Текст книги "Strings Attached"
Автор книги: Stephanie Julian
сообщить о нарушении
Текущая страница: 1 (всего у книги 17 страниц)
Titles by Stephanie Julian
By Private Invitation
No Reservations
Over Exposed
Do Not Disturb
Strings Attached
Stephanie Julian
InterMix Books, New York
AN IMPRINT OF PENGUIN RANDOM HOUSE LLC
375 HUDSON STREET, NEW YORK, NEW YORK 10014
STRINGS ATTACHED
An InterMix Book / published by arrangement with the author
Copyright © 2015 by Stephanie Julian.
Penguin supports copyright. Copyright fuels creativity, encourages diverse voices, promotes free speech, and creates a vibrant culture. Thank you for buying an authorized edition of this book and for complying with copyright laws by not reproducing, scanning, or distributing any part of it in any form without permission. You are supporting writers and allowing Penguin to continue to publish books for every reader.
INTERMIX and the “IM” design are trademarks of Penguin Random House LLC.
For more information about the Penguin Group, visit penguin.com.
eBook ISBN: 978-0-698-19469-4
PUBLISHING HISTORY
InterMix eBook edition / November 2015
This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents either are the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously, and any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, business establishments, events, or locales is entirely coincidental.
Penguin Random House is committed to publishing works of quality and integrity. In that spirit, we are proud to offer this book to our readers; however, the story, the experiences, and the words are the author’s alone.
Version_1
Contents
Titles by Stephanie Julian
Title Page
Copyright
Chapter One
Chapter Two
Chapter Three
Chapter Four
Chapter Five
Chapter Six
Chapter Seven
Chapter Eight
Chapter Nine
Chapter Ten
Chapter Eleven
Chapter Twelve
Chapter Thirteen
Chapter Fourteen
About the Author
Chapter One
“I’m going to kill that man.”
Trudeau Morrison took a deep breath, trying to find her center. Which was more difficult than normal because it was flying all over the place.
All because of him.
“Seriously, I just want to put my hands around his neck and—”
“Uh, Truly, honey, maybe you want to keep your murderous intent to yourself. I don’t want to have to testify against you in court someday.”
Her eyes narrowing, she turned on her boss with a look that made his eyes widen. Greg Hicks was not a man who frightened easily, but he knew he was taking his life into his own hands when Tru started to sound like the possessed kid in The Exorcist.
“You.” She pointed her right index finger in his direction, freezing his feet to the floor of his film headquarters as effectively as any superhero’s superpower.
She didn’t care that he held her livelihood in his hands. That he was one of the richest and most powerful men in the film industry. That he could snap his fingers and kill her career.
She didn’t even care that he was the best boss in the whole wide world.
She would never forgive him for screwing her six ways to Sunday and up the other side by saddling her with Baz. Some days, the damn man only needed to look at her sideways and she’d want to string him up by his feet. Preferably over a pit of fire ants.
Saying they rubbed each other the wrong way was an understatement of epic proportions. No, Baz didn’t just rub her, he worked at her like a bristle brush on a tough knot.
Greg’s eyes widened even further, and he actually took a step back.
Maybe he did have a few brain cells left.
“This. This is all your fault.”
Greg raised his hands in surrender. “Uh . . .”
Her finger began to jab in his direction again. Was she doing that consciously? “And you will fix it. You will get that man out of my sight and out of the goddamn city. I don’t care where you put him, just get him away from me, because the next time I see him, I’m going to—”
“Blah, blah . . . cut me off at the knees . . . Blah, blah . . . make me regret I was ever born . . . Blah, blah . . .”
Tru caught sight of Greg’s eyes rolling just before she turned on the devil himself. The man who made her want to stomp her feet like a six-year-old and throw a tantrum worthy of any trust-fund princess denied her favorite new Ferrari.
The man she wanted to roast in the fiery pit of hell.
“You. Shut. Your. Mouth.”
Sebastian Valenti’s mouth closed, but she was pretty sure it wouldn’t stay that way for long. The man had absolutely no self-control. Whatever popped into his head came out of his mouth and usually made her want to strangle him. It was one of the things that drove her batshit insane. But only one.
