothes. “You’ll never see better.”

Jack snorted, and Ari found his first real grin of the night. Jack, though older by five years, was as close to Ari as any of the guys in the band, including Darius. He’d been with Sin since the beginning and often played Teflon between Ari and Joseph.

Snapping off a two-finger salute to the manager, Ari strode across the room to the door leading to a small storage area. Greedy, avaricious gazes lingered and stroked his half-naked body, but he didn’t glance up to decipher their owners. Didn’t need to. The faces changed, but they were all the same. Women who stared at him like a piece of meat they couldn’t wait to hunt down and devour. Part of him should’ve been ashamed for being rude. But his guilt was assuaged by knowing if he passed on the offer, they would quickly turn the same invitation to Darius or Oliver Scott, the bass guitarist, or Liam Black, Sin’s drummer.

Snagging a bottle of Jack off the table, he continued on until he slammed the storage room door behind him, temporarily blocking out the sounds of post-concert revelry.

In moments, he’d dragged on the t-shirt and jeans, but he didn’t join the party. Couldn’t. Instead, he twisted the cap off the bottle and tilted the alcohol to his mouth. The whiskey rolled over his tongue and created a searing path down his throat. He relished the burn, the flames licking at his chest and blooming in his gut. He downed another gulp, then another. How pitiful was it he was getting lit in a goddamn storage room with dusty chairs, old foldable tables and graffiti-sprayed walls for company?

A knock echoed on the door, and he sighed. Well, his sought-after solace hadn’t lasted long. “Yeah?” he called.

“You decent?” Jack inched open the door and poked his head inside the crack.

Ari snorted. “I’m dressed if that’s what you’re asking.” He lifted the whiskey, sipped.

Jack entered, an eyebrow cocked. He didn’t speak but, then again, his pointed stare at the alcohol Ari drank like water said it all.

“What?” Ari drawled. “I don’t know why you’re looking so judgy. I thought all rock stars drank and fucked. I’m just getting started on one of the two.”

His manager continued to study him until Ari imagined himself with wings and pinned to a corkboard. Finally, he blew a breath and lowered his arm, dropping his head back on his shoulders. “What, dammit? Just say it.”

“Everett Graves may make parole this time. You have to start dealing with the possibility. Self-destructing isn’t going to prevent it from happening. Hating yourself, drinking, fucking—it’s not going to change a thing.” Jack raked his fingers through his dark-blond hair.

His words pummeled Ari like tiny fists. He flinched, his fingers tightening around the glass neck of the bottle. Despair, guilt, fury, helplessness—they battered him with relentless blows. He glanced down, amazed his arms weren’t black and blue with bruises.

“I don’t want to talk about it,” he rasped.

“We have to.” Jack gripped Ari’s shoulder, the comforting gesture belying the steel in his voice. “Every year around this time you go into a depression and tailspin. It’s been three years, Ari. Three years.” His fingers tightened. “Caro’s not coming back.”

“You think I don’t know that?” Ari shook off his friend’s hand, not wanting—or deserving—his consolation. Pain ripped his chest open, propelled harsh bellows from his throat just at the mention of her name. The woman he’d loved…the woman he’d failed to protect. “I don’t want to fucking talk about it.”

“Okay.” The pity in his friend’s voice grated as much as the conversation. He didn’t want pity—didn’t deserve it. “But this vacation… You should take advantage of it to come to grips with what’s going to happen next week. The person responsible for her death might be walking the streets again in a matter of days. Somehow, some
way
, you need to decide if his freedom will break you or make you stronger.”

Ari loosed a bitter bark of laughter. “Yeah, I’ll get right on that. In between fielding and dodging Joseph’s badgering about writing more songs, adding tour dates and staying on top of the game. Not to mention ‘impromptu’ photo ops he’ll no doubt arrange. Damn.” Ari shook his head, shoving his fingers through his damp hair. “I wish I was going someplace he didn’t know about. Where he and everyone else couldn’t find me.”

“Good luck.” His manager smirked. “No offense, but the man makes a bloodhound look like a shar-pei.”

“Joseph doesn’t get it. I need a break. I can’t—” Ari snapped his head up, the kernel of a plan coalescing and solidifying in his head. For the first time in three years, a spark of hope flared inside him.
It just might work…
The more he flipped and turned the scheme in his head, the more he liked it. If only he could get Jack to agree…

He narrowed his gaze on his friend and manager. “I have an idea.”

H
oly shit, it was fucking Minas Tirith.

Neveah Morgan stepped down out of the resort shuttle van and squinted up at the imposing structure. The November air swirled and whipped against her, but she barely paid the freezing wind any attention. Not while she gaped at the fantasy before her. Well—she tilted her head—it was Minas Tirith without a huge white tree in the courtyard or a massive wall of rock at its back…or an enormous horde of Orcs overrunning it. Okay, maybe it didn’t look like the capital of Gondor at all, and maybe she was an embarrassingly huge
Lord of the Rings
nerd, but
damn
. This building was an honest-to-God
castle
.

