Razing Ryker (Dissonance Book 1) Read Free Page B

different style of choreography than what we’ve been doing. And I want to background check everyone extensively. Drug tests too. Everyone thinks I’m a coked up alcoholic man-whore and I’ll never get away from that stigma if I’m surrounded by users.”
    “Or carrying flasks in your back pocket.”
    Ryker groaned, turning away from Grant and the window – heading for the music room and his piano. “It was my fucking cell phone,” he growled.

CHAPTER FOUR
    Greer had run away from home when she was thirteen after her mother ran off with another man and left her alone with a stepfather who liked to visit her in her bedroom at night. Her mother had known this and still she’d left.
    People, Greer was quick to learn, were bastards.
    She ran away after only one month. She got her period, said a quick thank you to Jesus, and ran for the door. She was alone for most of that first year but she did alright. She got in with some tunnel kids and lived underground for a while, but then their camp was raided, the majority of them ended up beaten, bloodied, and robbed, and she went solo. Less conspicuous that way. She spent her time gathering cans, working odd jobs for anyone who would let her, and hiding. She was always hiding. Even now, even years later when she was in an apartment she was paying for and had locks on her doors, she was hiding. But never from Cameron.
    He was the only one who knew about her past because he’d lived it with her. They met when she was fourteen, he was seventeen, and he’d immediately taken her under his wing. He saw her huddled in the back of an ally waiting for the restaurant to bring out the trash and his usually tough exterior had broken. She had that kind of face. Big eyes like a puppy dog and long hair that was soft and shining despite the fact that she hadn’t been able to shower in two weeks. She looked like she was waiting to be saved and Cameron felt like he’d been looking for something beautiful. Something worth saving. He’d seen a lot of ugly in his life having spent almost all of it on the streets, and in that moment in time he’d been solidly certain that there was nothing worth anything in the world. Nothing but hate and pain. Then he’d met Greer and she gave him hope again. She gave him something to salvage and in the end it’d been that that had saved Cameron himself. That’d pulled the knife off his wrist.
    Sharing a love of music, they both took up with a dance crew four years ago performing for money in parks and in front of busy intersections. They made good money and they learned a lot from the other dancers, most of whom were properly trained but down on their luck. They learned about the system, about auditions, where to look for openings. After years of scrounging and saving they’d managed to buy the right clothes and shoes and both of them started looking for parts in off Broadway productions. After months of rejection, they’d finally found gold with Rendezvous.
    Now they both lived in apartments with other people, people from the cast that shared the same schedule and understood why they rehearsed relentlessly. They’d never know that part of the reason Greer and Cameron tried so hard was because they were faking it. They had lied on resumes and in auditions about where they’d learned to dance. They were just as good as the others, just as talented – if not more so – but they’d always felt like they were second best. Like no matter how good they were, they were never quite good enough.
    Greer had auditioned for the female lead in Rendezvous but the chemistry hadn’t been there. Cameron had the voice, the looks, and the dance skills and when you put him next to Eve, you could feel the desire. It was in the air, heavy and hot. When you put him next to Greer there was love, not lust, and audiences wanted lust. They wanted sex, even if they didn’t get to see it. They wanted the promise of it. So Greer had gone to the ensemble but she’d made it.