“You do not get to say another word right now because if you do, I will walk out that door.” She used her free hand to point at the front door, keeping her other hand pointed at Sebastian as if it had the power to hold him in place. “And if I do, I don’t know when I’d return and neither of you can afford that.”
Because it was the God’s honest truth, neither man said a word.
She took a deep breath, her center slowly stopping its crazy whirl as she drew air in through her nose and released it through her mouth.
With her gaze glued to Sebastian’s, she saw his brain working at breakneck speed. He wanted to say something. She could see it formulating in that mutant, brilliant brain of his. She actually saw his lips move infinitesimally, as if words were forming on his tongue and trying to get past his lips, but some last stronghold of sanity kept them contained.
“I am going to take a walk. I may be gone five minutes. I may be gone an hour. If I don’t return by tomorrow morning, you very well might be on your own, and then God help you both.”
With that, Tru turned on her heel and stalked down the hall.
The front door was in sight. She had her hands on the knob when she heard two little words.
“Drama queen.”
Every cell of her blood began to boil. Her teeth ground together with enough force to make her jaw hurt. And her hands gripped the doorknob so tightly, she thought it might turn to dust in her hand.
She was surprised to actually hear Greg mutter, “Oh, for fuck’s sake,” through the rush of blood in her ears.
It literally took every ounce of will power she possessed to open the door and take that first step through it. All she wanted to do was turn around and tell him . . .
What? What the hell could she say that she hadn’t already?
Even so, she had to literally bite the tip of her tongue so she didn’t say anything else.
Taking a deep breath, she stepped out into the bright sunshine of a Monday in May in Philadelphia.
And started to walk.
* * *
“You, my friend, have a death wish. Because if Tru doesn’t kill you, I will for making her life miserable.”
Baz fought to keep a guilty grimace off his face because . . . Well, hell, it didn’t exactly fit the whole bad-boy-rocker image. Then again, he didn’t have much of an image to uphold lately.
He’d taken a stage dive into near death and oblivion about a year before and hadn’t managed to pull himself out of the pit yet. He’d thought the first days after being out of rehab had been bad.
“Baz.”
They had been. They just hadn’t been the worst. The worst had come months later.
He’d fallen into a depression he had no idea how to handle. He’d gotten damn good at covering it up, though. He didn’t think any of his friends had noticed.
Especially not when he kept acting like such a dick to a girl everyone thought walked on water. How she managed it with a stick up her ass was beyond—
“Baz!”
He turned with a death glare. “What?”
Greg didn’t bother to glare back. The guy Baz had come to think of as a pain-in-the-ass older brother raised his eyebrows. “What the fuck is wrong with you?”
He opened his mouth to say, “Nothing,” but the damn word got stuck in his throat. And they both knew it wasn’t true.
The insane urge to destroy everything in his immediate vicinity made him crazy.
Before rehab, he’d dull it with whatever drug happened to be on hand. Usually weed, or Klonopin, or Ketamine, sometimes acid. None of which he could touch now.
So what he really wanted was a drink, but he couldn’t start in on the liquor just yet. It’d just make him pissy.
He shrugged. “Fuck it. Nothing. I’m going back to the studio.”
Turning, he headed back to where this had all started. The studio Greg had built for him.
The thought stopped him in his tracks. Hands on his hips, he tilted his head to look at the ceiling. The still-unpainted ceiling.
This part of the building hadn’t been completely refurbished yet. For some reason that made him feel a little better. Something the amazingly wonderful Trudeau Morrison hadn’t done yet.
“Fuck.” The word slipped through his tight lips like a bullet. “Fuck. Fuck. Fuck.”
Through sheer force of will, he unclenched his hands, knuckles cracking, and let them dangle at his sides. Christ, he was one fucking ungrateful bastard.
“Shit, Greg. I’m sorry.”
He couldn’t make himself turn and say it to his friend’s face. Embarrassment fired through his body like a speedball.
Contrary to popular belief, he tried not to be a dick all the time. Sometimes he just couldn’t help himself, though.
Apparently now was one of those times.
As he sighed, he heard Greg walk up behind him.
“Spit it out, Baz. What’s up?”
Greg stopped beside him, waiting.
Baz wasn’t a small guy, but he had to look up a couple of inches to meet Greg’s gaze. Which held absolutely no condemnation.
