Scott folded his arms across his chest.

  She rolled her eyes. “Chill. Your air of mystery is intact. I’m only wondering if I’m going to have to replace one of the best barbacks we’ve had.”

  “You’re firing me?” His voice went high, and that pissed him off more. This was total bullshit. He hadn’t punched anyone. Hadn’t even cursed that asshole out for pissing on the floor last night.

  “Slow your roll, hon. Technically you don’t even work here. And don’t be an idiot. The job’s yours as long as you want it. I just thought maybe you were ready to go back on the books.” Chai slapped his shoulder and said more quietly, “Seriously, man, got my cherry popped on that old Army cot. Can’t imagine it’s gotten any better to fuck on.”

  “Ugh.” Scott looked away but caught the eye of Mrs. S., and that only made it worse. “TMI.” Clearly it was way past time Scott got out of that storeroom. He stomped off to talk to Reeve.

  Reeve held up a hand when he saw Scott coming and wrote a bit more in his notebook before shoving the pencil in his dreads. “What’s up? Liam here?”

  One thing, the only thing, Scott had asked was to not be left in the dark. “No. Why? He supposed to be?”

  “Said he wanted a ride because we were going to work on a song. Then he said he had a ride. Figured it was you.”

  Scott grabbed for his phone and didn’t find it. Not in any of his pockets. Though when he shoved his hand back in the right front, his fingers went straight through to his thigh.

  Jesus. Like he needed more shit to worry about. He went back behind the bar, checked under the sink, the mats, down in the cellar. It couldn’t be in the storeroom. He hadn’t been in there all day. Shit. Except this morning when he grabbed a jerky stick.

  His phone buzzed against the base of the paper supply shelf. As he grabbed it, he saw he had seven text messages and Liam was calling.

  “Yeah.”

  “Finally. Thought it was supposed to be quiet today.” Liam didn’t even pause for breath. “Holy shit. Wait until you see Beach’s car. I can’t even believe I’m sitting in it.”

  Scott was used to some verbal vomit when Liam got excited, but this wasn’t making any kind of sense.

  “Who the fuck’s Beach?”

  “That guy, Beauchamp. The one who, uh”—Liam lowered his voice—“you know, got spanked.”

  A man’s laugh sounded over the background noise—which was pretty definitely noise.

  “Are you in a convertible?”

  “It’s a goddamned Ferrari Spider, custom interior,” Liam shouted.

  Beauchamp must have revved it because the eight cylinders purred loud enough for Scott to hear over the traffic and wind. Damn. Next thing, some guy would be tempting Liam with a fucking Bentley.

  “Still nothing like a ’68 Shelby Fastback,” Scott insisted.

  “You jealous ’cause I’m riding with another guy or ’cause I’m riding in another car?”

  “Shut up and put on your seat belt.”

  SCOTT HEARD the Spider when it pulled into the alley and went out to meet them. Beauchamp didn’t stay long, just long enough to pop the hood and let Scott drool over the engine. After a few polite words about the true American beauty of the Mustang, Beauchamp displayed one of those ankle monitors, like for people on house arrest.

  “I’m afraid I can’t come in. My probation requires me to stay out of bars, but I still wanted to play my part, hence the taxi service. I’m sure I’ll be seeing you both around.” Beauchamp slipped back into the Spider like he was greased and oiled back out of the alley.

  “What the fuck is going on?” Scott wanted to know.

  “You tell me. I thought Reeve was gonna pick me up, but around five thirty Beach comes strolling into the first aid station announcing, ‘Your chariot awaits, my prince.’”

  Scott’s lip curled.

  Liam nodded. “No kidding. Kishori dragged me for cheating on you already.”

  Obviously Jamie had been a busy little redheaded bastard, but what good a fifteen-minute drive would do beat the hell out of Scott.

  “Fuck do I know. No one tells me shit.”

  Liam nudged him with a shoulder. “Maybe they would if you’d answer a text.”

  “Yeah, well, I lost my phone for a tick.” Scott started to pull out his cigs, then thought of Morty and put them back. “Reeve’s waiting for you.”

