I shook my head and shot him a sideways look. “Speak for yourself. No one is killing me, but I’ll happily burn the house down on you fuckers if you try.”
Rhett waved me off like I wasn’t a complete psychopath when we both knew the truth. “You know what I mean. We’ve been struggling for a few years anyway, and Billie coming into our lives just exposed our truths. Our dirty truths, as that fucking blog likes to point out. We have far deeper troubles than her weakness. It’s our voice… We’ve lost our voice.”
Turning back to the view, I leaned forward and rested my chin on my arms, enjoying the brief chirps of birds and whistles of the wind through the grass. “You’re right. Our first two albums were hot, filled with passion and a unique beat, but lately it’s all on repeat. Change a few chords and words, slap a different bridge in there, but there’s no true creative skill in anything we’ve produced lately.”
Our sound had been deteriorating before Billie. We’d fallen into bad habits, resting on our fame and the fact that the fans just wanted whatever we threw out there. “We need a change of pace. New air.” I breathed even deeper at the realization. “I think we should move our next session out here. Maybe even tonight. I can start a campfire to encourage our creativity to flow in a new atmosphere.”
Rhett didn’t argue, choosing to look out across the field with me. “Yeah, I’d like that. I even have an idea for a song. I’ve been working on it off and on, and I think it can be fixed with your help.” He paused. “Yours and Jace’s.”
“You have to deal with her,” I said when Flo’s name wasn’t mentioned. “Whether you want her to be or not, for the time being, she’s part of the band. We’ll never find cohesion if you’re constantly giving her the cold shoulder.”
He dropped his foot and straightened, whatever peace he’d found gone in a flash. “I am dealing with her,” he rumbled. “But dealing doesn’t mean I have to be fucking polite. All it means is I sit in the same room as her and work on music. As long as she keeps it to music, then I’ll keep dealing.”
He stalked off, and I decided to follow. It was time to rally the others into our outdoor night session. Maybe none of us had been the “sit around a campfire and sing” kinda kids, but we did gel best when we were taken out of the recording studio. Away from all our fame and glory.
Maybe it was time to get back to our roots.
It really might be the last chance Bellerose had.
thirteen
RHETT
My skin fucking itched. Everywhere. It’d been three full days since Brenda kidnapped us all, and I was one hundred percent feeling the harsh cold of detox. There wasn’t even enough booze in the house to get a proper buzz going, just crappy half-strength beer and cider that couldn’t get a mouse drunk.
Grayson’s idea to take our songwriting session out into nature had seemed like a good one. Until I realized how bitterly cold it was outdoors at night. Thank fuck for the roaring fire, or we’d get hypothermia before ever producing any music.
“The lyrics need more authenticity,” Gray announced after we’d all settled in around the campfire, bundled up in our thick coats. “Right now, this song sounds like it’s been pulled straight out of an AI lyric generator.”
“Fuck you,” Jace spat.
Grayson just arched a brow, then shifted his attention to me. “Rhett, you said you had a song you’ve been working on. Let’s hear it.”
“Uh…” I glanced over at Jace, who stared back at me with an intense expression. He’d always written our lyrics. I’d helped tweak a word here and there and contributed on the melody, but writing Bellerose’s music was his thing. Then again, the shit he’d written these last few days was trash, so surely, I couldn’t do worse.
“Fuck it,” I muttered, picking up my guitar. “Alright, this is unfinished and shit… Whatever.”
Swallowing past my awkwardness, I strummed the opening notes of the song that’d been rattling around in my head lately, then shifted into the intro. I didn’t look at my bandmates, but I could tell, I could feel that I had them hooked.
“Our hands slipped apart when you betrayed my heart.
Stolen from time, there’re no promises to remain.
All the plans we made, lost and destroyed.
Your weakness was mine…” The newfound huskiness in my voice, thanks to how much I’d been smoking lately, added a haunting quality to the lyrics, and I nearly lost my train of thought.
I wavered slightly on the next verse, which was the most personal of all, then all of a sudden, I had backup. But not from Jace, my best friend. Nope, the first one to join my new song was Flo on her bass guitar, picking up the threads of my half-finished melody and weaving them together for a more fleshed-out sound.
Despite how sour I was feeling toward her, my confidence strengthened, and I pushed forward with the song, closing my eyes to block out Jace’s scowl and just losing myself in the music.
It wasn’t long before Grayson joined in, drumming his sticks on a hollow log, then finally Jace added his rhythm guitar and harmonized the vocals with me. When I ran out of the shit I’d already written, he adlibbed and built on the story I’d started to tell, finishing the remaining verse with enviable ease.
As the last few notes rang out, a weirdly comfortable silence descended over the four of us. For the first time in what seemed like forever, the music felt good.
“Rhett, that was amazing,” Flo said quietly, her voice as meek as a mouse, like she was expecting me to lash back with cutting words. Again. She was right to feel like that after how I’d treated her lately.
But she was more than just a bandmate. She was part of my Bellerose family. I might shout on about how I didn’t do family, but in truth, it wasn’t this family I hated. This one was my safe harbor, and that was no doubt why I’d taken her betrayal so hard, so personally. But I needed to get past it if we wanted any hope of finishing this album and buying ourselves out of Big Noise.
So I wet my lips and gave a short nod. “Thanks.”
Gray grunted in approval, then pulled a bottle of tequila out of his huge coat. “I reckon we deserve this.”
“Oh shit yes, you beautiful, rugged man, you.” I eagerly reached for the offered bottle. “If I were gay, I’d probably blow you right now.”
Flo snickered, but Grayson shook his head and gave me a look of disgust. “No thanks. You look like you’ve got an awful gag reflex. I’d hate to choke you with my anaconda.”
“Calm down, big man. I’ve seen what you’re packing, and it’s nothing to brag about,” I teased. Totally untrue, Gray’s dick was huge, the lucky bastard.
Jace cleared his throat, drawing our combined attention. His brow was creased in a frown, and I gave a resigned sigh. “What?”
His eyes narrowed at me. “I have some notes.”
I scoffed. “Of course you do. Come on then, let’s hear it.”
For the next several hours, Jace and I did what we’d done a hundred times already. We collaborated and made music. This time, though, he finessed my song, not the other way around. It was… nice.