It took a lot to make Greg angry, and Baz had never actually seen the guy blow his cool. Just being around Greg was sometimes enough to get Baz to chill.
“Honestly? I don’t fucking know.”
He only knew that whenever he and Tru were in the same room, he had the insane urge to needle her until she blew. She was so damn competent, so fucking put together and she made him crazy with her lists and her deadlines and her too-cool looks. He couldn’t resist trying to knock her off that pedestal everyone thought she deserved.
He loved seeing her lose her shit because—
Because you’re an asshole.
Shit.
Greg nodded, as if this was the answer he’d expected all along. “Okay. How’s the score coming?”
Ah, the one bright spot in his life right now. “Might be the best work I’ve ever done.”
“Might be?” The amusement in Greg’s voice loosened the kink in Baz’s shoulders a little more. “Better fucking be. It’s for my film, after all.”
Baz shook his head, then threw a smirk over his shoulder, feeling a little more like himself.
“You know, I do have a pretty fucking awesome career to fall back on, right? I mean, my band’s got fans and gold records and groupies and everything.”
Of course, he hadn’t seen the other four members of Baseline Sins in months.
The last time he and Nik had been in the same room . . . it hadn’t gone so well.
“Yeah, I do know that.” Greg paused. “Maybe it’s time you remembered.”
Greg smacked him on the back so hard Baz nearly pitched forward before he turned to walk away. “Got a meeting in five. I’ll be down to listen to what you’ve got later. Don’t piss off Tru again or she’s gonna cut off your balls.”
Greg disappeared down the corridor, leaving Baz alone in the hall.
Wondering how the hell he’d managed to wind up here.
* * *
By the time she got back to the office, Tru had walked off most of her mad.
The ice cream she’d gotten at the coffee shop on Lombard near Thirteenth had helped. Early May in Philadelphia was warmer than she’d expected, which was a nice surprise.
Before she’d moved here with Greg, she’d thought Pennsylvania would be cold. Not at all like sunny Southern California, where she’d dreamed of living all her life.
Growing up in bumfuck Nebraska, she’d promised herself when she’d moved away that she’d never again live anywhere winter lasted from October to April. Pennsylvania qualified, but only barely.
Until last year, she’d never considered moving away from LA. She’d loved it there.
Okay, mostly she’d loved that the temperature never really dropped below seventy and she got to shove her sister’s face in the fact that she was supporting herself in Hollywood.
Screw you, Violet. I fucking made it.
Which immediately made her feel like a total bitch. Still, it wasn’t Tru’s fault that her sister had gotten married during her senior year of college and started popping out kids a couple years later, thereby crushing her childhood dream of moving to New York and being a playwright and living the life of a starving artist.
Shit.
Alright, she totally needed to stop being a bitch, even if no one else could hear her.
And she needed to figure out where the hell she was. Stopping to take stock, Tru realized she wasn’t far from Haven Hotel. Sabrina was working the desk this afternoon, but she didn’t want to bitch to her new best friend about Sebastian. Again.
Sabrina actually liked Sebastian. Hell, if Greg wasn’t in the picture, Sebastian and Sabrina would totally have been a thing because Baz thought Sabrina walked on water. They’d have some adorkable nickname like Sebina or Sabrastian or something equally pukeworthy.
And Tru would have to seriously reconsider her relationship with Sabrina, because any woman who considered that man dating material had a definite screw loose.
Which wasn’t completely true.
Shit. Fuck. Shit.
Stopping at the next corner, she knew she should head back to the office. She had a shitload of work piling up on her desk. As the new managing director of ManDown Films, she handled the day-to-day operations of the company. And she had a shit-ton of things to do.
She also knew if she headed back now, she’d still be too pissed off to work and would probably hunt down Baz and start in on him again.
That left one option.
Rittenhouse Square was only a couple of blocks away so she adjusted her course. Thank god she’d had her phone in the pocket of her skirt when she’d walked out the door.
At this time of the day, there were quite a lot of people hanging out in the park, enjoying the sun and fresh air on their lunch breaks.
She probably should’ve gotten something other than ice cream to eat, but she wasn’t hungry. She was still too angry.
Finding an empty bench, she pulled out her phone. It rang once before her dad answered.
“Hey, Angelface. How goes it in the City of Brotherly Love?”
