The Girl's Got Secrets (Forbidden Men 7)

Clenching my teeth to hold back my retort, I glared at Galloway, envisioning all the ways I could murder him. None of them were pretty. Or fast.

“Which brings up another reason we shouldn’t have a girl in the group,” Holden finally put in his two cents worth, his voice soft as he winced. “With Gally around, you’d be suing us within five minutes for sexual harassment.”

I rolled my eyes. “Trust me, I can handle the little goat fucker talking smack.” I glanced at Galloway with disinterest. “As long as he keeps his hands to himself, I don’t give a shit what he says.”

Wiggling his fingers, Galloway grinned. “Oh, but these hands like to roam, baby. Especially over a landscape like yours.”

Oh, brother.

“Galloway,” Asher bit out, his voice a warning. Then he turned to me and shook his head. “I’m sorry; this just isn’t the right place for you. I’m sure you have an amazing talent, but we need to get back to our auditions now. We kind of have a time crunch.”

My throat went dry and I once again experienced the overwhelming need to sob. But I held it in. Gritting my teeth, I glanced at all three members, who gazed back with three different expressions on each of their faces, waiting for my response.

“So you all would rather be just another rock band cliché?” I asked. “With your leather pants—” I pointed toward Galloway with a disgusted wrinkle of my nose before targeting Holden. “—tattoos and piercings, and hot lead singer man-whore.” With a scathing glance at Hart, I set my hands on my hips. “Good luck getting anywhere with that.”

Sniffing my derision, I spun around and marched toward the exit, only to pause at the door and glance back. “Oh, and maybe you should Google Karen Carpenter, Moe Tucker and Honey Lantree. All were female drummers for big time mixed-gender bands. Certainly bigger than you losers will ever be. Chinguen a su madre.”

I didn’t slam the door as the drummer who’d tried out before me had. But it obviously only took one look at my face for all the others waiting in the hall to know just how badly I had failed.

Tucking my pink drumsticks back into my hip pocket with all the dignity I could muster, I lifted my head proudly and swallowed down the pain.

My so-called pal next in line smirked. “Didn’t want a chick, did they?” The gleam in his eyes told me he’d known I wouldn’t make it all along.

I didn’t honor him with a response. Notching my chin higher, I strolled regally down the hall, out of the studio and into the dismal, cloudy day. I didn’t burst into tears until I’d gotten into my car and was pulling out of the studio’s parking lot, the defeat making me drippier and even more pissed that I had to own ovaries and so many freaking emotions.

Thirty minutes after the ruin my life had become, I turned down the volume of “I Love It” by Icona Pop on the radio and parked a block away from Castañeda’s Mexican restaurant.

Face wiped free of the thick black eyeliner and lipstick I’d worn to the audition from hell, I checked my reflection to ensure my eyes were no longer red and puffy. When I saw myself, though, I snorted. Proof of my tear-fest might be gone, but I looked hideous anyway—as virginal and Christianly as a Sunday-school teacher. And yet I knew my uncle still wouldn’t approve. The tyrant preferred me in turtlenecks and cardigans over drab, ankle-length skirts made of sackcloth. But I had compromised as best I could with jeans—the denim ripped out in the knees—and a loose black sweater that liked to dip off one

shoulder and revealed the strap of my purple tank top—to match the purple highlights in my hair.

My punk-rocker wig gone, I finger combed my dark mane one last time and then grabbed my purse.

I bypassed the main entrance of Castañeda’s and ducked down the alley beside it, calling a greeting to Mick, the homeless guy who camped out there and waited for stray scraps.

After unlocking the back door of the restaurant, I slipped inside and hung my jacket on a hook. Behind me, the radio played a familiar Latino tune while a humid heat crawled up the back of my sweater.

“If you keep coming in late, mi padre’s going to take a strap to you, prima.”

I yelped and spun around to find my cousin Big T, short for Tomás, mixing dough. Half a dozen raw, already stuffed and sealed empanadas sat on a cookie sheet ready to go into the oven. A hairnet covered his dark head of thick black hair and flour powdered his heavy arms up to his elbows.

“Cállate,” I muttered as I stashed my purse and found my own hairnet to slip on.

He belly laughed. “What’s this? I abandon my post at the stoves to take over your oven job for you and all I get is a shut up? In Español, no less. My sweet prima offends me.”

Realizing I had been bitchy to one of my favorite people on earth, I let out an apologetic sigh. “Plus a great big gracias and kiss on the cheek for my wonderful Big T.” I wrapped my arms around his wide barrel chest from behind and leaned over his shoulder to stamp a big, wet, sloppy one right to his cheek.

He flushed but grinned his appreciation as he shrugged me off and continued to mix the dough with his beefy hands. “Shoo. Enough of that. Tell me how your audition went. You must’ve done well if you stayed this late. Made the first cut, ¿sí?”

My smile dropped. “The audition? It was...bien.” I nudged him aside with my hip and took over where he’d left off, since the baking was technically my job. I put all my attention into pounding my palm into the dough that suddenly worked as a nice stress ball. Fold, pound. Flour. Fold, pound. Forget all auditions, sexy lead singers, and the tears it had brought. Flour. Fold, pound—

Tomás grasped my elbow. “Hijo de puta, it’s dead already. Stop torturing the poor dough.”

I scowled at him but obeyed, yanking up the rolling pin and flattening it into a disc. Crossing his arms over his chest, my perceptive cousin leaned his back against the table beside me as he studied my face.

“They’re not the only band around, you know.”

I ground my teeth, trying to ignore him as I snagged a knife, then a nearby plate to use as a stencil and cut the dough into perfect circles. “But they’re the best band.”