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Securing the phone back in my pocket, I take a glance back at Peach, whose helmet lifts, and we take back off into the fading sunlight.
Chapter Two
Fin
Bythetimewemake it back to the venue, the stage is already erected tall enough to be seen over the stadium seats from our bikes. We ease through the wide opening off to the side of the turnstiles at the main gate that will be locked up before shutting down tonight to keep out the campers and squatters. But for now, people rush around to get ready for the next four days of craziness.
Vendors hurry to stash extra supplies and finish setting up, security are roaming around with scowls as they watch each person’s badges that come and go, checking passes and tickets to confirm identities as Peach and I ride right by all of them. Past the multitude of canopies where some set up tattoo equipment while others flash their best merch to be sold at the highest price and we ride right on through the concrete throughway to the main stage that was a soccer field only a few hours ago. The grass has been covered by festival mats that bump beneath my tires, meant to keep the real sod underneath from being destroyed by the tens of thousands of feet that are about to stomp the shit out of it, the gallons of beer from seeping in, and the weird amount of piss that will more than likely leak through anyway.
Coming up to the stage where all kinds of techs move equipment about, I spot my band’s long-haired and blue-green eyed vocalist off to the side with his ass planted and legs dangling down off the platform, his torso curled around a guitar and a pen pinched between his teeth.
I pull the bike right up under his feet, kill the engine, and toe the kickstand down for me to dismount the machine.
“Sup, fucker,” I say once my head is free of my helmet and I can shake out the dark waves on top of my head, Peach parking his hog beside mine and cutting the noise.
Rex snorts and flips me the finger but doesn’t look away from the notebook in front of him as he retrieves his pen and scribbles something on the paper.
My ears ring from the sudden silence that’s not altogether that silent with all the work going on around us. I work my jaw to pop my ears and hop up onto the stage next to my bandmate and brother.
Rex works a few cords on the instrument in his lap, the sound short and sharp without the amp hookup, but when you’ve got talent and have done this as long as we have, you hear it anyway. Almost as if the amplification is coming directly from the speaker.
“Take a …” Rex scribbles another note on the page and flips the book in my direction, the thing landing with a splat between us. “Look.” His blue-green eyes flick to mine, his pen back between his teeth.
“Looks like hieroglyphics to me.” I snag the notebook, holding it up and turning it to the side with a lifted brow. “What language is this?”
Knuckles land on my bicep and have a laugh bursting from between my lips.
“Lyrics, you dickhead.” Rex shakes his head of wild curls, a smirk tipping the corner of his pierced lips. “I already know my handwriting sucks.”
I snort and right the book so I can actually try to read the words scribbled in weird angles that completely ignore the lines on the page.
Oh, shit.
These are good.
“This isn’t another damn ballad, is it?” I squint at the lettering that mushes together and give my band brother more shit simply because he always deserves it.
Because the last set of ballads this fucker wrote knocked everything else As Above has written to date out of the water.
“Shut up and tell me what you think,” Rex says, but I’m already nodding my head and searching the page for the key to start humming the music once I find it. The lyrics are abstract and generalized, but if anyone knows anything about the tatted man next to me, they’d know exactly who these raunchy lovesick lines are about.
“This about her?” I ask without taking my eyes off the words, the cords already playing in the back of my mind despite the soft but irritating feedback that filters through the speakers right behind Rex.
I also don’t wait for the answer.
Because of course it’s about her. The new up-and-coming designer that has stolen his heart and brought him back from the dead. Rex’s fiancé and baby momma, Aria Scarlett.
Soon to be Aria Thompson.
Jumping to my feet, I search for a loose instrument cord and throw it Rex’s way. “Plug it in.”
The feedback whirrs at the contact but clicks when he seats the jack in the input of the guitar and that pen is back between his teeth when he strums the pick over the cords.
Left hand to the fretboard, Rex’s fingers engage the strings for the right notes, playing the chorus of a brand new song as I walk-think over mats and wires.
I nod along as I read the shit on the page and mash it together with the cords he plays, which continues in my head even when he stops playing.
“I just don’t know …” He’s on his feet and at my side with a finger to the words as I pause in my steps and notice the spot he’s talking about.
