by Tracy Wolff
“Okay. That’s fair. I deserve it.”
“You totally deserve it. You should have backed me about Drew.” This time when he held out one of the cups of coffee, she took it.
“You’re right, I should have. And I’m sorry I didn’t.”
She sighed as the last of her anger melted away. “It’s okay. It wouldn’t have changed anything if you had—you would have just ended up getting fired too, and this label needs someone around here who knows what they’re doing. Plus, Shaken Dirty gets Drew, so…it’s worth it.”
“Is it really? The music matters to you that much?”
“Of course it does.” Suddenly she became super absorbed in making sure everything in her box was packed tightly so it wouldn’t move in transit. “Why are you asking?”
“Oh, I don’t know. I was talking to the guys from Shaken Dirty this morning, and they were asking about you.”
“Were they?” She fought to keep her voice casual.
“They were. Wyatt, especially, seemed to want to know what you were up to. And if you were doing okay after ‘everything that happened.’” He used his fingers to put air quotes around the last few words.
“I hope you told him I was fine.” She rearranged her picture frames in the box for the third time.
“I did. But maybe I shouldn’t have.”
“What do you mean?” Her eyes shot to his.
“I mean you look like hell. You’re not sleeping, you’re not eating, and I’m pretty sure you were wearing that exact same outfit when I came to your apartment two days ago.”
“It was a different T-shirt.”
“Nope, pretty sure it wasn’t.” He walked over to her, put an arm around her shoulder, and pulled her into his side. “Want to talk about it?”
“Not even a little bit.”
“Okay. Fair enough. Want to get drunk?”
“It’s nine thirty in the morning.”
He shrugged. “It’s five o’clock somewhere.”
“Yeah, well, I just got back from babysitting an addict. The idea of drinking myself into oblivion doesn’t really appeal to me.”
“Good point. You know, you did a good job with that whole babysitting thing. I mean, even if you hadn’t figured out Drew was a perfect match for them.”
She glared at him. “Are you making fun of me?”
“No, I mean it. Wyatt’s been out of rehab for two weeks and he’s still sober. He looked like hell on the teleconference, but he’s not using. I figure part of that, at the least, is because of you.”
Her laugh was bitter. “More like in spite of me.”
“What does that mean?”
“Nothing.”
He pulled away a little, searched her face suspiciously. “I’ve tried to be patient, Soda Pop, but enough’s enough. What exactly happened in Austin that has you walking around like a zombie?”
“I’m not this messed up because of Austin,” she said, the lie sticking in her throat. She, who used to pride herself on her honesty, was becoming quite the storyteller lately. She could call it self-preservation, but that was just prettying up what it really was. And still she didn’t backtrack. Still she didn’t tell him the truth. Not when just thinking about Wyatt threatened to bring her to her knees.
“I’m messed up because my whole life is a disaster. I have no job, I have to move because I can’t afford my apartment, considering I don’t have a chance of ever getting another job in my chosen field with the gossip that’s running wild about Dad firing me. Whatever relationship I had with my father is pretty much over after my latest stunt and I just lost the only guy I’ve ever loved.”
Fuck. The last came out before she even knew she was going to say it, and the moment it was out, she wished desperately to take it back. But judging from the way Caleb’s eyes had widened to what had to be a painful degree, she figured that so wasn’t going to happen.
“Wow!” he said, when he finally managed to get his jaw unstuck from its wide open position. “So that’s what’s up with Wyatt.”
She looked at him sharply. “What’s up with Wyatt exactly?”
“If possible, he looks even worse than you do.”
“Don’t tell me that.” Her heart thumped painfully in her chest.
“Okay, I won’t.” Caleb reached out and pulled her close in a one-armed hug. “Can we talk about the other problems on your list, then? And how we’re going to solve them?”
“I didn’t complain to you because I need you to solve them. I was just blowing off steam.”