Of course, her twin sister, Heaven, had told Neveah the name of the Colorado resort was Castle Alainn, but she’d chalked the description up to clever marketing or Heaven’s propensity for exaggeration. Which was just a nice way of saying her twin lied like a politician caught flying his freak flag in a YouTube video. One of her grandiose tales had been responsible for Neveah being deposited on a mountain, smack in the middle of a Tolkien novel, in the first place. A tale and blackmail.

Still, thoughts of Heaven—or Hell, as Neveah liked to call her twin—couldn’t diminish her awe and pleasure. Seven and a half hours of exhaustion due to the airplane and car travel from Seattle, Washington to this remote place in the Rockies melted away in the wake of her delight.

Majestic trees soared toward the sky, silent and strong. The old, giant sentinels had probably witnessed glaciers create the crags and slopes of the nearby mountains centuries and centuries ago. Even the modern balconies lining the face of the construction couldn’t prevent her from imagining colorful flags flapping atop the towers and stone turrets, or a drawbridge lowering over the wide, snow-covered lake surrounding the castle. Or sword-and-shield bearing soldiers standing guard on the remains of a rampart. Gorgeous, fanciful Castle Alainn belonged on the cliffs of a European shore, not in Noble Pass, Colorado on Lake Noble.

“If you’ll follow me, miss?” The bell hop smiled, a piece of luggage in each hand.

Nodding, Neveah hiked her purse and carry-on higher on her shoulder and tailed the young man through a set of tall double doors into a cavernous room capable of containing her entire apartment. Rich wood paneling covered the lower half of the walls while a light-colored stone constructed the top. Arched doorways leading to alcoves and adjoining rooms lent the lobby an airy feel even though she was inside. Again, she had the sense of stepping back to a different age, to a simpler time of beauty and elegance. Stylish but comfortable couches, chairs and tables dotted the area, their presence inviting people to come sit, spend time and enjoy a cup of coffee or tea. A huge fireplace graced the other end of the lobby, flames dancing and swaying in its depths.

A coil of tension slowly unfurled in her chest and gut, the wealthy but welcoming atmosphere loosening the knot that had taken up residence since she’d boarded her flight in Seattle. Actually, since Heaven had announced
the “surprise vacation” she’d planned for
Neveah.

“Good afternoon. May I help you?” The clerk behind the wide front desk greeted her with a warm smile.

Neveah returned the grin and stopped ogling the architecture and décor to approach the gleaming, beautiful piece of wood masquerading as a desk. “Oh, I’m sorry. It’s just…this place is gorgeous.”

“Thank you.” The young blonde woman dipped her head toward the window. “You have perfect timing, too. Eight inches of snow have been predicted, which will shortly render the roads impassable.”

“So we’ll be stuck up here?” Part of Neveah acknowledged she should at least be a little panicked at the possibility of being trapped on a mountain several states away from home. But the thought didn’t alarm her. Just remembering what she’d left in Seattle—
who
she’d left—panic lost the battle to relief. Here, constant phone calls and stress from impatient realtors, irate borrowers or overworked and burdened underwriters couldn’t reach her. Here, family pressure couldn’t wrap around her like a boa constrictor, slowly suffocating and breaking her.
Here, the daily presence of the man she’d once loved and been betrayed by couldn’t batter her heart until she resembled an emotional punching bag every evening.

Here, she could escape.

At least, for a little while.

“It’s possible for a few days, until they’re able to clear the mountain pass. But nothing to worry about, I promise.” The desk clerk softened her voice as if soothing a wild-eyed horse about to bolt. “May I check you in?”

“Yes. My name is Neveah Morgan. N-e-v-e-a-h.” She spelled before the other woman asked. With such a unique name, she’d grown accustomed to the practice.

Nodding, the clerk’s fingers tapped the computer keyboard. Several seconds later, a bright smile lit her face. “Yes, you’re this month’s Noble Pass Affaire winner! Congratulations, Ms. Morgan, and welcome to Castle Alainn.”

“Yup, the contest winner. That’s me.” And the tension returned along with the need to wring her younger-sister-by-three-minutes’ neck. As did the urge to deliver a hard snap at the end for good measure.

The contest her sister had entered Neveah in without her knowledge.

The contest rumored to be a matchmaking scheme underneath the guise of granting a week-long, all expenses paid vacation for someone who was ready for some fun in their life.

Heaven had filled out an application online, had even sent a video of herself pretending to be Neveah to complete the essay portion. Her sister had claimed she needed a kick in the ass to get a life, forget the douche bag she’d wasted two years on and remember who the hell she was. When Neveah had balked and refused to go to some unknown destination for a pseudo
The
Bachelor
style hook-up, Heaven had blackmailed her.