Chapter Twenty-Two
“Ethan”
As I sit stoic in the car on my way to my sister-in-law’s house, I decide that on the scale of being screwed over by my brother Avery ranks higher than Tara. Most guys probably wouldn’t see it that way since I never slept with Avery, but logical or not, fuck it, that’s how I feel.
I think that I haven’t slept with her makes it worse. All that could have been garbage rattling around in my head combined with the garbage of overinflated expectations. Like how great we would have been together. That feeling of being cheated because I won’t ever get to know it. Now that Eric’s gotten with her, anything that might have been between Avery and me is in the crapper, fini. Suffice to say, I don’t fuck Eric’s leftovers.
My stomach turns and I try to tell myself it’s the gremlins that won’t leave my body from a night of getting wasted, but I know it’s more. Thinking of Eric with her makes me want to ram my hand through the car window, and the only upside of my anger is that I’m not driving.
Dillon makes the turn off PCH to Laurel Canyon toward Eric’s house, which for the last year has only been Tara’s. “Are you going to fucking talk to me or just sit there brooding?” he asks, shifting his eyes from the road to assess my mood before going back to focus on his driving.
My jaw clenches as I shrug. “Fuck you. How’s that for a conversation starter?”
He laughs. “Well, that’s a start. We’re getting somewhere. Maybe next you could thank me for taking you home instead of letting you take off with the bangers on the highway to hell last night.”
It’s a struggle not to laugh or crack a smile. Dillon’s a good friend, and undoubtedly saved my ass from a long regrets list given the shape I was in after being dumb enough to leave the concert with those crazy-ass chicks, but I’m not ready to behave human with anyone yet.
I stare out the window, relentless in not looking at him. “Let me guess. You’re not enjoying hauling my ass around any more than I am. Next time, try handing over the keys when I ask for them.”
“Can’t do it, E. You know the SOP. No leaving the grounds without me until further notice.”
I roll my eyes, since he has an uncanny way of sounding like he’s still in the military when he wants to, like that’s going to make this bullshit smell less like shit. Perhaps the least of my annoyance is that I’m stuck in a car with him, given Dillon refused to give me the keys to any of my parents’ cars, but when consumed by blasts of richly justified anger, that perspective is lost and almost anything makes me one pissed off jerkwad.
He holds out his arm across the center console, flexing his muscles. “What’s the matter, E? Afraid having me around will give you some competition with the girls?”
I run a hand through my hair, wanting to ignore that, but my gums start flapping anyway. “Yeah. That’s it. You beating me out with the girls is right up there on my priority list of worries.”
His eyebrows wiggle. “I can see how it’d be. I’m the superior specimen. Women love a guy who can shoot straight and hit their target.”
I scowl. “Keep telling yourself that, Dillon, and you won’t feel fucking old anymore. What are you? Sixty? Seventy? If you shoot at all, it’s blanks. They’ll be begging for me after you.”
He laughs in that annoying way guys who always come out on top do. Usually I find him funny and enjoy verbally sparring with him.
“No blanks in my barrel. What I lack in stamina, I make up in know-how.”
“Keep telling yourself that, old man. Maybe your wife will stop right-swiping me on Tinder.”
His eyes widen and my muscles tense up. The wife comment was out of bounds and I shouldn’t have said it. Rachel’s the best, and if she were my wife, I’d fucking rip the head off a guy who’d talk out of turn for a snarky comment’s sake.
I can feel Dillon’s eyes run my profile and how I’m sitting in my seat. Damn.
“You going to tell me what’s bugging you, E, or do you expect me to leave it alone and let you enjoy being an asshole?”
We’re parked in Tara’s driveway, and I open the door, setting one foot on the pavement before looking back at him. “Eric’s gone. Someone has to fill that slot.”
“How’s that working out for you?”
The front door to the house opens.
“Not any worse than every other fucking thing does for me.”
I climb out before he answers because Hana is running toward the car. Eric’s daughter is a cute, rambunctious, blond-haired, blue-eyed five-year-old who wiggled her way into my heart when I didn’t want her to.
It was unavoidable, I guess.
Keeping my distance from my brother’s family wasn’t possible after Hana was born. The combination of knowing this girl is as close to being mine as any child could be—seeing as Eric and I have identical DNA and I once loved her mother—and knowing she’d been stuck with my douche of a brother as a father made it certain I’d step up to look out for her.
“Hey, Hana Banana,” I say, crouching down, and I realize she must have been confused by the car and driver, and that she’s been running thinking I was Eric. I’d have given anything not to see her face cloud over the instant she figures out I’m not.
