Page 139 of Composed
“You can try and tempt me.” Her fingers graze mine before she presses play. “Now, stop being a sore loser and let me enjoy my prize.”
Chapter forty-four
Hendrix • Now
The (After) Life Of The Party – Fall Out Boy
Axelslidesacrossthecouch and drops his head in my lap.
“Dude!” I tug the notebook out from under him. “Can’t you go annoy somebody else?”
He groans, grabs my hand, and pushes my fingers into his buzzed hair. “God forbid a guy wants to hang out with friend.”
I shake my head, tapping my pencil against his brow while my fingers dance over his scalp. He hums, a smile ghosting over his lips.
It’s weird how easily we’ve fallen back into this routine. As if no time has passed at all, Axel just let me back in, in a way the others haven’t quite yet.
“Well, since you’re here.” I hold my notebook open over his face. “What do you think about this line?”
He scans the page, tipping his chin back. His nose wrinkles. “Very melodramatic.”
“Yeah, that’s what I thought.” I hiss air through my teeth, flipping my pencil and erasing the scribbled words. “I can’t seem to figure out this bridge.”
“You ask Cole his thoughts?”
“Nu-uh. Haven’t seen him.”
Not since I slipped out of his flat last night when he fell asleep on the couch.
Pretty sure I deserve a sainthood for leaving while he was sprawled out. My instinct was to curl up in his arms, but I forced myself to go back to my own place and do some work.
My business phone has been ringing off the hook the last couple weeks, and my inbox is a mess of requests and queries. I’ve never taken so much time off since I started in the business. A week here and there but nothing more. I’ve never wanted to.
I liked being busy in the studio.
Now, the thought of stacking my client list and getting back behind the mixing desk has me feeling all the things I don’t know how to deal with.
“What if I did…” I click my tongue, clenching my eyes shut as my brain works. “Now I’m chasing echoes, forever tracing lines of the girl I lost but never left behind.”
A long minute passes in silence.
Heat crawls over my cheeks as I feel his eyes digging into me.
I’m not stupid enough to think he can’t read between the lines of my lyrics.
The thing with songwriting, while you can make things up from your mind, there’s a beauty in using real life as your base. Real stories, real emotions, they all create the best, most honest music—the music that sells because itfeels.
“I like it,” he says, finally.
“Yeah?” I peek at him through cracked lashes. “Not just blowing smoke up my arse?”
“Would I ever do that?”
I give him a pointed glance.
“Point taken.” He sighs as I brush my knuckles over his forehead. “But I promise I’m not. You’ve still got it, baby girl.”
A sharp breath catches. “You think?”
