Billy Jeffers: Rockers of Steel (17 page)

“Congratulations?” He says in a voice that I take as a sign of jealousy.

“Not really.” I shrug. “He broke up with me, and Timmy avoided me like the plague.”

“End of summer of your senior year and you still hadn’t had sex?”

I nod. “I graduated and went to college a virgin.”

“That’s admirable.” He sighs as if he is possibly regretful and I have no idea why.

“Hey, did you miss the part about me trying to rid myself of my virginity? There is nothing admirable about that.”

He laughs. God, I love his laugh.

“At Notre Dame, I met Charles. He was a blue blood … like you.”

“Like me, huh?” I can tell he doesn’t like the comparison when he tenses a little..

“Well, not exactly like you.” I sigh. “He was my first.” I look over to see his jaw clench. I like that he is annoyed… a lot.

“Was he good?”

“What you really wanna know is if you were better,” I tease.

“Is that what I want to know?”

“Memphis Black is my brother. I know how the male mind works. But, no, he sucked.” I giggle at my pun.

He seems pleased.

“The next part goes to the grave; even Tales doesn’t have the juicy details,” I warn him.

“Okay.”

“During one of the times we had sex, he called me Matt.”

Billy’s eyebrows shoot up his forehead. “Matt?”

“Yep. Of course, he denied it, but I knew what I heard.” I force a laugh. “So, one night, I got wasted at a frat party. After a keg stand, I was sick as hell. The next morning, I woke up sore as hell, sandwiched between Charles and
Matt
.”

“What do you mean,
you woke up between them
?”

“Well, I was drunk, and well, the three of us … you know.”

“You had a threesome?”

I nod. “I did.”

“Because you were drunk.” He states it like it’s the gospel.

“That night, yes. The next morning, no. And over the next month, I may have gotten tipsy in order to actually go forward with doing it again, but no, not drunk.”

He says nothing, and I feel extremely stupid for telling him. Regardless, I decide to continue.

“My elementary crush came out of the closet; my high school boyfriend and his best friend Timmy are getting married to each other; and I know for damn sure Charles and Matt enjoy each other during threesomes more than the average straight man.”

It’s eerily quiet, so I decide to make a joke. “So, you can pat yourself on the back. You were definitely better in bed than all of them.”

Still nothing.

“And you were the first to perform oral on me,” I say a little quieter, feeling kind of—well, not kind of, but really stupid right now.

He looks at me out of the corner of his eye.

“And your dick was the first in my mouth, so there’s that. Madison Black takes a liking to nicely dressed men who shower and smell good and who enjoy shopping more than the average man. And they have all been gay or, at the very least, bi.”

He shakes his head.

“Okay, aren’t you gonna say anything?”

“I really don’t know what to say, Madison. If I ever met Charles and Matt, I would want to pummel them. Does this asshole who shared you with a friend know you were a virgin?”

“It’s really not the kind of thing you tell a guy.”

“It sure as shit should be. He should feel honored to have been your first. And none of them ever tasted you?”

I shake my head and shrug. “I didn’t taste them, either.”

“How the hell does that not happen?” He seems pissed.

“Well, he and I had sex maybe three times before we made it more a party than two people having sex, and then it was like four times.”

“So, you’re telling me, in your adult life, you have had sex less than ten times?”

“It’s not like I keep a running tally or anything.” I now feel my face burning.

“Jesus, Madison.”

“Ten times.”

“Ten times?”

“Those others and then three with you.”

“I would have never guessed by the way you act—”

“I wanted to be wanted, Billy,” I admit. “I saw the way you looked at me the first time we met. And say all you want, but you wanted me.”

“I wanted to not want you,” he argues.

“Exactly.” I nod, pretty damn proud of myself. “And you still want me.”

“Well, yes, of course I do, but it doesn’t mean it’s right.”

“Does it feel wrong?” I ask, looking at him. When he looks at me, I take in a deep breath and say, “I saw something in you I had never seen in anyone else’s eyes: desire”—I look down—“for me. I knew I did, and you were so stubborn. I tried to wear you down, and it didn’t work. Then I tried to hate you hoping it would stop me from feeling otherwise.”

“I don’t want you to hate me,” he says softly, looking back at the road.

“I couldn’t hate you if I tried.” I muster up the courage and take his hand. “That’s why you’re gonna let me help you or, at the very least, help you through it.”

“You promised,” he growls.

“Please,” I plead with all my heart.

“We’ll see.”

A text message from Memphis comes in.

Memphis: Where you at?

Madison: About ten minutes from my place.

Memphis: Your car’s there.

Madison: Thanks. See you in the morning?

Memphis: Come over tonight if you want.

Madison: No, I’m tired. A car ride for two days straight, ugh.

Memphis: How’s he doing?

Madison: He’s Billy. Weird, but fine.

Memphis: LOL. Love you, sis. See you tomorrow.

