Only for You (15 page)

Chapter
Twenty

Violet

It’s been a week since I’ve
warned Jaxon away from Bliss, but I don’t think he listened. But I
had to do it. I can deal with his crap, with his flirting and
outrageous expressions. Bliss can’t. There’s no way she can. She’s
far too nice and sweet to figure out that he’d just be using
her.

No one was there to protect
me from guys like Jaxon, so it’s my job to protect Bliss. More than
likely, I’m going to have to sit her down and have a heart-to-heart
with her

“
I know. It’s so sad,” I
hear Callie say. She’s pacing beside the bus we share.

Only Everett would think to
have buses segregated by gender, but maybe he thought it wasn’t
fair to the rest of us, since we could have our boyfriend or
girlfriend on the tour.

Besides, it’s better to
listen to Callie complain than her bang my ex.

Spotting me, she stops and
smiles. “For a real long time. You don’t even know… and I think
she’s drinking again.”

Incredulous, I stand there
and listen as she spews lies about me.

“
Yep, I tried to get
Violet to go to rehab
soooo
many times.” Callie fakes a sniff. “She’s such a
closet party girl—but no one will listen!”

I roll my eyes at her
theatrics. At her claims of trying to get me to go to rehab and
being a closet party girl.

Growing up, we were equal
parts dumb at sneaking liquor into her room, but we’d only done it
twice, because the second time we’d gotten as sick as dogs the next
day. We’d taken turns holding each other’s hair back.

“
Only a best friend would
do this, you know,” I pointed out, scooting away from the toilet. I
gather Callie’s hair and close my eyes. My head’s pounding so hard
it feels like someone’s dropped an anvil on it.

“
No, only your best friend
would shove her finger down your throat to make you puke, so you
won’t die from alcohol poisoning,” Callie said, and then
groaned.

“
This is the last time
I’ve ever getting drunk.”

“
Me, too.”

“
Why are you doing this?”
I ask, once she puts her phone away.

She stares at me, and then
says, “Because while you were gone
my
career finally took off, and now
you’re back. Well, I can’t take the chance of being in your
shadow.”

“
Is that why you changed
your looks and stole my boyfriend?”

“
I didn’t steal your
boyfriend, Violet. God, you’re such a kid.”

“
You’re three months
younger than me.”

Her mouth flattens. “Then
you’re a washed up has-been.”

“
Not according to
Billboard. My
old
songs are kicking your
new
one’s ass.”

She makes a noise, stomping
away, but I call out to her. “Sure would be a lot easier for both
of us, if we just pretended to get along.”

Flipping me the bird is her
answer.

I sigh. So much for that. I
didn’t want to become best friends with Callie again, but doing a
little repair to our broken relationship might have made the tour
more bearable for everyone else.

My phone buzzes and I take
it out of my pocket, glancing at the screen. My hearts does that
familiar little dip whenever my brain realizes that it’s not
Cole.

Jaxon: Rehearsal in
five.

Me: On my way.

I’m walking on stage when I
catch Jaxon staring at Bliss. She’s oblivious to it all, talking
with Anita about wardrobe type stuff, I guess.

Jaxon picks at this guitar,
and then completely stops playing when Bliss walks past him. His
gaze follows her.

Bliss glances back at him.
She frowns.

He frowns.

Then I catch Callie
staring at the two of them, and
she
frowns, her eyes narrowing

“
Oh crap,” I mutter. I’m
going to have to warn Bliss about Callie’s jealousy
streak.

Then Jaxon catches me
looking at him, and I frown.

We’re all frowning, except
for Bliss, who has disappeared off the stage.

Jaxon and Callie are first
to rehearse, only they start arguing and she storms off.

“
Looks like it’s just you
and me, baby girl.” He winks at me.

“
I’m not your baby
girl.”

“
You used to
be.”

“
And you used to be a
decent human being.” Unlike Callie, Jaxon and I don’t storm off
stage. We’ve been doing this far longer, and know how to turn it
off when the music starts.

We sing, pretend to flirt
and goof off, just like we always have on stage. But inside, I’m
wishing I was with Cole. I’m wishing I was staring into his blue
eyes. That it was his hat plopping on my head. That it was him
singing about holding on to me.

The music stops and so do
we.

But it’s not Cole standing
there...

I close my eyes.

Jaxon touches my cheek.
“Violet, I’m going to kiss you.”

My eyes pop open and I
shove him away as hard as I can. “Get away from me.”

He stares at me in
disbelief. Our band mates snicker. Disbelief gives way to
embarrassment and anger, but he doesn’t say anything.

Instead, he holds out his
hand and raises his brows. “Take it, damn it.”

I know what he’s trying to
do. He wants the band to think that we’re okay. That everything we
do or say up here is a performance, no matter if the music is on or
off.

I take his hand. “Was that
too much?”

A grin breaks out on his
face, but his smile doesn’t meet his eyes. “Maybe a little. I think
one kiss at the end will really make them happy.”

“
But you’re engaged to
Callie,” I remind him, this conversation doing nothing to change my
opinion of him. Even if I wanted Jaxon, I wouldn’t touch him,
because he’s with someone else.

“
She won’t mind, for the
sake of the show,” he says smoothly.

“
Always got an answer for
everything, don’t you?”

Instead of answering, he
leads me off stage. I follow him reluctantly, and then, as soon as
we’re out of sight, I jerk my hand away.

