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“Just one,” Pedro said, obviously teasing.

“I’m kind of old school, guys. That’s where I don’t want to influence your style.”

“Hayley’s right. You gotta commit too.” Holy shit…I couldn’t remember the last time Kyle had agreed with me on something like this.

Maybe our little bandcouldbecome something. That was the fire I’d wanted to reignite in him. It nearly took my breath away.

Wolf raised an eyebrow, slowly shaking his head—and, despite Kyle managing to remind me of one of the reasons I’d fallen in love with him, every little thing Wolf did seemed sexy.

I bit my lip.

What if he had a girlfriend? I was just tormenting myself. And, besides, Kyle and I were still a couple.

Still living together.

I had to keep my mind onthat.

“All right. Well, like Pedro, I have a lot of favorites—and it’s not just old bands or new ones. I like guitarists who laid the foundation, guys like Jimi Hendrix. And I love how music evolved in the seventies, with bands like Deep Purple and Black Sabbath. And when metal really took hold, becoming popular with millions of fans worldwide in the eighties, I could go on and on about all the bands whose music I loved and could play. I even loved grunge and nu metal. Industrial. Alternative. Everyflavor of metal you can name, I enjoy it, and I can play lots of it. I have plenty of favorites today too.”

“Can you name just one?” Pedro pressed.

Wolf closed his eyes for a moment. “There were three bands when I was a teen that really ignited my love of music. They were Soundgarden, Korn, and Rage Against the Machine.”

Glancing at the other three guys, I could tell they thought those three bands were all decent choices. But which would be the one Wolf landed on?

“If I had to pick just one…it’d probably be Rage.”

“Sick!” Pedro said, giving his blessing.

“They do have some good shit,” Kyle agreed.

“So you guys really want me to bring some of their songs too?”

“Hell, yeah!” Pedro said, all but shouting. “It makes us equal.”

Nodding, Kyle in effect echoed his support. “So when do we bring the songs we picked?”

“We’ll have to learn them all first,” Wolf said. I knew the people who’d have the hardest jobs at that would be Pedro and Kyle. Adrian was gifted on the drums. I’d seen him put a song on his phone and play along with it lots of times—and, once he could play the original track, the way the artists had written it, he would then add his own flair.

If there was a genius on our band in the vacuum Liam had left behind, it was Adrian.

“If we gotta do it by ear instead of reading music,” Kyle said, “why don’t we just group text the songs we choose so we can start learning them in our free time?”

“When should we have them learned and play ‘em together?” Pedro asked.

“Hold on, guys,” I said, sensing by the look on Kyle’s face that he was starting to feel overwhelmed. And who could blame theguy? He was just trying to get a handle on the concept. “Why don’t we maybe plan on learning one song a week?”

“Good idea, Hayley,” Wolf said. “And I’ll start practicing all your songs right now. We’ll start playing all the band songsandfocus on one cover a week.”

“So do we wanna text the song titles to each other so we can start listening to them 24/7?” Kyle asked. “Get that subconscious shit goin’ that you were talking about, Wolf?”

“Yeah.”

Kyle formed a fist with his hand, thrusting it in the middle of our group, something I hadn’t seen him do since one of our biggest shows in Silver City last year. In response, Pedro made a fist and joined Kyle. By the time Adrian stood, I had already joined them—and Wolf and Adrian joined their fists with ours.

Intent to Murder finally had a fighting chance, and we were ready to rock.

CHAPTER 8

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