Torn - Part Two (The Torn Series) (9 page)

“You’re okay?” she asked immediately, resting a hand on my elbow.

“I’m great,” I said, “I won, didn’t I?”

“You did.” She smiled shyly.

“Want to get out of here?”

She cast a glance back over her shoulder. “I guess. We’re not practicing anymore tonight but we need to get together pretty early tomorrow. We’ve only got two days.”

I shrugged. “So I’ll come to your place.” I glared around us. “Where’d Tony run off to?”

“He had to go.” She sighed.
Great. He said something to upset her. Of course.
“He left me alone, pretty much, thank goodness,” she said. “He seemed more interested in hitting on Jen.” She eyed me warily. “He said you wouldn’t be happy if you saw them together like that.”

The question hung in the air -
why would he say that?
I should have just told her the truth and I knew it even as the words were coming out of my mouth, but my inner bastard had taken over like it always did when Tony was involved. Like it always did, period. “Surly’s the one who wouldn’t be happy.” And I shrugged, and smirked, hiding from the truth - he knew about Jen and me. And he was going to use it.

Truth was, he was welcome to hit on her all he liked, I had no real feelings either way about the girl. Not since Riley. But would she understand that? Or would she just fixate on the fact that Jen had lied to her and I’d said nothing to set her straight?

I was too tired to sort it out in my head just then. “Come on,” I said, “I’ll take you home. You can kick me out as early as you’d like tomorrow.”

She smiled as I wrapped an arm around her waist, but it didn’t touch the little creases of concern around her eyes.

CHAPTER 9

“Which ones are the judges?” Riley was nervous. Well, Riley was always nervous, but she was extra nervous as she stood on her toes and observed the room. The venue was bigger than any they’d played before and had its own security, which meant I was off the hook. Surly and I had dragged along Lockett and a few other guys from the gym to cheer the girls on.

“No clue,” I said. I wasn’t even looking; I couldn’t peel my eyes off of her. Sure, the stage makeup was pretty thick, but she looked more like herself than she had in a while - she was bouncing on her toes in her high-heeled boots, tugging the hem of her skirt, biting her dark red lips. These were normal anxious Riley habits, without the frightened concern she’d been wearing.

Things were better - she’d seen me win my fight without losing my cool. And she’d gotten over whatever worries Tony had planted in her head. From what I’d heard, he was more interested in flirting with Jen, anyway.
Fine by me.
I supposed I’d have to come clean about our past relationship eventually but that night was not the night. Riley needed to focus on the show.

And I wasn’t ready to deal with the fallout yet myself. Maybe I never would be. Maybe I could convince Tony to keep his mouth shut, just about this one thing, just this once.
Fat chance.

“Uh oh,” she said, looking past me. “Take a guess who’s here.”

Preceded by an “uh oh,” I only needed one guess. “Tony.” I frowned. “What’s he doing here?”

“Jen invited him. I didn’t think he’d show, he kind of rolled his eyes when she talked about it.” A fake smile spread across her face and I felt his presence just behind me. “Hi, Tony,” she said, “Nice to see you again.”

I didn’t turn, just twisted my head to look at him over my shoulder. “What are you doing here?”

He grinned a shit-eating grin. “Your girl invited me.” I inwardly cringed.

“No I didn’t,” Riley said, her smile wavering.

“Oh,” he said, waving a dismissive hand, “Must have been the one with the purple hair.”

Riley’s eyes narrowed. I needed to knock this conversation off track, fast. “Since when are you into the music scene anyway?” I asked him.

“Just wanted to see if the girls are as good as they claim,” he said. “All three of them were full of big talk.”

Riley’s smile was completely gone now. “We’re just as good as we say.”
Shit.
She’d taken his bait. I recognized his pattern because I knew him so well. She had no such defense. Now was the part where he dropped the bomb, though what it would be I couldn’t even begin to imagine. Either way, I tensed all over and waited for the explosion.

“All right,” he said, “I just know one of those other bands hired a pro at the last minute. The Swordfish Fight? Their new bassist played for a whole bunch of semi-famous bands.”

I shouldn’t have let him say it. I should have punched him in his stupid smug face before he tried to psych Riley out. Why did I keep letting him get away with this shit? “Do you have to be such a fucking bastard all the time?” I asked, finally turning to face him.

“It’s fine,” Riley said, gripping my arm. “Please. Mallet. It’s okay. It’s better that we know, he’s doing us a favor.” I could feel her fingers trembling. I forced myself to calm down.

“Go on,” I said, giving her a nudge towards the backstage door. “The girls will be wondering where you’ve gone.”

Her eyes searched mine. “You’ll be okay?”
Fuck.
The competition wasn’t enough, now she was going to worry about me.

“Promise,” I said, then planted a quick kiss on her dark red lips, careful not to smudge them. “You look amazing, by the way.”

“Thanks.” Her smile finally returned, though faintly. “See you after the show?”

“I’ll be right here.”

“Good luck,” Tony said. She didn’t respond to him as she slipped away through the crowd.

I didn’t want to get myself kicked out but once she was gone, I didn’t need to play nice anymore, either. “You dumb fuck,” I snarled, “Why do you have to mess with her? She has nothing to do with any of the shit between us.”

He had no answer. Of course. So instead he tried to change the subject. “Saw you fight a couple days ago. Your chokes have gotten better.” He nudged me with an elbow. “Not good enough, though.”

