Paint It Black

by Amy Lane

  “You think you sexed me out?”

  “I think I drained your balls dry,” Cheever taunted, enjoying the way Blake’s eyebrows tried to go up when he couldn’t actually open his eyes.

  “Let me nap now and we’ll see whose balls are dry.” Blake moaned then and buried his face in Cheever’s shoulder. “That so did not come out right.”

  “No, it did not. But that’s okay. I’ll be back tonight after your meeting. I’ll bring dinner.”

  “Briony left some stuff in the fridge already. Come after dinner.”

  “No, idiot. Jesus, you’re stubborn. We’ll eat dinner and watch TV and be a couple. Then we’ll drain your balls again.” Cheever chuckled again because ball jokes never grew old.

  “We’re a couple,” Blake said, and although his eyes were closed, his voice sounded very lucid. “So, when the girl puts the microphone in my face and says, ‘You seeing anybody, Blake?’”

  “You tell ’em you’re seeing Cheever Sanders,” Cheever whispered. This was Blake’s reality. He realized it was about to become his.

  “Okay. Okay. Just….” Blake’s sigh shook his body. “Don’t tell no one the secret stuff, okay? I never told any other lover that stuff. Just… I just trust you ’cause you’re Kell’s brother.”

  Cheever stroked his hair back from his face. “Blake, go to sleep. I’ll keep you safe. I promise.”

  Blake’s breathing evened out, and Cheever lay there, watching him sleep, thinking that in all the years of living in Outbreak Monkey’s shadow, he’d never felt so blessed at what that gave him. It gave him money and resources, his schooling and options.

  And it gave him Blake Manning’s trust, when it was obvious the only people Blake had trusted in his entire life were Cheever’s brothers.

  This man needed him—needed Cheever, specifically and particularly.

  And Cheever wasn’t going to let him down.

  “I LEFT him food,” Briony said, her voice unfriendly.

  “I realize that.” Cheever tried a smile, but her puckered, angry face didn’t relax one iota.

  “I brought an entire bag of groceries to that man’s refrigerator. I checked with Trav, and he authorized Rosa’s sister, Lily, to start working for us, specifically to take care of things in the studio house, and that includes Blake.”

  “Well, that is very organized, and I did not realize that,” Cheever told her, taking a deep breath. Wow. Kell’s wife was something extra. “But that is very good of you. Thank you.”

  “Why are you going through my refrigerator?” Briony asked, none of her unfriendliness going away.

  “Because, uh, I wanted to make him dinner tonight. You brought him sandwich fixings, and I was hoping for… I don’t know. A thing I could make.”

  “Do you even know how to cook?” She had a little line between her big brown eyes that was absolutely laser pointed in irritation.

  “I can make pasta,” he said. “I took a home ec class in college. I can—”

  “Look, Cheever. You are starting to sweat, and that pleases me. But Shelia and I keep this refrigerator like the pantry of God. Grant’s daughter, Katy? She’s allergic to nuts. Shelia’s kids? They get sick with milk products. My kids? They have gluten allergies. If you so much as move a container of leftovers from one side of the refrigerator to the other, you could kill somebody.”

  Cheever shut the refrigerator with a snap. “I’m so sorry.”

  “I have told Lily that you are fed for tonight. If you want to call in takeout, that’s fine. If you want to leave Lily a shopping list, that’s fine too. If you want to call the driver to come take you somewhere, you are shit out of luck, mister, because we are going to the zoo in five minutes and he is helping. If you want to borrow someone’s car, well, you need to talk to them. Do you know how to drive? Do you know how to drive in LA? Do you even know where your car is?”

  “Uh, yes, yes, and no.” Cheever thought with a shock that he hadn’t asked about his car. “I, uh…. Blake and Trav must have taken care of it.”

  “Then go upstairs and tend to Mackey. His stuff is in the drawer labeled ‘Mackey and Trav’ and in the cupboard to your right, also labeled ‘Mackey and Trav.’ You may have some of his crackers, but you can’t eat ’em all. You may even have some of his food, or the food labeled ‘Family Leftovers’—that is also acceptable.”

