“It was pretty light. Which is surprising considering the closer we get to the holidays, the more people seem to lose their minds. They’re probably just winding up…”
He goes on, and I quietly loose a sigh of relief.
Thankful he let it go.
Thankful he hadn’t gone back to the subject of King Sullivan.
Because the only subject I want to avoid more than Justin is my former, secret boyfriend. The boyfriend who’d shattered my heart, stolen my trust in people and destroyed the fragments of my faith.
Yes, I’m very thankful. Now if I can only dodge the man himself as skillfully as I did this conversation.
One can pray.
Or not.
2
King
“Explain to me again how we let you convince us to move to Bumfuck, Washington? Because I must’ve been drunk as a muthafucka when I agreed to this. Either that or high off good pussy.”
I glance over at Kade Gibson, Bloody Sunday’s drummer, and kick at the edge of the table his long legs and bare feet are propped up on. Damn. I just moved into this house. Like, today. It still has brand new house smell on it and he’s treating it like his flop house. Case in point… I aim a pointed look at the blunt he just plucked from his shirt pocket.
Wincing, he slips it back in his pocket.
“Sorry, bruh.” He grunts, dropping his feet to the floor and picking up his tumbler of whiskey. “My bad. I wasn’t even thinking.” He holds his glass up and light from the suspension lamps hanging from the beamed ceiling reflects off the amber liquid. “This okay?”
“Don’t be an ass. Just because I have a problem with it doesn’t mean all of you need to stop drinking or smoking, for that matter. Last time I checked, weed was legal in Washington.” I snort, waving him off.
But I can’t brush off the guilt so easily. It crouches within my chest like a venomous snake, coiled and ready to strike. Ready to sink its fangs deep into muscle, tendon and even bone, spreading shame and humiliation until I’m riddled with it. Breathe it.
My addictions, my demons, my fucking weakness damn near destroyed us all. Nearly devastated the career we’d spent eight years creating, growing. Nearly rendered all of our astronomical success to shit on the soles of my feet.Myfeet. Because it’d been all me.
Trashing hotel rooms. Getting thrown out of clubs for being a high and drunken mess. Images of me, half-naked, with women sprawled over me, damn near out of my mind on drugs, splashed across the blogs and tabloid websites. Showing up late or sleeping through drops and press junkets. Performing high.
I’d become the rock star cliché and was too fucked up to give a damn about the music, my career, my band…my life. The label had put up with my shit until that night.
Until the night I overdosed in the bedroom of that hotel penthouse, people I didn’t know and who didn’t give a fuck about me outside of what I could provide them—money, second-hand fame, drugs, my dick—partying on while I died.
I scrub a hand down my face, my beard abrading my palm. Yeah, I don’t kid myself. Bad press more than true concern had my label slapping down an ultimatum on me while I lay in that hospital bed. Rehab or I was done. And not just me. But Kade, Mac and Gideon.
It’d been a surprisingly easy decision.
Now, six months sober, I have even more reasons to be thankful for my decision. More reasons to protect my sobriety like a dragon guarding its treasure.
Gunner.
“Do what you want. Just no smoking in the house. Gunner…” I add as way of explanation.
And it’s enough. I don’t need to say anything else.
Kade immediately nods. He, like Mac and Gideon, loves my son nearly as much as I do.
Which is funny as hell when I think about it. None of us ever pictured ourselves as fathers any time soon especially me. Very recent ex-addict front men of rock bands teetering on the edge of burn-out just don’t make for good daddy material on paper.
Yet, here we are.
“And you were stone cold sober when I told the three of you I was moving here—from alcohol and pussy. Also, as I recall, I didn’t convince you of shit. You damn near insisted on coming with me.”