CHAPTER FIVE

 

It’s holy matrimony, baby!

Hellish even.

But, you’ll make me half a million dollars.

And I’ll make you the best husband you’ll ever have.

 

NOX

It must be near dawn. Five a.m. if the digital clock on the nightstand is correct. Stretching, it takes me a moment to recall where I am. Not the cabin, and not Dean’s place. This isn’t patio furniture either. But it’s the best night’s sleep I’ve had in almost as long as I can remember. I reach under my hip and pull out a big bit of flattened metal. Circular and an inch thick. I pop the metal bangle onto the nightstand. Beck Casey is used to other people cleaning up after her, I’d bet my last dollar on it. Her hotel room is a mess.

Sitting up, I rub my jaw, glance around. There’s the glow of a screen coming from the other room. Perhaps she left the TV on, or she couldn’t sleep. Not surprising she didn’t join me in the bedroom. Didn’t expect her to. Especially after her reaction. I grin. Well, maybe not her reaction. There’s an attraction between us, a sexual tension that caught me by surprise last night as much as it did the first time I met her. I could sense how much her body wanted to mold to mine when we were touching each other. Wanted it.

That’s not the point. There are half a million points to be made, but that isn’t one of them. I climb off the bed and stumble to the bathroom. Need to piss.

Bladder empty, I tuck myself in, do up my pants, and wander into the living space. She’s asleep on the sofa, bare feet sticking out from under the white waffle weave robe she’s draped over herself. Her laptop is open on the coffee table. Two windows divide the screen. One’s an essay on some electropop group I’ve never heard of. The other is a blog titled Dear Anti-Cupid. The post is about how to push a guy until he cracks so you can find out if he’s a keeper, and her name is the byline.

I snort and shake my head. Make a note to have a look at this blog of hers later. She might hate me after all, but if she thinks I’m going to let go of half a million dollars and the chance to see if there’s something more here, she’s going to be shocked at my staying power. I quietly tuck the end of the robe around her feet before letting myself out the door. Three months of playing house with Beck Casey might be the answer to my problems, but I still have to go to work.

While I ride the elevator down, I text Jack. He’s probably still asleep, and if not, too busy to respond, but I need him to put me in touch with Liv again. If I’m going to keep up my end of the deal, I’m going to need a key.

Started feeling guilty while I was delivering lumber. Half a million dollars isn’t a good enough reason to make someone uncomfortable. And Beck doesn’t deserve it. The only thing she did wrong was marry me. God knows why. Probably because we were drunk. No hidden agenda, no deeper meaning like her friend thinks.

I was fucked up that night. Hating on everything but booze. Lena made sure of it. I wouldn’t be in this mess without her. Beck wouldn’t be involved either.

I pull into the empty lot behind the old building. Damn kids have been throwing rocks and smashing windows again. Tagged more of the building too. The steel records that used to decorate the space over the front door are faded and broken. A couple of the discs are missing altogether. Above them on the roof the Casey Record sign is a grimy, broken mess. God, this place used to be something. Rock royalty used to walk through these doors on a regular basis. They’d come stay at the cabin and make their records here. Couldn’t get them to come now. Dad would never have let it fall apart like this. All that’s left is a pile of bricks with no soul and no life.

My chest aches. Dad must be turning in his grave. His legacy lying in ruins like this.

Gravel crunches under the tires as I park the truck. Still keep messing up. Can’t get it right.

Jumping out of the cab, I find the key on my fob. We loaded all the equipmentthe instruments and mixers and rack mounts and anything else that wasn’t glued down—into my truck and moved it to Mayhem to store it when we thought we were going to have to let the building go. Now it’s just a shell. The power’s cut off, and there’s probably glass everywhere from the broken windows, so there’s no point in going inside. I just like knowing that I can. That no matter how hard Lena tried she didn’t manage to take it all from me. That as much as she did manage to take, she couldn’t take this. At least when I come out here there’s some hope that I can undo the damage, bring the bands back, rebuild the label to what it once was because we still have the building my father built into a rock landmark.

