“Bullet,” she purred. “Don’t you wanna get laid?”

I froze. Sure I did, but not tonight and not by her. I was sick of this fake shit. I might not have Lace, but I wanted something better than that, something real. I looked at the woman again, really looked at her. Behind the outward overtly sexual display, I knew that there was a living breathing person inside, one with feelings. That’s something I couldn’t ignore anymore.

I also noticed that her hand trembled. She definitely had stars in her eyes. She couldn’t be much older than my sister, Miriam, in fact. I’d been carefully avoiding thoughts like these for a long time. But all these women who threw themselves at us had one thing in common.

Hope.

Hope to hook up with someone famous. Hope that they’d be the one to tame one of us. Hope that when we hooked up with them it’d be the start of something beautiful and not just a sex act.

One time, never twice, leave ‘em satisfied, but always leave ‘em.

I couldn’t do that anymore.

The loud sound of a slap had me turning me head just in time to see War disappear inside the temporary dressing room with his trifecta.

Hell, fucking no.

I gently removed the woman’s hand from my arm. “I’m sorry, babe. It’s not you. It’s me. Maybe…” But I trailed off. She’d already turned away and moved to Dizzy before I’d even finished speaking. Appeared she was about to make him a similar proposition. So much for my attempt to save the world one groupie at a time.

The sound of Brutal Strength’s set starting in the background, I skirted around a group of tour personnel and didn’t stop to knock at the door I’d seen War enter. I threw it open so hard it clanged against the cinderblock wall. In spite of that, it took several moments before anyone inside even noticed me.

Leather pants unlaced, legs splayed lazily wide, War sat on a folding chair guzzling whiskey straight from the bottle. The woman kneeling between his legs was going down on him while he watched the other two women going at each other.

One of the girl-girl twosome glanced over at me. “Hmm, Bullet’s here. Come on over, baby.”

War’s head snapped up and he glared at me. “You’re not invited to this party, Jackson.” He took a long swig from the bottle. “Now, get the fuck out!” he shouted at me before pushing the woman’s head back down.

I saw red. Total fire engine red. Siren’s blaring in my ears. The works. I stepped further into the room. “Give us a minute, ladies,” I said cooly, but inside I was on fire, shaking mad.

The woman in front of War, sat back on her heels, wiped her mouth, gave me a confused look, and motioned to the other two to follow her out of the room. As soon as the door closed, I spun around to face War. Our illustrious lead singer re-laced his pants and met me in the center of the room, his own eyes ablaze. “This better be a fucking emergency.”

Furious, I took a step forward and shoved War with both hands.

“What the fuck, man?” War knocked both my hands aside and gave me an equally hard shove back. “You busting in here just to pick a fight with me?” War mockingly crooked the fingers of both hands. “Well, come on, Bullet. Bring it. Though I don’t get you at all, man. It’s me that should wanna beat in your fucking face in for what you did to me.”

All the anger and hurt I felt about Lace choosing him instead of me coalesced into my clenched fist. I reared back and let War have it. There was a satisfying smack as my fist connected with his jaw, sending a shock wave all the way back to my shoulder.

The force of the blow knocked War clear off his feet. His body slammed into the liquor cabinet. Bottles of booze fell like rain off the shelf, crashing onto the concrete floor.

He scrambled to his feet and rubbed his jaw. “You bastard. You’re the one who fucking screwed my woman.” Then he came at me like a blitzing middle linebacker.

I managed to dodge him just as the door flew open and Dizzy, Sager, and King burst into the room. As I was rounding on War, Dizzy stepped between us. King grabbed my arms from behind. Sager did the same to War. I saw the PR chick from Black Cat had followed them into the room. She closed the door behind her.

“Let me go.” I struggled to break free from King’s grasp. The guy was the same height as me but built like a fucking tank. I couldn’t budge him. My gaze flashed back to War. “You don’t fucking deserve her, asshole. She loves you, man. She almost died barely twenty-four hours ago and you’re getting yourself a blow job the minute she’s not around.”

“Used to love me,” War muttered. “She served me walking papers at the hospital.” He shrugged out of Sager’s grasp. “I didn’t start this shit.”

Holy shit. Lace had broken it off with War! And she’d tried to call me before she went into rehab.

