Wyatt’s father picked him up, Duke had Easton. Both Easton and Wyatt had the power to overcome them, but out of raw respect they held back, marched forward as Beckett and Duke pushed them.
A second later Wyatt was tossed in the driver’s seat of the truck, and Easton in the passenger seat.
“You two assholes get on the road, work it out—and if you wreck my truck I’ll have both your asses in a sling,” Beckett said before he slammed Wyatt’s door.
Easton was reaching for his jaw, feeling the sting of one of Wyatt’s punches, when he saw Georgia being led out by her mother who was gripping her arm.
Seeing her being handled forcefully was enough to smolder any control he’d gained. Before he could open the door Wyatt floored it.
Easton glared in his direction, but Wyatt’s eyes were on the rearview, then flicked to the road as he settled in his seat.
“Memphis is with her. Memphis, our best friend, is with his fucking sister. Where he should be since they lost their father. What the fuck, Easton? Any damn girl—any one of them in this town would have been just peachy making you feel right last night. How could you do this?”
Easton slid down in his seat, perched his elbow on the door, let his long fingers brush his lips. Even after the fight and all the aggression he could still taste her lips.
“I didn’t sleep with her.”
“Congratulations,” Wyatt bit out.
“It just happened, Wyatt.”
“You’re still lying to me. I know you were out with her last night. I saw the way you kissed each other just then. I’m not stupid.”
“We went fishing,” Easton said as he slid further down in his seat and settled in for the long ride.
Wyatt glanced to his side. There was nothing about Easton he didn’t know. Granted he didn’t know what the hell he was thinking when he got all quiet and stoic, but if it happened to Easton, at the very least Wyatt knew the gist of it. He got it now—Easton had returned a favor, had done for Georgia what Lucas had done for him.
Of course he wasn’t an idiot though, he knew something happened. In nearly twenty years Easton had never hit him over a girl, never hit him over something he said or assumed. And it never happened before because Easton had never given a damn.
“It’s still not right, not right now. She’s only seventeen, Easton.”
Easton clenched his jaw knowing younger or not, Georgia was too good for him. It was going to take all he had, but he would figure out how to stop thinking about her one way or another.
“Your right hook sucks,” Easton said as he exhaled.
Wyatt busted out a laugh as he reached to turn the radio up. “That was my hurt shoulder, and you still swayed.”
“Only to protect your confidence, no doubt in the morning you’ll draw another death wish.”
“I like it wild,” Wyatt said with a smirk.
Chapter Four
(Three years later)
The air was thick with smoke and lousy with the sour stench of spilled beer and cheap liquor. The music was blaring as the wasted crowd swayed out of rhythm with the band. It was a scene Georgia Armstrong knew all too well.
This was the life Hunter Davis, her on-again, off-again boyfriend of the last three years, brought her into.
The band Eclipse was the third he’d been a part of over the last three years. He’d managed to get himself kicked out of the others and was nearly thrown in jail twice, as well.
This scene seemed old now. It had at times in the past, too. And when it did, she’d break it off with Hunter, tell him she couldn’t handle this life, his self-destruction any longer.
Each time she did, Hunter would crash and burn, destroy himself from the inside out. Out of guilt, fear, and some kind of love she didn’t understand, she’d come back to him, clean him up, get him sober, help him make his amends and get him on the straight and narrow once more.
It was a vicious cycle she desperately wanted to end. A cycle she had been trapped in since weeks after she laid her father to rest. When a sweet, daring grunge boy found her crying in the hallway between classes and asked her to skip—he helped her forget about her hell. Not because he was magic like Easton Ballantine and could wisp away the pain, but because if she was taking care of him she didn’t have to think about who she was.
Before he went on stage tonight, she and Hunter had one of their ‘talks.’ She’d turned down the band manager’s offer for her to promote Hunter’s band exclusively.
It was a bad business deal, and she told them as much. Promoting other bands built her name. It helped her make contacts to increase the career she really loved—graphic design and photography.
All the revenue she made she kept on the down low—it was hers, in a bank account Hunter didn’t know anything about. Which meant he didn’t understand why she wasn’t thrilled to get a few hundred bucks on the regular from one band.
Their talk turned into a fight—a fight they didn’t have a chance to finish. Which meant he’d act like it never happened later, and Georgia would be stuck in the same cycle she was in.
She pulled a bar stool against the wall to stand on and take a few pictures. She’d climbed to the top of the stool and was just getting ready to squat down again, and take her last shot, when some fake blonde in a halter top purposely swayed into her stool, sending Georgia flying through the air.
Georgia only missed the ground by a mere inch, and considering how strong the arms that caught her were, she wondered if the ground would have been better. Holding her just above the beer-soaked floor was the venue owner she’d only met in passing—Sawyer, she thought his name was.
The blonde and her quartet of friends laughed as the bar owner untangled the stool from around Georgia’s arms, then helped her to her feet.
“Innocent bitches always get hurt, sweetheart. You’re in way over your head,” the blonde said, blowing a kiss at Georgia from her jet-black lips before disappearing into the crowd, moving toward the stage.
