Rock Angel (Rock Angel Series Book 1) (21 page)

“I suppose you think you could do better?”

“Well, the main road is really cool. Wait a minute.” She got up and went into her own room. When she came back, she had the Angel. “How about adding a scenic overlook?”

Shan sat down on the bed beside him and concentrated on the music. She strummed along for a few minutes to capture the chord progression, then said, “Scenic overlook coming up.”

She sprang off into a choppy, reggaesque beat for a few bars, then smoothly transitioned back to the original rhythm. She beamed. “There! What do you think about
that
?”

“That’s not a scenic overlook,” he growled. “It’s a ten-car pileup.”

But she’d been watching his forearms and, when the goose bumps rose, she’d seen them.

Hours later, Shan put down her guitar. “I think I have to stop,” she groaned, stretching.

Quinn glanced at the clock on his bedside table. “Holy shit, it’s two-thirty,” he said, setting aside his small Yamaha keyboard. “You must be exhausted after all the driving today.”

“I am. I didn’t expect we’d start in working so soon.”

“Sorry, I didn’t think about that. I was just so excited to have you here, finally.”

She nodded. “Me, too. I love what we did with it. It’s got some soul now.”

“Yes, it’s good. I’m glad we still have our connection. Sometimes when you’re out of touch, things can change.”

“We haven’t been out of touch,” she said. “We’ve talked two, three times a week.”

“I know, but I mean the music connection. You’re always evolving, you know. I am, too. Anybody who plays as much as we do is, or ought to be, and musicians can grow apart. I’ve seen it happen. I’m just glad it didn’t happen to us.”

“Me, too,” she agreed, stifling a yawn. He tousled her hair as he climbed off the bed.

“Be right back,” he said, heading for the bathroom.

She laid back on Quinn’s bed. Maybe hers, too, soon? She could hope. She closed her eyes and snuggled her face against the pillow, smelling his lime aftershave as she drifted into sleep.

The next morning Shan woke in Quinn’s bed, covered with a blanket, fully clothed, and alone. Apparently he’d behaved like a perfect gentleman. She sighed.

She rolled out of bed, used the bathroom, and then went to the kitchen for her methadone. Afterward she hunted up Quinn, finding him in one of the Adirondack chairs on the front porch, drinking coffee with Ty. He was barefoot in jeans, a black T-shirt, and sunglasses, blond hair loose around his shoulders. He looked like a rock star. “Morning,” he greeted her. “I’m assuming you slept well, since you hogged my bed all night?”

“You could have waked me,” she said pointedly, but he shook his head.

“Then I would have had to help you set up your futon. Easier just to let you sleep.”

“Is there a plan for today?” she asked, boosting herself up to sit on the porch railing.

“I told Dan I’d go to Encino with him to pick up the furniture from his folks. Then I want to hit the Guitar Center on the way back.”

“Me too,” Ty said. “I need strings.” The sun was hot already and droplets of perspiration were beaded up on his nut-brown skin. “Wait’ll you see it,” he said to Shan. “It’s the ultimate shopping mall for guitar players.”

“Cool! I want to go, too,” Shan said, “and I’ll have to bring my guitar. The Angel’s case got broken on the trip,” she added. “I’m using the soft one for now, but—”

“That won’t work once we start gigging,” Quinn agreed. “You need a new one.”

“You can ride with me,” Ty said. “We’ll meet you there, Q. What time?”

Shan went inside for some coffee, leaving her bandmates to work out the logistics. As she poured, Quinn came into the kitchen. “Don’t worry, I haven’t forgotten that I said I’d help you find a clinic,” he said, dropping his voice. “Did you get a referral?”

“Yes. There’s one in Van Nuys. Is that close?”

“Pretty close. About half an hour.” He was practically whispering and she smiled.

“You can talk about it out loud, Q. It isn’t a secret, not with the phyamps in the fridge.”

“But it’s nobody else’s business,” he said. “I don’t want you feeling weird about it.”

“It’s just as well everyone knows because I don’t want to have to hide it. It’s exhausting,” she said and he nodded, squeezed her shoulder, then went upstairs in search of Dan.

Shan took her coffee out to the front porch. Ty had gone upstairs, too, so she was alone. She blinked in the bright sunshine, then leaned on the railing to survey the valley around her.

