Page 21 of Reverb

“Oh, my god,” I whispered. This was a nightmare, a literal nightmare. There was no way we’d just been talking about sex, and now the couple next door were—

More thumps. These ones were rhythmic.

Yes, yes they were.

“This can’t be happening.” I grabbed a pillow so I could stuff it over my head and block the sound out. “Someone please kill me.”

Stone’s voice was unperturbed. “From the sound of it, it’ll be over soon,” he said conversationally. “He’s going too fast.” He paused, listening, assessing, and I pressed the pillow harder to my ears, though I could still hear the sounds.

Stone twisted in bed and banged on the wall above his headboard. “Slow down, man!” he barked. “Jesus, she can barely breathe!” The sounds paused at that, then continued, and he banged again. “Slow the fuck down!”

Was this funny? Maybe someday I’d find it funny. Right now, in this moment, I wanted the bed to split open and become a portal to another dimension so I could disappear, hopefully forever.

Stone was right. It didn’t take long. I fell asleep with the memory of those sounds in my head, wondering what it would be like if, for once, I was with someone who slowed the fuck down.

EIGHT

NOW

Stone

The restaurant where I met Angie was classy, the lighting dim, the tables sparse. The hostess who led me to the table wore catlike eyeliner and a dress that was a sleek dark sheath. She gave me a look like melting caramel. Maybe she knew who I was and maybe she didn’t. I quirked an eyebrow at her but didn’t encourage her. She shrugged and turned away.

Angie Miller-Gold was already here. She stood up when I approached the table. She was wearing sleek black pants, high waisted and wide in the leg, with a silky top. Her blond hair was tied up neatly, and tiny diamond studs gleamed in her ears.

She was pure, hot class, this woman. The kind of woman who didn’t have to give any man the time of day. She had money, looks, a killer body, brains. She didn’t need me, or any other man, to have dinner with her. I should be eager to chase her, to get her attention, to see if I could get her naked. Instead, I just felt wary.

“Thanks for joining me,” Angie said as we sat.

I shrugged. “I didn’t have much else to do.”

“Would you like some wine?”

“Sure.”

She signaled, and a waiter appeared from the shadows. We ordered wine. The waiter faded away again.

“I don’t know how often you get recognized,” Angie confessed. “I chose this restaurant because I didn’t think it would happen here.”

“Because this isn’t my kind of place?” I looked around, squinting through the dim lighting at the people at the other tables. The kind of people who owned summer homes and multiple Lexuses. They’d put up with forty years of married misery for all that money. Not my scene.

“That isn’t the reason at all,” Angie said. “This is the kind of place where they’re too polite to bother you, even if they know who you are, that’s all. I don’t have any preconceived notions about you, Stone.”

I turned back to look at her. “Everyone has preconceived notions about everyone,” I said. “And a lot of them are right.”

Angie blinked. “That’s a dim view of humanity.”

I’d heard that before, or variations of it. “I don’t get recognized often, anyway,” I told her. “If we went to a music store, it would be different. But this seems like more your crowd.”

The wine came, and when the waiter left again, Angie leaned back in her chair, her shoulders sagging a little. She glanced away, seeming to think for a minute, her perfect brows creased, and then she looked back at me. “This was more my husband’s type of crowd, to be honest. I looked you up, you know, before I decided to take on the band as a client. I looked all of you up. I wanted to know what I was getting into.”

I didn’t know where she was going with this—she seemed to be following a trail of logic in her head. When she paused, I said, “I’m pretty sure you had no idea what you were getting into.”

Angie gave a faint smile at that. Rock bands were a lot to handle, especially when you weren’t used to them. She’d been a good sport, though, when she’d been blasted with glitter at our first meeting. “I’m learning,” she said politely. “But what I’m getting at is that there isn’t much online about your past, but I know that you were raised by a single mother. That you didn’t come from money.” She gestured briefly to the restaurant around us. “I was born poor, too, and my mother was single. And both of us have money now. So we have that in common.”

I wasn’t going to talk about my childhood or my mom, so I said, “Your husband was the rich one?”

“Yes.” Her cheekbones went a little red, but she held my gaze. “He was thirteen years older than me, wealthy, and I married him when I was twenty. I was a model. Feel free to judge me all you like. I’m used to it.”

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