CHAPTER FIVE

“In My Blood”

Evan

“Hey, Stan, what’s up?” I asked as I watched Quinn drift back up to the main house.

When I finally pulled my head out of my ass and decided to hire a lawyer, I chose not to go through my dad. At Chaz’s suggestion, I called Grant. After explaining the situation to him, he hooked me up with the label’s legal team and they steered me to Stan. I liked Stan as a person, but I wasn’t sold on his legal abilities, just yet.

“I got a call from opposing counsel today and it seems that Amanda would like her car back,” Stan drawled in his thick Texas accent.

“Yeah? Well, I’d like a divorce. Sometimes we can’t get everything we want, can we?” My abrupt response gave him pause. Good. He should have told opposing counsel to go fuck themselves.

“I realize you’re frustrated, Mr. Walker, but we might be able to use the car as a bargaining chip.” We could, if I hadn’t already gotten rid of it.

Over Christmas break—the same break my brother tried to tell me my wife was cheating and we ended up at Margo’s for the first time—I flew home with the intention of fixing my marriage. My plan was to seduce Mandy into forgiving me by showering her with gifts, one of those being a candy-apple red Porsche Cayenne. The Porsche was such a hit that she forgave me on the spot. During the afterglow of our make-up sex, she informed me that she wanted us to make a fresh start. When I asked what she had in mind, she hit me up for a new house. New car, new home, fresh start. Why not? By break’s end, not only were we back together, but we were the proud owners of a brand-new home. Yep, just slap a giant S on my forehead and call me “Sucker.” My guilt for leaving had blinded me to what was really happening. Case in point—the car and the house. Not anymore...

“It’s hard to negotiate with something you don’t have, Stan. I guess Mandy will have to find another means of transportation.” In an attempt to be funny, I suggested she borrow her boyfriend’s car. Stan didn’t laugh. Then again, Stan never laughed. I wasn’t sure if he even knew how to.

“That’s too bad,” he commented. No, it wasn’t. I should’ve never bought her the car in the first place.

“On your call to opposing counsel, did you happen to mention the phone calls?” The woman seriously needed to stop calling me. If not for the hassle, I would have changed my number by now.

“Did you block the number, like I suggested?” he asked.

“So far, I’ve blocked four different numbers, Stan, and she still keeps calling.”

“I mentioned it to her attorney. She said she would advise her to stop, but that’s all she could do. It might behoove you to change your number,” he advised. No shit.

Stan mentioned having another meeting to get to and ended the call. I was really starting to detest talking to him. All it did was dredge up the past. A past I wanted to forget...

Two days after Bobby confirmed my wife was cheating on me, I flew home to confront her. I didn’t bother to call and tell her I was coming. Anything I needed to say had to be done in person.

The moment I stepped foot through the door, I felt like a stranger. New house? New start? Fucking bullshit. As I took in the ridiculously ostentatious living room, I tried to find a semblance of who we once were. Where were the framed pictures? What happened to all of the little trinkets and things we’d collected over the past nine years? Now that I thought about it, where was my fucking piano? It was as if everything that made us who we were had been erased. That’s when it hit me. This was deliberate, her intention all along...this was my punishment for leaving.

“You’re home.” Her words floated softly across the expansive living room. I was somewhere, but it sure as hell wasn’t home. Suddenly, the anger I’d been nursing for the past two days was gone and in its place was a bone-crushing hurt.

“Why?” I barely managed to get out.

I watched her head slightly tilt and her lashes flutter, both of which I used to think were sexy. “Why what?” she asked. And that’s when I saw her. I mean, truly saw her. This woman, in her fancy clothing and frosted-blonde hair, the woman I’d tried so hard to love, wasn’t my wife. She was a complete stranger.

“I gave you everything I had—diamonds, cars, houses—everything. I just want to know why?” Her brow creased in confusion as she took a step in my direction. My hand shot up to stop her. I didn’t want her anywhere near me.

“Evan, what’s wrong? You’re scaring me.” Her sweet voice, the same voice I’d come to love, now sounded manipulative and calculating. The blinders were off and for the first time I was actually seeing her for what she was. I had to give it to her, she was good. Too good. My sister called it. My brother called it. Hell, even Chaz had called it. But not me. No, I’d been wandering around in the darkness, bound by vows, and blinded by feelings that didn’t really exist.

“What’s wrong?” I asked. “Tell me, Mandy, have you ever been to the Roundabout?” She blanched at my question, her face turning ghost-white. My heart seized in my chest. She knew. I could see it in her eyes.

“What’s the Roundabout?” she asked.

“Hmmm, let me see. The bar where Jonas and Livy saw you...with your boyfriend,” I harshly bit out. Her lips twisted as if she’d swallowed something sour. I don’t know what I expected, a confession, maybe some tears, but certainly not anger.

