The Man You Need (Love on Tour #4) (12 page)

14

As soon we’d gotten off the bus in New York and made our way into the venue, Jack pulled me into a little room off the back hallway.

“What’s going on, Stacey?” He trapped me up against the wall between his arms.

“What are you talking about?”

“You might think you’re a great actor, Princess. And maybe on stage you are. But I know you were pissed at me last night. And you didn’t say one word to me the whole way here on the bus.”

“Jack, I’m fine.”

“Don’t give me that bullshit. Are you pissed about Sharyl? Because I meant it when I said–”

“I am not pissed about that. Jesus, Jack! Get over it! I was the one who wanted you to hook up with her, remember?”

My anger was usually under control. With the exception of me going crazy on that groupie in the parking lot, I
owned
my mad. But Jack seemed to bring out all kinds of emotions in me. Right then, I was pissed off. I was angry that I’d reacted the way I did to him and Sharyl last night, and I was angry about the way I’d felt when I looked into Jack’s eyes last night. I didn’t want to explain any of it. I just wanted to get away from him.

“Then why don’t you tell me what you’re mad about?”

“Let it go, Jack.”

“I thought we were friends.”

“Yeah, and friends are allowed to get pissed at each other every once in a while. Now, will you please let me go? I have a shit ton of people meeting me here tonight.”

Jack pushed himself roughly off the wall and stood back. “Fine.”

I walked to the door.

“Have fun tonight.”

“Thanks.” I wrenched the door open.

“And be safe,” I heard him say softly.

“Jackass,” I mumbled under my breath, as I moved down the hall in search of Mike.

As Mike and I made our way to the lobby with a handful of backstage passes on black lanyards hanging from our hands, I tried to get myself into the right place. I was in New York. I’d be hanging out with people who only knew a certain side of me. I’d spent way too much time lately with people I was comfortable around. And if Jack could see through me so easily last night, I was in deep shit.

“Stacey!” Jenn ran toward me as soon as I walked through the doors that connected the backstage area to the lobby.

I accepted her embrace. “Hey, girl!”

She stepped back and looked me up and down. “Lookin’ good!”

I took in her long blonde hair, the tiny tank top that framed her giant boobs, and the tight skirt that showed off her ample booty. “You too, sweetie.”

“God, our apartment is so lonely without you.”

I found that hard to believe. Jenn and I shared a tiny one-room hovel that frequently had two to three people crashed out on our floor on any given night.

“Hey, Stacey!” John walked forward and threw an arm around me. John was a guy I’d met during a show. We’d co-starred together as a romantic couple. As a result, we’d ended up sleeping together both before and after each show. As soon as the run was over, though, we’d ended it and become friends. It was the perfect situation. And if I thought I could sleep with Jack and things would be like they were with John, I would. But Jack was different, partly because John didn’t really know me at all.

“God, John, I missed you!” I kissed his cheek after telling the lie.

In truth, I hadn’t missed any of them. I looked around at them all. I considered six of them my friends, another eight acquaintances, and the other ten strangers.

Mike and I gathered them all up and took them down to a large room for the meet and greet. I stood in the corner with Baby and Bell and watched as Sean and Hank made the rounds through the throngs of my friends.

Even though I had been in this exact situation a few times before, I still found it strange. These people – who I spent time with, hung out with, drank and partied with – were looking at my brother all starry-eyed. They saw me as one of them – a buddy, a regular girl. But they looked at him like he was… a rock star. It didn’t matter that it had been this way since I was in high school, it was still weird.

“So bizarre,” I said. “Even Jenn, my roommate, is acting like she just met the fucking President.”

Bell reached into the cooler beside the wall, pulled out a beer, cracked it open, and handed it to me. “I know, right? They have no idea that both of those men are terrible slobs.” She chuckled and took a sip of her water.

“And that they couldn’t find their way around a screwdriver to save their lives,” Baby said.

“Fuck, remember the crib?” Bell said, laughing at the memory.

Sean and Hank had attempted to put together a crib for Bell’s little bundle before leaving for the tour. The damn thing looked like a disaster and listed to one side.

“That’s the handy man,” Baby said, pointing her beer bottle at Mike.

Mike had straightened the whole thing up in about thirty minutes. “True. But that girl who’s hitting on him hard – I think that’s Geri’s friend, Heather – anyway, she’s in for a big disappointment.”

We were all chuckling when I watched it happen. Julie, who I’d been in a few plays with, was talking to Sean. She was a real player, that girl, the kind you had to watch your boyfriend around. And apparently, she wasn’t deterred by the ring on Sean’s finger, either. She reached out and put her hand on his chest, leaning her body toward him.

I didn’t stop to see if Baby was looking. I could only hope she wasn’t. I marched over there. As I made my way across the room I saw Sean take a step back, but instead of pulling her hand away, Julie’s paw just slipped further down to his stomach.

As soon as I reached them, I grabbed her hand off my brother’s abs and interlaced her fingers with mine. I smiled sweetly at her. “Hey, Julie! I have something to tell you.”

She looked at me quizzically, but followed as I pulled her across the room.

“What’s up, Stacey?” she asked when we came to a stop by the far wall.

“No touching,” I said firmly.

“What? Are you serious?”

“My sister-in-law is right over there,” I said, gesturing to Baby. “And she’s very sensitive.”

“So help me find a way to get your brother alone.”

I gaped at her.

“You can probably figure that out, right?”

“Fuck no! Are you kidding me?”

