Ch.28: Uninvited Guest

I still hadn't met Meagan Morgan, but there was no shortage of other people that Elle wanted to introduce me to, and I let her pull me around, pausing every now and then to top up my champagne.

A short man with a beard that almost reached his navel offered me a joint, but I declined. The last thing I wanted tonight was to get too drunk or high and make a tit of myself.

Across the terrace, I spotted Jude laughing at something that China Rose was saying. My heart skipped a beat. He'd gone full rockstar tonight, in dark ripped jeans like the ones he'd worn for our interview, and a leather blazer that hung open around his bare chest. A fang-shaped pendant dangled from a chain around his neck, long enough that it reached his stomach. His curly hair was just the right mix of wild and styled, and his panty-dropping grin was in full effect.

He caught my eye and smiled, not that stage grin, but his quieter smile, the one for me.

My heart gave another flutter.

"Oh, yeah, you've got it bad," Elle said, and I blinked, realising she was watching me.

"What?" I said.

She clinked her champagne flute with mine. "I know Jude better than most people, and I've never seen him look at anyone the way he looks at you."

"Really?"

Elle nodded. "I'll be honest, I wasn't sure about this whole trial marriage thing when Jude first told me about it."

I leaned closer to her. "I'll be honest, neither was I."

Elle laughed and we clinked glasses again.

"Seriously, though, I did wonder if he was doing it for the novelty factor, but there really is something there. You guys might actually make this work," Elle said.

"Don't sound too surprised," I teased.

"I can't help it. I always hoped he'd settle down one day, but I never imagined it would be like this."

I took a long sip of champagne. "There's no guarantee that it will be like this. We haven't been married very long, and things are going great, but it could change. I'm not naïve enough to think that the honeymoon period doesn't exist."

"Well, I believe in you," Elle declared.

"Thanks."

A cheer rose up from one corner of the terrace where one of the women from Skyclad had stripped topless, climbed onto a chair, and started belly-dancing.

"Living up to their name," I said.

"She always gets naked once she's had a few drinks," Elle chuckled.

Squeals broke out in another corner as a guy I didn't recognise sprayed a shaken bottle of champagne over a girl-group. I couldn't remember their name, but I was pretty sure Elle had appeared in one of their music videos a couple of years ago. Rich Powell watched them, laughing.

To my left, a guy I'd been introduced to as one of Angels & Demons' sound engineers balanced a white pill on his tongue before sliding it into the mouth of a younger man.

Another member of Skyclad was dancing naked on a chair, managing to keep perfect rhythm with her bandmate, despite being high as a kite.

Somewhere in the crowd, I heard Tasha laugh, though I couldn't see her.

Cole Roth had apparently forgotten about Natalie – a lithe blond straddled his lap, her face buried in his neck. I couldn't see Natalie anywhere; hopefully she'd left.

The bikini-clad model was still lying across the table, but everyone had given up on shot-glasses and were licking booze off her bare skin.

I wondered if Jude would normally join in with this, or if he was holding back on my account.

Then I wondered if I'd mind if he did join in.

I'd definitely have a problem if he kissed another girl, but in the spirit of a party, would I mind that much if he licked champagne off her stomach? Possibly not.

I looked around for him. I hadn't seen him as much as I wanted tonight.

He must have gone back into the loft – he was just jogging up the steps as my eyes landed on him, his long necklace bouncing against his muscled stomach.

I imagined licking champagne off that stomach, and my blood heated.

I started towards him, but someone beat me to it.

A tall guy with long, shaggy hair and heavily tattooed arms strode past me, his shoulder clipping mine, and blocked Jude's path.

Wait, I knew those tattoos . . .

Jude stiffened. "What do you want, Darrell?"

I froze.

Darrell Deal was here? Once, meeting the band's original guitarist would have had me buzzing with excitement, but all I could think about was the note that I'd found in Jude's pocket, the one that Darrell had written, alongside all the threatening phone calls Darrell made. No way should he be here.

