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I sniffed and blew out a big breath. “I’m okay. Physically. Something happened and there’s no one else I can talk to about it.”
“Go.”
I told him a censored version of the story with the t-shirt, one that didn’t involve me being upset about anything other than the shirt. “It was too late to do anything and I knew she wasn’t trying to hurt me so I just left. Screaming at her wouldn’t have helped anything. I needed space for the night so I checked into a motel.”
“Shit, Lay. I’m sorry.” He seemed to be thinking about something and finally he cleared his throat. “I kept a box of their shirts back then. I knew you’d wear the ones you got until they fell apart so I wanted to make sure you always had at least a few. I’ll mail you a new one.”
My eyes burned and my chest felt like someone was sitting on it. It took me a minute to be able to speak around the emotion clogging my voice. “You’re the best brother in the world, Jagger. I don’t know what I’d do without you.”
His voice sounded suspiciously wobbly when he replied. “You’d be fine without me. You’re a fighter. You’re smart and tough and smart as hell. You don’t need anyone to be okay, Layla Rose.”
I sat up and hugged my knees to my chest. “Is everything okay, Jag?”
He let out a quiet laugh. “Yeah. Just worried about my baby sister. Do I need to come crack some heads?”
“No, but you could come and see me soon. I miss you. You could hang out with the band when you got tired of me, too.” I knew I sounded desperate if I was offering up the band to get him to come and visit, but I didn’t care. I just needed comfort.
“I don’t know if I can get away from work right now, but I’ll look at my calendar, okay?” He sighed. “Things have been busy around here.”
I nodded even though he couldn’t see me. I just didn’t know if I could handle more disappointment in that moment. “Sure. Of course. Hey, thanks for answering. I just needed to talk for a minute but I feel better.”
“Layla…”
I ignored the hesitation in his voice and rushed on. “I love you, Jagger. I’m going to sleep this mood off and tomorrow will be better. Get some sleep, big bro.”
I hung up before he could say anything else and saw I had a dozen texts from Nick after turning airplane mode off to call Jagger. I quickly turned it back on and didn’t read a single message. I just wanted peace. At least for a few hours.
I shoved both earbuds deep in my ears and hugged my purse to my chest. The music screamed at me but I never managed to fall asleep. I just pretended I was sleeping while doing my best to not imagine what positions the naked woman could get into that I couldn’t.
23
Layla
Thesuncomingupwas a blessing. Without sleeping for even a few minutes, I’d just been over trying. I wanted to leave the motel and figure out if I could get through a day of travel with the guys before I jumped out of the moving bus. I didn’t have high hopes.
I took a shower that left me feeling dirtier than when I’d got into it somehow and then got dressed. I’d grabbed leggings and a sports bra. Nothing else. Frustration and the need to cry were still right under the surface, bubbling away inside me, and the sports bra really pissed me off. The last thing I wanted was to have my tits shoved inside something that felt eight sizes too small and made them look like a uniboob.
The moment I turned my phone on to order a car, it started ringing. I saw it was Jagger and answered. “Up late and early, huh? Aren’t we a tired sack?”
“What are you doing, Layla? I got calls from every member of my favorite band last night, asking me if I knew where you were. That was weird, let me tell you. Then, I get a call from your security guard. When the hell did you get a security guard? He made clear that if I knew where you were and didn’t tell him, he’d drive his happy ass to Tennessee to knock my two front teeth out. If I even had them to begin with.”
I gasped. “Nick said that?!”
“Oh, yeah. Your boy was stressed. I could hear JAX shouting in the background. Tell Nick when you see him that it’s so cute that he tried to play tough, but I’ve flossed with stronger stuff than him.” Jagger snorted. “You scared the shit out of me, though. Their fear was too real.”
I grabbed my purse with my clothes stuffed inside and decided to walk and talk. “I’m sorry, Jag. I didn’t mean to scare you. I’m sorry they called you. I don’t know why they did. I guess they didn’t last all that long with scissor girl.”
“Oh, no. Scissor girl had a bad night, too. She was escorted off the bus by security, apparently. When I got on the phone with Jones Alridge last night, I ripped him a new one for letting people near your things and Jones Aldridge informed me that he’d been made aware of the great shirt debacle and that he’d let naked girl know that she’d fucked up. He also tried to order a shit ton of authentic, vintage concert shirts last night. He only didn’t because I informed him that that wasn’t the important part. Unless he could order them to have been worn by our dead parents, they didn’t matter. I really played up the guilt for you.” He took a deep breath. “But Jones Aldridge… I’m still a little starstruck.”
I was stopped on the sidewalk, stunned by the words coming out of Jagger’s mouth. “Wow.”
“Yeah. I’m glad you finally answered, though. I knew you were fine, but I let their fear get the best of me.” He grew silent and I knew whatever he said next would suck.
“What’d you do, Jag?”
“Well, after a while I got worried. I just needed to know you were safe for my own sanity. I remembered that we did that fun thing with that app before so we could track each other…”
“I wasn’t a part of that! You did that to me so you could make sure I wasn’t sneaking down to the bad parts of LA!”
