More Than Maybe - Erin Hahn Page 0,86
and dig it out.
CULLEN
Fuck. Where are you?
CULLEN
I swear I had nothing to do with this.
CULLEN
Pick up your phone. Seriously, where are you?
CULLEN
Luke. I’m not kidding. Answer your phone.
I’m startled as it rings again, and I answer. “Christ, Cullen, I was”—Oh. I can’t tell him—“busy,” I finish quickly. The lobby is loud, and I automatically raise my hand to cover my other ear, only to hear the crinkle of the bouquet. “Hold on,” I say. “I can’t hear you. Let me find a quieter place.”
I shove through the glass doors and out into the cool night. “Okay. Start over. What’s wrong?”
“(Not) Warren backed out of Liberty Live.”
My stomach clenches, and my arm sinks, flowers and all. “What? Why would they do that? It’s only a few days away!”
“They got a better offer, apparently.”
“What the fuck? They promised Vada.”
“That’s not the worst part, Luke. The other bidder was the Bad Apple.”
I groan. “No. No way. He wouldn’t do that. They aren’t even open yet.”
“Apparently, they’re opening the same night.”
I’m spinning, but I can’t tell if it’s all in my head. “What? But. That’s insane. They can’t do that. There’s no way. That’s such shady business. What is Dad thinking?”
Cullen releases a slow breath over the phone, and it’s static over the roar in my ears as the implications of everything sink in.
“I don’t know. He seemed surprised at my reaction. I don’t think he realized it was the same night. Or the same band. Maybe it was those idiot partners of his? He stopped listening to the podcast, apparently; it doesn’t matter. What matters is the benefit concert is fucked.”
“Luke?” I swing around. Shite. It’s Vada.
“I have to go, Cullen.” I crush the phone in my hand.
“Hey,” she says. “I didn’t know you were here. Did you watch?”
I swallow. Trying to grasp on to the feeling from a few minutes ago. Before I answered the phone, when I was high off Vada. But I can’t. I’m sunk. She’s sunk. The club is sunk. Liberty Live is sunk.
And it’s my fault. All my fault. I was the one who’d bragged to Dad’s partners about the Loud Lizard getting (Not) Warren. I’m the one who’d told them exactly what they’d needed to take Liberty Live out—what would crush Vada’s plans.
I muster up something that hopefully resembles a real smile. “Yeah. I did. You were brilliant.”
She closes the distance between us. Her hair is already down around her shoulders, and the scent of her shampoo covers me, making my stomach pitch painfully toward the dirt below my feet. “Are those for me?”
I look at the flowers in my hand. They don’t even feel attached to me anymore. I pass them to her. “Definitely. Vada.” I shake myself. I need to get this out first. Before the rest. Before I lose my chance. “That was incredible. I’ve never seen anything like it—”
“Twitching. I told you,” she jokes, but I shake my head, needing her to hear this.
“No. Incredible. Moving. Spectacular. The best thing I’ve ever seen, and to have it to my song, it’s like … I don’t know what to say. I can’t tell you what that meant.”
She presses a finger to my lips. Her eyes are bright in the glow of the parking lot lights. Then her lips are replacing her finger, and I can’t stop myself from kissing her back. Feeling every part of her against me, her scent overwhelming me. She tastes like nothing in this world, and I’m desperate to memorize it.
For such a short time, she was mine.
I pull back and wish I could smile at the slightly dazed look in her eyes. I clear my throat.
“Vada, that was Cullen.”
“Yeah?” she asks. Her hands are tracing circles on my shoulders, and they burn through my shirt.
I step back, putting distance between us. “Vada, I have bad news.”
She blinks, and her brows crease in concern.
“The Bad Apple is opening the same night as Save Liberty Live.”
“Oh,” she says. “That’s … well, not ideal. But we’ll have (Not) Warren, so—”
I’m already shaking my head. “We won’t have (Not) Warren. The Bad Apple outbid us. They dropped out.”
“What? Why would they—”
“Vada, we were outbid by my dad.”
Her face tightens. “Your dad? Charlie did this?”
I nod. “More likely his partners, but still. It’s his club.”
“But why?”
“I’m not sure. Cull thinks my dad didn’t know, but—”
She takes another step back. “But?”
“But I’m not that confident. Maybe Charlie didn’t know, but his partners had to. I think they did it because I refused to cooperate.”
“You?” she