“Come on,” the man she thought was named Sawyer said.
Me? Georgia thought. What had she done?
He guided her behind the bar, then through a door that said ‘Staff Only.’ Georgia was an overly cautious person; following any man into a back doorway was something she would not normally do, so she went to pull away.
“Bleeding on that floor is a death wish,” he said as he let her go and fumbled in his pocket, pulling out a set of keys that obviously went to the door that said ‘Boss Man.’
Georgia followed his glance and saw streams of blood pouring from her elbow. She didn’t even feel the wound and was more concerned about her lens, now dotted with her crimson blood. She was digging in her cross-body bag to find something to clean up with when she heard him say, “Your body first, equipment second. You kids kill me sometimes.”
She smirked as the memory of her father flashed in her mind—he’d agree with this man. Lucas Armstrong was the most non-materialistic man who had ever lived. Georgia had inherited the trait from him, no doubt.
“Good point,” she said politely, setting her camera on his desk.
Georgia wasn’t known to have a temper, but the blonde had stirred a fire in her. It wasn’t the first time Georgia had seen her around, and it wasn’t the first time the girl had shown a natural disdain for Georgia. Where the hate came from was lost on Georgia, and frankly she didn’t give a damn.
The man lifted her elbow and smirked as he used a pad to wipe away the blood. “I suppose you live up to your last name, Armstrong.”
The defensive side of Georgia came to life as her stare angled up at him.
“Georgia Armstrong, right? I’m Sawyer Wright. I make sure all bands and crews have IDs when they book and play here, which you’re not wearing,” he said with a nod to her stomach, where the lariat she was given should’ve been.
“I thought it was just for backstage?”
“If you’re their publicist, would you not need to be backstage?” he asked as he put a cool
cream over the cut, stopping the bleeding almost instantly.
“I’m listed as a publicist? ”
“Crew is what I think it said.” He nodded to the camera. “I made my own assumptions.” He put a strip of white gauze on. “Surely, you’re not hooked up with any of those knuckleheads?”
“And surely you’re not hitting on me,” Georgia said with a lifted brow.
His temperate eyes met hers. “Considering I have daughters older than you, no.”
She bit her lip just so she wouldn’t smile.
“You just don’t look the type,” he said in a gruff tone.
“Type?” She had ditched her Goth style years ago. It wasn’t really a hard decision. Dyeing her hair became a pain, and after a while the makeup was much the same.
“Right, you’re sober, smart. Independent.”
“You don’t think very highly of your clientele,” she noted, clearly understanding he thought them to be the opposite.
“Not all of them. Not the posers.”
She met his stare as he fell back into his desk chair. “Did you book them?”
He shook his head, holding in a sarcastic smile. “Money is money.” He reached to pull out a form. “Can I get you to fill this out for me?”
“That says I will not sue you because I decided to climb a barstool in a pool of drunk people to take a few shots?”
He glanced down to her feet at the heels on her boots, which barely made her five-six. “That’s right.”
Georgia’s eyes went wide with insult.
Another chuckle. “I just document everything. You can sue me if you want, then you can have my glorious job.”
When she glanced to the address line, a twist in her gut made her decide for sure tonight she and Hunter were going to get some things straight.
She hadn’t had a stable address since she left her father’s grave. She and her mother had had a fall out weeks after, on her eighteenth birthday. Georgia had been couch hopping since then, with Hunter at her side.
“You really tour on this circuit?” Sawyer asked.
“I have been for the last four months.”
“Holding up good for four months; still have an air of innocence about you.”
“You’re a labeler, aren’t you?”
“Monday night crowds, yes. Artists, no. I guess I’m just telling you you’re better than the group you’re with. And yes, I did book them. But those jackasses pulled one over on me. Last time they were here, they caused more than a few fights and left me a tab of three grand in liquor wide open. I suppose they feel because they changed their name and juggled the lineup a little I wouldn’t notice. But they’re going to figure it out when they leave the stage and I refuse to let their equipment leave until the bill is paid.”
“Seriously?” she asked as anger welled in her eyes. This deal right here was going to jack her up. If she told Hunter they were leaving, he’d now say he had to stay at least through the next show to have the cash to do so. Then there would be another excuse after the next show.
When she first met Hunter, she’d had over two hundred grand in her account; what her father had left her from life insurance. Hunter blew through eight of it the first few months they dated. Setting up a band he screwed over in the end.
She hid the rest. She told him her grandmother put the funds in an account so it would grow interest and she could have it all at twenty-five, along with the rest of the estate which was broken down between her and her brother.
The cash was for a home, a root. The will said so, and Hunter was making her feel like a traitor to her father with dreams that had merit but no real plotting behind them.
Hearing the cash flow was gone completely ticked Hunter off and solidified his all-embracing hatred for what family she did have.
“Oh, I plan to negotiate,” Sawyer said evenly. “I don’t need or want their equipment. But they already have a tab close to a grand tonight.”
