To that end, I’d given up my room to Jesse, so at least I was the only one out a room, and Jesse Fucking Mayes, hottest guitar player in the universe, wouldn’t be slumming it on someone’s couch—which he probably would without complaint, he was that cool, but no fucking way was I having that. So, problem half-solved.
Zane was shaking his head. “Those two aren’t gonna last.”
Yeah. I knew that. I saw it. Wasn’t my place to say anything about it, though.
I wasn’t close enough to Jesse, in that way, to say anything to him. Elle I could talk to, but when it came to shit within the band, I tread carefully. I wasn’t in the band; she was. And I sure as hell wasn’t in her relationship with Jesse.
Besides that… the woman was totally gone for that guy. She’d break herself to hell and back for him if she had to. I could understand, in a way. Jesse was gorgeous and talented; tall, dark and elusive. Elle was beautiful and talented, too. But Jesse wasn’t the one who was head over heels in love; anyone could see that. He’d have to be the one to end it, and when he did, it would be bad.
I felt for Elle, but the band had to come first. That was the unspoken agreement we’d all made when we came on board this crazy train.
“What happens to the band when they don’t last?” I asked, wishing I didn’t have to. But this was the first time anyone had even talked to me about it. Brody and I hadn’t even discussed it yet.
“Fuck all,” Zane said. “They go to their separate corners a while, lick their wounds. And we keep doing what we do. Nothing’s gonna break this band. Not ever. We’ll be eighty and still doing our thing.”
I cracked a smile, hoping he was right about that. Would be pretty interesting, to say the least, booking gigs for eighty-year-old rock stars.
“Think we could still get Coachella?” I asked.
He tipped his head back and gave a sexy laugh, and I tried to laugh with him. But his blue eyes were on me, and among his many talents—unfortunately, for me—Zane had the incredibly inconvenient talent of being able to read me better than anyone else I’d ever met. Including my mom, and I was tight with my mom.
Hence, why it was a terrible idea for the two of us to share walls.
“Give it up, Maggs,” he said, his expression darkening as the laughter died.
“Give what up?”
“Maggie.” He leveled me with his ice-blues. “Whatever it is you’re trying not to say, but we both know you’re gonna tell me eventually.”
Right.
I cleared my throat, got brave, and let it bleed. “I talked to him tonight.”
“Who?”
“My dad.”
“Shit.” Zane tensed like he’d been punched in the gut, pitching forward in his chair and leaning on his knees. “Fuck. I shoulda known. You should’ve told me, Maggs.”
I shrugged.
Yeah, I should’ve known too. I should’ve known better than to drop my dad’s name at the front desk when I was hoping to score an extra room. I’d considered just getting a room elsewhere, but I really didn’t have the time if I wanted to hook up with Coop, and I totally did. Besides that, I needed to be close if anyone needed me. It nauseated me to do it, but I was desperate… as one of the owners of this tacky-ass hotel, he was my only hope. But I’d coughed that shit up for nothing. The hotel was still fully booked, and by the time the woman at the desk confirmed that with him via text, I heard his gravelly voice. I turned around to find a tall, blond, aging rock star standing behind me—my dad.
I’d hoped I could avoid him while we were in town, even though we were staying in his hotel.
No such fucking luck.
“What the fuck did he do this time?” Zane demanded, his voice going scary-low, stone cold murder flashing in his eyes as he read my face.
“Oh, you know,” I said vaguely. “Dizzy has a way of making me feel extra special about myself.”
“You really gotta stop talking to him.”
“Yeah,” I agreed, and I meant it. But I’d never do it. Totally cut off my dad.
He was my dad.
Even though he was a royal douche.
“I’m so gonna kill that dude one day,” Zane muttered, almost to himself, as he flexed his fist and cracked his knuckles.
“I really wish you would.”
He grinned at me, that heart-stopping, swoon-inducing grin, all beautiful, badass Viking with a side of cocky rock star, and I reached over and poked his knee.
“Seriously. Don’t go all stabby on me, okay? I don’t wanna have to explain that shit to Dolly.”
Just what we all needed.
I’d already had to spring the man from jail enough times in my life. Not that he’d ever done anything that bad. No, Zane Traynor’s rap sheet was a colorful list of minor offenses with descriptive words like “indecency,” “disorderly” and “lewd.” But the mention of his grandma, Dolly, the sweetest woman on Earth and the one who’d raised him after his parents checked out, made him soften.
“Okay.” He settled back in his chair. “No violence. For now. Tell me what the world’s greatest dad had to say.”
Oh, shit.
Here I was complaining about my dad for being a douche, but at least my dad had been somewhat present in my life. Unlike Zane’s, who’d been a raging alcoholic, ditched out on him when he was a toddler, and then gone ahead and died.
“Shit, Zane. Never mind. Let’s just forget it. He’s not worth talking about anyway.”
“Maggie,” he said, his eyes locked on mine with a casual air of command. “You can tell me what happened with your dad, or I can come over there and fuck you senseless, and then you can tell me what happened with your dad. Either way, you’re telling me what happened with
