laughed.
Sasha all but lunged forward to the desk where she spoke with the two men in the suits. They must have been the owners of the business. Or the bosses.
Sasha always handled that part of the gig.
We just showed up, sang, and eventually got paid.
“Is she done yet?” Jess asked. “I need a cigarette.”
“You’re jumpy today,” I said. “What’s wrong?”
“I’m jumpy?” Jess asked, looking past Rae to me.
Then I had both Jess and Rae looking at me.
“What?” I asked.
“You’ve been a raging bitch,” Rae whispered. “I don’t know what happened, but something-”
“Thank you so much,” Sasha said in a loud voice.
I wanted to know what the hell Rae and Jess were talking about.
I mean, yeah, sure, things sucked a little.
When I came back home from Reed’s place, I took a long shower and then curled up into my bed and fought the urge to cry. I didn’t need the shower, but I needed to wash away anything that reminded me of him. As far as crying went, it just hurt that he refused to talk about what happened the night he kicked me out of the tour bus.
That was a day ago.
I spent the day and the night in bed.
When Valerie bothered me, I told her I had a stomach bug.
She made me eat soup and drink ginger ale.
I would have preferred cookies and vodka, which I did get later in the day.
Alone and thinking… not a good combination.
I replayed that night over and over.
We both had issues at that point. We weren’t together but pretty much were. Nothing had been official or given a title. That meant if Reed wanted to go fuck some groupies (this was before the world of Line Whores) he could. That meant if I wanted to enjoy myself with someone, I could do that too.
Did we ever do that?
I wasn’t sure.
I didn’t really care.
I liked Reed’s company. I liked laughing with him. I liked flirting with him. I liked having crazy, rock star sex with him.
And then the world suddenly blew up…
My thoughts were broken apart by a hand touching my lower back.
At some point Rae and Jess had walked away.
Sasha was still talking to the other two guys.
I stood alone, turning my head, looking at some tall, string bean looking guy with a perfect smile, touching my lower back.
“You have a great voice,” String Bean said to me.
“I know I do,” I said.
“Oh, a little confident and cocky there,” he said. “I like that. If you don’t mind me saying, you also have a great body. I wouldn’t mind listening to you sing to me… privately… one on one…”
His hand moved an inch down and I swung my right hand.
My fist uppercut against his jaw and his head snapped back.
“Oh, shit!” someone yelled. “She just punched Dale!”
Sasha looked at me and her eyes went wide.
“Don’t ever fucking touch me, you pig,” I yelled. “Who the fuck do you think you are? You think you can just grab at my ass and get away with it? You fucking scumbag.”
Jess appeared in front of me.
“Shut up,” she growled at me. “They have their phones out. Turn and walk away.”
My chin quivered and Jess nodded.
“I know,” she whispered.
String Bean wiped his bottom lip of blood. “Maybe don’t dress with such tight pants next time.”
I lunged forward and Jess pushed me away.
Before I could yell at her, she spun around and took a swing at String Bean.
“Jess! Stop!” Sasha yelled.
String Bean took a shot from Jess.
When Jess turned back around, she hurried toward me and hugged me.
We walked out of the building together.
“Hey, Jess?” I asked.
“What’s up?”
“I think I might need a cigarette.”
I didn’t smoke a cigarette.
But I did order two drinks to start when we went to the restaurant that Sasha picked out. She said it was a business meeting.
In other words, she wanted to yell at me for what I had done.
She was right.
We were supposed to be working.
Not attacking customers.
But my ass wasn’t something to be bought or used.
Tell that to Reed, right?
When Sasha sat down, I waved my hands.
“Get it off your chest,” I said. “Give it to me.”
Sasha looked at me. “It’s your turn to talk, Abby. You’re going through something. Please talk about it.”
“What?”
“First off, that guy touched your butt?” Sasha asked. “He’s an idiot. I talked to the two guys who own the company and they apologized. Now, that’s not the first time it’s happened to you.”
“I’m not talking about this stuff,” I said.
“You need to talk about everything else,”