His Distraction (Assured Distraction Book 2) (2 page)

The downtown Austin police station was fairly quiet since it was mid-week and the college kids hadn’t had a turn on the bar crawls down Sixth Street since Saturday night. Walking up to the desk behind the large pane of glass, Ryan spied an officer who looked fairly underwhelmed by his work.

“Excuse me,” Ryan said, waiting for acknowledgment from him.

“Can I help you?” the officer asked, sounding annoyed by Ryan’s appearance at the window.

“I’m here to bail someone out,” Ryan explained, his fatigue apparent in his voice as the grimy feeling from the long night and day on the bus and the stress of his ongoing conflict with Krissy suddenly weighing on him. Add on his barely sober state from partying on the bus all day and he felt like he didn’t have the energy for any of this right now.

He ended up sitting in a silent, deserted lobby for what felt like hours, waiting to hear whether he could make bail getting Krissy out at this point. He sat on the only bench in the large space and laid his head back against the wall, and the next thing he knew someone was kicking his shin and yelling in his face.

“Get the hell up, dumbass, and take me home.” He jerked to consciousness, not realizing he’d even fallen asleep, to a very unwelcoming expression on Krissy’s familiar face. Their reunion shouldn’t start this way after two months apart. The stormy look on her face said everything he didn’t want to hear.

“Krissy, what the hell?” Ryan stood and tried to pull her in for a hug.

She was having none of it and stomped off toward the door. “Take me home. I’ve been in these clothes all night in that damn, nasty ass cell.”

He grabbed her arm and spun her around to look at him. “Wait a minute. I haven’t paid your bail yet.”

“You don’t have to. I was released since I’ve never been in jail before.” Ryan heard the anger in her tone. It felt like he had returned home to some alternate universe. He still hadn’t found out what happened to cause the arrest, even for the few hours she was in jail.

“Baby, wait a minute. Are you okay? I come home and this is what I wake up to. I was freaked the hell out with worry about you when you weren’t at the studio to pick me up. Then I get this text from Janae that you were under
arrest
. And now I’m here, and you don’t even seem a little bit happy to see me when I missed you like crazy. Don’t I even get an explanation as to why?” His hurt and worry were boiling over and turning to anger more and more by the second. His girl had a rough night, she’s acted like it was his fault, and now she ordered him around like he’s her servant waiting to attend to every order she barked.

“We’ll talk about it later. Right now I just want to get the hell out of here, get cleaned up, and get some decent breakfast.”

He opened the truck door for her, and she climbed in, pulled down the visor, and started checking her appearance in the mirror. He stood looking at her through the window for a moment while she ignored him, puzzled by the icy greeting he was receiving. He walked around to get into the driver’s seat then he turned and looked at her expectantly. “Well?”

“Well, nothing. Take me home.”

“Like hell I will. Not until you tell me what the fuck’s going on here.” Ryan’s patience grew thin with her.

“I was arrested for drunk and disorderly conduct at The Side Bar. I got into a fight with some stupid bitch. They called the cops. She didn’t get arrested, but I did because I was drunk and pissed and thought the cops were arresting the wrong person and I told them so.” Ryan pictured the scene. He’d only seen her extremely intoxicated on a few occasions, and knew she wasn’t always a fun drunk.

“I guess you should be happy that’s all you got arrested for then. They probably could have got you for resisting arrest, assaulting a police officer, and a few more things.” He laughed briefly, trying to lighten the mood between them for a moment.

“The bitch had it coming, Ryan! I didn’t attack her without a reason.”

“Tell me, Krissy. Exactly what reason was enough for you getting thrown in jail and probably losing your job over?” Ryan sat back in his seat and closed his eyes waiting.

“I left work with the excuse that I was sick. I am pissed at you. I decided if you could be drunk in the middle of the day then so could I.”

He already knew where this was headed. He had heard many times how she felt about them being apart for long periods of time. If they continued the tour with the mega band, Frission, more wild women would fill their intoxicated nights, and who knew what else. Her imagination would run wild, especially after she read the tabloid reports about the first half of the tour. He needed to hear the rest.

“Yeah, go on. You leaving early from work didn’t get you arrested.”

“So, I went to the bar and was minding my own business when this ho-bag is sitting a couple of stools over started running her mouth like we were just gonna be new BFFs and shit. I didn’t want to talk to anyone, but she kept on and on.”

“Now, wait a minute, Krissy. Did you go to a bar alone? That’s not like you to do that.”

“I called some friends but since it was the middle of the day they were all still at work. Janae was coming to join me when she got off, but everything happened before she could get there.”

“You should have waited until after work then. You know that wasn’t a safe idea.”

“It was the middle of the day asshat. How unsafe can downtown be in the middle of the day? Besides that, we go there all the time, and the people who run the place know us.

“
Then
, she moved over next to me and looked right at me, and said, ‘I know you. You’re one of the groupies that always follows Assured Distraction. Those guys are hot. I’ve seen them a lot of times around Austin.’

“That didn’t hit me the right way since I was already pissed and had a few beers in me. So, I looked at her and said, ‘I am not a groupie. My boyfriend is in the band.’ And do you know what that skanky bitch said to me? She said, ‘Yeah, honey, that’s what all the groupies say so they can feel better about letting those dudes get in their pants.’”

“Now, that shot my temper from zero to ten in about two seconds flat.”

“Don’t tell me, Krissy. You launched into her in the bar?”

“Hell no, I didn’t! But I wanted to. I just leaned back and looked at her, told her she had it wrong, that I’ve been Ryan Powell’s girlfriend for eight months now. The bitch had the nerve to laugh in my face.” Ryan knew where this was leading, and it didn’t look good no matter what spin she put on it.

