“Drew, get Dee a drink. Something strong.”
When I got to her office, I told her everything. All about Jake. She put her arm around me and patted my back.
“Why did Alex keep that from me?” I asked. “It doesn’t make what he did any better? He was still driving the car. It just makes me look like an idiot for not knowing.”
“Hell, girl, you were just a kid. People aren’t going to tell you that kind of thing. And then, after he died, they didn’t want to drag out the dirty laundry. Probably not many people in your hometown knew, anyway. And it could sound a lot worse than what it was.”
I nodded. That made sense. But Jake wasn’t the squeaky clean guy I’d believed in. He’d had secrets.
“I need to talk to Pete,” I said. “I need to get this sorted out.”
She nodded. “Wait a minute. I’ll relieve him at the bar so he can chat to you.”
“Hey, sorry I had almost sex in your office.”
She smiled and slipped out of the room. A moment later, Pete knocked on the door.
“I hope this is important,” he said. “I’m working.”
“Sit down.” I folded my legs, preparing myself for this conversation. “We need to talk about Jake.”
“Alex said he’d kill me if I told you anything.”
Which, in itself, meant there was something to tell. Pete was lousy at keeping his mouth shut.
“You aren’t telling me anything, you’re confirming what I heard elsewhere. Whole different situation.”
He nodded.
“The night that Jake died, was he doing drugs?”
Pete didn’t meet my eyes. He looked around for a moment.
“Do you really want to open all that up? It’ll be messy.”
Like Pete hadn’t already opened it up. He had some ulterior motive in wanting me to know this. I’m not sure if it was get in good with Alex, which had backfired anyway, or he just wanted to hurt me.
“I need to know.”
“Then, yes, he was. He was a god-awful mess. There’s no way he could’ve driven that car. It was up to Alex to drive. You probably don’t want to know this, Dee, but we were worried he’d overdose that night.”
“Why didn’t you tell me this in the first place, after he died?”
“What? No way. You and your parents, you didn’t have to know anything. You were mourning. None of us wanted to mess with his memory.”
“So, why now?”
“Because Alex is crazy about you and you won’t give him a chance. Before, it was just about Jake. He could take his secrets to the grave. Then you wanted revenge on Alex, but I figured, once you came face to face with him, that would change. But the bitterness is still there. It’s not fair to Alex to blame him. It’s not just about you and it’s not about Alex. This revenge shit is going to ruin our band. This is my career, not a toy for you to play with.”
I didn’t want to ask Pete about the woman or the dick pics. My brother’s sex life was his own business. It’d be ick to get the details. I didn’t want to know any more about the drugs either.
This didn’t make Alex any less culpable.
“One thing, why didn’t you drive?”
Pete gave a strange grin. “You know I regret that, Dee. I’ve regretted it every day since.”
Alex
The time in the recording studio had been a dream. No false starts, no screw ups. I’d gone in knowing exactly what I wanted. The sound engineer was on the same page. Couldn’t be more perfect.
Saturday night, we had our support slot for Holden’s band. Not at Trouble but Mansgrove Arena. That place was huge and Holden would be able to pack it out. It’d be a massive boost. We’d win those punters over and be on the way.
I left the studio, feeling everything was right with the world.
When I got to Trouble, Holden was at the bar. The look on his face made me pause. He was an easy-going guy, it wasn’t often he didn’t have a smile.
“What’s wrong?” I asked.
“The opener’s pulled out for Saturday. Last minute thing. Apparently, their guitarist has a burst appendix. My manager’s been calling around but it’s such short notice.”