Hard Rock Desires - Athena Wright Page 0,2

instruments for sound check,” a guitar tech said as he came up to us.

The tech held his hand out to take Finn’s bass. He growled, clutching it to his chest.

“I’ll do it,” the bass guitarist said stubbornly.

Some things still stayed the same, though, no matter what. I hid a grin. You’d have thought the damn thing was solid gold, the way Matthew Finnley treated his bass.

“Think you can find someone from the venue to turn up the A/C?” I asked the tech.

“It’s broken,” the man said. “That’s what I heard from one of the staff. It got overworked and blew a fuse or something.”

“Shit,” I said.

“Told you,” Finn said. “Too many people. We should have lowered the number of tickets.”

“We would have disappointed too many fans.”

“Then I guess you’ll just have to suffer.”

“The price we pay for fame.” I reached into the cooler for a bottle of water, but a waiting assistant rushed up before I could bend over more than an inch.

“Here you go,” she said breathlessly, shoving a bottle into my hands.

“Thanks, love,” I winked at her.

She stammered and blushed, leaving Finn to fish through the bucket himself. He ignored the bottles of water and grabbed a can of beer instead. He popped the tab and took his own handful of chugs. The assistant recovered in time to reach for the half-empty can, more than willing to be a cup holder. He handed it over and held her gaze.

“I haven’t seen you before.” Finn let his fingers linger over hers as she took the can from him. “I thought I knew all the venue staff. Are you new?”

“Yes,” she squeaked. “I just started last week.”

A shark-like smile spread across his face.

“I bet you haven’t been to an after-party yet, have you?” he asked.

She shook her head, eyes so wide she looked like Bambi.

“You should join us tonight after the concert,” he said smoothly. “I’d like to see you there.”

Her fingers clenched down on the can so hard it crinkled, her face turning purple and ears going red.

And that was another one down for the count. If that idiot kept making the assistants swoon, we’d have no one to do the actual assisting.

I pressed the bottle of cold water to the back of my neck.

“Stupid, shitty, broken A/C,” I muttered.

“If you’re that hot, I can dump that bucket of ice water all over your head,” Finn suggested.

“Don’t you fucking dare,” I replied.

But his blue eyes sparkled with evil glee, and I knew he was seriously considering it.

“I’m going to go check on Anya,” I said hastily.

Finn’s evil look eased into concern.

“Is she doing okay?” he asked.

“Same as always, last I checked.”

“So that’s a no.”

“She’ll be all right,” I said. “It’s getting better lately, I think.”

“Is it?” Finn asked doubtfully.

“Mr. Finnley?” the guitar tech asked fretfully. “The sound check?”

I left Finn to play tug-of-war with his bass, feeling sorry for the poor tech. The guy was just doing his job. It wasn’t his fault Finn was such a drama queen about his instrument.

There were dozens of people milling around backstage, mostly techs, assistants, and other venue staff.

“Hey, there,” I stopped one of the staff wearing a lanyard around her neck with a soft touch on her arm. “Is it true the A/C’s broken?”

She stopped, expression startled. She looked down at my fingers on her elbow, then twisted her head all around, like she thought I might have been talking to someone else.

“I heard it blew its fuse,” I continued.

She realized I was talking to her, and her cheeks went red. She bobbed her head regretfully. “We’ve called someone in to fix it, but it might take an hour or more.”

Shit. Once we got on stage, those spotlights were going to be brutal. Finn had been right about my clothes. Maybe I could peel my shirt off if I got too hot. The fans would love that. Shirtless rock star in leather pants? Fuck, they’d go wild.

Hm. Maybe this whole broken A/C situation was a blessing in disguise.

I kept the idea in the back of my mind as I searched out the dark corners and closed off rooms in the venue for my lead singer.

Since this wasn’t one of our huge stadium concerts, just a small fans-only live, I was pretty sure Anya would be all right. The excuse got me away from Finn, though, before he could go ahead with his ice bucket prank. I knew that dick would be tempted to go through with it now that the idea