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I turn to the sound of Emily's laughter. An unabashed laugh we poked fun at her in college about. Adam has his feet spread wide, arms crossed in front of his chest, and is pantomiming a move I don't recognize. I can't hear what he's saying, but it must be a hilarious story because Emily is bent over in laughter. His gaze lifts to meet mine, and I feel the corner of my lips rise into a smile.
He winks in my direction and nods before turning his attention back to Emily.
He's the calm. He's the professional. He's the reason why I thought this might work.
It's him.
Chapter Seven
Adam
"Don't you two have adjoining rooms?" Ariel asks the perplexing question which has stumped people since the beginning of time. Why is Laredo late?
I take a sip of coffee and adjust the music stand in front of my stool and smirk. I recognize a rhetorical question when I hear it.
It's early morning. Like eight a.m. early. When Ariel mentioned the timing last evening over ice cream, Laredo and I laughed. Even when she sent the text with the schedule, I assumed it was a typo. No musician I know wakes up before nine, let alone starts a studio session this early. But it's what she wants, which is why I arrived ten minutes early. It's also the reason I sip from an extra-large cup of caffeine.
Ariel paces in front of me in the small studio space located just a half mile from the boardwalk. She's wearing grungy purple shorts and a black tank top. Ariel is white, five eight, thin with a set of the most expressive dark eyes I've ever seen. Intensively focused one second, deadly cutting the next, and my favorite, the endless joy when she's playing music. It's a gaze I could lose myself in. Luckily for me, her black hair swings in front of her face as she continues to pace. "I purposely ended our evening early so he'd have no excuses."
Ariel is adorable when she gets worked up. And I'm enjoying every single second. Stomping back and forth, her eyes shooting toward the doorway as if expecting Laredo to rush in any moment. I don't dare share with her where Laredo went after we left the boardwalk last evening. He spotted a party on the beach, a loud group gathered around a bonfire. He gave me his guitar, leaped over the railing, and disappeared into the night. I never heard him enter his hotel room. And I got no response when I knocked on his door this morning. There's less than a fifty percent chance he ever made it to the room.
She spots the smirk on my face, and I see steam escape from her ears. "You find this is funny?"
I nod. "I kind of do." I take another slow sip, knowing she's bubbling to explode. I've heard tales of Ariel's legendary temper. I knew it would only be a matter of time before I got to experience it up close. And I knew it would be Laredo who would set it off. "Why are you surprised when my brother acts like… well, himself?"
"They told me you were the quiet one." She steps right into my personal space. Her dark eyes electric with fury and fire. A jolt races through my body. She's challenging me.
I'm no longer my brother's keeper. I thought Ariel knew this already. "My babysitting days are done. Are we here to make music?" I pivot her to the one thing I know she cares about. It's the reason we're here.
She swings her hand behind her toward the empty room. "We can't exactly do that without the lead guitarist."
I snicker at the obvious.
"What?" she yells, and I can't believe how much I'm enjoying this moment. "Speak now, or I'll…" She wags her finger at me and pauses. The sneer on her face fades as she realizes what's going on.
"I can play lead. So can you." I provide the answer to the question she couldn't see behind her angry clouds. "But we don't have to start there."
I pat the empty stool next to me. Her brow furrows, and I whisper, "Please humor me."
She pulls the stool close to me, slipping on it. I twist to face her, and our knees nearly touch. The studio is small but not knees pressed to one another small. I have plenty of space to move back, but don't. She goes quiet, yet the electric current in the air continues to sizzle all around us.
The rest of the studio is empty. I suspect at this hour, the rest of the building is vacant. Ariel knows the owner of the music studio and bought out the entire space for the next few days.
"Tell me about Ariel Tyler." I use her full proper name. The one that's buried in her social media posts. Ever since her band blew up, the world has only called her by two names—Ariel and the name I whisper to myself when she's not looking, Goddess Ariel.
Her gaze lowers to her lap, and she rubs a thumb onto the palm of her other hand. She takes a deep sigh, and I watch the tension slowly dissipate. "It's all out there. You know me, Adam." I hear resignation, not a territory I thought she ever ventured into. Things don't just happen to a woman like Ariel. It happens because she manifests it.
I let the silence sit between us, hoping she understands the true intent behind my question. "What don't you know? What exactly are you asking?" Her questions are meant to stall. I won't let her avoid them.
I rest a hand on her knee. The warm touch elicits a response from her. She lifts her chin and stares at me, her gaze tender. "I'm here for you. The only way I know how to make music is for it to be personal. Who's Ariel Tyler?" I ask the same question another way, hoping she lowers her guard.
I've been writing music since high school. Melodies that get stuck in my head played on repeat until I put it down on paper. My sister Hailey is the lyricist of the family. She makes words paint a vivid picture so beautiful, it makes you want to hang it on the wall of a museum. I've been learning at the foot of my genius sister, taking notes as we've collaborated over the last few years. A key learning, make the music personal. It's the key to making it unique.
Last night when I got back to my hotel room, I streamed the early works of the band. They're an eclectic bunch with varying musical styles, and they swap lead singers based on the tune. I focused on the tunes featuring Ariel. The early tunes are full of angst and anger. Rebellious anthems of finding independence and standing up for what she considers is right.
"You can't ask a girl a question like that on the first da… day," she whispers a response, and I watch her walls rise. She straightens her shoulders, and her body becomes stiff. My hand freezes on her leg, the soft gaze in her eyes darkening like an approaching angry storm cloud. "I put it in the text. I need to try out something different. Bands like ours that have been around as long as we have can become complacent. Stale. I won't let that happen. Have you listened to our stuff?"
I nod.
