The New Rakes (25 page)

‘Yes.’

Ruby smiled. Slowly, her movements stilled, until she was motionless over Jon’s body. She held her face inches from his. ‘No,’ she said, her voice all velvet and treacherous. ‘Not yet.’

Jon groaned. Ruby hushed him and stroked his face. She let her fingertips rest on his lips, very gently. Something in the touch was so intimate that it embarrassed Kara. It was as though by witnessing this one small gesture she was trespassing on territory even more private than the sex.

Jon kicked and tried to lift his hips. He turned his head to bury his face in Ruby’s palm, whispering something into it that Kara couldn’t hear. Ruby stayed where she was, unmoving, her thighs locked over Jon’s hips.

‘Come here,’ she said.

Kara knew she was talking to her and she responded instantly, slipping onto the floor and crawling over to them. She felt like a beggar at a feast, waiting to see what Ruby would offer her – something to suck or something to put inside her. It really didn’t matter. She hovered next to their entwined bodies, ready to do whatever she was told.

But Ruby had a different plan.

‘Watch us,’ she hissed, drawing herself up straight. She leaned back, arching her spine like a dancer so that Kara had a clear view. Her eyes were drawn to the point where their bodies joined, the cleft of Ruby’s sex with Jon’s cock buried inside it. When Ruby started moving again, Jon’s shaft slid out of her, his skin dark and glistening with moisture.

‘This is what you don’t get,’ Ruby said, breathing heavily. ‘This is what you’ll never have.’

She locked eyes with Kara as she swayed over Jon, rising up and sinking down again, over and over. Although Jon was pleading with her, she didn’t increase her movements, just kept rocking at a steady pace. Her eyes were glittering, with arousal, but also with the thrill of victory.

‘You get to be the star. You get to win the race.’ She panted as she spoke. ‘You get to win all the games, Kara. But you don’t get Jon.’

‘No,’ Kara said, ‘I wasn’t playing games with you.’

But Ruby wasn’t listening any more. Her body had curled over Jon’s, her hands splayed on his chest while she ground her hips into his. Kara spread her hands on her knees and watched as Ruby rode Jon into the floor. She was locked out of their tryst, outside of the circle. Neither of them were even looking at her any more, just moving against each other, their movements perfectly in sync.

Kara could tell they were going to come from the way Jon’s
fists
were curling and Ruby’s screwed-shut eyes. It wasn’t a performance any more – their bodies were lost in each other. Ruby slammed down, fucking Jon with short swift thrusts.

Kara held her breath, listening to the broken cries and the short panting breaths. She watched as Ruby curled over and spilled across Jon, raining kisses all over his face and cupping his head in her hands. Words tumbled out of her mouth, softly whispered, something Kara couldn’t quite hear. There was a catch in her voice, as though she was crying.

Jon repeated her words back to her and the two of them collapsed, sagged against each other. Ruby buried her head in the crook of her boyfriend’s neck and breathed hard.

Sitting next to them, Kara heard the heartbeat in her ears match the pulse in her womb. It was the same restless rhythm that pushed her forwards every day – the one that she heard just before she went on stage or when she was about to have sex.

Jon stroked the small of Ruby’s back, a rhythmic soothing touch that Kara suddenly longed for more than anything. She hugged herself tightly and listened to the birds singing outside.

Her phone woke her – the jangling ring tone screeching into her dreams and jerking her awake in seconds. She was in her own bed, wrapped in the sheet and lying flat on her stomach. Bright sunshine sliced through the curtains and the sky outside was a hard flat blue. Kara swore and scrabbled through her clothes for the phone. Mike’s name showed on the screen, and when she caught sight of the clock displayed under his number, Kara winced.

He didn’t even bother to say hello.

‘Where the hell are you?’

Kara started to stammer an explanation, all the memories
of
the long strange night flooding her brain and making her stomach twist. But she was still foggy and half asleep, and the words wouldn’t come out right. She was sure she could hear Mike grinding his teeth on the other end.

‘I don’t want to hear it. I’ll pick you up in twenty minutes. Be ready.’

Kara counted in her head. Three hours until the sound check. Four until the doors opened and the audience started filling the black cave of the Polar. Five hours until she had to be up there, with a new set of backing musicians and new songs, making her big impression on all the people who mattered.

