Page 16 of Syncopation
“That’s better.” Carl rose.“Your lunch will be here soon and you have the studio until eight. After that, they’ll be packing up your shit.”
“Send the drum kit to the house.” Zavier spoke low, but with force.
Carl jerked back. “What?”
“My kit.” Zavier slid his hand from Ray’s shoulder, and it took every ounce of control not to shudder. “Send it to the house.”
“Why?”
A huff that Ray recognized as Zavier’sare you stupidlaugh. “Because I’m a fucking professional drummer.”
Carl stared at Zavier. “Right. Okay.” He swung around and headed to the door, already punching shit on his phone.
When the door slammed shut, Mish dropped into the seat Carl had occupied. “That man has no right being a manager.”
Another grunt from Zavier—this one neutral.
“It’ll be fine,” Ray said, though his guttold him a different story. Like it or not, Carl was their manager. The first label exec he’d ever talked to had praised Carl up and down. Said that Twisted Wishes couldn’t do any better.
“Will it?” Soft, quiet words from Dom. He’d been standing over by the window the entire time. “I mean, Zavier’s good—”
“Why thank you.” Zavier’s cocky attitude was back.
“—but this is shit.” Dom gesturedaround the studio. “They want us to fail.”
Zavier rocked back on the stool and rubbed his chin. “The label wouldn’t send you on tour with Five Asylum if they wanted you to fail.”
Dom finally crossed the room. “But Carl’s not giving us what we need.”
Ray followed Zavier’s hand from his chin to the table. Long fingers. Tats that ended at the wrists. In formal wear, you’d never see theink.
Zavier gave off a rumble that fit somewhere between a cough and a laugh, and he flattened his hand against the table. “Carl’s not the record label.”
“He might as well be,” Ray said. “He’s our only contact with them.” Their gateway to the stars, Carl sometimes said.
Zavier arched his eyebrows. “Really? Is that typical?” Not a snide question—honest curiosity.
God, Ray felt likeshit—he wasn’t smart enough for this gig. Images of Kevin with his bottle of Jack flashed through his mind, and he rubbed his forehead. “Maybe?” They’d gone into this blind, happy to have a contract and a label and some money behind them. “This is so different than when we played in local bars and put out singles, you know?”
But Zavier didn’t know. He’d been off getting a music degree andtouring the world with symphonies.
Ray pushed himself up. “I’ll go wait for lunch. I need some air.”
He followed the same path Carl had taken, but unlike Carl, he couldn’t jump into a car and drive away. Hell, he was such a fuckup, he didn’t know how to drive.
Ray stared up into the clear sky. Dom was right—this was shit, and he had no clue how to fix it.
* * *
As the dayswent by, Zavier watched Ray become more unraveled. When they played, Ray was fine, but as soon as music wasn’t flowing through the air, he turned moody and snappish, or still and silent—a statue sitting out on the deck, watching the sky.
The few times Carl stopped by to listen to them practice in their makeshift space in the garage, Ray had gone from the Zen, perfect singer to a destructiveasshole in no seconds flat.
“Maybe,” Zavier murmured at Mish while they cleaned up a broken plate and glass, “we should switch to paper and plastic for a while.”
“He’s really stressed,” she whispered back. “He’s a good guy.”
“I know he is.” Ray was frustrated and scared. Only when he sang did he loosen up and breathe.
