Convincing Constance (The Blow Hole Boys) (16 page)

“Let. Me. Go,” she said firmly.

I knew I was being a dick, but she smelled so good. I wanted to feel her close to me just once. Her scent mixed with the smell of the rain was an aphrodisiac. It pushed me to do things I knew weren’t smart.

“Or what?” I asked.

“Or I’ll put my fist through your cocksucker.”

I chuckled and let her have it. “Sorry, baby. You’ve mistaken me for yourself. As a matter of fact…” I said as I started undoing my belt, making sure the noise was loud enough for her to know what I was doing.

She shoved at my chest.

“Fucking asshole,” she spat.

And then the gravel popped and cracked under her boots as she walked away.

I was disappointed. I expected more from her—more fight and anger. It used to be what drove her. But then again, maybe I’d broken all the fight inside her. It was one of the things I loved about her—her drive and sarcastic cuts—but that part of her seemed to be gone, and I was sure I was the reason for its absence.

I stood there and listened to her footsteps and the rain. I wanted to go after her and push her buttons some more, but I knew it was the wrong thing to do. She wasn’t the one to blame for the way I was feeling. I was. When the sound of her footsteps went silent, I stepped out from under the awning and let the cold rain hit my hot cheeks.

A month and a half of torture was headed my way. A month and a half of feeling like my skin was being ripped from my body. I didn’t know if I could take it. I didn’t know how long I’d last until I was on my knees, begging her to stay. Just the way I should have four years before.

I’d survived the first night
of being around Tony… barely, but I definitely survived. When he stopped me outside on my way back to our bus, I thought for sure I’d melt into his arms and forget everything that happened. Either that or I’d kick him in the balls. I was a bipolar mess full of different emotions and wants.

But mainly I knew seeing him again would strike something in me. Something that I’d tried to kill so many times. It was compulsive and reaching—it was hell-bent on driving me nuts. The need to be near him was worse than I thought it would be, and I’d almost given in to everything he wanted, but then he opened his big asshole mouth and I was done. I should have thanked him for reminding me why I should hate him.

Not to mention, I smelled the alcohol on his breath and I could tell by his slow speech and the slur in his voice that he was doing more than drinking. Any notions I had about falling into anything died in that moment. Some things changed, but I guess some things really did stay the same.

It was a damn good thing I didn’t hold my breath and wait for him to change for me or come after me. I would have been long gone.

The following morning, things moved fast. It was the first show for everyone and there was lots of getting the kinks out and a ton of people running around like their asses were on fire. The rain didn’t help anything. If anything, it contributed to the chaos. I didn’t understand how anyone in Seattle could survive in so much rain.

Once things got popping, the crowd was insane. Women sat on men’s shoulders and showed everything they had to the world, while some sat to the side, smoked and drank, and enjoyed the show. The sound of their screams became a wave that rushed onto the stage whenever the music stopped even for a second.

I smiled to myself at the thought of being out there in front of everyone again. I loved it. I never thought I’d be able to say that, but I truly loved performing. It was a time when I could be someone else. I could stand on the stage and pretend everything in my world was golden, and the people in the crowd responded to that behavior. They fed it and pushed me more.

While most of the bands and their members waited until their time to play to come out of their bus, I stayed on the side stage and enjoyed the show. I bobbed my head to the music and enjoyed some of my favorite bands. It was a front row view to paradise as far as I was concerned.

When it was our time to play, I beamed into the crowd and enjoyed solos on the speakers. I planted my boots into the ground beneath me and swayed with my melody. I owned my guitar, and the band as a whole owned the people all around us.

Lena screamed into the mic, shouting my lyrics and mind-fucking the men on the front row. Hope beat the drums like they owed her money, with her signature cocky grin. Mia’s bass hit hard and fell in with my chords seamlessly. I smiled over at Twiggy when her piano solo blended with my guitar during one of our ballads. The muscles popped in her slender arms as she pushed down on the keys with closed eyes.

