Page 18 of Rescue

“You have brothers?”

She shakes her head. “No. But pushy bandmates is something I can relate to.”

We sit in silence for a moment. “Is that why you needed to get out of there?” I ask. “Bandmates bugging you?”

She shakes her head but doesn’t answer. It’s dark in the alleyway, but I somehow get the feeling that if I were able to see her face better she would look a lot more like the girl I saw in the rehearsal space than the one whose beauty just took my breath away.

She clears her throat. “Crowds sometimes are… hard for me.”

“Me too.”

She snorts. “We picked a damn good career to go into then, huh?”

I find myself chuckling, a reaction I never would have imagined myself capable of only a few moments ago. Haylee laughs too, and the sound makes my breath catch.

“Your brothers don’t seem to mind the crowd.”

“Are you kidding me? My brothers are attention whores. They freaking love the crowd. Any crowd.”

She laughs again, and I’m reminded of the feeling I got when we got nominated for our first Grammy award.

“So you’re the quiet brother?” she asks, her voice playful.

“Is it that obvious?”

“There’s always a quiet brother,” she says.

“Then I guess that would be me.”

“That’s good to know. Before the tour starts.”

“So you can avoid me and my maudlin ways?”

My eyes are adjusting to the darkness, and I can see that she’s smiling. “On the contrary. I like quiet.”

“Me too.”

And we sit there in the quiet for a long time, a few feet away from each other, the alley dark around us. A lot of people would be uncomfortable, just sitting there with a near stranger without talking. But Haylee doesn’t seem to mind. As for me, I’m feeling better than I have all night. There’s something comforting about it. Sitting in the dark without having to say a word. Without the pressure to fill the silence.

“Why didn’t I meet you before?” she finally asks. “Back in Houston. I only remember Reed and Cash.”

“We did meet. But I was by myself. And I didn’t tell you who I was.”

She’s watching me, squinting at my face like she’s trying to remember. “Why not?”

I shrug. “You were standing on your own, drinking a beer. And you’d just finished your set. I didn’t want to bug you. Sometimes… people get a little weird when they realize who we are. Who my brothers are, at least. Lots of times they don’t recognize me and…” I realize that I’m babbling. “Anyhow. I told you that you played a good set, and you thanked me. Not very memorable.”

She’s still watching me. “I wish I had known.”

I shrug. “No big deal.”

She makes a funny noise in the back of her throat. “Well, the only thing I do remember is Cash. I was pretty wasted, to be honest. But I remember Cash—”

“He hit on you.” It’s not a question. I already know the answer. It was before Sam. Of course he hit on her.

“Yeah.”

“And that’s all you remembered about us.” I have a sudden memory of her face at the rehearsal space, how pissed she looked when she started that last song. I’d gotten the feeling then that she didn’t think very much of us. “He’s gotten a lot better,” I assure her.