Heartbreak Beat Read online

  Dion chucked his dress shirt onto my drums. “Take this. Doesn’t sound like I need clothes up there.”

  He pushed his still-hard penis back into his pants, tucking it away with a rise of his zipper. I could still make out the impressive outline of its bulge.

  “You going to finish yourself off?” he asked.

  “What?” I responded, picking up his shirt. What the hell did he just ask me? What the hell did we just do? I was too shocked to process it all.

  He took the shirt from my hands and wrapped it over my shoulders, drawing me in close.

  “You know, touch yourself. You gonna think of me finger-fucking you? Will that make you come?” he whispered into my ear while he pressed his erection into me.

  “You gonna think of me when you’re fucking one of those groupies up in the pool?” I spat out, pulling away from his heat. I shoved my arms into the too-big top.

  His eyes hit mine. “How do you know I don’t already do that?”

  I turned about fifty shades of crimson.

  “Thanks for the shoulder, sis,” he said with a laugh. Then Dion and his still rock-hard cock unlocked the door and sauntered out of the room, leaving the door wide open.

  I yanked the shirt closed and rushed to the door, slamming it shut. My body shaking from a toxic mix of anger and adrenaline, I leaned my back against it and slid down until my ass hit the floor.

  I was a legal adult. I had banked some money. My music career was still nascent, but I was making a name for myself and starting to book some lucrative gigs. I could afford a small place. Not in the trendy sections like West Hollywood or Silver Lake, but a decent apartment was not financially out of reach.

  One thing was certain—I could no longer live under the same roof as Dion. Together, we were combustible.

  2

  The security guard took forever to open the gates that shielded the Davis manse from the outside world. It was ludicrous that my stepfather insisted on having a guard at the gates rather than an electronic keyed entry. He claimed having a human doing the job kept everyone safer.

  I never put much stock in other people.

  I leaned on the horn again and wondered how much speed I’d need for my Hummer to break through the gates. Traffic was heavy on the 405, so I was already late for band practice, and I wasn’t in the mood for Presley’s wrath. It annoyed her I moved out, into a sweet little one bedroom near Venice Beach no less. That I was stuck in traffic because of it would make her apoplectic.

  Presley was on edge about going on tour with Gold Dust. Not because she was nervous—my sister had so much self-confidence that she wasn’t plagued by butterflies—but because she was on backing vocals. Presley didn’t like to be backing anything. It irked her to stand behind Stacy Mills. Never mind that Mills was an icon and fronted one of the few bands that was still selling out arena tours fifty years after their heyday. Nope, Presley didn’t quite see it like that.

  After one more long horn blow, the black iron gates inched their way open. I gunned the engine and tossed off an annoyed wave as I roared past the guardhouse. The security guard rubbed at his eyes, like I woke him up from a nap. So much for safety.

  I pulled up the long drive, coming to a sudden stop when I saw the mess of black SUVs parked in front of my stepfather’s Mediterranean-style villa. The license plate “RAWK 1” stood out in the fleet of cookie-cutter cars, so whatever was going on was big.

  That plate belonged to Gary Grimm, president of Grimm Records, the label that had catapulted my stepfather’s post-grunge band, Anthem, to superstardom some twenty-plus years ago. Grimm was also the label that, in an act of egregious nepotism, had signed my stepbrothers’ band, Rogue Nation. The Nation was about to go out on a major tour. Not playing arenas, but large venues that fit seven-hundred-and-fifty to one-thousand bodies, which was big, especially considering this was in support of their debut album. That was until Kyle was found dead three months ago, leaving them without a drummer and a tour that was kicking off in five days.

  I bet Grimm was here to cancel it officially.

  Gary Grimm was a germaphobe. He went from his home to his office, and occasionally to the same room in the Chateau Marmont to bed any young, buxom blonde that was not his wife. As he aged, his quirk magnified, and now a sighting of him anywhere outside his Malibu mansion or the Grimm offices was rare.

  For Grimm to show up here meant that something major was going down.

