Consumed (6 page)

After the incident in Atlanta, I did my best to put Lucas Wolfe out of my mind. I ignored the magazines with him on the cover in the supermarket. I changed the channel when anything Your Toxic Sequel came up. And I sure as hell didn’t look him up online. 

“No, apparently Google is my worst enemy,” I say. “Lucas . . . Wicked Lambs is touring with YTS, aren’t they?” 

I know the answer well before he confirms, but it doesn’t stop the tightness from spreading across my chest when he says, “I thought you already knew.”

Lucas

To be honest, I truly believed that Sienna was already aware of Cilla being on our tour. Si’s surprise and irritation says differently, though. She’s hesitant now, giving me short, clipped answers.
Yes. No. Fine. Okay.
It drives me fucking insane, but I control the urge to threaten to spank her.

There’ll be time enough for that later.  

We talk for another few minutes before she fakes a sorry ass yawn and tells me she has a wardrobe assignment in the morning. “I’ll call you later this weekend, okay?” she says.

Cilla and Wyatt are only a few feet away from me smoking, but I don’t hesitate to stop Sienna before she hangs up on me. “Wait!” Her breathing picks up on the other line. I sit down on one of the nightclub’s outdoor benches. A few feet away, Cilla paces back and forth with her middle and index finger making such a tight vice on her cigarette, the damn thing is close to snapping in two. 

It’s not secret that I don’t want Cilla coming on tour with us, but because I don’t want to hurt her, I drop my voice to a whisper when I tell Sienna, “I love you. And I’m so fucking glad you’ll be with me.” 

Sienna laughs nervously. I can almost picture her nodding her head briskly and skimming her teeth over her bottom lip. “I’m your wardrobe consultant, remember?” 

The way she says
wardrobe consultant
—in a low, professional voice—makes my cock harden. I start to tell her that I’ll be on the earliest flight to Nashville in the morning, but then I remember I’ve already made plans to fly to Atlanta.

It’s a trip that can’t be avoided if I don’t want to lose my mind anytime soon. 

“I know exactly what you are,” I say. I catch Wyatt’s shit-eating grin, and I turn my body slightly so he can’t read my lips when I add, “And I’m going to have one hell of a time with you in and out of that wardrobe. Bending you over—”

Her voice is strained when she interrupts me, and I know she’s forgotten all about the Cilla and Wicked Lambs issue. For the time being at least. “You shouldn’t talk like that, Lucas.”

No, I shouldn’t. Because now, all I’ll be able to think about for the rest of the night and all through the morning on the way to Atlanta is the warmth of her skin beneath mine, the tiny beads of sweat on the small of her back and the sweet scent of her apple body wash lingering between her shoulder blades. When I go to sleep tonight—alone and with my dick throbbing—all I’ll be able to imagine is the way her bound hands reach out to me, grabbing at my hips so that she can pull me deeper into her. 

Knowing that she belongs to me and that I don’t have to fight for her is worth spending a hundred nights alone. “Sienna?” 

“Yes?”

“Later, when you touch your pussy—because I know you will, and there’s not shit I can say to make you wait for me—I want you blindfolded. I want you thinking of me inside of you, tasting you. And after you’re done, after you’ve called my name into your pillow and you’re shaking, let me know.”

“You don’t know that—” she begins, but I cut her off with a rough noise that leaps from the back of my throat.

“Don’t play games.”

Cilla flags me down, and when I make eye contact with her, she juts her head in the direction of the entrance of the club, where her band’s party is happening, and gives me a bittersweet smile. She hobbles up the brick steps on her spiky red heels, and the doorman lets her inside. Her shoulders are trembling, and I stare at the club’s black metal door long after it closes. 

“I love you, Lucas,” Sienna interrupts my thoughts. That strange feeling of warmth crawls through my body. “I’ll talk to you tomorrow.”

“Don’t forget what I said.”

“And what if I don’t do what you’re thinking?”

“You will.”

For a moment after the call ends, I’m silent, oblivious to the world despite the Friday night traffic less than 50 feet in front of the club and the sound of Wicked Lambs’ newest music blasting behind me. When I finally decide to give a shit about the world around me, I realize Wyatt is sitting next to me on the bench.

“You smell like smoke,” I point out, and he shrugs. 

“She didn’t take Cilla well, did she?”

“Did Kylie take any of the shit you did to her well?” It’s a low blow, but he doesn’t seem to be fazed. He stretches back and starts to light up another cigarette, though he knows I can’t stand the smell of smoke—at least not cigarette smoke. I give him a look, and he groans and shoves the cigarette back into the half-empty green and white box. 

“I think Cilla’s going to run her drunken mouth and call Sienna “Pepper” or tell her how many times you’ve fucked her in the past and then she’ll get her ass kicked.”

“Just so we’re clear here—which one’s getting her ass kicked?”

“Cilla. That’s what I hope will happen.”

None of us wanted Wicked Lambs on the tour—with Sinjin being the most vocal—but the combined tour was what our label wanted. And all of those details were worked out long before Sienna came back into my life. 

“They won’t fight,” I say.

But later, after Cilla has had even more drinks, she stumbles up to my table and offers to come home with me in front of everyone—Cal, Wyatt, our tour manager, and her own drummer. I take this as my cue to leave, but when she follows me, I pull her into an empty alcove close to the club’s entrance to let her down as easily as I can.  

That shit doesn’t happen.