  “Thank you,” he said, seriously dripping sweat down the middle of his back in the air-conditioned kitchen.

  “What you can’t do,” she emphasized, poking him in the chest, “under any circumstances, is muck about in this refrigerator without knowing what the fuck you are doing.”

  Cheever nodded, pale. “Understood.”

  “You also can’t”—poke—“break Kell’s best friend again. Do you understand?”

  And now Cheever was sweating even more, and his face and ears were prickling. “I do,” he said. “I’m sorry. I’ll bring bottled water and juice upstairs, I promise.”

  “Feed him.”

  “I was try—”

  “I get that. I’m saying he’s got food there, feed him. Water him. But don’t break him.”

  Cheever nodded, closing his eyes. “Look, I didn’t know he’d get dehydrated. It was unintentional—”

  “Everything that happens to Blake Manning needs to be intentional, and it needs to be intentionally good. Do you understand me?”

  Cheever nodded, afraid, in awe and… and pretty much in love with Kell’s sweet-faced, fearsome warrior wife. “Thank you,” he said, kissing her unexpectedly on the cheek.

  “For ripping you a new asshole?”

  He shook his head. “For treating him like a brother. Let me get Mackey some foo—”

  “I’ll run it up before we leave. Go talk to him. Tell him how you sexed Blake out. It’ll do him good.”

  Cheever wasn’t going to gainsay her or second-guess her. He was simply going to flee.

  “YOU LOOK scared,” Mackey said, looking up from a tablet that seemed to be consuming his attention. “What did you do? The whole house could hear Briony chewing you out.”

  “I was going to put together a dinner to take to Blake—”

  Mackey’s eyes got big. “Are you insane? You don’t tamper with that woman’s kitchen. Her and Shelia, they’ve got that place dialed in. You stick to your own cupboard, you understand me?”

  “What if you want an Oreo in the middle of the night?” Cheever complained. No wonder this place was good for Marcia—it was more intensely regulated than the mental health facility.

  “You make sure she has it on the list!” Mackey rolled his eyes. “Jesus, man, I’m trying to save your skin here. Pay attention!”

  Cheever flopped into the seat next to Mackey’s bed, suddenly out of fight. “Mackey?”

  “Yeah?”

  “I’m in love with your second guitarist.”

  Mackey let out a breath. “Good. I’d hate to think you were throwing the family into this much confusion because you were dicking around with his heart.”

  Cheever laughed a little. “Okay. Good. As long as I know you’re okay with it—”

  Mackey waved the tablet in the air. “You should hear the songs he’s written about you, little brother. I’m not really okay with it—but God. The poetry. I can’t see any reason to break you two up when he’s making such gorgeous fucking rock and roll in your honor.” He set the tablet down and leaned back against the pillow with a sigh. “Best part of my day was getting those songs. Hope the guys do ’em justice.”

  “They will,” Cheever said, breaking out his sketch book. “They love him too.”

  “What you drawing there?” Mackey asked, some of his depression lightening up.

  “You. I want one of all the guys.”

  “Not here,” Mackey muttered fretfully, picking at the blanket over his midsection, leaving his cast poking out. “Not in bed. Not when I can’t fuckin’ move—”

  “I’ll get you later too,” Cheever said softly. Then, because he was s
tarting to learn. “Trust me here, Mackey. In your good and your bad. Trust me. I won’t do you wrong.”

  The look Mackey gave him was terribly young and terribly sad. “I’ll take your word for it,” he said bitterly. “It’s like you and Blake. Not much I can do about it anyway.”

  Cheever was sketching already, gnawing on his lower lip and taking in the fox-pretty features of his older brother. “You could make us miserable about it,” he said softly. “Thanks for trusting me not to.”

  “Augh!” Mackey fell back against the pillows and gazed listlessly at the television. “Please tell me we can play video games after this. Trav is no good at ’em, and you got some fuckin’ hope to not suck.”

  “I promise.”

  “Good.” Mackey closed his eyes, and the lines of pain etched his face. Cheever thought that if he could keep his brother from gnawing his own foot off while he was stuck in bed, he would have done his best goddamned deed ever.