We were on it—hotter than hot. I felt legendary, and the crowd was eating it up. They sang my words up at us as we played—words that had gotten me through the biggest heartbreak I’d ever been dealt—and it was as if each word they sang back to us healed some of my broken pieces.

I never looked to the side of the stage, even though I felt Tony’s eyes on me the entire time. I wondered if he knew those words were because of him, and part of me hoped he understood the hurt he put me through.

Blow Hole was up after us. I hadn’t listened to their music over the years. It hurt too badly. The girls hated how I changed the station every time one of their songs came on, but it was for my sanity. How was I supposed to get over a man when he was on the radio every damn time I turned it on? No thanks.

I was hoping to be back on our bus by the time they started, but we got caught up backstage. I tried to shut out their music, tried not to listen or feel the sound, but the lyrics made it through and I knew right away that the first song they played was written for me.

“But you’re gone and all that remains is my sick addiction,” Finn sang into the mic.

I stepped away from the group and to the side of the stage. Finn’s facial expression was one of pain as he sang the heartfelt lyrics. He gripped his fist and spat the words out into the crowd. Women reached for him and screamed his name.

“Never being as high as I was when I was with you.”

Every word was sung to me. I just knew it. It was then that Tony caught my eye. He was standing there, clothed head to toe in black. The sweat-covered tattoos on his exposed arms looked shiny in the lighting and his piercings flashed when the light changed. He was so sexy it hurt.

He wasn’t facing the crowd. Instead, he was facing me. He plucked the strings of his guitar and bobbed his head with the music. His eyes devoured me, touching me all over, leaving me feeling as if he could actually see the emotion welling up inside.

“The drugs can’t take away the pain you left behind,” Finn cooed.

It was all I could take. I turned away and went straight to the bus, leaving the girls behind to deal with backstage issues.

The following day, we left
Seattle. I spent most of the time staring out the window and watching the skyline change. The weather went from wet, to moist, to dry, and two days later, we woke up in Las Vegas.

I stepped off the bus in front of a glitzy hotel and took in the sights around me. It was as if a bizarre city had been planted and grown in the middle of a desert. Hotels were shopping malls and shopping malls were food courts. Everything ran together yet was its own defining entity. Every large city was represented in the buildings around me. I was kind of digging Vegas.

We were going to be in the city for three days since we were playing two different shows. I was fine by that since there was a ton to do on the strip. Not to mention, it meant we would get away from the bus and into some kickass hotel rooms with big comfy beds during our stay.

The first night there, the bands got together and hit one of the biggest clubs in Vegas. Knowing Tony and the boys would be there, I sat out and watched zombie movies until I fell asleep. Dead people eating faces and ass was better than some sappy chick flick or spending the night feeling uncomfortable with his eyes all over me.

The next day we did sound check, and again, I sat at the edge of the stage and watched the show. Once Blow Hole was up, I left. I didn’t even want to hear first chords since I knew which song they’d be playing first.

“Dude, we’re legit in Vegas. Are you seriously going to sit around and watch TV instead of hitting the town with us?” Lena said as she patted her hair down and reapplied her lip-gloss.

We were sharing a room and her shit was littered all over the place. She was definitely the girly one of the group, yet we got along really good. It was an opposites attract kind of thing, but it worked.

I was lounging in bed, wearing a pair of
Family Guy
boxers, which meant I wasn’t going a damn place. Again, I didn’t want to be anywhere Tony was. It sucked that he was ruining all the fun I could be having, but I knew it would be that way when we signed up for the tour.

“I worry that you’re an old lady trapped in a hot-ass body,” she said before she smashed her lips together and made a smacking noise.

“Yep. Just call me Granny Great Ass. I won’t fuck you, but I’ll feed you,” I said sarcastically.

“You need to snap out of it. Seriously, Constance.” She stood there and stared at me like I was going to change my mind, and then she shook her head and gave in. “Fine. Don’t wait up, Grandma,” she said as she shut the door behind her.

