Page 88 of Anthem of Love and Loathing

“Stop worrying about the band. We’re solid, bro,” Bronx clasps Riot on the shoulder. “Seriously.”

“Tell her she looks gorgeous,” Kodiak says.

Riot looks at me. Really takes in the red hair. “She knows...”

“Knows what?” Kodiak rolls his hands, one over the other.

“Gorgeous. She knows she’s gorgeous, okay?”

Heat crawls up my neck. I busy myself with an imaginary loose thread at my neckline. I don’t want him to see that his words landed when they shouldn’t have.

“Great. Now maybe pull that stick out of your ass.” Kodiak’s mouth turns up smugly.

Riot scowls at him.

“Viens, mon amie.” The stylist grabs my hand and tugs me away from all three guys. He helps me back into my chair and announces, “We still have work to do.”

I take a full breath, the kind that should ease the tension inside me, but does nothing for the needy ache I have. “Can I pretty please eat my lunch first?”

He huffs but nods. “Five minutes.”

The three men share a short, quiet exchange before Kodiak and Bronx leave me alone with the stylist, his entourage, and Riot.

Riot brings the paper bag and drinks over. He unpacks two Seattle dogs loaded with cream cheese, sauteed onions, sriracha, and jalapenos.

My stomach complains like she hasn’t eaten in days. It’s weird. When I wasn’t eating every day, the hunger went away. But staying with the guys... having access to food... I’m ravenous.

In more ways than one.

Picking up the dog, I stuff one end into my mouth.

Riot watches me, his own hotdog hovered halfway to his mouth.

I bite down.

He grimaces and resumes focus on eating. But then his gaze drifts back to me, curious. “You want them, don’t you? Kodiak? Bronx? Golden too? Did you want them when we were together? Well, not Kodiak...”

I take another big bite and chew thoughtfully. It’s different than it was. Bronx and Golden and I used to flirt and play around but we all knew the score. They would never do anything to harm the band, and I was never going to do anything to hurt Riot.

But it turns out Riot hurt me and he blames me for harming the band. My stupid fantasies don’t seem like such a big deal anymore. “I’m not going to sleep with them.”

He tips his head to the side. “No?”

“Not because you’ve ordered them to stay away from me. You don’t have that much say in my life anymore. But because...” My fantasies used to end with him being consumed with wanting me, and then he did want me, but it wasn’t how I thought it would be at all.

My sexual fantasies still end that way because the way he plays my body... no one has ever had the dynamic we have between us. But after this morning that is never going to happen again. “They are my friends and I care about keeping it that way. I’m not trying to destroy the band.”

“That would be a hell of a lot easier to believe if you didn’t almost manage it last time,” he says.

He talks like I set out to burn it all down. I lost my temper on a woman who was going out of her way to provoke me. A woman who wanted and took my boyfriend and the father of my unborn baby. A bitch who could call shots with the record label. But I can’t find it in me to regret it. “I punched Sonatina. I walked away. That’s hardly grounds to accuse me of trying to destroy a band I put my heart and soul into helping get from your brother’s basement to the national stage.”

“What about the money?” He puts down his food; his eyes locked on me.

“The money?” What the hell is he on about? Onion and a big dollop of sriracha drip onto the paper I’m using as a plate. “Is that supposed to mean something to me?”

His brow pulls tightly together. He rolls his lip inward. “The money you stole from us?”

The what I what now? Seriously. What is happening right now? “I have no clue what you’re talking about.”