Sing to Me (The Highlands Book 1)

by Ali M. Cross

  He flicked on lights while Fiona sat on his leather couch—the only thing to sit on besides the low-slung gaming chair pulled close to the TV. It wasn’t like he had guests over often. In fact, only Kipper had stood inside his apartment and that was just to pick up her check one morning. At least he kept it clean; he was grateful for that at the moment. He knew she wouldn’t see anything embarrassing, other than the posters and albums hanging on the wall. There was a reason he didn’t invite people over, after all.

  This was the one place he could remember who he was. He needed to remember because it was the whole reason he was trying so hard to change. His parents’ gold and platinum albums were so numerous he could cover all the walls in his apartment with them and still have some left over, but all that success hadn’t made them close as a family. They hadn’t had family success. The kind of success that counted.

  His own collection covered the long wall behind the TV, along with concert posters, and a bunch of memorabilia he’d had framed. He’d had a lot of success too, and a future that promised more of the same. But what were a bunch of hit songs compared to having a wife to go home to? What did he care about nameless fans and girls’ numbers written in Sharpie on his chest, if he didn’t have a family that cared if he lived or died?

  He was here in River Mile to change all that. To become a new man, and Lord knew he’d been trying. He’d been trying so hard. And now here was Fiona, sitting on his couch. His heart was stuck in his throat while his feet were stuck in the little divider area between the kitchen and the living room. He had no idea what to say.

  “Will you come sit with me?” Fiona said in a quiet voice.

  They were the words he needed to hear, and so he went to her, his eyes never leaving her face. He couldn’t read the thoughts in her storm-gray eyes, but she patted the couch next to her and turned to face him when he sat. They faced each other awkwardly for too long, both of them fidgeting with their hands. Fiona scanned the walls, and Nix scanned her face, but neither revealed anything.

  Pops, who hadn’t barked or even moved from his bed through this strange night, looked at him with baleful eyes. Say something, you idiot, Nix imagined him saying.

  But when Fiona finally looked back at him, there were tears in her eyes and Nix was speechless. “I’m sorry about your parents,” she said, and opened her arms. Mystified, but suddenly in need of her embrace more than he could express, he wrapped his arms around her waist and drew her close. As she stroked his hair he closed his eyes and breathed a long sigh of release.

  “How did you find out?” he asked. He met her gaze and saw only sincerity there and his own carefully constructed walls around his heart began to crumble.

  “I haven’t told anyone, talked to anyone about all of this.” He spoke to his hands, his long fingers curling together, gripping each other as if the tighter he held on, the more strength he’d have to continue. “Except God, I guess. I talk to him a lot.”

  Fiona had been watching his hands, fascinated by the way they stayed in constant motion, but when he stopped talking she glanced up and found Nix looking at her with a question in his eyes. Of course she knew he believed in God. He directed the church choir, after all. But now she realized his faith was deeper than a Sunday thing. She squirmed under his steady gaze, unsure if she was capable of understanding his relationship with God. Her faith was a tiny seedling, blowing in the wind. She wasn’t even sure what she believed in, or if she believed anything at all.

  “I – I care about you, Fiona. But I think you’re gonna think less of me than you already do once you hear my story.”

  She shook her head to deny that she had a low opinion of him, but he halted her with a pointed glare. The man did infuriate her. He was kind and caring one minute, and arrogant and conceited the next. She had to admit that she had thought him pretty darn low from time to time. But that wasn’t what she thought now. Now she thought—she didn’t know what she thought, other than the words beautiful and loving. And mine.

  “I know it offended you when I said I was a master musician, and I’m sorry for that.

  “I am good at music, though. And I guess I wanted you to know that—I wanted you to feel like we had something in common. Something we could share.

  “I am good at music, though. And I guess I wanted you to know that—I wanted you to feel like we had something in common. Something we could share.