“You had me followed? You have some nerve,” she hissed. Stunned by her reaction, I just stood there staring at her. “You left me!” she shouted. “You think I don’t know what goes on after concerts? You and your buddies all revved up and needing a place to stick your...dicks.” She pointed at my crotch and let out a growl of frustration. “Why do you think I wanted out? Because I knew you were cheating on me!” Wait what? What the hell?

I was so shocked by her response that it took me a minute to react. “You’ve lost your mind. Believe it or not, you are the only woman I’ve slept with...in nine years.”

“Liar,” she snapped.

“I’m not lying. Ask anyone on the tour and they’ll tell you.” Her response was a glare. “You didn’t want out of our marriage, you just wanted to see how far you could push me. If I say I want out, Evan will buy me diamonds. If I do it again, he’ll buy me a car or even a new house. I wonder how far the sucker will go?” I mocked.

A caustic sounding laugh flew from her lips. “Yeah right, blame this shit on me.”

Was she fucking serious? “Blame you? People saw you with another man, Mandy! I have proof that you’ve been cheating on me for months! Hell, yes, I blame this shit on you!”

“You left me!” she screeched.

“I was on tour. That’s my job. That’s how we can afford to live in this...house! And what do you do? You run out and immediately cheat on me?” I shot back.

“You went behind my back and tried out for that band, knowing that I wouldn’t approve. Then you left me!” she repeated. She may be pissed that I left, but she didn’t deny cheating on me. Go figure.

“I not only apologized, but I bent over backwards to make it right, and you know it.” The force behind my words brought her up short.

Switching tactics, she said, “You’re right. You did. I’m sorry. Look, we’re both in the wrong, here, but you’re home now and I forgive you for leaving. Let’s just call the past the past and start over.” Was she kidding? She’d not only made the past year of my life a living hell, but she’d screwed around on me. Fuck that and fuck her.

“Get out.”

“What?” she whispered, her eyes wide with surprise.

“Pack your bags and get the fuck out. We...this,” I made a circle with my finger around the two of us, “is over.”

“You don’t mean it. You’re just upset.” I could see her mentally scrambling.

“I’m way past upset. I just want you gone.”

“B-but this is my house,” she sputtered.

“Which I paid for...with the job I took...when I supposedly left you. Don’t worry, I’ll let you buy me out when we finalize the divorce.”

“Divorce?” she whispered, as if the thought had never crossed her mind.

“What did you think, woman? That I would just sit by while you fuck other men?” I watched as the reality of the situation began to sink in.

“But...I love you.”

“Yeah? Well we clearly have two totally different ideas of what love is. Now, pack your things and get out.” Tears spilled from her eyes and rolled down her face and I wanted to scream at her, at what she’d done to us.

“I don’t want—”

“You don’t get it, do you? I don’t care what you want. I just want you gone...”

Mandy had left, but she certainly hadn’t gone away. I thought that maybe she would chill if I let her move back into the house. If anything, she’d only gotten worse. The incessant phone calls added to her latest ploy with the car, was right in line with the rest of the shit she’d pulled. The woman just didn’t know when to quit. Sick of thinking about my screwed up marital situation, I pushed back from the piano and headed for the house.

In my search for caffeine, I discovered Quinn. She was bent over with her head in the refrigerator and her ass swinging in the wind. An ass that looked damn fine in the shorts she was wearing, I might add. Mandy was all tits and no ass, but Quinn had both in equal proportions.

“Quit staring at my ass,” she muttered from inside the refrigerator.

“I would never,” I gasped. Laughing, she closed the fridge door. With creamer in hand, she turned in my direction. I tried not to stare at her tight as hell work out top, but seriously, the thing barely covered her chest.

“I was thinking about going for a swim. You want to join me?” she asked. Quinn in a swimsuit? Fuck yes.

“Sure,” I managed to say, once I got my tongue unstuck from the roof of my mouth.

“Annnd, I’m cooking steaks tonight, if you’re interested?”

“Does a bear shit in the woods?” I asked in my best country drawl.

“Hmmm, if no one’s there to see it, then how would you know? Coffee?” she asked, holding up the pot.

Nodding, I teased, “Ahhh, so you’re a ‘didn’t see it, didn’t happen’ kind of gal.” When she lifted onto her tiptoes to retrieve a coffee cup and one of her tits all but popped out, I nearly choked on my own saliva.

“Creamer?” she asked.

“No, thanks.” Although I considered my erection to be quite impressive, something told me Quinn might find it offensive. Locking onto her earlier comment about the pool, I murmured, “I’m going to change into my swimsuit. Meet you back here in fifteen.”

“Sounds good,” she muttered. I waited for her head to turn before slipping through the door and up the stairs.

