The Bribe: Calamity Montana - Book 1

by Nash, Willa

  And I had friends working there. The band members who’d traveled with me for years. A few backup singers I’d gotten to know, though since the label chose my backups, most only stuck with me for months or at most, a year. Then there was the studio staff. The sound engineers who’d made creating each album a blast.

  At least some of my penalty fee would go toward their salaries—that’s what I was telling myself.

  “Yeah. Send them to me,” I said.

  The dust had settled on this adventure and I found myself staring at the horizon, wanting so much to keep walking forward. But first, I’d have to turn back and clean up my mess.

  “Okay. Anything I can do to help?” Everly asked. “Want me to slash the tires on Scott’s Maserati?”

  I giggled. “Don’t tempt me.”

  We talked about her plans for the day—to take a walk in the park and do some shopping—then we ended the call with the promise to talk tomorrow.

  I put my guitar away and wandered around the house, wishing our call had lasted longer. Should I clean? Garden? Nap?

  Nothing appealed.

  The restless energy in my fingertips was overpowering and what I wanted was to move. So I swiped my keys from the kitchen counter, climbed in my car and headed for town. The weather was still warm at the end of September so I’d stuck to my flip-flops, a pair of relaxed jeans and a long-sleeved tee. It was white, which meant before I ate anything, I’d have to change or find a bib. With Duke’s ball cap on to shade my face, I decided to continue my exploration of First Street since it had been cut short the day I’d gone into the gallery.

  As before, the sidewalks were mostly empty. I lingered with every step, not rushing as I passed stores and restaurants. I’d been in Montana for, what, nearly two months? If I didn’t find something to occupy my time, I’d go crazy this winter.

  Television was fine but I felt guilty watching all day. For as much as I’d hoped to love reading like my mother, none of the books I’d picked up had clicked. Next, I was going to try a thriller or mystery. But even if I became a voracious reader, I craved a challenge.

  Maybe a job? The idea sparked when I passed the café and the red and white Help Wanted sign caught my eye. I slowed my pace. I was here and might as well inquire about the position. I stretched a hand for the door only to yank it back before my skin could touch the metal.

  How was I going to get a job when I couldn’t fill out the application? Jade Morgan had no social security number. No bank account for direct deposit. Hell, I didn’t even have a valid driver’s license.

  Duke’s phone would be ringing off the hook if anyone in this town suspected I’d been lying to him and that I was trying to con him into . . . whatever. They might have accepted me from a distance, but that man was loved.

  Truly loved.

  If the Calamity populous suspected I was screwing him over, I’d be chased out of town with pitchforks and torches.

  A surge of pride put a smile on my face as I walked away from the café. Duke deserved that loyalty. He deserved to be loved so much.

  I reached the end of First Street and crossed the road, walking down the other side to return to the Rover. After today, I finally felt like I had my bearings in town. I could point out the direction to the park where Duke and Travis had played baseball this summer. I’d learned that the school was on one side of town, east of First, and two of the three churches on the west. And I knew the names of most streets and businesses.

  For a town the size of Calamity, there was more here than one would expect. It was something that had intrigued me when I’d done my online research, choosing the perfect place to restart my life. The chamber of commerce deserved a pat on their back for an alluring website that showcased the town.

  The two-show movie theater was currently featuring an animated film for kids and an action movie. The Mexican restaurant hadn’t opened for the day yet, but there was a woman inside, sitting at a booth, rolling silverware in white napkins. The gift shop had put a sandwich board on the sidewalk, advertising forty percent off all summer apparel.

  And every person I passed had a smile and a wave.

  It was no secret who I was anymore. After the football game last week, word around town must have traveled fast. I was Duke’s girlfriend. I was the woman living in Widow Ashleigh’s place.

  I was Jade.

  Blech.

  Every time the name crossed my mind these days, a sour taste spread across my tongue.

