Royalty (RiffRaff Records Book 1)

by L. P. Maxa

  Jacks shook his head sadly. “You know, I truly think this is something all of us struggle with. We spend so much time with the groupies and the drugs and the booze. Then when something good comes along, something real? We think we’re not good enough, not worthy. But let me tell you something, man. If you let that girl love you, really let her in? You’ll never regret it a day in your life.”

  “What if I can’t love her back the same way?”

  “The fact that you left because you thought you weren’t enough for them says it all. You were in love with Payton when you walked out that door, and you’re in love with her now. That pit in your stomach, that ache in your chest when you think about a life without her in it? That’s love, Mason. Don’t let your fear rule your life. Don’t let it keep you away from the people you need to survive. Don’t kill yourself because you’re afraid to live.”

  I hung my head, letting a few tears fall before I wiped them away. I was afraid to lose Payton. I was afraid to lose Katie. I was afraid that they’d both wake up one day and realize they could do better than me. I was afraid that my dad could see me. That M Kat knew I was failing.

  I was afraid that if I went home and loved those beautiful girls, the universe would take them away too.

  Chapter Thirty-three

  Payton

  Fifteen weeks old (almost four months)

  I pulled my giant mom SUV into my parking space at the house and cut the engine. I leaned my head against the soft leather seat and studied the windows, trying to see who was still awake and who wasn’t.

  I’d told my brothers that I’d had a date. It was a lie I started to tell them every so often over the last few weeks. It got them off my back about moving on and forgetting about Mason. Usually I’d go to dinner with my friends from the hospital or see a movie by myself. The alone time was nice, and my family had stopped bitching so much and trying to set me up with friends and coworkers.

  I walked into the house to find my brothers on the couch, Katie sitting between them in her bouncy seat. “It’s almost ten o’clock. Why is she still up?” I made my way into the room and stepped in front of the television. Both of them moved their heads to the right, trying to see around me. “Really?”

  Pax frowned, waving his hand for me to move. “Every time we tried to put her down, she’d wake up. Finally we just let her have her way and put on a movie. What’s the big deal? It’s not like she has to get up early for school tomorrow.”

  I put my hands on my hips. “The big deal is that we’ve been working on this sleep training for a solid two weeks and I’m pretty sure you two just unraveled everything.” I didn’t know why I was even bothering. Neither of them had looked away from the TV once.

  When I threw my hands in the air, Parker grabbed the remote and pressed pause. “Why are you home so early? Who are these losers you’re going out with?”

  “Just because your dates don’t end until the sun comes up, doesn’t mean mine have to.” I unbuckled Katie out of her seat and cuddled her to me, sitting down in the brown leather club chair. “Come here, Bug. You need to go night-night.” I kissed her chubby cheeks and started to rock her a little.

  Pax grabbed his cell. “Speaking of dates, since you’re home, I’m going to go have one myself.”

  I wrinkled my nose. “Dates that start at ten o’clock at night are booty calls.”

  “Don’t I know it?” He winked and headed out the front door.

  After he left I glanced across the room at Parker. “What? Why are you staring at me like that? Sorry I didn’t have sex with Nate, geez.”

  He raised an eyebrow. “I thought you had a date with some dude named Dan tonight?”

  “Oh, uh, yeah. I meant Dan.” I giggled like an irritating schoolgirl, trying like hell to sell my lie. “I just go on so many dates these days that I’m getting guys confused. You know me, just a dating machine.”

  Parker tilted his head to the side. “Didn’t you say you were meeting up with a Chuck last week?”

  “Oh, uh, yep. Chuck. He’s in real estate investments.” I sighed dramatically. “It’s not going to work out between us though, he has daddy issues.”

  My brother gasped loudly, pointing at me and startling Katie. “You aren’t going out with anyone. You’ve been lying this whole time.”

  I gasped right back, trying for indignant. “I most certainly have not. Katie and I don’t have to sit here and listen to this. We’re going to bed.” I went to stand.

