Fill Me by Michelle Hazen (rm book recommendations .txt) 📖

Laughing at your neurotic lead singer is wrong.

I know it, everybody with a heart knows it, so I clamp my twitching lips closed and try like hell to be a good person.

“Do you think anybody saw me?” Jax hunches his shoulders, his back to the busy bar room as he whips off his shirt, balling the UPS logo to the inside.

“Uh, yeah, dipshit,” Danny says. “They did.”

“Shut up, or I’m not getting your underage ass any drinks,” Jax growls at our bassist. “Now where’s my shirt?”

“Don’t worry, Jax, I’ll shield you while you change so nobody notices.” I step squarely in front of him, giving a smile and a wink to a guy whose eyes drift toward us. Danny reaches over and tugs down the already-low V-neck of my Ramones babydoll tee, doubling the amount of cleavage I’m offering. I slap his hand. “Hey, jerk!”

“Just protecting our chances of getting drinks,” Danny says. “The only way something as tiny as you makes a decent shield is if you show some skin.”

“I thought big brother types were supposed to be protective.” I put on a scowl, but my eyes slip away to check the front door before I can stop myself.

Nothing.

“Not your brother.” He crosses his arms, hazel eyes gleaming with mischief even though his face, as always, is relaxed. “As your bandmate, it benefits me to get some eyes headed your way. Longer they’re staring at you, the longer they’ll watch us play.”

“Then I guess you should have built me a drum riser, because nobody’s going to be able to see me behind my cymbals.”

Both men ignore me. Jax smacks Danny, knocking his black beanie askew. “Dude. Shirt.”

“What shirt?” Danny pulls off his knit hat, black hair in wild chaos before he tugs the cap back on.

“It was on the list I gave you when I left you my truck so you could load while I was at work.”

Danny wrinkles his nose. “List?”

Jax pales, his blue eyes flaring brighter as he stares down our bassist. “The list with all our equipment on it. Including my good shirt.” He flaps the offending uniform top at Danny, while I stifle a laugh into my fist.

He shrugs. “Play in what you’ve got.”

Jax chucks it in Danny’s face instead. “Nobody sees a brown UPS polo shirt and thinks, ‘Step aside, panties, there’s a rock star in the house.’”

“If you need a shirt to drop panties, man, you better hightail it back to that gym you’re always trying to drag me to,” Danny drawls.

Jax’s jaw twitches and he straightens to his full height, carefully cultivated muscles bunching.

Danny looks bored, his lean body looking just plain skinny beneath the black hoodie and old jeans he threw on before we loaded Jax’s truck. 

I step between them, because they like a friendly fight a little too much, and last time Jax’s mouth ended up so swollen and bloody he couldn’t sing. No matter how many times I explain it to him, Danny doesn’t get the concept of pulling his punches.

“He’s screwing with you, Jax,” I say. “We have everything on the list, and your shirt is on the front seat. I’ll get it for you, if you want to make a little refreshments run.” I nod toward the bar, my eyes flickering past it to the entrance.

Still nothing.

Jax’s hand lands on my arm, squeezing gently. “Was Andy supposed to be here?”

“Nope.” I force a smile, though I can’t wrench my gaze higher than the tribal swirls of the electric guitar tattoo on Jax’s forearm. Somehow, seeing Danny’s artwork settles some of the fizzing in my stomach. “He couldn’t make it.”

“Oh, was Douchefest 2012 tonight?” Danny asks. “Too bad. I know he couldn’t possibly miss that.”

Jax throws him a warning look, then turns his attention back to me. Not long ago, having this much focus from him—plus his hand, his actual hand touching me!—would have sent me into a blushing, stuttering mess. Our band had its first anniversary and I graduated high school before the sheer beauty of our lead guitarist became commonplace enough that I could do more than pant in his presence.

Thank God he never noticed. If we had ever ended up between the sheets, he’d probably strain something making sure I was fully inducted into the local chapter of the Jax Is A Sex God Club. I’d be exhausted before we got past the making out part of the scheduled programming. And considering how I get in bed? Jax and I would be each other’s own private hell.

I smile up at him, his model-perfect jaw and the chin-length strands of his wavy blond hair nothing more than pretty packaging on the concerned face of a friend. “Andy had to study.” I shrug. “He’s got a lot of big tests coming up this week. It’s no big deal.” Over Jax’s shoulder, a lanky blond guy passes his two bucks to the bouncer, and I push up on my toes to see better, but no, it’s not my boyfriend.

