Give Me Love (3 page)

Mac emerged from the wardrobe as I struggled to my feet.

“What are you doing?” she asked in disbelief, as though flopping around on the floor like a trout was something I was doing for fun. “We need to get going.”

I glared. “I’m trying to get dressed, asshead.”

I smoothed the long curls of hair that ran down my back, an attempt at fixing the mess created from clothing whiplash, and flung the babydoll top over my new lacy creation. As I moved to examine my appearance in the full length mirror behind the wardrobe door, Mac came to stand behind me.

“Just say yes.”

I heard a quaver in her voice and had no doubt she believed with all her heart that Jared and I were meant to be. I couldn’t help but feel partial responsibility for that particular belief.

I met her eyes. “No.”

“Sandwich,” she growled. “I want you happy. I want Jared happy. The two of you together would equal giant rainbows of happiness.”

I couldn’t help but laugh at her earnest, yet idiotic expression which changed to hopeful when I didn’t reply.

Mac nodded her head approvingly and pointed at me. “Shoes.”

At that, she spun on her heel and vacated the room.

I clambered for a pair of black stilettos from the chaos that was now my wardrobe and gave up breathing as I bent over to slip them on. These shoes were the David Copperfield of the stiletto world. They might have looked like skyscraping gems of leather strappage, but in reality it would likely take threats of scissors and at least half an hour to get them off later tonight.

I stood up with a gasp, my face red from the exertion of performing magical deeds.

“Hurry up, asshead!” Mac shouted up the stairs.

I rolled my eyes, because this was the Eyerolling Convention after all, grabbed my bag, and headed down the stairs to the car where everyone was waiting.

Chapter Two

“Up and in the shower, Sandwich!”

Mac’s voice sounded far away because I was happily burrowed deep beneath the fluffy white mounds of my bed, busy reflecting on last night’s success.

The White Demon Warehouse had been filled to capacity just like Mac assured us it would be. The venue was more than worthy of launching our band, Jamieson, into success. Only a repeat booking would provide the concrete evidence, so we'd remain on tenterhooks until Mac had spoken to their manager Marcus and received some feedback.

The White Demon was located in the heart of the city, just a drunken stumble to Central Station, and displayed a retro red brick façade, white panelled windows, and high lofty ceilings for acoustical brilliance. Several bars dotted the interior, allowing enough alcoholic lubrication to launch a rocket, and burly bouncers swarmed the four entry points, ensuring drunken degenerates were given the boot.

I felt hands make contact and give a tickle to the body protected by the thick white covers. I chuckled and burrowed in further.

“She’s awake.” I heard Henry’s muffled voice.

The covers were whipped off, and I shrieked at the sudden bright rays of light, squinting at Mac and Henry as they piled on my bed.

I squeezed out a squeal as I yawned and stretched aching muscles, exhausted after last night’s efforts. It felt far too early to be doing something as energetic as getting in the shower like Mac suggested.

“What’s going on?” I muttered tiredly.

“Mum and Dad are having a barbecue lunch today. Spur of the moment. They were disappointed they missed seeing you last night, so they want us there.”

I was disappointed I’d missed seeing Steve and Jenna too. Mac’s parents were like my surrogate mum and dad since my own were no longer around. My dad—a very loose term—Ray, was big on sailing, and when I was five, he’d gotten on his boat one day and never returned. It would be nice to believe that the choice of leaving us was out of his hands, even if that meant he’d died, but there’d been a couple of random sightings of him by family friends, so the truth was that he just didn’t want us anymore. Sometimes, I think it must have broken my mum’s heart more knowing that rather than if he’d died. For me it doesn’t hurt, not in a devastating break your heart kind of way, because I didn’t know him. There was just an empty space where a dad was supposed to be. Random snippets sometimes flitted through my mind of him on the boat as the harsh sun beat down, laughing, directing my older brother Coby on hoisting sails, urging me out of the way, but they were blurry, and sometimes I wondered if they really happened.

My mum, Nance, wasn’t around much. She worked long hours in an investment banking firm. That had never been an issue for me because when she was home and with you, she was
with
you. Her focus didn’t waver, and Coby and I knew, without her needing to say, that we were the most important part of her life. The hard work was done for us, a single mother trying to do it all for her kids.

She died the day of my sixteenth birthday. She’d left at four in the morning just so she could get through her work to leave early and help set up for my party. I was bitterly disappointed when she hadn’t arrived and set about doing it all myself. I left school early that Friday to be there and angrily strung up balloons, thinking that I’d never asked for much, just Mum’s time, and on the day of my sixteenth birthday party of all days, work had come first. Only an hour after the party was under way, Coby found me in the kitchen chatting to my friend Cam. His pale, anxious face and the fact that he’d snatched my wrist, dragging me upstairs to my room without a word, was cause for alarm. When he delivered the news that Mum had died in a car accident, I didn’t cry or turn hysterical. Adrenaline kicked in and I nodded quietly and returned to the party, realising Coby had told Henry first because guests were already disappearing en masse towards the door. I calmly accepted hugs and tears from closer friends, and when the door closed behind the last guest, Coby and Henry looked on, their eyebrows drawn together in similar expressions of worry as I set about pulling down balloons, binning rubbish that littered the house, and packing food away in the fridge. I still looked back on my response that day and marvelled at how I managed to just pack it away and pull myself together. Apparently, I was good in a crisis.

Later that night, Coby and Henry urged me into the shower, thinking that maybe the shock of the water might alleviate some of the adrenaline and let the emotion through. The fact that I sat on the floor of the shower for over an hour as the water beat down on my curled sobbing form told me their idea had been a good one. Unfortunately, I’d packed it away again the next day, and that was when my life had started to spiral out of control. Turning to both men and alcohol wasn’t the ideal way to heal the horrible sensation of abandonment, but it certainly helped me forget, and for brief moments I felt wanted. Thankfully, Coby forgave me for those years even though I’d put him through hell. At seven years my senior, and in the middle of finals, I figured being saddled with a sixteen year old female was probably already hell in itself.

