Outsider (11 page)

“For
the last time,” Steve yelled from behind his drum kit, “I’m not gay. I get more
pussy than a crazy cat lady on free-pet adoption day.”

“Would
you stop listening to Exodus End’s music if he was gay?” Reagan yelled at the
crowd, her emotions so overwhelming that her hands were shaking. “Our private
lives are none of your fucking business! We’re here to rock, not have a
discussion.”

“What
do
you
know?” someone yelled from the audience. “You’re not even a real
member of the band!”

Reagan
didn’t see which loud-mouthed guy yelled those hurtful words, but they struck
her in the chest hard enough to steal her breath. She couldn’t argue; he was correct.
But it still hurt to always be the outsider.

“Reagan’s
right—we’re here to rock,” Max said. “Time to crank, crank, crank it up.” He
made a twisting motion with his free hand, shaking his perfect leather-clad ass
to the beat in his head.

Signaling
the start of “Crank,” Steve slammed one of his bass drums so hard, Reagan jumped.
She hurriedly shoved her earpiece back into place and played the rapid,
repetitive riff that carried the hard and gritty song. She watched the jeering
crowd, wondering how many of them wished she would disappear so Max could
reclaim rhythm guitar. She wasn’t sure when she started thinking of the fans as
her enemies, but she was no longer playing to delight them. She was playing to
show them that she belonged on this stage, that she was good enough. She wasn’t
a phony, Reagan Elliot was the real deal, and if they still denied her skill
after this performance, they were flat out
wrong
.

At
the end of the song, Reagan reached for a bottle of water and took several
swigs between gasps for air. She’d never played so hard in her life.

“Reagan
is on fire tonight,” Max said.

She
smiled slightly and took another drink. She kept up the same pace through the
entire performance. As they took their final bows after the encore, she clenched
and unclenched her aching fingers. Trailing behind the others as they exited
the stage, she examined her fingertips, which felt unusually raw and sore. She
winced at the spots of blood seeping through the crack in her middle finger.
She usually expended plenty of sweat while she played, but tonight she’d added
a few tears and even some blood. If that was what it took to prove her fretwork
spoke for itself, then she’d gladly bleed all over the stage.

“Are
you riding with Sinners?” Dare asked as they wound their way down the corridor
to their dressing room.

She
shook her head. “They’ve already left.”

“Trey
didn’t stay behind to be with you?”

“He
needed a quiet place to think. I sent him and Ethan ahead. I’ll meet up with
them at the hotel tonight.”

“He
missed seeing you at your finest,” Dare said, his smile wide. She was pretty
sure that was pride shining in his eyes.

She
shrugged, though it felt damned good that he’d noticed she’d put her all into
that performance. “I guess I should always play pissed off.”

The
after-parties had been canceled out of respect for Sed’s loss. No one felt like
celebrating anyway, not even party addict Steve Aimes. They trudged toward the
bus, ready to put Albuquerque behind them. Reagan couldn’t wait to snuggle
between Ethan and Trey later tonight and forget how cold the world outside
their embrace could be.

She’d
just put her foot on the bottom step when the familiar voice of Toni Nichols
carried across the parking lot.

“Logan!”
she yelled again, struggling in the arms of some security guard who’d caught
her around the waist and was doing his damnedest to keep her from getting any
closer.

Reagan
clenched both hands into fists and turned to take out some of her rage on the one
responsible for her foul mood. Dare blocked her path with his arm.

“Get
on the bus,” he said quietly while Toni screamed for Logan to listen to her,
claiming her innocence in a gut-wrenching wail.

Reagan
forced her feet up the steps, Dare’s hand at the small of her back reminding
her in which direction she should be moving.

“Logan,”
Dare said to the ashen-faced bassist behind him. “Don’t fall for her lies. Walk
away.”

