Page 22 of Before Now

The inside of the bus has been silent all morning. Other than the driver, I could forget anyone else existed until now.

We hit the road around two a.m. I slept better than I expected I would at first. The rocking motion as we escaped the city slowly morphed into a rhythm. Even so, I’ve been up for hours with my head spilling out everything I want to capture.

“Filming is kind of my job,” I remind him.

He breaks into a full grin. “Cool. Mine is to keep these assholes safe. Doesn’t mean I can never turn it off.”

I pull my legs off the couch seconds before he drops onto them. Readjusting, I turn off the camera and set it on the floor beside me. Colton’s studying me, I realize, glancing up, so I settle back and serve him a stare right back. He’s wearing a tight black T-shirt again. His typical uniform from what I’ve seen.

After a second, he points his chin toward the side table behind me. “You’ve got my color.”

Next thing I know, he’s leaning over me for the red polish I used to repaint my nails. He drops the bottle onto my lap and tucks a foot under him to sit facing me. He holds a hand out, palm down.

His nails have the slightest remnants of polish lingering. I smile as I cautiously untwist the lid. I swipe the brush over one of his nails as he watches the color deposit. It’s the most normal I’ve felt since this whirlwind began. The most included if I’m being honest.

Last night at the concert, especially, I felt like a documentarian trying to get a shot of a wild animal in its natural habitat. Being as invisible as possible and taking up minimal space—watching but never a part of it.

The thought has me warm, though, closer to my dad than I’ve felt in a long time. This was his day-to-day, on the move and having only seconds to capture an entire world in a frame. Although he wasactuallyphotographing wild animals. He would travel to the most incredible places and experience the world in a way so few have. I remember the stories he’d tell me, the promises to take me with him when I was older. How he’d show me the world.

I swallow down the tightness in my throat, re-dipping the brush. Colton sighs, and I glance up at him staring out the window with a content look on his face. His gaze darts over and then back to the scenery.

“Seems like a week ago, we were packed up in a sketchy van, driving this same road to an even sketchier bar gig. I think there were maybe six people standing on the concrete floor in front of the guys. The rest of the bar was regulars who didn’t give a fuck if they were listening to live music or a jukebox. They sure as shit didn’t remember the band’s name by the time we started packing up the gear.”

“And now?” I ask, curious of his take on all of this.

I’ve known since Prague that Colton’s not just a security guard. I mean, he fully believed he could change the band’s minds about bringing me onboard. Knowing he’s been on the road with them since the beginning helps a piece fall into place.

“Now I can’t think about it too hard because…” His eyes sweep over to meet mine before his attention falls to the brush as I finish up his pinky finger. “Because every second of this life feels so surreal.”

“You talk like you’re a member of the band,” I say softly.

Colton whips out a grin made to destroy hearts and swaps hands. “Please. Adams wouldn’t be able to compete with me. My sexiness would tear us all apart.”

I roll my eyes, and he chuckles.

“Nah, I’d much rather experience the whirlwind from my perspective,” he says. “I get to go along for the ride, being proud as fuck of my best friend, and not feel the weight of the world crushing down on me.”

I nod, not needing to ask who he’s talking about. Only one member of the band has that kind of heaviness in his eyes. The other two surely have their own stressors and fears of their sand castles coming crashing down. Anyone in their position would. But it’s not them who look like they’re drowning, fighting off the waves.

“You and Adams were friends before then?” The name tastes strange on my tongue now, as if Adams North disappeared in a wisp of smoke the second I heard his words coming out of Foster’s mouth.

“Adamshas been my brother since the beginning,” Colton says, a sly little smirk forming—he doesn’t realize I’m in on the joke. “He lived down the street when we were little. Our moms were close, so when his family moved to New York, they’d have these little ‘video dates’ for us. It kept us close until he moved back to Texas. And then…” He pauses, and for a split second, I catch his mouth twitch down on one side. Then he sniffs away whatever’s bothering him and grabs the brush out of my hand. “Let’s just say we’ve been through a lot of shit together. At some point, it became an unspoken understanding we’d go through the rest of it together too.”

My thoughts immediately turn toward Foster’s history with his father. Theshithe put Foster through, the wounds he left him with to heal. Those are details Foster told Remi Saint in a completely different life, though. Something tells me he’d rather Remi Sinner not have access to those memories.

Even so, I can’t help but wonder what new scars he carries, and the curiosity is burning. So much so I have to sit back against the arm of the couch and take a deep breath before I take a shovel to Foster’s last five years.

I distract myself by watching Colton. He finishes his thumb before he tugs the bottle from my grip and screws the lid on tight. He holds it out for me, and as I reach for it, his eyes move over my head. My fingers graze the bottle while I glance over my shoulder, where my eyes collide with a whole lot of tattooed skin.

Dev’s running a hand down his bare abs to the top of his gym shorts, his eyes half open and his hair a sleepy mess. Even in his drowsy state, he still manages to grin at me. “Morning.”

I whip back around to Colton and his smirk. Right. Bus full of musicians. Skin is a part of the game.

Dev bangs around in cupboards in the kitchenette. He comes into the lounge with a mug of coffee, and then he’s plucking the nail polish from my hand. With a wink, he drops onto the couch across from us. He balances the coffee on the cushion beside him while he opens the bottle.

“Help yourself,” I mumble.

Colton chuckles. “Get used to it. These guys live like barbarians on the road. They see something they want, their brains go caveman. Chest-pounding, grunting, not washing their balls?—”

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