He rolled his eyes at her. “I’m a guy, Poppy. If you didn’t want my help, you shouldn’t have told me what was going on.”
It was her turn to roll her eyes. “So how do you propose to fix this?”
“Uh-uh. I’ll share with you after you share with me. Explain to me exactly what the hell happened in Austin?”
“I fucked up.” She moved away from him, went to look out her window at the bustling, crazy city below her. “I mean, I still don’t know how it happened, but I just…”
“Fell for Wyatt Jennings.”
“How did you know it was Wyatt?”
“I told you, he looks as bad as you do. Besides, who else would it be? Ryder and Quinn are taken, from what I understand, and Jared probably has bigger trust issues than you after what Micah pulled with his fiancée. Plus, I could tell when I was in the teleconference with the band that something had happened between you and Wyatt.”
She turned to frown at him. “So this whole thing was really a fact-finding mission about me and Wyatt?” she asked, gesturing to the coffee.
“Many birds, one stone.”
“Oh yeah, then what are the other birds? I’m done talking about this one.”
“Why? Did he hurt you? Or is this all about the fact that you lied to him?”
“I hurt him,” she said. “He told me stuff almost no one knows and I let him, despite the fact that I was working for the label.”
“So that’s what the fight’s about? You lying to him?”
“It’s about more than that. He was so quick to turn on me, you know? It reminded me of Dad, and instead of trying to explain myself more clearly, I just shut down because…”
“He hurt you.”
“Yeah, but I hurt him first.”
“Like that matters?” he snorted. “I’m still going down to Austin to kick his ass.”
“Don’t. This is my fault, not his.”
“And yet you’re just sitting here, licking your wounds instead of trying to make it right?”
“Some things you can’t make right.”
Caleb snorted. “Yeah, nuclear war. Poverty. Climate change. Those are things we can’t make right. Your relationship with Wyatt…I’m pretty sure that’s not in the same league.”
“I don’t appreciate you belittling my feelings.” She glared at him.
“And I don’t appreciate you wallowing in despair when we have bigger fish to fry.”
“What bigger fish?” she demanded.
For a minute, it looked like he was going to stay on the Wyatt thing for a while longer. But he must have thought better of it, because he said, “Like what we’re going to do now that we’re both unemployed.”
“Both unemployed?” Adrenaline shot through her. “Did Dad fire you, too? I’ll go talk to him, tell him it was all my idea. He can’t do that. He can’t—”
“Relax, Braveheart. You don’t need to go charging into battle quite yet. Dad didn’t fire me. I quit.”
“You quit? Are you crazy? Why would you do that?”
“Because he was completely out of line when he fired you? Because he’s a jackass who doesn’t listen to reason? Because I’m sick of trying to fight his archaic ideas about music and women and the industry?” He shrugged. “Take your pick.”
“So what are you going to do?” she demanded. “You know he’s not going to put up with you going to anyone else. Not with everything you know about the inner workings of the label. He’ll blackball you.”
/> “Probably.” Caleb shrugged.
“And yet you don’t look upset. Why is that exactly?” She was totally confused. Work was Caleb’s life. This company was his life. How could he be so calm about losing it all at once?
“Because I have a plan.”
“To get your job back?”
“Hell, no. To make a label of our own.”
“A label of our own? What are you talking about?”
“I’m talking about starting our own company. With you scouting talent and me running things behind the scenes, we can’t lose.”
“Umm, we can lose. We can lose huge and you know it. We can’t just start a label.”
“Sure we can. I’m thinking…Gemini Records? Because of the—”
“Twin thing. Yeah, I get it.” The initial shock was wearing off and in its place was a cautious excitement. “You know Dad will crush us the first year. No way will he let this happen.”
“There are some things in the world he doesn’t have control over, you know.”
“Yeah, but, there are so many variables in the music industry. What if we try and it doesn’t work?”
“What if we try and it goes huge?”
