Page 5 of The First Chord

As the waitress walked away, we fell into silence with Dennis scouring the area for the prospect of any trouble. Joey looked like he was dozing with his arms folded over his chest and I could feel my own eyes getting heavy. The sun felt good against my skin and my lungs were enjoying the fresh air, instead of that in the fart heavy bus or stuffy hotel suite. Stretching out my legs, I settled in to wait for my beer. It couldn’t have been even a minute before I was being tapped on the shoulder.

“Hey, Ronnie.”

God, that voice. That beautiful, sweet perfume.

My heart began to thump wildly as I sat and let my eyes wander over her loose hair, which she recently dyed back to blonde, pulled over one shoulder, and a smattering of freckles showing beneath huge sunglasses.

“Amber. What are you doing here?”

Joey snorted from behind his baseball cap. “I think she’s with the band.”

Amber chewed at her lip and glanced anxiously at him. “Sorry, I didn’t mean to disturb you. I was just out shopping and saw—”

“It’s fine, love,” Joey said, pushing his cap back. “Come and sit down and join us.”

“Are you sure?”

She looked at me, but I could only nod. For some reason I’d lost the power of speech. I saw the woman almost every day, or at least every other day and yet seeing her there, with the sun behind her and her smelling of sweet roses, I couldn’t utter a damn word.

When Amber ran her hand through her hair, pushing it from her face, the sunlight caught the small diamond of her engagement ring. My stomach knotted. Call me a twat but ifI’dbought it for her, she’d be struggling to hold her hand up. And then there was fact that Jimmy had put it there. It shouldn’t have been an issue, I shouldn’t have been thinking about another man’s wife, but I was. The more texts that we sent to each other, the more time we spent having quick conversations, the more I was thinking about her and the blurrier the lines got.

My attention was gained by Joey kicking the seat of my chair. “Answer the girl.”

“Sorry, yes, sit down.” I made the mistake of glancing at her long, bare legs beneath short denim cut-offs. They were so short the lining of the pockets were peeking below the frayed hems. When Joey coughed, I looked away and dragged a chair away from the table. “Please, sit down. Join us.” Looking over my shoulder I waved for the waitress and when she came closer, I said, “Aperol Spritz please.”

Amber inhaled. “Th-thanks.”

“Hmm, you know what she drinks,” Joey muttered. “Interesting.”

“He says I’m the only person who could like that shit,” Amber replied with a giggle.

“Does he indeed?”

Joey’s smirk was worthy of a slap in the mouth, stupid dick. Sometimes I wondered how I stayed friends with him. Probably because Elliot and Beau had this man-crush thing going on with each other and I felt sorry for Joey. It was enough of a disappointment for him that he could only play drums.

“Scooch up a bit,” Joey said as he forcefully pushed Amber’s chair closer to mine.

It was confirmed. I was breaking off our friendship and snapping his damn drumsticks. I would have given him a dead leg, there and then, but our drinks arrived. The waitress put them down in silence, dropping paper beer mats with each one. We each thanked her and before she’d even got back into the restaurant, Joey had knocked back his water and was pushing out of his chair.

“Right, I’m going back to the hotel.”

Frowning, I looked up at him. “What?”

“I’m going back to the hotel. Do you want Den to stay with you or can he come back with me?” He slapped a hand down on Dennis’ shoulder. “I know you’re dying to get in the gym.”

“Well, I wouldn’t mind.” He was already halfway out of his chair. “You’ll be okay, won’t you? I can send Jack back.”

We hadn’t even wanted Dennis to come out with us in the first place. It was Ali who always insisted we had security with us. People barely glanced at us outside the UK and USA. Fans were a lot cooler everywhere else.

“Go, we’ll be fine.” I looked over at Amber. “Unless you want to go back with them?”

She paused and my heart stopped until she shook her head and said, “I need get a few things, so if you’re happy to come with me then…”

As soon as I said yes, I wondered if I’d done the wrong thing because the excitement of spending time alone with her scared the shit out of me.

CHAPTER4

AMBER

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