“Miss you too.”
The line goes dead, and I start to make my way back to the arena. I can’t stop thinking over what Quinn said; she was quick to jump to Leo’s defense. Wasn’t she? Was I wrong in not hearing Leo out? Skyler left the tour before I came on board, that’s the reason they needed me, so obviously she had already known she was pregnant. So did that mean that Leo knew before he had even met me?
I’m not sure if that makes things better or worse.
I sigh, and continue walking.
Maybe I should have given Leo a chance to explain? But still, as we had been growing closer, he should have told me.
I stew all the way back to the buses, wrestling with my own thoughts. Did I ever think that things would become serious with Leo?
Yes, I did.
Otherwise I wouldn’t have wasted my time or heart on him, especially after what I went through with Walker. I had worried that Leo was a rebound, but instead of getting sick of him, I only cared more of him.
But he had gone and screwed it all up.
When I walk on the bus, I only see Mae Li curled up on the couch reading; the bus is silent.
“Hey, congratulations,” she says, smiling at me and putting her book down.
“Thanks. Where is everyone?”
“Amber went out and Ginny is back there sleeping,” she nods to the bedroom that she shares with Ginny. “Rough night last night,” she chuckles.
Right. I forgot that most people went out last night. While I was busy learning my sort-of rock star boyfriend had knocked up his previous back up singer.
“Okay. I’m going to head back and pack up my stuff.”
“Your stuff?” Mae Li asks confused.
I nod. “I’m only going to sing back up until they can replace me. The new singer will move onto the bus. They’re moving me to Eden’s former bus.”
Mae Li lets out a low whistle. “Good for you, girl.”
I flash her a grin. “Thanks.” As I head back to my room, I realize that I really like Mae Li. She doesn’t get involved with any of the stupid drama, and while she’s very quiet, she’s friendly. She seems trustworthy too, but I’m not about to confide in anyone.
It takes me less than twenty minutes to pack and Mae Li watches as I take my bags off the bus.
“See you around,” I say, as I grab my last bag.
“Yep! See you in the makeup chair tonight!”
I haul my bags across the parking lot and I’m happy to find that the bus is unlocked. I can smell the cleaning products as I climb on. What I’m not expecting are the dozens of roses that cover every counter space.
I’d like to think these are congratulatory flowers from Mark, but I know better. Sighing, I pick up the notes attached to one of the vases; there must be at least twenty dozen roses.
Carly – I’m sorry. I understand if you want nothing to do with me again, but please just give me a chance to explain. ~Leo
I throw the note in the trash and look around the bus.
It’s roughly the same size of the one I shared with the girls, though it’s slightly nicer. Of course, it’s not as nice as the band’s bus.
Ignoring the flowers, I run my hands over the granite counters, at least what’s not covered by roses, and then take in the comfortable sitting area. There’s an L-shaped couch and it faces a flat screen TV mounted on the wall.
I move into the back and see that there are two bedrooms nearly identical to the ones I shared with Ginny, Amber and Mae Li. One of the rooms has bunks while the other one has an actual bed in the center of the room. I choose the room with the bed and get to unpacking. It will be nice to sleep in a full size bed as opposed to a bunk.
Unpacking is relatively quick, and I remember that Mark had sent me a text earlier about rehearsing. I check the time and see that I have fifteen minutes. I quickly apply some lip-gloss and figure that my jeans and t-shirt are good enough for rehearsing.
I walk into the building and step onstage only to see Leo sitting in the audience.
“Excuse me,” I say in a tight voice to the band and head over to the edge of the stage.
I place my hands on my hips. “What the hell are you doing here?” I ask in a low voice.
“I needed to see you.” Leo doesn’t look very well rested, and I take in the dark circles under his eyes and his sloppy clothes.
“I’m working right now. It’s not a good time.”
“Did you get my roses?”
“Yes.” I say rudely, forcing myself not to say thank you.