  Reeve and Liam sat on the stage edge and made chords and hums every couple of minutes, but a table of sweaty dads with hall passes was loud enough to drown out most of what was going on.

  Scott had just started to relax again when Eli banged through the front door and strolled up to the bar. One of the regulars gave his skintight aqua shirt a side-eye, then shrugged and grabbed another handful of peanuts.

  Eli leaned over the bar toward Chai. “Do you have any more of those delicious Moon Shots?”

  “Show some ID and I’ll make you one.”

  Eli sighed and tugged out a license. He handed it over with some cash. “Perfect. I’ll take two.”

  Scott didn’t figure Eli was here alone, and sure enough Quinn, Jamie, and Gavin rolled up in Eli’s wake. Chai gave Scott a look under lowered brows, but she filled drink orders and ignored it when Jamie and Quinn shoved two tables together in the space in front of the stage.

  Chai sent Scott over with the tray. He slapped down the KZ bottles in front of Gavin and Jamie, then said, “What the hell?”

  Jamie shook his head. “It’s the Gay Avengers assembling, kid. Get over it.”

  Two more guys showed up. One looked a long white robe away from playing Jesus in an Easter pageant; the other was tall and thin, with sharp features and white-blond hair.

  Before Chai could even ask for ID, the blond ordered a KZ X-treme Creme and Jesus ordered a freaking orange juice. Chai stared at him for a second before yanking one of the small cans out of the fridge. She handed the tray to Scott without a word.

  Which was the scariest thing yet.

  Two black women came in. The taller one had her head shaved and wore a long flowing dress with big red flowers all over it. The shorter woman had a suit jacket over one arm despite the heat outside. Chai gave Scott another furrowed-brow look when she realized they were joining the table in the back. The tall woman ordered a pint of Honeydew Jalapeño, and the shorter asked for club soda with lime. She sat next to Eli.

  Liam and Reeve had given up on whatever music thing they were doing. Liam looked at Scott with hands spread wide, and Scott shrugged.

  As Scott brought over the new drinks, Gavin said, “Thanks for coming on short notice, everyone. Would the secretary please note that we have a quorum of steering committee members as I call the meeting to order?”

  Jesus took a small notebook and pencil out of a back pocket and wrote.

  Scott tucked the tray under one arm and leaned against a support post to watch. Not that he was egotistical, but obviously this show had something to do with the phone call with Jamie this morning.

  “The chair recognizes Vice-Chair Ardell Green.”

  The shorter woman nodded, sending her shoulder-length braids swinging. She had on a tight tailored shirt that was almost a match for Eli’s except hers was a deep purple.

  “Even before the physical space is ready, we need to address transportation. Already we have issues with volunteers who can’t always get to the shelter to help.”

  “Transportation and safety,” Eli put in.

  Gavin nodded. “Is there any disagreement with an ad hoc committee to get transportation and safety off the ground? Volunteers?”

  Jesus raised his hand.

  Then, looking like it would kill him, Jamie lifted his barely enough to be noticed. “I’ve got some ideas.”

  Scott didn’t think he was quite as stupid as his grades in school suggested, but he still couldn’t figure out what the hell Jamie was up to. Back on the day Jamie had first dragged him to meet Eli and Quinn, they’d mentioned a shelter, only Scott had been too old for it. He’d figured it for a homeless shelter. Must be a pretty specific kind, since he’d have bet a carton of Newports everyone around those tables was some flavor of queer.

  Liam moved to stand next to him. “Reeve thought it was a setup to catch them in some kind of code violation, but I told him you knew most of them and they were cool.”

  That wasn’t something Scott was willing to bet on.

  Scott tuned back in to hear Jamie say, “…reimbursed for parts and have personal use of the vehicle as compensation for time.”

  “Do we have a motion to look for someone to fill that position?”

  “Moved.” That was the blond.

  “Seconded,” the taller woman added.

  “Votes for?” Gavin looked around the table.

  Everyone raised a hand.

  “Opposed?”

  Scott half expected Jamie to go against his own proposal.

  “Motion passed.”

