Page 61 of Tangled Up In You

“So, take Shay along,” Gavin replied.

“Thing is,” he said and took another drink, “she’s interested in you in particular, so I thought?—”

“For fuck’s sake, Con, you’ve never needed me to get yourself laid. What are you going on about?”

“He’s trying to annoy me since my being here seems to annoy him,” Sophie said. The progress she thought she had made with getting on Conor’s good side back in Los Angeles had clearly dissipated with her surprise arrival. It was obvious he saw her as intruding.

“No, this is normal tour life, honey,” Conor told her, smiling. “You think your man wasn’t taking every advantage before you came back? You think he wasn’t fucking a different woman every night?”

“Enough of that!” Gavin snapped.

Conor shrugged. “It’s the truth now, isn’t it? If she’s to be a part of all this, glued to your side and all, then she’ll have to deal with it.” He raised his glass in a mock toast to her.

“Ignore him—he’s drunk,” Gavin told Sophie.

“I’m just enjoying myself, don’t everyone panic,” Conor said before taking a prolonged swig.

“He’s not drunk. But do you think he’s taken something?” Sophie asked. If Conor was going to make her uncomfortable by suggesting that Gavin help him chase groupies while she was right there, then she would go ahead and push back against his game-playing.

“Why, you want what I got, Sophie?” Conor asked with a suggestive leer.

In a rush, Gavin leaned forward so that he and his friend were inches apart. “Knock it the fuck off,” he said.

“Piss off, Gavin. You know what your problem is? You’re no bleeding fun anymore. You’re tired and boring me to death.”

Sophie winced at the look of hurt on Gavin’s face. Before he could recover and respond, the limo drew to a stop and the door was opened for them. A waiting crowd of paparazzi and gawkers drowned out any effort Gavin could have made to reply. Conor jumped out first and didn’t wait for the rest of them. He ignored the red carpet screams of photographers for him to stop at the step-and-repeat background for photographs and went straight into the restaurant-turned-event-space.

“Let him be, Gav,” Shay said. “He’s bound to get it out of his system first girl he finds.”

“Yeah, sure.”

Sophie expected to navigate around the media like at the awards show but Gavin held her close, his arm around her waist as he slowly moved them along the red carpet entryway. The flash of the dozens of cameras blinded Sophie but Gavin held his own, doing his best rock star stare.

“Conor is going to really freak out about this,” she said.

“He needs to shut his gob and worry about himself.”

She hated the idea that she was creating a rift between Gavin and his best friend. She wasn’t quite sure why Conor felt so threatened by her but she wanted to try to fix things.

“He’ll come around,” she said, and they inched forward.

Gavin was oblivious to the fact that Martin was mimicking them by trying to hold Shay in the same intimate way that Gavin was holding Sophie, but she saw it from the corner of her eye and tried not to laugh. Gavin needed her attention at the moment.

“Fuck him,” Gavin grunted.

“Oh, don’t say that,” she said reproachfully. When he didn’t turn to look at her, she playfully bit his earlobe, pulling on the tender skin with her teeth and making him laugh.

She knew the increase in the camera flashes meant the moment would be well documented the following day. She was quickly learning what the paparazzi responded to. Anytime she and Gavin appeared relaxed with each other, they pounced—just like now. Gavin was comfortable with the attention but she worried it would just rile Conor up all that much more and had to remind herself to keep her guard up around the press.

33

GAVIN

The Blender magazine party was a sexy, splashy affair, with go-go dancers performing on a stage backed by a giant bronze Buddha statue. Oversized lanterns hung from the thirty-foot-high ceilings. Amber and blue lighting washed against the expansive brick walls. Alcohol was offered everywhere, including from a specially crafted Jägermeister shot slide carved out of ice. The magazine’s latest edition featured Radiohead’s Thom Yorke, and versions of the cover were displayed throughout the space, both as hanging posters and embedded within ice carvings. Popular DJ Junior Senior had the crowded room on their feet, and the first floor was a mass of sweaty bodies.

Gavin thought he saw Conor talking to Carmen Electra, and briefly wondered if he’d have to jump into the fray if her man, Dave Navarro, took issue with it. Before he could sort out the odds of this, he heard his name being called.

It was easy to put the voice to the person, as Christian Hale stood taller than most. They greeted each other with a familiar hug.

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