She stumbled out of bed and stubbed her toe on the way to the bathroom. Lucky that adrenaline dulls the pain, she thought to herself as she jumped in the shower and blasted herself awake with scalding hot water. She thought about doing some vocal warm-ups in the steamy room, but decided she couldn’t risk waking Jon and Ruby.

The night had been intense, weird and sexy – a strange way of making peace. But Kara still felt as if the ground underfoot was treacherous, that there were still pitfalls and tripwires between her and Ruby.

For some reason, after all the charged sex and emotional confrontations, the image that stuck in her head was of Jon and Ruby holding each other so tight they looked like they’d been carved from a single piece of stone.

Kara dressed in her lucky red Converse and favourite vest top – grey with neon flowers spilling across the chest and a deep-slashed neck. She pulled on a pair of jeans and shoved her make-up bag into a backpack, along with her song sheets. As a final thought, she packed the silver guitar pick Tam had given her for her twenty-first birthday. She tried not to think too hard about what Tam might be doing or thinking.

There was no time to call him or worry about Lina’s threats.
In
a few hours Kara would be on stage. This was what she’d been working towards for the past five years – nothing else could get in the way.

By the time she heard Mike’s horn outside, Kara had drunk two cans of Coke and put on her brightest, reddest red lipstick. She clattered downstairs to his car and slid into the seat, barely getting the door pulled shut before he was pulling away from the kerb.

‘Morning,’ Mike said brusquely. His normally calm face was scored with deep lines and his eyes were flashing deep violet. ‘Good to see you.’

Kara ignored the sarcasm in his voice. She looked out of the window at the fruit shops and cafés that were passing as they sped down Great Western Road. Mike ran two red lights and took the corners way too fast – swearing bitterly when the car got snarled up in the Saturday traffic.

Kara watched a couple walking over Kelvin Bridge, the man with his arm slung over the woman’s shoulders, their heads turned in to snatch a kiss.

‘Is Lina at the venue?’ Kara asked, trying to keep her voice even.

‘She’ll be around,’ Mike said, keeping his eyes on the road. ‘Why?’

‘No reason,’ Kara said.

‘Wherever the action is, you’ll find Lina,’ Mike muttered.

Kara threw him a curious glance. Was there more to his mood than stress and the fact she’d run out of the studio the night before? ‘You fell out?’ she asked, before she could stop herself.

Mike crunched the gears as he pulled up at a junction and braked hard. ‘What else is new,’ he said, almost to himself. Then he twisted in his seat to look at Kara. ‘We’ve been up most of the night trying to set up this gig.’ His gaze tripped
over
Kara as if hunting for clues. ‘While you’ve been up to God knows what.’

‘I had stuff to sort out,’ Kara answered, pulling at her fringe.

‘What stuff? With whom?’

The question, or the fierceness of Mike’s tone, startled her.

The light had changed to green, but Mike sat motionless with his hand on the gear stick, waiting for her to talk. Behind them a taxi sounded its horn.

Kara opened her mouth to give him a choice reply, but bit her lip when she saw his face. Something told her this was something she really, really didn’t want to get into.

21

POLAR WAS A
very different place during the day. The whole place reeked of pine disinfectant layered over the lingering smell of stale beer, and the black walls were scuffed and shabby. Without the lighting and the crowds, and with the pulsing background music silent, the place echoed like an empty gym hall. Stagehands and engineers shouted to each other across the stage, wires lay coiled on the floor and bursts of feedback crackled at random through the speakers.

Kara followed Mike through the warren of corridors behind the stage, glancing through half-open doors and trying to keep her bearings. Backstage spaces always disoriented her – windowless, functional labyrinths with the feel of an engine room. There was always the sense that everything was humming with purpose, counting the hours until show time. Mike knocked on a white door and tried the handle. It didn’t budge.

‘Shit,’ he muttered, wheeling round and letting Kara see the tic of irritation that jerked in his cheek. ‘The instruments are in there. Lina has the key.’

Kara took a deep breath and exhaled through her mouth. She could tell the tension was getting to Mike. Before a gig, she and Tam would be wound up and brimming with nerves, ready to spark a fight or a fuck at any moment. She found sex usually helped take the edge off. But they had hours to go yet – and Mike looked like he was suffering from something worse than stage fright.

‘Is everything OK?’ she asked, unsettled that Mike wasn’t as cool and in control as he always seemed to be.

