“Charlee?” Nathan’s hand touched her back.
She startled. Was that normal behavior for women? Did they all look that debauched? She’d never witnessed another woman in a sexual situation. “Did I look like that?” she whispered for his ears only.
“No, Charlee.” It was a repulsed response.
She wanted to believe him. She also wanted to power wash those vaginas with a fire hose. Inside and out. Then hold them down in a tub of bleach.
Jesus, that was a hell of a thing to wish on someone. Why was she so appalled? Was she ashamed for them? For herself? How many hours had she spent tied down and wearing come just like that? She was no better than they were.
Despite her unraveling justifications, she knew her reaction was driven by jealousy. How important were those women in Jay’s life? Was he writing songs about them? She clutched her gut and circled, scanning the room. Where was he?
Nathan grabbed her shoulders. “Charlee?”
“Why do you keep calling her Charlee?” The woman struggled against the ropes. “I’m his Charlee tonight.”
A shiver chilled her spine. She pushed around Nathan and glared at the woman. “What did you say?”
“Whatever, bitch.” The other one tried to kick a tied foot. “He called me Charlee right before he ejaculated.”
Bile bubbled in her gut. She wasn’t sure what her expression held, but Laz ducked out of a bathroom and turned her toward the connecting bedroom. “Don’t pay attention to them. While I’m looking for Jay, can you just…” He nudged her forward. “Go turn down his bed or something.”
She twisted her head, searched his eyes, driven by a need for answers. “He calls them Charlee?”
His face tightened as he shifted his gaze to the piano. “Girls, where did Jay go?”
“He wandered off.” One woman giggled. “Didn’t look so good. Hey there, sexpot. Who are you?”
Nathan bent over the piano, untying the knots in the rope. They could stay there for all Charlee cared, but in the eyes of her benevolent protector, a restraint was a restraint, no matter how willing.
With a sudden need to be out of the room when the women were free, she trudged to bedroom. The maid service had already turned down the bed, but what caught her eye was a doorway in the furthest corner of the room. A walk-in closet? She moved toward it and flicked on the light.
A center island dominated the space. She walked around it and froze.
Jay sprawled on the floor, nude from the waist down, his face planted in the rug. Lines of white powder dusted a square plate beside him.
How many times had Laz warned her? She understood Jay had issues, but seeing him prone and pathetic on the closet floor squeezed things in her chest. “Laz!”
Should she check to see if he’d overdosed? Her experience with drugs was limited, as in nonexistent. She screamed louder, “Laz!”
Stomps pounded through the bedroom. A moment later, Laz dropped beside Jay, lifting his head up and to the side, and prodding his lips. “Lips aren’t blue. Still has his annoying bronze glow.” He rolled his eyes, hovered his mouth over Jay’s ear, and roared, “Faggot!”
A flinch rippled over Jay’s body, and his eyes opened and squeezed shut.
“He’s just high, not OD’d.” Laz grabbed a wadded towel from the floor, spread it over Jay’s very sculpted, too naked ass, and raised his eyes to her. “Remember what I said, Charlee. Look for the man beneath the—”
“Towel?”
He smirked. “You’re twisted.”
She shrugged, and it was stiff and forced. “When it fits the bill.”
“Fair enough. Any pants up there on the counter?”
She tagged a pair of workout shorts from the island where she leaned and tossed them. As Laz shoved them up Jay’s long legs, she tried not to watch, let alone think about how toned his calves and thighs were. Those legs were wrapped around piano sluts. Her cheeks heated and sparked. “I thought cocaine made a person jittery and excited. Why is he so out of it?”
Laz tugged and twisted the shorts over his friend’s ass and removed the towel. “Doesn’t look like he touched much blow tonight. He was probably drunk off his ass before he invited the girls up. I bet he hurls before he wakes.”
Here he was, rich and famous with the world salivating at his feet. Yet…”What a sad and lonely life, drinking, fucking wanton women…” She waved a hand over the bed. “Vomiting in his sleep. Is it a rock star thing?”
With a heave and a grunt, Laz threw Jay’s body over his shoulder in a fireman’s carry and carted him to the bed. “Is it a rock star thing to drink, fuck, and vomit? In the nineties, maybe. You won’t find much of that among modern musicians. Our schedules are hell, the media slaughters us for bad behavior, and most of us are businessmen in this industry.”
Laz rolled him into the bed facedown, and Jay bounced with a moan. Then he kicked a trash can with his foot until it bumped the bedside. “No, this is a Jay thing.”