  I maneuvered my Hummer around the SUVs, spinning its wheels in the gravel as I drove. Kicking up a little road dust felt good. I contemplated denting RAWK 1, but didn’t want the grounds crew to get blamed for it as a gardening mishap. Knowing Vince, he’d make them pay for the damages, and I saw their paychecks once. Those guys couldn’t afford a Bel Air auto body bill.

  I parked away from the fleet and walked to the imposing front doors. The gong that echoed when I pressed the doorbell made me jump. Even seven years later, the damn thing still set my teeth on edge.

  A maid in a uniform that looked like it was tailored by Hustler magazine opened the door. She was a recent addition to the staff.

  “Yes?” she asked. She could barely open her eyes—they were weighed down with that much mascara.

  “I’m Mr. Davis’s stepdaughter,” I said. “Well, one of them. The one that doesn't live here.”

  “Nikki?” she asked, and I nodded. “Mr. Davis said you were arriving soon.”

  I wrinkled my nose. That was weird. Since the basement studios were soundproofed, he wasn’t usually briefed when we had band practice. Must be because Grimm was here.

  She stepped aside, and I entered the ridiculous foyer. A sweeping staircase greeted me, but my mom had taken all the class right out of it, replacing its elegant wooden spindles with a garish etched glass. There were neon lights under the bannister to illuminate the etchings. Mercifully, they were not on.

  “Nikki,” the woman herself called from the top of the stairs, opening her arms out for dramatic effect. Clad in a silk robe, her long bottle-blonde hair was wild and unbrushed, like she had just rolled out of bed. Amber liquid spilled out of the rocks glass in her hand. It was barely noon.

  “Don’t come down, Mom,” I said, noting her wobble at the top step. “I’m late for practice.”

  “I know,” my mother slurred. “Presley won’t shut up about it. She’s ready to kill you.”

  Then she laughed, a high-pitched cackle. Not unlike the Wicked Witch in The Wizard of Oz.

  “The Wicked Witch of Bel Air,” I muttered to myself and watched her stumble back to her bedroom, fabric and mussed hair flowing around her.

  “Mr. Davis asked that you come to the library,” the maid said, drawing my attention. She motioned for me to follow her.

  “I’m late meeting my sisters.” I sidestepped in the opposite direction, toward the kitchen. “Don’t worry, I know the way.”

  “I’m sorry, miss,” she said. “Mr. Davis insisted you see him first.”

  I jerked to a halt. The wrath of Presley would not be swift. And it would not be merciful. But when Vince Davis beckoned… oh hell. I didn’t want the maid to get reamed for ignoring his request.

  I followed her to the library. My eyes moved from her dark hair, which was pulled into a tight bun near the nape of her neck, down to her ass. The skirt was so short that each stride made it ride up, exposing enough for me to know that she wore expensive lace underwear. Vince was probably reaming her in other ways, I snorted to myself. For my mom not to notice—or care about—Vince’s latest dalliance in her own home told me her drinking was off the charts.

  While I followed the maid’s perky ass through the palatial home, I ran down the list of recent family encounters in my head. Nothing stuck out to merit an audience with Vince. And that Gary Grimm was in the house added to the weirdness.

  The lace-covered rear end stopped at the door to Vince’s library. She knocked then entered, flashing her butt just enough to get an appreciative smile from Vince.

  The
library was the one room in the house untouched by my mother’s garish taste. The walls housed all manner of leather-bound books, making this room a favorite of my bookworm sister Jett. Not that Vince was much of a reader. The library had been carefully curated by The Strand bookstore in New York City. Based on the number of interviews that took place in this room, I figured Vince staged it simply for publicity purposes. Not that it mattered to Jett. She was usually wrapped up in a blanket in a corner club chair, nose in a book.

  But not today. Vince and three suits, including Grimm, who was wearing a surgical mask over his mouth, sat at a library table at the far end of the room. The shelves behind them were covered not with books but with Vince’s awards—there were a smattering of Grammys and a bunch of MTV Moon Men. An iHeartRadio Music award was shoved in there somewhere. He left space for the impending Rock and Roll Hall of Fame award. It wasn’t wishful thinking—Anthem would get a nod eventually, quite possibly this year because of the tragedy of Vince losing his son to drugs.

