Chapter Eight
“I’m not going to go back there.” Up on the stage of Erik’s theatre, Nash tuned his guitar.
“Well, well, aren’t you just Prince Charming?” Erik sat down at the piano.
Nash glanced over at Christine. She simply stood there, arms crossed, eyes narrowed, clearly glaring at him.
“What’s the point?” He began to tune his guitar. “What’s the point of any of it?”
Erik stood, took his time smoothing down his shirt, moved his hair off his face and then strode over to him. “Let me get this straight. For the last four days I’ve heard you talk about nothing but this Princess Petals, how she wept at the sight of you, how she held your hand, how you felt a connection unlike anything else.”
“Are we going to play or what?” With everything in tune, he put an extra pick in his mouth and got read to make some music.
Erik crossed his arms. “Why don’t you play with your fair maiden by the lake?”
“I can’t play in front of her.” Nash’s voice came out muffled from the pick.
“Right,” Erik growled. “You wouldn’t want to blow your big cover.”
The second Petals figured out he was a has-been rock star, it was over anyway. Better to end it sooner rather than later. He only met her twice and couldn’t stop thinking about her, where did she go after she left him, who was she, what would she do if she knew who he was or was it better this way? Rather than hear a rehash of his life, he began to play a little rift.
Erik lunged over and put his hand over the strings and stared into his eyes. “Now you ask this lovely goddess on this so-called bizarre date in the middle of nowhere, and you’re not going to show up because?”
“Because he’s a jerk.” Christine pursed her lips.
“Other than that?” Erik tilted his head. “What did Stacy and twiddle-dumb and twiddle-dumber do to you?”
With a huff, he turned away and stared down at his guitar. Same make and model as the one he used on tour with Spectre, but not the same one. That one was a burnt up piece of rubble in some landfill, exactly like his career, his life, everything. He could go to the lake and be with Petals, but in the clear light of day he was a loser. Something his stepmother would never let him forget.
Still basking in the high of seeing his nameless little flower, who gazed up at him as if he could save her, he ignored Stacy’s phone calls. Finally today, she demanded his appearance. Though he had much to prepare for tomorrow night on his extremely unique date, he didn’t want the glower of her hanging over his head, and he drove over there.
For the first time since his father’s death, he went to the house. He got out of the car and took in the simple two-story home in Santa Monica. His father bought it with Stacy when they first got married over fifteen years ago when Nash was on tour. Though he never lived there, the memories were there all the same.
The front door opened. “Nashville,” his stepmother screeched.
Something was different, her hair, her makeup, something.
“Get inside, I need you.” She opened the door wider.
Back in the day, he understood why his father married her. She was a beauty, but with an edge, a complete contrast to Nash’s mother. It was over the years and especially once his father became sick, not once, but twice, that the edge sharpened, mostly directed in Nash’s direction.
Determined to not make himself miserable, he complied, approached the woman and nodded. “You look nice.” There, a compliment. Every woman loved a compliment.
“Only nice?” A snide smile lifted one side of her face and she ran her hand over her hair.
He paused, knowing he better come up with the right word for her to not make a scene. “Perhaps radiant is a better word.” In truth, she appeared smooth, maybe too smooth. With her low-cut blood red shirt on and apparently a push up bra, putting everything right there out in the open, she also appeared as if she needed some clothes.
“That’s better. I had a little refresher done. We have the best cosmetic surgeons right here, but he said I only needed a little touch up.” She reached out and ran her hand down his shoulder. “Come in, I’ve been waiting for you. The twins are shopping and I set everything up in the dining room.”
Cane firmly in his grasp, no sooner did he step inside than he realized that his stepmother wasn’t the only thing to get a little freshening up, or a lot. The entire house was different. Gone was the warm mantel with family pictures, cream colored walls, and couches that were perfect to sink into, and it their place everything was done to look like a model home, white, grey and pristine, as if no family ever lived there. Every trace of his father and him were gone, as if they never existed. “What do we have here?”
“Everything needed a nip tuck, Nashville. I couldn’t sit here and live in a shrine to your father. His ghost haunts me.” She hooked her arm in his and guided him to the dining room. “You need to do the same.”
