Page 36 of Sycopation
Finally the bus stopped and the engine cut out. They all shifted, and Ray finally let go of Zavier’s leg. He missed the touch almost immediately.
I like this man.He’d known that, of course, but there was something more visceral there, deeper than the surface lust he felt for beautiful Ray. Maybe the start of a good friendship, if Ray ever let him in.
Ray was amessand pulled so many ways, and so not the type of person Zavier normally took into his life. But then, Ray had been lurking there on the edges since high school, so why not? Other than the pesky part where they worked together.
So no. Zavier rose off the couch and filed out of the bus with the others. Time to go see what the shop attached to the truck stop had in the way of munchies. As he wandered past the walls of coolers, he checked his email and found a note from Nadia.Finally.
He read the message over, then read it again and grunted.
Your rock band manager isn’t entirely uninteresting. He used to be a musician. You know what to do, darling!
She wanted a phone call. There was the pull and the push and the resistance. But the carrot had been dangled, as it always had been before.
That night, years ago, she’d held out a length of rope. “Darling boy, everything comes with a price. I’ll teach you what you want to know, but you have to decide if you’re willing to pay.” After pacing in front of her for a good fifteen minutes, he’d held out his hands.
Same resentment now. Same resigned sigh. He tapped her number and headed out of the store.
After a few rings, she picked up. “You’re never a disappointment, Zavier.”
He fought against both the flare of anger and the one of pride and let both go. “So how is Carl interesting?”
“He was, at one time, the lead singer for a band very much like your own.”
Curious, indeed. Zavier paced the length of the hot truck stop lot. “Twisted Wishes is hardly my band, Nadia.”
“Mmm, but you’re already putting your stamp on it with your bare chest and your leather pants and the way that lovely boy looks at you.”
He didn’t even have to ask which lovely boy, and if that was what Nadia was seeing, then he really did need to start searching for those stories on the internet. “I didn’t call to hear you sing the praises of my ass.” He let annoyance seep in, with purpose. Even if he had worn the pants exactly to get a rise out of Ray.
“Your drumming, then. You should read some of these articles, Zavier. ‘Demos isn’t just another pretty face, though. With his classical training and unlimited energy, his drumming elevates Twisted Wishes to a new level.’”
She was doing this to needle him. “Nadia, I’m standing in the middle of a truck stop somewhere between Chicago and St. Louis. I’m going to have to climb back onto the bus soon. You can email me all the articles you want and I promise to read them and be embarrassed and grumpy. Please tell me about Carl Roberts.”
Silence on the other end. “Ah, so this is serious.” A change in her voice from the teasing drawl to the other tone he remembered so well: Nadia the instructor.
Thank god.
“Your manager is the failed lead singer of a group called Tenacious Dreams. They had one single that did moderately well, pushing into the Top 100, but after that, they vanished into obscurity. Unlike your Ray, Carl was not a singer/songwriter. Their guitarist wrote most of their material, though the song that went somewhere was penned by Cynthia and Douglas Harndt.”
Zavier’s fingertips tingled. “They compose blockbuster movie soundtracks now.”
“Indeed. Their skill is tremendous. Carl’s voice, however, left something to be desired. Even with voice lessons, it never improved enough for the big time. Nor did the lyrical skills of their guitarist. The band dissolved and the members went on to other things. Carl ended up working for the various record labels until he landed where he is now.”
Jealousy? But that was such apettymotivation. He glanced back at the bus and saw Ray waving at him. Likely it was time to go. “Did Carl manage any bands before Twisted Wishes?”
“Ah, that’s an interesting thing, too. No. What I heard—and this is from a friend of a friend—is that Carl had been reasonably successful in the marketing department. Someone over there had the brilliant idea that if the label used a marketing manager as a band manager—rather than the band hiring one themselves—they’d have much less friction with bands. Yours is a trial run on that, since Carl had some practical experience.”
Carl was a marketing manager? That explained some things, but not others. “Thank you, Nadia.” He headed back toward the bus, at a slightly slower pace than normal.
“You care about him, your Ray.”
Not a question, which meant Nadia already had an answer. The question was why. Zavier snorted. “What makes you say that?”
“Oh, darling, those photos show the way you look at him, too.”
Zavier stopped walking. He was still far enough away from the bus to speak without being overheard. “That’s called lust.”
“Mmmhmm. I’ve seen you in lust, dear. This is something other than that.”
