Christ. When Aish fucked up, he did it spectacularly.
But Devonte kept that wide and bright smile. “Okay, man, how are we going to fix this for her?”
By that evening, Aish’s suite looked—and smelled—like a dorm room, with plates and cups and bottles stacked on any available surface, notes spread over tabletops, and both laptops practically smoking from overuse. Room service begrudgingly brought drinks and albóndingas, little spicy meatballs, but no one had been back to clean anything up.
Aish knocked over a stray glass when he pressed send with a flourish.
“Got another one!” he announced, thrilled to have connected with one more media outlet who would be present tomorrow afternoon when Aish torpedoed his music career.
But Devonte hung up his phone with a frustrated grunt. “Goddammit,” he said, throwing his phone on the sofa and striding over to his bag in the corner. He started to pull clothes out of it. “She’s still not answering. I’m going to have to go track her down.”
Ready or not, Namrita and Sofia were going to have to deal with the press descending tomorrow for Aish’s press conference. Devonte had been trying to get through to the PR rep all day to let her know their plan, but she was ignoring him.
“You keep going through that list,” Devonte said as he began unbuttoning his shirt. He was apparently going to strip down right in front of Aish. That was no problem; Devonte had seen him just about as naked as he could be. “Get ahold of as many people as you can. Make sure they know hauling their asses to the Monte one more time is going to be worth their while.”
And it was.
For the first time in his life, Aish was going to stand alone in front of the media. He was going to open his mouth and lie his ass off. He was going to tell them that he’d known about the song thefts all along (which he didn’t) and that he was equally as culpable as John (which he wasn’t) and that they would relinquish all claims on current and future earnings of Young Son’s royalties to pay settlements to all the victimized bands. That last part was true. He was also going to claim responsibility for releasing the evidence on the flash drive, claim it was a ploy to lay the blame at his deceased bandmate’s feet that had misfired.
Sofia, he would tell the world, was the only one creating something real and authentic.
Manon had stopped by his room to see if there was anything he’d needed, and he’d told her a stripped-down version of his plan and asked her to share it privately with the interns, in case any in the group were holding Sofia at fault. She’d assured him that Sofia had all of their support.
Every song he’d written, every song he’d not yet gotten to, cried out at the thought of how he was about to aim a depth charge at his career. Writing, playing, and singing were the only things he knew how to do, the only things he wanted to do besides loving Sofia, and his life was going to stretch out long and lonely without either music or Sofia to occupy it.
Then he thought about how she’d held her niece and nephew and knew that this was a sacrifice he owed her.
“... But the thing I can’t figure out is who did share that flash drive?” Devonte’s monologue interrupted Aish’s thoughts as the man pulled clean pants over his stellar ass.
Aish shrugged. The focus on who had done the deed had gotten lost in the damage the deed had wreaked. “She said it’d been in a box. I think I saw the box, it was in her room, but I didn’t see anyone else as I was sneaking there to...”
Aish cut himself off as heat rose on his skin.
“Fuck?” Devonte finished for him. “Declare your endless love?”
Aish looked back down to his media list while Devonte put on his shoes.
“You’re letting her go too easily,” Devonte said.
Aish raised his head to glare at him. “I’m trying to do the first unselfish thing in my entire fucking life. Don’t ride me on this.”
Thankfully, Devonte nodded. It had been a long, hard day, and tomorrow was going to be longer and harder. Aish didn’t need Devonte reminding him of all he was going to lose when he gave Sofia her winery back.
Devonte slipped on a blazer, grabbed his phone. “Don’t wait up. You need your beauty rest if you’re going to be in front of a bunch of cameras tomorrow. Namrita is going to listen to me even if I have to shout through her suite door.”
Aish smirked at him. “How do you know where her suite is?”
Devonte snick’d back. “Businesspeople have business meetings. Get your head out of the gutter.”
As the door closed behind Devonte, Aish’s smile faded away. He desperately wanted to follow his friend. He desperately wanted to run through the halls and pound on his love’s door and beg, fucking beg, to get another chance.
He gripped his fist on the desk like it could tether him there. There was a very real chance that he would never see his love’s face again.
A knock sounded at the door.
“Did you forget your key?” he called, pityingly grateful for the distraction as he approached the door and opened it. But it wasn’t Devonte, as he’d expected.
It was Manon again. The French hotel executive now looked frazzled and anxious, not anything like the elegant and carefully coiffed executive he was used to seeing. She was standing next to a man wearing the Bodega Sofia uniform, a maroon polo and khakis. Brown hair, blue eyes, he smiled benignly at Aish. Behind him was a large laundry cart with a few linens.
“Aish, I just wanted to say how sorry I am about everything that’s happened,” she said, surprising him by