“Uncle Ethan.” There’s enough letdown in her voice that it can’t be missed, and she peeks around my body, hoping Eric’s in the car. “Is Daddy with you?”
I gently run a hand over the top of her head. “Sorry. Not this time. He’s working, or he’d be here. He sent me with a kiss for you.” My throat catches a bit because we’re getting close to an age when she’s not going to buy that anymore, and I dread the thought of how hurt she’s going to be once she’s old enough to know things.
I give her a loud, sloppy one on her cheek, wanting to make her giggle, but nothing.
She frowns. “Who’s that?”
“That’s Dillon. He’s driving me today. You remember him from Grandma and Grandpa’s?”
Her face falls more.
I stand up and hold out a hand. “Why don’t you take me inside the house so I can visit with you and your mom? I’ve missed you. I don’t like it when I don’t get to see my favorite girl.”
She slips her small fingers in mine, and she starts to walk when I do, but keeps peeking back over her shoulder.
“Guess what?” I ask, in an effort to end her preoccupation with the car.
She looks up at me.
I smile. “I’m off the road for a long time. If it’s all right with your mom, we can hang out more together. Would you like that?”
Her saucer eyes lock on mine, and it feels like forever before she nods. Getting the silent pouts from Hana hurts like hell. She’s naturally a chatterbox.
Shortening my strides to match hers, I ask, “You look very pretty today. Like a princess. Did Mommy pick that dress or you?”
Her fingers curl in the fabric but she doesn’t lift her gaze from the ground. “I did. Daddy sent it to me.”
“I could tell. It looks like something your daddy would buy for you.” Which is a lie because the pink sundress covered in prints of shells has Mom written all over it. It strikes me the lengths we go as a family, lying because of Eric, and also brings home that not all the ways we do it are bad.
Her features scrunch up and she looks on the verge of tears again. I want in the worst way to put a smile on Hana’s face but thus far I’ve failed.
“Ethan!” Tara’s voice gushes, causing me to look up to see my sister-in-law hovering in the open doorway.
I’m used to how beautiful Tara is. It lost effect on me a long time ago, but unexpectedly my pulse ticks up at first glance at her. My reaction takes me off guard and I really don’t like it. I never want to feel anything, good or bad, for her. Her stirring anything in me kicks awake too many emotions better left undisturbed.
It took a lot of time to get beyond her being the hurricane inside me and me trapped in the eye of it. To move her where I wanted us to be: an ugly footnote in my life of no importance.
But, fuck, here I am again feeling all twisted up because of her, and I’m unclear how that happened.
“I got here as quickly as I could,” I say, not sure what else to tell her.
“I know you did. You never let me down, Ethan.” Her fingers curl around my shirt the second I’m within reach of her, her body too close to mine, her forehead against my shirt. “But I’m going out of my mind with all the things I’m reading. No one has told me anything about what’s happening to him. One day he calls, says he’s coming to see Hana, and then the next he disappears. No one will talk to me. None of his people will answer my questions. I’ve called your mom a dozen times and she hasn’t called me back. I don’t know what to think. I’ve been so afraid.”
With a finger, I lift her chin so she’s looking at me. “I’m sorry the family hasn’t kept you up to date. A lot’s been going on, but that doesn’t excuse them not calling you. It’s unforgiveable and I’ll fix it.” I glance at Hana, then back to Tara. “There’s nothing to worry about. You have my word on it. Don’t worry. It’s going to be all right, Tara.”
She nods, her hair teasing my chin. “If you say it is, I believe you.” A ragged breath sighs out of her then she traps me in the endless green of her eyes. “Tell me he’s all right.”
Fuck, how can she still love him with all the shit he’s pulled? “He’s all right, Tara.”
She searches my face anxiously, and somehow my blood manages to pump even faster, and I know it’s not exclusively because I just lied to her.
Fuck, I need to get it together fast.
This isn’t good.
The last thing I want is to get tangled up in Tara again.
Jesus Christ, what the hell is the matter with me?
What are these strange sensations blasting through me at random? Probably nothing. And I’d have to be dead inside not to be feeling things with Tara today. The train wreck that’s been Eric for nearly a year, I can see in every line on her face.
Yep, she doesn’t look like I expected to find and that’s why she’s slipping through my guard.
Her model-perfect face carries a tension that robs her of a great deal of her natural beauty. Her curvaceous body is all but swallowed by frumpy oversized sweats like my sister Kaley would wear on early morning carpool days. Her long brown hair looks like it needs a brush and her giant green eyes are red from crying. The combination makes her appear vulnerable and weirdly maternal; two ways I’ve never thought of Tara before.
She curls her arm around mine and looks down at Hana. “Go to your room and play for a while. I need to talk privately with Uncle Ethan.”