“Earth to space cadet,” Mac sing-songed, snapping her fingers in my face and I blinked away the memories.

“They’re putting on a barbecue just for us?”

Mac’s parents lived in the Sydney suburb of Balmain, still in the same house Mac grew up in until she moved to Melbourne on scholarship and found us. They’d been excited about coming to our first Sydney show last night, but we hadn’t finished playing until well after midnight. Being in their early fifties, they weren’t the die-hard mosh pit types, well not anymore, and they left at a sensible hour.

“Yep,” she replied.

“That’s really nice, but um, why does that mean we need to be up at the hour of...whatever hour it is?”

Henry and Mac shared a meaningful smirk.

“Because Mac wants to head over there early to help Jenna set up,” Henry offered as he stole the pillow out from under my head and propped it behind his back.

“Hey!” I made a grab for the pillow. “Does she want me there to help too or do you need a lift?”

Mac didn’t own a car and neither did Henry. They hadn’t needed one in Melbourne. Most places had been within walking distance, and I had my Toyota Hilux and the Rice Bubbles had their van, so they borrowed either when needed.

“No...no, but maybe you can make your slice?” Henry suggested, pressing his back hard into the pillow as I tried to pry it away from him.

My lemon coconut slice was popular on the Melbourne uni circuit because it had the perfect ratio of biscuit base to lemon icing and had a tart chewy crunch that almost made your toes curl.

“Sure,” I said on a yawn, stretching again, and when Henry shifted, I snatched my pillow back in triumph. Fluffing it and then tucking it back under my head I asked Mac, “But how are you getting there then?”

Henry and Mac once again looked at each other with raised eyebrows, and before I could make threats of violence to find out what they were up to, a voice called out from the stairway and my question was answered.

I jabbed an angry finger at both Mac and Henry as they crowded my bed. “You sneaky interfering fuckers,” I hissed. “You both need to worry about your own damn love lives and stop interfering in my own.”

Shit.

“In here, Jared,” Mac shouted.

Double shit.

I’d successfully managed to evade Jared last night, but it wasn’t through any magical tricks from my bag of, well, magical tricks. After the show, my band mates had left the dressing room for the bar, the roar of the DJ thumping through the air as they’d made their exit. I’d stayed behind, mostly because I was still in the throes of avoiding Jared and somewhat because my makeup had sweated off under the blinding bright lights of the stage and needed a serious overhaul. Then Mac had busted through the door, in the way only Mac could, and delivered the news that Jared and Coby had been called out for work and exited the warehouse half an hour ago. I squashed the feelings of disappointment like a pesky bug and summoned up a smile of delight to put Mac off the scent. Jared was likely off to shoot at a few criminals before blowing up a small building or two.

Jared earned his living dealing in mayhem and chaotic violence, just like my brother Coby. They both co-owned
Jamieson and Valentine Consulting
here in Sydney, along with Mac’s other brother Travis. Coby fitted in well with the Valentine brothers, having met Jared when he’d visited Mac in Melbourne one weekend a few months after she’d moved. Happy I was settled and doing well at uni, and seemingly done with my years of spiralling out of control, Coby moved to Sydney and their consulting business was born. To be honest, none of us were sure what the
consulting
part meant; the term was conveniently vague in my opinion, but I knew they had contracts from various government agencies and mostly dealt in hostage negotiations, kidnapping, and ransom.

After being in business for five years, their operation expanded and they now had a huge team in place as well as gaining another co-owner, Casey. I knew they’d been shot at on more than one occasion. Travis was actually hit once in the shoulder. Jared was knifed two different times, and Casey rolled his car during a full-on, hair raising, police flashing, siren screaming car chase down Motorway 5 in Sydney’s south-west. It seemed they had their fingers in every dangerous pie across the city of Sydney and would soon be running out of hands. Once, while I was busy trying to recuperate from a hangover on the couch of my Melbourne apartment, I saw Coby on the news running full pelt down a back alley, shouting and gun in hand, before it cut to the news reporter on the street. My heart almost closed up shop and moved to another city. I told Coby he had to remove
consulting
from their sign and change their name to
Jamieson & Valentine: Badass Brigade
.

Henry laughed and Mac smirked as I tried to smooth the birds nest that was my hair and hurriedly wiped under my eyes to make sure no smudged mascara residue lingered there.

Why hadn’t I jumped in the shower like Mac told me to? I was now desperately lamenting my laziness. The first time I’d met Jared I’d fared no better.

It was the first time Jared had visited Melbourne and became friends with my brother. Henry and I hadn’t known Mac before uni; she answered our online ad to share a three-bedroomed apartment with the two of us. Jared had stopped in for a weekend visit from Sydney to see with his own eyes that Mac was happily settled and not getting into any trouble. He didn’t actually say that last part, but it was definitely implied. The fact that we were uni students in a band meant that troubles did abound on a regular basis, however, we weren’t housing any plans on announcing said troubles to an overprotective older brother. We had a party apartment. It was within walking distance to the uni bar and featured lots of timber flooring that forgave rivers of vodka spillage and unfortunate barfing with reckless regularity.

His arrival was unannounced, so when the knock came at the door, I was prone on the couch, Mac was on the floor, and Henry was somewhere in between both. The three of us were hungover, motionless, and watching a music video marathon with all the enthusiasm of a goldfish on Christmas day.

A quick and silent rock, paper, scissors ensued, and the loser, which was always me, staggered off with a numb backside to open the door.