Tears sprang to her eyes for no reason other than her dad always sounded like home to her.
“Hi, Daddy. It’s going.”
“Uh-oh, that doesn’t sound good. You need me to send you a ticket home?”
She laughed because this was the game. And Tru loved the game she played only with dad. “Not yet. Maybe next week.”
“And you know the ticket would be waiting for you. Now, what’s up, sweetheart? You sound stressed. That boss of yours giving you trouble? You know I could take him in a fight.”
She laughed again, feeling her stress levels begin to recede at the thought of her sixty-year-old, cue-ball-head, thirty-pounds-overweight dad challenging Greg to a fight. The fact that her dad actually liked Greg didn’t mean he wouldn’t take on the younger man if Greg hurt her.
“I’m sure you could. Just having one of those days, you know?”
“Well, when I have one of those days, I’m usually hip-deep in sewer water in someone’s basement. I know that’s not in your daily planner.”
“True. No, it’s the damn musician scoring Greg’s film. He’s a pain in my ass.”
“Huh. Never thought I’d see the day you let a guy get to you.”
She opened her mouth to explain how wrong her dad was. That he hadn’t really gotten to her. That she’d been busy and he was a douche and—
She sighed. “Yeah, I let him get to me.”
“So what’s with this guy? You like him?”
The horror of his statement made her gasp. “Oh my god, no! He totally rubs me the wrong way. Most days I want to strangle him the minute he opens his mouth but we need him to finish the score. He’s such a pain in the ass. He constantly rubs me the wrong way and he does it on purpose.”
“I don’t know, honey. It kinda sounds like maybe he’s got a thing for you. You know, like in grade school when a guy likes you, he’s gonna pull your hair.”
She blinked a few times, not even able to grasp how completely off her dad was on this one. And he was usually so perceptive. “No. No, that’s just not even in the realm of possibility.”
“Well, you know best, being as you’re there and all. And I’m here.”
And sometimes her dad was Captain Obvious. But he was still one of the smartest people she knew. Only this time he had it wrong.
“So how’s Mom?”
Since her dad was a man of few words, they covered the rest of the family in two minutes flat, including her grandparents and their various ills and her sister and brother-in-law and her three nephews.
“The boys are giving your sister hell right now.” Her dad’s voice held noticeable glee. “Constantly on the move. Did you know they’re all playing hockey now?”
That made Tru smile.
Her sister was one of the girliest girls Tru had ever known. A cheerleader from the time she was five, Violet had worn jeans only if it was below zero, and then only if she didn’t have a pair of clean tights to wear with a denim skirt.
She’d married her high school sweetheart, who treated her like a queen, and then she’d gone and had three boys. Who took after their daddy way more than Violet had counted on.
They were the most adorable beings on the planet, even when they were covered in mud and the only clean spots to be found were their teeth when they grinned after digging holes in the backyard to plant dinosaur eggs.
Which had turned out to be Violet’s ugly-ass collection of pottery eggs from some local dude who thought he had talent. For some reason, Violet thought they were beautiful.
So, of course, Aunt Tru had whispered to the boys that those eggs were totally hiding dinosaur babies inside and that if they planted them, the dinosaurs would grow. Tru had planned to dig them up and “plant” baby dinosaurs in their places but Violet had noticed her eggs were missing and thrown a shit fit.
Their dad had laughed himself sick. Behind Violet’s back, of course.
“Serves her right for having boys.”
“You know that’s not how that stuff works, right?”
“What stuff, Dad? Sex stuff?”
Her dad laughed. “Yeah, I guess I walked into that one, huh?”
She and her dad didn’t talk about sex. He liked to pretend she didn’t know what it was, and she let him think she was a virgin.
The fact that she had been until her senior year of college had helped. And it wasn’t like she’d been racking up notches on her bedpost lately.
She sighed. “I guess I should get back to work.”
“You tell that boss of yours to give you more time off. He’s working you too hard.”
“I love my job.”
“I know you do. Which is the only reason I haven’t called him myself.”
She wasn’t exactly sure he wouldn’t so she just shook her head and laughed. “Love you, Daddy.”
“Love you, too, Angelface. You come home for a visit soon. We miss you.”