  Every dude in that room had eyes on the maid. I don’t think they even noticed I was right behind her.

  “Vince, what’s up?” I asked to grab his attention. “I’m late for practice, so…”

  Vince stood up, his arms open as if for a hug. “Nikki!”

  I stood my ground in the middle of the room, my eyebrows knit together. “Hi, Vince. Like I said, I’m late for practice, and Presley’s already not happy with me.” I was not interested in playing family for the sake of his record label.

  “Please, have a seat,” he said, his voice dropping from faux warm to cordial. “This won't take long. Presley can wait another few moments.”

  I sighed. No, she really couldn’t, but there was no way out of this. Once I slumped into a chair at the unpopulated end of the long table, one of the suits started droning on about the financial impact that Kyle’s death had had on Rogue Nation. My fingers brushed along the table’s expensive wood grain, polished to a sheen, and my ears focused on the cadence of the suit’s speech. I drummed my fingers in time to his words. Not loud, not like a petulant teenager. Creating a beat to go with words was habit by now.

  It wasn’t like anyone noticed. Well, except for Grimm, who pulled the mask down to his chin.

  “Facts and figures are not interesting,” he interrupted the bean counter. “Nicole—”

  “Nikki,” I corrected him. “As in Sixx.”

  Yes, thanks to my wayward parents, I was named after the drummer of Mötley Crüe. Similarly, Jett was named after Joan, Presley after Elvis. We were as much a rock and roll cliché as we were a rock and roll family.

  “Pardon me. Nikki,” Grimm said, “we’d like to offer you a permanent job.”

  My fingers stopped drumming. I looked up at him. “A permanent job?”

  “We’d like you to drum on the Rogue Nation tour,” Vince said. His smile showed off a row of perfectly capped teeth.

  “You want me to drum on the Rogue Nation tour?” I repeated like a simpleton. Understanding swept over me. They weren’t canceling anything; they were remaking the band in time to travel. “You want me to drum on the tour?”

  “I see you’re a smart cookie,” Grimm said. He pulled the mask back over his face.

  The corner of my lip lifted in a tiny snarl. Based on the look Vince shot back at me, he saw it and wasn’t happy about it.

  I hit the finance drone with a pointed stare. “Why would I go on tour with Rogue Nation? Canceling the tour will wipe out the band’s finances, not the label’s. Bands front the costs for their own tours, right? In fact, remind me why we have labels again?”

  “We are music curators,” suit number two chimed in. “We know what the public wants to listen to.”

  That response told me he was the label’s A&R guy. The A&R guys always believed they were savvier than anyone else in the room, even more than the musicians themselves.

  “I am sure there are a hundred drummers who would love to be part of this tour,” I said. “Why me?”

  “Shouldn’t you be flattered?” Vince’s question was more like a statement. Fucker.

  “I am not Pamela,” I shot back. If my mom noticed the perky-ass maid, all Vince would have to do was coo a bit of niceties into her ear and hand her the black Amex. She was easily swayed by false flattery. Me? Not so much.

  Grimm removed his mask again. “We fronted the band money for this tour. With our contracts with the venues, we stand to lose a significant amount.”

  My jaw dropped open before I could stop it. “The label fronted my three stepbrothers a significant amount of money? You’ve met my stepbrothers, right?” Grimm actually chuckled at that, much to Vince’s consternation. “And isn’t what happened to Kyle considered an act of God or something?”

  The bean counter cleared his throat. “Actually, the out clauses in the contract do not specify the untimely death of a band member as reason to cancel. I mean, it would if it were Dion—the front man is the face of the band. But the drummer? He’s replaceable.”

  I scowled at Bean Counter.

  “Obviously, we recognized when we recorded the album that Kyle had some issues. We knew exactly why his drum playing wasn’t up to par,” Grimm said. “And that is why we needed you to rerecord the drum tracks after the band left the studio. So, Nikki, the point is, you already know Rogue Nation’s music.”

  “So you knew Kyle was drugging hard? In that case, your contracts were stupid,” I said, staring at Bean Counter. “Contract writers are replaceable too. Particularly shitty ones.”

