Beyond The Music (The Rock Gods Book 7) (42 page)

“Well, I’ll let you two have at it,” Lincoln mumbled.

“No, stay,” Dante grunted. “We like an . . . audience.” Dante’s voice was becoming shaky.

Lincoln looked back at the bedroom door. “We’re not into sharing,” Lincoln stated firmly.

“Neither are we,” Dante hissed as Ashton’s head continued dropping into Dante’s lap. “It’s about watching and being watched for us. Nothing more.”

Lincoln absorbed that information and Dante’s head dropped to the back of the couch. “Oh, god,” Dante cried out. “Baby, you’re gonna make me shoot.” Lincoln turned to step into the doorway of the bathroom as Dante groaned again. Lincoln couldn’t help himself. His eyes darted back to the couch to see Dante’s hips lifting off the couch cushion thrusting into Ashton’s willing mouth. “Oh, fuck! I’m coming!”

Lincoln’s gaze was glued to Ashton’s tongue as it lapped up all of Dante’s release from his still pulsing shaft. The soft, satisfied moans escaping Dante and the skilled attention Ashton was giving to Dante’s cock were captivating. Lincoln had to force himself to turn around and walk away.

“Thanks for watching, man,” Dante panted.

“You are one kinky motherfucker,” Lincoln remarked and shut the bathroom door behind him.

An hour after the sex show, the buses pulled into the parking lot of a restaurant and stopped for breakfast. The sun was just beginning to rise above the tree line when they rolled out of their bunk beds and one by one exited the bus to amble their way inside for nourishment. Exhaustion on all their faces was clearly evident as they slid into three tables: one table for each band, and another for their security detail. A waitress placed two pots of dark French coffee on each table and left menus behind for them to take a look at.

The fatigue was really hitting Lincoln now. His eyes were having trouble reading the menu. He handed it off to Aaron. “Order me a burger or something,” Lincoln suggested.

“I’ll order you a spinach and mushroom omelet, with no des frites maison.” Aaron winked.

Lincoln leaned closer to Aaron and grinned. “I have no idea what you just said, but it was hot as fuck,” Lincoln said. “French sounds good coming from that sexy mouth of yours.” He brushed his lips to Aaron’s then stood up from his chair. “I’m gonna go wash up,” he said and stepped away from the table.

“Where are you headed?” Zac asked Lincoln.

“Bathroom,” he answered. “Would you like to come along with me and hold it? Although, you’ll have to ask Aaron. He might have a problem with that.” All the guys laughed at Lincoln’s comment, but Zac seemed undeterred by the words and followed him to the restroom anyway.

After checking the bathroom for security threats, Zac let Lincoln inside and waited by the door to keep anyone else out while Lincoln was in there. Lincoln finished up in the bathroom and walked back to their table with Zac in time for the delivery of several more pots of coffee. The hot beverage felt like a lifeline right about now and Dagger asked the waitress to keep it coming. They gave the young girl their food orders and waited. Lincoln glanced around the tables at the motley crew of musicians and grinned at what they must all look alike to the people in the restaurant that didn’t know them. He was enjoying his private joke when Alex sat down in the empty chair beside Lincoln.

“Hey, how’s it going?” Lincoln asked Alex.

“Not bad,” Alex replied. “What about you? How are you feeling today after performing the entire set with your band last night? Are you dragging ass?”

“All things considered, I’m feeling pretty good,” Lincoln confirmed. He lightly touched the spot on his forehead where the stitches were and rolled his eyes. “I’m still dealing with a dull headache from this, but I’ll survive.”

“You’re right. You
will
survive and we’re all going to do our best to keep you healthy,” Alex affirmed.

Lincoln nodded, suddenly he felt a little self-conscious. “Thank you, and I do appreciate your support, but I’m good,” he said. “Plus, I have Aaron to take care of me.”

Alex patted Lincoln’s back. “I’m really happy for both of you,” Alex said. “It’s not easy finding someone that wants to be with us for the right reasons and not for what we can do for them. Aaron is a great guy—the real deal, so I know you’ll make this work, just as I managed to do with Chase and Danni. The work is worth it.”

Lincoln watched Alex stand up and stretch his arms over his head. Alex’s gaze was pointed toward the entrance of the restaurant and Lincoln visibly saw Alex’s body tense.

“Mother fucker!” Alex grit out. “Did you guys see that?”

“See what?” Dagger asked.

