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“Everything?” Jenni double-checks like a deprived housewife who doesn’t get her kinks untwisted daily.
“Everything,” I pledge before air-blowing them kisses and hotfooting it inside.
I’ve only just stored my phone away when a conversation in my dressing room slows my steps. “Have you known Nicole long?”
“No.” Laken’s chuckle would sound authentic if he didn’t grind his teeth together at the end of it. “We only recently met.” He waits a beat before adding, “I’m her bodyguard.”
“Her bodyguard?” I picture Bonnie’s dark brows raised into her hairline when she breathes out, “Wow.”
“Don’t make it sound like that. It’s nothing important.”
I stand tall with my shoulders back when Bonnietskshim. “How can you say that? That girl has a gift.”
“She does.” I won’t mention how wildly my heart beats during Laken’s confession because I need to store oxygen for the brutal blow he hits my lungs with two seconds later. “But not like this. The only thing I should be protecting her from is excessive jazz hands and a hideous eighties getup.”
I almost cuss Knox’s vision to hell until Bonnie says, “The eighties are making a comeback.” I wish she would end their conversation, but regretfully, she continues. “But I’ve heard rumors from the girls that things aren’t great. I was hoping it was jealousy.”
Laken digs the knife in deeper. “Believe me, it isn’t.”
A brief stint of silence prevails before the last person I want to see busts my watch.
Laken startles when he spots me at his station, and although he looks me in the eyes for the first time in twenty-four hours, the remorse in them doesn’t match the callousness of his words.
“Did you tell them it’s only been a little over thirty hours since we…” He wets his lips with a slow, teasing lick to get across his point. “Or were they talking about another random stranger you hooked up with before me?”
15
LAKEN
You’re a fucking ass.
A complete and utter prick.
You don’t deserve a woman like Nicole, much less the ability to add her name to your stats.
When my inner monologue becomes too honest to ignore, I cuss my arrogance to a painful death before stomping backstage at a dance studio brimming with chatty teens and a handful of scruffy-looking adults who appear oddly out of place.
I didn’t mean to make out Nicole is a slut. My anger got the better of me, and I took it out on who I believed was responsible for the black tar filling my heart.
Nicole isn’t solely to blame. Knox’s confession last night that my mother is back in River’s life started my downward spiral. Then, the constant bend of mattress springs from Nicole and Knox’s room pulled the tracks out from beneath me.
I tried to drown out their antics by shoving a pillow over my head before drowning my sorrows with a bottle of whiskey. Nothing worked. Even drunk, I couldn’t escape the noises of someone getting down and dirty in a room only two up from mine.
It killed me hearing them, and it’s had me acting like a bear with a sore head ever since, but not even alcohol poisoning gives me the right to disrespect Nicole the way I did. I was out of line, and if I’m honest, I’m hopeful my giant step out of bounds will get me fired.
I tried to talk to Knox again this morning, but he’s refusing to acknowledge that I’m not the best person to protect Nicole.
With him not willing to listen, I took a dig at the person he refers to as the “love of his life.”
Knox has changed a lot from the man I once knew, but not even someone as laid-back as him would let his girl be called a whore and not have something to say about it.
Partway down the hallway that saw my personality stoop to the level my conviction automatically lumps onto my name, I’m stopped by Knox. “Where are you going? I need you out there.” He jerks his chin in the direction I just left.
“I need to speak with…Bonnie.” You have no fucking clue how close I came to blurting out Nicole’s name. “I won’t take a minute.”
He twists me away from the dressing room and shoves me back toward the stage area. “There’s no time. I need you out there with the masses, protecting Nicole like you’re paid to do.”
“It’s fine—”
