Worthy of the Harmony (Mountains & Men Book 2) (13 page)

HE ALWAYS STAYS.
Deep down in my soul, I’m sure that one day he’ll grow tired of me; he’ll leave and he won’t look back—and yet, ever since that very first night, after he’s done owning every single one of my orgasms, and after he’s come as many times as the night will allow, he wraps me in his arms and
he stays
.

He’s better at mornings than I am, and he’s usually awake before me, holding me, waiting to greet me with kisses—some sweet and tender, some passionate and ravenous. Either way, I can’t think of a better way to wake up. Seeing his beautiful, icy blue eyes admiring me first thing in the morning makes me want to stay in bed all day.

It also scares the shit out of me.

I draw in a deep breath and shake the thought away, my eyes scanning the assignments I have laid out on my desk—the assignments I’m supposed to be grading. I managed to find my focus to teach my first class of the day, and my second and third are in just a couple of hours. I should certainly be trying to get something done, instead of daydreaming about the pianist who played me and pleasured me just as well as he did that piano last night.

I run the back end of my green grading pen across my lips as I remember the end of our date—me in his lap as he played me
Beethoven.
Christ—he had blown my mind. I hadn’t been expecting that sort of performance. He really is brilliant. I can see why his parents would be upset with him for choosing another path, even if I don’t exactly agree with them. At the very least, he most certainly has skills to fall back on if he ever decides that it’s time to move on from Mountains & Men. I knew he was good with his fingers—but watching them create music?

“Knock, knock!”

I’m startled out of my thoughts at the sound of her voice. Lindsey grins at me as she invites herself into my office and plops down into one of the chairs in front of my desk.

“Hi, Lindsey,” I manage, trying desperately to clear my mind of anything and everything that reminds me of Sage.

“I know you know why I’m here, Mill.” She wiggles her eyebrows at me playfully and I stifle a groan. “You managed to escape me yesterday, but I haven’t forgotten that dark haired, blue-eyed Adonis of a man who was lurking around your office Tuesday.”

“Oh,” I mutter, wishing I could claim ignorance. “He’s—” My conscious prevents me from assigning him the title of
nobody.
Every part of my body,
every part
, knows that would be a huge-ass lie. He’s not
nobody
…

I fear he’s becoming the exact opposite.

“He’s…what?” asks Lindsey with a devious smile. “Hot? Sexy? Lickable?”

Yes. Yes. And absolutely, yes,
I think to myself, still unsure what to tell her. He’s not my boyfriend. We’ve only really been on one
real
date, in spite of the fact that over the last three, almost four weeks, he’s made me come more times than I can remember. He’s the only man I’m sleeping with, sure, but he’s
not
my boyfriend.

He’s also not a
friend
. I’m certain I’ve never had any friends who bite my—

“Millie!” she cries with a laugh. “Spit it out already. The suspense is killing me, over here.”

“His name is Sage,” I spit out with a self-conscious shrug.

“And you’re…?”

“Undefined.” I let the word hang in the air for a moment before I nod, sure that that’s the best answer I can provide. “We’re undefined.”

“Hmm,” she hums, narrowing her eyes at me. “And what does one
do
with Sage in the realm of
undefined?
”

We have sex. A lot. Earth-shatteringly, amazing sex.

I don’t say the words aloud, but I can tell by the look on Lindsey’s face that my silence eradicates my need for words. Then I feel the blush that fills my cheeks and I know I couldn’t be anymore obvious even if I tried.

Fuck.

“I don’t want to talk about it,” I murmur, averting my gaze as I look into my lap.

“Why, Millie Valentine—I do believe you’re
smitten
.”

I flinch at the word, my heartbeat picking up speed as I bring my eyes back up to meet hers. I shake my head, but I can’t find my voice. Now, I really wish that she would leave. I can’t have this conversation. I won’t.

Just then, there’s a light knock on my open door and we both look back to see one of my students standing in the hallway. “Professor Valentine? Am I interrupting? I had a few questions about our last assignment.”

