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I squeezed my eyes shut and held out my hand to make him stop. “I have to finish breaking down the stage.”
Jones shrugged. “We’ll come help you.”
“No!” I took a deep breath and lowered my voice. “No. I don’t think I want to be around any of you right now.”
“What the hell, Layla?” Xavier crossed his arms over his chest. “We didn’t get in any real trouble. The cops were really nice about everything. It was just a misunderstanding.”
“A misunderstanding? Cocaine is a misunderstanding?” I scrubbed my hands over my face and shook my head. “Was Miriam a misunderstanding, too?”
Jones’ face hardened. “What are you talking about?”
“You know… I thought I was having a shit night when my ex wanted to have a heart to heart about cheating. He even had a cute little picture of you dragging Miriam into the bathroom. He’s crushed, by the way. Then, I get a call from the police about you three.” I dug my nails into my thighs to keep the emotions at bay. “For a moment, the cheating didn’t matter. My heart fucking stopped. The last time I got a call from the cops, I found out my parents were dead. I thought there’d been another accident.
“Nope. Just a cocaine misunderstanding, apparently. I had to stop doing my job to come pick y’all up from the police station. Because of a fucking cocaine misunderstanding. I’ve had a long night. I’m angry and I’m not in a place where I want to listen to men lie to me. I’d rather do my work alone.”
“I didn’t sleep with Miriam, Layla.” Jones growled out the words. “And the cocaine wasn’t ours.”
I turned so I was facing him completely and folded my hands in my lap, doing my best to stay composed. “Do you want to know how I talk to guys at the bar, Jones? After a few drinks, I like to grab them by the hand and tug them into the bathroom with me. It’s just so much nicer in the bathroom, where people are shitting and crying about their boyfriends cheating. It’s the perfect fucking atmosphere for talking. I’m guessing you’re the same way with your female friends?”
Mack put his arm across Jones’ chest and shook his head. “Let’s all calm down first and we can talk in the morning.”
“I’ve been fighting to be with you for months now, Layla! When are you going to fucking get that? I don’t want Miriam or anyone else. I don’t know how else to get it through your head!” Jones pushed Mack’s arm aside and leaned into the car. “I didn’t fuck her. If you really think I did, you’re crazy. If you’d let us explain, you’d understand what that photo really shows. Also, mighty convenient of your ex to get such a perfect picture, isn’t it? And he just happened to come running to your side with that photo, just so you guys could be buddies and cry together? Or did you ever consider he’s still trying to fuck you? Did he make a move tonight? After telling you that I’m a cheater? Did he?”
I stubbornly kept silent.
“Of course, he did. Of fucking course.” Leaning even farther into the car, Jones met my gaze with fire in his eyes. “Well. Did you fuck him?”
I slammed my hands into his chest to shove him away. “Fuck you for asking me that! I’m not a cheater! When I love someone, I love them with every part of me. How dare you ask me that!”
He caught my hands and pinned them to his chest while I fought against him. “When you love someone, huh? When you love someone, you just accuse them of the worst shit and believe the worst shit about them?”
Tears filled my eyes but that just made me struggle even harder to get away from him. “I don’t love you! I hate you. I hate you for making me feel like this!”
Mack sighed. “Liar.”
“You know I didn’t fucking cheat on you, Layla. Jesus, I can’t think of anything but you.” Jones dragged me across the seat and into his arms. “The cocaine was Miriam’s. I saw her take it out and wave it around like a goddamn nutjob. I took her into the bathroom to force her to give it to me away from prying eyes. If she was clean like she said she was, I didn’t want to stand by and just let her use. I shouldn’t have gone in with her alone. I’m sorry. But I didn’t cheat on you, Layla. I wouldn’t hurt you. And I wouldn’t hurt me by making you hate me.”
I fought my tears and clung to his chest. I was mixed up, but I wasn’t so mixed up that I didn’t believe him.
From behind the guys, shouting broke the silence we’d fallen into. “I told you to fuck him, you idiot. You had one job!”
I saw red as the voice and the words lined up. I forced my way out of the car and yanked my hair up in a bun. If I hadn’t broken his nose the first time, I was going to make damn sure I did that time.
37
Layla
Ontheothersideof the parking lot, The Homewreckers’ tour bus sat the opposite way of ours so I had to go around it to find Matthew yelling at Miriam by the bus door. She saw me first and her eyes went wide.
“Nothing happened, Layla!” She held up her hands but I wasn’t concerned about her.
“You sonofabitch!” I pulled my fist back and let it fly, hitting Matthew across the cheek. My hand instantly throbbed and I tried to shake out the pain, but watching him hold his face and bend over in his own pain made me feel better. “First of all, don’t shout at her like that!”
Miriam frowned. “You’re sticking up for me?”
“You deserve a better manager than this piece of donkey shit. Him telling you to fuck someone for his own personal gain is disgusting. You may not be my favorite person, but you should fire his ass.” I looked back at Matthew. “Back to my points. Second of all, setting up a guy to cheat on me is just weird behavior. Do you get off on me being cheated on? That’s some bullshit version of sadism if I ever heard it. Third of all, if you gave those drugs to Miriam as a part of your stupid scheme, I’ll hit you again. Harder.”
Matthew swore as he glared at me while still holding his face. “You fucked your way to this job and you think you’ve got it all figured out, don’t you? I just want you back where you belong. Under me, doing my work and putting out when I call you. You had to go and fuck it all up, though. I was going to propose and give you a few kids. You ruined all of that, though.”
