Casey rushed off, and I tried to keep up while thinking of an excuse to give Oni. The artists and repertoire rep wasn’t known for her welcoming personality. She was a bit of a hard-ass, but I’d been raised by the worst of them, so I told myself I could handle anything she threw at me.

I just hoped it wasn’t the door.

I wasn’t like the other musicians who’d clawed and scraped for this moment, this once-in-a-lifetime opportunity. Did I earn it? Yes. But it had never been my intention. Now, I couldn’t blow it, and it wasn’t because Oni had made it clear this would be my only shot.

I almost groaned out loud when “Lose Yourself” by Eminem began playing in my head.

Great.

I didn’t pay much attention to my surroundings as Casey led me to a conference room, but I couldn’t ignore the drastic change in atmosphere when I stepped inside the large room.

My gaze fell on Oni Sridhar first.

Brown skin, black hair, and even darker expression, the A&R rep looked understandably pissed as she sat at the long conference table. The apology I rehearsed was on the tip of my tongue when my nervous gaze shifted to the other occupants in the room.

Genuine surprise tasted tart like ripe, green apples—crisp, sour, sometimes sweet, and while mostly refreshing, this wasn’t one of those times.

The power running my brain flickered uncontrollably until blinking out completely—a total fucking blackout. When the backup generator finally kicked in, my first thought was that Casey had made a huge mistake. This was the wrong room, the wrong meeting.

It had to be.

And there wasn’t just one reason.

There were three.

The first leaned against the floor-to-ceiling windows. Bundled in a white hoodie with long arms folded, his gray gaze shone like silver, and the gold in them rivaled the center of our solar system beaming through the windows behind him. As that sun touched his black hair, I was tempted to run my fingers through the messy strands. His hair was so dark that the white cotton of his hoodie appeared starker than freshly fallen snow, his pierced lips a tempting pink like strawberry icing on a cupcake.

God, I wanted a taste.

The second lounged carelessly in a high-backed chair, his blond hair gelled and pushed off his forehead and tucked behind his ears. While he lazily chewed a stick of gum, I ran my gaze over his torso, unsurprised that the dress shirt he wore was splayed open, despite him being in the middle of a business meeting. He flaunted and seduced as if it were second nature. The strong column of his neck even sported the medallion he never seemed to be without. I’d never been close enough to see what was on it, but I was told it was his family’s crest. He’d been the only one of the three to come from money.

The final earth-shattering reason stood at the head of the conference table. His gray T-shirt was fitted enough to show off his impressive chest without making it obvious he wanted everyone else to notice too.

You know the type.

I admired his arms and the corded veins until my gaze reached his large hands planted on the table surface. When his finger tapped the wood impatiently, my gaze shot up to his styled brown hair, though not as thoroughly as his bassist, before finally meeting his gaze. Instantly, I was drowning in a forest of green. Instantly, he hated me.

Hester, give me strength.

My eyes had to be deceiving me.

What was unfolding…couldn’t possibly be.

The only flaw in my logic was that no one could ever mistake Houston Morrow, Loren James, and Jericho Noble.

It was them.

Bound.

Time stood still when she walked through the door.

Wearing a burlap sack and red hair like living fire, her brown eyes seemed to stretch wider than humanly possible when she realized who occupied the room. I was genuinely surprised she recognized us. I would even have been flattered if I weren’t so pissed. She looked like she’d come straight off the prairie. That hideous dress she wore covered her from neck to ankle. Her too-big eyes and lips made her look weird as fuck. And unpredictably stunning.

I couldn’t look away from the beautiful paradox, and there were a few reasons why.

The first was because she’d rudely interrupted me. I was in the middle of telling Carl Cole and his flunkies exactly how I liked my dick sucked when she barged in. Now I couldn’t think of anything other than enlightening her. Those lips of hers looked perfect for the job—even if the rest of her wasn’t up to the task. No way she wasn’t a virgin—not that she’d say no.

