Playing for Love at Deep Haven (19 page)

Zach opened her
car door in the preferred parking area, and Violet took his hand, flashing him
a smile that she didn’t feel. She wished she’d checked out what Zach was
wearing and chosen something more appropriate for herself. Or at least used her
darkest eyeliner and brought a black sweatshirt to throw on over her aqua silk
blouse. With all of the piercings, tattoos and band T-shirts on the rowdy
patrons approaching the doors of the arena, Violet stuck out like a sore thumb,
and this was only the parking lot, for heaven’s sake.          

She could see
the excitement in Zach’s face. He’d started getting edgy as dinner dragged on,
and Violet had finally asked Jacques to advise Monsieur
Léonard
that they needed to leave for a concert. The chef had packed up two slices of
tarte
tatin
aux pommes
caramélisées
, with the express wish that she and Zach
return again for a more leisurely dinner sometime soon. At which point Zach had
given her a look that she read perfectly: two hours was as leisurely a dinner
as she was likely to get with
him
.          

She sighed, not
minding the light rain that misted around them, and stepped around a parking
lot pothole outside Port City Music Hall.          

“So, how many
concerts have you been to?” Zach asked, pulling her closer as they crossed the
busy parking lot together.          

“Oh, um,
two.”           

Zach stopped in
his tracks. “
Two
?”           

“Yep. I saw
Simon and Garfunkel in Newark once, and another time
Shep
sent me and Sophie to Mohegan Sun to see Jason
Mraz
.
For my birthday.
Shep
was much more into the
symphony.”           

“Vile. You’ve
never been to a rock concert? How is that
possible?”           

“You of all
people know the kind of music I
like.”           

“Okay. Fair
warning. Heavy metal is going to be very loud.
Extremely
loud. Like shaking your teeth,
thunder-cracking-inside-your-body loud.” With his free hand he reached into his
pocket and pulled out a small plastic bag. “You’re going to need
these.”           

“Check.” She
took the little bag from him, holding it up to look at the two bright yellow
ear plugs, then shoved the bag in her pocket, touched by his thoughtfulness.          

“There might be
a
mosh
pit in the front, but we’re in the seventeenth
row, and we’re going to avoid that at all
costs.”           

While Violet had
heard the term
mosh
pit
before, she honestly had no idea
what it was.          

“Check. No
mosh
pitting.”           

“The people
around you will probably be
headbanging
. Just nodding
their heads back and forth with the music.” He demonstrated for her, and she
thought it looked ridiculous and pointless, but she didn’t share that
observation. “Everyone usually stands through the show, too, and there are a
lot of fists in the air. You know, guys throwing devil horns,
rockin
’ out. It doesn’t mean anything. It’s just
energy.”           

 
“Ch-check.” She knew her eyes must look like
saucers, but she couldn’t help it. She felt like he was prepping her for battle
and she wasn’t at all sure she felt ready.          

“You’re going to
be frisked as we walk in, but remember, it’s for everyone’s
safety.”           

“Oh,
okay.”           

He took her
other hand, grinning at her. “Sometimes they use pyrotechnics in the show. It
can get ridiculously hot and feel very real if you’re up too close, but it’s
regulated really carefully for safety and that’s all it is . . . for show.
Okay?”           

 
“Uh-huh.” Her hands felt sweaty, and she
looked down, trying to
steel
herself for the next two
to three hours of noise and
headbanging
and
fireworks. She had learned to ski for
Shep
, for
heaven’s sake. She could do this for Zach. She looked up at him and gave him
what she hoped was a confident grin.          

She didn’t
expect him to hook a finger under her chin and press his lips against hers, but
when he did, she sighed into his mouth from the unexpected sweetness of it,
flattening her hands on his chest. The tip of his tongue found the tip of hers,
then pulled back before returning to lick the sides and top tenderly, teasing
her, making her pant for more. Heat fanned out from below her belly, and she
felt a quickening between her thighs. He thrust his tongue into her mouth
again, and she caught it, sucking on it as his hands pushed into the small of
her back, arching her against him. She felt his erection against her tummy, the
unmistakable outline of it straining against his jeans as he pillaged her mouth.
         

When he pulled
away from her, she was so light-headed, it took her a few seconds to open her
eyes.          