  “Sit back down.” He was using his big brother tone. I didn’t want to listen, but my body kind of automatically responded. Years of conditioning. He started ticking off points off on his fingers. “Nate? Dan? Chuck with daddy issues? You’re going through the characters on Gossip Girl.” He shook his head sadly. “How dumb do you think I am?”

  I shrugged. “I don’t know. Not as dumb as Pax, if that makes you feel any better. I told him Dan was a writer and his first book caused quite a bit of controversy. He still didn’t catch on.”

  “Why lie?”

  “I was tired of everyone telling me what to do. Tired of everyone wanting me to move on, to pretend like Mason doesn’t exist.” I smiled down at the baby in my arms, kissing the top of her head. “Because he does. And one day he’ll come home.”

  Parker narrowed his eyes. “And then what happens, Pay? You welcome him back with open arms? You hand over Katie without a fight?”

  I sent him a small smile. “I don’t have all the answers, Parker. I just know that he will come home. That one day the tour will end, and he’ll be standing at the front door. And when that day comes? Things are going to be hard enough. There is already going to be so much we need to figure out. I don’t think bringing another guy into this mess is fair.” I stood up, maneuvering Katie to my shoulder, a practiced move I did a hundred times a day. “I already brought you and Pax in, already put you two in a position to get hurt. To lose someone you’ve come to love. I won’t do that to anyone else. It isn’t right.”

  Parker got to his feet, holding his hands out and smiling at the little girl he thought of as his niece when she cooed at him. “If you think that I’ll let you just hand her over to him, you’re wrong. He doesn’t deserve her. And he doesn’t deserve you either, Pay.” He took Katie out of my arms and held her close to his chest. Both my brothers had come to love her like she was their own. They were with her every day. They were helping me raise her and watching her grow. They were already wrapped around her little finger.

  I placed my hand on her tiny back and met my brother’s eyes. “You’ve never seen them together, you don’t know how much he loves her. You don’t know what it was like in the beginning.”

  “You’re right. I was just here for the aftermath. I listened to my baby sister cry herself to sleep when she thought no one could hear. You haven’t moved on, you haven’t even tried.” His body was relaxed, but his face was hard. I opened my mouth to argue that point, but he kept talking. “You can play the martyr all you want. You can tell me it isn’t fair to start a relationship right now. You can tell me that Katie is your only priority. But I know the truth. Mason hurt you, Pay, devastated you. You might not want to admit it to me, or to yourself. But he did.” He shook his head. “You dropped everything to help him. You were there for him when he had no one else. You turned your life upside down to raise his baby sister. The child his parents left as his responsibility. Your social life, your job? All that is gone. You gave it all up for a man that walked out on you without a backward glance.”

  “He didn’t walk out on me, Parker. He had to go back on tour. He didn’t have a choice.”

  He snorted. “Sure, keep telling yourself that.”

  I watched as my brother walked down the hallway, Katie cradled in his big arms. Once he turned into her room, I headed toward the kitchen. If Park was going to put her bed, I was going to have a glass of wine. I poured myself a tall one from the opened bottle of red on the counter and then sat at the table. I pulled out my phone and started
flipping through the old pics I’d saved. The ones from the beginning, the ones of Mason and Katie I’d taken. When we were best friends and we were turning into more. When we were becoming a family.

  I hadn’t gotten over him, my brother was right. But how could I? I was living in his house, raising his baby sister. It wasn’t like I could take Katie and run. That would be kidnapping, if he ever decided to come looking for us. I could only sit here and wait for the day he came home. And hope that I was the only one who ended up hurt.

  I took a deep breath and picked up my phone. Jacks had been calling to check in on Katie and me. Something Mason had stopped doing altogether once they’d extended the tour. Something Parker had said was weighing on me. It was a thought I’d had then pushed to the furthest corners of my mind. But it was time and I needed to know the truth.

  Me: Did Mason have a choice about going back on tour?

  I waited, drumming my fingers on the counter and sipping my wine. When my phone dinged, my stomach dropped. I was terrified of seeing his answer.