Thank God he didn’t leave it all to me alone. He had foresight where I had none. Though I very nearly ruined that too. Marrying Lena would have resulted in her having a right to half the studio. Instead, I married Beck. She doesn’t even know how she saved me that night. I didn’t know. Not until later when I couldn’t see any other way out but to give Lena what she wanted. Dad had mortgaged the studio and the cabin to help me get back on my feet and the debt still needed to be cleared. I had to sell my house because Lena’s name was on the title. Couldn’t see any other way out but to sell the studio to the developers Lena worked for.

Until I was sitting with the paperwork in front of me and dad’s estate lawyer asked me about my marital status. Such a tiny detail, but the impact was huge. A simple clause in dad’s will transferred half of the estate into Beck’s ownership the moment we married. To sell it I had to have her signature, and I had no idea where she was. There was not a damn thing Lena could do. God, she was angry. Still enjoy revisiting that moment. Her face... thought she was going to go nuclear.

But it’s been two years and I can’t make a dent in the mess. Haven’t managed to do a damn thing to get this place back to what it should be. Haven’t been able to pay my siblings back for helping me keep everything afloat. It’s been long enough.

This is why you’re going to stick like glue to the girl. For Finn, and Dean, and Jack. And for Lou. And for dad, because I have to fix this. That’s what he would want. He was always telling me that there were too many songs still to be sung, guitars to be strummed. We Caseys don’t quit what we start.

Can’t let an opportunity like the one Liv’s giving me slip through my fingers because Beck doesn’t deserve to be caught in the middle. Already put her there when I married her. Maybe after things are turned around I can make it up to her. Maybe give her a once in a lifetime interview with the ghost of a rockstar. Or call in a favor from Sophie Valentine. Beck would probably like that.

Something glints at the corner of the building. Diamond bright. What the hell? I stalk in that direction, stop when I get to the steps to the darkened front doors. Beck Casey is taking pictures with her Nikon. Stuffing it back into her tan leather tote bag, she tries the door. The chunky chain padlocked around the handles rattles. Her curvy ass bounces inside that cute, stretchy aqua skirt. And then she pulls a bobby pin from the base of her ponytail.

I clear my throat. “Need help?”

“I-uh.” She jumps and spins around, her hands behind her back. “No, I don’t. What are you doing here?”

“Casey Records.” Jogging up the steps to meet her on the fat bit of concrete between the top four and bottom four, I point at the faded and cracked sign suspended on top of the building, before pushing my thumb into my chest. “Nox Casey.”

“You?” Her eyebrows arch into two perfect peaks. “You’re related to Dalton Casey?”

“He was my dad.”

“Oh.” She comes toward me. “I’m so sorry. He was a great man. From what I’ve read.”

“He was better in person.” Our conversation tapers off the way it does whenever this subject is broached by people who didn’t know him. We both stand around awkwardly staring at the building, her biting her thumb nail, and me with my arms crossed.

“You grew up here?”

Can’t blame her for wanting to change the topic, even slightly. Don’t know what to say myself. “I did.”

“This place must have been amazing in its heyday.” She glances around the empty lot.

“It was.”

“I heard Sophie Valentine had her first kiss in this parking lot.” She shields her eyes with her hand as she twists at the hips like she’s surveying her kingdom.

“Yeah, I remember.” Standing beside her, I point at an uninteresting spot in the yard. Memories overlap the rubble and littered glass from windows and broken bottles, tinting it golden. It’s like looking through dust motes or dirt streaked windowpanes at a perfect summer’s day. “Um, it happened right over there.”

She gazes out to where I pointed, and then her nose crinkles and she turns to me. “Was it with you? Did you and Sophie—”

“Oh. No. Not me.” I grimace. Sophie and I shared a lot of moments, but they were all platonic.