Through his father’s illness, he helped manage the finances. After propping his cane up on the wall, he took the seat always reserved for him at the head of the table. Only it was a different table and a different chair. She already set out his calculator and the checkbook. “What do you mean?” he asked.
Before sitting down next to him, she walked over to a new bar grabbed two wine glasses, a bottle of wine and an opener. “Will you do the honors?”
“Are we celebrating something?” He worked the corkscrew and poured them each some of the drink.
“New beginnings.” She lifted her glass. “I’ve now buried two husbands. I’m starting over. No more marriage, no more taking care of someone. I’m in this for me.”
Strange, he always thought that was her deal.
“What I’m trying to say, Nashville,” she leaned over the table and ran her finger over the back of his hand, “Nash.”
He ground his teeth together. This wasn’t the first time she’d traveled down this path with him. Once he hit it big with Spectre, she did everything to catch his attention. One time, he even had to kick her out of his bed.
“We’ve always had the chemistry. You’ve always been there for me.” She stood and leaned down, putting her cleavage right in his face. “We’re connected, and we don’t need a commitment or anything else. No games, just you and me.”
Her words almost smacked too close to home to what he told Petals. Was this his destiny? How could he want a woman and not even tell her his name? He pushed himself back in the chair and tried to plan an escape route. “Stacy.”
“Yes, call me Stacy.” She grabbed his hand and brought it to the side of her breast. “It’s been so long since I’ve been fulfilled.”
He moved his hand back and tried not to appear as if he were going to vomit at her attention. “I’m not the man to fulfill you. I’m not what you need. Plus, you’re my father’s wife.”
Her cheeks reddened and she slid back in her seat. “You are a simpleton, Nashville. You don’t see what is right in front of you. You’re living in a world that was ten years ago.”
“Then that’s my path.” Actually, he didn’t know his path, he didn’t have a map. “Plus, remember I’m a has-been rock star. What use do you have for me?”
“What I’m trying to tell you is that you need to move on.” Her voice hardened. “Get rid of that millstone around your neck. Let’s sell the property and move on from all the grief. There is a land holding company that owns most of the property around the area. I am quite sure they would offer us a tidy sum to own the few paltry acres the cottage is on.”
No doubt the woman already shopped his land around. He would die before he gave it up. “Where are all the items you got rid of?” He set the wine aside and lifted her checkbook.
“Damn it, Nashville.” She hit the table. “Are you going to live in a shrine to your parents forever?”
“I believe I’ll just take this home and work on it.” He gathered up her paperwork.
“Your father. He was the same way. Holding on to that property as a way to keep something of your mother.” She held up her hand. “You’re no different. You are holding on to a star that has long ago faded. Look at you with your hair and your clothes. All you do is wish for something you will never be again.”
He retrieved his cane and tossed her paperwork back on the table. “Something tells me you’re overdrawn.”
She put her glass down and dashed over to him. “Nashville, I need you to make it better.” With wide eyes, she stared up at him.
“It looks like you’re providing your own elixir.” He stormed through the house.
“Your father would have wanted you to help me,” she called after him.
No, he didn’t turn back, didn’t flinch, he only continued to limp through the now unfamiliar and foreign space. “I know what he wouldn’t want.”
“If you don’t get back here and get this done, Nashville, everything from the past is going in the dumpster,” she hissed.
He slowed his steps.
“Now, if you turn around and make it better, I will let you take whatever will fit in your car.” With a sick laugh she came up beside him. “I believe there are a lot of photo albums.”
He stopped and stared straight ahead. He would never be free of her, this burden, everything he had become and everything he lacked. A fool. He was a fool who lived in a fantasyland where one day he would reclaim his career, refurbish his cottage, and a girl like Petals would traipse through the forest to be with him. What was he thinking?
He turned back to the house, to the table, to work.
“Nash?” Erik waved his hand in front of his face.
Nash blinked and glanced around the stage. After spending hours recording the money that flowed through the woman’s account, he came straight to Erik’s theatre. He needed music, something to ground him, and get his head back in the game. “Let’s play, Erik.” The only way to have Petals was if he stayed a Knight, because he could never be Nash.