“Zach,” she
sighed. She would never, ever get enough of him.          

He rested his
forehead on hers. “I’ve been wanting to do that since we parked the car. I’m so
turned on that you’re here with me. I know it’s your first time, and you don’t
really want to be—”           

She arched her
back so that her silk-covered breasts, beaded and greedy for his touch, pressed
into his T-shirt. “Yes, I do. I do want to be here. I want to be with
you.”           

She felt his
breath hitch as he buried his face in her hair. “Fuck, Violet. You say shit like
that, and it levels me. It’s like I have no right to hear
it.”           

“It’s the
truth,” she whispered in his ear, pulling on the lobe with her teeth, the
dangerous excitement of the concert making her bolder and more daring. His arms
tightened around her, and he shuddered as she licked the soft pillow of warm
skin before pulling back.          

“When we get
back to the house? You’re not sleeping until the sun comes up,” he said softly,
low and taut against her ear, biting hers as she had his. “I’m going to be
inside you all night
long.”           

 
She moaned softly, wishing they could skip the
concert and go straight home.
“Promise?”           

A concertgoer
jostled them, and Zach tightened his grip on her again, but it was just enough
of an intrusion for them to pull apart and start back toward the concert hall
doors. Just as they reached the doors, Zach yanked her back up against him
hungrily, his dilated eyes capturing hers.          

 
“Yeah, Vile. I promise.”

Chapter
14

Zach could tell
she wasn’t enjoying the music, but to her credit, she never asked to leave, and
at least a few times he felt her body brush his as she tried to move to the
stomping beat. Most of the time, however, she was utterly still beside him, her
face a mix of fascination and fear and distaste. When the heavyset shithead to
her right knocked into her for the sixth time, Zach took her arm, moving her to
his seat, and gave the guy a swift elbow to the side. The fat fuck took a swing
at Zach, but Zach ducked, and the guy was so wasted, he fell backward into his
companion from the momentum of his own punch.

Zach turned to
find Violet watching the scene with horror, staring at the man sprawled half on
his seat and half on the floor.

“IT’S VERY, VERY
ANGRY HERE!” she yelled. He couldn’t make out her voice over the loud music,
but he was adept at reading lips.

He nodded,
taking her hand and squeezing it. “IT’S ALL PART OF IT!”

“WHAT?”

“IT’S OKAY!”

She nodded
nervously, looking again at the guy passed out on the floor. Zach caught her
eyes. “HE’S FINE!”

Violet bit her
bottom lip and turned her attention back to the stage, her face stony and
unsettled at once. She was not having a good time, and Zach started to wonder
if this was a very, very bad idea.

***

Violet had never
felt as relieved as she did when Stone Cold played only two encores and then
left the stage for good. The “music” didn’t sound anything like music. Even
Zach’s song, which she had tried to listen to subjectively, was awful. The
other concertgoers were menacing. Her toes were bruised, and she was sure her
hip was black-and-blue from the guy who’d been standing next to her. And as
much as she appreciated Zach eventually swapping seats with her, she was
troubled by seeing the man slumped over his seat in a stupor.

But it wasn’t
just the volume, or the patrons, or even the music itself, which was furious
and uncomfortably dark. What bothered Violet most of all was how much Zach
seemed to love it all. He hadn’t noticed her watching him for a large share of
the concert, but it was easy because he’d been so enthralled with the band, so
focused on them, beating his hands against his thighs, his fist in the air and
headbanging
with the rest of the rowdy crowd. Zach loved this.
Loved it.

How? For the
life of her, she didn’t understand what there was to love. How had this been a
part of his life for so long? These people? This noise? Who was he that this
appealed to him? It frightened and bewildered her. How could he love this dark,
angry music and still be the person who wrote love songs with her and made her
body sing under his fingers? How could he love this and still have room in his
life for her?

The lights came
on, and as the people around them funneled out into the aisles, Zach turned to
her, his face sweaty and his eyes bright.

“What’d you
think? You want to go backstage?”

No, she did not
want to go backstage. She wanted to leave this theater, get in the car, and put
some distance between this experience and the safe bubble of Deep Haven.

“Oh,” she
started, “I’m so tired, and we still have that long
dri
—”

“Come on, Vile!”
he said. “You used to be game for anything. Just come meet the guys. Then we’ll
go. We won’t stay long. I just want to tell them they rocked it.”