“Please, Carly.”
“I’d really like you to leave, Leo.”
Leo straightens his jaw. “It’s not a closed rehearsal, so I can stay here if I want.”
“Fine,” I say exasperated, “Suit yourself.”
I stalk back to the mic and motion for the band that I’m ready. We start with the Sideroad songs, and work our way through them. I feel better doing them this time and I know it’s because I’ve had the chance to perform them live.
I purposefully don’t look at Leo, and we move onto the covers. The hour flies by, and Mark stops us, saying that I sound great and he doesn’t want me to hurt my voice. I thank the band and make my way off the stage. I’m not surprised to find Leo blocking my path as I go to head back to the buses.
“Excuse me,” I say in a flat voice.
“Carly. I’m begging you. Please hear me out.”
“What?” I cry, looking him dead in the eye. “What could you possibly have to say to me? What could you say that would actually make me change my mind?”
He stared at me for a moment, not speaking. “I don’t know what I can say to change your mind,” he said quietly. “But I do know that I can tell you the truth and you can decide for yourself how you feel.”
Something about the way Leo spoke – the quiet defeat in his voice, or the way he sounded less cocky than I’d ever heard before – brought my defenses down.
I sigh. “Fine. You can tell me your side of the story. But I’m not making any promises that I’ll feel differently. I’m only giving you the chance to share with me.”
Leo’s entire face breaks into a grin and I feel an old tug at that breathtaking smile. I steel myself not to be swayed.
“Great! Can we talk after the show tonight?”
“No. I’d rather talk now.”
I can see I caught Leo off guard. He probably planned to woo me or do something elaborate with his explanation later. Too bad. Now was as good a time as ever and I didn’t want this hanging over me all night, especially since it was only my second night performing.
“Okay, umm, I was going to hang with Jacie, but-’’
Leo sees the look on my face.
“But it’s not a problem. Let me just send her a quick text.” He takes out his phone and starts punching away and then looks up at me. “Where would you like to talk?”
“How about my bus?” It’s the only private place I can think of nearby. I definitely don’t want to go on Leo’s bus with the rest of the band.
Leo makes a face. “I don’t know if I want to talk in front of the other girls.”
“Mark moved me to Eden’s bus today. I have it all to myself.”
Leo whistles. “Damn. Good for you, Carly. Sure, that sounds great.”
“Don’t get any ideas,” I mutter darkly as we make our way out of the building.
“Wouldn’t dream of it.”
“What’s up with you and Jacie anyway?” I ask.
Leo gives me a blank look. “You know we’re related, right?”
“Yes, I had heard that somewhere.”
“She’s my cousin. We grew up together and we’re the black sheep of the family. Always letting our parents down. It made sense that we would go off together and form a band. Even as kids it was always ‘Jacie and Leo getting too dirty’ or ‘Jacie and Leo getting in trouble’ and ‘Jacie and Leo just can’t get good grades.’ ’’
I’m not really sure what to say, so I nod. I know that Leo has issues
with his family not supporting him; I didn’t realize that Jacie was in the same boat.
Leo shrugs. “She’s like a sister. My actual sister was always too busy kissing ass and studying so…” he trails off not finishing his thought.
We get to the bus and I pull the door open so Leo and I can walk on. Leo appraises the bus and smiles.
“Not too shabby.”
I nod. “It’s nice,” I agree, not wanting to tell him how thrilled I actually am. I need to keep a poker face. “Can I get you something to drink?”
Leo laughs nervously, “I feel like I need a scotch, but I guess I’ll take water.”
I could care less if Leo drinks but I don’t even know what is in the kitchen on this bus. The pantry is pretty bare, but there’s some beer in the fridge.
“Does beer work?”
“Yeah, beer is great!”
I get myself a bottle of water and hand Leo a beer. He twists the top off easily and takes a long swing.
I wait for him to start speaking. Leo looks down at his hands and then starts to speak.
