For Better or Worse (7 page)

Heather turned slowly on her heel, her eyes searching and immediately finding Jessie's. The adorable Belles receptionist looked torn between laughter and horror, and she wasn't alone.

Alexis and Brooke stood nearby as well. Brooke had her hand over her mouth, and even the implacable Alexis looked a little wide-eyed.

“Sooooo,” Heather said slowly. “Did I hear that wrong, or are they thinking that I'm going to do this whole thing? Alone. And that I'm just to
text
her for her approval?”

Brooke's hand slowly dropped from her mouth. “Look on the bright side. At least she won't be a bridezilla?”

Heather gave her a look.

“Okay, she won't be a
hands-on
bridezilla. The ones that try to control every little detail are
way
worse.”

“Are they?” Heather muttered as she rubbed her temples.

“Absolutely,” Alexis said. “This will work out. How often do we wedding planners get carte blanche to do whatever we want?”

“
Never
, and for good reason,” Heather muttered. “Everyone knows that an uninvolved bride is the kiss of death. What if I pick chocolate cake, and the groom's allergic to chocolate? What if I pick a DJ when they wanted a live band? What if—”

“What if we open up a bottle of champagne, toss in some orange juice to make it before-noon
appropriate, and have a brainstorming session over mimosas?”

“No, no,” Heather said quickly. “You guys all have your own work to do, and I can handle this. Really.”

“We want to help,” Brooke said quietly.

“I need to do this myself,” Heather said, just a little bit sharply.

She gave Brooke a pleading look to soften the rebuke.
Please. I need to prove myself.

Brooke's eyes narrowed slightly as she studied Heather, but eventually she gave a small nod. “Okay. But if you need anything . . .”

“I'll ask,” Heather reassured her friend, even though she knew she wouldn't be asking for anything. She would nail this wedding, all on her own.

She had to. She was so close to achieving her dreams. She had the apartment, the wardrobe, and in three short months, she'd have the job.

And if there was a tiny nagging part in the back of Heather's mind wondering if she was missing something crucial, Heather ignored it.

Chapter Seven

O
KAY, GUYS, THAT WAS
good,” Josh said, pulling his guitar strap over his head and setting the guitar aside after the final chord he'd played to end the band's latest song had faded away. “Really good.”

“Wait. We're done?” Felix Mendoza asked from behind the drum set, an incredulous look on his face. “It's only been, what, an hour?”

“Two,” Josh replied, looking at his watch.

“Boss has a date,” the lead singer said, making a lewd hand gesture. Of course, Trevor Cain could get away with just about any gesture and still have any woman he wanted. Such was the perk of being a kick-ass vocalist with one of those low, gravelly rock voices the women lost their panties over.

“I wish it was a date,” Josh said. “More like a curfew.”

“News flash, dude. You're in your own home. Can't have a curfew.”

“Yes, thank you for that bit of wisdom, Donny.” Josh clamped a hand on the shoulder of his ­high-
more-often­-than-not bassist as he headed toward the kitchen.

“Seriously though, what gives?” Trevor asked, following Josh into the kitchen.

Josh held up a beer in offering, and Trevor nodded. He was about to shout to the other guys, but Felix and Donny had already started in again on the music, working their way through the trickier part of the chorus.

He opened his mouth to tell them to knock it off, but he figured they probably had another ten minutes before 4C came over and busted their balls.

Today was Friday, which meant tomorrow was Saturday, and as she'd reminded him at least a dozen times, Saturdays were her big show days.

Excuse him,
wedding
days.

Although as uptight as she got about her job, they sure as hell seemed more like performances than ceremonies.

“Not feeling it tonight?” Trevor asked, taking a sip of the beer.

“Nah, it's this new neighbor. Not one of our biggest fans.”

“Shit. That sucks. But we knew it was a risk when Mrs. Calvin moved out. Man, I miss that banana bread.”

“Trust me, no banana bread coming from the new resident. I doubt she bakes, and if she did, it'd probably be, like, sour apple cyanide cake or something,” Josh said, leaning against the counter and rubbing at the back of his neck.

“Bitchy neighbor sure got under your skin,” Trevor said, already opening the fridge for another beer.

Josh didn't have the heart to tell Trevor that it wasn't Heather who was getting him down. Yeah, his hot neighbor was sort of a pain in the ass, and he'd sell a little piece of his soul to be the one she came to when she finally decided to get rid of all that wound-up energy, but . . . she wasn't what was bugging him.