  “On to the next fundraiser.”

  Jamie kicked away from the table and came to stand next to Scott. “Okay. Here’s the deal. Try not to argue until you think about it okay?”

  “No promises,” Scott said.

  “So there’s no place in Baltimore for homeless kids. Especially not queer ones.”

  Like Scott didn’t know.

  “Now there’s going to be. Gavin put together a foundation and hauled in a bunch of us on a steering committee, but he and Ardell are really the ones who know what they’re doing. They’ve been trying to figure out something for transportation. I found the car while I was looking for something for them.”

  “What car?” Liam said.

  Jamie raised his brows, and Scott muttered, “Later.”

  “If you go for it, the foundation will put up the money for a van and parts. They’ll pay the insurance and registration. You donate your time to modify it to handle some accessibility issues and to perform routine maintenance. In exchange, you can drive it when the foundation doesn’t need it for the shelter.”

  “Liam could drive it?” Scott said.

  “That was the whole fucking point, right? So you can use that cash to get out of the hole and get an apartment, and Liam has a way to get around. Gotta keep a clean license, though. Anything that makes the shelter look bad and I’ll take it out of your skin.”

  The threat was leveled at Scott, but Liam said, “I think we can handle it.”

  “Good.” Jamie smacked Scott on the shoulder and went back to the table.

  Scott scratched behind his ear. “You just made that call without talking to me?”

  “You had some other idea?”

  “No. But—”

  “What car?”

  “You remember how I told you I wanted to get you one.”

  Liam nodded.

  “Kind of had it all lined up all ready.”

  Liam put a hand on the post above Scott’s shoulder. “And you’re giving me bullshit about me saying we’d go for the plan without talking to you first.”

  Scott considered. “Pretty much.”

  “You are such an asshole sometimes. And for that, you totally owe me a wake-up blow job.”

  Chapter Twenty-Five

  LIAM WAS awake way too early, considering he and Scott had only passed out in a sticky pile of satisfaction less than four hours ago. He curled himself more tightly around Scott despite the morning heat in their tiny studio apartment in Towson. Breathing in the smell from Scott’s neck, Liam pressed a quick kiss on the damp skin and tried to will himself back to sleep, but a seesaw of excitement and dread kept jerking him back awake.

  He blew a breath across Scott’s skin, aiming for the sensitive place behind his ear. Scott’s head moved a little on the pillow, but his eyelids never fluttered and his breathing remained deep and even.

  Tonight was Blow the Moon’s last tune-up before opening for Charm City Cyanide at Sunfest, but that wasn’t what kept Liam from falling back asleep. After that weird committee meeting at Schim’s, Liam had talked to Quinn for a long time. Without going into a lot of details, Liam told him that he didn’t feel right about people praising his sacrifice when it had been an off-base car accident. Quinn had some pretty definite opinions about sacrifice and disabilities people never noticed, and said he didn’t necessarily think it was a bad thing to draw attention to disabled vets, given what was going on at the VA. All true, but not a fucking lot of help.

  Liam had been about to get up when the look in Quinn’s eyes held him in the chair.

  “I can’t tell you what to do,” Quinn had said, but the firmness in his voice made Liam think the man was used to handing out orders. “How it happened doesn’t matter. It’s your body. And you don’t need to turn it into a message board unless that’s what you want it to be.”

  So Liam had told Reeve that opening with “Rooster” and acknowledging vets would be fine, but whether Liam went on stage in cargo shorts or jeans would be up to how he felt on any given day. Dev had whined that whatever got people to notice them was worth it, but then Mac said, “Either it’s about the music or it’s not,” and that was the end of it.

  Today was going to be a jeans day. Liam was already nervous enough about the song that was finally ready to replace one of their covers in the second set. He scooped Scott’s hand from where it rested on his ribs and brought it up for a kiss. Both Scott’s thumbs were a bloody mess of peeled skin and scabs from him gnawing on his cuticles, but between the nicotine transdermal patch and some nicotine gum courtesy of Maryland’s smoking-cessation program, Scott had made it five days so far, insisting his decision to quit was purely financial. Liam caught Scott pushing on the patch a lot, like that would get him an extra hit.

