Madelynne Ellis: Come Together

Mischief

An imprint of HarperCollins Publishers

77–85 Fulham Palace Road,

Hammersmith, London W6 8JB

www.mischiefbooks.com

Copyright © Madelynne Ellis 2014

Madelynne Ellis asserts the moral right to be identified as the author of this work.

A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library.

This novel is entirely a work of fiction. The names, characters and incidents portrayed in it are the work of the author’s imagination. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, events or localities is entirely coincidental.

All rights reserved under International and Pan-American Copyright Conventions. By payment of the required fees, you have been granted the non-exclusive, non-transferable right to access and read the text of this e-book on-screen. No part of this text may be reproduced, transmitted, down-loaded, decompiled, reverse engineered, or stored in or introduced into any information storage and retrieval system, in any form or by any means, whether electronic or mechanical, now known or hereinafter invented, without the express written permission of HarperCollins.

Ebook Edition © 2014 ISBN: 9780007579525

Version: 2014–09–04

Contents

Cover

Title Page

Copyright

Prologue

Chapter 1

Chapter 2

Chapter 3

Chapter 4

Chapter 5

Chapter 6

Chapter 7

Chapter 8

Chapter 9

Chapter 10

Chapter 11

Chapter 12

Chapter 13

Chapter 14

Chapter 15

Chapter 16

Chapter 17

Chapter 18

Chapter 19

Chapter 20

Chapter 21

Chapter 22

Chapter 23

Chapter 24

Chapter 25

Chapter 26

Chapter 27

Chapter 28

Chapter 29

Chapter 30

Chapter 31

Chapter 32

Chapter 33

Chapter 34

Chapter 35

Chapter 36

Chapter 37

Chapter 38

Chapter 39

Chapter 40

Chapter 41

Chapter 42

Chapter 43

Chapter 44

Chapter 45

Chapter 46

Chapter 47

Author’s Note

More from Mischief

About Mischief

About the Publisher

‘I should get you one of those,’ Xane remarked to his best friend Steve Matlock, pointing out the slogan on the T-shirt of the guy standing at the end of the VIP bar.

‘“I love to bang,”’ Steve read, and chuckled over the stick-figure drawing of a man beating the hell out of a set of drums. ‘Like it. Do you reckon there’s a whole set, so we can have one each?’ The pair were two sixths of the rock band Black Halo, and they’d just blown the frigging minds of the thousands-strong crowd around the main stage at the Sölvesborg Rock Festival with their explosive gothic freak-show. While the rest of the band members were still scrawling their signatures over various pieces of female anatomy, Xane and Steve had slipped into the VIP tent for some celebratory drinks. After all, it wasn’t every day you went platinum before breakfast and got to psych the crowd up for Ozzy in the evening. Xane figured he’d be riding this particular high for weeks, if not months. It’d been a long while coming, but their dedication was finally paying off.

‘What would Ash’s say?’

‘“I love licking,”’ Xane suggested. Their lead guitarist was widely rumoured to have a magic tongue. Chances were he was giving it a workout right now, charming the panties off their female fans in order to guarantee their future loyalty. It certainly spread the word about them more successfully than any flyer campaign.

‘Yeah, and “I love to touch base” for Paul. And maybe “I practise the rhythm method” for Spook.’

‘Except he doesn’t.’ Their rhythm guitarist Spook Mortensen didn’t need to employ contraceptive methods because he never had sex, a fact Xane still struggled to get his head around. He wasn’t sure how anyone managed to function without getting horizontal on a regular basis – like a minimum of three times a day and preferably more. Not that he insisted on being horizontal – he was equally happy getting his rocks off standing, sitting or swinging from the rafters. Hell, in pretty much any position imaginable. He was flexible like that. Xane was flexible about a lot of things, which was how he’d come to move on from the interesting shirt to the far more interesting body beneath it, and the very cute guy to whom it belonged. And he did mean very cute.

‘What would yours say?’ Steve asked, still focused on clothing slogans.

‘“Throat job.”’

‘“Throat job,” seriously? That makes it sound like you’re up for sucking dick … Oh!’ Steve caught up with the direction in which Xane’s thoughts had wandered. ‘I guess you are. You know that doesn’t guarantee he is?’

‘He is.’ The guy had been casting him not so surreptitious glances since they’d walked in.

‘I think it’s more likely he’s out to bang chicks.’

The guy had two of them hanging on his every word, but neither had his attention. That was hotly focused on Xane. The man was literally eating him up with that five-yard stare.

Xane didn’t recognise him but, with 30-something groups on the roster ranging from virtual unknowns to the megastars of the genre, that was no big surprise. What he did recognise was a man dedicated to his craft. You only got arms like that, a physique like that, through drumming. He knew. He’d admired Steve’s body often enough.

‘Can’t you stick to wrapping your lips around a bottle?’ Steve ordered them another two beers.

Xane whistled an uh-uh sound across the neck of his beer. Alcohol just didn’t give him the same warm and fuzzies as a robust workout. It had a habit of making him miserable instead, and tonight he intended to stay firmly in the happy camp. He was not going to wallow in the shitty events of his past. Fuck his siblings, fuck his parents and … you know, fucking sounded like a really good plan right now.

‘All right, so let’s go find ourselves some nice young ladies.’

‘Actually, I’m good with what’s on offer here.’

Steve turned his back to the bar and chugged another mouthful of beer. Concern lines furrowed the area between his wing-like brows. ‘Xane, he’s totally not hitting on you. He’s probably staring because we just played the best set of this festival.’

‘Totally is hitting on me. He’s itching to unwrap my dick and go down on me.’

The slap Steve gave the back of his head didn’t dispel the notion. Some things you just knew on a gut level, and this happened to be one of them.

‘Mate, if you go over there and suggest that, you’re going to get yourself beaten senseless.’

‘One hopes.’ So far, no one had given him an orgasm that good. Xane refused to be put off by Steve’s efforts to keep him on the straight and narrow. He didn’t see why everyone got so antsy about his mutable tastes. He patted down his jacket pockets, making sure he was all set for the fun ahead. He couldn’t remember the last time he’d been this happy and horny at the same time. Normally he fucked to achieve a state of contentment, and then used the little piece of cloud nine he landed on to float through the following hours without succumbing to the shit that messed with his equilibrium on a daily basis.

His response prompted Steve to pinch the bridge of his nose, which did nothing to remove the furrows. ‘You don’t know who he is. You don’t know where he’s been.’