Chapter 8

Kya

I had just cracked the first of three eggs into the skillet when Addison walked in with her hair a mess and still wearing her kitty cat pajamas. “I don’t want eggs today.”

“Too bad. I’m not a short-order cook, and you better hurry up and get ready for school or I’m going to take away your TV privileges.” At four years old, she was too strong-willed like me. Add that paired with her father’s smarts, and she was a tiny force to be reckoned with when she wanted to be.

“I want to stay home.” She lifted her chin, her little round face staring up at me with eyes from the other side of her gene pool. She was a tiny duplicate of me, yet her eyes had always been like her father’s.

“You can’t stay home. You’re almost done with this year, and then you’ll have all summer to sleep in.” I couldn’t believe she was complaining. She never had before. “You usually like school. What’s this all about?” I hoped this wasn’t a new phase that would bleed into her teenage years. Surely, it wouldn’t start this early?

“I want to go to Aunt Sadie’s house.” She smiled and batted her thick lashes. “I haven’t seen her all week.”

“If you get yourself ready, we’ll go over after school. I promise.” She hesitated, but I didn’t back down. “Go. I have a lot of stuff to do today.” I didn’t want to tell her I’d be spending time with Sadie.

“Okay, but can I bring her some of the cookies we made last night?” I realized that was the real issue. She’d asked about sharing the night before.

“I’ll tell you what. I’ll bring her a baggie of these and then let you make a special batch the next time we go over for dinner.”

“Okay.” Addison seemed satisfied and ran to her room to finish getting ready.

I breathed a sigh of relief and finished cooking the eggs. I had too much on my mind with the recent blowup with our manager, and this time, it was the final straw. I thought back to the day we’d signed him and wished I could take it all back. Not only had we shit-canned Mona Star that day, but we’d signed our souls away to Whit White who had talked a smooth con.

I had later found out that not only had he pissed a lot of people off in the industry, but he wasn’t the man Blitz had wanted us to meet. We’d only assumed he was. And to make matters worse, Mona had hung around outside to wait on him to come out of the bus, and she’d propositioned him. They’d been together ever since, and he’d taken every opportunity he could to skim from us. I didn’t know what was worse, knowing he was taking more than his fair share or that he was spending it on Mona.

Addison and I ate our breakfast together, and then I drove her to school. She’d started her education a little early because of my tour, and she’d had enough tutoring on the road that at four years old, she knew how to read at a third-grade level. I tried to keep her life as normal as possible, but there were times it was a challenge.

With my parents still not talking to me, especially now that I was not only a heathen rock and roll singer but because I was an unwed mother, Sadie and the rest of my rock tribe was my family.

Sadie and Stones had gotten together and were still in a complicated relationship, and since Blitz was in the picture because of that said relationship, he had taken on the role of grandpa to Addison when he was around. Rob and Liam had been like uncles even though Liam was expecting his own little one.

We were a very motley crew indeed, but I wouldn’t have it any other way.

I pulled around the circle drive and stopped at the drop-off point. “Here you go, little one. I’m sure you’ll have a good day.” She turned and gave me a hug and then stopped to hold out her finger.

I held out my own finger, locking it with hers. “The two of us,” I said with a wink.

“The two of us,” she repeated with a giggle.

It was our special way of saying I love you, and though we’d said those three magic words many times, too, this had been our thing.

Her teacher walked over and took her hand, and after giving me a warm good morning, she shut the door and led Addison inside.

I drove away and went to the diner for my meeting with Sadie, hoping traffic wouldn’t be terrible. The last thing I needed was to be late again. She was already on me about the last time.

I found a parking spot outside the diner and then went inside to find her looking at her phone. “Not too bad. You’re only a minute late this time.”

“Like you have anything else to do, and I was only three minutes late the last time.” I knew she was just having fun with me, and she reached over to give me a nudge.

“I know. I was getting a little worried, though. I went ahead and ordered your usual. Didn’t want it to get too cold. How’s Addie?”

“She misses you. God forbid we go a few days without you.” I sometimes thought she loved her aunt Sadie more than me.

“You should have brought her along. She’s too young for school anyway, and what’s she going to miss? She’s already reading.”