  “He was supposed to get clean for the tour,” Vince said, his voice quiet. He slumped back in his chair, his face drained of color. “He promised me.”

  For the first time, I noticed how exhausted he looked. Kyle’s death had aged him.

  “We’ve auditioned a number of drummers over the past few months. None of them worked out. With the tour scheduled to get on the road in a few days,” Grimm continued, “we need someone who already knows the music.”

  “Dion will never sign off on this,” I said.

  Grimm’s eyes turned hard. “Dion put himself in this situation by insulting every drummer we auditioned, while they were still in the damn room. Now he doesn’t have a choice. I’m picking the drummer, and I pick you.”

  “What about Johnny Frieze?” I asked, my mouth inadvertently making a sour face. Johnny was one of Kyle’s oldest friends. He also happened to be dating my sister Jett at the moment. I didn’t think he was a talented drummer, but he knew most of Rogue Nation’s music.

  “Johnny Frieze is not a good drummer; he’s a loud drummer. There’s a difference,” Vince said.

  Ouch.

  But Vince wasn’t wrong.

  “You are the best drummer out there, Nik. The best,” the A&R guy jumped in, spreading on a thick layer of faux charm.

  “And I want the best for those boys,” Vince said. “So does Gary.”

  Grimm nodded his agreement from behind his mask.

  “The money’s solid,” Bean Counter said. “We have you at the top end of the sideman per-gig fee, and that’s based on union wages. Plus, we’ve worked in a bonus structure based on the number of tickets sold for each performance. Not to mention a very healthy per diem for meals and other incidentals while you are on the road.”

  He pushed a stack of papers over to me. I stared at the contract, the black-and-white ink blurring as I turned their offer over in my mind. The men’s expectant looks faded with each ticktock of the antique grandfather clock in the corner.

  I pushed the papers back toward them. “This isn’t the deal I want.”

  Bean Counter’s mouth dropped open. “This is the most lucrative contract for an unknown drummer I’ve ever drawn up. These terms are unheard of for someone like you.”

  “Man, you’re superb at selling this, aren’t you?” I said, my voice thick with sarcasm.

  “What do you want, then?” Grimm asked, his voice impatient.

  “Satan’s Sisters goes out on tou
r as the opening act,” I said, adding quickly, “and Grimm Records covers our tour costs, no payback. In addition to the offered contract for playing for Rogue.”

  “You’re out of your mind,” Bean Counter roared. “Labels do not cover tour costs—”

  I interrupted him. “Hey, you’re the shitty contract writer who covered Rogue Nation’s tour costs. And I expect Satan’s Sisters to get favored nations treatment, or there is no deal.”

  “You’re not even on the label,” A&R guy said, his voice rising. He was panicking. Favored nations meant Grimm Records had to match every single payout—and cover every single cost—just like Rogue Nation had written in their contract. They thought I was an idiot, but the minute Vince had moved us into his house, I’d paid very close attention to the deals made at this very table.

  “And we don’t want to be on the label,” I said. “No offense, Mr. Grimm. Your A&R department is pedestrian. Not exactly taking any musical risks these days.”

  “I suspect you are probably right,” Grimm agreed. Mr. A&R and Bean Counter were at the receiving end of a Gary Grimm glare. “Miss Benson, you have a deal. Satan’s Sisters are on tour as the opening act. We foot the bill. You get your sidewoman salary. Write it up, gentlemen. And good day.”

  He gave everyone at the table a curt nod before turning his attention back to me. “Nikki, will you do me the honor of walking me to the door?”

  I got to my feet and matched Grimm’s brisk pace.

  “I’ve been at this game for a long time,” he said, “and I don’t think I’ve ever met someone with quite as much moxie.”

  “Is that a compliment, Mr. Grimm?” I asked.

  “You’re more than a skilled drummer,” he said. “You have talent. And that is a compliment. However, you are taking advantage of an unfortunate situation.”

  “My stepbrother’s death,” I said.

  “Yes,” he responded. “And I just want to make sure you are aware of how I feel about that.”