  Jacks Cole: No, he had to do the first six weeks or his crew wouldn’t have gotten paid. He had people depending on him and he did the right thing.

  I let out a small sigh of relief. Okay, so when he left, he had to. He did it because he cared about his crew, the people his tour had employed.

  Me: And extending the tour? Whose idea was that?

  Jacks Cole: Mason’s.

  I squeezed my eyes shut, trying like hell not to cry.

  Me: Thanks.

  Jacks Cole: I’m sorry. I know that wasn’t the answer you wanted to hear.

  Me: No. But it was the one I needed to.

  I placed my phone facedown on the table. I didn’t want to see those words staring back at me. They were making me sick. It was what I had feared, put out there in black and white.

  Mason hadn’t wanted to come home. He didn’t miss us so much that it hurt. He wasn’t lying awake wondering how we were. He was just done. He didn’t want this life. He didn’t want to be part of this family.

  I took another sip, a larger sip. I took a deep breath and when I let it out, I let him go.

  Chapter Thirty-four

  Mason

  Home after eleven and a half weeks on the road

  There were giant steel planters on the front porch, teeming with multicolored succulents. They looked expensive and custom made. I knew the silver Tahoe sitting in the driveway wasn’t Payton’s. I’d had a Mercedes GLS delivered two days after I left. I’d done a lot of research and that was one of the best and the safest. So either she said fuck you to my gift, or there was someone else here. The sick nervous feeling in my stomach intensified.

  I tried the door and found it locked. I told myself that was a good thing. Payton was being safe and cautious. I fished my key out of my pocket, a key I hadn’t used in over three months. I frowned when it wouldn’t fit in the lock. I was forced to knock on my own front door. I held my breath, waiting to see her face. I almost wanted to close my eyes.

  I was terrified.

  “Can I help you?” I jerked back. The man who opened the door was built like a brick house. He had dark hair and dark eyes, his face set in confusion.

  “Uh, can I help you?” My voice sounded like a spoiled sixteen-year-old girl’s, and it made me wince.

  His expression deepened, an almost smile playing on his lips. Yeah, I sounded ridiculous and we both knew it. “What?”

  “This is my fucking house.” I wanted to hit him, even though he had a couple inches and like forty pounds on me. Payton had moved some guy into my house? Screwing him under my roof? With my sister down the hall? I wanted to hit him, and then lean over the new planters and throw up everything I’d eaten today.

  “You’re Mason.”

  Of course I was Mason. I was famous as fuck, not to mention that my pictures were up in the damn house. Lining the hallway, sitting on the dresser. That smug prick knew who I was. “Are you going to move? Or am I going to have to call security.” I had started to get my voice back, and I sounded a lot stronger than I felt.

  He crossed his arms over his chest, his massive body blocking the whole doorframe. “Go ahead, asshole. Call them.” He gestured toward the gate with his big head. “I’d love to know why they let someone on the property without calling the house first.”

  My eyes widened. “Because it’s my fucking property.” I all but screamed in his face. “Move.”

  He stared at me for so long I was seriously wondering if I was going to have to go get security. Security I’d hired. Men I paid to make sure that Payton and Katie were safe. Finally he let out an annoyed sigh and stepped to the side. I picked up my worn, army green duffle off the ground and brushed past him. I made sure to knock my shoulder into his, but he didn’t really budge.

  “Where’s Payton?” My eyes scanned the living room. The furniture was the same brown leather stuff my parents had picked out. But it was rearranged and there were toys scattered in baskets on the bookcases, and there was a pink and gray foam play mat under the windows.

  “Pay took Katie to mommy and me yoga. They should be home any second now.” The beefcake was still standing by the door, his muscular arms still crossed over his chest.

  Pay? How long had those two been shacking up? “Are you the nanny?” Please God, let him be the nanny. Payton hiring a hot and built manny would be so much better than her moving her boyfriend into my house.

  He threw his head back and chuckled. “No.”