  What the hell had I been thinking? Maybe I could pull this off for others, but for me? No way. I didn’t want to live a fake life. I didn’t want to saddle Duke with that kind of burden, forever calling me one name in public and another in private. How would he introduce me to his parents? What if we got married?

  My dad wasn’t here to walk me down the aisle but it would have broken his heart to see me pledge myself to a man with a fake name.

  On the flip side, the minute I confessed, the minute Lucy Ross was Calamity’s newest resident, it would cause upheaval. News outlets and paparazzi would swarm and probably annoy everyone in the county for information. I’d be flipping on a neon sign to my whereabouts, practically begging for my stalker to head out west.

  Music hit my ears, distracting me from the Jade vs. Lucy dilemma, and I searched for the source. Ahead, the front door to Jane’s was propped open.

  A band was playing and as I walked closer, the lead guitar hit a riff that sucked me right in. I matched my footsteps to the beat of the bass drum and I found myself in the doorway, tapping my hand on my thigh to the song.

  This was the same band that had been playing the night Duke had brought me here for burgers. I’d been so busy worrying about him and being in public that I hadn’t really appreciated the lead singer. He had a smooth voice and a decent range.

  “Hey, honey.”

  I snapped out of my intense focus as Jane came my way through the darkened room. “Hi. Sorry, you’re probably not even open. I was just listening.”

  “Oh, that sign doesn’t matter. Come in.” She waved me over the threshold and led the way to the bar, which was lined with empty stools. “Want a drink?”

  “Water, please.”

  “You got it.” She went behind the bar and filled a pint glass of ice water with a lemon wedge. “You feel the need for something stronger, just holler.”

  “Thanks.” I raised my glass to her, then took a sip, swiveling in my seat to watch the band as she went to the other end of the bar to unload a dishwasher.

  My foot tapped on my stool, and when I caught a glimpse of myself in the mirror behind the bar, there was a huge smile on my face.

  Once upon a time, I had been the one at the bar rehearsing at ten in the morning for a ten at night show. Those were the early days, when the label wanted me at all the hot spots in Nashville. And those nights, the ones spent just feet away from the crowd, had been the best. When the people listening and singing along to my music made it that much sweeter.

  When the band paused for a break, the lead singer set aside his guitar and walked behind the bar for his own glass of water. He shot me a smile and held out a hand. “Hey. I’m Andrew.”

  “Jade. Nice to meet you.”

  Jane left the notebook she’d been scribbling in beside the cash register and joined us. “Jade, you should hop up there and sing.”

  I blinked, my heart in my throat. Why would she suggest that? “Huh?”

  “Heard you singing along. You’re good,” she said. “Might as well try it behind the microphone.”

  I’d been singing along? Well, hell. I hadn’t even noticed.

  I should have stayed home.

  “Come on up,” Andrew offered. “We’re harmless. Think of it like karaoke, but better. And there’s no crowd to heckle you.”

  “Oh, no. That’s okay.”

  “Come on.” He set down his water and nodded for me to follow him. “Guys, this is Jade. She’s going to sing a song.”

  The drummer and the bass pla
yer both waved me up, so I slunk off my chair, my heart racing as I made my way to the stage.

  I hadn’t been this nervous to step behind a microphone in years. But damn it, I really wanted to sing. To remember how it felt. To ensure the woman who’d loved to entertain wasn’t broken.

  Because I had loved it.

  I’d loved filling a stadium with my voice. I’d loved singing at the top of my lungs. I’d loved putting smiles on faces as people joined in, feeling the vibration of their claps as they kept time with mine.

  My hands were trembling as I stepped onto the stage, dodging wires and amplifiers and mic stands.

  I stretched to shake hands with the drummer. Joe looked to be in his forties with a thick white beard to make up for the complete lack of hair on top of his shiny head. Then I introduced myself to Gary, the bassist, who was apparently Andrew’s brother. Both had dark hair and warm smiles and when they told me they were Jane’s nephews, the resemblance clicked into place.

  “Gary and I started a garage band when we were in high school,” Andrew said, slinging his guitar over his chest. “We were awful.”