It was beautiful, in a rugged, desolate sort of way. Their house was tucked into a deep cleft in the mountain—Echo Flats, it was called, or so Quinn had told them the night before. The mountain was impossibly steep but, somehow, thick and twisted with trees and bushes that grew green and thrived in the rocky soil. The brush had a prickly, alien look unlike anything she’d seen before, even in the Rockies, which they’d crossed on their drive west. The mountains in the Berkshires where she’d grown up were mere hillocks compared with these.

The screen door slammed as Quinn emerged. “It’s beautiful here,” she said to him, “but it seems so remote.”

“It is. The nearest neighbor is about three miles that way.” He pointed back up the road they had traversed the night before. “I like that about it. There’s no one to complain about the noise when we practice. Ready?” he asked as their roommates emerged from the house en masse. Dan and Ty were just finishing a joint.

Denise nodded. “Do I look all right?” she asked Shan. She was pretty in yellow and had toned down her usual punky makeup, wearing only light mascara and a sheer lip gloss.

“You look beautiful,” Shan told her. “Very ladylike.”

“I keep telling her not to worry about it,” Dan said. He knocked the head off the roach, examined it to make sure it was out, then frugally preserved it in the small silver stash box he always kept in his pocket. “My folks are going to love her.”

“They’re pretty laid back,” Quinn said, “just like Dan. They’ll go easy on you.”

“But they’re my future in-laws,” Denise fretted, smoothing down her dress. Her diamond sparkled in the sun. “I want to make a good impression.”

“Of course you do,” Shan said. “I’d feel the same way if I was meeting Q’s parents.”

Quinn looked uncomfortable. “They’re the opposite of laid back, but don’t worry. I’ll never subject you to them.”

Suddenly the sun didn’t seem quite so bright to Shan. Quinn appeared not to notice. “Get there early,” he said to Ty. “It will blow her mind, so make sure she has enough time to look around.”

“I’d like to see Hollywood, too,” Shan said, burying her deflation. “Will there be time?”

“Sure,” Quinn said. “That’s where the store is. But don’t get your hopes up about Hollyweird,” he added, boarding the van behind Denise. “It’s not what you expect.”

Shan found out what Quinn meant later that day, when she saw Hollywood Boulevard for the first time. She chattered excitedly, poking Ty and pointing as the HOLLYWOOD sign appeared on a distant hillside. She gasped when she spotted Michael Jackson outside of Grauman’s Chinese Theatre, but a moment later realized it was just an impersonator. Hannibal Lecter, Edward Scissorhands, and a drag-queen Madonna all occupied the same block. Ty pulled over, anyway, so she could get out and look at the famous footprints in front of the theater.

It was a hot, sticky day and the boulevard was crowded with tourists. She saw they were milling on the Walk of Fame, but beyond the pretty pink terrazzo stars were tattoo parlors, shabby bars, and a couple of establishments advertising nude dancers. There were tour buses everywhere and each block seemed to house a different version of the same dingy souvenir shop. As they got back in the car, Shan wondered how this place had earned its reputation for glamour.

After a short distance, Ty pulled over again. “Here we are,” he announced.

Shan got out of the car, shouldered the Angel, and looked up at an enormous building with a huge red guitar over its awning. She’d heard of the Guitar Center. Every musician had.

Ty had crossed the street and was standing under the awning, motioning her to follow. She did, and when she joined him he pointed down. “This is the RockWalk,” he said.

She looked down and saw that the sidewalk beneath her feet was just like the one in front of Grauman’s Chinese Theatre, except it was covered with handprints instead of footprints. She moved from square to square, looking at the names. “John Lee Hooker,” she read. “Les Paul. Oh, look, Ty,” she gasped. “
Eddie Van Halen!
” Ty chuckled as she dropped to her knees.

She was still there when Dan dropped Quinn off nearly half an hour later. He spotted her as soon as he got out of the van. She was down on her hands and knees in front of the shop, her guitar still strapped to her back. “Having fun?” he inquired.

Shan looked up at him. “B.B. King,” she intoned with reverence. “But you know, Q, there are hardly any women.”

“There are a few,” Quinn said. “The Wilson sisters. Carole King…”

“But where are Joni Mitchell and Joan Baez?” she said. “Or Sarah McLachlan?”

“All good guitar players,” Quinn agreed, “but they don’t particularly rock.”

“Bonnie Raitt, then. And how about Joan fucking Jett?” She looked affronted.