Logan
closed his eyes and took a deep breath before stepping onto the bus. The door
swung shut behind him and he turned, pressing his forehead against the inside
of the door. He closed his eyes, his hand curled, fingertips digging into the
surface beside his crumpled face. There was a loud thud on the door’s opposite
side, and Reagan could hear Toni shouting and the repetitive beating of hands
on the side of the bus, but she couldn’t hear what Toni was saying. Eventually
the bus left the wolf in lamb’s clothing behind. And though Logan looked as if
they were dragging his heart along the asphalt behind them, Reagan was glad she
didn’t have to deal with Toni anymore. Damn, the woman was a good liar. If
Reagan hadn’t known better, she’d have thought Toni wasn’t responsible for the
mess they were in. But the evidence was irrefutable. The tabloid’s mole
couldn’t have been anyone else. How could a friend be so cruel?

Ethan
pushed a beer across the table to Trey and slid into the bench across from him.
Sed and Jessica had taken a flight home. Brian and his family, along with Jace
and Aggie—who apparently did a lot of sewing for her corset business—were in
the motorhome that followed Sinners’ bus everywhere. Eric and Rebekah had
stayed behind to help with tear down, Rebekah making sure the sound system was
packed just so while Eric mostly made a nuisance of himself. So besides the
driver, tonight it was just him and Trey on the bus. Which was good. Maybe
Ethan could find it in himself to talk.

Ethan
had read all the articles in the tabloid twice, and while he was called out as
the villain—sleeping with another man’s girlfriend—and Trey was depicted as a
clueless but loveable twit, Reagan had been completely trashed. And not just in
the article about her sex life with two men. Her integrity had been questioned.
Her talent had been crucified. She was a strong woman, but anyone would crumble
beneath that much condemnation.

“We
should have waited for Reagan.” Trey took a long swallow from his beer.

“She
told us to go ahead without her.” But Ethan had been thinking the same thing.

“What
should we do? It isn’t fair that she’s taken the fall for something we’re all
equally involved in.”

“What
do you suggest?”

Trey
gnawed on his lip. “I don’t know. Do you think it would help if we came out?”

Ethan
felt as if a heavy fist just slammed him in the chest. “Came
out
out?”

Trey
nodded.

“As
gay?” Just making sure here.

Trey
shrugged. “I was thinking we both come out as bisexual, but we could pretend
we’re gay and claim that Reagan doesn’t sleep with either of us. She’s just
trying to cover our forbidden relationship. We’ll pretend she’s our beard.”

Trey’s
foot pressed against Ethan’s beneath the table.

“I
think that would make things worse,” Ethan said. And he didn’t want the world
to know he slept with
both
women and men. His family would never speak
to him again. The thought of coming out as gay was daunting enough, but coming
out as bisexual? Not happening.

“We
should just tell the truth.”

“How
would that help anything? Reagan would still be sleeping with two different
men. They’d just know that we’re sleeping with each other too.”

“This
isn’t just about fucking,” Trey said. “It’s much more complicated than that.”

“I
know that and you know that and Reagan knows that, but how will the rest of the
world see what we have?”

“If
they’re smart, they’ll realize we’re in love.”

Ethan
snorted. “That will never happen and you know it.”

“So
what do you suggest we do?”

“Stage
a huge breakup between you and Reagan. You just found out she’s been sleeping
with her bodyguard behind your back. You should dump her, if for no other
reason than to save face.”

Trey
slammed his beer on the table. “I’m not breaking up with her because of this.”

Ethan
shook his head. “I don’t mean for real. If the tabloids want a story, give them
a story. But don’t tell them the truth.”

“How
am I supposed to act around her if everyone thinks we’ve just broken up?”

“Distant,”
Ethan said. “And it won’t be easy. I should know.”

Trey’s
hand slid across the table, and he trailed his fingertips over Ethan’s
knuckles. “I know it hurts you to have to pretend we’re not involved when we’re
in public.”

Ethan
nodded, his gaze trained on the table in front of him.

“Will
it make you feel better if I have to pretend as well?”