Instead it was a tiny, annoying nagging sense that he didn't mind that they had to wrap up their practice early. Even worse: that Josh might be just a little bit relieved.

Which didn't make sense. Josh loved music. Loved listening to it, writing it, playing it. He knew that without vanity or conceit, he was the center. Most of the band's songs were
his
songs; the band was together because
he'd
brought them together.

Josh was the heart of the Weathered Gentlemen.

But lately, he hadn't been feeling the whole band thing.

He'd been feeling the
music
, yeah
.
At the risk of sounding like a douche, even to himself, Josh had
always
felt the music. He was the kid that had happily squeezed choir in alongside baseball practice all the way through high school.

And though his baseball prowess had maxed out in high school, his voice was good enough to get him into an a cappella group in college, where he'd continued to write songs at night to give himself a break from finance homework and economics ­papers.

And that was the tricky part. Josh had been every bit as good with numbers as he was with music.

Only, it wasn't just a matter of having two separate skills; it was as though they'd been intertwined. Music had been the counterpoint to the numbers, and vice versa.

Hence the problem. Josh still had the music, and was damn glad of it.

But he didn't have the numbers.

Not since he'd quit the firm. First because he'd had to, and then because when it had been time to go back, he'd realized he hadn't wanted to.

Hadn't wanted to go back to the suits and the power lunches and the power drinks followed by power dinners, and then . . . repeat. Days had blended into nights, weekdays blended into weekends, and though objectively he'd known that it wasn't his long hours that had caused his entire life to fall apart, it certainly hadn't helped matters any.

Maybe if he hadn't been so damn tired all the time, stressed to the max, living on frozen dinners and cocktails, he might have caught the signs a little earlier. Could have saved himself and his family a whole lot of fear.

And so he'd politely turned down his boss's offer of having his old job back, and had become, well . . . whatever he was now.

He'd founded the band from a mix of old acquaintances and friends of friends a year ago. The Weathered Gentlemen were good, but they weren't
great
. There was plenty of talent, good enough looks to get them into small weeknight gigs if one of the guys knew a guy. But with three out of the four holding down full-time jobs and four out of the four
committed to an active social life, they weren't going anywhere in a hurry. And Josh had been okay with that. He had more than enough money in the bank from his old job to sustain his new appreciation for the simple life.

For the other guys, he always figured this was more of a hobby. The kind of thing where they'd gladly be along for the ride if the band hit the big time, but music wasn't their whole life.

And Josh was realizing slowly that it wasn't his, either.

He needed music in his life, definitely. It just wasn't
enough
. As if it wasn't bad enough that his routine was boring the shit out of him lately, now even the band—the one thing he'd thought he wanted—wasn't doing it for him.

Which begged the question: What was he missing?

A loud, repeated banging at his front door scattered his thoughts.

Heather.

Just like that, Josh felt his bad mood lift in spite of himself as he pushed away from the counter and went to open the door.

“That the neighbor?” Trevor called.

“Probably.”

“Then what's the lady-killer smile for?” Trevor's asked. “I thought you said she was a bitch.”

For once in Trevor's charmed life, his timing sucked, the last part of his statement coming just as Josh had opened the front door and at the exact moment Donny and Felix stopped playing.

The word
bitch
hovered in the awkward silence.

Josh braced for Heather to tear him a new one. He deserved it. He hadn't called her a bitch explicitly, but he hadn't exactly said anything nice, either.

The woman was annoying, yes, but she was also . . . interesting.

And despite all those badass walls she tried to put up, he'd bet his guitar that there was a sweetheart hiding beneath all the curls and sass.

Maybe.

One could always hope, at least.

To his surprise, she didn't mention the bitch comment at all. Knowing her, she was probably saving it for another time, planning to let it marinate good and long in her woman vault of Things You Did That One Time and haul it out and make him pay later.

Instead she merely lifted her eyebrows. “Do I need to do the whole ‘do you know what time it is' routine, or is it pretty clear why I'm here?”

“Ahhh—”

For a moment Josh's brain turned off, because the way her purple tank top hugged her firm, round, slightly perfect breasts made him wish she were here for an entirely different reason.

“Well, hello there. You must be 4C,” Trevor said, coming to the door and giving Josh a reprieve.

