“Those things are terrible for you,” Cody says, grabbing two bottles of water.
“But they taste good,” is my argument.
He rolls his eyes as we take our seats across from each other. We make small talk as we eat. Cody goes up for more food, but I’m stuffed. If I eat any more, I’ll be sick, but I stay and chat with him, sipping on my water, as he devours his heaping pile of vegetables and chicken.
“How do you eat healthy on the road?” I ask.
His eyes widen and he points down at his plate. “Uh, they provide it.”
“Yeah, when we’re here at a show. But what about actually on the road?”
“Everywhere sells salads.”
“Rabbit food, you mean?”
Cody rolls his eyes. “Why ask if you’re going to be a dick?”
“Is salad seriously the only healthy thing you eat on the road?” I ask. “There’s no fucking way.”
“I cheat now and then. I do enjoy a greasy ass burger sometimes. But it’s not difficult to find places that make food that isn’t highly processed or full of fat and calories. You just have to look at the right places on the menu.”
“Sounds like too much work,” I mutter, bringing my bottle of water to my lips.
My skin at the back of my neck tingles, and without thinking, I glance over my shoulder.
My gaze finds Aliko’s. There’s something in his eyes that I can’t place, something slightly darker than usual. He’s standing with the rest of the guys in the band at the beginning of the line to get their food.
Lucien elbows him, then says something. Aliko blinks and looks at Lucien, nodding along to whatever he’s saying. I bring my attention back to Cody, who is looking at me confused.
“What was that about?” he asks.
“What?”
“Aliko mad at you or something?”
I shrug. “Fucking hope not. His drums were giving me a hard time earlier.”
“Were they? Because they’re not alive.”
I give him the middle finger and glance back at Aliko who is fully focused on filling up his plate with food.
“I think a few of the guys are playing poker in one of the empty dressing rooms until we do our final sound check. You in?” Cody asks.
“Yeah, sure.”
I drain the rest of my bottle, swallowing hard. I gather my stuff and toss it into the trash and recycling bin before heading toward the door with Cody.
I feel Aliko’s gaze on me all the way there.
Chapter Nine
Aliko
Dorian and I share a tour bus because we don’t like to party it up like Lucien and Kael. Most bands share one tour bus, but since we’re so big, that wasn’t really an option. We’d considered each having our own, but that felt like a little too much. So, we settled on two in each of the biggest tour buses we could find. It’s still a struggle sometimes, but we make it work. As long as we aren’t trying to hang out in the same space at the same time, we’re good. Which we don’t usually do since both of us tend to keep to ourselves. Kael and Lucien are the party animals.
We’ve been on the road for a few hours now, meaning we still have about six left. I don’t mind driving from place to place, it’s a nice rest after playing a show, especially three in a row.
We kicked off the tour with a Friday and Saturday show. The energy was out of this world, and I didn’t realize how exhausted I was until the following Monday. I rode that high all day on Sunday, in disbelief that we just played two fucking shows.