“I’ll start at the beginning. Skyler was on our last tour and we saw her occasionally and I saw her a lot while we were recording our current album. I’ve told you before that I don’t have the best track record with women.” He hesitates, “I’ve never been the dating type.”
None of this was news to me.
“Skyler and I started a casual relationship. It was just sex. Like all of my relationships with women. As we were wrapping up the album, she was around a lot and we hooked up pretty frequently. We weren’t exclusive,” he explains, looking up to catch my eye. I work hard to keep a blank face.
“Apparently for Skyler though, we were exclusive. To be blunt, I was screwing other women but she was only sleeping with me. And to be clear, I thought Skyler was a total bitch. It was purely sex.”
“I get the point,” I snap. I didn’t need him to spell it out a hundred ways – they were fuck buddies, plain and simple. Leo’s told me a dozen time that this was his pattern.
“Right. So, I got tired of our situation, and honestly, Skyler was just annoying to be around, so I stopped seeing her. A month or so later she said that she couldn’t go on tour with us, and then there was a rumor swirling around that she was pregnant. I think Amber was the first one to start talking about. I thought that maybe Amber was just starting drama, but it reached the record label and they were pissed.”
He takes another long sip of beer and traces his fingers along the condensation. I try not to think about where those fingers have been on my body.
“The day that you first came to rehearsal, I got a phone call earlier in the day from Mark. He confirmed that Skyler was definitely claiming that she was pregnant with my kid. I went berserk, telling Mark that she was lying and I didn’t buy it. Mark said that I was going to have to take a paternity test. I was so damn angry. It felt like Skyler was just fucking with me.”
He hangs his head in shame. “I had slept with so many women and had never had any trouble. How did this happen?”
He looks up at my face and I know that I probably look repulsed by his admission. “I know, I know. It was bound to happen, right?” he asks wryly. “I still wasn’t convinced that she wasn’t just out to get some of my money. But Mark explained that Skyler was insisting that I was the only person she had slept with in the past three months.
I went to get a paternity test in between our first and second dates. That was the reason I couldn’t see you the very next day. And I certainly wasn’t going to share this awful detail with you right off the bat. I really liked you and I was willing to try dating you and I knew that confessing that I might have knocked up my old back up singer, would certainly scare you away. And, honestly, I kept hoping that Skyler would get rid of the baby. I know that makes me a complete asshole. But I have a huge career right now. I did not want to be tied down to a kid, especially with a woman I didn’t like. I wanted to call Skyler and tell her to get rid of the pregnancy.”
My stomach turns at Leo’s words, but he’s being more open with me than he’s ever been before. I don’t want to interrupt or say anything for fear that he’ll shut down and stop talking.
“I did break down and call Skyler once before I went to get the paternity test. She was pissed. I told her that she should get rid of the baby. She was a total bitch, telling me that I wasn’t father material and she wouldn’t want me in the baby’s life anyway. She said she only wanted ‘financial support,’ ’’ he says with a sneer. “Just what I assumed – money. I hung up.
Skyler called me a couple days after the test to tell me it was positive. I told her she was going to have to give me actual proof from the doctor’s office; I wasn’t going on just her word. And she told me she was keeping it. I was so pissed. She gave me some crap about her being an adult and she needed to be responsible. I yelled at her for lying about being on the pill and she said something about missing a pill.”
“Didn’t you use a condom?” I can’t help but ask. My voice is only a whisper.
Leo shakes his head. “I was clean. She told me she was clean.”
I don’t say anything.
I can’t say anything.
“The next day Mark had documents for me, proving that I was in fact the father. It was right there in black and white. Mark told me that there was nothing I could do but offer to help Skyler. He advised me to keep it out of family court by offering her a child support amount that she couldn’t refuse. He told me that kids were expensive and I should also offer to help pay for some of her pre-natal stuff. I didn’t want this to get to the press and I didn’t want any media hoopla. It sounded like the best plan.
