Rhythm, Chord & Malykhin (9 page)

I swear I couldn't help but snicker as I steeled my spine and prepared to go rip my ex a new asshole. "Yeah. I do." I rubbed my hands over my thighs and gave them a smile that was probably more vicious than it needed to be. “Thanks for telling me. Have a good show tonight, okay?”

I'd barely made it three steps out of the room when I felt a hand on my elbow. Without looking I knew it was Sacha who was tugging me back toward him. His eyes were wary. "Why do I feel like you're about to go do something bad?"

"Because I am," I chuckled, taking a step forward, a step closer to my mission. "I'm kidding. I swear I'm not going to do anything bad. I just need to go talk to him for a minute."

Those gray eyes swept across my face. "Are you friends?"

I cleared my throat and fought the urge to scratch my ear. "We used to date."

"That guy is your ex?" he asked after a brief pause.

He’d heard more than enough about my infamous ex from my family the night before. Especially from traitor Iza. Damn it.

I nodded completely unenthusiastically. "Yep."

He raised an eyebrow. "But you're not friends?"

I shook my head. I should have focused on the fact that he was so insistent on asking if my ex and I were friends or not, but I didn't. "No. I'd kick my own ass if we were friends."

Sacha smiled at me, this big, grand smile that could have lit up Main Street at Disneyland. "I'd help you if you want."

"You already have." I grinned at his flirty butt. “I promise I’m not going to do anything bad, you can go back and warm up.”

“And miss whatever you’re going to do? Nah.”

The security guard in the back winked at me as we made our way out of the back door toward the bus. Sacha grabbed my forearm that time, easily matching my quick stride with his natural, normal one.

"What exactly are you planning on doing?"

"Ask him what the hell he's doing here." I think.

His large, warm hand tightened its grip. "Were you together for a long time?"

"Around two years," I mumbled, reaching for the door handle to the bus before flinging it open. I don't think I had ever run up those two steps faster than I did right then. I heard the voices in the bus before my foot even landed on the first one.

"—get the fuck out.” I recognized Eli's voice immediately.

"It's not a big deal," the voice I hadn't heard in months greeted me in return when I made it to the top of the steps. The curtain was pulled closed so I couldn't see anyone at first.

"What in the fuck would make you think showing up here wouldn’t be a big deal, you dumbass? Gaby's here, pickle dick!" my twin bellowed.

I don't think I had ever loved Eli more than I did in that moment standing at the top of the stairs with Sacha's warm body directly behind me. He was talking so loudly it could have been considered yelling, but I knew that Eli only genuinely yelled when he was excited about something, and he was definitely not excited to see Brandon.

"I invited him out," the voice I recognized as Julian's deep one spoke up.

“This has nothing to do with you, man. This taint stain knows he had no business coming here but he did anyway,” Eli explained before pausing.

My ex let out a sigh that I’d heard one too many times over the years. “Look—”

"Shut the fuck up and get out. I don't want to see you, and Gaby doesn't want to see you either." I swear to God my brother growled. "Go hide or die, I don't give a shit what you choose. Otherwise I'm going to take a shit on your face right after I knock you out for breaking up with my fucking sister over the phone, mangina."

Sacha poked me in the back at that moment, snickering quietly, and I couldn't help but snort a little too. Leave it to Eli to come up with
mangina
.

"Gaby's a big girl, Eliza,” I thought I heard my ex say.

But he couldn’t be that stupid, could he?

“What the fuck did you just call me?” Eli snapped, and I had my answer.

This asshole just called my twin by the nickname only I could use. If I wasn't going to murder him for simply showing up to the concert, I was now going to do it because he messed with Eli. Nobody messed with my brother.

Pulling the curtain aside so roughly I might have torn it, I spotted my ex sitting on one of the long couches with his arm draped around a pretty brunette. What struck me first was the fact that the bastard had on a shirt I'd bought him for Valentine's Day a year ago. Seriously?

"Gaby," Brandon muttered with wide blue eyes.

I felt my ears start to heat up from how angry I was getting each second that passed by. "Brandon."