He had endured a
seven-course, two-and-a-half-hour tasting dinner at
Léonard’s
.
She owed it to him to keep her mind open, didn’t she?

“Sure. We can go
say hello.”

He took her hand
and started pulling her toward the back of the auditorium with the rest of the
crowd. “I thought you said we were going backstage!”

“Oh, yeah. We
still say that, but we’ll catch them at the bus. Nobody really goes backstage
anymore.”

They slipped out
a side door marked Emergency Exit and found themselves in the parking lot. The
rain had picked up during the concert, and Violet hurried to keep up with Zach
on the slippery asphalt. She felt rushed and forgotten as he pulled her along behind
him.

“Are we in a
rush?”

“Just want to
say hi before they go.”

They reached a
cordoned-off area of the parking lot, where two imposing coach buses sat side
by side with the engines humming. Zach flashed the pass around his neck, and a
beefy security guard nodded him through. As Zach stepped over to the bus, the
backstage door opened, and a man, whom Violet recognized as one of the
musicians, stepped out and lit a cigarette.

“Gabe!”

The guitarist
looked up, his eye makeup running down his sweaty face. His black hair was long
and tangled, hanging wet and limp around his shoulders, but his eyes brightened
as he took in Zach. “Fucking Zachariah! Shit! Were you out there tonight?”

Zach let go of
Violet’s hand to slap his friend on the back. “You shredded it, man.”

“Fuck, yeah. You
heard ‘
Puppetmaster
’? That’s some good shit, Z.”

“Who changed the
bridge? Weasel?”

“Fucking
Weasel,” commiserated Gabe, running a hand through his sweat-soaked hair. “What
the fuck are you doing in Maine?”

Violet had been
watching the exchange from a few steps back, uncomfortable and uncertain about
her place. Zach looked around and found her, putting his hand out to her and
pulling her up beside him.

“Who’s this?”
asked Gabe, raking his eyes up and down her body.

“Violet,” said
Zach, and she noted his jaw tightening. “She’s—”

“An old friend,”
Violet finished for him, hoping to spare him the awkwardness of trying to
describe their relationship.

His eyes darted
to hers like lightning, whip fast and angry.

They were all
distracted by the door swinging open again, and another man exited the
building, flanked by two women, one under each arm. He stopped in his tracks
when he saw Zach.

“Z!”

“Hey, Weasel,”
said Zach, his voice terse and annoyed. “Good show.”

“What did you
think of the new bridge, man?”

“Maybe I think
you’re a talentless dick.”

“Fuck you, Z.”
Weasel’s eyes narrowed and he spat on the ground. “Creative license, fucker.”

Violet was
distracted from their head-butting by one of the two women who shrugged out
from under Weasel’s arm and approached Zach with a confident smile.

“Zachariah, you
hot piece of shit.”

To Violet’s
shock, she reached forward, grabbed Zach’s crotch with one hand, the back of
his neck with the other, and pressed her lips against his.

Zach dropped
Violet’s hand and pushed hard on the woman’s upper arms, making her stumble
back a step. “Jesus, Flick, I’m with someone.”

Flick turned her
glance to Violet, scoffed in derision, then trained her eyes back on Zach. She
hooked a thumb at Violet. “Who? Your mother?”

“Don’t be a
bitch.”

Flick turned to
Violet, a mocking smile hanging on the edges of her black lips. “Mind if I
borrow Z for a quick fuck, Mom? I miss him.”

Violet’s eyes
opened so wide, they burned, and she could hear her heartbeat in her ears. She
had an overwhelming urge to step forward, haul back her fist, and slam it into
Flick’s face. But she didn’t. She took a ragged breath, staring at the woman in
front of her with confusion and anger.

“You’re out of
line,” snarled Zach at Flick, reaching out for Violet’s hand.

But suddenly it
was all too much. The awful concert, her bruised ribs and toes, and now this
dreadful woman who’d obviously slept with Zach. Probably more than once.

Before he could
lace his fingers through hers, Violet wrenched her hand away and turned
swiftly, the heels of her boots click-clacking angrily across the parking lot.

***

Two and a half
hours is a long time to drive in stony silence.