  “Either Aunt Jane saw our potential or she knew she’d get us at a screaming deal.” Gary chuckled. “She told us we could play at her bar when we learned enough covers for a full set.”

  “So you’ve been playing here since high school?” Was that even legal?

  “Pretty much.” Andrew shrugged. “That was over twenty years ago. We have real jobs and we don’t play here every weekend. Gary owns the Town Pump. Joe’s a mechanic at the garage. And I’m a freelance writer. We carve out Thursday mornings to rehearse and play a few weekends a month because it’s fun.”

  “Very cool.” Had I not been discovered, this was probably what my life would have looked like too. Playing for the sake of playing.

  Gary rapped his sticks on a snare. “What do you feel like singing, Jade?”

  “What do you know?”

  He grinned. “Everything.”

  “All right.” I stood in front of the mic and flipped it on. “You guys know any songs by Dolly or Reba?”

  I loved classic country. It wasn’t something I’d listened to as a kid but as my career had progressed, I’d found myself more and more drawn to the style and lyrics of artists like Loretta Lynn and Patsy Cline. It hadn’t been often that I could play those for an audience—even an audience of one bartender—because when I’d been behind a mic, it was to sing Lucy Ross branded music only.

  “Sure.” Joe nodded and rattled off a list of song titles. “Take your pick.”

  I chose a Dolly Parton hit, one that I knew best so I wouldn’t stumble on lyrics because unlike karaoke, there was no prompter here and it had been a while.

  Gary tapped his sticks and counted off. “One. Two. Three. Four.”

  Then they played.

  And I sang.

  Damn, did I sing.

  My vocal cords were a little raw and the initial bars were raspy but as I worked them through that first song, they loosened up. By the time we’d played a Reba McEntire song and one from Patty Loveless, my range had expanded and my lungs weren’t on fire.

  Joe strummed the opening notes of the next song and I froze. “Do you know ‘Midnight to Morning’ by Lucy Ross?”

  I gulped and nodded, then without stopping to overthink or worry, I sang the song I’d written at three in the morning on a tour bus headed from Dallas to Las Vegas. The song lyrics were flirty and dirty. The tune was raucous and loud. It was the one I used to close a show because it was a no-holds-barred screamer with insane vocals. The label had made me tone it down some for the album. Peppy but not riotous.

  Today, I sang it wild.

  The feeling was second to none. Exhilarating. Stimulating. Thrilling. I closed my eyes and gripped the microphone, its handle warm from the heat of my palms. Standing on that stage in a nowhere bar in Nowhere, Montana, it was powerful to just be me.

  For three minutes and twenty-six seconds, I was Lucy Ross.

  Maybe I was bruised. Used. But the pain was fading. And I knew in my heart, I couldn’t give this music up. It would crush my soul.

  The volume was full blast when I hit the ending. The guys were good and had followed my lead perfectly, letting me stretch where I wanted to and linger a little on my favorite parts. The last note rang through the bar, clinging to air until it finally faded and the only noise was the hum of a fan.

  I came crashing back to reality.

  Holy fuck.

  That. Was. Awesome.

  I choked down a laugh. My cheeks were flushed and I couldn’t hold my smile. “Thanks, guys. That was fun.”

  “Damn.” Andrew looked at me with wide eyes.

  Joe’s mouth was hanging open. Gary stared at me like I was a ghost.

  “Um . . .” Andrew gulped, finally breaking the silence. “We don’t pay much. But, uh, would you like to join the band?”

  They didn’t have to pay me. The music was enough.

  And luckily, Jade Morgan wasn’t under contract with Sunsound Music Group and she could most definitely join a band.

  “Yes, please.”

  Chapter Seventeen

  Duke

  “Hey, Jane,” I said, pinning my phone between my shoulder and cheek as I typed the last line on a report for the mayor I’d been working on all afternoon. The music in the background was blaring.

  “Better get down to the bar,” she said.

