Sweet Ache

Chapter 30

HAWKIN

If I can get the lyric to come it will be a sign that she’ll talk to me today. I laugh out loud into the empty studio, my own voice coming back to me with that tinge of hysteria to it. What the fuck am I thinking? That a perfect lyric means she’ll forgive me for fucking up royally when I should have come clean a long-ass time ago?

Scrubbing my hands over my face, I try to focus on the chords again but when I look down, my hands are on the neck of the guitar, the one I strapped her to before I fucked her. My mind lingers on the memory of that night: the soft, the wet, the hard, the fast, the guitar pick, and every goddamn moan in between. I can remember the look on her face, the way she made me feel, and all I want to do is chuck it across the room and hold it closer to me all at the same time. I’m a pathetic fucker but I’ve never been through this shit before, never knew how goddamn bad it hurts.

No wonder there are so many fucking love songs written.

My mind flickers where I don’t want it to go, in those deep dark recesses where the wild things are, to my dad, and for a moment I understand his desperation that day. Shit, I’m just losing a girl when he stood to lose his wife and two sons. I’m going fucking crazy right now since she’s refused to even speak to or see me in the last three days—I can’t imagine how he felt.

I force myself to turn the mirror away, to stop drawing comparisons to my dad because fuck if I’m going to commit suicide and hell if I want to admit I might just understand an iota of the mindfuck he was going through. Sometimes reflections are a hard thing to face and right now I’ve got enough shit on my plate. I don’t need to be scared to look in the goddamn mirror.

But I am.

My mind rifles over the images from that night, trying to make sense of everything. The comedy of errors that led Quin to think I was actually going to share her. No fucking way. I’d just spent fifteen minutes in the kitchen telling Vince that he could fuck off and die if he actually thought I was following through with the bet. Shit, it’s not like she’s some random groupie.

She’s Quinlan.

And fuck—everything after that was a misunderstanding: leaving the room to look for the tuning fork so I could tease her body with the different vibrations by resting it above her clit like a musical vibrator of sorts, then telling Rocket to have Vince come and help me find it since he had it last, Vince going to the bedroom when I wasn’t in the studio because I thought I’d seen it in Rocket’s room. Fucking Vince thinking that when I said meet me “where I make music,” he thought I meant between the sheets. And then of course everything that happened after that. I heard the trepidation in her damn voice, could feel her nerves bouncing off her so that when I knelt on the bed to tell her she didn’t have to go through with this, I was surprised when she yanked me into her and kissed me like a woman starving for her last breath of air.

I should have stopped her, pushed her back right then and told Vince to get the fuck out, but the mix of alcohol, the ache in my nuts wanting to finish what we had started earlier, and the taste of her kiss … it ruled out any thought of stopping. And then thank fuck she said no and changed her mind, stopping everything I didn’t want to happen but thought she wanted.

Then of course I was so fucking busy being pissed at Vince for pushing the issue, and making her so uncomfortable. How did I let the situation get that far? What the fuck was I thinking?

I let her walk away when I should have fucking run after her immediately rather than five minutes later with a hurt fist and complete panic. But how she found out about the bet, I have no clue.

I rack my brain for the millionth time, even though I know who must have told her because while I was looking for the tuning fork I ran into Hunter. My fucking brother looking for a handout but instead I told him to get the fuck out.

He had to have told Quin. The only other people who knew were the guys and I know they wouldn’t have ratted me out even though I deserved it. They knew without me saying it how much she’d come to mean to me. Shit, I let her in when I let no one in.

But that still makes me question Vince and his full-court press on the matter. It sucks to be committed to being in this house with the guys when one of them is someone I don’t really like right now. The one who knows me better than anyone, who I’m trying to figure out what the fuck kind of game he’s playing.

Add to that the shit I should be worried about, my court date in two days. My do or die. The thought of the possible outcome makes me throw back the rest of my drink. I’m surprised Ben hasn’t called to prep me on yet another thing I need to do or say since I stood him up for our scheduled meeting to go over details. I stopped answering his calls so I’m sure beating down my door will be his next move.

The idea of beating down the door has me thinking of my pathetic-ass self and how I left the house for the first time last night to force Quin to talk to me. How I stood on her porch forever, waiting her out, when I should have been at Ben’s office.

