Steve kicked Logan under the table. Logan tore his gaze from Toni and found Steve grinning at him as if he were dumber than a rock. “Uh, Steve asked me if I was available to start a new band,” Logan said. “I wasn’t actually—I was playing with Last Cannibal—but the lead guitarist was a tool, so I decided to give Exodus End a try. Steve and I had both been playing the Southern Californian club scene in different bands for a couple of years, so we partied together a bit. We never played together until Exodus End, though.”
“Last Cannibal broke up as soon as Logan left. He was the only one in the band who knew what he was doing,” Steve said.
Logan shrugged. “That’s because the rest of them were too lazy to schedule gigs. When you’re first starting out, you have to network constantly. They wanted to skip directly to the after-parties.”
“Logan got us most of our gigs when we first formed,” Dare said. “If he wasn’t such an awesome musician, he’d have made a great manager for some lucky band.”
“I hated doing that shit,” Logan said. “A necessary evil to get noticed.”
Logan glanced at Toni and found her gazing at him with adulation. Awesome. Keep talking me up, guys. He was all about getting noticed. Always had been.
“So when did Max join?” Toni asked.
“We’ve been through a couple lead singers,” Dare said.
Logan tried not to feel too bitter about that since he’d been the band’s first and shortest-lived vocalist.
“It’s hard to find the right voice sometimes,” Dare said. “You know after a few shows if they’re right for the band or not. Since they get most of the attention and glory—”
“But have the easiest role,” Steve interrupted.
Max leaned across Toni to shove Steve halfway out of the bench. He was the only one who’d finished his breakfast. That explained why he’d been so quiet throughout their story.
“—you have to find someone who can sing and incite a crowd,” Dare continued. “Especially if you plan to make it as a live band. Plus he played bad-ass lead guitar.”
“Wait,” Toni said. “I thought that until he hurt his wrist, he played rhythm guitar.”
“If that’s what you want to call it,” Dare said.
“When we first started we had two leads,” Max said. “The record label made us tone our sound down a little. Have you heard our first album?” he asked Toni. “The one we produced ourselves? It’s hard to find. We only pressed a few hundred copies. But we sounded quite a bit different then. Very guitar heavy.”
“I don’t think I’ve heard any of your early work,” Toni said. “Is there any chance we can share some of it in the book?”
She was so excited her voice squeaked. If Logan hadn’t already been crushing hard on the woman, that little sound of joy would have done it for him.
“Maybe,” Dare said. “We’ll have to check with Sam. We have to worry about record contracts and no-compete clauses and all that legal bullshit. That’s why we never rereleased that album digitally.”
“Oh,” she said. “Well, I hope we can at least share some clips, but if not, I’d really like to hear it just for personal enjoyment.”
“It’s not as polished as our record label stuff. You might not like it,” Max said. “Two lead guitars is a bit overpowering.”
“Sinners pull it off in their solos,” Reagan said. Her entire body was quivering with the excitement of possibility.
Logan wrapped an arm around her shoulders and squeezed. “Now don’t you let that boyfriend of yours give you any ideas. We stick with what works for us, not what works for Sinners.”
She sighed in disappointment.
“She wants to play lead so bad she can taste it,” Max said with a soft laugh.
“Sorry, Reagan, that’s my gig,” Dare said. “You’ll play lead in your own band someday. You’re too good not to.”
This seemed to placate her for the time being. Logan loosened his hold. Toni released a loud breath. Hmm . . . Did she not like it when he hugged Reagan? Or was she sighing in relief for some other reason? Logan rubbed Reagan’s bare arm and watched Toni for her reaction. Her eyebrows drew together in a harsh scowl. So she didn’t like him to touch Reagan. That was a certainty. The elbow jab to the ribs told him Reagan wasn’t much appreciating his familiar fondling either.
Logan dropped his arm and located his fork. He picked the tomatoes out of his