“But you were there.” She nods to herself, most likely slotting images into place in her head. She lifts her Nikon and takes a few photos of the area. “Will you tell me about it?”

“It’s not really my story to tell.” Crossing my arms, I rock back on my heels. Boy, it was a story though. We thought it would be an epic. But time teaches reality, doesn’t it? Sometimes, I wish...

“Please. It’ll be completely off the record. It’s just I’ve always wondered.”

“Well, since you’re my wife I suppose I can tell you.” I owe her at least this much.

“Hmmm,” she says, but she doesn’t argue. I guess at this point she just wants me to tell her the story.

“Sophie was having a bad day. A real shit show. She’d been in the booth for hours, but the song wouldn’t come together. They’d run through it so many times that my dad suggested it might be better if she came in the next day. It wasn’t a big deal. We’d grown up together, so she’d always had unlimited access to the booth. It was sort of unspoken that she was a star.”

“Really?” Beck whispers, as though she doesn’t want to interrupt the story.

“Yeah. She had that...light inside her, that zing from the beginning.” Sort of like Beck did the first time I saw her. Everything was haywire in my head and she shone like a flare. Can’t tell her that though. “Anyone could tell she was special the moment they heard her voice. But she worked her ass off too. That day wasn’t an exception. And then she received a phone call about the boy she was dating. It really messed her up.”

“I wonder what it was.”

I still remember her face while her best friend broke the news that the boy Sophie had started dating was spreading rumors about her. She had never kissed a boy and half the kids we went to school with were going to believe she was a slut. “I’m not sure, but she was furious. She stormed out of the booth.”

“It must have been bad.”

“Yeah, I think it might have been.” She was so pale, all the color washed out of her face and tears started leaking from the corners of her eyes as she slammed the booth door behind her. Her hands were shaking, and she was panting as she turned to race out of the building. And then my brother said something to her about how she shouldn’t let it get to her. “She flew out the doors behind us and straight across the yard. Do you see that line?”

“What line?” She screws up her nose and uses a hand to shade her eyes.

Taking her arm, I pull her in front of me and then point over her shoulder so that she can follow the line of my finger to the faded white line on the gravel. “That one.”

“Oh yeah,” she whispers.

“That’s how far she got. You see there was this other boy. He worked here. A boy she’d grown up with and had been friends with all her life. And he’d loved her for all that time. So when he saw how upset she was he had to comfort her. He slammed out of those doors right behind her, chased her across the yard, and then he grabbed her arm.” I take Beck’s elbow as I step closer to her, guiding it back toward my chest, holding onto her like I need her to stay. What would it take? “Like this.”

She inhales sharply. “Go on.”

“Sophie spun around, her eyes red rimmed. She could have obliterated him with her glare. They were both breathing hard, locked into the moment.” Leaning closer, my breath ruffles her hair. The thin strands dance against the nape of her neck, and goose bumps form despite the heat. “A storm of electricity between them, they stood rooted where they were. I suppose it had been there for a while, but not like it was that afternoon while they stood in the sunlight, and he took her face in his hands and told her that she was too good for some stupid boy from this town. That she was going to be the one who everyone wished they could have had a chance with because she was so much more than anyone deserved.”

Her breath hitches and her shoulders still. She’s caught up in this story. Deep down inside, Beck Casey is a romantic. She just doesn’t know it.

“And she asked him if she was too good for him,” I continue.

“What did he say?” she asks.

“He said she was the best thing that ever happened to him, and if that meant he’d spend every day for the rest of his life trying to be good enough for her, then that was what he was going to do.”

“And then he kissed her?” Her voice crackles, eager for the happy ending. Anticipating it.

“No,” I say, drawing away. “She kissed him. She leaped at him, kissing him before he could comprehend what was happening. It took him a few seconds to catch on and by then she’d pulled away.”

