The girl in the mirror mocks me with her smoky eyes. She knows as well as I do that I wouldn’t have traded today for anything. It felt like old times. Rhyson may have forgotten, but I used to do my homework outside his rehearsal room. I loved hearing my brother play, replaying a passage until it was perfect. That hasn’t changed. I may not make music, but I love it. My parents may manage musicians now, but they were both brilliant musicians when they were younger. Uncle Grady, too. I told Grip I was an ugly duckling in my family. Maybe I’m not ugly, but I’m certainly the odd man out.
My eyes drop to the shadowy cleft between my breasts.
Correction. Odd woman out.
I slip back into the studio unnoticed, and my heart skips a stupid beat when I see Grip at the piano with Rhyson. Both of their faces, which are so different but so handsome, wear matching frowns of concentration.
“Did you try it here?” Grip points to a place on the pad Rhyson has been scribbling on all day.
“Yeah.” Rhyson chews on the end of his pencil. “But it’s a major third.”
“Ahhhh.” Grip nods since that apparently holds significance to him that I don’t grasp. “I see.”
Neither of them looks up when I step farther into the room, keeping their eyes trained on the pad.
“Oh!” Grip’s face lights up. He grabs Rhyson’s pencil and music pad, writing furiously, a wide smile spreading over his face. “What about that?”
Rhyson takes the pad, frowning for a few silent moments before laughing and slapping Grip on the back.
“That does it.” Rhyson’s shoulders slump with his relief. “Man, thanks. I’ve been looking at it too long. I didn’t even see what was right in front of me.”
“Glad I could help.” Grip’s expression shifts, amusement twitching his lips. “Hey, did that guy send you his demo or mix tape or whatever? The guy from Grady’s class?”
“That dude.” Rhyson grimaces and then shifts into an odd British accent. “I was gonna listen to that, but then I just carried on living my life.”
Huh?
“That’s one of your goofy ass movie quotes, isn’t it?” Grip shakes his head, his grin teasing Rhyson. “Which one?”
“Russel Brand in Forgetting Sarah Marshall. You’d like that one.”
“That’s what you said about Little Nicky.”
“Okay.” Chagrin wrinkles Rhyson’s expression. “Upon further consideration, that was an Adam Sandler miss, I admit.”
“I’ve never known anyone as obsessed with movies as you. You got a quote for every day of the week.”
Really? I don’t remember Rhyson ever watching movies. He never had time. It strikes me—again—how little I know this version of my twin brother. Grady, Grip, and Jimmi seem to all know more about him than I do. Maybe because they’re his family now.
“Yeah. You know that’s how I decompress.” Rhyson returns his attention to the music pad, halfway gone already.
“I can think of several ways to decompress that . . .”
Whatever Grip planned to say goes unsaid when he catches sight of me. His eyes scroll over my body in a quick assessment and then go back up and down for slow seconds. When he finally reaches my face, his eyes burn into mine. His mouth falls open just the tiniest bit, and in that small space between his full lips, I see his tongue dart out for a quick swipe. Like he wants a taste of something. Like he wants a taste of me. It’s a nanosecond, but it’s real, and I see it before he stashes it away and schools his face into the indifference he showed me in the kitchen this morning.
“Bris, wow.” Rhyson’s brows disappear under his messy fall of dark hair. “You look . . . wow. Grip, you’ll have to protect my little sister at the club tonight.”
I saunter closer, my Louboutins adding another inch or so to my confidence and some sway to my hips.
“Maybe I don’t want to be protected.” I laugh at the nauseous look on Rhyson’s face. “This is my spring break, brother, and I am all grown up. I’ve been in this studio all day working on my essay. I’m ready to be hair down, bottles up, and I’m glad you won’t be there cramping my style.”
“You finished?” Grip asks, speaking for the first time. “The application?”
“Yeah.” We stare at one another for a few seconds before I untangle our eyes. The leftover heat in his gaze is still too hot for me. “I’ll read over the essay one more time before I submit.”
“What’s this essay for anyway?” Rhyson asks from behind the piano, linking his hands behind his head.
“An internship I’m applying for with Sound Management.” I watch his face to see if it sinks in for him.
“Sound Management?” Rhyson bunches his brows. “They manage some huge acts. What’s your major?”
“Business. But my emphasis will be entertainment. Entertainment management is what I want to do.”
I feel Grip’s eyes on me. I hadn’t mentioned that in all our discussions about music yesterday. I wanted to talk with Rhyson about this myself.
“Following in our parents’ footsteps.” Cynicism twists Rhyson’s lips. “Shocking.”
“Well, it is the family business.” I shrug my shoulders nonchalantly. “Besides, maybe you’ll need someone you can trust to manage you when the time comes. I want to learn everything I can. Maybe move here after graduation.”
Two sets of eyes snap to my face, Rhyson’s and Grip’s. Even pointedly eyeing my manicure, I feel them both looking at me.
“What the hell?” Rhyson’s face is somewhere between thunderstruck and thundercloud, shock and anger competing. “Manage me doing what? I’m not a performer anymore, Bristol, and I won’t be.”
I give up feigning interest in my nails and focus all my will on my brother, even managing to block out Grip’s magnetic presence.
“You are a genius, Rhyson.” I set my face in stone. “One of the most brilliant pianists to ever live. There is no way you’re supposed to spend the rest of your life writing music for other people and producing their stuff.”
“Did Mother put you up to this?” Rhyson levels a cold stare at me. “I knew it. You come here all ‘I want my brother back’, but this is your agenda. Their agenda. To get me under their control again.”
“Fuck you, Rhyson.” The words erupt from the pool of lava boiling in my belly. “I’m the one who has made any effort to maintain a relationship between us, not you.”
“Yeah, and I know why.” His anger, which matches mine, slams into me. “They couldn’t get me back themselves, so they use you to manipulate me.”
“Use me?” A bark of laughter hurts my throat. “Why would they ever think I had any influence over you? When have you ever cared about me, Rhyson? If they didn’t know by the absolute disregard you had for me when you lived at home, surely they would have known by the way you cut me out of your life when you left.”
The anger on his face stutters, going in and out like a bulb with a short.
“Wait. Known what?” Bewilderment puckers his expression. “What would they know, Bristol?”
“That you haven’t ever given a damn about me.” Emotion overtakes me, inundating my throat, burning my face, saturating my eyes. “They have to know that. I certainly do.”
“That isn’t true, Bris.” He runs a hand through his hair, his movements jerky. “Look, this escalated fast. I shouldn’t have—”
“No, you shouldn’t have.”
Someone entering the studio silences us both, curtailing our argument. A guy around our age wearing headphones looped around his neck pauses, watching the three of us cautiously.
“Sorry.” He adjusts his black-rimmed glasses. “Rhys, am I early or . . .”
“No. We, um . . . I’m ready.” Rhyson propels a sigh, looking at me. “Bristol, I—”
“Are we going to this club or what?” I cut him off, slicing a look Grip’s way.
“Uh . . .” Grip’s eyes skid from me to my brother. “Maybe you should—”