Page 46 of Revel
She fixes her intoxicating green eyes on mine, and the air in my lungs seizes. “I know, but it’s exciting. What should we write about?”
I clear my throat and sit up, resting my elbows on my knees. Trying to redirect my thoughts, I turn a shaky hand through my hair. “Good songs come from extreme happiness or sadness. Everything else is watered-down bullshit.”
“Okay. . . so that leaves. . . .” Her timid voice trails off, and she fidgets with the pen in her hand and the notebook beside it. Apparently, she wants to write a song right now. I’m not sure I have it in me today because it’d probably involve me trashing this room and fucking her up against the wall.
I drag my eyes to her face. “Revenge.”
Her eyes widen. “Revenge?”
Yours. Mine. Ours.
“Yes, revenge.” I swallow the bitterness in my throat. “As long as I get to call her a gold-digging whore, I’m happy to write about whatever else you want in the song.”
Nodding, she begins fidgeting again. “So we’re writing a song together?”
I roll my eyes. “Don’t make me regret this. I have a reputation to uphold here.” I’m being serious, but also sarcastic. Her smile ignites my own.
She takes the drink in her hand, and I’ve never wanted to be a straw more in my life when her lips close around it. I watch her swallow, and have to concentrate on breathing in and out. “I have a question for you.”
Panic rolls in my stomach, tension burrowing between my temples. I fear questions about myself. I lace my fingers behind my head and lean back again. The coat’s still open, and her eyes are darting anywhere but my junk. “I knew you would. . . .”
“Why did you say those things about me?”
Okay, I wasn’t expecting that one. My eyes sweep to hers. Green on blue. Tough on soft. “I don’t know, high or drunk, maybe both. But be honest, your lyrics don’t say anything substantial.”
“They do too.”
I raise an eyebrow and snub the cigarette. Smoke filters up from the ashtray and into the space between us. “C’mon, really?”
Red laughs, hiding her face in her hands and then smiles. “Okay, maybe they’re too pop for someone who writes about politics and zombies.”
“If you’re referring to ‘Disease,’ it’s not about politics. It’s about addiction, in any form, and how it distorts your version of reality. It makes you think nothing’s safe anymore, even your own mind.”
“So why don’t you tell people what it’s really about? You have the majority of the world thinking if the president’s assassinated, it’d be you.”
“I don’t tell people what the songs are about. Any of them for that matter. I want a listener to find their own meaning. Never forget the weapon words can be, and if you give them meaning, it can ruin the song.”
She doesn’t get the chance to say anything else before a wordless knock hits the door and in walks her ex. Goddamn it. I thought I locked that. Apparently not.
He glances at Red, then me. “Am I interrupting something?”
“Yeah, you were,” I bark, scowling at him. “Leave.”
Breckin snaps his eyes to Red. “What’s he doing in here?”
“I don’t think I have to explain that to you,” she bites back.
He says some shit to her, most of which I don’t hear because believe it or not, I don’t fucking care. What gets me is when I get up to leave, because I can’t sit in the same room with this piece of shit any longer, he says to me, “You don’t scare me, Revel,” as if he knows what I’m up to.
I laugh, rolling my eyes. “Yet. I don’t scare you,yet.” I wink at Red. “See ya, Princess.”
EYES ON YOU, PRINCESS
TAYLAN
“What was that about?” Breckin demands, like he has any right to be demanding anything aside from my wrath. “Why is he inyourdressing room?”
I send a text to Bella telling her to come back, and to get hair and wardrobe in here. “Does it matter?” I set my phone down to find Breckin glaring at me.