  Well shit. I turned my back to him, once again surveying the house. All my pictures were gone off the shelves, the walls. They were replaced with pictures of Katie. There was one of Katie and Payton that made my heart stutter in my chest. I walked closer, studying it. They were in the field of wild flowers that always grew on one of the back acres of the ranch. They were both dressed in white and she was holding Katie up, the sun lighting their smiling faces.

  “I’m guessing Pay doesn’t know you were coming back today?”

  I cleared the lump out of my throat and spun around, irritation on my face. “No. I didn’t call Pay to let her know I was coming home. To my own fucking house.” I sounded like a straight up asshole now. But I was scared that she’d moved on, moved on to someone better. Someone who had been here for her and Katie when I’d all but abandoned them.

  He shook his head, a smile forming on his stupid pretty face. “You should have called, bro.”

  I opened my mouth to go off on him, but before I could get a word out, the front door swung wide.

  “We’re home!” Payton walked in, her long hair piled on top of her head and Katie in her arms. There were both smiling at the man I’d quickly grown to hate.

  Katie started to squirm and he scooped her up, making her coo and Payton chuckle. The sound of her laughter made my heart stop.

  “I know everyone thinks their kid is the cutest kid, but I’m telling you Pax, our girl was the—”

  Her words cut off when she noticed me standing in the middle of the living room. Her gaze took me in and her face froze, like she couldn’t really believe I was here.

  “Hey, Payton.”

  “Mace?” She took a step closer, her light pink tank top flowing with the sudden movement. Her mouth was open and her eyes were wide. I’d shocked her. Maybe the Hulk was right. Maybe I should have called. “What are you doing here?”

  I swallowed around the lump in my throat that had formed the minute she’d walked in the door. She was the most beautiful girl I’d ever seen. “The tour is over.” I looked from her to my baby sister sitting happily in another man’s arms. “I, uh, it was time to come home.”

  “Pax. Uh, could you—”

  “Come on, Katie Bug, let’s go see the horseys. You want to go see the horseys?” He glared at me on his way out of my house, holding my sister. “Say bye-bye.” He picked up her tiny little hand and waved gently for her. “Bye. Bye.”

  “Bye-bye, Bug. Have fun.” Payton blew her a kiss and smiled until the fron
t door shut. Then she turned to me, her expression wary. “You didn’t call.”

  “Yeah. Well I didn’t realize I needed to. Since this is my house.” My tone was way harsher than it had any right to be. I should be acting contrite. But seeing her, seeing Katie smile at that guy? It was like a punch to the stomach.

  Payton crossed her arms over her chest. “This isn’t your house, Mace. It may be in your name, but you don’t live here. Not anymore, not since the day you decided to extend your tour.” She raised an eyebrow and dared me to tell her a lie. Did she know that it was my idea to extend? “You should have called.”

  I mirrored her position, even though I should have been groveling at her feet. “Why? Afraid I pissed off your meathead boyfriend?”

  She snorted. “Who? Pax? That’s one of my brothers.”

  Holy shit. That was one of her brothers? What did the other two look like? They could kill me with one hand tied behind their backs. Were they all like the Hulk? Just less green? I shrugged like I was indifferent, not slightly alarmed. “What was he doing here?”

  She sighed, clearly already annoyed with my dumb, snarky ass. “Not that it’s any of your business why my brother was in my house, but he lives here, helps me take care of Katie.”

  “Where’s the nanny?”

  “I fired her the second you hired her. I told you I’d stay with Katie when you extended the tour, there was no need to get a nanny.” Payton crossed the room, picking up a couple of Katie’s toys off the floor.

  “Your leave of absence was over, I thought…”

  “I knew Kate wouldn’t have wanted that for her, wouldn’t have wanted her daughter raised by a stranger. So I took on an alternate position at the hospital, and my brothers moved in here to help me.”

  “Brothers? As in more than one lives here?”

  “Two live here and—”

  “Katie wasn’t going to be raised by a stranger. I was coming home, the tour would have ended eventually.” Payton scoffed. Clearly she didn’t believe me. Which was okay, because I didn’t really believe me either. But for some reason I was hell-bent on selling the lie. “This leg only had two weeks left anyway.”