Yeah, that wasn’t going to happen in the next six months. Hell, she hadn’t even gotten home for Christmas last year. And honestly, she’d been too busy to do more than briefly miss her parents.
They both hung up at the same time. No good-byes. They never did. Superstition was a wonderful thing.
Putting her phone back in her pocket, she didn’t get up right away, though she knew she should. She had so much work to do. Work she loved and that made every day interesting and different and fulfilling.
Too bad Sebastian would still be there.
Just the thought of him made her want to stomp her feet in frustration and throw things at his head.
Of course, that hadn’t been what she’d thought the first time she’d seen him. That had been more like, Holy crap, he’s hot.
He was the lead guitarist for one of the country’s top hard rock bands, and he looked like the boy next door, with deep brown eyes and short, light brown hair and a mouth that made her—
And therein lay the problem, didn’t it?
Yeah, probably don’t want to think about that right now, huh?
With a sigh, she rose and pointed herself back in the direction of the office.
And resigned herself to the fact that until Sebastian Valenti got the hell out of her life, she was doomed to frustration and flashes of rage.
And how wonderful was that?
* * *
“So, dinner tonight. You’re coming with me. Few people I want you to meet.”
Baz spared Greg a quick glance before looking back at the laptop on the piano. This one last scene in particular was making him crazy, and he didn’t have a clue why.
It needed something slow but had to convey the emotions the characters were trying so hard to bury.
“Can’t. Need to finish this.”
Baz’s fingers played over the keys, trying to find the right tune in the notes. He could almost hear it. The actress, Amanda Whatever, had provided some of his best inspiration so far. When he looked at her, he heard exactly what he needed to create. Same with Daisy Devlin.
Neal Donahue . . . He was a tough one—
“You’re going, and I don’t want any shit. You’ve been hiding in this damn studio for weeks, and I’m starting to feel like a slave driver, so I’m ordering you to come to fucking dinner and have a fucking good time.”
Laughing in spite of himself, Baz pushed the stool away from the piano and met Greg’s gaze head-on.
“That’s a stupid-ass reason. And why would you want me at a business meeting? I’m just the talent. Tru’s got the brains.”
“Yeah, she does. But one of the guys I’m meeting has a daughter who’s a fan of yours. So your ass is mine for the night. It won’t be that bad. You get dinner, drinks, and some girl who’ll fawn over you all night. It’s a win-win. Besides, when was the last time you spent a night out?”
Since his answer to that included Greg’s girlfriend Sabrina and a kiss he’d had no intention of ever apologizing for, he kept his mouth shut. Greg’s raised eyebrows made Baz give him the finger.
“That’s what I thought.” Greg shook his head. “Look, I’m not gonna make you go, but I seriously think you should. You need to get out.”
“Is Sabrina going?”
Greg’s lips curved. “Yeah, she is. And she said if you actually show up and look like you’re having a decent time, she’ll reward you.”
Baz shook his head, knowing his idea of a reward and Sabrina’s were vastly different. She’d wanna bake him cookies. He’d want . . . something he couldn’t ever have.
Fuck.
He wanted to tell Greg no but knew he couldn’t. He owed the guy way too much. Plus, he’d used Sabrina’s presence to sweeten the pot.
Greg knew how much Baz cared for Sabrina. And Greg was secure enough in Sabrina’s love for him to not be threatened by that. Like, not at all.
“You suck, you know that?”
Greg smiled a shit-eating grin. “Yep. No jeans. They won’t let you in the restaurant.” He raised a hand when Baz started to swear. “Not my choice. The guy let his daughter pick where we’re going to eat.”
“I hate her already.”
“Yeah, yeah. You’re such a badass.” Greg turned and headed for the door. “You never know, man. She may be the one. Or at least you might get laid. And don’t antagonize Tru or I will maim you.”
Sonofabitch.
The door closed behind Greg before Baz had a chance to throw something at the guy’s head.
Damn it. He was going to have to apologize to Tru before they got to the restaurant or the night would be a total clusterfuck.
“Shit.”
His fingers began to fly over the keys, the melody from Baseline Sins’ first album. The one that had started everything for them.
It was the first song he and Nik had written for the album. It wasn’t the first song they’d ever written. That one would never make it onto an album. But it was the song that had shot them to the top of the rock charts in a matter of weeks.