  “I am a pretty masterful musician.” He grinned, his eyes crinkling at the corners, an alluring gleam in their dark depths. “I can play just about any instrument you put in front of me. I’ve composed more songs than I can count and performed for millions of fans. Screaming, adoring, rip-their-clothes-off kind of fans.” That wicked gleam in his eyes flashed before he ducked his head in what seemed like a moment of embarrassment. “I try not to be conceited about it, but that’s a work in progress.”

  He was proud of his success, she saw. Proud, but also embarrassed by it. She’d never been a fan of punk rock, but she knew opera wasn’t exactly a crowd favorite, either. Musical tastes were personal. Unique to each person. She’d known patrons of Jacobs that were country music producers in Nashville. She’d known opera singers who started their careers in family folk bands. Heck, Pat Benatar earned her rockin’ wail from classical studies. Opera wasn’t for everyone. But success was. That she could understand. She’d never envisioned people ripping off their clothes in ecstasy over her music, but she had hoped to one day hear the thunderous applause of a packed house at the Met. And she’d dreamed to hear it over and over again. How could Nix have given that up?

  Her hand found its way to her throat in an unconscious gesture. If she could never sing again, how would she know she was alive?

  Nix did take her hand then, pulling it away from her throat and stroking his thumb across her wrist. “I want to talk to you about that.”

  Fiona sighed in resignation. “I know. But—will you tell me your story, first?”

  He held her gaze steady on his for a long moment before he nodded. He settled more comfortably into the couch, drawing her hand with him so she had no choice but to snuggle up close to him. With her cheek pressed to his shoulder, he continued.

  “If you read anything you found online about me, you already know how I grew up. Absentee rocker parents and all that jazz. They raised me to be a musician. They expected me to rock out like other parents expect their children to eat their vegetables. They wanted—they encouraged—me to be free, to experiment, to discover myself and then pour every bit of myself into the music I created.”

  “Did you like it? I mean, most kids would love to have such freedom.” Fiona watched his profile as he stilled, considering her question.

  “You know, I…I don’t know. I loved them. I wanted to please them. And I did—I do—love music. All kinds of music.” He looked at her pointedly and she felt her cheeks warm. “But I missed them. I missed them a lot.

  “I’d never been much into experimenting, like they encouraged me to do. I think since nothing was off limits, nothing really enticed, you know? And until I was a teenager, I didn’t really have friends. No one really wanted me, a potentially dangerous influence, hanging out with their little kids. It wasn’t until I was a teen and kids did more of what they wanted instead of what their parents wanted that I started having people to hang out with. But even then, I didn’t get off on being disobedient. I’d already learned a long time ago that there wasn’t really anything I could do to get my parents’ attention.”

  His focus was on her hand in his, so Fiona watched, too, while he traced the lines on her palm with a fingertip. She waited for him to continue, unwilling to interrupt him. Besides, what could she say? What he described was so different from her own experience growing up in a close family with loving parents. She realized with a start just how lucky she’d been. She brought her knees up to her chest, unwilling to think about her family. It was too late to get all mushy about them. She’d made it clear from the time she was a kid that she was goi
ng to be somebody and then she’d never come back. She’d been so unkind. She swallowed back the tears and mentally urged Nix to continue.

  “Growing up, TV was my best friend,” Nix said, as if responding to her need. “I watched it so much I’d seen entire shows often enough to memorize the dialogue. My favorites were the oldies. Shows from the twenties, thirties and forties.” His words had begun to tumble together and his whole countenance brightened. Fiona remembered her own love affair with opera and the grand stage, and she found herself mirroring his expression. She loved the musical tone in his voice, the excitement that drew it upward and down, like a rollercoaster of sound.

  “I especially loved the vaudeville shows,” he continued. “Where multiple acts performed everything from singing to dancing to snake charming and knife throwing.”

  “Aha!” Fiona exclaimed. “Now, Variety makes sense.”

  Nix pointed a finger at her and grinned. “You see? And you know all the decorations on the walls? Wait—” He raised his finger again, this time in mock sternness. “You’ve never been! We’re gonna have to fix that, because it—is awesome.”