  My heart stopped. There weren’t a lot of times Jane had summoned me, but when she did, I went racing. I shot out of my chair and gathered up my keys, moving for the door. “What’s up?”

  “Just get down here. You’ll see.”

  “Jane—”

  The noise disappeared. She’d hung up.

  Shit. Her cryptic call left me imagining the worst.

  Was it a fight? A drunk and disorderly? If things were really bad, the band wouldn’t have been playing, right? Though it could have been the radio blasting. Jane loved loud music.

  Maybe someone had taken their afternoon beer too far and broken a bottle over someone’s head. Swear to God, if I walked into that bar and there was a dead body and Jane hadn’t given me a better warning, she and I were going to have one hell of a conversation.

  The bullpen was empty as I maneuvered past desks. The only deputies in were Grayson and Carla. Gray was pounding away at his keyboard, finishing up his daily report before the evening shift started rolling in within the next thirty minutes. Carla was at her workstation at the front of the bullpen, sitting behind the bulletproof partition that separated her desk from the lobby. She was bent over her phone, thumbs flying over the screen.

  “Carla, I gotta go,” I told her, not slowing down as I headed for the door. “Jane called me down to the bar.”

  “Duke, wait!” She jumped out of her chair, following me out the door to the lobby. “I just got this text about Jade.”

  My feet ground to a stop and she nearly collided with my back. “What text?”

  “You know my cousin Harry. He owns the pawn shop. He’s my mom’s sister’s son.”

  “Yeah.” I circled my hand, wanting her to get to the point. I knew Harry. I knew his pawn shop. What I didn’t know was why she’d get a text from Harry about Lucy.

  “Well, he usually meets some of his buddies down at the bar on Thursday afternoons for a beer. He’s down there right now and I guess there’s a woman singing with the band. Harry said it’s your girlfriend because he was at the football game and saw you two together but I told him that I didn’t know she was a singer and maybe he had the wrong lady but he said she’s wearing your favorite hat and has quite the voice.”

  I blinked, absorbing the string of he said, she said. Lucy was singing? That had to be why Jane had called me down.

  “Thanks. I have my cell.” I walked out the door, jogged to my truck and broke every speed limit on my way downtown.

  Every parking space in front of the bar was full. So were all those in the three adjac
ent buildings, on both sides of Jane’s. So I circled around to the alley, figuring I’d find somewhere to park in the rear lot. Nope. Full.

  What the fuck? It was a Thursday at four o’clock in the afternoon. Was the entire town here?

  I finally found a space two blocks away from First and parked. Then I hustled toward the bar, catching the sound of music before it even came into view. It was loud. Damn loud. Jane must have been in her office with the door closed when she’d called because otherwise, I wouldn’t have heard a word.

  The bar’s door was open and when I heard Lucy’s voice, my stomach balled into a knot.

  What the hell was she doing? Singing, one of her own damn songs no less, was not how to keep a low profile.

  I stepped into the bar, giving my eyes a moment to adjust to the dim light.

  The dance floor was packed. Couples were dancing the jitterbug and two-step. And beyond them, there she was. The most beautiful, enchanting woman on earth was standing behind a microphone, wearing my hat.

  My hand slapped my chest to keep my heart from escaping.

  Damn, but she was exquisite. She had the entire room under her spell with that bewitching voice and glorious smile.

  The band members on stage with her had never been so into a performance. They looked like they didn’t want to be anywhere else in the world than by Lucy’s side. She was hitting the high notes on “Ruby River.” It was a hell of a song but she was doing it differently than I’d heard on the radio. She’d picked up the tempo so it was a fast song made for dancing.

  But it was still her song. And she was taking a big risk by singing it.

  I tore my eyes away from Lucy and scanned the crowded bar, searching for anyone who might be recording this. Everyone seemed too busy listening to have their phones out. There were a few guys from the bank in slacks, their suit jackets draped over the backs of their chairs. The booths were all full and my guess was that word about the impromptu concert had pulled store owners away from their shops to join the party.