In Harmony (Fenbrook Academy #2)(50)
Author: Helena Newbury

In the week after the recital, when I’d had a long, serious talk with my father and he’d agreed that it was time for him to back off, I’d spent a lot of sleepless nights worrying about operating without a safety net. Then I’d convinced myself that Nat, Clarissa and Jasmine had all managed jobs, bills and rent just fine their entire time at Fenbrook. Well, maybe not Jasmine. I’d leapfrogged them, going from having my life run for me straight to being out there on my own in the workplace, but it helped that it was the tight-knit and reassuringly kooky workplace of an orchestra. Musicians, it turned out, were musicians wherever you found them, and I was settling in with the rest of the dwarves already. And I realized that I did have a safety net; I’d always had one—I’d just never relied on it until these last few months. People don’t have to be related to you to be family.

As we stood there waiting for Clarissa and Neil to arrive, I pulled Natasha close. “Thanks,” I told her.

“I should be thanking you. You and Connor. Darrell’s like a different person—the happiest I’ve ever seen him. He’s had maybe one nightmare in a month and when he works it’s like…regular work, you know? I mean, I still have to drag him out of the workshop at 3am sometimes, but he’s doing it because he loves it, not because he feels he has to.”

“How do you drag him away from it?” I asked, puzzled.

She gave me a wicked smile.

Oh. “And you? How are you doing?” I asked.

Natasha gave me a slow, solemn nod. “Okay. I think. Better, at least. The pen helps, when I feel like I have to cut.”

A few days after the recital, confident in my ability to help my friends—or, at least, not screw up any more than anyone else—I’d gone online and spent a full day reading everything I could about self-harming and coping strategies. I’d eventually presented Nat with a gift-wrapped box containing a non-toxic red marker pen, and told her to use it instead of the razor blades, if she felt like she was going to cut. She’d looked at me as if I was crazy at first, but a week later had reported that it worked. She’d only needed it twice that I knew of and the slips seemed to be getting farther apart.

Jasmine opened the front door and Clarissa walked in, her arms full of grocery bags. Neil was right behind her, with two cases of beer. They walked straight through to the kitchen to unload and, even though I knew it was wrong, I couldn’t help but follow after them, staying in the hallway but pressing up against the doorway so that I could hear what they were saying. Things seemed to be better since my rant at Neil, but I wanted to check.

“—could at least help me, now you’ve put the beers down, instead of just standing there,” Clarissa was saying. “Why do you need that many beers, anyway? You and Darrell and Connor are going to get steaming drunk again, aren’t you? And then you’re going to start pawing me in front of them—”

Neil’s low rumble: “You like it when I paw you.”

“I—No! I mean, not in front of—”

“Like this….”

“Ah! That’s not fair! I’ve got my hands full!”

I could hear the smirk in Neil’s voice. “So have I.”

“Bastard! Ah! God, don’t,”—her voice went high, and I imagined his hand sliding up her thigh. “Ah! Neil, you can’t just—”

The sound of lips meeting, hungry and urgent. Yep. They were back to normal.

Just as I was about to draw back and stop eavesdropping, I heard Clarissa say, “God, what if Karen walks in?”

“She’s already seen us f**king, and from what you said she liked it enough to keep watching,” said Neil.

I flushed. She’d told him!

“Think she’d be up for watching the real thing?” Neil asked, and his dark, smoky voice sent the words straight down my spine to throb in my groin. “Or maybe joining in? Would you like that?”

I never heard Clarissa’s answer, because I was running to my bedroom to get out of earshot. Oh, great—how was I ever going to be able to look Neil in the eye now?!

I ran straight into Jasmine, who was stringing fairy lights around the lounge. And the hallway. And the bathroom. “It’s going to be like a fairy grotto,” she told me. “Only sexier. A fairy boudoir.”

I wasn’t sure what Dan—whose cast was finally off—or the rest of the quartet would make of that. Not to mention the friends I’d made in the orchestra, or the few biker friends that Clarissa had allowed Neil to bring. It was going to be an interesting party.

“All I need now is a date,” said Jasmine, without turning round from trying to string fairy lights around the shower—an electrocution waiting to happen. “It’s no fun being the sole singleton.”

That, I decided, was a challenge for another day.

Strong arms suddenly encircled me from behind and I was lifted off my feet. I knew who it was, but I gave a little scream anyway, just because.

Connor kissed my neck and I squirmed in delight, electricity arcing straight down my body to the tips of my toes and bouncing back to turn to heat in my groin. Jasmine watched patiently as I was turned around to face him and then slowly lowered to the ground. He gave just a trace of a wince as his jacket rubbed against the sore patch where the tattoo used to be.

“Hi, beautiful,” he told me. That accent still did it to me, the words caressing my brain like silver wrapped in silk.

“Hi yourself.” I tilted my face up as he kissed me. First quickly and then slow and deep, his fingers entwining with mine as his tongue explored my mouth and all sense of time slipped away, a deep warmth blossoming in my heart and radiating to every corner of me. I noticed that Jasmine had made herself scarce, leaving us alone for a moment.

“Don’t drink too much tonight,” I told him. “We have to rehearse tomorrow. It’s our last chance before the studio.”

Rachel, the record label rep, had turned out to be serious about us recording a track and we’d put something together based on our recital and the improvised piece. Cleaned up and smoothed out, it was sounding good—but there was always room for improvement.

Connor kissed me again. “That’s not very rock n’ roll.”

“You could use a little taming, Connor Locke.”

“Oh.” He leaned even closer. “You going to be the one to tame me?”

I could whisper, he was so close. “I was under the impression I already had.” And then I kissed him.