I breathe a sigh of relief and Lindsey looks at me with a raised eyebrow. “We’re not finished,” she whispers, and I believe her. For now, though, I’ve been saved, yet again, by my love of numbers. They’ve never let me down and for that, I’m eternally grateful.

“Hi, Saundra. Come on in. Professor Clark was just leaving.”

IT’S BEEN ANOTHER
long ass afternoon. I look around the garage at the guys and the weight of our dilemma weighs on me even more. We just said good riddance to yet another wannabe bass player. It’s the fifth one this week and I’m really starting to stress the fuck out. We all are. With this agent coming to see us play next weekend, now is our time. We need to have our shit together or we could miss our chance. Who knows when the next one will come around? These things don’t just happen.

I slump down into one of the warn, comfortable couches we keep out here and tilt my head back. This place is home. And I don’t just mean that in the sense that the garage is attached to our house. Never once have we parked a car in here. It’s like our sacred place—meant only for the creation of music. We keep most of our shit out here, except for in the winter months when we store the instruments inside, where it’s insulated and the cold won’t get to them. But we’ll practice out here no matter what the temperature.

Violet was the one who suggested we pick up a couple second hand couches and make the place a little more cozy. Sometimes, when any of us want to get away, we’ll come out here and chill. Lately, it hasn’t so much felt like an escape out here—more like a marooned ship. As time passes, we drift farther and farther away from civilization—farther away from any chance of finding a decent guy to make our band complete again.

“Is this Alex guy still coming?” asks Knox. He’s sitting across the room on the other couch, his feet propped up on a small table as he absentmindedly plucks at his guitar.

“Yeah,” I mutter, reaching into my pocket for my phone. Brandon had followed through, giving my number to Alex, who reached out to me yesterday. “He said he’d be here at four-thirty.”

“It’s four-twenty-nine,” Maddox grumbles. “Fucker better show.”

“Hey,” pipes in Derrick.

We all look in his direction, where he sits behind his set. He tips his chin, signaling for us to look out of the open garage door. We watch a car pull up across the street. When the driver side door opens, I furrow my brow in confusion.

“Who’s that?” Derrick asks.

I shrug, not even bothering to look back to see if he noticed the gesture. I’m too focused on the pretty girl reaching into her backseat to pull out—
Fuck. Me
—her bass guitar.

She straps the instrument across her back and then looks both ways, making sure there’s no traffic before she crosses the street. The closer she gets, the more details I notice. She’s got long dark hair, the curled ends died a rich purple, the front held back with a rolled up, yellow bandana. She’s a tiny little thing, too; can’t be more than an inch taller than Rosy, and probably weighs one-twenty soaking wet. In grey combat boots, jeans, and two tank tops—white over teal—she appears completely casual. I can tell, as she walks between the cars parked in the driveway, that she doesn’t dress to draw attention to her body—but that doesn’t mean she doesn’t have a body worth looking at.

“Hey,” she says hesitantly, offering all of us a small wave. “I’m guessing you’re Mountains & Men?”

“Yeah,” Maddox answers. “Who the hell are you?”

“I’m Alex. I talked to Sage about an audition? Sorry—I don’t know which one of you is Sage.”

“That’d be me,” I say, raising a finger.

“Right,” she mutters, lightly tapping her fingers on her forehead, as if to express her thoughtlessness. “Brandon did describe you—dark hair, tats, glasses...I should have known.”

I look at the guys, each of them studying Alex with a different dubious expression, and then meet her gaze once more. “Uh, funny you should say that. Brandon didn’t tell me too much about you. Actually, he didn’t tell me
anything
about you. Like, that you’re a girl.”

“Oh.” She coughs out an embarrassed laugh and then shrugs. “Is that some sort of problem?”

“Look, Alexandra? Alexandria? Whatever your name is—no offense, but we’re a bunch of dudes called Mountains &
Men,
”
Knox explains.

