Page 34 of Follow the Rhythm
I didn’t get up. He seemed like he needed someone around. “Is Bea here?”
Ellis gave a harsh, sarcastic laugh. “Bea prefers the Ellis who drinks to have fun. She’s gone out with a friend somewhere, I don’t know. She’ll come back eventually.”
“Are you sure you’re alright? I can stick around for a while.”
Ellis tossed back the rest of his drink. “I’m perfectly capable of drinking myself into a stupor on my own. But maybe you have something else in mind?”
He cocked his head at me, one brow raised. He slouched artfully on the couch, his legs wide, and my eyes instinctively dropped to the outline of his cock in those very tight jeans. I flicked my eyes back up to his.
“I’m not in the habit of fucking drunk guys,” I said.
Ellis’s eyes glittered. “My my, Charlie, what a dirty mind you have. Who said anything about fucking?”
I inclined my head, conceding the point. Had I read the situation wrong? My face flushed hot and red. “I’m here as a friend. Or a colleague. Both? I don’t know, pick one.”
“That’s disappointing,” Ellis sighed. “I am sick of being a stereotype, you know.”
“What stereotype? The ‘sexy rockstar with a drinking problem and a volatile personal life’? It’s a classic of the genre.”
Ellis smirked again. “Yes, that one. But I’m glad to hear I’m ‘sexy.’”
“I’m making coffee, you want some?” I asked, changing the subject, and headed to the kitchen.
“Sure, why not?” Ellis answered.
I brought back two cups, brewed using the fancy machine that was also in my unit. Ellis had put on a shirt, but he had an expression of such sadness that my heart broke slightly. He looked up and arranged his face back into its usual mask.
“To breaking stereotypes,” I said and clinked his coffee mug with mine in a toast. He rolled his eyes but still gave me a brief smile.
I spent a few hours with him, talking through tour details that he claimed not to care about, but he asked enough follow-up questions to prove that was a lie. I turned on a baseball game at one point, the Giants versus the Rockies. After making fun of me for liking the world’s most boring sport, we got into a heated argument about whether baseball or soccer was worse to watch on TV.
He didn’t get up to get another drink.
“Is it your father?” Ellis asked after a few minutes of quiet.
“Is what my dad?” I asked warily. I never wanted to talk about him if I could help it. My opinion of him rarely matched what people wanted to hear.
“You know how to deal with human disasters quite well. I’m wondering where the practice comes from,” he said. I was a little embarrassed that he’d seen what I was doing, trying to distract him.
I gave him a rueful smile. “Between him and the rest of North Portal, I’ve had a few test subjects for my methods.”
Their last tour, a reunion that should never have happened, had been a never-ending nightmare of public feuds and crises that only ended after my father’s on-stage stroke.
“Was he always like that? A mess?” Ellis’s eyes really were remarkable. When he looked at me like that, like what I was saying was the most important thing in the world, I couldn’t look away.
“Maybe. He wasn’t around much when I was growing up. And when he was, he always seemed like he wanted to be somewhere else. Not the best male role model. Luckily, I had Kristopher, my mom’s other Alpha, as a better example.”
“You grew up in a pack?”
I shrugged. “Barely. Considering my mom only had two kids, and my dad was hardly around, I think it was pretty much like any other family.” Truthfully, the main feeling from mychildhood was loneliness, but I didn’t want to bring down the mood.
Ellis nodded, still watching me with those icy blue eyes. “And do you want that for yourself? An Omega and a family and all the rest?”
I laughed a little and considered telling him I’d been with more Omegas than many Alphas would ever even meet. It honestly made the whole concept of bonding seem unnecessary and old-fashioned. And my parents hardly seemed happy, even with a bond mark between them.
But then I thought of Jess. Whatever the connection was between us, it felt vital and important. What would life be like withherspecifically, not just a faceless Omega?
“I really have no idea. What about you? Do you want a pack?”
