Before You(3)

The other man picked up the bass guitar, smiling intimately at the crowd, his blond hair spiked in every direction. If there were such a thing as a living Ken doll, he was it. With fitted dark jeans and a tailored dress shirt, he didn’t look as if he should be playing bass in a band, but that didn’t mean he didn’t have admirers. Women grabbed at his ankles when he neared the edge of the stage. He clearly loved the attention.

Interrupting the scene created by the living Ken doll, the drummer banged his drumsticks together, and the lead singer ran onto the stage with his back turned away from the crowd. He ran up to the other members of the band, saying something to each one before addressing the audience. When he turned around, Aubrey’s mouth fell open. It was Jax. The amusement twinkling in his eyes earlier was noticeably absent. He was all business. His intense eyes scanned the crowd, eager women screaming as his gaze passed over them.

The attention that the other band members garnered earlier faded into the background as all eyes in the bar focused on Jax. Aubrey noticed his appeal when he approached her earlier, but on stage, he commanded attention, and that was before he even opened his mouth. She secretly admitted that his sexual magnetism eclipsed the rest of the band members, who had looked so impressive before she saw Jax on stage, Cam included. Now she understood why Cam was so excited about the prospects of his band.

When Jax’s eyes land on her, somehow Aubrey managed to keep her face composed, but her perfidious heart raced double-time. Physically incapable of pulling her eyes away from his penetrating stare, she soaked him in. He really had the most disconcerting eyes. Being Cam’s girlfriend, she knew she should look away and ignore him completely. Instead, his mischievous smile held her hostage, making her feel as though they were sharing some private, intimate joke, and against her better judgment she found herself returning his smile.

“We’re Chasing Ruin. Thanks for coming to see us tonight.” His eyes were glued to hers as if they were the only two people in the bar and she had the unnerving desire to get closer to him, to trace the lines of his face. She hadn’t seen Cam since Christmas, and he was all but forgotten.

Jax raised his hand, signaling the band to begin the first set, and words flowed out of his mouth. Even with the fast pace of the song, his voice flooded her senses. It was smooth like honey caressing her skin, bewitching her and everyone in the crowd. Wow. Words escaped her. He was the whole package. Cam was right. This band had potential to go all the way.

Then he redirected his attention to the group of girls screaming for him just below the stage. Bending down, he reached his hand toward the devoted fans, making the girls beam in delight. And just like that Jax, the lead singer of Chasing Ruin, had already forgotten her, which was fine. She didn’t need or want his attention. She had Camden, her best friend since childhood and her boyfriend for the last six years.





Chapter Two





Jax Carmichael watched as the beautifully fake Katie ran her hands all over his body, bored beyond belief even as he managed to mumble encouraging words in her direction. Usually sharing a meaningless moment with an equally meaningless woman was a perfect way to end the night after a performance. He could drag Katie back to the storage closet and let her make good on all the ridiculous things she was murmuring in his ear with annoying frequency. It might even be momentarily entertaining to see what exactly they could do in that closet.

The sad fact of the matter was that he’d rather be talking with Aubrey, though he wasn’t exactly sure why. Her hair was a disheveled mess, her clothes were boring and rumpled, and she wasn’t wearing any makeup, but that wasn’t what caught his attention. From the moment he saw Aubrey walk into the bar, he knew he had talk to her. She was the first real person he’d set his eyes on in weeks, perhaps his entire life. Growing up on the fringes of Hollywood with a dad in the industry meant that real people were hard to find, but he knew she was different when he spotted her looking lost near the entrance to the bar, and before he could second guess his actions, he slid into the barstool next to her.

Up close, she was undeniably beautiful and not in the obnoxious, overly surgically enhanced way. Her skin glowed, her almond shaped amber eyes tilted upwards with an impish glint, and her smile fascinated him. He had never seen anyone whose entire face lit up like that. From the minute he first glimpsed that smile all he could think was that he wanted to be the person who put that smile there every day.

When she claimed to be meeting her boyfriend at the bar, he wasn’t deterred. He saw the way she looked at him. He was very familiar with that look. Many women offered him that look, but with her the look wasn’t calculated. He had piqued her interest. She denied it, but he knew it was true. He was happy to play the game until she admitted her interest. After all, watching her and talking to her was undeniably intriguing.