I got a brief glimpse of Mia, Twiggy, and Hope standing in the hallway, waiting for her. Hope rolled her eyes, and I knew Lena was telling them I wasn’t coming. I felt bad for separating myself from the band, but if they knew the whole story, I was sure they’d understand. Well, most of the girls would understand. Hope, on the other hand, I was sure would go straight up to Tony and kick his ass. I debated telling her just so I could see that happen.

I spent the night in front of the TV, eating entirely too much expensive room service and writing lyrics. The colorful lights of the Vegas strip shined through my window and taunted me with all the reasons I wasn’t out there enjoying my life. I closed the curtains and got comfortable in bed.

It didn’t take long to fall asleep since the bed felt like heaven compared to my bunk. I stretched out my legs and tossed and turned as much as I wanted without fear of kicking someone in the face or falling over the side of the bed and slamming into the hard floor.

It was two in the morning when the hotel room phone starting ringing. At first I just lay there thinking I was dreaming, but soon I was reaching out from under the covers and feeling around for the phone. I knocked over a bottle of water and then I knocked the headset from the receiver and onto the floor.

I could hear someone calling my name through the earpiece as I leaned over the side of the bed and picked the phone up from the floor.

“Yeah,” I growled with closed eyes.

“Constance, this is Tony,” he slurred on the line.

My eyes popped open and my heart sped up. “What the fuck do you want?” I asked rudely. “And why the hell are you calling me this late?”

He chuckled into the phone like I’d just told a joke before going sober again. “Can you pick me up?”

I lay back onto the bed, burying the back of my head into the feather-filled pillow. “You’re bullshitting, right? Why would I pick you up?” I yawned and closed my eyes again. “Call someone who cares, Tony.”

“I would, but the boys aren’t answering. It’s loud where they are. I’m sure they just can’t hear their phones,” he mumbled.

“I’m hanging up now.”

I lifted the phone from my ear, prepared to hang it up, when he said the magic words.

“Please. I need you, Constance.”

I’d stayed away from him for that exact reason. I knew how hard I had to fight over the years to not think about him. Having him call me and beg for help was my weak spot. It triggered something in me and I couldn’t fight it in that moment. I blamed the fact that I was sleep deprived.

Throwing the covers from my legs, I sighed loudly into the phone. “Fine. Where the fuck are you?”

He laughed drunkenly into the line once more, and I almost hung up again. I was tired and I didn’t have time for his fucking games.

“I’m in jail.”

I sat there with the phone to my ear and my mouth gaped open.

“What did you get arrested for?” I asked.

“Please just come and get me,” he whined.

And just like that, the hotel room door was closing behind me, and I was tackling the Vegas strip alone.

I hailed a cab outside the hotel and had him take me to the City of Las Vegas Detention Center. With half-closed eyes, I watched the bright city and happy people go by.

“Wait here,” I said to the cab driver as I made my way into the jailhouse.

The place was loud and busy. Not at all what I’d expect a police station to look like. A transvestite in black leather with a bullwhip was sitting in the waiting area. She smiled up at me, revealing missing teeth. I smiled back and turned toward the counter where an officer stared back at me.

“I’m here to pick up Tony Russell,” I said to the young cop behind the counter.

He looked my age, and his uniform was too big for him. It was amazing the things you noticed when you’re sleep deprived and standing in the middle of a police department in your pajamas at three in the morning.

He shook his head. “Oh. Our resident rock star is being picked up. I guess who you know really does matter, huh?” he said sarcastically.

I was taken aback by his rude tone and considered hauling off and slapping him, but I somehow didn’t think it would be very helpful while picking someone up from jail if I was sitting next to them in the cell.

“What do you mean?” I asked.

He looked from side to side like he was about to tell me a secret and then he moved closer.

“As soon as we got him in, his bail was paid and the charges were dropped. As long as he pays for the damage he did, it’s like it never happened. We were going to hold him until he sobered up, but now you’re here to get him.” He leaned back and flipped through a few manila folders before pulling out a file. “I’m sure George in the back will be happy to see him go. He hasn’t shut up since he got here.”