It was only when I felt Sacha's fingertips dip into the band of my jeans, brushing at the small of my back that I calmed down enough to think rationally.

In months past, I’d thought of a hundred messed-up things I would have loved to happen to Brandon. Everything from hooking up with a transvestite, to losing his dick from some kind of strange man-eating bacteria, had waged its war through my imagination. I didn't hate him, really, but he would always and forever have a spot on my Shit List. But when I felt my new friend tug on the back of my jeans, I realized that I wasn't the same person that I'd been a few months back. Even a month back.

Though the flesh and the flakes that comprised the shell of skin were the same, I felt stronger than before. I didn't need Brandon, and I really was better off without him. We'd had a good relationship but in hindsight, he wasn't the kind of man I wanted to be with forever. Our interests were too different and… I guess something had been missing. We didn’t have that easy camaraderie that came so naturally to my demons and I. Hell, even Sacha and I had instantly taken to each other’s humor. He'd loved me, I think, but it wasn't enough to erase the fact that I'd always been second—sometimes third or fourth—in his life after his shitty-ass band. It was just that our breakup had come out of the blue. I’d asked myself a thousand times if the signs had been there that things were falling apart, but no matter how much I over-analyzed it, there really hadn’t been a sign.

Really, it was okay. Whatever his reasons were, I didn’t care anymore. I cried, I grieved, and like every Barreto before me, I was going to move the hell on with my life. I was happy, regardless of whether I knew what I wanted to do with my life or not.

But more than ever, I wanted Brandon’s ass torn up by a dozen hung porn stars.

"Let's go outside," I told my ex in a voice so calm I didn't know I was capable of.

His eyebrows furrowed as his face went a little pink. "What?"

"Come outside with me, Bran," I said, indicating with my head toward the exit. "We should talk."

Those eyes that I'd once cared for narrowed in my direction. He knew me; he knew that even if I was calm, he'd crossed the fucking line calling Eli my nickname for him. Some things were unforgivable. His brunette girlfriend tugged at his hand as she shook her head.

I shot my brother a smirk; he was standing there with a flushed face and rigid jaw. All signs of the devil inside of him were visible, waiting to burst out and destroy. "Come on, Brandon. Let's go. I'll only take a minute."

"Baby," the girl whined softly.

I'd never been clingy with him and maybe that was my mistake, but I couldn't find it in me to bother wondering if that had been a factor in our split. If Brandon had wanted to talk to someone, talk to one of his fans, I'd never cared. I figured if he wanted to cheat on me he could do so any time he wanted and there was nothing I could do about it. But this bitch was going to learn that I definitely didn't want his pimple-butt ass. "I don't want his pickle dick." I glanced at Eli when I said it. "I just want to talk to him for a minute, and I don't want to embarrass him in front of everyone."

Sacha tugged at the back of my pants again, his fingers dipping deeper into the area between the denim and my panties. "Gaby," he warned.

"I didn't know you'd be here," Brandon cut off Sacha. "I figured I could avoid—"

I couldn't help but roll my eyes. He thought he could avoid Eli? Oh, please. "I don't care," I piped up in a sing-song voice. "Get off the bus and talk to me. You owe me." I wanted to add a “motherfucker” at the end but I kept it to myself.

He knew he owed me. I didn't bother waiting to see him get off the couch; I glanced over at Eli once more before I turned around. He was clenching his fists and staring at Brandon like he could kill him by looks alone. I passed Sacha on the way out, circling his wrist quickly with my thumb and index finger as best as I could. I didn't meet his eyes, but it wasn't because I was embarrassed that he'd learned that I'd been dumped, much less over the phone. It happens to every girl. I think. Maybe without the phone part. Touching Sacha was more to just tell him that I was fine. That I wasn’t going to do anything I’d end up regretting.

In no time, Brandon was tumbling out of the bus after me, closing the door behind him. Four months had passed since the last time I’d seen him and of course he looked exactly the same: his dark hair was perfectly styled, the facial hair that he kept just long enough to be called a beard the same as always, and his body was still just muscular enough to be considered fit. Was he good looking? Yeah, but who cared? I could go online and find thousands of guys that were just as equally, if not more, attractive as him.