Ethan
lifted his gaze to Trey’s. No, he didn’t want Trey to feel the same disconnect
that he was forced to endure for the sake of public scrutiny. “Of course not. I
just don’t see any other solution.”

Trey
sighed and scratched his nose. “Maybe Reagan has an idea.”

“Is
she still onstage? We could call her. Ask her if she thinks dumping you is a
good idea.” Ethan winked at him to let him know he was joking.

Trey
snapped his fingers and pointed at Ethan’s chest. “I have an idea. We could
release a sex tape. I volunteer to be in the middle. It will put all the
public’s focus on
my
obvious perversion.”

Ethan
chuckled. “How sweet of you to sacrifice yourself for the common good.”

“I
promise to yell how much I love you both as I’m fucking her and being fucked by
you.”

Lust
curled low in Ethan’s belly as his thoughts fast-forwarded a few hours to when
he could be alone with both of his lovers and participate in exactly what Trey
was suggesting. Yet Ethan pushed his desire to the back burner to simmer. Trey
would sate his lust if Ethan showed his sudden need, but he knew Reagan was bothered
when they made love without her. She seemed to be under the impression that if
she weren’t present, he and Trey would decide she wasn’t a necessary variable
in their equation. She couldn’t have been more wrong.

After
an hour of discussing possible answers to their dilemma, neither was closer to
coming up with a real solution. Hopefully, Reagan had some valuable input. Trey
switched on the TV in the lounge and stretched out on the sofa to watch a
baseball game, signaling that he was done talking. Ethan joined him, sitting on
the end of the sofa and shifting Trey’s head onto his thigh. He smiled when
Trey unwrapped a cherry sucker and stuck it between his luscious lips, licking
and sucking at it as if it were the best thing he’d ever had in his mouth. If
the ornery imp kept it up, the desire Ethan had on simmer would be at a rolling
boil in no time and he’d put something a little bigger into that mouth of his.
Ethan stroked Trey’s bangs from his face, far more interested in watching him
than any televised ball game. Usually the tour bus was crowded, so Ethan kept
his ever-growing affection for Trey locked inside. But sitting alone with him,
he didn’t bother with the macho façade or feigned disinterest.

“I
love you,” he murmured, his fingers lost in the silky strands of Trey’s hair.

Trey
looked up at him and grinned, his smile lighting up his emerald-green eyes.
Even the adorable freckles on his nose seemed to brighten with happiness. “Best
news I’ve heard all day.”

Ethan’s
phone rang, and he would have let it go to voicemail if it had been anyone but
Reagan. The sound of her ringtone had him digging through his pocket.

“Hey,
babe,” he answered. “How’d the concert go?”

“The
concert was fine,” she said. “The rest of the evening sucked balls.”

“Did
she say she wants to suck our balls?” Trey asked, his devilish grin drawing a
smile from Ethan, but he didn’t dare laugh. He could tell Reagan was not in the
mood for jokes.

“Did
you have another run-in with Toni?” He’d never seen Reagan get physically
violent with anyone before. He was pretty sure if Butch hadn’t hauled the
little journalist off when he had, Reagan would have done a lot worse than
shove her.

“Not
directly, but can you believe Logan is already trying to patch things up with
her?”

“Love
is blind,” Ethan said, tracing Trey’s eyebrow and the small hoop piercing it
with one fingertip and then brushing over the freckles he adored on Trey’s nose.

“He’s
as much a traitor as she is as far as I’m concerned.”

“I’m
sure you’ll see things differently after you’ve had a nice bath and a soothing
massage and the two men who are the cause of all your troubles make love to you
until you can’t move.”

She
released a soft moan. “That sounds perfect.”

“We
know what you need.”

“I
wish I was there with you now. Are you at the hotel yet?”

Ethan
glanced toward the front windshield of the bus, but couldn’t tell where they
were. “Not yet, but we’re probably getting close. Do you want to talk to Trey?”

“Yeah.
Put him on.”

