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I tilted my chin up and she doused my hair. We were in Charlotte, in a hair salon downtown. Brit had talked to the salon’s owner and convinced him to let her use the space after hours so she could give us all haircuts. I had no idea how she’d done it, but it was eleven o’clock at night and she’d already done Neal, Denver, and Stone. They’d escaped back to their hotel rooms, and now it was my turn.
“I know it’s just a haircut,” I said. Brit squirted shampoo onto her palm and started scrubbing my scalp. I tried not to let out a pleasurable groan. “It’s just that I recall some duress happening.”
“You owe me,” Brit said, rinsing and then squirting conditioner onto her palm. “I’ve been running errands for all of you for weeks. And you nearly killed me with that streaking stunt.”
“I apologized for that.” I really had felt bad. When we’d come up with that stupid idea, I hadn’t thought Brit would ever know about it, and I definitely hadn’t considered that she’d think we were high. She wasn’t out of line, either. Any other year we’d been on the road, when we pulled shit like that, we were definitely drunk, with weed layered in. We had all of our dumbest moments in that state.
“I accepted your apology,” Brit said. “But the haircut situation is dire.”
“Hmmm.” I was enjoying the feeling of her hands on my scalp. Also, when I dropped my gaze, I could see down the neck of her shirt where she leaned over. It was literally a sight for sore, hard-up, reborn-virgin eyes like mine. Her bra had lace on it. Her skin looked warm, and I would have given every dollar I earned on this tour to know what it tasted like.
“Did you shampoo the other guys?” I asked, wondering if my bandmates had enjoyed this incredible view.
“No, because they all showered first. Unlike you.”
“I forgot. But I can’t say I’m unhappy about it.”
Brit doused me with water again. “Why not?”
“Because this is the most pornographic thing I’ve seen in months. I think I might die of happiness right now.”
Brit froze for a second as she realized what I was talking about. “Axel!”
“Have pity on me,” I said. “You’ve seen me naked, anyway. And those are the nicest breasts I’ve ever seen.”
She made a strangled sound—pleasure? Embarrassment? It was hard to tell. She turned off the water, grabbed a towel, and dropped it unceremoniously over my eyes, shutting out the glorious view. “Sit up. We’re done.”
I sighed, slowly scrubbing the towel over my face and through my wet hair. I shouldn’t be flirting with her, but those reallywerethe nicest breasts I’d ever seen. And that was saying something.
“Sit there.” Brit pointed to one of the salon chairs. She had twisted her hair up, and tendrils fell around her face and down her neck. She was wearing a sleeveless top and jeans I’d seen a dozen times by now, because we were all living out of suitcases. Her lashes were dark and she had lip gloss on. I wanted to devour her whole. I had this impulse every time I saw her lately. Maybe I always had.
I sat in the chair, and Brit draped the cape over my shoulders, spinning me toward the mirror. “Admit it,” I said. “You got that photograph from Sienna Maplethorpe, and you used it to blackmail us into getting haircuts.”
“I have no idea what you’re talking about.” She didn’t even try to sound innocent. “I found that picture myself, of course. Didn’t you like it?”
The photo was horrifying. Brit had texted it to us all this afternoon. It was a candid snapshot of the Road Kings, taken sometime during our first tour, when we were all of twenty-two or so. The four of us were standing in front of a club, on a dingy street, posing for the camera before we went inside for the show. Who the hell had taken the picture? A fan? We didn’t have fans back then. The club owner? I couldn’t remember the picture at all, and neither could the other guys. But someone had taken it, and all these years later, someone had sent it to Brit.
We were dressed badly in it—thrift-store shirts, jeans that were out of style even then. But the point of the photo, the blackmail part, was the hair.
The terrible, terrible hair.
Denver had an overgrown Beatlemania thing happening that flopped partly over his eyes. Stone’s hair was so long it went past his shoulders, and he had a weird, creepy beard. I had done a home bleach job, so my hair was platinum and obviously damaged. And Neal had an honest to god mullet.
When the photo had come up on my phone, I cringed so hard I bent over double, right there in my hotel room, my hands on my knees. A painful sound had emitted from my throat, like someone had punched me in the face. I might have shouted “No!” into the ether.
Brit had followed the picture with a text:You’re all getting haircuts tonight, or this picture goes public.
Sienna had to be behind this. She was a journalist, and she was out to get us. I wouldn’t put it past her to dig up that picture from whatever hellish depths it had long disappeared into. And Brit had made a deal with the devil to get that photo from her.
I low-key cringed again, sitting in this chair, just from the memory of that picture. “What are you going to do to me?” I asked Brit.
“I’m still deciding.” She sounded amused as her fingers wandered through my hair. “What do you think? Some bleach? A mullet?”
“Neal refuses to apologize for the mullet.” He claimed he’d actually gotten laid because of that haircut.You have no idea how many women secretly love a mullet,he’d said.They just don’t want to admit it.“But the bleach was a mistake. It took forever to grow out. Holy shit, that feels good. Did you do this to all of your L.A. clients?”
“Do what?”
“This.” I pointed in the mirror to where her fingers were wandering through my hair, the strands trailing over the backs of her hands. She had made no move to start cutting. She hadn’t even picked up her scissors. “You’re petting me.”