  Warmth and happiness rushed through Fiona, flushing her cheeks and inexplicably raising her hopes. She wanted to feel as happy and proud of her accomplishments as Nix did. She wanted a second chance at life, too.

  “My parents were nothing if not generous, and with the allowance that appeared in my bank account every month, I began bidding anonymously at studio and museum auctions, eventually decorating my entire suite at the Grand and stuffing a storage unit full of memorabilia from all the best vaudeville acts. I had Charlie Chaplin’s walking stick and bowler hat from the Three Stooges. Dance shoes and magic hats and gilded microphones—I wanted, and mostly got, it all.

  “When I was thirteen my parents actually took me along with them to London. They’d never taken me with them on tour and they were always too busy to take a family vacation, so I was on cloud nine. They took me to a punk rock bar downtown where they met up with some of their friends.” At Fiona’s expression of alarm, he added, “Yeah, I know. But rock stars, right? There really weren’t any rules for them. And get this, they took off soon after we got there so I had to stay in the VIP area and hang out all night while band after band took the stage. You’d think it would be terrible—my folks had finally taken me somewhere with them, and then ditched me at practically the first opportunity. But it wasn’t like that, I swear. I loved my parents and I know they loved me. But they were selfish and probably overly dedicated to their careers. I get it.”

  “Did you get it then, though?” She wanted to say a bunch of unkind things about his parents, but remembering that photo of him from their funerals quieted her tongue. “You must have felt so lonely.”

  Nix shrugged and rolled his shoulders to release tension. “I guess I was. A little. But something big happened to me that night. Most of the bands weren’t very good, but a few caught my interest. The sound wasn’t like anything I’d ever heard before. It was like Lulu and Rock’s hard rock, but the words spoke to me. It wasn’t about sex and drugs, but about making a better life. About being true to who you were. About fighting for a better world.” His face lit with a passion Fiona hadn’t seen on him before, but she recognized it. She’d seen it on her own face during rehearsals when she was encouraged to sing in front of a mirror, and on the faces of her costars on stage. Even thinking about it, she could feel it. Remember the allure and power of it.

  “That night, using a borrowed pen and club napkins, I composed my first song and I haven’t stopped composing since.” He seemed about to say more but he stopped, his mouth closing shut. “Well, I guess until this year. That—” he waved a hand toward the door and a black satchel that leaned against the wall by his shoes, “song you were playing the other night—that’s the first thing I’ve tried to compose since my parents died.”

  Fiona leaned forward and slipped her hand over his. She wanted to tell him about the music, how she’d fixed it, how it really was beautiful, how much she loved the piece, but Nix wasn’t looking at her and he resumed speaking before she could tell him anything. His words fell out of him now, almost in a monotone, as if he were reciting the events of someone else’s past. As if the story of his life was a punishment decree.

  “A year later I formed Bloody Iris and a year after that we started touring, starting in that same club in London. I saw my parents less and less after that. By the time they settled down in Vegas, taking up a regular show for the MGM, I was touring eleven out of twelve months a year and rarely, if ever, made it home to the States.

  “When Lulu became sick, Rock reached out to me. She wanted to see me. But I always had a show booked and the time was never good. ‘I’ll come home next month,’ I’d say, but next month would come and there were rehearsals or bookings or nothing at all and I didn’t go.”

  He stopped and took a deep breath. Their hands were tangled together now and Fiona scooted closer, moving a hand to his arm, hoping to offer the comfort he seemed so much to need.

  “Last Christmas Rock called. Actually called on my cell. I didn’t even know he knew the number. They got it from my manager or something, I don’t know. It wasn’t like I was hiding from them or anything, it just had never been that important to talk, you know?”

  He shifted and stretched out his legs, propping his feet on the coffee table. Fiona felt unsure if he had moved to break their contact, but he patted her leg and then straightened it, so she had to turn and stretch out like he had. He put his arm around her and tugged her close to him.