  Liam stared hard at Scott’s face and saw his lips twitch. “You’re faking and I need coffee.”

  Scott didn’t open his eyes. “And your crutches are right next to the bed. Help yourself.”

  Bed was a pretty generous term for the futon and frame that folded back into a couch, but since it had been free—a gift from Chai because she said it hurt her back—it was what they had. The biggest problem was that it was a lot lower to the ground than the beds Liam was used to handling. He needed to sit in their one reclaimed-from-the-sidewalk chair to don his leg.

  Right now, it was easiest to roll onto the floor and push up with the help of his crutches and the chair.

  Scott turned over and watched him.

  Liam shook his head. “You really are a bastard, you know that.”

  “So my mom told me. Was this one of the times I was supposed to give a shit? You got to give me a signal.”

  “Like falling on my ass?” Liam made it over to the single block of what was the extent of their kitchen counter, then flipped Scott off before filling the carafe.

  Liam’s mom had said that while he was welcome to come home anytime, she wouldn’t enable his destructive patterns. What that actually meant was Liam only got to take his clothes, and she wouldn’t be buying them any housewarming presents. But as Scott waited at the end of the driveway, Greg pointed to a box on a garage shelf of “stuff I keep meaning to take to Goodwill. Maybe you could drop it somewhere for me.”

  It had held everything that currently made up their kitchenware: an old coffee maker, some dishes, mugs, utensils, and a big pot with a lid.

  As Liam scooped coffee into the filter, he spied some brown fragments on the counter. Either the cockroaches were hopped up on mega growth steroids, or they also had a mouse problem.

  He turned toward Scott with a smile. “Do you think we could get a cat?”

  DESPITE THE ten-dollar cover and no extra promo from the Brooks guy or the Charming Rag, according to Mrs. S.’s counter, they were twenty shy of the capacity. Scott tapped out the latest number and sent it to Liam.

  On the drive down to the bar, Liam had been a bundle of nerves, which didn’t exactly help Scott’s withdrawal headache. Apparently it was a problem if Scott talked to him and it was a problem if Scott was too quiet. Scott hoped the do-gooders tracked down a van fast, because he was looking forward to Liam being able to drive himself—at least when the band had a gig.

  Despite Liam’s freakout, everything seemed to be going fine as they rolled through the second set. The second set was the stuff they weren’t using for the shows where they opened for CCC. It had stuff they were trying out or fine-tuning, so Scott wasn’t surprised to hear Reeve do an intro mentioning a new song.

  Scott had just set the tap on another Bare Ass Blonde keg when the first few notes made him jerk his head up. Liam had been playing those chords nonstop, and when Scott asked him what song they were, he’d said just something he was working on.

  He. Liam. Not Reeve. Scott wished he could remember whatever title Reeve had mentioned just now.

  Liam’s guitar had the melody line, and even from the bar, Scott could see that Liam had closed his eyes in concentration. Then Mac came in with something rougher, pushing the rhythm faster.

  Liam’s voice was a soft growl. “Never been wanted, never been needed.”

  The hair on the back of Scott’s neck stood up. He moved out from behind the bar, sliding along the edge of the crowd. His don’t-fuck-with-me scowl let him weave in closer.

  Liam finished the verse, and there was a pause like a sucked-in breath, only a steady ringing from Dev’s cymbal filling the air. Then the chorus flooded out in a hot blast. Liam lifted his head and whisper-screamed the words right at Scott.

  “You hold me, you bleed me, you scar me. You fill me, you starve me, you choke me, you are me.”

  They both might as well be fucking naked. No, worse. Liam’s song turned Scott’s skin transparent, and anyone could see everything he tried so hard not to feel. Except no one else was looking at him. Just Liam.

  The bridge buckled Scott’s knees, but the crowd kept him up.

  “Ten thousand clicks the distance, still your teeth in my skin, your bruises on my bones and I’m right back again.”

  Liam had shut his eyes now, and when the chorus started, the crowd had picked it up enough to sing along.