Krissy continued, “‘well, he’s on the road now. I bet he’s got lots of girlfriends,’ she told me with this uber-bitchy look on her face. I got up and moved to one of the tables with my drink and tried to ignore her. I knew you were coming home to me, and I just tried to focus on that. Then a couple of her girlfriends came in and she just kept running her mouth, getting louder and louder the more she drank. She turned around from the bar and tried to call me out as a delusional A.D. groupie. She even had the nerve to tell them that she had hooked up with you after a concert at Red Eye Fly. She said it loud enough for everyone in the bar to hear it, too. After that, I don’t know what exactly happened because I saw red.”

Ryan stared at her in shock at her story, both the confrontation and the outcome. He shook his head and let out a long, weary sigh. Things had been going downhill since he’d stepped on the bus after the last show. He knew the blame was all going to come down to him, as it often did when things didn’t go Krissy’s way, and he wanted to do whatever he could to smooth this over quickly. He didn’t need anything else to fight with her over.

He softened when he realized that it was all behind them so why continue dredging it up. His girl was within arm’s reach, and he didn’t want to waste another minute not touching her. He leaned over the console intending to wrap his arms around her, but she jerked away from him and shoved at his chest. Staring at her in momentary confusion and hurt, he chalked it up to her foul mood and started the truck and drove home in silence.

When they arrived at his apartment, all Ryan wanted to do was pull her into the shower with him, wash away the miles of road and weeks of frustration, and then take her to bed with him, but he could tell by her demeanor that was never going to happen now. He walked through the door with her pulling his suitcase. Krissy spotted it and spun around staring at it and then him like a lightbulb had turned on in her head.

“So when were you planning to tell me?” She waited for a response.

“Tell you what?”

“Ugh! You make me so damn mad, Ryan Powell. I already know about the fucking, stupid second-half of Frisson’s tour. How long were you going to wait to tell me, huh? Maybe wait until you got some makeup sex? Think again, you sorry asshole! NOT. GONNA. HAPPEN! Right now, having any kind of sex with you is completely off the radar.

“I heard the news this morning after we talked last. The DJ on the radio was bragging about how Assured Distraction, the local Austin band, was tearing up the airwaves with their new individual iTunes releases and now had been invited to make the second-half of the tour with Frisson. Did you think you could keep that news from me for very long?”

“Now wait a minute, Krissy. I planned to tell you first thing, but you didn’t give me a fucking chance. You were in freaking lockup, remember? JAIL, KRISSY! What kind of woman gets herself thrown in jail over a damn bar fight? I’m so mad at you right now. If I wasn’t a gentleman, I shake some sense into you.”

“No, you wait a damn minute. You’re sure as shit not going to turn this around and make it about me. This is all on you. You took off on tour to play rockstar with your little rock band wannabes. Y’all were
too good
to continue playing here in the Austin area where there are plenty of great places to keep you busy for a lifetime. NO, that just wouldn’t satisfy you or the rest of the band, would it?”

“No, Krissy, you’re right. It damn sure wouldn’t do anymore. We are moving up to the next fucking level, and we damn well deserve it. We’ve played every smoky dive bar and every hazy club around here for years, Krissy. We fucking need to move now while the time is right. And that time is right fucking now.”

Krissy wouldn’t let it go. She turned and got back into his face again.

“I can’t do this again, Ryan. Two months, two full months, that’s how long you left me. You barely get home and you already packing to leave me, AGAIN! ” Krissy stomped around the apartment so mad with Ryan that she had to lash out with more angry words. “When do
I
come first? When does what
I want
matter? Will I EVER come before the band?”

Ryan took a second to calm down because the argument was getting out of hand. He hated yelling and screaming, and this wasn’t his style at all. He was a lover, not a fighter. He knew this kind of yelling was wrong for their relationship, and he was determined to find a way to make peace, but he simply didn’t know how to at this point. He could talk rationally with her without the yelling, but apparently she couldn’t.

Finally, taking a deep breath, he calmly stated, “Krissy, we have to go. It’s not like I’m leaving to get away from you. You know I can’t stand us being apart. But this is what we’ve been working toward for years. The tour is huge for us,” Ryan tried everything to placate her; he was done fighting.

“It may be huge
for the band
, but it sure as hell is not
huge
for us, as in you and me!”

“Don’t say that, Kitten. You know this isn’t about you and me.” This subject was getting old with him already. He loved his Kitten, but he did not love the feral claws that came with her, ready to scratch every time he had to choose his obligations as a band member.

“Don’t call me that. You know I hate it. This damn sure is about us, and you know it.” Krissy seemed determined not to let this go, and a sense of dread started to creep into Ryan’s chest. “Constant touring is exactly the reason Janae wanted Jacoby out of the band. When they started getting better, she invited me to go over there and keep her company. She knew y’all would be gone all the time, and I would be alone. We talked about how this was going to be our lives now, and it sucks, Ryan.” She was practically whining at this point.

“No fucking way you are going to compare us to them. She’s the devil incarnate, and you know it. Look how badly she messed with Jacoby’s head trying to make him feel guilty over cheating given the chance on the road. That he might fucking cheat on her in the future! What kind of trust did she have in him? None, Krissy. Damn, she got him to quit the band over it and take some shitty day job, for Christ’s sake, and I know he’s miserable. He fucking loves music. It was his life before she got into his head. And now, it sounds like she got to you, too. She’s obviously convinced you I’m not trustworthy either. I spent two months on the road doing nothing wrong. I ignored other women’s advances. I was enjoying the music too much to worry about finding someone else.”