“
Don’t you ever do that
again. Don’t touch me. Don’t try to kiss me.”

Jaxon’s hands clench.
“Fine, but I’m not going to stop trying to fix things between us. I
will get you back.”

“
Not while you’re engaged,
you idiot. In what world does it makes sense for the guy who
cheated on me to cheat on his fiancée with me?”

“
It wouldn’t be cheating,
because I don’t love her.”

“
Yes, it would.” I throw
my hands in the hair and huff. “Doesn’t matter, because I don’t
want to be with you. I’m over you.”

“
You’re not with
Cole.”

“
Are you actually
listening to yourself?” I shake my head. “Have you ever done
anything in your life that you’re not proud of? Aren’t you
embarrassed about perpetuating this Billy Badass persona at the
expense of others? Is there anything good and decent left inside of
you?

“
I was the one who called
911 that night.”

*** *** ***

Jaxon

“
That’s not funny,” Violet
says, her face going white.

“
I wasn’t trying to make
you laugh. You asked a question, multiple questions, and I
answered.”

“
How… what…
why?”

This is one of those
moments I’ve been dreading. This is one of those moments where I
have to tell the truth without revealing the entire truth. “When
you took off in your car… well, Callie and I followed.”

“
You did?”

“
Yeah, I knew something
was off. You only had two drinks that night, one you didn’t even
finish, but you were acting different,” I say. “I think, but I’m
not entirely sure, someone slipped something in your
drink.”

“
Someone
drugged
me?”

“
Yeah… apparently that
club got shut down when another girl was allowed to drink and drive
home. She hit a sedan and not a tree. All the passengers in the
other car died. Turned out one of the waiters was testing out a new
date-rape drug.” I swallow. “The same waiter that was working in
the VIP section that night. Two months ago, he confessed to testing
it out on twenty people, two of them celebrities. And one of the
bouncers was helping him. So…”

“
But-but wouldn’t the
doctors have figured it out?”

I shake my head. I know she
wants proof, but all I have to give her is speculation, and my
memory of that rat-faced dude.

“
Fast running and damn
near untraceable according to the experts that
testified.”

“
How do you know all
this?”

“
Callie’s favorite show is
Book ‘Em Nashville. They did a reenactment.” What I don’t say is
that Callie was at my condo, out of her mind that someone would
blame us for Violet’s accident. That somehow we were responsible
for Violet.

For once, Callie was
right. We
were
responsible for Violet. It’s just as much my fault as it is
Callie’s that we let her walk out of the club and get into that
car.

“
I didn’t see the crash,
just your car… I hit the brakes and called 911, then drove up a
little ways, parked in the woods, and got out.”

“
You were with
me?”

“
I-I couldn’t leave you
like that, bleeding all over the place. I was scared as fuck, and
out of my mind.” The memories of that night come rushing over me,
like a tsunami that wants to suck me under. So much blood, so much
pain. She was so pale, so helpless, and so was I. “I held your hand
until I couldn’t. I wanted to stay with you, but Everett made it
impossible for me to stay.”

“
He was there,
too?”

I nod, and then look
around. The last thing I want is for Callie or Everett to suddenly
appear. “She called him while I was with you. He came out of
nowhere, and we got in a fight.”

“
So that’s why you had a
bloody lip and a black eye,” she says. “Why don’t you tell
someone?”

I bark out a laugh. “How
would it look for me to tell the cops that my dad beat my ass so
hard that he put me in the hospital for a week?”

Her eyes grow even wider
before she says, “Like he committed a crime.”

“
Baby girl,
I
committed a crime by
leaving you there.”

“
One day, Jackson, you’re
going to have to stand up to your dad, and not let him bully you,
with his words or his fists,” she finally says.

It’s not the forgiveness I
wanted, or even an indication that I’m absolved of what I didn’t
do.

I walk away, not sure what
to say next. But it’s off my chest, and it’s one less sin I need to
atone for.

***

For some reason I think
it’s a really good idea to go looking for Bliss, mostly because I
want to apologize. Or so I tell myself.

A few inquiries and I learn
that she’s hiding out in the huge trailer that holds all of our
instruments, wardrobe, and extra equipment.

She’s sitting on the floor,
hunched over something while she hums—way off key. I don’t find it
cute, not at all.

Her hair is loose tonight,
falling forward and exposing the back of her neck.

I swallow at the sight.
“Hey.”

The humming
stops.

“
Hey yourself,” she says,
turning slightly. There’s a couple of my shirts and one of Callie’s
dresses on a white sheet beside her.

“
So I’ve come to
apologize.”

Her gaze rakes over me.
“Why?”

“
Because I wasn’t myself
that night, and I was angry, and I took it out on you. Normally, I
don’t say things like that.”

One corner of her mouths
lifts. “I bring out the best in you, huh?”

I shake my head. “No one
can bring out the best in me.” Mostly because the best in me has
left.

“
That’s a pretty sucky
attitude to have.” A flash of attitude from the mostly quiet Bliss?
Now this is interesting.

“
Maybe so,” I say. “Well,
I gotta go. Just wanted to apologize for my asinine
behavior.”

She returns to her work.
“Okay.”

I head out of there, and
it’s not until I’m back at my bus that I realize she never said she
forgave me. What am I to these females—the most unforgivable
creature on the planet?

***

The very next day, I go
looking for Bliss again and find her in the same place, in the same
spot, doing the same thing.