He bit his lip. ‘It’s been a long time,’ he said.

‘Since you played on stage?’

Mike sighed. He rattled the door handle again, as if it might magically unlock itself. ‘Go and find Lina,’ he said, abruptly. ‘Get the key and bring it back here.’

He kept his back to Kara as he spoke and she hovered for a moment waiting for more information.

‘Go on!’ Mike said, and Kara spun on her heel and jogged back the way they’d come, retracing her steps until she emerged in the auditorium. She caught sight of the hired guitarist sitting on the edge of the stage.

‘Seen Lina?’ she called, not willing to say more to him than she absolutely had to. Every time he saw her, Eric’s face took on a contemptuous leer.

Now he sat back and spread his legs wide, giving Kara a greasy smile. ‘Who wants to know?’

Kara nearly spat on the floor. ‘Just tell me where she is,’ she said, putting her hands on her hips.

‘Surely Mike doesn’t want to see her,’ he continued. ‘Ever again, I’d have thought.’

‘What are you talking about?’

Eric frowned. ‘Of course, you disappeared last night. That did not go down well. Want to hear what happened next?’ He beckoned to her, patted the stage next to him. ‘Come and sit down, I’ll tell you everything.’

Kara swallowed. She edged closer to the stage, keeping Eric at arm’s length. ‘So spill.’

‘What, you don’t want to cuddle up next to me?’ Eric raised his eyebrows.

‘Eric. Tell me what happened,’ Kara said through her teeth.

‘OK,’ Eric sighed. ‘Let’s just say – “hell hath no fury”. After you left, Mike freaked out. He shouts at Lina –’

‘And Lina shouts back, no doubt,’ Kara filled in, impatient to hear the rest. ‘Then what?’

Eric screwed up his face and winced. ‘It wasn’t pretty. Lina tells Mike he’s going to mess it all up like he did the last time.’

‘What, the concert?’

‘Yeah. Hasn’t played for six years. But she also said …’ Eric stopped talking and pulled at a thread on his jeans.

Come on
, Kara urged him silently. She slid a little closer and put her hand on his knee, forced herself to smile at him. ‘Said what?’

Eric looked at her. His eyes were as wide as a startled animal’s. Underneath that sleazy exterior, Kara realised, he was just an insecure kid. She squeezed his thigh hard.

He cleared his throat and kept talking. ‘She said you were using him. That you didn’t need him. And that you had probably gone to, uh … to get together with Tam.’

‘What did Mike say?’

‘He just went really quiet. And then he left. Lina went after him,’ Eric said. He shrugged. ‘They drove off in his car. Left us standing about like spare parts. So we packed up our gear and called it a night.’

Kara realised she was gnawing at her bottom lip. Had Mike listened to Lina’s outburst? Would he care? Maybe she was using him. It seemed everybody had marked her down as a selfish bitch lately. She slid off the stage and wandered towards the ticket desk, turning things over in her mind.

Lina was crouched over the desk, phone clamped to her ear, laughing with that smoke-and-gravel voice she had in the mornings. Kara waited at a discreet distance, trying to make out what the conversation was about. Whoever she was talking to, Lina was turning on the charm.

‘Well, just make sure you do,’ she said, playing with a lock of her hair. ‘OK. See you then.’ She looked up and caught sight of Kara, hovering behind a pillar. Her expression slipped for a moment, and then she nodded. ‘Bye, Tam,’ she said sweetly, and folded the phone slowly shut. ‘Kara. What is it?’

‘That was Tam? How is he?’ Kara asked. The blood buzzed in her ears and she had a crazy impulse to wrench the phone out of Lina’s hand.

Lina stared at her for a moment and raised an eyebrow. ‘What do you want, Kara?’

Of course, the way Lina played her games included never giving a straight answer. Keep cool, Kara told herself, although her heart was squeezing. ‘We need the key for the dressing room,’ she said.

Lina plunged a hand into her pocket and pulled out a keyring. She held it out, dangling it on the end of her fingertips. Kara reached for it, but Lina swung it aside, leaving her hands to close on empty air.

‘You failed,’ Lina said.

Kara noticed the other woman’s lips were rimmed with colour but pale in the centre, as though she’d chewed off the berry-coloured lipstick that was usually so perfectly applied.