“Caleb—”
“Soda Pop, we’re not going to know until we try. So I say we try. I know it’s hard for you. I know it’s not easy for you to trust in the unknown. But sometimes you just have to take a leap of faith and believe that you won’t fall.”
“It’s a big leap of faith.”
He shot her a look. “So’s going after Wyatt, but we both know you’re going to do that eventually, too.”
“I’m not—”
“Yeah, you are,” he said as he fired his coffee cup toward the trash can in the corner. It soared in and he whooped. “Nothing but net, baby. Nothing but net.” He grew serious then, and turned back to her. “If you hurt Wyatt, don’t you think it’s up to you to make it better?”
“He probably doesn’t want to hear from me.”
“What if he does?”
“What if he doesn’t?”
“I saw him today. Believe me, he does.”
Her hands were trembling so badly now that she almost bobbled her coffee cup. “I’m scared, Caleb. I don’t want to get hurt any more. And I sure as hell don’t want to hurt him any more.”
“Oh, babe.” He pulled her in for a hug. “You really think talking to him is going to hurt any more than what you’re already going through?”
“I think it might.” She rested her forehead against his shoulder and tried to just breathe.
“Leap of faith,” he said again. “Leap of faith.”
It was her turn to snort. “What happens if I leap and end up crashing to the ground?”
“You won’t.”
“What if I do?”
“Well, then I’ll catch you.” He pressed a kiss to the top of her head. “Isn’t that what your twin is for?”
Chapter Twenty-Four
A leap of faith.
Five hours later, she was still thinking about her conversation with her brother as she poured herself a glass of wine. Caleb wanted her to take a leap of faith, to trust that they wouldn’t fall flat on their asses. Or worse, their faces. After she’d calmed down enough to listen to him, he’d laid out a pretty decent business plan, including where the funding was going to come from (they’d be using pretty much their entire trust funds from their grandmother and then borrowing the rest).
She’d have complete autonomy over what acts they signed—no more hiding, no more going around her dad, no more pretending she didn’t know what she was talking about—and she’d also be in charge of marketing and publicity, her second favorite thing. Caleb would handle the rest.
It sounded too good to be true, and if her life had taught her anything, it was that if it sounded like that, then it probably was like that. And yet…and yet she was tempted to do it anyway. Tempted to give it a shot even if it meant risking everything.
Maybe that’s what Caleb had been trying to tell her—in reference to the label and to Wyatt. That life was worth living and she couldn’t get so busy protecting herself that she forgot to risk anything. Otherwise, what was the point?
Her mind jumped to Wyatt for what was probably the millionth time in the last week. Was Caleb right? Was he as messed up as she was? And if so, could she stand knowing she’d done that to him? Could she stand knowing that she’d added another layer of hurt to the already huge burden the man carried?
Just the thought had tears coming to her eyes. She’d screwed this whole thing up so badly. Had hurt Wyatt when that was the last thing she’d ever wanted to do. And then she’d left him. Just walked away when he got angry with her and lashed out. She’d been so busy protecting herself that she hadn’t thought, even for one second, that maybe he’d been doing the same thing.
And Caleb thought she could just fix it? Thought she could just call Wyatt up and apologize, and everything would go back to the way it was? She shook her head, wiped at her tears. Caleb had always been the optimist of their duo.
And yet…
He wanted her to take a leap of faith.
She took a long sip of her wine, then—because she was a glutton for punishment—went over to her record player and put on the first album she came to in the box of rare vinyl Wyatt had gotten her. It was The Beatles’ White Album and as she put it on, she couldn’t help wondering if she was making a big mistake.
Then again, if she was, it was just one more in a long line she’d made recently…
She listened to “Back in the USSR” on autopilot, but when the lyrics to “Dear Prudence” came on, she couldn’t help but listen. Couldn’t help but pay attention as Lennon crooned about Prudence opening her eyes and coming out to play, about her greeting a beautiful new day.