The song was good. Hell, it was one of their best, and rock and metal fans had embraced it. Then luck had kicked in, and a few DJs at some of the most influential stations around the country had begun to play it in heavy rotation.
And five nineteen – and twenty-year-olds from the Pennsylvania Coal Regions catapulted into a lifestyle they’d dreamed about since they were kids listening to Slipknot and Avenged Sevenfold and Anthrax in Baz’s basement.
And then Baz had cracked.
His fingers slammed down on the keys before he shoved away from the piano. Snapping the laptop closed, he grabbed his wallet and keys off the piano and headed for the door.
He almost made a clean escape. He was reaching for the front door when he heard Tru call to him.
“Sebastian. Wait.”
That voice felt like fingers running up his spine. And not in a bad way. Because there was one thing Trudeau was not. She was not ugly. And he’d noticed that a hell of a lot more lately. How not ugly she was.
Which didn’t make any fucking sense.
Stifling a sigh, he briefly considered ignoring her. But that would’ve been a dick move. And he didn’t want to be a total ass.
So he took a deep breath and turned. And tried to ignore the fact that his dick wanted to get hard.
He didn’t typically get wood for girls who looked like her. Tru was the all-American girl-next-door straight out of a casting call. If she’d been an actress, she could’ve given Kirsten Dunst or Amy Adams a run for their money.
Her hair was brown but the word didn’t mean a damn thing in reality. Each strand seemed to be a different shade of brown with a few red and blond highlights tossed in. And those wide blue eyes were stunners. Such a bright, clear blue. When she flashed them at people, Baz had seen men and women do a double take.
And then totally dismiss her because when she smiled, her looks put her firmly in the “Damn, she’s cute” category, with a pug nose and those freckles that made her look half her age, which, contrary to her stick-in-the-mud-attitude, was only twenty-six.
Of course, when she smiled, his dick got hard.
Luckily, she didn’t smile at him. Ever.
Which pretty much sucked.
“Hey. What’s up?’
He figured he probably shouldn’t bring up their fight from this morning. Wouldn’t do any good. He should apologize for yanking her chain, but then, she’d done the same.
So around and around they went.
Now, he stuck with short and sweet. And refused to let his gaze drop below her chin. She hid it well but the girl was built for sex.
And yeah, you probably really don’t want to think about that.
“I understand you’re going to dinner with us tonight.”
He bit back the automatic smart-ass reply of “Don’t worry. I won’t do a line of coke before and act like the junkie you think I am.” Instead he said, “Yeah.”
She nodded, her expression remaining completely neutral. He had to wonder how hard she was biting her tongue.
And how much he wanted to suck on it.
“Then I’d like to declare a truce.”
A truce, huh? “Sure. I can do a truce. But we’re not at war, Truly.”
Her lips pursed, but she didn’t ream him for calling her Truly. “Good to know.”
And now he couldn’t seem to stop looking at her lips. She had a mouth made for kissing. Yeah, he’d noticed it before, but for some reason, right now, he wanted to grab her shoulders, yank her against him, and kiss the hell out of her.
You totally need to get laid.
“I’m glad to hear you say that.” Her lips curved but in no way did he consider it a smile. “Then I’ll see you tonight.”
He felt compelled to add, “I won’t let Greg down.”
Now her smile turned genuine. And it felt like a punch in the gut.
Christ, what the fuck? Had he totally lost his mind? This was Tru. She’d cut off his balls before she’d ever let him kiss her. And she’d be totally in the right.
But right now, smiling at him like she was, just made him want her more.
“He has that effect on people, doesn’t he?”
Baz didn’t know about anyone else. He only knew that Greg was one of the few people he trusted to have his back. That it’d happened in such a short amount of time was the amazing part.
“Yeah. He does.”
Silence fell then. They continued to stare at each other for several long seconds until finally she shook her head as if coming out of a trance.
Join the club, babe.
“Okay.” She took a step back, and Baz had to make a conscious effort not to reach for her. To grab her hand and pull her forward. She’d probably slap the hell out of him. “So I’ll see you tonight.”
“Sure. Tonight.”
With a nod, she turned on her heel and headed back down the hall. Baz couldn’t take his eyes off her ass until she disappeared into her office.
Fuck.