“The guy walking out,” Alex pointed in the direction of the exit. “I just saw that asshole Sebastian, I’m certain of it!” Dagger stood up quickly and accidentally tipped the chair over behind him. A second later, Zac, Mason, and the rest of the security team jumped to their feet.

“Who the fuck is Sebastian?” Zac asked, already hurrying toward the door.

“He’s the guy that fucked us all over a while back,” Dagger ranted. “Go get him!”

It was Mason that tackled the man in question to the ground out in the parking lot. The man struggled beneath Mason rattling off a long rant in French that had to be curses. The rest of the security guards arrived and hauled the man to his feet, just as Lincoln, Dagger, and everyone else reached them.

“That’s not him,” Ryan announced. “Sebastian is English, not French.”

“Are you sure?” Zac asked.

“Positive,” Dagger agreed with Ryan.

The man being restrained by Zac and Mason was still yelling French slurs at them. The one word and gesture they all understood was when he said “Americans” and spit on the ground at their feet. Dagger pulled out his wallet and removed a few hundred dollar bills. He folded the money and slipped it into the man’s shirt pocket.

“We’re sorry for the misunderstanding,” Dagger said. “Please accept this as our apology.”

Zac and Mason released the man and he cursed at them some more, then smoothed down his clothing before he continued to walk to his car. The guys in Black Ice and Ivory tower started to walk back to the restaurant, along with their security and returned to their tables inside the restaurant.

“I would have bet money that was Sebastian,” Alex said to Dagger. “Don’t you think that looked like him?”

Dagger nodded. “Yeah, he did look like him, but he wasn’t,” Dagger replied. “Lucky for him he wasn’t Sebastian because I would have snapped his neck.”

“I hope I never see that little prick again,” Alex said.

“I can’t tell you how many times I’ve thought I’ve seen him,” Dagger commented. “I’ve also wondered more than once if he’s had anything to do with the close calls we’ve had with stalkers at our houses and the home invasion Ashton went through at his place.”

“Do you really think that could be a possibility?” Alex asked.

Dagger shrugged. “Somehow I wouldn’t put it past him, and if anyone would have a reason to try and piss us off, it would be that piece of shit.”

“But, I’m pretty sure he moved back to the UK after he got fired,” Alex added. “If he were back in the LA area we would have heard about it.”

“I know, and that’s the
only
reason why I haven’t pointed the finger at him,” Dagger answered.

Their food had arrived at the table by the time they returned and everyone settled into their seats again and began to eat in silence. For several long minutes, all you could hear was the clanking of their forks and knives on their food plates.

Once they finished, everyone walked back to the buses to finish up the final leg of the trip into Paris. Their first show was scheduled at the Bataclan Music Hall. It was a small venue with a long history of famous artists that had graced the stage at one time or another. After headlining at Wembley for two nights, doing a show at the Bataclan would be like performing inside a closet. But that was exactly why the guys were so excited about this show. They loved performing in intimate settings whenever they could and insisted the tour manager schedule several into each tour. The larger venues would be their main focus on this tour and they’d be memorable for their size and magnitude alone. But the smaller shows would be their chance to really perform to the crowd on a more intimate level and see their faces while doing so, instead of a sea of writhing people that spread out for a mile in front the stage like it seemed to be at Wembley.

They arrived at the Bataclan that afternoon in time to do a walk-through of the stage. The buses pulled into the parking lot behind the venue and stopped side-by-side. For whatever reason, Ryan was the first to bounce down the stairs to exit the Black Ice bus before any of their security. Ryan stepped a few feet away from the door and covered his eyes to shield them from the sun while he looked back at the bus. He smiled at Dagger as he appeared on the stairs of the bus, then the glint of the sun danced off a knife blade. A second later, it was pressed to Ryan’s throat. Dagger yelled to alert the others as he jumped from the bus.

“Come any closer and I’ll cut this asshole,” Sebastian threatened.

“All right, all right,” Dagger said. “Calm the fuck down.” Dagger kept his arms slightly raised to shoulder level and did his best to keep the panic out of his voice, but seeing that blade pressed to the skin on Ryan’s throat was scary as fuck. “No one needs to get hurt here, Sebastian, so why don’t you let Ryan go.”

“It’s a little fucking late to be worrying about people getting hurt, don’t you think?” Sebastian taunted Dagger.

“How’s that?” Dagger questioned.

