**Van**
"Drink this you tosser, it'll make you feel better."
I accepted the luridly blue bottle of liquid skeptically and took a sip. After a couple of minutes I realised that Josh was right, on both counts. I was a tosser and the vaguely radioactive looking drink did make me feel better. Of course the added hydration improved my ability to think, something that had been sorely lacking when I'd awoken earlier and rolled straight off the edge of Josh's bed. He hadn't needed to laugh quite so heartily in my opinion. And my chances of puking my guts up on our flight to Los Angeles had diminished significantly. I'm sure I wasn't the only one thankful for that improvement.
There I was sitting in the departure lounge at JFK Airport using my newly rediscovered ability to think to ponder the utter immensity of my previous evening's fuck up. I'll admit that my behaviour was nowhere near the car crash levels of my brother's usual antics and in a sliding scale of bad behaviour based on Vienna Boys Choir to Mötley Crüe I was probably hovering somewhere near Ed Sheeran but still even my mildly outrageous antics were something I'd thought I'd well and truly grown out of. Beside me Josh was scrolling away on his phone and in the row of seats opposite me Ace and Gray were chatting in low voices with only the occasional disgruntled glare being thrown my way by Gray. Josh and Ace were clearly taking their instructions to keep Gray and me separate seriously. As if I'd take a swing at Gray sober.
Well I was pretty sure I wouldn't anyway. Just so long as he didn't look at Kim.
And if it had been one of the other three guys thinking along the same destructive lines as I was I'd have his shirt clenched in my fist as I told him that he'd need to get his shit together because the band was more important than anything else. Could I give myself a slap? I really fucking needed it.
As for Kim she was pacing at the end of the row of seats talking, or pretending at least, to talk intently on her phone. I didn't doubt for a second that she was avoiding me. I'd tried to talk to her as we waited in the hotel lobby for the van to take us to the airport but she'd proven particularly adept at avoiding me. I couldn't blame her. She'd actually apologised again at the reception desk when we were checking out for the disturbance we'd created. The apology I'd offered up at the reception desk when Kim had scurried outside to watch for our van hadn't made me feel like any less of an asshole.
I was going to have to man up and apologise to Gray but at the hangover level I was functioning at speech was still a difficult proposition and didn't really want to waste it on anyone who wasn't Kim. Plus Gray had taken Kim back to his room. Innocent or not, he wanted her and I couldn't stand the thought that she'd turned to him when she was upset about something to do with me.
I'd sat in silence pondering my own stupidity for a while when Josh looked up from his phone and gave me an assessing glance. "That's better," he said approvingly, "You don't look like you're about to puke anymore. They might even let you on this flight."
I gave him a slow nod, not yet game to make any sudden movements. "Yeah, thanks for that."
He grinned at me. "All good, mate. You've helped me through a hangover or three. Rough night last night, huh?" He glanced back at his phone.
"Sorry you had to deal with my drunk ass." I ran a hand through my hair. I didn't need to look in the mirror to know that it was sticking up in random tufts. The best I could hope for was that it looked intentional.
Josh shrugged. "Not the first time one of us resorted to punches."
It was true, Josh and Ace had thrown down with each other more than once, although as quick as they were to anger they were quick to forgive and forget. Even Gray had been lured into the occasional half-hearted shoving match with one or the other of them. None of that consoled me. "Yeah but it was the first time I have." In fact the only person I'd ever seriously come to blows with in the past was my brother and not one of those fights had been half-hearted. Truth be told Gray may have flipped my rage trigger the night before but it was Rich I'd really wanted to take a swing at.
Josh looked at his phone again and swallowed hard. "I guess you may have had more than a few things winding you up."
"What the hell's so interesting?" I gave his phone a hard look. His eyes darted from his phone to me, to Gray and Ace and then back again. Gray and Ace were still deep in conversation, focused intently on the phone in Ace's hand.
"Errrrr..."
"Just fucking tell me already." The way I clenched my teeth did nothing to ease the pounding of my head.
"Just a couple of online articles about our show last night."
"Were the reviews bad? Did they hate us?" Like I needed one more thing to pile on to the shit show of the night before. I took a shaky sip from the bottle in my hand.
"No! They thought we were great." The fact he left the but unsaid, didn't mean I couldn't hear it. I heard it all right and without conscious thought I reached for his phone.
I don't know what I expected to see, probably some hideous disastrous news of some kind, my lingering hangover was feeding my sense of doom. What I actually saw in front of me was surprisingly tame for online gossip. Someone had managed to snap a picture of me, Kim, Rich and Minty. My expression was one I'd never really seen in the mirror before – utterly blank with nothing but a faintly superior curl of my lip to stop me from looking like a wax work. Kim's smile was more of a grimace, Rich was smirking smugly, the camera had managed to pick up the evil glint in his eyes and of the four of us it was only Minty who showed any genuine happiness in her expression. Of course whoever had written the grubby little tidbit of gossip hadn't been much interested in that aspect. Oh no, they were far more concerned about sharing with the interested public that Rich and I both happened to be dating sisters and not just any sisters but the ridiculously wealthy Beaumaris sisters – heiresses to an airline fortune.
It could have been so much worse. So, so much worse than what was essentially a stupid little piece of fluff but everything about it infuriated me. There was no mention of my band's actual performance. No mention of the very real job Kim did as one of our managers just an overly gushing reference to the wealthy background that she did her best to downplay. And how could I forget the images of Rich showboating like a mofo, using every opportunity, no matter how random, to push his social media career and notoriety in the press now that his actual music career was gurgling toward the drain of oblivion?