How could anyone drink that much? Georgia thought to herself.
She reached in her bag for her debit card and held it out to Sawyer. This was her payment to the devil. She’d pay this debt—the band would never know about it—then Hunter wouldn’t have an excuse. One way or another, her life was changing for the better before she closed her eyes tonight.
Sawyer reached for the card, read the name, then dropped it on his desk. “You must have pulled the wrong card; that one has your name on it.”
“It’s the right one. Just square it with me.”
His stare appraised her the way her father’s used to; a deep, penetrating gaze. “You baffle me,” Sawyer said finally. “You’re sober as the night is long. A vision of health.”
“If the debt is paid, you shouldn’t have an issue with who’s paying it.”
He raised his chin. “You want to square their debt? Let the band move on tonight. Get yourself a little apartment and work here. Within a month or two, I’d be able to introduce you to the A-class promoters. Get you into good company. You don’t belong on the ground floor. Not with those boys.”
Georgia scooted the card closer to him. “Promoting would keep me in this world, now wouldn’t it?”
Sawyer’s stare lingered a little longer. “I’m going to cut through the bullshit and tell you like I tell my girls. If it’s not good enough for your daughter, then it’s not good enough for you.”
Georgia looked at the man like he’d lost his mind.
He leaned forward. “Imagine your own daughter with the man you’re with now. Would it make you happy, or would you think of every way to get her to see a new path?”
“I don’t have any kids.”
“Not the point. You know what I mean.” He slid the card back to her. “This is not your debt to square.”
Georgia furiously grabbed her card, stuffed it in her bag, strapped her camera across her, and made her way out.
She’d quit smoking twice as many times as she’d quit Hunter. Just like Hunter, the vice always seemed to taste sweeter the next go ‘round.
Georgia stopped at the bar, asking if she could buy a pack from them. They didn’t sell them, but the bartender took mercy on her and handed her his half-empty pack, telling her he had another, along with a lighter. There is a God, she thought to herself.
She pushed her way through the drunks and walked out the side door to light up.
First hit, she coughed. She tasted every single noxious chemical, the harshness of a crutch she didn’t want. The first hit made her wonder why she ever would have picked up this habit. The second, addiction started to bubble to the surface, along with a dizzying, yet numbing sensation. She was done for.
She slid down the brick wall as her thoughts raced and anxiety started to prickle in her body. A downward spiraling sensation daring her to scream, and begged for her to find some way to hit the reset button.
Cursing, she took another hit of the toxic addiction and fumbled with her equipment. Transferring the best images to her iPad so she could edit then post them.
Just as her second smoke was lit, she heard men arguing and looked up to see Sawyer and the band manager going back and forth. The back doors busted open, and the two-crew guys who toured with the band started to bring out equipment to load in the vans. She moved away. Halfway hoping if she turned a blind eye to what was going on she could forget it.
She’d already been paid to cover the lead band tonight and decided to get a few candid shots of their equipment and the members horsing around as they got ready to head to the stage.
Crowds from the bar were trying to come out, too. But the bouncers held most of them in, or at least out of the alley the bands were in. Fake bottle blonde made it out, though. When she threw Georgia a nasty glare, Georgia flipped her off.
The bottle blonde bitch walked over to the drummer in Hunter’s band and whispered something to him as she rubbed her body against him, something the girl often did to any male Georgia was near. It was a one-way competition as far as Georgia was concerned. Sh
e wasn’t a road whore and never would be.
Right then she felt sweaty hands move under her tank and grip her gut. Hunter. “Oh, baby, that was awesome,” he moaned as he pressed his body against hers.
She winced as he wrapped his arms around her, pinching her bandage. She pulled away, and it took him a second or two to notice she was tending to a cut, which had ruptured once again. He was too busy talking to the other band members who were basically saying it was time to bail.
“What did you do to yourself?” he asked with a laugh.
She glanced up from her cut. “Got knocked around,” she said as she looked at the bottle blonde.
“Must have been a good band on stage,” he said, completely missing the silent girl catfight. “We got to head out. This bar owner is an ass, trying not to pay up or some shit.”
“I have to stay for the next band.”
He scowled. “We talked about this.”
“No, we argued. This is my income.”
“And I fixed that. This band’s paying you enough now.”
This band wasn’t paying her crap. “This is a commitment I already have. Tonight, I want to talk to you.”
He spat out a curse and looked away. He never liked her talks, often called her and them a buzz kill.
“Yank his chain, girl,” the band manager yelled in their direction. Earning a round of laughs from everyone outside and completely ticking Hunter off. He gave her his classic ‘told you so’ glare.
“We need to finish the fight, things have got to change, Hunter.”
He rolled his eyes, stepped forward, and gave her a menacing glare—all for show, all to make it look like he was putting Georgia in her place. In a low voice, he said, “I’m right about this. You shouldn’t be around these other bands without me.”
He pulled her closer. His hands slid down her ass. Earning a few whistles and hollers from his boys and ultimately humiliating her.