“There just aren’t that many awesome girl rock guitarists out there, which is what makes
you
so special. Once your handprints are here, you’ll lead the way for the rest of them. Couldn’t you find a case?” he asked, switching gears as she rolled her eyes.

“What? Oh,” she said, remembering her reason for visiting the store. “I didn’t look yet.”

“Have you even been inside?” She shook her head. “Christ,” he said, taking her arm and leading her into the store. “We’re going to be here all day.”

She followed Quinn, but stopped dead just inside the door.

There were guitars, hundreds and hundreds of electric guitars festooning every inch of floor and wall space. Guitars of every conceivable brand and model and color and size. Gibsons and Fenders and Kramers. Telecasters and Flying Vs and Explorers. The Gretsch Black Phoenix like Brian Setzer. The ’63 Strat hybrid like Stevie Ray Vaughn. And—

“The Gibson Lucille!” It was set up and plugged in, just waiting to be played, and Quinn laughed as Shan sprinted to it.

“Just like B.B. King,” he said as she lovingly took the guitar into her hands.

“This is
not
a music mall,” she called to Ty, who was himself playing a Gibson Thunderbird over in the next row. “It’s guitar nirvana.”

Some time later, Quinn found Shan in the vintage section. “Have you found a case?”

“Nope.” She didn’t look up, as she was concentrating on the solo from “Stairway to Heaven,
”
which she was playing on a late-fifties Sunburst like Jimmy Page.

“You’re beginning to annoy me,” he told her. “This place isn’t going anywhere, you know. You don’t have to play every fucking guitar in the store today.”

She let him take the guitar out of her arms. “I want them all.”

“For now, you should take care of the guitar you’ve already got.” He carefully set the ’Burst back into its metal display stand. “The cases are up there,” he said, pushing her through a door and pointing up a flight of stairs, “along with the rest of the guitar trimmings. Do I have to go with you, or can you manage to take care of this on your own?”

She pointed her nose in the air and marched up the stairs. Quinn waited to make sure she didn’t get sidetracked again, then headed back to the keyboard zone, shaking his head.

At the top of the stairs, Shan discovered a loftlike space as jam-packed with equipment as the rest of the store. Instead of instruments, the walls and display racks were covered with picks, straps, capos, and a plethora of other guitar accoutrements. Before her, in front of a wall bedecked with packets of strings, was the sales counter. The clerk was deep in discussion with a tall, red-haired man, so she looked around as she waited. Almost immediately she spotted an array of guitar cases toward the back of the room. She headed that way.

She tested one hardshell case after another and finally narrowed it down to two. Neither looked particularly sturdy, but they were the only ones in her price range.

“They probably have the proper case for that out in back,” someone said behind her.

She turned and discovered the customer who’d been at the counter, a giant of a man, easily six four, wide shouldered and buff in a skin-tight purple T-shirt. His eyes were a striking deep blue and his coppery hair tumbled halfway down his back. A gold hoop glittered in one ear and spidery tattoos snaked up both arms. Pretty hot in a California rocker way, she noted.

She realized he was examining her as well. In fact, he was giving her a very definite once-over. “Are you a guitar player?” she asked.

He pulled his gaze from her breasts up to her face. “Yes. Why, do I look like one?”

“Well, you seem to have opinions.” He nodded, grinning.

“I wouldn’t use one of these cheap shit cases, especially not with a guitar like that,” he said. “Nice axe. A Martin, right?”

“Right, and thanks. What’s yours?”

“My main one’s a Gibson. A Les Paul.”

“Also nice,” she acknowledged. “I was just playing one downstairs.”

“Are you in a band?” he asked, just as Quinn materialized with a bagful of audio cables under his arm.

“There you are,” he said to Shan. “Have you found…hey!” he exclaimed, catching sight of the red-haired man. “Where’d you come from?”

“Well, hey there, Q,” the man said, his face lighting up in a big grin. “Why am I not surprised to run into you here?”

“So you met?” Quinn asked, gesturing at Shan.

The red-haired giant looked puzzled for a moment, then comprehension dawned on his face. “You mean
this
,” he looked down at Shan, “is the angel?”

“Well,
this
is the Angel,” she corrected him, tapping her guitar. “
I’m
Shan O’Hara.”

“And this is Dave Ross,” Quinn said, clapping a hand on his shoulder. “Also known as Dazzle.”

Dave was regarding Shan with a new respect. “I’ve been listening to your chops,” he said, “working up some rhythm parts to go with them. You’re one hell of a guitar player, Shan.”