All He Feels - Dax & Ginny (Crossroads Book 11)

by Melanie Shawn

  When the first headline populated on his screen he’d read the words at the same time that Ginny gasped beside him. He read it again: “Is Country Artist Virginia Valentine Snubbing Her Roots?” The subtitle encouraged readers to judge for themselves.

  Before he’d been able to read any further she’d thrown on sweats, answered her phone and was up pacing the floor as she talked to her mom using words like backlash, un-mastered files, damage control, strategy and liability, while he scrolled through article after article telling the world that music from her much anticipated album had been leaked.

  Once he’d skimmed through about a dozen articles that all basically said the same thing, he made the big mistake of reading the comments on them. Some were people saying that they loved the new music, but they were in the minority. The majority of them were people that were outraged that her music wasn’t country enough. There were a lot of comparisons to Taylor Swift, which he would have thought was a good thing—hell, he’d never willingly listened to her music but for some reason he knew several of her songs. They were catchy and everywhere. The people on the internet apparently did not see it that way. They definitely were referring to Taylor Swift in a negative context.

  Then several minutes later, while Ginny was still on the phone with her mom, his phone lit up again with alerts. This new wave had nothing to do with her music. Instead the headlines all included Derek St. Vincent’s name and were variations on the believability of Derek and Ginny’s romance. Was the “it” couple ever really a couple at all?

  As he read the first one, Ginny rushed into the spare room. He and Capone followed her and watched as she opened her computer and he saw the look of horror on her face as she pulled up article after article, all featuring pictures of her and Derek. Some had timelines of when they’d been seen together, some had graphs of how much time they’d spent together vs. apart in their year-long relationship, some had pictures with Derek and the other girl on a beach.

  He stood beside her feeling helpless, enraged, protective and furious. Every instinct he had was telling him to take care of her, to shield her, to fix this. But he didn’t know how. He’d never felt so useless. In his life, when there was a problem, he handled it. He was proactive and he took care of the people that he loved. He loved Ginny and all he could do is standby and witness as her life was unraveling.

  After a few minutes of searching through the articles, she shut her computer and left the room. She was still on the phone with her mom but was mainly silent, only saying yeah or mmmhmm every once in a while. He assumed that she’d be heading back to the room but instead went straight to the back door and let Capone out.

  It honestly blew his mind. He’d been so caught up in the situation, in what he was feeling that he hadn’t even heard Cap whining. But nothing was actually happening to him. All of this was happening to Ginny, yet she’d had the wherewithal to let his dog out. This was why it was hard for him to wrap his mind around the fact that she was for real. Because she did things like that, things that just kept being added to the growing list of why he loved her.

  Once Cap had done his business, he and Ginny snuggled up on the couch and that is where she still sat, on the phone with Chase now, with the dog pressed against her.

  Dax had been following each alert up until now, but he’d decided that he needed to stop before he did something he’d regret.

  Over the short time that both of the stories had broke, he’d sat there and read through the comments and seen how much of a mob mentality they seemed to breed. Commenters were getting each other riled up and it reminded him of an online version of villagers with pitchforks. Before his very eyes, in real time, the situation escalated from negative people saying that they didn’t like her music and never believed that she and Derek were an item to calling her horrible names. Worthless. Whore. Bitch. Slut. And those were the less creative posts. Some were so descriptively heinous that he honestly couldn’t believe anyone would ever write them. And he’d been in the Marines for eight years, surrounded by men that had all the time in the world to come up with creative insults.

  Those posts made him want to hunt down each and every one of the low-life degenerates that had written those things and explain to them with force, exactly why they would never be writing another derogatory comment in their lives.

  Even though those had made his blood boil as hot as the pits of hell, they hadn’t been the reason that he’d decided he needed to disarm his alerts and stop reading the trash. That realization had been triggered when he started reading people saying that she needed to die.

  Die.

  And they didn’t stop there. These sick fucks described how she should die and what they would do to her when she was dead.

  He’d already put a call into Nate, who headed their cyber division to find out if they could track the IPs to uncover where these death threats were coming from. He wanted names. He wanted addresses. He wanted to kill them, but he would settle for legal action being taken.

  “Okay. Thank you so much, Chase. I’ll see you soon.” Ginny disconnected the call and for the first time all morning, she looked up at him. “So, how’s your morning going?” She let out a small forced laugh and shook her head as her bottom lip trembled and tears filled her eyes.

  He’d been trying to give her space while she was on her calls, but now that she was off the phone he rushed to her side. Sitting beside her, he pulled her onto his lap and she melted against him.

  He rubbed her back and said the only thing he knew to say, “What can I do? How can I help?”

  Her left shoulder lifted in a shrug. “Nothing. It’s done. The songs are out there. And what they’re saying about Derek and I is the truth.”

  “Do you know how the songs were leaked?” he asked, trying to get some clarity on the situation.

  “No. The only people that have access to the files are Chase and I. He sent one song to Karina and I’ve sent the songs to my mom, but that’s it.”

