“Just like you have to know that the absolute last thing I want to do is hurt Jamison.”
“That’s not a promise.”
Ryder shook his head. How could it be when he knew how very likely it was that he would screw things up? It was the one guarantee in his life, the one thing he was exceptionally good at.
Jared wasn’t his best friend for nothing. He could see from the look on his guitarist’s face that the other man knew exactly what he was thinking. “Shit, Ryder.” He sighed. “Then be prepared for a lot worse than a punch in the jaw if you do hurt her.”
“That sounds fair.”
“You think?” Jared asked with a roll of his eyes.
Ignoring his friend’s sarcasm, Ryder stopped him as he went to open the dressing room door. “Don’t tell anyone about Jamison and me, okay? I’m not ready for it to go public.”
For some reason that made Jared smile all over again. “Tell who what? I know nothing.”
Ryder snorted. “Let’s keep it that way.”
…
As the dressing room door closed behind Ryder and her brother, Jamison let out a low, shaky breath and tried to pretend she hadn’t walked up in time to hear the very last part of their conversation. After all, it was none of her business if Ryder wanted to keep their “arrangement” a secret.
And what were they now, anyway? An item? A couple? Fuck friends? Or were they not even that? If Ryder didn’t want anyone to know they were sleeping together, there had to be a good reason. And if it wasn’t worry over Jared finding out, the only other explanation she could come up with was he was afraid the press would get ahold of her. Nothing like a few rabid paparazzi to break a relationship wide open.
But he had to know she was used to the paps. She was around Jared enough when the group wasn’t touring that she’d dealt with her fair share of them—and pretty well, if she did say so herself. So if he wasn’t worried about protecting her from the invasive questions and photos, why all the secrecy? Why the need to keep their relationship away from public consumption?
In her head, there was only one answer and it was the one she wanted least to believe. Not after the hours they’d spent in bed together that morning and certainly not after the way Ryder had made love to her in the bathroom. For the first time in her adult life, she’d felt like she really was beautiful. That her man saw her in a way she’d never been able to see herself.
Only now she was finding out that man didn’t want anyone else to know he was with her. She’d been around the block enough to know that most men were pretty territorial when it came to the women they were with, so if Ryder wasn’t being like that, it was because he really didn’t think of her as his. He didn’t want her, not the way she wanted him.
It was stupid to be upset by that now—she was the one who’d set the rules, after all. But how could she have known that her feelings for Ryder would deepen, would become so overwhelming, so quickly? She’d wanted him forever, had grabbed on to him with both hands when she got the chance. And to hell with the consequences.
Getting angry at Ryder, being hurt, wasn’t fair. Not when all he’d done was abide by the rules she had set. But knowing that in her head and understanding it in her heart were two different things, especially when each day she fell deeper and deeper in love with him. How could she not when he was
so kind and considerate and sweet to her when they were alone? Of course it had been easy to be blinded by the affection, and the sex. Was still easy, because even as she died inside at this new knowledge that he didn’t love her, not like she loved him,, she also knew that she wasn’t going to do anything drastic. It wasn’t like she had any intention of putting a stop to their relationship. Not when she so desperately wanted to hold, and be held by him.
Shoving the pain down deep inside of herself, she crossed the hall to Shaken Dirty’s dressing room. She’d come to find out if they wanted her to cook this afternoon or if they were just planning on eating the buffet that was currently being laid out in the green room.
Determined not to let what the hurt she felt affect the way she did her job—or anything else—Jamison shoved the dressing room door wide open. And walked straight into hell.
Chapter Eighteen
“Call 911!” Ryder yelled at Jared. “I don’t think he’s breathing.”
“Are you sure?” Jared was already dialing his cell phone as he raced across the room to where Wyatt was passed out on the couch.
“No, I’m not sure! But it doesn’t look like it.” He laid his head on Wyatt’s chest, listened for the beating of his heart and the telltale movement of his torso that foretold breathing. But there was nothing there. Goddammit.
Not again. Wyatt was not doing this shit to him again.
But he was, and this time he wasn’t just unresponsive. He was dead.
No. Goddammit, no. Ryder wouldn’t accept that. He didn’t have a fucking clue how long his drummer had been like this, but he was not going to lose one of his best friends on the dirty floor of a dressing room in Houston. It wasn’t going to fucking happen.
Grabbing Wyatt by the shirt, Ryder pulled him onto the floor. Covered Wyatt’s mouth with his own and delivered two rescue breaths. As he did he was reviewing his very rusty knowledge of CPR in his head. “Ask them how to do CPR,” he said to Jared, who was frantically explaining the situation to a 911 operator. “I can’t remember how many compressions I’m supposed to do in a row.”
“Thirty.” Suddenly Jamison was there, falling to her knees beside him. “Right here,” she said, putting her hands in the center of his chest and beginning rapid compressions.
“Okay, breathe for him,” she said. He did, twice, then she started compressions again.
“The ambulance is about seven minutes out,” Jared said.
“Stay on the line with the dispatcher,” Jamison told him, a little breathless as she continued the compressions. “But call security, see if they have a defibrillator they can get in here. If we get a pulse, we can use it. Plus, there should be EMS on scene for the concert tonight—see if they’ve arrived yet. And give security a heads up about the ambulance. They should have someone waiting to bring the paramedics back here.
“Breathe,” she told Ryder and he did, a little awed at how competent she was. How fast she’d taken over when fear had been a raging nightmare inside of him.
She started CPR again. “Jared, there’s water running in the bathroom. Someone’s taking a shower. Go in and find out what time they went in there. We should try to have an estimate for the paramedics for how long Wyatt’s been down.”
“Right.” Jared sprang into action, all but flying across the large room. Then a bunch of things happened at once.
She got a pulse.
Wyatt’s body started to shake, then to convulse. The dressing room door burst open and two security guards ran in, followed by three paramedics with a gurney.
And Jared fell over, landing on his ass just outside the bathroom door. He was sheet white.
“Let us take over now, ma’am.” The paramedics eased in beside Jamison, helped her roll Wyatt onto his side so he wouldn’t hurt himself. Then one began firing off questions as the other started an IV.
Ryder answered the first couple of questions, torn between terror that Wyatt would die, rage that he’d done this to himself—and all of them—again, and concern for Jared, who hadn’t moved from his spot on the carpet. He looked almost as bad as Wyatt did.
Jamison crossed to him just as Victoria stumbled out of the bathroom, a small towel wrapped around her dripping body.
Seconds later, Micah followed her out.
He was also wet and wearing only a towel, and for a second Ryder felt like his head was going to explode. Had he somehow fallen through a wormhole into an alternate reality where everything was fucked up beyond all recognition?