“You’re only taunting me because you’re scared,” I said, tilting my head. “Why the hell else would you come all the way down here to bother us? You want to mess with Riley’s head and mess with mine because you think it’ll give you the upper hand.” I shoved him backwards, not too hard, just enough to jostle him a step. Just enough to piss him off. “It’s not gonna work,
brother.
” I spat the word out like a curse. “Go home. Leave us the fuck alone.”

People were starting to eye us and move away. Tony showed his palms, refusing to shove me back. I would have loved the excuse to hit him in the face but he always did manage to remain infuriatingly calmer than me. “Sorry,” he said, “I wouldn’t want to rattle the little triangle you’ve got going on.”

“There’s no fucking triangle.”

He shrugged. “That’s not what that Jen girl thinks.”

When the hell had they gotten so friendly? I didn’t want to know. “Go fuck Jen yourself for all I care,” I said, “Just leave me out of it.” Finally, I did what I should have done in the first place - I walked away. He wouldn’t follow. I’d have Lockett and Surly on my side once I found them and they would verbally shut him down in ways that I couldn’t seem to manage. I found them near the bar and tried to put on a happy face as they cheered my arrival and passed me a drink. This was Riley’s night. I wasn’t going to let Tony ruin it any more than he already had.

We weren’t music experts, so when the first band came out and played a five-song set, we clapped politely and shrugged at each other and ordered another round of drinks. Their style was different from the Mistresses of Mayhem and they didn’t command the crowd’s attention as well as the girls did, so I didn’t consider them much of a competitor. I could imagine Riley backstage though, fretting and twirling her hair. I wished I could have been back there to reassure her.

I wished I knew who the judges were so I could attempt to bribe them. Not that I
really
would but there was no harm in entertaining the idea.

The MC was back onstage announcing the next act. “Up second tonight but hopefully not coming in second, right guys? Heh. We have The Swordfish Fight!” The crowd applauded but I refrained. If they were Riley’s main competitors then I wasn’t going to cheer them on, no matter if it made no difference.

They were good; there was no denying that. They were far better than the first band and the crowd definitely seemed more into their show. I couldn’t tell if they were better or not - how could you even judge “better” when their genres were different? These guys were playing rock covers, the Mistresses played punk. The guy on bass seemed to know what he was doing, but so did Riley as far as I was concerned.

“Think the girls still have a chance?” I asked Surly once they cleared off the stage.

“Sure,” he said with a shrug, “Who know what the judges are looking for?”

Fighting was so much easier. Sure, sometimes a match had to be judged and a winner declared if the match was close. I didn’t like fights like that, though - I liked it when it was clear. The loser either passed out or tapped out and that was that. I’d gotten used to being declared the winner . Except when Tony was involved, of course.

The girls played next. They stormed onstage with a wild energy and launched right into their first song as soon as Robin was seated behind the drum set.

I could tell that Riley was off her game right away and sappy as it sounds it broke my damn heart. She still played well - she always played well, and she’d told me that herself. I didn’t doubt it. But the spark was missing. She wasn’t marching back and forth and owning the stage the way she normally did. Her smile was strained and her shoulders tense. Even from where I was standing I could see the looks passed between her and Jen.

My stomach sank when they finally strode offstage. Maybe I’d only noticed something was wrong because I knew her so well. Maybe they still had a chance at winning. The crowd had seemed just as into it as always. But who could say what the judges thought?

I pushed my way through to the backstage door and waited for Riley as I promised I would. She burst out just a moment later with Jen hot on her heels.

“Maybe if you didn’t have your head up your ass you would have remember how to play five simple fucking songs,” Jen was hissing when they reached me. Her teeth were bared and her eyes were wild. Hell, she was probably drunk, or high, or both. “This was a mistake,” she snarled, “Letting you join was a mistake.” Riley pressed her forehead against my shoulder and I tugged her close. “And this,” Jen went on, gesturing at the two of us, “is a
ridiculous
fucking mistake.”

“Don’t be such a bitch, Jen, Jesus,” I said.

“Where the fuck is Surly?” I pointed back towards the bar and she shoved past me, slamming her shoulder into my arm. I ignored her. What else could I do?

“You okay?” I asked, rubbing the back of Riley’s neck. “Don’t listen to her. She’s always been kinda crazy.”
Please don’t be crying.
Much as I wanted to comfort her, I wouldn’t know how to deal with that, that was for damn sure.

Luckily her eyes were dry when she stepped back. “She’s right,” she said, shoulders slumping, “My head was up my ass. I fucked it up and we’re going to lose.”

“You all sounded fine to me,” I said.

“We didn’t want to sound ‘fine.’ We needed to kick ass. We needed to sound awesome.”

“I’m not a good judge,” I said, “How bad did you guys think you were?”

She shrugged. “Not bad enough to embarrass ourselves but not good enough to win.” It was a reasonable assessment. Too reasonable to argue with, so I hugged her close and kissed the top of her head.

“Jen will just have to get the hell over it,” I said. “It’s the same with fights, you know. Some days you’re on and some you’re just off and all the training in the world won’t save you.”

“Well, tell that to Jen.” She wrapped her arms around my waist and squeezed. “Can we go?”

“You don’t want to wait for the results?”

“Not really.” She sighed and stepped back. “I guess we ought to.”

Robin finally joined us while we watched the last two acts. She didn’t look eager to seek out Jen, though she kept looking for her over her shoulder. “She won’t kick you out of the band,” she reassured Riley, “Let’s take a few days off. I’ll calm her down and then we’ll talk about our next move, okay?”

“If you say so,” Riley said with a tight smile.