I didn’t even notice that King had released me. My mind was still reeling from the implications of that bit of earthshattering news when suddenly War was nose to nose with me. I smelled the fumes on his breath and his face was red and twisted with anger.

“I warned you, brother. Bitches are trouble. But you didn’t listen. And now she’s come between us. Messed us up. Messed up the band.”

“Wasn’t her that did all that. It was you, asshole,” I growled. “You’d sell your own mother if the price was right.”

“Whoa,” Dizzy said. “Easy, guys. Let’s leave the mothers out of it.”

“I can’t believe you.” War shook his head. “You’ve got that bitch up so high on a pedestal you can’t even see her faults.”

The shrill ringing of a cell phone cut through the charged silence that followed the last comment.

“Yes.” Beth eyed us all warily as she answered the call. “I’m here now…No, you were right, Mary. I’ll call you back as soon as I’m done.” She pocketed the cell. Her heels clacked on the concrete as she took a couple of steps forward. Her demeanor was entirely professional. Apparently she was totally unfazed by what she’d just seen. “You guys obviously need a keeper. Mary’s calling in Ian Vandergriff to handle things.”

I cringed. Vandergriff had a reputation industry wide. He was the manager who’d been brought in to straighten out the Dirt Dogs after their lead singer had passed out on stage for the third time in two weeks. I’d heard it had taken less time than that for him to bring them to their knees. The guy was a total hard ass.

Shit.

Beth glanced back and forth between me and War. “Vandergriff’s salary is going to come out of your tour bonuses by the way.”

Great. Just fuckin’ great.

30

Twisting my hands together I sat on my bed and stared out the window at the courtyard, by now a familiar tableau. The soft gurgling of the fountain was the only sedative I had left. No more methadone to keep me company. It had been tapered off days ago.

Just me and my sober self.

Well, and Dr. George. The other rehabbers referred to him harshly as Sawbones. I wasn’t really sure why. The wrinkled old psychiatrist seemed benign with his grey hair and grey beard, his kind eyes and soft tone, like some benevolent grandfather figure.

It wasn’t the session with Sawbones that had my stomach turning summersaults. It was my first mandatory group session, and I wasn’t relishing the thought of laying out all my baggage in front of a bunch of strangers.

A quick glance at the clock had my stomach roiling. Time was up. I took in a careful breath and straightened my shoulders.

You can do this.

I pushed off the bed, stepped into my slippers, crossed the room resolutely, flipped off the light switch, and opened the door.

“Hey,” a musical female voice called out. “Hold up.”

I turned and saw a young woman with long platinum hair locking the door to the room next door to me. She was beaming an infectious double dimpled smile as she walked over. Her smile even put my brother’s illustrious one to shame. Despite my nerves, I found myself grinning back at her.

“I’m Bridget Dubois. I just saw you in the cafeteria the other day. You got in last week, didn’t you?” She didn’t pause to let me answer. She spoke each sentence in rapid fire succession. “You’re coming to the group session, aren’t you? You look a little pale. Don’t be nervous.” A micro-pause. “Really, don’t be.” She glanced at me, white blond eyebrows arching up expectantly. She reminded me of a pixie with her petite frame, her sparkly blue eyes, and her exuberant manner.

“I’m Lace Lowell.” I held out my hand which she took and squeezed once before letting go.

“Nice to meet you, Lace.” She studied my face for a minute before waving for me to follow her down the hall. “Don’t worry. You don’t have to talk the first time if you don’t want to. Believe it or not, I didn’t.” Another dimpled smile. “I think you’ll be surprised. It’s really helped me to know other people have gone through the same stuff that I have.” As we entered the cafeteria together, she continued to jabber while I looked around. The tables had been moved to the side and there was now a circle of plastic chairs near the windows.

I took a seat in the circle beside Bridget and tried to focus on her rather than on the upcoming session. “Why are you here?” I asked quietly.

Her gaze slid away. She stared out the window introspectively before looking back at me. “Usual story.” She shrugged. “I fell in love with the wrong guy. Got pregnant. Family disowned me.” Her light and breezy tone said one thing, but the expression on her face told a different story. This girl had been hurt deeply. There was a lot more to Bridget Dubois than I’d initially thought.