The fucked-up thing is my mind should really be focused on my court date on Tuesday, but it’s not. It’s on a long-legged, wavy-haired blonde who owns my thoughts. I know they say absence makes the heart grow fonder, but fuck that shit. Absence makes you want to drink a fifth and pass out so you stop thinking and feeling. Both make your gut twist so why not take the one that numbs you?

Living the dream, man.

“Are you ever going to leave the studio or do you plan on looking like you’re homeless for the next tour?” Speak of the bastard. I look up and just glare at Vince, my frustration fueling my anger, my temper on a hairpin trigger ready to hammer forward at the slightest pull. And he’s pulling. Fucking stellar. “Some chicks dig the unshowered, unshaven, I-look-like-shit look. It’s working for Jared Leto, so I guess it’s worth a shot.”

“Leave me the fuck alone,” I grumble, wanting to fall back under the veil of my comfort: music and my Jack and Coke.

He rubs a hand over his unshaven face and moves his lower jaw back and forth. “You gonna punch me again?”

“You gonna piss me off again?” I ask, raising my eyebrows. First my brother and then Vince. What is it about Quinlan that makes me want to defend her at all costs? It’s like some switch has been flipped in my head and all of a sudden I’m thinking things I’ve never allowed myself to think or feel before.

And of course the realization comes now that she’s not around, so I shove it back down and read it as desperation on my part, unable to accept the truth of our situation just yet.

“Doesn’t take much these days,” he muses.

“You got a fucking point, Vinny?” I ask, slamming down my pen on the pad of paper, causing the crumpled candy wrappers to fall to the ground, and then he chuckles and that makes me even more pissed off. “What is it with all of this, huh? Why are you riding me so goddamn hard? You won your fucking bet, now back the fuck off me,” I shout at him, my pulse racing, my anger mounting when he just smiles that goddamn smirk that taunts and irritates me all at once.

“That all this was, a bet?”

“Yep.” It’s all I’ll give him because one, I don’t want to talk about it, and two, he doesn’t deserve shit for an explanation about what this is or isn’t. It’s my damn business, not his.

“In all the years I’ve known you, man … like forever … I never took you for a pussy. Guess there’s always room for one to change though, isn’t there?”

As much as I want to shove my chair back and unleash my hurt on him right now, to get out all of my pent-up frustration and anger and misery on him, I just clench my fists, grit my teeth, and glare. Instead I take a deep breath and stand up, eyes locked on his, and head for the door, suddenly needing to leave the room I’ve used as my sanctuary for the past few days.

“You don’t get the girl, Play, if you don’t fight for her.” His voice is low and even as it hits my ears, stopping me in my tracks, hand on the door.

So many thoughts whirl through my head and to fuck it up further, I’m just not sure which one I want to hold on to when all I want to be holding on to is Quinlan.

“Dude, I’ve been fighting my whole life, maybe I don’t have any fight left.” It’s the biggest bunch of bullshit, deep down I know that, but right now I need to find the life left in me before I can find the fight there.

Vince belts out a laugh but it falls flat, telling me that as much shit as he’s giving me, he’s concerned about me and what deep end I’m going to jump off now. I keep my back to him, one foot out the door, because I can’t let him see how lost I am right now. If he does, he’s gonna say shit to me, force me to see stuff that I’m just not ready to acknowledge aloud just yet.

“Sometimes you have to fight in order to be free,” he says into the uncomfortable silence, and all I can do is nod my head because there’s nothing I can say. “I’ll leave you be, Hawke,” he says finally after a deep sigh, “but I hate seeing you like this and love seeing you like this all at the same time.”

When I look over my shoulder at my oldest friend and my most honest sounding board, I realize that right now I love him and hate him all at once. I want to question what he means but know he can only be referring to the one difference in my life over the past few months, Quinlan.

“You’ve lived long enough by your old man’s principles; maybe it’s time you start living by your own.” We stare at each other a beat longer before I nod my head and turn around to walk out.

I used to think that holding on to my dad and the promises he extracted from me were the one thing that made me stronger, but now I suddenly realize that sometimes letting go is when you can truly show your strength. Vince’s words just reaffirmed that. The problem is, I think I’m holding on to the wrong person while letting go of the right one.