Madison: See you tomorrow.

“I’d like to stay with you tonight,” she says quietly.

Madison Black, quiet.

Well, Fuck.

“We both need rest,” I answer as I get out, walk around the SUV, and open her door.

“How much rest are you actually gonna get tonight?”

“More than I did last night,” I answer. “Come on.”

She gets out, and I walk around to grab her suitcase from the back of the SUV.

“The case’s cute.” So is her ass, but pointing that out at the present time would be contradictory to what needs to happen.

“Thanks,” she grumbles then pouts as she walks up the walkway to the house.

After punching in the code, she opens the door and walks in.

I stop at the threshold, and she turns around to look at me.

“I give you permission to enter if that’s what you are waiting for.”

I must look confused, because she follows with, “You don’t watch
Vampire Diaries
, do you?”

“I guess not.” I keep my feet planted.

“It’s a good show. Anyway, I won’t rescind, so it’s an open invitation.”

“I’m just gonna head home and try to get some sleep and then attack this situation in the morning before heading to the studio.”

“You have to learn bass,” she says, letting go of her little Basic Black rolling case.

“I’m not even worried about that. It won’t be a problem.”

“Cocky much?” she asks, walking back toward the door.

“Confident. There
is
a difference.”

I won’t walk in regardless of how tempting it is. She’s got that look, too, which makes it—

“Goodnight,” she says as she starts shutting the door.

“Oh, okay.”

“What were you expecting? Me to beg you to”—she smirks—“
come
in?”

“Maybe a proper goodnight?” What the fuck is wrong with me? Why would I even say that shit, especially after telling her the opposite?

“What is a appropriate fuck buddy goodnight? I’m not really versed on the proper etiquette of it.”

“I think, more important than that, we should recognize that we are friends, Madison.”

She sticks her hand out. “Well, then goodnight.”

I accept her hand and shake it. “Goodnight.”

With a glass of scotch and music playing through the Bose system, I sit on the couch with my laptop and disconnect the Wi-Fi before sticking the flash drive in the USB port and waiting. When the file pops up, I start to take notes. After an hour, my eyes feel like they are crossing, and I feel like there is no real fix to the situation.

As angry as I am with them, I can’t send my father to jail in hopes that I get off. He fucking deserves it, though. The new estate is mortgaged to the hilt. The money from the sale of the house that I paid for is apparently being used to pay for renovations.

After going through all the data, I am not so sure this can be remedied without bringing us both down. A million dollars needs to be paid to the investors, and he has a fucking mortgage of four point two million. I have five hundred thousand invested that I can use to pay back the investors. It might keep me out of jail.

“That son of a bitch. The motherfucking son of a bitch!” I scream as I throw the fucking glass at the wall. Glass shatters everywhere, and now there is a hole in the sheet rock of my fucking wall.

New walls.

I can sell this place and hopefully get the two hundred and fifty thousand I paid for it back.

My cell rings, and I grab it off the table, seeing it’s Madison.

“Everything okay?” I ask.

“I was gonna ask you the same thing,” she says quietly.

I look at the floor and lie, “Everything’s perfect.”

“Okay.”

“Okay,” I say back.

“See you in the morning?” she asks.

“Yeah.”

“Goodnight, Billy.”

“Goodnight, Madison.”

When I walk into Forever Four earlier than usual, I look around for Madison, but she is nowhere to be found.

I send her a message as I walk into the soundproof booth. It says delivered, but not read.

I grab the bass guitar and decide to practice a bit. When Finn walks in, I look at the clock and realize I must have gotten lost in the music. It’s been over an hour. I stop playing and set the guitar in the stand.

“Sounds good, man,” Finn says, running his hand through his hair. “Almost as good as me.”

“Thank you. That should worry you some. I’ve only been trying to play for less than a week.”

“I’m not worried at all.” He smirks. “How’s your old man doing?”

“He’ll live.”

“He have a heart attack?” Finn asks as River and Memphis walk in.

“Anxiety attack. He’ll be fine.”

“Glad he’s okay,” Memphis says as he grabs the acoustic.

“Real glad,” River agrees.

I notice them all seem to exchange glances. It pisses me off, but I keep my mouth shut, because until I figure it out, until I know I will be able to pay them back, I need to keep the fact that I am a little pissed off at them for not telling me they invested with him, under my hat.

The thing that makes me even angrier is I have never once said a damn thing like, “
Hey, invest with my father; he’s one hell of an investor
,” because he’s not. Nor have I ever even mentioned he was in finance.

“How’s your mom doing?” Memphis asks.

“How’s yours?” I ask back, wondering why the hell he would ask that shit.

“She isn’t dealing with a sick husband, just an ex who’s probably dressing up as an altar boy, trying to get some holey action,” Memphis quips as he starts to play his guitar.

River and Finn bust up laughing, and Memphis smirks then shakes his head.

“Man’s a fucking joke.”