  “I have a call in to Nate, our cyber, guy already, do you want me to have him look into it? See if he can find anything. He’s literally a computer genius. Like Mr. Robot dude level genius.”

  “I’ve never seen that show, but yes, that would be great if he could. I mean, it’s not urgent. At this point you can’t put the cat back in the bag.” She leaned her head against his shoulder and he ran his fingers through her hair. “Wait, you said you already had a call in to Nate, Is everything okay?”

  His shoulders tensed and he reminded himself that she didn’t need more stress on top of what she was feeling. But he also needed her to know what was out there, just in case. “There were a few comments that raised some red flags for your security and I want him to check them out.”

  She lifted her head and her brow furrowed. “Do you mean death threats?”

  Shit. He didn’t want to spell it out for her but now that he’d started this he wasn’t sure how to back out of it. Ginny was right, you really can’t put the cat back in the bag. “Yes. But they were extremely disturbing.”

  “Let me guess.” She started counting things off on her fingers as if she were listing the days of the week. “There was dismemberment, torture, being burned alive—”

  “Yes,” he stopped her, not wanting to hear her describe anymore. “You read them?”

  “No, not today, but I get them all the time. Most people in the public eye do.”

  “What kind of people would write those things?” He hadn’t meant to say that out loud.

  “Oh, they’re not people. They’re trolls.”

  He’d heard of Internet trolls but he had no idea that it was this disturbing.

  “Those people probably have never listened to one of my songs, and they certainly don’t care whether or not Derek and I were a real couple. They just sit behind their computers and whenever there’s something that’s trending they jump on the bandwagon and say horrible, evil things.”

  Ginny spoke as if it was a normal thing. Annoying, but normal. L
ike traffic. Or the DMV. Just something that you had to put up with. Never in a million years would Dax understand how that behavior had become an accepted part of society.

  A buzz sounded and Ginny looked down at her phone. She pushed off his lap and he could see that she looked a little nervous. “I need to take this.”

  He watched as she answered, and he noted her voice was a little higher than normal and if he wasn’t mistaken, her lip was trembling. There were tears in her eyes when she answered, “Hello.”

  His mind was racing trying to figure out who could be on the other end of that phone. Was it a reporter? Was it Derek?

  “Yes, that sounds great.” Her voice was shaky. “I can be there in half an hour.”

  Half an hour. Where could she be in thirty minutes? He had no idea but he knew he sure as hell was going to be with her.

  “Okay, see you then, bye.” When she lowered the phone, she just stared at it blankly.

  “I know this is a stupid question, but is everything okay?” he asked.

  “What?” She glanced up at him and her eyes looked a million miles away. When she saw his expression, which he was sure looked concerned, she smiled and shook her head. “Yeah, everything’s fine. That was The Colonel, or…um…Grandpa J. He’s agreed to be interviewed for my video montage.”

  “Oh.” Dax would never have guessed that was the person on the phone. One thing was for sure, she seemed more off balance now than before he’d called. “Is that good?”

  “Yeah.” She nodded but neither her tone nor facial expression backed up her positive answer. “Um, I have to go get ready. Do you need the bathroom first or is it okay if I…?”

  “Sure. Go. I’ll jump in when you’re out.”

  She nodded again and started walking into the kitchen but then realized she was going the wrong way and headed to the hallway. She seemed distracted and anxious and for some reason his gut was telling him it had nothing to do with her bad press.

  Chapter 19

  Ginny tried her best to listen as she interviewed The Colonel, but her mind was too full with the Should-I-Show-This-Man-The-Picture-I-Have-In-My-Purse pro/con list. Up until she had spoken to Chase an hour ago, she’d decided not to approach the man she believed to be her paternal grandfather. After seeing him surrounded by his family and friends, she truly believed in her heart of hearts that it would be best to just leave well enough alone.

  But then, this morning happened. Yesterday was…there were no words to explain how amazing yesterday had been. She and Dax had spent the day having sex, watching shows, eating and repeating. She’d been blessed with a lot of amazing opportunities and honors. She’d had over ten number-one singles, won AMAs, CMAs, and Grammys, she’d performed sold out shows for over fifty thousand people and even collaborated with the legendary Stevie Wonder but none had compared to spending the day with Dax. It showed her what really mattered weren’t awards, shows, or accolades. She would trade all of those things, if every day could be like yesterday. Not that she would trade her music, that was different, that was her soul. But the success, the fame, the money—none of that compared to someone who saw the real her and made her feel so safe, protected, cherished and loved.

  When she went to bed last night her world couldn’t have been more perfect. But then she’d woken up this morning to the shit hitting the fan and she’d figured it might be karma. Not that she really believed in that, but maybe her going along with a media relationship was coming back to bite her. She’d tried to justify her actions by telling herself that she’d never confirmed or denied her and Derek’s relationship. And if people took pictures of them kissing and drew conclusions from that, well, that was their prerogative. But that was just semantics. She’d lied by omission and allowed misleading affectionate photos to tell a story that wasn’t true.