"You know what I want," Darrell said. His voice sounded harsher, drier, than I remembered from watching video clips of the band in their earlier days. He looked thinner too, like his bones were pushing against his skin.

"We're not having this discussion. Not here, not now," Jude said.

Darrell drank deeply from a beer bottle I hadn't realised he was carrying, and then deliberately dropped the bottle on the floor. It smashed, and a few people jumped. In my periphery, I saw Darius tense and half-rise from his seat, ready to back Jude if he needed it.

Jude didn't take his eyes off his former friend's face. I'd never seen him so tense.

"Darrell, you're drunk, you're high, and you weren't invited. Please leave," he said.

"It's a fucking party, ain't it? Everyone's getting high," Darrell said, his words slurring slightly.

"Not on heroin, they're not. That shit's banned here and you know it," Jude snapped.

Darrell lurched closer to Jude. "You can't avoid this forever." He glanced over his shoulder, and his eyes narrowed as he saw me standing there. "Does your wife know about it?"

He said the word 'wife' as if it left a bad taste in his mouth.

Jude's jaw was clenched, his eyes churning, and I wanted more than anything to reach out and take his hand, but I didn't dare move. I had no idea what Darrell would do.

"Maybe I need to have a little chat with Camden," Darrell said.

"Back the fuck off," Jude warned, his voice low and hard.

Darrell chuckled. He leaned in even further and whispered something to Jude that I couldn't hear. Jude's face was a storm of barely contained rage, but I thought I glimpsed fear too, flickering through the clouds in his eyes.

What was he afraid of?

Darrell patted Jude's cheek and Jude knocked his hand away. I half-expected him to follow that with a punch, but he didn't.

"We'll talk later, yeah?" Darrell said.

He turned to a nearby copper bucket and reached for a beer, but the second he opened it, Jude snatched it out of his hand. Beer foamed up the neck of the bottle and spilled across Jude's hand.

"Darrell, you weren't invited and you're not welcome. Get out of my house," he said.

Darrell smirked. "You going to make me?"

"Do you really want me to answer that?"

They stared at each other for a long moment, while I was still frozen behind Darrell, and people around us quietly murmured as they watched, but no one tried to intervene. Was that because they didn't consider it their business, or was it that they knew Jude could handle it?

Darrell plucked the champagne flute from a nearby woman's hand, and drained her drink while she sputtered indignantly.

"See you later, old friend," he said, his eyes locked on Jude, and there was so much anger and resentment in his voice.

Darrell strode towards the steps, deliberately clipping Jude with his shoulder as he passed, and disappeared into the loft.

Jude sucked in a shuddering breath and downed the beer he'd taken from Darrell.

I sidled closer. "What the hell was all that?"

"Doesn't matter," he said shortly.

"It obviously does."

Jude stared down at the empty bottle in his hand.

"Hey," I said, and touched his face the way Darrell had done, but where Darrell's touch had been mocking, mine was gentle. "Talk to me."

He looked at me, his façade cracking. There was something exhausted in his face, and I'd never seen it before. Sure, I'd seen him tired after a day in the studio, but this was a different kind of exhaustion. This ran deeper, rawer.

"Jude," I whispered.

A loud cheer went up from the other side of the terrace, and I had no idea why, but it broke the spell. Jude blinked, sucked in another breath, and looked away.

"Your glass is nearly empty," he said.

He grabbed a bottle of champagne from a bucket and topped up my drink before taking a long swig straight from the bottle.

"I thought you hated champagne," I said.

He wiped his mouth and grimaced. "I do. It tastes like shit."

"Are you going to tell me what's going on?" I asked.

"Nothing."

"Bullshit."

Jude's jaw tightened. "Can we just enjoy this night? Please?"

It was the 'please' that did it. There was a pleading note to that one word that I'd never heard in Jude's voice before.

"Okay," I said.

This wasn't the end of it. This marriage couldn't work if he was keeping secrets from me, and if Darrell was blackmailing him, then at some point he needed to come clean and tell me that Darrell had over him.

But it didn't have to be tonight.