The seconds ticked by, too many of them, and she still hadn’t spoken. Her only reaction was her full lips parting. They were red and swollen like she’d been kissed to within an inch of her life. Even as my jealousy struggled to surface, I wondered if they were natural. My dick told me they were. My gut was too busy tying itself into an endless knot.

“Are you lost?” Loren inquired, always the first to be an asshole. “Or did you lose your voice in that ugly-ass dress?”

There were snickers drowned out by a throat clearing.

Carl.

The dick who owned this shady label, and now he was intervening before the fire rising in the girl’s eyes turned Loren to ash.

Shame. I would have enjoyed watching her try.

“Casey, can we help you?”

The intern looked ready to shit a brick when she realized her obvious mistake. “I’m sorry, sir. You told me to bring Ms. Fawn right away when she arrived.”

The room fell so quiet I wondered if they heard my nuts retracting back inside my body.

No.

Hell. No.

This could not be Braxton Fawn. To start, I assumed he’d be a dude. Even worse than Fawn being a woman was the fact that I wanted her.

As if only now remembering that she was responsible for this mess, Oni Sridhar shot to her feet. When the pain-in-the-ass A&R rep didn’t immediately dismiss the intruder, I stood up straight, catching the prairie girl’s reaction to my height.

Give me a break.

“Yes,” Oni confirmed as she strutted with too much confidence for my liking toward the door where her intern and the imposter stood. “This is the promising up-and-comer I was telling you about. I think Braxton is just what Bound needs to take it to the next level.”

“The next level?” Rich spat as he straightened from his position near the windows. It took a lot to anger him since he was supposed to be the nice one. Right now, he was pissed and rightly so. We’d given the world everything, and it still wasn’t enough. It never was. “Who’s your mom’s favorite band? Pink Floyd? I bet if Nick Mason gave her a million to suck his dick, she’d still suck mine for free.”

Oni whirled on her fuck-me pumps to face my drummer. Fucking her was what I should have done when I had half the chance. Now she couldn’t stand me, or any of us for that matter, and I hated whenever we breathed the same air. “Perhaps she would if my mom were still alive and Nick wasn’t over seventy years old. Are you done?”

I saw the regret in Rich’s eyes, but he didn’t offer an apology. Oni had already turned away. Before she could continue with her ludicrous pitch, Loren took his turn exploding.

“Please tell me you’re joking. This is Braxton? She’s our new guitarist?” My bassist didn’t move from his slouched position in the chair, but the vicious sneer he shot Braxton did the trick. “This chick looks like she just came from choir practice.”

Slowly, little Miss Fawn’s head turned. We weren’t prepared for the force of her full attention. The awe in her gaze when she’d stepped into the room was gone. Her doe eyes had sharpened and cut us down before she spoke.

“Actually, it was Bible study.”

Loren jerked as if someone had run an electric bolt through his heart before remembering he had the upper hand. “I don’t give a fuck if it was Bible camp. Get lost.”

Disappointment ripped through my chest when Oni cut in before Braxton could retort. I had no intention of letting some blushing virgin join Bound, so I was more than eager to have my fun with her while I could. Loren would eat her insolent ass alive, and I’d savor every second of it.

“You had your chance to find a replacement and knew what would happen if you didn’t. The tour starts in three months. You barely have any time left to rehearse.”

“We know the material,” Rich reminded her dryly. “We wrote it.”

“Braxton,” Oni said, emphasizing her name, “doesn’t.”

“Hello? Is anyone at home in there?” Lo inquired, tapping his own skull. “Or are you secretly blonde?”

“So, the pot calls the kettle.”

He ignored that. “If she doesn’t know our music, what makes you think she’s a good fit for our band?”

“You can teach her.”

Rich’s nostrils flared.

Loren rolled his eyes. “Not interested.”

“They don’t have to teach me,” Braxton announced. She’d found her damn tongue. A moment later, we all learned a valuable lesson.