"Woah. Take it easy mate!" Josh plucked the phone from between my clenching fingers and gave it a once over as if he was afraid I'd crushed it. I would have snorted if I'd had the energy. I might have been pissed but there was no way I was capable of hulking out and crushing a cell phone with my bare hands. It would have been a nice party trick to have but no, I was not Bruce Banner.
Josh edged away from me slightly and gave me a sidelong glance before he said, "So I guess we know how Kim scored us those upgrades on our flights and got us lounge access in London, huh?"
"It looks that way." I stretched my legs out and contemplated my boots. Eye contact was completely overrated.
"You didn't know?" Josh spun his phone between his fingers like some kind of oversized fidget spinner.
"No, I didn't know." And that's what stung. Not the slightly sleazy implication in the article that Kim and Minty were slumming it with the trashy musician Williams brothers or even the disgusting way Rich had assumed I'd latched on to Kim for her money like he had with Minty. Hell, I knew those things weren't true, at least where they concerned Kim and me – I couldn't speak for Minty and what her reason for hooking up with Rich was. No, what had stung like a bitch and had sent me stumbling out into the night in search of tequila wasn't that Kim's family was far wealthier than I could have ever imagined, it was that her family, their wealth and their status was something that had affected her deeply and she hadn't trusted me enough to share that with me.
Josh gave me a considering look and then, while not avoiding the topic completely, changed direction. "How about that? And you and Tricky dating sisters? Now that's a trip man."
It was impossible to hold back my grunt of disapproval. "Don't get too excited, it's not likely to last long."
"Why? You planning on dumping Kim?" he gave his chin a thoughtful stroke.
I looked up from my contemplation of my boots - they had lasted extraordinarily well, but were probably due for replacing – to the sight of his grinning face.
"Ha fucking ha. Remind me to get you a spot on SNL when we're back here in New York." I jabbed him with my elbow. "Based on my fuck up last night she's more likely to dump me than the other way round." Kim was still pacing the concourse just beyond the seats, focused on her phone and studiously avoiding looking at any of us. It was hard to know if my sense of impending doom was because of how much I'd fucked up or if it was thanks to my lingering hangover. Either way I only had myself to blame. I dropped my eyes back to my boots – they really had had a good run.
Josh leaned back in his seat and clasped his hands behind his head. "Don't you fret, just leave things to the real driving force of this band. The rhythm section. Uncle Josh and Uncle Ace will see you right!"
The twinkle in his eye and the glint of his teeth did not reassure me.
****
An awkwardly cleared throat had me looking up from my phone. "Hey, looks like I'm next to you," Kim said. That was a surprise, I'd expected to be seated with Gray and Josh. Window seat for me, middle seat for Josh and aisle seat for Gray. Ace and Kim were to be seated in the row in front of us in the middle and aisle seats.
Standing behind Kim in the aisle was Josh who flashed me a discreet thumbs up but then dropped his hands as he said, "Sorry to disrupt the seat allocation but Ace and I had burritos last night after the show. Let me tell you they're not wrong when they say you're best off avoiding Mexican food in New York." He pressed a hand to his stomach with a wince that was as natural as the blue in Ace's hair. "We need to be able to make a quick exit from our seats." Ace waved a hand over the top of the aisle seat in front – Kim's rightful seat.
Suuure they did.
Kim gave him an uneasy look. "You're not about to spend the next six or so hours vomiting are you?"
Josh pursed his lips in a way that suggested he was trying to hold back the contents of his stomach. The idiot, I could tell he was trying to hold back a laugh. "No, I'm pretty sure I won't. I just don't know right now which end the burrito is planning to explosively evacuate my body from." In front of us Ace made a strangled sound that could have been a gag or, to the better informed, his choked back mirth. Gray's suspicious eye was suddenly framed in the sliver of space between the two seats in front.
Kim was looking at our row in trepidation, the idea of being trapped between Josh and his uncontrolled bodily functions and me not exactly her idea of a good time. I blew out a breath and shoved my phone back in my pocket. Unfastening my seatbelt I proceeded to shuffle down the row toward the aisle. I was not that guy. The one who forced an unwilling woman to sit trapped between him and the threat of puke as we flew across the country.
"You can have my seat. Gray can sit between you and Josh and I'll take Gray's seat." Kim's eyes flew to my face.
"You will?" It killed me to hear her so surprised by that. "Why?"
I glanced down at the two guys already seated in front of us. Ace was scowling, clearly pissed that I'd thrown over his and Josh's cunningly created plan, and Gray was expressionless aside from the ticking muscle in his jaw. He gave me a long, steady stare and the bruise darkening his cheek was a reproach for the way I'd lost my cool and taken a swing at him. He'd have been delighted to know that behind my sunglasses I was sporting a black eye. Turning my attention back to Kim I said softly, "Duchess, I never want to force you to do something you don't want to do."
"Oh." It was barely a word, more of a soft intake of breath. She glanced at Gray and then back at me and everything in me screamed 'pick me, pick me!' I didn't truly believe she had any interest in him other than friendship but it felt like her choice of seat would tell me if I had a chance at making things right with her.
She drew her shoulders back and straightened her spine. "No, it's fine. Ace and Gray are settled. I'll sit here with you guys."
If we weren't in the middle of a crowded aircraft in the middle of boarding I would have kissed her. Instead I gave an apologetic grimace to the people queuing behind Kim and Josh and said, "At least take the window. You'll be away from pukezilla and considering we fly over the Grand Canyon, you'll get a great view."
"Thanks." She gave me a smile that was about more than the seat swap and squeezed quickly past me into the window seat.
I settled down into my new spot and clicked my seat belt into place. My left elbow was unceremoniously shoved off the arm rest. Josh leaned in toward me with an evil grin. "Arm rest is mine. You frickin' owe me."
I sighed. Middle seat in economy. It was going to be long flight.