Rock Star Romance: Dan (Contemporary New Adult Rockstar Bad Boy Romance) (Hard Rock Star Series Book 4) Read Free Page B

hooking up with anyone in the scene. That was smart;
but it didn’t leave a lot of hope for me to convince her to hang out sometime.
Of course, it didn’t leave a lot of hope for Mark, either. You don’t even
know if he remembers her, I reminded myself as Heatkeeper started to play.
I pretended to almost ignore Sophie, not in some kind of strategy but because I
didn’t want to make it obvious that I wasn’t paying 100% of my attention to the
band on the stage. She sang along with a little over half the songs the band
played, and I couldn’t help occasionally glancing over to see her tits shaking
and jiggling inside her shirt as she danced around.
    By the time Atreides started setting up, some of
the people who’d only come for Jackal 5 or Heatkeeper had wandered off, and
Nick and Olivia and Mark had found me where I’d camped out, next to Sophie and
Benny, who had broken down at record speed after his band finished. I watched
Mark flirting with Sophie and didn’t tell him about what Benny had told me on
the subject of Sophie’s prospect of being picked up; instead I just watched as
she flirted every bit as hard as Mark did, but without giving a single inch—it
was like watching a cat with a cloth mouse: the cat’s obviously having fun, but
has no intention of actually doing anything to the mouse or even killing it,
since it can’t be killed in the first place.
    Atreides finished setting up and started sound
check and I watched a total change come over Sophie’s demeanor; she no longer
even pretended to pay attention to Benny or Mark or even me, but instead
started jumping up and down, screaming for her sister. It was adorable. “Oh my
gawd, Jess Riviera! Have my babies !”
    “Bitch, that’d be incest,” Jess called back from
the stage.
    “Not if you’re just a surrogate,” Sophie
countered.
    “Find a sperm donor then!” It went on like that
the whole time Jess, Nelson, and the rest of the band went through sound check;
I wasn’t the only one enjoying the side-show, but I had the front row seat, so
to speak.
    When Atreides started playing I actually did pay
full attention to them, barely even noticing Sophie next to me. I sang along
with Jason, Nelson, and Jess; I jumped when they told the crowd to jump. I
grinned at Sophie during one of the slower songs and followed the chant. It was
a good show—as good a show as any that Molly Riot have ever put on—and I was
glad I’d come out to see it, even if I couldn’t get anywhere with Sophie.
    After the set was finished, I turned my attention
back onto the bar. People started closing out their tabs, heading for the next
spot on their evening out, but Sophie hung around, and so did Mark and Benny,
so I had no reason to leave. Nick and Olivia took a few minutes to chat up the
members of the band, and I was pretty sure that Olivia got whatever it was she
needed for her article; they left after a quick drink to celebrate the show.
Within thirty minutes of the show finishing, the crowd at Prop was only about a
dozen people; it was the time of night I liked the best. Jess and Ricky were
making out at one of the tables off in a corner, and Mark was talking to Benny
about the studio. The air conditioning started to be better than theoretical,
and I was more than ready to close the place out. I wanted as much of a chance
to see what the deal was with Sophie as possible.
     

 
    ****
    “You don’t have to walk me home, you know,” Sophie
said, listing slightly to the left as she turned to look up at me.
    “Someone got knifed in this neighborhood last
week,” I pointed out to her. “I don’t want to log onto Facebook tomorrow and
see a bunch of Respects bartenders paying tribute to their fallen comrade.”
    “They wouldn’t anyway,” Sophie told me, shaking
her head. “They’d hold a benefit concert for me in a couple of weeks to help
Jess and my parents pay for my funeral, and that’d be that. Apart from the help
wanted ads.” I