  THEY FOLLOWED the same routine—video games, bullshitting, followed by sitting in via Skype on the meeting at the studio. Cheever made sure Mackey had his pain pill this time, and Trav made sure Blake was drinking orange juice and water, and the guys… well, the guys did this sort of magic thing. Cheever figured Blake had been working on those songs a while—well, some of them—but the guys had apparently taken his music ideas, swished them around in their head a little, and come back with some solid riffs and instrumentals, which they played as they discussed. Any doubts Cheever’d had about them finishing the solo album before they had to go back on tour in September were erased by the amazing gestalt his brothers created just by loving what they did.

  Cheever sketched Mackey while he was talking, just his face, with the sun coming in the window behind him, and when the meeting was done and the phone was off, he presented both sketches, the good and the bad, the happy and the sad, and the smile he got in return….

  He had to swallow twice just to breathe.

  “Those are so good, little brother. Those… you were going to do all the guys like this? Two sides of the coin? ’Cause that—oh my God, turn Skype back on!”

  At that moment, they heard the door downstairs slam and the guys—all of them, including Blake—talking up a storm.

  “Guys!” Mackey called, “Blake! I got your album title! Come on up!”

  Blake came up, looking much better than he had that morning—even late in the morning, when Cheever had left him for his meeting.

  “Jesus, Mackey, it’s like you scream onstage for a living or something.”

  Mackey gave Blake a fuck-off-and-love-me grin, and Cheever had a sudden insight to just exactly what sort of power his brother must wield live. “You’d think I run a rock band or something instead of a bunch of broken monkeys, right? Now shut up and look at what Cheever did.”

  Blake glanced at Cheever and snorted softly. Cheever blushed, and Mackey rolled his eyes.

  “If you two start talking about that shit when I can’t even beat you, I will take out a hit. Do you hear me? Now look at his sketchbook—those two pictures.”

  Blake’s hazel eyes softened, and he took the book from Cheever with a furtive little glance under his lashes. Cheever bit his lip and smiled, and their night came flooding back.

  “Yeah?” Blake looked at the good one and his face lit up; then he looked at the bad one and it fell to sadness. “Those are real good, Cheever.”

  Cheever’s smile was going to take over his entire body. “Thanks.”

  “They’re the two sides of the coin,” Mackey said with meaning. “Get it? Two Sides of the Coin?”

  Blake’s posture snapped straight and his eyes got big, as if he and Mackey had been hit with the same electric current. “Like the songs on the LP,” he said, the thrill of excitement in his voice, and Cheever got it then. Blake’s songs—the melancholy love songs and the snarky breakup songs that were his specialty—both sides of love.

  “Yup. You got your concept, son.” Mackey’s grin was 100 percent Mackey-James-Sanders Grade A happy, and Cheever’s breath caught in his chest. God, his brother was like a nova sun.

  “And you get your producer credit, Dad.” Blake’s grin was quieter, not as showy but just as deep, and Cheever’s heart ached. In any other company, Blake would be the star. But Blake didn’t seem to mind.

  Maybe because being around Mackey made them all better.

  “That is a good day’s work,” Mackey said in satisfaction and then fell back against the bed. “And no offense, guys, but I need my nap.”

  “Still hurting?” Blake asked softly.

  “Yeah. But at least I have the good sense not to break myself with sex.” Mackey’s chuckle was all dirty. “You two thought you’d get away without me even mentioning that? Oh my God. It’s like you don’t even know me.”

  Blake let out a guffaw. “Wait until you’re up and around—you and Trav won’t come out of this room for days, and then you’ll be walking funny.”

  “Cocoa butter,” Mackey said with satisfaction. “Hell on laundry, easy on the balls. Now go. Send Trav up.” He swallowed, and his ebullience and larger-than-life attitude faded. “I… I kind of need him.”

  Blake squeezed his shoulder gently, and to Cheever’s surprise, Mackey caught his hand.

  “Like that?” Blake asked, and Mackey bit his lip and nodded.

  “Let’s just say it’s a good thing I need help to pee,” he muttered. “Can’t get out of bed to get high.”