Hana scowls and snaps me out of my Tara preoccupation and hones my focus on her.
Christ, what’s up with that?
“Now,” Tara says firmly.
Hana shifts her gaze to me and it’s then I see the unvoiced worry in her eyes. “I won’t leave without saying goodbye, banana,” I assure her soothingly. “I can hang out with you the rest of the evening. That is, if you want me to.”
She almost gives me a smile this time, before she nods and disappears into the house.
We stand on the front stoop listening to Hana’s footsteps fade. As soon as she’s out of earshot, I ask, “Jesus Christ, Tara. What’s been going on here? I’ve never seen Hana this way.”
Tara shakes her head as if lost on how to explain it. “Your brother. That’s what’s been going on here. Filing for divorce didn’t change anything. Instead, the roller coaster of living with him is whizzing on the tracks even faster. He acts like nothing’s changed. You know the drill, what life is for us when Eric’s having his issues. Empty promises. Angry excuses. Dropping in and out of our lives without notice. Disappearing acts. But she’s a little girl. All the chaos and instability hits her hard.”
My mouth tightens. “Looks to me like it hits you hard, too.”
She flushes. “It’s been hell, Ethan. I won’t lie to you.”
I run a hand through my hair, trying to get a handle on how things could have gotten so fucked up in every corner of my world without my knowing it. I hadn’t a clue things had gotten this bad for Tara and Hana, and I feel like a bastard for not doing something, anything, for them before today.
“You should have called me sooner, Tara.”
Her eyes tear up. “It didn’t seem right to pull you into my problems. You don’t owe me anything and I sure as hell don’t have a right to ask for your help. But it got to the point it seemed there wasn’t any other way to find out what’s happening. Not after reading the blogs this morning.”
I flush. “We’re family, Tara. If you can’t ask me for help, who can you ask?” Then my mind latches onto her last sentence. “What do you mean the blogs?”
Her brows shoot up. “The one for the band that girl writes. And the PR company. It’s all over social media. That’s how I found out my husband’s gone into rehab and you’re replacing him as lead singer with Black Dawn.”
“Rehab?” I yank my phone from my pocket and my fingers move like greased lightning across the screen.
My gaze bores into the long string of posts on the Roaming Redhead.
No, no, no.
Those weren’t there last night.
As for the stories, they’re garbage. No one knew it was me on stage instead of Eric. No one was supposed to know. And I sure as hell never agreed to replace Eric in the band.
From how the posts are written it’s like Avery was at the Bowl last night. But she wasn’t. And where the fuck did these videos come from? They look as if they were shot by her with her camera, staying consistent with that fan-in-the-audience style she prefers rather than something appearing slick and produced.
My thumb pushes and pauses until I’m through the twenty posts that appeared out of nowhere on her blog. What the fuck is happening here?
Alarm flashes in Tara’s eyes. “Ethan, what’s wrong? Eric did go into rehab, didn’t he? Please don’t tell me it’s not true. It’s the first hopeful thing I’ve heard in forever. Maybe now I can get things back on track with him and Hana can have her dad again.”
I swallow the lump in my throat so I can push out a lie. “No, it’s true, Tara. I just didn’t know about the press releases.”
“Don’t scare me like that. Not ever again.” She covers her face with her hands and I can hear her quietly crying behind her fingers. “God, why is everything so impossible? And why are you always so wonderful in my worst moments?”
I slip an arm around her. “I’m feeling pretty fucking far from wonderful. Damn, Tara. You should have known I’d always be here for you if you need me.”
She brushes at the tears on her cheeks. “Thanks for offering to spend some time with Hana. I think it’ll be good for her having you around until Eric gets back. Maybe help her to miss him less.”
I nod and the emotion in me is sucking up the oxygen before it can enter my lungs. Lying for Eric and standing in for him is something I should be used to by now, but I fucking hate it. It leaves me feeling I’m the worst kind of asshole, even worse than my brother because I don’t have an excuse for being dishonest and I know better.
But there’s no help for it.
Correcting the facts, hurting Tara and Hana with the truth won’t help anyone.
Maybe that’s why the folks kept her out of the loop. To see how long Eric stays gone before they tell her he’s gone for good. That sounds like Mom. Waiting to see, to be sure, before dropping a bombshell on someone else’s life.
Maybe that’s why those bullshit stories are on the Internet. To protect Tara and Hana from the truth.
Fuck.
Who knows?
I’m too tired to unravel it.
She lays her head on my shoulder as we walk into the house, and I know I should step away from her quickly and keep distance, but I can’t. When we land in an Eric crisis together, it’s never far from my mind that I loved her once.