I feel my face pale a shade. “Hey—”
“You need anything else, just give a shout,” she says brightly, but I swear she’s blinking back tears. “I’ll be around.”
I feel something inside me crumble as she turns from the table and walks away, ponytail swinging behind her with a bit less bounce than before. If I was the kind of guy who felt guilty about being an ass, my head would be hanging pretty fucking low right now.
As it is… Iaman ass. I don’t know how to be anything else.
So, I reach out, twist off the seal of the whiskey, and take a long swig straight from the bottle. The familiar burn feels so good going down, it’s almost enough to forget the look in her eyes as she walked away from me.
* * *
“Comeon, Ry,”Lacey says in her little-girl voice, twining her hand with mine and tugging me from the booth. The pout on her face might be cute if it weren’t so contrived.
My feet hold firmly to the floor when she tries to drag me in the direction of the bar. The last thing I want to do is run into our waitress, to see the hurt in her golden eyes as she stares through me again. The high from our set has officially worn off, in no small part because the Red Machine label guys never showed us so much as a flicker of interest. To celebrate our failure, I’ve been hunkered in our booth alone for the past hour, listening to the band and drowning my sorrows with my old friend whiskey. Lacey’s been at the bar, letting boys she’ll never sleep with buy her shots she shouldn’t drink. Aiden and Linc disappeared into the crowd to cast their lines amongst the groupies, hoping to reel in a girl before closing time.
Sex, booze, attention— we’ve all got our consolation prizes.
By the time Lacey circles back around to our booth, I’m half as drunk as I’d like to be, twice as pissed as I have reason to be, and definitely not in the damn mood to deal with whatever she’s up to at this hour.
“Lacey.”
Her eyelashes flutter. “What?”
“Either tell me where you’re trying to drag me or I’m going home.”
She sighs dramatically. “God, you’re no fun anymore.”
I stare at her, waiting.
“Gosh, I don’t know, I just thoughtmaybeyou’d want to meet the record executives from Red Machine.” She drops my hand so she can cross her arms over her chest and pout more effectively.
I go still. “They approached you?”
“Uh, yeah.” She flips her hair. “The guy with the glasses bought me a shot of jägermeister. Which I drank to be polite but, like…gross. Everyone knows I’m a tequila girl.”
“Your drink preferences are not really the point here, Lacey.” I swallow hard, feeling suddenly sober. “What else did he say?”
“Nothing! Relax. I told him I needed you by my side before we talked about any kind of deal.”
Sweet fuck.
A deal.
A sliver of hope pierces me through the heart. Maybe all is not lost.
“This is big, Lacey.” I glance around, looking for Aiden and Lincoln. “We have to grab the guys, they should be there for this—”
“No!” Lacey interjects, grabbing hold of my arm to stop me. “No.”
My eyes narrow. “What’s going on?”
“Just you and me, Ry.” Her grin is simperingly sweet, her gaze pleading. “Come on. It might overwhelm them if all four of us go. You know how Lincoln gets. He’ll talk a mile a minute and scare them off.”
I hesitate, just for a moment, and she takes the opportunity to link her arm with mine.
“We’ll just talk to them for a second. Okay?” She starts pulling me back toward the bar. “What can it hurt?”
I fix my eyes forward, ignoring the unease stirring in my stomach as she drags me through the crowd toward everything I’ve ever wanted. I should be over the moon at this opportunity.