Heather shook Trevor's hand. “My reputation precedes me, I see.”

Josh's eyes narrowed. Was that
flirting
he heard in Heather's voice? He didn't think the ballbuster was capable of it, but . . .

Yup, that was definitely an eyelash flutter he just saw.

“Can I get you a beer?” Trevor asked.

“Don't bother,” Josh said. “She's here to kill all joy in the world.”

“Not all joy, Josh. Just yours,” Heather said, still smiling prettily at Trevor. “
And
I would also like a beer.”

Josh's mouth dropped open as Heather came inside.

“Do you want to borrow a sweatshirt?” he asked her gruffly, surprised at himself even as the question came out unbidden.

Finally she looked at him, those wide eyes narrowing. “Why would I want to borrow a sweatshirt?”

“Just thought you might be cold,” he muttered, shutting the door.

“Hey, who's this?” Felix asked, coming out of the practice room with Donny.

“This is 4C,” Trevor said before Josh could respond.

“Heather,” his neighbor corrected sweetly, going to shake Felix's hand as well as Donny's.

“So, you guys must be the band keeping me awake,” she said good-naturedly, as though she didn't secretly want them all to die a painful death for ­stealing her precious sleep time. Josh felt like he'd just stepped into the twilight zone. Who was this smiling, friendly creature? Why was she not waving her hand around all crazy-like, forcing him to kiss her to shut her up?

And from the speculating look on Trevor's face, he wasn't the only one who noticed that Heather Fowler
in her skimpy little tank top and flowing pajama pants looked ridiculously kissable.

“What kind of beer?” Josh asked Heather.

“I've got it,” Trevor said, appearing at Heather's side and pressing a bottle into her hand as she stuck her head into the practice room.

“So this is where the noise happens, huh?” she asked.

Josh's eyes narrowed as his friend's hand touched Heather's back briefly. “Absolutely,” Trevor said. “We're sorry it keeps you up though.”

“Oh, it's okay,” she said, waving her hand. “I mean . . . it's not. But tonight I couldn't sleep anyway, so you get a free pass. What do you all play?”

“Donny's bass, Felix is on drums. Josh is lead guitar, and I, as the most important member, have the pipes.”

“Oh! I thought Josh was the singer,” Heather said with a quick glance over her shoulder at him.

Their eyes locked, and Josh felt a flicker of . . . something.

“Ah, is that what he's telling the women these days?” Trevor joked.

“No, I just . . . I hear him, singing sometimes,” Heather muttered.

“Our boy can carry a tune well enough, but wait until you hear
me
, love,” Trevor said.

Josh turned away in mild disgust, pulling a beer out of the fridge as Trevor and the other guys coaxed Heather into the practice room, thrilled to have any sort of audience, even a reluctant one.

“Yo, Tanner,” Felix called.

“What?” he called, popping the lid off the bottle and tilting the beer to his lips as he tried to shake off whatever was bringing down his mood tonight.

“Let's show Heather here that we're more than a bit of noise coming through her bedroom wall.”

Josh turned around to see Donny dragging one of his kitchen chairs across the room, disappearing into the practice room.

“All right, love, you just sit down and get comfortable,” Trevor said. “Tanner! Come on, man.”

Josh heard the low strum of Donny's bass guitar, heard Felix do a little warm-up rhythm, and knew there was no way of getting out of it. If he refused to play a song now, he'd look like an ass.

Still, his feet didn't move, and he took another sip of beer.

Feeling eyes on him, he glanced up to see Heather in the doorway, leaning one shoulder against the doorjamb as she studied him.

“Okay, 4A?” she asked.

Her tone was lighthearted, almost slightly reluctant, as though she didn't want to care about why he was out here alone, feeling oddly itchy with his life.

He appreciated it. He'd spent enough time in the past few years dealing with people who walked on eggshells around him, cooing sweetness. Some of it genuine, some of it not so much.

Heather's no-nonsense question was refreshing—and exactly what he needed.

He was happy and healthy and living the dream, damn it.

Even if he was no longer sure it was
his
dream.

“You going soft on me?” he asked, taking one last sip of his beer before setting it aside and strolling toward her.

Heather's eyes narrowed. “Hardly. I just wanted you to get your shit together so I can see your cute lead singer work his magic.”

He deliberately stepped into the doorway so she couldn't move in either direction without brushing against him, grinning at her discomfort.