“I won’t tell Pepper,” she argues. Her red lips stretch up into a slow grin. “Not that I care what she thinks—”

“Cilla.” I grab her wrists when she tries to run her hands down my chest. “We’re not doing this—we won’t ever do it. Her name is Sienna, and believe me, I give a whole lot of fucks about what she thinks, how she feels. If I’m with her, there’s no me with anyone else.” 

She jerks out of my grasp and stumbles backwards, her black hair going everywhere. “God, who are you? Not my Lucas. Not anyone I know.”

“You’re right.” I sneer. “But I’ve never been your Lucas.” This time, Cilla doesn’t come after me when I leave the club. 

My driver gets me home in record time, and after I get into my bed—the same one that I intend to share with Sienna once the tour is over with—I check my phone. I’m not surprised to find a message from her that was sent over an hour ago, at 3:22 her time. It’s the self-portrait she sent along with it that knocks the wind out of me.  

The sight of the makeshift blindfold over Sienna’s blue eyes and her flushed face turned to the side is sexier than anything else she could have given me. The text below the photo is simple:

1:22 AM:
I needed you more. 

Because of Sam, I avoid going home as much as possible. But the next morning, after I’ve signed autographs at LAX and smirked for a few photos with a group of college girls from New Zealand claiming to be Your Toxic Sequels biggest fans, I board a flight that’s bound for Atlanta. Unlike the last time I came to town, there’s no limo to pick me up when I arrive. I rent a Suburban and head straight to my ex’s place. 

She’s still living at the same overpriced apartment on Peachtree Street, still driving the same Mercedes that’s she’s had for a year and a half now. When I walk past it, I want to kick its grill in—I paid for the goddamn thing—but I keep my feet on the pavement and go inside of her building. It hasn’t changed either. 

The only thing that’s different about this visit is that Sam’s not expecting me. And the way she looks when she opens the door for me.

The last time I saw her was in the spring, and she was skinny as hell. Now, with a pair of cutoffs hanging from her hips; her tits nearly non-existent beneath a baggy tank top; and her short hair hanging in limp, greasy strands around her face, she looks like she’s aged five goddamn years instead of five months. 

Sagging her tiny body back against the foyer wall, she takes in the sight of me, starting at my black Converse and ending at the top of my head. 

“You hiding from someone?” she demands. It’s my usual look when I travel, but Sam already knows that. Besides, it didn’t do me much good this time. It was too fucking hot to cover my arms, and the stars on my wrists, which were the result of a bet I lost to Sinjin seven years ago, are now my trademark. “Well, are you?”

“No, not hiding. Not anymore.”

“I told you I’d come to you next week, so why the fuck are you here?” she yells. 

“Not happy to see me?” I shove open the front door and let myself into the apartment, which smells like gin and vomit covered up with expensive perfume. Sam doesn’t bother to stop me, but I don’t expect her to. She needs the money too much to try anything stupid. 

“As a matter of fact, I’m not. I’m—” And this is where I tune her out and focus instead on all the U-Haul boxes scattered around her living room. Most are open, and their contents are spilling out, giving the impression she’s in a hurry to go somewhere.

“Moving?” I turn to face her, and her gray eyes go wide in surprise. They’re the biggest damn things on her entire body.

“Why do you care?” She stares at a cigarette burn on the oak floor, but I know she’s seething. She’s probably already run through the money I gave her this spring, so I’m not the least bit surprised by what she tells me next. “Yes, I am moving. Downgrading to a smaller place—not that it’s any of your business. I told you I’d come to you—”

“Save me the ‘you’re inconveniencing me’ bullshit. I wanted to get this over with.” Leaning over her coffee table, which is covered with full ashtrays and stacks of mail, I drop the envelope holding the last check she’ll receive from me. It lands on top of a letter from her electric company marked Urgent. She’s not just downgrading to a smaller apartment, she’s evicted from this one. “Saved you a trip.”

Sam shuffles around the coffee table, not once looking at the envelope I brought, until she’s on the opposite side of me. Calmly, she sits down on the edge of the couch and places her forearms on her bony thighs. “Then we’re done,” she says. “I told you this would be it for me and you, and I meant it.”

I take a couple steps back but remain expressionless. I expect her to scream. Or tell me that she’s changed her mind about leaving me alone and that she’ll be around to fuck me over until the day I die. She doesn’t. She just sits there, her gray eyes empty, running her hands over her bruised kneecaps.

“I’m leaving now.” 

“Tell Shannon and Dan I said hi,” she hisses. “I’m sure you’re going to see them next and I know how much your parents adore me.”

“Get some help, Samantha, but don’t bother me again.” I make it halfway to the door before she calls out to me, and when I look back at her, I’m already prepared for the deluge—for her to physically come at me. 

But she hasn’t moved from her spot on the white leather sofa. “And I’m the bad one.” Her pale lips curve into a grim smile. “I’m the fucked up, heartless bitch.”

“You haven’t made it any easier,” I growl.

“I didn’t hurt anyone, Lucas,” she says. “I only reminded you of what a goddamn coward you are.” Her words pierce right through me like a knife to the gut, but I keep my shit together. I’ve got no other choice if I’m going to get out of this apartment. 

When I don’t speak, she continues, “Nobody will ever love you for who you really are . . . because of what you’ve done.”

I force the corner of my lip up. “Fair enough.”

She slides back until her shoulder blades hit the cushions. She doesn’t look at me, but she doesn’t have a reason to. Sam knows exactly what she needs to say—what she needs to do—to cut me to pieces and remind me of what I am. “Good luck on your fucking tour, Lucas.”

“Bye, Sam.”

She doesn’t say goodbye, but I don’t expect that either.