The guys on the Ivory Tower bus were now exiting and coming around the front of it toward the Black Ice bus. Soon as they saw the knife pressed to Ryan’s throat, everyone took a cautious step backward.

“You don’t need to do this,” Alex said.

“Fuck you, Zander . . . or Alex, whatever the fuck a narcissist like yourself prefers to be called,” Sebastian barked.

The security team moved into position around Sebastian and drew their weapons. Zac was still on the bus. He saw the commotion unfolding outside through the tinted window of the bus and a rush of adrenaline shot through him. He raced to the back, pulled up the carpet on the floor and opened up the escape hatch. Quiet as possible, Zac slipped through the opening in the floor and rolled out from under the bus on the opposite side of where Sebastian was holding Ryan. Zac carefully peeked out at the end of the bus and signaled Mason to distract Sebastian. Mason nodded and started to talk to Sebastian.

“Why’re you doing this?” Mason asked Sebastian.

“Because these three fuckers ruined my life!” Sebastian yelled.

Behind them, Zac hurried around the Ivory Tower bus. There wasn’t a lot of room to do a surprise attack on Sebastian and the risk of that knife slicing into Ryan’s neck was also a factor. Zac knew he needed to do something quick before bullets began to fly and the cagey look in Sebastian’s wild eyes were a tell-tail sign that this situation was about to go south.

Every little movement the band members made caused Sebastian to become jumpier and the knife would press harder against Ryan’s throat. And hearing Ryan’s cries as the blade cut through that first, thin layer of skin was pushing Dagger closer the point of taking down Sebastian himself. No one would have blamed Dagger for jumping into action. Seeing the man he loved being visibly hurt by Sebastian’s hands—the same man who had nearly destroyed their relationship years ago—made this ten times worse. The blood beginning to trickle down the side of Ryan’s neck had everyone tense and feeling desperate.

“Drop the fucking knife, Sebastian,” Dagger demanded. “You’re surrounded by our security team. You won’t get away with this, so you might as well give up now.”

“I got away with all the other attacks and the so-called stalkers I’ve been planting at your houses,” Sebastian gloated with a snide grin. “I’ll get away with this, too. You’ll see.”

Dante growled and stepped closer. “You were behind Ashton’s home invasion?”

“Yeah, I was, and I also arranged for the not so subtle artwork at Lincoln’s house, too.” Sebastian laughed. “Did you really think I’d let you losers get away with ruining my life?”

“We didn’t do shit to you,” Dagger countered. “You did this all to yourself.”

“I don’t understand,” Dante said. “You live in another country. Why would you feel the need to get back at us after all this time and do so from thousands of miles away?”

Sebastian laughed again. It was an evil sound rumbling from his throat. “Are you really that stupid?” Sebastian taunted Dante. “I hired people to fuck with you. I hadn’t planned on Ashton getting that hurt, but we’ll call it collateral damage. You guys were resilient, though, I’ll give you that much. Every guy I threw at you, you managed to get rid of him one way or another. I was about to give up on my mission, but then your tour dumped your sorry asses smack in the center of London. If that wasn’t a sign for me, I don’t know what would be. I couldn’t turn away from that opportunity, not when you were that close. The one detail I hadn’t counted on was having to do this myself, but here I am.”

“Killing one of us was really that important to you?” Dagger’s voice boomed and seemed to echo between the buses.

“Kill you?” Sebastian balked. “That was never my plan! I merely wanted to mess with you a bit and make sure you all remember who Sebastian Keating is for the rest of your fucked up lives.”

Zac could see Dante’s fists clenching at his sides and the calming arm that Ashton had wrapped around Dante seemed to be doing no good at all to relax Dante. If someone didn’t put an end to this madness, Dante would surely lunge at Sebastian even before Dagger got to him and kill him with his own two hands.

Mason saw Zac appear at the front bumper of the Ivory Tower tour bus. They exchanged another eye signal and Mason shifted quickly to divert Sebastian’s attention in a different direction. It worked. Sebastian spun on his heels and put his back to the front of the bus and that is when Zac made his move. He took two long strides and then hurled himself onto Sebastian’s backside. Sebastian was forced to release Ryan and turned to swing the blade of his knife in Zac’s direction. Dagger grabbed for Ryan and pulled him back to where the other band members were standing. Dagger quickly wiped at Ryan’s neck with his fingers. The cut was superficial and Dagger growled in relief as he wrapped his arms around Ryan’s back.