“Since when do you give a shit if a guy’s taken?” She sneered. “I
know
you’ve turned a man’s head away from his girlfriend.”

She was referring to the story of how I broke my arm. They all thought they knew the truth about that incident. But they didn’t. It wasn’t the same.

“Has your time in California turned you into a prude?” she pressed.

“Fuck no. It’s just… He’s my brother. It’s different. I really care about my sister-in-law. And besides, you are not going to get anywhere with him. He’s a faithful husband and the most boring rock star in the world.”

She eyed me for a long moment. I straightened up and put on my sassiest face.

“He’s a Boy Scout, huh?”

“Uggh, like you wouldn’t believe.”

She grinned at me. We were okay now, I could see it. We were back to being peas in a pod, sharks in a tank. Only I didn’t want to be like her, not anymore.

“What about Hank?”

“Oh God, he’s worse. Especially with a wife who’s preggers. I’m telling you from experience, honey, don’t waste your time.”

“Alonso?”

“Go for it.”

****

I was out with my friends after the show. We’d barely been in this bar for an hour now, and I was already anxious to leave. I thought I would be happy to hang out with my friends in New York again. I’d been itching for exactly this for the first two months I was laid up in Malibu. But now that I was here, I just felt exhausted. I was tired of keeping up the act. I used to do it twenty-four hours a day. But I was rusty, now. I’d let my guard down for too long.

I was just trying to think of an excuse for cutting out early and catching a cab back to the hotel when I felt my phone vibrate. I looked at the text message.

Just got done with the show. You in NY? Where you at?

Holy shit. Evan Light.

“Hey, you guys wanna party with some real rock stars?”

The girls all screamed. I texted Evan back with the name of the bar we were at and shoved the phone in my pocket.

“You finally get your brother or Hank to come out?” Jenn asked.

“Hell no. I said
real
rock stars.”

“Your brother is fucking huge, Stacey. You need to recognize that,” John said.

“Yeah, but he’s not a hot mess, like Evan Light.”

“Evan Light is coming?” Julie squealed.

I nodded. “And I bet he’ll bring his whole band.”

Evan and his band showed up about twenty minutes later. He walked right over to me, pulled me into his arms, and shoved his tongue down my throat.

Half an hour later, I was in the girls’ bathroom, calling Jack.

“Stac, is everything alright?”

“Yeah.”

“What’s going on? Are you still at the bar you said you were going to when you left the venue?”

“Yeah, I’m still here… And, um, Evan Light is here.”

“Isn’t he in some shitty band?”

“Yeah.”

“You know him or something?”

“I met him at Sam’s wedding reception.”

There was a long pause. “The bathroom guy?”

“Sean told you about that?”

He chuckled. “Yeah, he told me about it when he dragged me into his study that day at his house and asked me to keep your legs closed.”

“Jesus. Figures.”

“So what’s the deal, Stacey?”

I let out a heavy breath. “He wants me to come back to his hotel room with him.”

“And… Do you wanna go?”

“Um, I don’t know.”

“Are you drunk?”

I was actually insanely sober. It was easiest to keep up the act this way. “No.”

“Where are you right now?”

“In the girls’ bathroom.”

“Okay, so I’m going to assume that since you are hiding in the bathroom calling me that you don’t want to go.”

“I guess not.”

“So go tell him that and get in a cab and come back here.”

“Maybe you could come get me?”

I heard him sigh. But I was sure he would come. I could imagine him busting in the door of the bar, telling Evan to go to hell, and dragging me back.

“No.”

“What?”

“You need to do this yourself.”

“What?!” My knight in shining armor had just failed me.

“You need to tell him off, Princess.”

“You’re not going to help me?” I whined.

“Tony will be in front of the bar in fifteen minutes. You tell Evan off and get on that bus.” Then he hung up.

Son of a bitch!

I stood against the wall in the bathroom for another ten minutes taking deep breaths. I could do this. I could. I
needed
to. But I didn’t move.

“What are you doing, girl?” Jenn asked as she breezed into the bathroom.

“Oh, hey, just, um, talking to my brother,” I said, holding up the phone.

“Is he coming out?” She stepped up to the mirror to reapply her lipstick.

“No. He wants me to come back to the hotel.”

“What are you, twelve?”

I decided not to answer that. Instead, I left the bathroom and walked slowly over to the table where Evan sat waiting for me. As he watched me approach, a drunk smile on his lips, I tried to figure out what I was going to say, what excuse I was going to give. But nothing came to mind, except the truth.

“Hey, baby,” Evan said, resting his hand on my ass when I reached him. “You ready to get out of here?”

“You know what, Evan?” I said, pulling his hand off me and picking up my purse from the back of the chair beside him. “I’m actually going to go back to my own hotel, alone.”

“What? I thought we were going to hook up?”

I stepped back. “Sorry, not tonight.” I took another step toward the door. “Maybe never,” I called over my shoulder. Then I walked out to the curb.

The bus wasn’t there yet, and I looked nervously back at the bar as I waited. But Evan didn’t appear. Tony showed up within a couple minutes and I hopped onto the bus.

Jack was not, as I’d hoped, on the bus, and as Tony and I rode back in silence, I became more and more angry. I was angry at Jack for not coming to my rescue. I was angry at myself for not being in Evan’s hotel room right then. I should have been. I would have been. I’d changed. And it pissed me off.

Tony walked me up to my room. I had the keycard slipped in the lock when he spoke. “Stacey.”

I looked up at him. Tony had said maybe two-dozen words in all the time I’d known him. And most of them were ‘sit the fuck down.’