  Blake looked over his shoulder at Cheever. “The guys are downstairs getting dinner and planning a TV night. Go join them?”

  Cheever’s vision—him, Blake, alone, takeout—wafted away like smoke. “Yeah. I’ll go get in their way.”

  Blake winked at him. “Just be there to get in my way. And send Trav up if you get the chance.”

  Cheever stood, and Blake took his seat, but he paused to squeeze Blake’s shoulder, just as Blake had squeezed Mackey’s. Blake surprised him then, took his hand and kissed it, and then turned his wrist out and kissed his scar. “Thanks.”

  Cheever bent and brushed his lips over Blake’s temple. “Of course.”

  He left thinking he meant those words.

  Of course. This was Blake’s family in a way Cheever still had to fathom. Cheever was learning, but Blake knew their pulse, and it was up to him to call the shots.

  As he went downstairs, Cheever hoped he could talk somebody into ordering pizza.

  Sympathy for the Devil

  THEY WATCHED TV with the guys—it was Kell’s turn to pick, so they ended up watching reruns of Sons of Anarchy, but it was one of Blake’s favorites too. Cheever leaned against Blake, sketching while he propped his feet up on one side of the love seat—a very Mackey thing to do, actually, even though Mackey and Trav’s customary couch was left vacant, by habit or respect.

  Like they did, they commented on the show—who was a badass, who shoulda done what, when. Cheever would look around, catching the conversation and smiling every now and then when someone said something pithy or funny. About an hour into it, the kids got home and they turned off the TV to go help with the great disembarking and bath time. Marcia was still bringing stuff in, so Cheever told Blake to stay there on the couch and pick his nose (exact quote) while he went to help.

  Blake ignored that last bit and grabbed Katy, who was trailing in with her souvenirs and her sunhat. She was too big to swing up in his arms, so he took her hand and twirled her in a pirouette, because little girls going in circles were usually a good thing.

  “How you doing, Katy-bug?”

  She smiled, but a little sadly. “We had fun,” she said, her voice clogged.

  “Why the face?”

  She swallowed, her nose scrunching. “’Cause we had to decide what else we’re gonna do before I go visit Grandma and Grandpa. Only I don’t want to visit Grandma and Grandpa.”

  Blake grimaced. Katy’s original visiting stipulation was six weeks out of the year. The end. And then Briony and Shelia had their first k
ids, and they established a routine that involved kids, and they asked—nicely—for more time.

  Grant’s widow had balked at first, but then Trav had a talk with her. Blake didn’t know what he’d said, but one minute it was “No, you can’t have my baby!” and the next, Katy’s mom, Sam, was in college and then law school. And Katy was living in LA during the year and living up in Tyson for much of summer vacation. She called and skyped her mom almost every day—she even had her own phone so Blake knew they were in contact a lot—and she spent most of her summer vacation with Sam.

  But she spent the first two weeks with Grant Adams’s parents, and that… that was the problem.

  “They got horses,” Blake said diplomatically, because when they’d been visiting the Adams ranch, giving Grant some peace before he died, that had been the main attraction. Blake had never seen horses, not up close and personal, and he and Jeff and Stevie had spent a lot of time showing Katy the horses while Mackey, Kell, and Grant had closed the books on a lot of shit that Blake would be forever glad he wasn’t involved with.

  Blake had learned to love the critters—enough so that he took the older kids on trail rides, using a local service, a couple of times a year.

  But Grant Adams had sickened and died before he turned twenty-five years old, and most of it, from what Blake could see, was because of the poison that had existed in that painful, angry household.

  His dying wish was for his daughter to spend as little time as possible there—and he hadn’t been foolish about it either. Blake and Mackey had privately admitted that one of the things that had kept them clean in those first years was the knowledge that before Katy came to their home, the whole band was going to have to pee in a cup.

  They still did, actually. But now raising kids, having them in their lives, was part of the fabric of the band’s being. Unless something shitty and stupid happened, like Mackey falling off a giant speaker and being stuck in a room in his own head without any relief, neither of them had enough time, much less any inclination, to think about using.