But after trying
to get Violet to talk to him several times on the way out of Portland, Zach
gave up. For two hours she hadn’t even shifted her body from its position
facing the window with her arms tightly crossed over her chest. She was
stubborn like that, and he knew it. She’d not broken down once at Yale and come
to find him after he’d left her. He knew how strong she was, and if she wanted
to be furious and hurt, nothing he said was going to coax her out of it until
she was ready.

And fuck it,
because frankly, he didn’t have the energy.
He
hadn’t exactly had the greatest night either. First that pretentious fucking
restaurant: rabbit salad? grilled
tamago
? Local
pheasant with a turnip polenta? Good food was one thing, but between that
showy, self-important display and a burger?
Give
me a burger any day.
And fine, she hadn’t liked the show, but could she
have possibly been stiffer and less fun? And how about that cute little number
when she told Gabe they were just old friends? Fuck “old friends”—they were a
lot more than
that
. And damn it, he hadn’t come on to Flick. She had come on to
him. She ’d always been fast and forward. Anyway, why was he even feeling
guilty about her? He’d only slept with her a handful of times—it’s not like
they’d ever been involved. Violet was going to get in a snit about Flick? Mad
about him having casual, occasional sex with a groupie? For
chrissake
,
she’d fucked
Shep
Smalley for a decade and Zach had
barely said a word about it, even though it burned his insides like acid
whenever he thought about it.

Not to mention,
aside from the shit with Violet, Weasel had exchanged his bridge for a
shitty-sounding riff that didn’t mesh well with the rest of the song and made
Zach embarrassed to have his name on it. Nothing made Zach angrier than subpar
musicians who fucked up his music.

He watched the
windshield wipers whip back and forth through the increasingly heavy rain,
wishing they’d never gone out tonight.

When he turned
onto Route 1 at Ellsworth, heading south toward Winter Harbor, Violet finally
said, “I don’t get it,” in that taupe Mid-Atlantic accent she’d used that first
night they ran into each other at Deep Haven.

“What don’t you
get?” he asked in an equally clipped tone.

“It’s like
you’re two separate people.”

“What does that
mean?”

“I don’t even
know where to begin. You’re totally different now from who you were at Yale.
And the person you are at Deep Haven is totally different from the person you
were tonight.”

“Well, fuck,
Violet,” he started with a sarcastic bite in his voice. “You’re just exactly
the same as you were at Yale. You
always
spoke in a pretentious French accent and loved eating grilled squid with
roasted kale in your dorm room every night.” He glanced over at her before
turning back to the road. “Do you know what I remember about you? You weren’t
judgmental. You were wide-open. You liked everyone. You had room in your life
for everyone.”

“Well.
You
certainly have room in
your
life for everyone, Zach, including
that . . . that—”

“Who, Flick? I
banged her twice. It wasn’t even that good.”

“Oh, that makes
it all better.”

“Says the one
who banged
Shep
Smalley for a decade.”

“Eight years. I
banged
him for eight years, and it
wasn’t even that—”

She stopped
abruptly, and he glanced at her in the dim light of the car. She looked down at
her lap with her lips tightly pursed. Zach had assumed her sex life with
Shep
was conservative, but after this morning he wondered
if it was downright measly, with
Shep
selfishly
getting off and Violet merely a vessel for his pleasure. Her almost admission
still surprised him, though, since she seemed to hold on to some residual
loyalty to her old boyfriend. Surprised him, but made him feel a little bit
awesome, too, since it made sex with him the best of her life.

“I don’t want to
fight with you,” he said softly.

“How can you like
that music? How can you even call it music? It’s vitriol and anger and
hatefulness! It’s just noise and fury! There’s nothing beautiful about it.”

“Except amazing
beats and intricate chording and awesome, gut-wrenching sound.”

“You’re better
than that.”

“Which is why
I’m not writing for Cornerstone anymore—a decision I only reversed out of
consideration for you!”

She huffed.
“Don’t do me any favors.”

His face
contorted like she’d smacked him. “You were pretty happy to accept my favors
yesterday. But then, you stand to make a lot of money out of our arrangement.
Twenty grand pays for a lot of tony dinners and ski vacations.”

“Fuck you,
Zach,” she snarled. “That’s not what I’m about, and you know it.”