Fifteen minutes later, I was back downstairs with my swim trunks on and the empty coffee cup in hand. Quinn was in the kitchen filling a cooler with bottles of water and beer. She looked amazing in workout gear, but the woman absolutely rocked a bikini. Even though Mandy looked good in one, she refused to wear bikinis as she claimed they accentuated her stomach pooch, whatever that meant. Last summer, I couldn’t even get her to wear a one piece. I had to admit, it was refreshing to be around a woman who wasn’t insecure about her body.

An hour later, we were on floats in the middle of the pool, listening to the local rock station when my phone rang.

“Shit, I should get that,” I muttered. By the time I made it to the side of the pool, the call had gone to voicemail. When I realized it was Bobby and not Mandy, I called him back. He answered on the first ring, and after complaining about my not listening to his epically long voicemail that he’d apparently left, he got down to business.

“We need to meet. The earliest Tut and I can be there is Friday.” Shit, this sounded serious.

“You found something?”

“Yeah, we found a lot of somethings.” Fuck! Tension seized my muscles and I had to fight not to panic. I didn’t want to wait. I wanted to know now. Taking a few steps back, I parked my ass on one of the pool loungers. Think, Evan. Now, in front of Quinn, is not the time to discuss this.

“I’m going to Austin on Thursday. You can either meet me there or you can meet me back here on Sunday,” I told him.

“Sunday works. What time?” he asked.

“I’ll be back by mid to late afternoon.”

“See you then.”

“Bobby?”

“Yeah?”

“How bad is it?”

“Bad enough for me to want to discuss this in person,” he replied. Before I could respond, he hung up.

“You okay?” Quinn called out.

“No.”

“Want to talk about it?” She was hanging on the side of the pool, her gray eyes watching me with a concerned expression on her pretty little face.

I didn’t want to talk, but I also didn’t want to be rude. “That was my PI, Bobby.”

“And?”

“He has something on Mandy and wants to meet face to face. He’ll be here Sunday.” Then it hit me what I was saying. “Shit, I didn’t even think to ask if that was okay.”

“Pfft, this is as much your house as it is mine. Grab two beers and come float with me.”

While Shawn Mendes sang about the walls caving in and giving up, I snagged two beers from the cooler and joined Quinn in the middle of the pool.

“I met him last year,” I said, handing her a beer.

“Who, Shawn Mendes?” Her unenthused tone stated that she was clearly unimpressed by my confession.

“He’s actually a nice guy. H—”

“Hey,” she interrupted. My eyes found hers and I lifted my brow in question. “Tell me about the call,” she urged. When I didn’t immediately respond, she pushed the matter. “You look like you could use a friend. Believe it or not, I’m a good listener.” She followed this with a smile. Super. Now she was using my lines against me.

“You remember that, huh?” I asked.

“Like it was yesterday.” Her dry as hell response made me laugh. When the laughter subsided, I thought about what to tell her. Finally, I just gave in.

“Last Christmas, I gave Mandy a new car. When I found out she was cheating, I kicked her out of the house, and with the help of Bobby’s firm, I hired a local PI to repossess the car. The night I got it back, I moved it into the garage, but before I headed back inside the house, I decided to search both the glove compartment and the center console. All I found were a few receipts. On my way inside, I casually glanced over them, expecting something like the grocery store or Dairy Queen. One was from 7-Eleven and the other was from a jewelry store in Spring. It was for a man’s wedding band, size 8. Just so you know, I’m a size 10.” Quinn’s mouth dropped open in understanding. “I didn’t recognize the credit card number and she signed it with her maiden name.”

Filling in the blanks, Quinn said, “So you gave it to your PI and he found something.”

“Yep, and apparently, it ain’t good.”

“Maybe it’s not as bad as you think.”

“Maybe not.” But we both knew it was.

The conversation drifted to Meltdown and I spent the next few hours telling her stories about my adventures with the band. She was especially interested in the Melties.

“Oh my gosh! They’re exactly like Kate Hudson in Almost Famous,” she gasped, clearly excited by this.

“Who in what?” I asked.

“Please tell me you’ve seen the movie Almost Famous?”

“Shit, darlin’, you just described my life,” I joked with extra twang in my southern drawl.

Her gray eyes glittered with excitement. “You really haven’t seen it?”

“I really haven’t.”

“Whoo-wee, Rock Star! We’re having movie night tonight!” she shouted, and promptly fell off her float.

That night I ate one of the best steaks I’d ever had while watching a movie that was pretty damn true to my life and enjoying the company of a woman who’d made me feel more alive in one day than all nine years of my marriage. Go figure...

