Did he actually think she was in love with him or something?
She could not possibly be that good of a con artist.
I mean, she was gorgeous. And totally plastic. Exactly the type JC fell for, historically. But wasn’t he past the days of falling for girls like that and thinking there was any substance to them?
Really, how stupid was he?
I took a step closer. He didn’t move aside or invite me in, just stood right in the doorway. I wondered if he was alone. If Brianna was in the house. Or if his bodyguard was here with him. I didn’t see or hear anyone else in the hallway behind him.
“Well, thank you for deigning to open the door for me,” I said. “Seems like we should talk.”
“About what? Pretty sure waiting on an ‘I’m sorry’ from you is a lost cause.”
I considered how to put it, then went with, “There’s a possibility that I misread your… involvement with her.”
He made a disgusted sound. “And that’s the closest to an apology I’m gonna get, I know.”
“What do I owe you an apology for?”
“Only you would ask that question, Johnny.”
“I don’t think she’s the kind of girl you think she is.”
“What,” he said bitterly, “like the kind of girl I was considering giving a ring?”
Jesus.
He wasn’t, really.
Was he?
“I’d probably be rethinking that if I were you,” I told him.
“The day I ask for your opinion on the matter, hell will have frozen over. So I’m afraid you’ll be out a fiery chasm to slither back to after your next diabolical conquest.”
Cute. And poetic.
If only the song lyrics he wrote were half as good.
“How about let’s not make this about her,” I suggested. “Last I looked, she wasn’t in our band.”
“Well, neither were you, half the fucking time,” he fired back, his voice rising.And here we go with the tantrum.“You know how many times I heard you were out there, talking to some other band about leaving us and joining them?Too fucking many,” he hissed at me, answering his own question. “You think I don’t know you talked to Dirty behind my back? Trying to leave us for something better, every other fucking minute?” He shook his head, like that disgusted him even more than the Brianna thing. “You want fame, you want money, and you want pussy, and you’d stab me in the fucking back to get any of it.”
“That Dirty thing was years ago. And it was just a conversation. You’re free to have those with other bands yourself, if you think you can find something better.”
“Of course it was just a conversation. You think Jesse Mayes and Zane Traynor didn’t see you coming a mile off? They were never gonna play backup to your fucking ego.”
“So, you’re my backup band, is that it?” As if I hadn’t already listened to him moan and complain about living in my shadow, for Goddamn forever. Like every single time I co-wrote a fucking song, as if I had no right to assert my ideas. As if I had no voice.
And every single time I sang backup on a song and he didn’t like it that peoplelikedmy voice. That our crew and our friends and our fans said I should sing more.
JC was the lead singer, and how dare I threaten his supremacy?
As if I ever wanted his fucking job. Yeah, I liked money, but you couldn’t pay me enough to be the lead singer, in any band.
“You’ve had one foot out the door from day one,” he accused. “You never wanted this band as much as you wanted a vehicle to become Johnny O, superstar, and you didn’t give a fuck who you rolled over along the way. Well, I’m evacuating the fucking train wreckbeforeyou crash and burn.”
So, maybe I couldn’t change his mind.