I could look at the guys on tour with me.

Brandon stopped and crossed his arms over his chest, his eyes boring into mine. "Gaby, I'm—"

"Shut up."

Brandon’s eyes widened at my snappy tone, and I didn’t miss the way his shoulders reeled back in surprise. “Why are you being like this?”

Why was I being like this? Seriously? “Are you joking? Or are you really asking me why I’m pissed off that you’re here?”

“This isn’t a joke,” he replied.

“Of course it isn’t a fucking joke. You’re here, and you shouldn’t be. What’s difficult to understand about that?” I snapped.

“Baby, you’ve always been so sweet—”

My vision went red. He’d gone there with the b-word. Holy fuck.

“This isn’t how you usually act—” he kept going, oblivious to the fact he was
this close
to getting shanked.

Honestly, if there wasn’t steam coming out of my ears, I would have been surprised.

This isn’t how you usually act.

Baby, you’ve always been so sweet.

Gaby, what are you doing with your life?

I can’t do this anymore…

Everyone had his or her breaking point, and I’d reached mine.

“You broke up with me! On the phone! Out of the blue! All you said was that you didn’t want to do this anymore and some shit about me not knowing what I want to do with my life and how it affected your artistic vibe, you prick. I spent two years with you—two years! And in five minutes you kick me out of the place
you
had asked
me
to move into with you six months before. I’d told you I didn’t want to live with you and you told me how much fun it would be, how much you loved me, how it was inevitable. Six months, Bran! What the fuck?”

Under normal circumstances, I wasn’t one to go on a rant or a tirade of any sort. Well, unless it was around my family members or Laila. But the words had been bottled up deep in my chest for months now. All the questions and the frustration over what had happened to my doomed relationship just exploded out of me in this hateful, screaming demand.

To give him credit, Brandon put his hands on his forehead and sighed, his gaze going down to the ground. “I did love you. I’ll probably always love you, in a way. You’re great—”

I put my hand up to stop him from continuing on with a list of traits he admired because, frankly, I didn’t give a shit what he liked about me. “We hardly ever fought, and we’d talked on the phone the night before like everything was normal. You just cut me perfectly out of your life after so long, and I never heard from you again. Then a week or two later, I find out you have another girlfriend already? It just caught me out of the blue, do you understand why that pisses me off?”

“I’m sorry. I’m really sorry, babe.” He slid his hands down his face with a shaky exhale. “I didn’t mean for things to go the way they did. I swear I didn’t have sex with her while we were still—”

I had to rewind the words that came out of his mouth and go through them again.

When I did, my ears went hot and my brain just kind of short-circuited for a split second. Not once had I even thought that he’d cheated on me. I really hadn’t. Brandon thought he was a catch but not once had he ever been the type of guy that I imagined texting eight other girls while he had a girlfriend. That wasn’t like him. We’d gone on a date the day after we’d met. I guess I had just thought he’d done the same thing again.

But this…

“You didn’t have sex with her while we were still together…? But you started talking to her while we were…?”

Anxiety crossed his features so quick it was amazing. He might have even stopped breathing before he began stuttering. “Well…”

I wasn’t even mad, per se. I wasn’t. What was done was done and whatever. I cleared my throat and got the knot out of it. “It doesn’t matter.” The words came out of my mouth a little rough, a little weird.
He’d started talking to other people before we’d even split up.

But my pride, my pride couldn’t handle it.

I picked up the imaginary pieces and balled them up.

"It really doesn’t matter anymore, but I will cut your balls off with my eyebrow trimmers if you ever talk to Eli like that again. You walked out of my life, and I don't care if I ever see you again. My brother doesn't want you around, and you better believe that the only reason your face is still intact is because you came out here with me."

"I'm sorry, baby," he said quietly, using that same damn nickname that was stabbing a spike into the back of my neck. "I didn't mean to hurt you like that."

I shrugged because how else could I respond that didn’t include me punching him right in the eye for being a piece of shit? "I don't care anymore, Brandon. But I want you and your girlfriend to get off the fucking bus. Go watch the show from wherever you want but stay away from me."