Page 239 of Silver Sweet

“I’m wearing more than underwear,” I snap, but yeah, I didn’t grab a shirt. Just gray sweatpants. “So you dug into my arrest? I’m guessing.”

“Correct.”

“And here I thought I was as relevant to you as the fifteen-day lifespan of a housefly,” I say tightly.

“The boyfriend has a good memory.” His tone is more bored than impressed. “And clearly your relevancy has increased now that you’re in a relationship with Tom.” He opens the door wider. “Field mice have a lifespan of about a year. That’s where you’re at.”

Calling himBritannicais on the tip of my tongue, but I have no time to get the words out—he’s heading back into his room. I follow before the door can slam in my face.

He’s staying in a presidential suite.

Fancy.

I trail him past a full bar and through a spacious living room with marble floors and a baby grand piano. A movie, maybeChildren of Men, blares from the TV, but Charlie shuts it off with the remote.

We end up in a formal dining room—where his bodyguard, Oscar Oliveira, is eating breakfast from a spread of fruit, cheeses, croissants, and eggs. His expression is caged as he sips his coffee.

I remind myself he’s not out to get me.

I’ve chatted with Oscar post-show several times since he’s been following The Carraways on tour with Charlie. He cracks jokes and pumps up the Cobalt Empire like they’re his favorite sports team. Plus, I’m friends with his little sister.

Joana, Harriet, and I have kept up our Wednesday dinners every time Tom attends his family ones in Philly.

“You were arrested at a concert venue in Boston,” Charlie tells me, going to the head of the table. “That came out in the background check. I was perfectly fine not digging any deeper because frankly, I just don’t fucking care. But Beckett cares. So as a favor, I dug into it for him.”

My nose flares. “Favors, I get. I have plenty of those with my brother,” I say, a little stilted because I’m on edge, and I just grip the back of a chair in a half-lunge. “Charlie…” I trail off when he returns to me with an electronic tablet.

I’m caught off guard. He taps the screen, then spins it toward me. My insides twist so painfully, I almost black out. A grainy video is playing.

A video I’ve neverseen but one I’velived.I didn’t know there was footage of that night.

The night I ruined Sophomore Summer. It was the last concert we ever played. Fuck, it was the last time we ever playedperiod.

The concert was held at a tiny venue in Boston. Standing room only with two floors. Someone must’ve filmed from the balcony. Despite the bad quality, there’s a bird’s-eye view of the worst night of my life, and I can barely watch myself stand up from behind the drum kit.

I look young.

And so much angrier.

The heckler in the audience interrupts the fifth song in our set. “Lame ass music!! Guy on guitar!! Yeah, you, bitch!! Give me a refund!! YOU SUUUCK!!” He’d been shouting the whole concert, mostly at Birdie, and I finally snapped.

My response is raw fury as I reach the edge of the stage. “MAN, JUST LEAVE! STOP RUINING EVERYONE’S FUCKING TIME!!”

He laughs shrilly over the video, and I lose it, dropping down into the pit. The small audience doesn’t part like I’m a cannon blast. They tug at my clothes and touch me as I dig toward the heckler.

I throw one punch, then two. I have him on the floor.

My brother hurriedly unstraps and shrugs off his guitar onstage. I’ve never seen the fear in his eyes from that night. Not until now. He’s screaming, “PHOENIX!” and hopping down into the crowd after me.

I push the tablet into Charlie’s chest. “Shut it off.”

Charlie surprisingly pauses the video. He overturns the tablet on the table. “Does Tom know about Heath Foley?” He names my old college friend…the lead singer of Sophomore Summer.

“No.” My heart is racing. “How doyouknow about Heath?”

“The video.”

“Oh my God. It’s in the video?” I fall into a chair, my face in my hands. My eyeballs feel like swollen balls of fire. I drag my fingers up through my hair and try to breathe. “I was onlycharged for assaulting that fucking heckler.” Birdie ended up dragging me outside. I went back in—second mistake.