Page 16 of Mic Drop

Backstage, I strip off my shirt and take the clean one from Nese, who still is waiting for an answer about Jenna’s whereabouts. I hate the fact I went from dumping her—before she dumped me, I can finally admit to myself—to missing the shit out of her.

I need Jenna at my side.

“You’re on fire out there, Bennett,” Nese notes. “Almost like you’re trying to exorcise someone from your world.”

I must not have been so clever. She fusses with my shirt. “It’s been fucking awful.”

“He speaks.” She tugs on the hem of my shirt. “What happened?”

I can’t bring myself to tell her the lie I’ve been telling the rest of the guys. Still, the truth isn’t in my orbit either. Instead, I settle for a half-truth. I’m still unsure exactly what happened. “It wasn’t pretty.”

She nods. “What are you going to do about it?”

“I don’t know.” That’s the truth.

“All right, guys. Your audience awaits your encore. Go give them what they want!” Luke riles us up. Or tries to, in my case. “Remember, there’s a meet and greet before the club tonight.”

A collective groan goes up from the band. Meet and greets are fine, but the more we do, the less enjoyable they are.

Luke gives us the evil eye. “No complaining. Besides, first round’s on me.”

The rest of the band cheers and we head back on stage to claps and screams from the crowd. We perform the last three songs like we always do, garnering the proper response from the audience. When I introduce the band, including Tris, the reception is as overwhelming as it ever is. But my heart isn’t in it.

It’s in the Hamptons with the woman who took it with her.

I walk off the stage, ever mindful of my thigh. Thankfully, it’s the one thing that hasn’t been giving me problems all day. Maybe I can call Jenna and ask her for more exercises? Or jump on Jeb’s bandwagon and see if she can help them out? Perhaps even get her to come back on tour and incorporate the crew into her sessions?

What am I doing? She’s through with me. She wanted to be home with her mother. Last I checked, I’m nowhere close to having a vagina. Although, I’m sort of being a pussy.

I change out of the leather pants and put on a pair of designer jeans. I also swap my wet T-shirt for a tour tee from The Light Rail and am ready to go. In the greenroom, I make idle chatter with the lighting and sound guys.

Tristan is the next to join us. Was I unfair to him before? Maybe. Maybe not. If I were an adult, I’d talk it out with him...but I’ve never been accused of being an adult. Ask Mom. Lissa.

Jenna.

It’s the last name on the list who forces my feet in the keyboardist’s direction. “Hey.” I clamp my hand around his shoulder, which tenses. “Relax. I’m not going to bite your head off.” I consider my options. “Not now, anyway.”

“Good to know.” His gaze darts around the room, but no one’s paying us any special attention.

“I think I’m ready to hear what went down between you and Jenna.” My body stiffens. If he so much as kissed her on the cheek, I’m going to lose it.

“Nothing untoward, I promise. She was in the lobby, dragging her luggage. She was in a bad way. When I approached her, she burst into tears. I held her while she cried her eyes out. She didn’t tell me what happened, but I’d have to be a blind idiot not to know you two had a massive fight.”

“That’s the thing, man. We did, but we didn’t.”

He tilts his head. “Come again?”

“We exchanged a few heated comments, but I didn’t think too much of them and took a shower. When I got out, she was shoving her clothes into her bag and couldn’t get away from me fast enough. Kept mumbling about her mother, about needing to go home. And somehow it was all my fault.”

He scratches his chest. “Something sounds off to me. If you two didn’t fight?—”

“We didn’t.”

“Then maybe something else intervened? Have you checked to see if the paparazzi has written anything else about her?”

His question brings me up short. “Not that I’m aware of, but who knows?”

He pulls out his phone, but a quick search doesn’t reveal anything new. “All I see is the regular stuff about her being a Black Widow. Oh, maybe this is something. There’s been graffiti at her clinics.”

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