With Vengeance Read Online Free PDF

bottle to his and then
Cliff’s bottles, as well as Klement’s coffee mug.
    The bassist looked around at them all then
asked, “Well, should we jam a bit?”
    Without waiting for a response, he left the
kitchen, gesturing for them to follow. Down the hall and up the
stairs, the music room was even more impressive than Kinley had
described it the night she and Viciӧus stayed here. Countless
guitars, basses, even a banjo and a mandolin hung from the walls.
Huge amplifiers stood in every corner, except for one taken up by a
drum kit. One side of the room was dedicated to recording
equipment, complete with a mixing board and a small computer.
    Cliff waved her over, a B.C. Rich guitar
hanging low on his hip from the shoulder strap. Kat’s awe returned.
After years of listening to his voice on her stereo and admiring
him from the audience at concerts, she’d never imagined she would
be this close to him.
    Reverently, she took out her guitar and
settled the strap over her shoulder. Holy Shit, I'm about to jam
with Bleeding Vengeance!
    “You can plug in here.” Cliff pointed at a
huge Marshall amp. “And the pedals are over there.”
    Kat hooked up her guitar and did some last
minute adjustments on the strings before palming her pick. Roderick
settled back behind his drums, and Klement lifted his Rickenbacker
bass from a stand in the corner. As he bent over to plug it in, Kat
couldn’t help watching. She hadn’t expected him to have such a cute
butt. Cliff had plugged in his guitar when she turned back to him,
and she felt a twinge of regret at missing the view.
    Klement turned to Kat and the band. “What do
you say we start with ‘Bring Out Your Dead,’ to see how she grooves
with us before we move on to the new stuff?”
    Cliff and Roderick nodded in agreement, and
Kat felt a wave of relief and gratitude. “Bring Out Your Dead” was
one of their biggest hits and she knew it by heart. It also had one
of the most awesome—but difficult—guitar solos she’d ever learned.
They were going easy on her, but not too easy.
    In tandem, Roderick and Klement began with
throbbing bass and rolling drums. Kat struck the first shredding
cords right on cue as Cliff chimed in with the rhythm guitar. Kat’s
worries and awareness of her surroundings faded away as she became
lost once again in the song, in its joyful brutality. She was
merely jamming, or playing a gig at one of her local bars. It might
well have been Kinley to her right at the mike stand, Laura on bass
on her left, and Bev on drums behind them.
    Cliff’s rough velvet voice shattered the
illusion, nearly making Kat’s fingers slip on the strings, but she
managed to hold the note and progress to the next. She closed her
eyes and pretended Cliff’s voice was just on the stereo and she was
rocking out at home. Unable to stop herself, she started
head-banging, fingers dancing on the fret board in ecstasy, and
when it came time for her solo, the music had overtaken Kat’s
consciousness to the point where it didn’t matter whether she was
playing with Bleeding Vengeance in their living room, at an open
mike night, or alone in her basement childhood bedroom. Her hair
flew and her hips swayed, and her hands wrought symphonic fire.
    Too soon, the song ended. Kat struck the
final chord on her Gibson, power coursing through her. Then the
silence crowded in like white static and her fingers trembled to
chase it away.
    Roderick broke the silence. “Brilliant,
love.”
    Cliff eyed her with new respect. “Not
bad.”
    Klement nodded before giving the others an
inscrutable look. “Now ‘Sorrow’s Harvest’ again.”
    His fingers danced so rapidly across the bass
strings that Kat became almost too distracted staring at him. God,
he was good.
    Sucking in a breath, she began her part just
in time. Her earlier joy dampened in the midst of her intense
concentration on getting the song right. Still, triumph filled her
with every chord she perfectly executed.
    Just as she was