“Huh,” she scoffs, propping her fists against her hips. She looks around at every one of us before she speaks. “Are you sure you’re not just a bunch of sexists
jerks
called Mountains & Men? And my name is Alex, by the way.
Just
Alex.”

“Hold on,” I say, standing to my feet. I lift my hands up slightly, hoping to stop the sudden rise of tension in the room. “Look, we’re just surprised, okay? All Brandon told me is that you could play. How do you know him, anyway?”

“We go to the same church. I play in the worship band.”

“Oh,
fuck
no,” Maddox replies emphatically. “You brought us a fucking
church girl?
This is not going to work.”

I sigh, reaching up to run my fingers through my hair. I’ll be the first to admit, Brandon left out quite a few important details about
Alex
, but we’re kind of desperate. I told Brandon not to fucking mess with me and he assured me that he wasn’t. I trust him. The least we could do is see if she can play. I open my mouth to say as much, but Alex speaks before I can.

“Goodness, I don’t know why I’m about to defend myself. Lord knows you’ve insulted me enough that I should turn around and leave you high and dry, but here I go.” She pauses, claps her hands together, and weaves her fingers as she lets her arms drop in front of her. “The way I heard it, you need a bass player. I get it that you’re all
dudes
, but this is about music, is it not? You might be taller, bigger, stronger, with an extra appendage that I don’t have, but none of you have what the one with the
boobs
has—” She points at her tits and my eyebrows shoot up in shocked amusement. I also can’t help but look. “And that is,” she continues, drawing my focus back to her eyes, “the ability to play the bass like a badass.

“I’ve done my research. Granted, I might not be able to put names to faces, but I’ve listened to everything you have online. I’m ready for this audition. I’m looking for a band—
you’re
a band. I can play anything you want. Now, are we going to do this or not?”

For a moment, none of us says a word.

“You’ve listened to our shit?” Derrick asks, appearing intrigued.

“Pretty much non-stop for the last twenty-four hours. And don’t call it shit. You know it’s not. It’s really good.
Great
, even. But you know
Contortion
wouldn’t sound half as sick without that bass.”

“Wait a second,” JJ says, speaking for the first time since Alex arrived. “You’re telling us you learned
Contortion?
In the last twenty-four hours?”

A small smile pulls at her lips as she nods once. “Remember the part about me playing like a badass? I don’t boast about much. In fact, I suck at a lot of things; but playing the bass is the one thing I’m most proud of. It’s my gift. I practically live to play. So…”

“She says she can play
Contortion
, I want to hear it.” JJ stands from the couch and makes his way over to his keys.

I look to the rest of the guys, hoping to feel them out. Derrick spins his sticks between his fingers and tips his chin at me. Maddox shakes his head, but gets up and plugs into his amp anyway. Knox shrugs and then does the same. I turn my focus back to Alex and gesture with a sweeping motion of my hands for her to come on in. She takes her bass out, straps up, and plugs in. Once everyone is set, I step to the mic.

“You sure you’re ready for this?”

She takes a deep breath and squares her shoulders before she responds. “Yes. Let’s do it.”

“Okay,” I say with a smirk.

The song starts with just vocals and keys. JJ and I kick things off simultaneously. When I begin to sing, the words come as effortlessly as my next breath. Then, after I finish the opening phrase, Derrick clicks the beat and everyone joins in at once. Alex falls into the mix as if she’s been here all along. Suddenly, I actually have to think about the words to the song as I continue to sing; all the while, Knox, Maddox, JJ, Derrick and I are exchanging glances. She wasn’t lying. She’s a fucking badass.

When we get to the middle of the song, there’s a bass solo. While she plays, her focus glued to her fingers as they glide along her fret, I watch her intently—the way she moves with the beat, her right shoulder marking time—and the way she seems to get lost in the notes. When she nails it, the garage erupts with our roar of astonishment. We don’t even finish the song. JJ pulls his headphones from over his ears then reaches over to clap her on the shoulder. I think in his excitement, he nudges her harder than he intended, and she stumbles forward a step. She catches herself and laughs it off just as Knox comes over and offers her his hand.