Page 25 of Crazy Love
“Pfft! You’re kidding, right? It’s one song, two, if you need a back-up. Give me twenty minutes I could manage that with reasonable proficiency.”
“Yeah, but you’re not an ordinary bassist.”
The remark raises a smile. Damn, I love it when her cheeks lift like that, and a hint of colour washes across their tops. It makes me forget why we’re here and how badly everything sucks for a moment.
But only for a moment.
“I’m hardly unique. I’m just prepared to put in the work. I think the problem here, is that you have a bass-player who doesn’t put in any work, ever.”
That’s not wholly true, in the early days, in fact, until relatively recently Knox worked twice as hard as any of us. He’d spend hours upon hours playing our tracks, until the finger movements no longer required conscious thought.
“If we turn up to play for Graham Callahan with a new bassist, he’s going to want to know why.”
“Yeah—so tell him the truth. That Knox is a screw up and you felt this was a more stable line up. I think he’ll appreciate your honesty.”
Why am I not surprised she has an answer? Why the fuck is she helping me? If my willingness to sacrifice everything for Knox doesn’t make sense to her, well then her willingness to stick her neck out for me, doesn’t make sense either.
She looks at me and wets her lips.
“Know what I think, Darke? I think you’re clinging on to him, because he’s an inbuilt excuse for failure. I think you’re frightened to succeed.”
“That is such bollocks.” I am not afraid of success. I’ve been striving for it long enough. “And I suppose you’re not,” I retort, wounded by her words in a way that makes my heart throb.
“Petrified of it,” she confesses. “But that doesn’t mean I’m going shy from any opportunity that hurtles my way. I’ll probably pee my pants if I have to play a thousand strong crowd let alone a ten or twenty thousand strong one, but imagine the high afterwards. I bet you’d be so pumped you’d just want to fuck and riot and dance about like every Christmas since Jesus’s birth had arrived at once.”
“I’m on board with the fucking part.” In fact, my weary brain has fixated on it. I want to get dirty with her right now. Here on the floor, against the hard, smooth tiles, with Knox in the bath beside us. I want to push into her from behind, while I weigh her huge tits in my hands and pinch their peaks into hard little spires, and make her groan my name. I want to hear her beg me to fuck her hard, fuck her fast, to fuck her tight, hot, wet pussy.
Mostly though, I crave the silence and the void that exists when I’m wrapped up inside a woman’s body. I want that moment of peace. That moment of knowing everything is fucking perfect—even if it is only for fifteen—too short—seconds.
“Maybe it’s time we both turned in,” she suggests. Her blue eyes narrow as she looks at me as if she’s distracted by my internal thoughts.
So much for wishful thinking. I really hoped she might take the bait when I mentioned fucking. I stick out my hand in order that we might part of civil terms, but her brows draw low and her tongue becomes wedged between her teeth.
“You know, Bitch Slap aren’t without issues. Ours might not be as immediately apparent, but that doesn’t stop them from being any less potentially catastrophic.”
I’ve a sudden inkling that she’s not here out of the kindness of her heart, or even because there’s a definite spark of attraction between us, but because she senses an opportunity. Is Joel right? Is Loveday Trevaskis ready to jump ship?
“What issues?”
“I told you, Ivy won’t tour. She’ll play for Graham Callahan, but she won’t get on a bus around Europe, and she’s definitely not going to fly any further afield.”
“Don’t you have a friend you can call to step in?” I ask, mimicking her suggestion to me. It’s cruel, and uncalled for, but I’m feeling petty. The combination of tiredness, frustration, anticipation and despair, not to mention horniness make me a horrid person.
“None who can play keyboard, and definitely none who can play keyboard and who are prepared to flash an audience,” she says, ignoring my jibe. “Let’s face it, that’s probably why Graham Callahan’s considering us. Muff wins hands down over music.”
“You’ve some good tunes.” I reckon Callahan’s after them because of her skills, not Ivy’s exhibitionist tendencies.
“We’ve a handful of songs, and you’ve heard the best tonight. WhilePerverted Tit Fuckermight get a concert crowd going, I can’t see it storming the charts, can you? No radio station is ever going to play it. And I don’t know about you, but I’m under no illusion that Graham Callahan’s in this for the money, not to make anyone’s day.”
“I know that. The song you sang, though, that one has all the right elements. It blew me away.”
“Flatterer.”
I cross my heart. “My God’s honest opinion. You’ve a far better voice than Jessie. I got shivers from that song. It’s when I knew Bitch Slap were going to cause us real trouble, and that you amounted to more than a two fingered salute at Dane.”
She smiles at the praise, despite the furrows still wrinkling her forehead. “Bitch Slap are about Jessie’s rage. I hope we’ll become more than that in time, but it’s probably wishful thinking. It’s more likely that Jessie will find herself another guy to obsess over, lose interest in the band and move on.”
“I don’t see her getting over him.” Dane sure as hell isn’t over her. “The pair of them falling back into bed…that’s another matter.”