Thursday came fast, and before I knew it, I was on the road to Austin. I’d spoken to Chaz a few times since he and Olivia’s visit, but had yet to tell him the latest news. I also hadn’t told him about Quinn. Grant and Mallory had the bigger house, so we were all crashing there. We’d have plenty of time to play catch up.

I thought about Quinn on the drive to Austin. I also thought about Bobby. I could tell the severity of the situation by his tone of voice. He had some shit to tell me—some seriously not-so-good shit. Mandy was the one who’d ruined our marriage, so why did I feel as if I was the one paying for it?

The front gate was open when I pulled into the drive, so I continued to the house. Grant and Mallory had a killer pad, but I preferred Quinn’s giant porches and antebellum style over their more modern Austin stone. I was halfway to the door when I heard the barking from inside. Hellion, I thought with a smile. I tried to think back on the last time I’d seen her. Had it really been a year?

The door swung open right as I stepped up to press the bell and before me appeared a very pregnant Mallory.

“Evan’s here!” she shouted over her shoulder, then pulled me in for a hug.

“Hey gorgeous. Pregnancy looks good on you,” I murmured in her ear.

“I want this baby out of me,” she whispered back at me, and we both laughed.

“Get your grubby paws off my man,” Grant told his wife. Mallory gave me another tight squeeze before passing me off to her husband. “Good to see you, man,” Grant said, slapping me on the back. Hellion, who now looked more like a mix between a terrier and a schnauzer, circled our legs while barking like crazy.

An hour later, the rest of the gang had arrived, and I had to admit, I’d missed the hell out of them.

That night over dinner, after Olivia and Chaz had surprised us with Olivia’s ridiculously large engagement ring, we’d heard all about Nash and Rowan’s wedding plans, and Grant and Mallory’s birth plans, all eyes drifted to me.

“Well?” Rowan asked.

“Well what?” I asked, pretending innocence.

“Talk, fucker,” Chaz said, pinging me on the side of the head with a piece of bread. It had to come out sometime. It might as well be now.

“Fine. As I’m sure you all know by now, Mandy and I are permanently calling it quits.”

“The bitch was cheating,” Chaz interjected. I shot him a glare and smiled when Olivia smacked him on the chest.

I went on to tell them about the house and the car.

“You didn’t tell me she’d moved back in,” Chaz scolded.

“You didn’t ask.”

“You’re living in the same house?” Olivia asked, clearly confused by this.

“Hell no.”

“So where are you living?” Mallory questioned.

“With a friend.”

“What friend,” they collectively asked.

“Yeah, what friend?” Chaz pressed.

Here goes nothing, I thought, and answered, “Her name is Quinn.”

“Quinn!” Chaz and Olivia both exclaimed.

“I so called it!” Chaz shouted, while pumping his fists in the air like an idiot.

“You did not! You said Quinn was too cool for Evan,” Olivia argued.

“Thanks, dick,” I muttered to Chaz’s howl of laughter.

“Quinn?” Grant asked, and Chaz and Olivia both launched in, telling the table all about burger night at Margo’s.

“I knew you were into her,” Chaz stated, still laughing.

“I’m not into her. I’m simply living in her house and helping her when she needs it,” I argued.

Olivia giggled. “Uh-huh”

“Think what you want, but I can’t be into Quinn or anyone else until those divorce papers are signed, and after talking to Bobby, I doubt that’s going to happen anytime soon,” I informed them. The room instantly sobered.

“What’s up with Bobby?” Nash asked. It took another ten minutes for me to fill them in.

“No more leaving us in the dark,” Mallory scolded when I was through talking. “We’re all family here and you, my dear, are a major part of it.” Scanning over the table, she said, “You all are. Just because we’re doing separate things right now doesn’t mean we aren’t still a family.”

“About that,” Grant said, giving his wife an indulgent smile. “I don’t know about you guys, but I’m going insane. Mallory is sick of me moping about the house. Hell, I’ve written at least a dozen songs.”

“Same here,” Chaz and Nash both confessed. I hadn’t written dick.

“Here’s what I’m thinking,” Grant said. “After Nash and Rowan’s wedding and the baby comes, we get the band back together here at the house for a series of recording sessions, like we did before. We won’t tell anyone about it until the album is complete.”

“Then you can announce a new album and a surprise tour!” Olivia exclaimed, clapping her hands. “Oh my God, this is brilliant!”

Grant laughed at her obvious enthusiasm, then turning to us, he asked, “What do you all say?”

Nash stared at his wife to be. “Rowan?”

“I say yes, but only if I can go this time,” she answered.

“I’m taking the baby!” Mallory chimed in.

“Well, you know I’m there!” Olivia exclaimed.

“If she’s there, I’m there,” Chaz cut in.

“Evan?” Grant asked. It was then that it hit me. My dream wasn’t over. It was just beginning...

Meltdown was going back on tour.