Her
conversation with Trey was entirely different from the one she’d had with him.
She told Trey about the performance and how the fans made her feel and how bad
her fingers hurt and other stuff only mutual guitar heroes could commiserate
about. Maybe she needed the two of them in her life as much as Ethan needed
both Trey and Reagan in his. They didn’t only fulfill each other’s excessive
sexual needs, but also met different emotional needs. Reagan came to him when
she needed to feel safe, and she went to Trey when she needed a deeper
understanding of all she was going through in the spotlight.

“Make
sure you put something on those fingers,” Trey said. “And eat something. You’ll
feel better.”

Trey
listened to her say something and replied, “I love you too.” A few seconds
later he added, “I’ll tell him.” He ended the call and handed Ethan his phone.
“She says she loves you and that since she can’t be here, she wants you to give
me a blow job while I finish watching my ball game.”

“She
said that, did she?” Ethan said, slipping his phone back into his pocket.

Trey
looked up at him through one partially closed eye. “Yep.”

“You
sure she didn’t say you should give me one?”

“I
give them to you all the time, E. You almost never—”

Ethan
pressed a finger to Trey’s lips. “Reagan’s had a rough day. I should probably
do what she says without arguing.”

Ethan
slid a hand down Trey’s suddenly quivering belly and unfastened his jeans. “Did
she say
why
I should give you a blow job?” Ethan teased, knowing damned
well this was all Trey’s idea.

“Because
I’ve been thinking about it since we moved over to the couch.” His eyes drifted
closed, and he sucked in a breath when Ethan’s hand circled his partially erect
dick.

“So
she’s a mind reader now?” Ethan said, massaging Trey’s cockhead, loving how his
touch made Trey tremble.

“She
must be.” Trey moaned as Ethan’s thumb rubbed his rim.

“Are
you sure she wanted me to use my mouth and not just my hand?” Ethan asked, his
grip light as he stroked Trey’s shaft.

“I
think she wanted you to do both.”

“Pull
your pants down for me.”

Trey
lifted his hips and tugged his pants and underwear down to the middle of his
thighs. He was far more obedient than Reagan was, and Ethan rewarded him for
his unquestioning cooperation by leaning sideways and licking the tip of his cock.
Trey’s head lifted from Ethan’s thigh as he shifted so he could watch. Ethan
knew Trey loved it when Reagan sucked him off, but he always went insane when
Ethan did it.

Ethan
shifted his hand between Trey’s legs to gently massage his balls, and then
further between them to brush one fingertip against his asshole.

Trey
groaned and opened his legs as far as his tangled jeans would allow. Ethan knew
he wanted penetration, but it was much more fun for them both if he toyed with
him, teased him, and made him beg.

“E,”
Trey gasped.

Ethan
drew the head of Trey’s cock into his mouth, sucking gently.

“Oh
God.” Trey’s head dropped back against Ethan’s thigh as he thrust his hips
upward, pushing himself deeper into Ethan’s mouth. Ethan waited until his hips
settled back on the sofa before he began to move his head, sucking gently as
his mouth rose and fell over Trey’s dick. Trey shifted restlessly, lifting his
head again to watch. His belly clenched, well-defined abdominal muscles
tightening. His fingers touched the back of Ethan’s head.

“So
sexy,” Trey murmured, and Ethan suppressed a grin. Ethan typically liked to
dominate, but he recognized how excited Trey became when he took a more
submissive role. Ethan’s ass clenched with expectation. Just how submissive did
he want to go here? He didn’t bottom for Trey often, but he was in an unusual
mood this evening.

“We
should take this back to the bedroom,” Ethan said before sucking Trey
vigorously accompanied by several rapid bobs of his head.

Trey’s
fingers clenched in Ethan’s hair, only relaxing when Ethan lightened his
suction and slowed his strokes. All the while, he continued to massage Trey’s
balls and tease his ass with his fingertip. The bus slowed, the tone of the
engine lowering as they exited the highway.