  Sitting there, tucked against his chest, his warm, solid arm holding her close, Fiona thought she knew exactly what he meant about not staying in touch with his parents. She wondered if he knew just how much she understood. She’d lived her last six years exactly like that. Her parents called, she texted back. They sent a gift, she sent a card. They were moving to the other side of the world and she visited them in the airport—the airport! They must have been so disappointed she cared so little that she couldn’t even invite them to her apartment.

  “Anyway, last fall Rock said it was getting bad for Lulu and that I should come home for Christmas. That we’d have a real family Christmas. I think I laughed and said sure I’d try, but I knew I wouldn’t. I had a big show scheduled for Christmas day and another, even bigger one set for New Year’s Eve. Plus, I couldn’t even remember the last time we spent Christmas together. It’d never been a big deal before. I figured I’d go see her in the New Year. I had a few weeks off then, anyway.”

  He grew silent and Fiona reached for his other hand which he had curled in a fist on his thigh. He turned his hand palm up to meet hers. Her stomach fluttered and she closed her eyes, savoring the moment even while she feared what it meant. She wasn’t an idiot. She knew she was falling for him, but she wasn’t sure she was the right woman for him. Especially after hearing his story. She knew where this was going—he’d had a personal revelation that he should settle down, discover the meaning of life, the value of family. She’d grown up on that stuff and knew its power. But she’d never felt it herself.

  Still, when he laced his fingers between hers, she let herself be present in the moment and enjoy it for what it was. It had been a very long time, maybe never, since she’d felt this sort of connection with a person.

  It was a long time before he continued, and when he did, his voice was low and hoarse. “She died New Year’s Eve. I was onstage when Rock called. She’d been asking for me, wanted to hear my voice one last time. Instead she heard me onstage. My manager said she probably loved that—but I don’t know. Rock wouldn’t talk to me afterward. Didn’t ever talk to me again. I found him dead on the floor in their suite at the MGM when I got there.”

  He stopped and Fiona was silent. What words could she say? Her parents were alive and well but she could string the time she’d spent with them over the past six years into ninety minutes.

  “So now you know,” Nix said quietly.

&nb
sp; She pulled him against her and wrapped her arms around him. Her instincts weren’t very practiced, but they screamed at her to hold him, to comfort him. “I’ll never tell your secrets,” she said and he squeezed her waist in response. I should tell him, Fiona thought. She felt like she could trust Nix, trust him the way he’d trusted her. And she realized that she wanted to—she wanted to tell him everything.

  PALE LIGHT FILLED THE ROOM WHEN NIX BEGAN TO stir. Sometime during the night he and Fiona had switched places, so it was she who lay against his chest, cradled in his arms. He wanted to draw her nearer and never let her go, but he was afraid she would be embarrassed and uncomfortable when she discovered they’d spent the night together. This seemed too familiar and intimate for wherever they were in their relationship. If this even was a relationship.

  He gently half-lifted, half-pushed her back into the corner she’d been sitting in the night before, and propped a pillow between her shoulder and head. Then he got up and put on a pot of coffee. She stirred a little while later, never the wiser that he’d held her in his arms most of the night.

  “Hey,” he said, bringing her a cup of coffee. “I didn’t know how you took it, so I guessed.” She cupped the mug in her hands and breathed in the steam.

  “Smells good,” she said, then took a careful sip. She smiled up at him. “Perfect. Good job.”

  He shrugged, uncomfortable under the open scrutiny in her eyes. He thought she’d rush out, in a hurry to forget everything about last night, so he was unsure what to do since she was still looking at him expectantly. Under her gaze he felt vulnerable and exposed, wondering what she might think of him now.

  He stepped into the kitchen to fix his own coffee, using the distraction to buy himself some time. He wasn’t sorry for telling her his story—she’d shown a side of herself to him, a caring, loving part he’d believed was inside her but normally remained so hidden. He was glad she knew the truth about him. Telling her had been like weaving a rope of trust and affection that connected them together—and she was leaving. He’d envisioned having this conversation someday, but he thought it would be with the woman he planned to marry. The woman he could trust to keep his secrets close to her heart. He was certain Fiona did not want to be that woman.