“Is that all?” Beck sounds disappointed.

“Well, it was a first kiss for her. For him as well. You can’t expect too much.”

“But...that’s really it?”

“No.” I grin. “She went to walk away, and he dragged her back into his arms and made a good deal of their second kiss. But I can’t tell you about that because I didn’t stick around to witness it.” Tried not to witness most of the public displays of affection between my brother and his girlfriend for the next four years.

“I wonder what happened to them. To him.” Beck turns her blue-eyed gaze on me, twisting her torso to face me.

I scratch at my jaw. There’s only so much I can tell her. “He didn’t want to get in the way of her achieving her dreams, I suppose. When her star started rising, it was inevitable that things between them would change.”

“Is he the one you were talking about when you said you knew a guy who thought she might be the devil?”

“He never thought she was the devil. It was just a little joke.”

“Thank you.” Beck touches my arm. “Thank you for telling me the story, and thank you for leaving my hotel room and not making this marriage nonsense more difficult than it has to be.”

“I’m sorry,” I say, because I don’t want to make her uncomfortable, but there are too many people depending on me to not commit to the deal I made with Liv.

“That’s oka—”

“No.” It doesn’t matter how I try to soften the blow, it’s going to come out wrong. “I’m sorry I had to go to work this morning and that led you to believe that I’m done with being your husband. I meant what I said last night. It’s not going to change.”

Her eyes get real huge, all glittery blue except for her pupils. In them I can see myself, and the horror at the situation we find ourselves in. She takes a breath in. A long, deep breath that makes her tits rise like two balloons. And then she expels it in a flurry of words that aren’t particularly intelligible as she paces in a circle, but the gist is clear. She couldn’t be less happy with the situation. “Why can’t you be reasonable? What can you possibly get out of doing this? Surely this isn’t fun for you.”

“Well, until a couple seconds ago it was kind of enjoyable.” I don’t mean to be an ass, though she must think I do. I’m too tired to formulate a plan, too out of place with her presence all of a sudden. I turn the keys over in my hand. They rattle against each other. Something familiar in this new landscape that takes the edge off. Perhaps I just want to be honest in a situation that calls for dishonesty.

Again she stops and stares at me, her lips parted loosely. “You’re joking. Or confused. This is enjoyable to you?”

“For a minute there.” I look her in the eye. “Yeah, I was enjoying myself.” Probably more than I have these past two years. Or even longer. Except one night in Vegas. “Weren’t you?”

“Wh…You think that...it was just a story. I thought you had changed your mind about torturing me.”

“Torture?” I glance over my shoulder at the truck cab. I’ve put in a full day. All I want is to go home and have a shower and drink a beer. Chill out on my couch and watch some shitty TV. Spend some time in the shed next to the cabin and create with my hands. Instead I have to go teach a couple kids how to play guitar, and then I have to work out how to deal with this woman who clearly has no idea what torture in a relationship is like. “Does that friend of yours—”

“Liv,” she hurries me along.

“Liv. Does she ever tell you that you’re a bit dramatic?”

“Dramatic?” Her voice gets squeaky. She looks about ready to blow her top. “Are you seriously calling me a drama queen?”

“Now, now. I never called you a queen.” I grimace, clasping my hands behind my back and shifting my weight. “I’m just suggesting that you might be going a little too far when you call this situation torture.”

“Is that so? What would you call it?”

“Marriage, for starters.” I shrug while I locate the truck key. “And since I happen to like you, Beck, it’s not exactly a hardship.”

“I still don’t understand why you’re insisting.” She flaps her arms. I bet she wishes she could take off right about now. Just fly out of this town and away from me.

“I guess it’s because if my old man was still here, he’d tell me that some of the greatest things come from the most unlikely places.” Stepping up beside her I take her arm to lead her to the truck. “And he’d tell me that if I could go so far as to put my mother’s wedding band on your finger, the least I can do is find out if it could be worth it.”