Jax lets me go, his brow furrowed. “He’d seriously rather do homework than see his hot girlfriend wail the shit out of her drum kit?”

“He’s stupid,” Danny says. “What else did you expect?”

I ignore my best friend, because arguing with him will just egg him on, and I don’t want to risk him dropping something too revealing right now. He insists my issues are all Andy’s fault, because Danny is terminally loyal.

I point at Jax. “Don’t think I don’t notice your sneaky little compliments to cheer me up. And it’s fine, seriously. His grades have been slipping because we’ve been spending too much time together and I don’t want to be the reason he loses his scholarship.”

My heart squeezes at the thought. I’ve been waiting my whole life for somebody like Andy. Somebody who yanks the breath out of my chest. Somebody who can distract me from anything, even music. But instead of filling me to overflowing, the way music does, he makes every part of me echo with the need for something that’s not quite within reach.

I give Jax a little push toward the bar, his muscles even firmer under my fingertips than I remember. Has he been killing himself at the gym again? I make a mental note to ask Danny if Jax’s mom has called recently. His socialite bitch of a parent never fails to set off one of his self-improvement tailspins. “Go!” I tell him, backing away. “Or you’re not going to have time to triple-check our set up and Danny’s tuning of your guitar.”

His eyes narrow. “Talk about sneaky, Jera. That was seriously below the belt.”

“Oh, I can’t look below your belt,” I say, my hand poised on the push bar of the side exit to the parking lot. “Because if I do, I’ll see your hideous work khakis and my libido will start cashing in its social security benefits.”

I shove the door open before he can come after me, Danny’s chuckle sounding low from inside the bar. No way am I telling our singer I packed jeans for him in the truck.

I blink away the glare of the inside lights and take the long way through the parking lot. Who knows? Maybe “homework” is just an excuse for Andy to surprise me and he’ll be waiting out here. He likes to do cute stuff like that, and his presence would be the only thing that could make tonight’s—actually paid—gig even better.

Besides, if he really isn’t coming, then I have a sinking feeling I know why. And it has a whole lot to do with last Saturday.

Chapter 2: Appetizer

Danny

“Drink up, kiddies,” Jax crows, though he keeps his voice down as he passes me a drink. It’s just a tall soda glass filled with brown liquid and ice, and I quirk an eyebrow.

“Coke?” I don’t care that much. Where I’m going later tonight, nobody who knows my face would dare card me.

And everybody there knows my face. 

“Our good friend Jack might have snuck into your Coke,” Jax says with a grin. “The bartender’s ah...well, let’s just say he’s not sad Andy’s not coming, and as long as he sells to me, his conscience and his license are clear.”

“And as long as he gives it to you in a soda glass, the owner’s happy, too. I’ll drink to that.” I clink my glass to Jera’s, though she glances away even as she laughs. She’s embarrassed about having to get our booze through our bandmate, though I don’t see why. Age is a number, a fact. It’s not a thing embarrassment should apply to.

I toss back a drink, ignoring the straw and letting the ice collide cold and hard with my lips as I swallow down the familiar burn of whiskey and carbonation. I love to play with the hint of a buzz softening my stomach, the lights hot on my skin and the strings of my bass thick beneath my fingers. The stage I’ll be on after this will have lights, too, but the energy’s not the same. Here, I’m cushioned by our music; my band. There, it’ll be just me with none of my sharp edges dulled. I’m thirsty for it, but I know I need this first, to keep me centered.

Jax takes new jeans and a shirt from Jera, and heads to the bathroom to change.

I throw an arm around my friend and hug her into my side, though I’m careful not to meet her eyes. Not now, when I can feel the wildness licking up the inside of me, white hot and begging for a release. “Doesn’t matter,” I murmur, low enough that only she will hear.

Jera snorts. “Yeah, it totally isn’t humiliating at all that we couldn’t even get this gig without him promising to ‘supervise’ us like we’re twenty-year-old babies.”

The crowd isn’t too thick tonight, but female eyes follow Jax as he walks away. Some are for the muscles rippling above his belt line, but almost as many are on the ink I’ve tattooed into his skin. Something shifts in me at the sight, deep and proud. I don’t blame them for watching, though. That body, that voice. The cocky smile paired with