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It wasn’t until the twins were asleep that I finally pulled out my cell and pulled up my text messages. I only had one text from Harris that he’d sent when he’d gotten up earlier.
Love you, Lucy.
That text had gotten me through dinner and the movie, but now as I lay down to try and sleep, I started missing him even more. I should have been able to fall straight asleep since I’d gotten zero sleep the night before, but it eluded me.
Swiping my thumb over his name, I lifted the phone to my ear, needing to hear his voice just once before I could close my eyes.
Chapter 18
Harris
If I thought I could just come back and handle everything with the wave of my hand, I was wrong. Peyton had caused me enough headache to keep me on my toes for weeks, it seemed.
The friends she had brought in hadn’t gotten into a fight with just any VIP, but one of the biggest names in basketball right then, Greg York. Two of the guys Peyton had with her had jumped the guy because Tiny was going to let him up as he normally would. Peyton, who had promised them all she could get them upstairs with all the other important celebrities she ‘knew’, hadn’t been able to follow through with her promise and they had all gotten pissed.
Now I was facing backlash from the press because one of my staff had incited the fight on top of the bad publicity from the fans of York’s who was supposed to be playing in the Olympics in a few weeks with the rest of the American team. He couldn’t play with how bad his jaw was broken. I already had one lawyer call me regarding the lawsuit the ballplayer’s agent was trying to make happen and the cops wanted to talk to me as well.
It was a clusterfuck and one I was not in the mood to handle with the cool head and patience that it needed.
As soon as I got to the club late that afternoon, the Blonde Bombshells were waiting on me. I’d called Genesis and told her to have her girls in my office by the time I got there or I was going to fire them all. The contract they had all signed had stipulations should anything like this happen and I could cancel it at any time should they defame my club or myself in any way. Natalie had taught me well about making sure my ass was covered on every possible basis business-wise. I had one of the best lawyers in California at my back to ensure there were no loopholes and made any contract I put my name on as airtight as humanly possible.
The Blonde Bombshells had some serious talent and I had wanted to get them a deal with a manager and a label while they were still under contract with me, but their inability to get along had left even Emmie Armstrong reluctant to work with them. Mostly it had been Genesis and London’s bickering at each other. I figured it was just a jealousy thing and had stayed out of it as much as possible. They continued to come to me and tried to pull me into their arguments, but I wanted nothing to do with anything that didn’t concern the club.
Roanna and Aubree were great to work with, though. Roanna was the lead singer of the group and her voice left goose bumps on my arms when she hit those damn high notes. She was sweet, perhaps too sweet for the rock world, but then again I didn’t really know her that well. The other girls tended to shelter her from the world and I couldn’t help wondering why. Aubree, on the other hand, was so fierce she reminded me of Kin and I’d come to like her a little more than the other four girls.
Peyton had always been my least favorite of the girls. She was too conceited, acted like the world owed her something and she was entitled to everything. She had never worked hard for anything in her life and it showed. She was a self-absorbed little bitch who wasn’t happy unless she was making someone else’s life miserable.
Normally I had a lot of patience and could handle anything thrown at me when it came to work, but this shit had pulled me away from the only person I wanted to be with and I was beyond pissed when I walked into my office.
Slamming my office door behind me, I watched as four of the blondes jumped while the fifth one just played with something on her phone. I crossed to the chair where Peyton was sitting and swiped the phone out of her hands. Her head snapped up, anger already flashing at me from her brown eyes.
“What the fuck? I was about to beat level four-thirty-seven!”
“For fucking real?” I exploded. “You nearly get my club shut down and you’re only worried about beating some level on Candy Crush?”
She shrugged. “I was on a roll.”
Biting back a curse, I slung the phone across the room but didn’t feel even a little better when it shattered against the wall. Peyton jumped to her feet. “You owe me a new phone, asshat.”
“Sit down and shut up,” I roared. What little patience I’d had was completely gone now. She stood there, staring me down, then after a minute flopped ungracefully back down into her chair. I turned away from her, disgusted by the mere sight of her. “You’re gone, Peyton. I’m done dealing with your shit.”
“Big deal,” she muttered.
“A big deal is you tearing up all the work I’ve put into making First Bass what it is today. A big deal is you dragging me away from my girlfriend when I wasn’t supposed to be here until Tuesday. A big fucking deal is you shitting on everything that is important to me and not giving two fucks about the destruction you’ve caused.” I was yelling now, unable to hold back a second longer without actually exploding into a million pieces.
“Girlfriend?” Peyton’s eyes widened and her ears turned pink. “Bu
t…”
I ignored her as I turned my attention to the other four girls. No way was I discussing Lucy with any of them. It was none of their business if I had a girlfriend or not. I was their boss, and that was the beginning and end of our relationship. “You can all go with her, if you think she’s worth it. I don’t give a fuck anymore. You’ve all been more headache than you’re worth. I can have a new band here Thursday night to fill your spots with no problem at all. There are bands out there that’d kill to have this job.”
Genesis and London were already shaking their heads, for once agreeing on something. “No. We don’t want to leave with her. We’ve already decided that she’s out,” Genesis assured me, shooting Peyton a nasty look that the other chick only rolled her eyes at. “She’s pulling us down and we won’t sink with her.”
“Fine. But one more fuck up from any of you other four and you’ll all be gone.” I was done playing nice with them. “Good luck finding a record deal if you fuck with me again.”
“We won’t,” Roanna was the one to assure me, but I barely spared her a glance. “We’ll be on our best behavior, I swear it. Right, girls?”
“Yes,” the other three echoed.
