Page 96 of A Ballad of Betrayal and Beauty

“Yeah,” he whispers.

“But I can’t live like this anymore. Can’t be stuck between two half lives. Not when I deserve to live one that’s whole. Complete. Do you understand what I mean?”

I can practically see him nodding. “Yes. I do . . . more than you think.”

“I hope you find what you’re looking for,” I say gently.

He hums into the phone and the vibration shoots through me.

“And I hope you’ve found the kind of love worth risking everything for.”

The phone disconnects, and I place the receiver back on the holder as though lost in time. Then I gather the few personal items I’ve kept at my desk, throw them in my bag, and walk out the door with no plan to ever come back.

CHAPTER24

Bad to the Bone

JOEL

“What the fuck is taking so long?” Dave mutters from the leather seat in the waiting area.

James shrugs. “Lawyers charge by the hour. Probably make us sit here for longer than necessary just to bill us for it later.”

My nail picks at the cording on the leather chair I’m sitting in. Part of me is back in that apartment above The Sudsy Dream and the other is terrified that One-Punch Logan is going to win this case.

“And there’s been no word from him? Nothing?” Dave asks, leaning forward in his chair to stare at me.

“Oh, how silly of me. Yes, Dave, I forgot to mention that he called this morning.” Dave frowns. “Told me he was . . .what did he say? Oh right, he was taking over production at Willy Wonka’s Chocolate Factory.”

Dave rolls his eyes. “Oh, fuck off.”

James looks over. “Is that necessary?”

My fingers abandon the chair, and I start picking at the nail bed of my left hand. “Seemed it was to me. Or have you both forgotten that I’ve spent the better part of forty-eight hours searching for him?”

“You’re the one who knows him the best,” Dave stresses. “And you mean to tell me that you have no idea where he would have run away to?”

The idea that I don’t know my best friend as well as I thought I did stings. Like suffering a deep papercut only to squeeze lemon juice on it. Biting and sharp.

“Look,” James interjects before I can tell Dave to fuck off, “for all we know, he knows exactly how to prove the songs are his. He’ll waltz in here, and this will be over in an hour.”

As if to prove him dead wrong, a young woman in a skirt and blazer approaches us in the lobby. “Excuse me, gentlemen, we’re ready for you now.”

The three of us jump to our feet and adjust our awkward suits. Al insisted we dress appropriately and while everything inside of me is screaming of discomfort, I know it’s for the best. We’ve spent too much of our lives being treated like deadbeat losers for how we look at first glance. The tattoos on James and I alone usually have women like this pretty brunette clutching their pearls.

We follow along down the wide wood-paneled hallway until we reach a large door. The woman pushes it open and gestures for us to go inside. One step in the door and my body is rigid with anger. One-Punch Logan sits, looking unfortunately suave, in a tailored suit flanked on either side by who I assume are his overpriced lawyers.

“Gentlemen, please come in,” says an older man with shockingly white hair. He sits at the end of a long conference table next to Al, who’s wearing a grim look on his face. His lawyer, who we’ve met on several different occasions throughout our music career, gives us a nod from where he sits at our manager’s side.

We take our seats in the leather swivel chairs, and I make the conscious choice not to look at the traitor across the table. His eyes are on me, I can feel it. I know he hates me. Hated me from the first moment we met. Hated how Key became closer to me and cut him out of the band.

Good. Because I hate him too.

Not because he ever did anything specifically awful to me directly, but because of how he hurt my friend. He was always a jealous leech and I saw right through him. And now, sitting across from me, he’s determined to suck the life out of all of us because he knows he’d never become anything without it.

“Right,” says the man with white hair. “I’m Judge Horowath and we’re here today to discuss the claim of one Mr. Samuels against the members of musical talent, Carnal Sins, for copyright infringement on seven songs, as outlined below.”

He lists off the songs—the only songs on both our EP and LP albums that Key was the sole songwriter.

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