I thought about it some more at home and I came up with what I thought was a great idea. I would offer Skyler a generous monthly amount. I didn’t want to give her any money, but I have plenty of it, and there was nothing I could do about it now. I would also offer her a generous pre-natal sum, along with some incentives. Every year I would give her a type of ‘bonus’ at the kid’s birthday and around Christmas. But those numbers and those perks would only be offered if she agreed not to disclose my identity as the parent while the kid was under eighteen. I thought of you, too. I figured that if Skyler couldn’t open her mouth, you might not find out. I was trying so hard to impress you. I think I may have thought that I could share it with you one day, when I was certain that you weren’t going to run away, but I couldn’t take the risk now.”
Leo finishes his beer.
“Don’t you see, Carly? I was only trying to save my own ass in front of you. I should have laid everything out on the table before you – all my shit, but I didn’t. You were so close. We seemed to be on such a good path that I wasn’t going to risk it. I should have known that Amber and Skyler would’ve been in touch.”
“It was Amber,” I murmur. I knew it.
“So, that’s the whole story.” He pauses. “Any questions?” he asks, his face twisting into a grimace.
Where would I begin? I just can’t understand his logic. Instead, I ask a stupid question.
“You don’t want kids?”
His face twists into a frown. “I never really thought about it. I never saw myself as settling down. My parents screwed me up so much and I don’t want to do that with a kid.” He’s quiet for a few seconds. “I definitely didn’t want kids with Skyler.”
Why do I care? Do I think that Leo Nash and I could live happily ever after? Was I going to wear a white dress and have his babies? Geez, I was off my rocker. I was sure of only one thing right now.
Leo needed to get the hell off my bus.
Leo
I watch Carly go through a number of emotions silently. I’m not sure why she’s asking me about kids. I never wanted kids before, but if I could settle down with someone like Carly, then maybe it would be a possibility.
Would I ever find another girl like Carly? She was gracious enough to let me explain but I can see that she can’t forgive what I’ve done. I
don’t want to ask if she can’t forgive my desire not to be in my kid’s life, or the fact that I hid the baby from her. Either way, it’s more information than I need to know.
“I appreciate you sharing the whole story with me,” she says formally, rising.
“So you believe me?”
“It’s not that I didn’t believe you, Leo. There’s just so much more to it.”
I nod. She’s right. It’s just too much baggage. I stand up. “Thanks for listening.” I know my voice is cold but I’m working hard to control my emotions. I want to grab her and shake her. To tell her that I’ll try harder. That I can’t possibly be this big of a fuck up. I was becoming a better person, I know that I was.
Instead, I keep my mouth shut and move to the door.
“Congrats on getting the opening act.”
“Thanks.”
There’s nothing more to be said, so I slowly make my way down the steps. But I just can’t let it go.
“So that’s it?” I ask, turning around as I step off the bus. “You heard my story and now, that’s it?”
Her face hardens. “I only promised to listen,” she reminds me.
“And you have no other thoughts?”
“I have plenty of thoughts!” she says angrily. “Most of which are not nice, so I thought I’d keep them to myself.”
Right. She found the story as ugly as it actually was.
“Some kind of feedback would be nice,” I mutter.
“Feedback? You want feedback? How about the fact that you were stupid to screw so many women and think you wouldn’t eventually get into trouble? I’m surprised it took that long!” she spat. “And how can you have a child that you don’t want to see? How could you not want to be involved?”
“Skyler doesn’t want me involved,” I say stubbornly.
“You just admitted you don’t want to be involved anyway,” she cries with frustration. “I don’t know what the hell to think Leo! I can hardly wrap my head around it.”
She closes her eyes and takes a deep breath. When she opens her eyes, she seems to have regained her composure.
“Thank you for sharing, but you need to go now. I need to get ready for the show tonight.”
Forbidden Ballad - Rock My World Page 13