  As far as the music being leaked, she’d reasoned that it was just the universe’s way of evening things out. There was no way she could have what she had with Dax and have her professional life going well.

  When she first talked to her mom, she’d definitely freaked out on the inside. But Capone had helped her calm down. The more she petted him, the calmer she got. And once the initial panic had passed she’d resigned herself to the turn of events fairly quickly.

  Until The Colonel had called.

  When she’d interviewed Sophie Sloan the week before, Sophie had mentioned that her grandpa had asked about the project after he heard “the kids” talking about it and he’d said it sounded like fun. Sophie had asked if Ginny might want to interview him. She’d said sure, fully intending not to bring up the picture. She figured at least this would give her a chance to talk to him one-on-one and get to know him a little bit. She’d taken his number and told Sophie to pass hers along to him.

  Honestly, she’d planned on contacting him but then Dax’s mom and sister had shown up and everything else kind of got put on the back burner.

  But then, this morning when she was sitting on Dax’s lap and she’d seen his number something inside her had snapped. In an instant she realized that Dax was here now, but she’d be leaving in a week. As amazing as he was, he wasn’t hers. She had her mom, who was the best support system ever, but she was one person and she had a husband now. In a flash, Ginny felt alone. Really alone.

  And she didn’t want to be. She wanted family.

  When she answered the call and heard his voice, it was all she could do not to cry and tell him who she was. She’d managed to keep it together then and now that she was here she was trying to decide what to do.

  There was so much chaos in her life right now. Was this the right time to add something else to it? Was this the right time to invite someone else into it? Talk about not being able to put the cat back in the bag, once she opened this can of worms there was no going back.

  As he finished telling her about the moment he knew that his Marie was the one, Ginny knew her time was running out. She had one more question to ask him and then she was due at the studio to try to figure out her next move with Chase. Logically, she knew even if she didn’t broach the subject today she could do it at a later date, but her intuition was telling her that if she walked out that door without showing him the picture she never would.

  “Okay, and my last question is what is love to you?”

  He sat quietly for a moment and then smiled, it was the kind of smile that had hidden depths. It revealed his wisdom and knowledge and at the same time, his spirit and heart. “Well now, that’s quite a question. For such a little word it sure can mean a lot of things to a lot of people, can’t it? The Bible has a pretty darn good definition of it in First Corinthians that covers love in general, but I’m guessing you mean romantic love?”

  “Yes, sir. I do.” Ginny smiled.

  “Well, I suppose to some people love is a feeling. But, I know better than that. Sure, when you love someone, it can feel good. It can be the best feeling in the world, but that’s just a side effect. A symptom.

  “And now, I guess some people think that love is something you fall in. That you’re just walking around, minding your p’s and q’s and you stumble right into it. But I’ve never quite agreed with that theory because the flip side to that coin is that you can fall out of love just as easy as you can fall into it.

  “I think when folks think love is just a feeling or something that you can fall in and out of, well that’s a darn shame, because that means you’re gonna miss out on the best part of what love is. You want to know what I think love is, young lady?”

  Ginny nodded, with bated breath, hanging on his every word.

  “Love is work.”

  Oh. That’s not where she saw it going.

  “Love is something that you choose to work on every day. And yes, some days you’re gonna feel like you can fly to the moon and back just when your special fella or lady looks at you and smiles. And you’re gonna feel like there’s nothing that could ever take that feeling away, but let me tell you, when you love someone, life doesn’t give
you a pass and everything comes out smelling like roses.

  “When you love someone, truly love someone, there are going to be times that you might not like them very much. And that’s where the true meaning of love comes in. That’s when the work comes in. That’s when you remind yourself what that person really means to you. That’s when you gotta do something extra-special for that person, because let me tell you somethin’, as frustrated or disappointed or upset at that person you might be, you’re no peach yourself, and they’ve had to put up with you too.

  “I remember when me and my Marie used to disagree, usually over small things, but sometimes over big ones, I would always bring flowers home, or leave her a special note telling her how beautiful she was, or that her laugh was my favorite sound in the world, or that when she walked into a room everyone else faded to the background, or how my heart never truly beat until it found her, or how just thinking her name made me grin like a fool. Or one of the hundred other things that she was, that she meant to me just to remind both of us how much I loved her.

  “And when I would be a knucklehead and upset her, she would do things like pack me an extra dessert in my lunch, or buy a round of golf for me and my buddies, or make my favorite dinner, or be wearing my favorite dress that showed off her legs when I got home.” Grandpa J wagged his brows. “Now did she really want to get gussied up for me when I was being bullheaded about somethin’ or other, probably not, but she did it because that’s what love, true love is, it’s work. I had the best job for over sixty years with my Marie and I miss it, miss her every second of every day. So if you’re lucky enough to get that job, hold onto it with everything you have and don’t let go. Don’t call in sick. Don’t take a vacation. Show up every day and put in the work, that’s love.”