Fuck. Why the hell hadn’t the Sex Pistols album been the first one she’d come to? No hidden messages in that LP. It was like the whole damn universe was trying to send her a signal…
And if it was…if it was, shouldn’t she listen?
Again, she thought of Wyatt.
The Wyatt who went out of his way to get her a present she would like.
The Wyatt who’d managed to stay sober for at least three months, even with his terrible demons.
The Wyatt who brought her unimaginable pleasure, who always made sure she was taken care of—in the bedroom and out.
The Wyatt who had told three kids he didn’t know that he’d show up at their gig, just because he knew it would mean the world to them.
That was the Wyatt she knew, the Wyatt she had fallen in love with. That was the man she’d hurt.
Suddenly she was so incredibly lonely. So desperate to hear his sandpaper and gravel voice, to smell his clean water scent, to run her hands over his beautiful skin, his beautiful ink. She reached for her phone, started to pull him up on contacts.
But then another idea came to her. One that was terrifying and exhilarating and so, so foolish, all at the same time.
She didn’t have to call him. Instead, she could hop a plane down to Austin and see him.
Tomorrow was Friday night. If he was the man she thought he was, he’d be at the Spotlight, watching a band of teenagers play one of their first gigs. She could show up there and take that giant leap of faith her brother had been talking about.
It was a crazy plan, a desperate one, but it made perfect sense to her. So instead of calling Wyatt and listening to his voice, she pulled up an airline website and booked the first flight to Austin the next morning.
It might be reckless, might be a fool’s errand, but that was okay. For once in her life she was tired of playing by someone else’s rules. She was making her own rules now, and nothing was going to keep her from seeing this through.
…
“So, I’ve got a favor to ask.”
“Sure,” Jared said, followed by a chorus of “You bets,” from Ryder, Quinn and Drew, just as he knew would happen. The four of them had just finished working on a
new song and they were all a little sweaty and a little tired. And still they were up for whatever favor he was going to ask, despite the fact that he’d been a real ass these last couple of weeks. He had no idea what he’d ever done to deserve friends like these—including Drew, who they’d all decided was a pretty damn good guy—but he was done second-guessing the universe. Done feeling guilty about it. He was just going to enjoy, and try to be the kind of friend they deserved in return.
“What’s up, man?” Drew asked, settling down on the couch at the back of the studio and kicking his feet up onto the table.
“I promised these kids I’d go hear them play tonight. It’s one of their first gigs over at the Spotlight. I thought you might like to come with.”
“The Spotlight?” Ryder whooped. “Wow, there’s a name I haven’t heard in forever.”
“Right?” Quinn agreed with a laugh. “Remember how you almost got knifed during our second show there?”
“Pretty hard to forget,” Wyatt answered. “So you want to go?” It wasn’t that he needed them to come, it was just…he’d been feeling pretty fucking awful since Poppy left, and the last thing he really needed to do tonight was go sit, alone, in a bar. He didn’t think he’d drink or score—he hadn’t so far—but he figured there was no reason to tempt fate if he didn’t have to.
“Sure,” Jared said, exchanging a long look with the others that Wyatt tried not to notice. “What time?”
“Whenever. They’re starting in about half an hour, but they’ll play two or three sets. Or at least that’s what their manager said when I called to check.”
“You called to check?” Ryder asked. “Who are these kids?”
He shrugged. “Just fans who chased me down the street one day. They’re good kids, still in high school, I think. Big fans. They invited me to their gig and I said I’d be there. So, I’m going.”
“That’s pretty awesome,” Drew said, pushing himself off of the couch. “I say let’s go, then. Does this Spotlight club have decent food? Because I’m starving.”
“Yeah, um, maybe we should grab something on the way,” Wyatt said.
“No maybe about that,” Jared said, pulling out his keys.
“Right?” Quinn added as he finished texting Elise about their plans. “Since I’m not up for food poisoning, we’re definitely eating before we go.”