“Which is why she’s in a special school. It’s important she stays grounded while she can, and you know if this lawsuit goes anywhere, it could be a while before we tour again. I can’t keep her out that long.” Sadie had always argued that she needed to be a kid as long as she could.

“Fine. And that reminds me, we have a meeting tomorrow.” She took a sip of her coffee and gave me a pointed look over the top of her cup.

“Who with? And don’t tell me it’s that slimewad, Whit White.” Thinking of him made my skin crawl. He was the worst decision I’d ever made, and I’d made some doozies.

Sadie shook her head. “No, it’s our lawyer. I’ve finally found one who looked professional, and she’s supposed to be fierce in the courtroom. I think we need a strong woman to put little Whit in his place.”

“Has she seen many cases like ours?” I didn’t want a newbie with no experience.

“She’s no rookie, but I guess we’ll have to ask her tomorrow.” Her phone rang, and she glanced down and made a face she only reserved for Stones Hunter. It was somewhere between excited to hear from him and unsure of his faithfulness. She turned the phone down, but let it ring.

“Are you going to answer him?”

She sighed. “No, he can call me back later.”

“I’m sure he misses you.”

“I’m sure he does, but we talked like two minutes before you showed up. We had a fight, and he hung up on me. The band signed on for six more shows. You know Blitz, always taking the opportunity where he can find it.”

“Don’t we all?” I could hardly blame the man for wanting to make a living for himself and his band and crew.

The waitress arrived with our food and topped off Sadie’s coffee. She stirred in extra sugar and looked up at me. “I’m scared if he doesn’t come home soon, he never will.”

“That’s all the more reason to answer his calls, Sadie. I know it’s been a rocky relationship, but he loves you.” The guy had written sappy songs about her and treated her like a goddess on most days. One could only be so lucky.

“I know. I just don’t know if it’s enough. Blitz is nonstop and expects him to be in his shadow, and it might be fine when I’m on the road, too, touring the same venues, playing the same shows, but the distance makes me wonder if we’ll ever be a real family or have kids of our own. I mean, look at Blitz and Addie. He loves her like she’s his own.”

“And spoils her like it too,” I added.

Sadie laughed. “Right, but you’d think that would make him understand our need for a little time to have the same.” Her smile faded, and her lips turned down to a frown. “Stones and I want kids, too, but at this rate, we’ll never have time to get married, much less start a family. And he won’t stand up to his father.”

I cut up my waffles and passed her the only knife on our table to do the same. “I’m sorry.” I took her wrist and gave it a squeeze.

She gave me a half-hearted smile. “Yeah, me too. I hope this lawsuit doesn’t drag on. It’s only going to make things worse before it gets better.”

I hoped that wasn’t true. I didn’t want any ugly legal battles ruining the peaceful life I’d built for my daughter. It wasn’t easy, but we’d managed, and it helped that without all the stage makeup and spiked heels, I could look normal. Most of my tattoos were hidden, and I had lost my red streaks for a tamer look over a year ago.

I raked my hand through my hair and sighed. “I just want us all to get our money. It makes me angry every time I think of how we just listened to that asshole like a quartet of morons. Maybe if we’d gotten a lawyer then, we wouldn’t need one now.”

Sadie took a bite of her waffles. “I’m just glad you finally figured it out. I mean, I thought things were good, but a little short, you know.”

I took another bite of waffle after swirling it in syrup. “I know. We should have known that any asshole who’d fuck Mona Star, much less keep her around for five years, was up to something. I want back everything that asshole skimmed. And I want something for all the shows he cost us.”

We shared a collective sigh and busied ourselves eating. After a moment of silence, Sadie looked up and dropped her fork to her plate. “You know what the scariest part of this is?”

I lifted a brow and shrugged. “All of it?” I knew I couldn’t think of one silver lining if we lost. Our reputations would be ruined, no one would want to work with us, and getting future representation was going to be hard as hell. Not to mention he controlled all the work we did, and while we would still get our cut, he’d continue to profit from it as well. With me having Addie, I didn’t have time to start all over at the bottom. “Or the fact that if we lose this fight, we might all have to get regular jobs?”

“That’s a pretty bad one, but I was thinking about having to see Mona’s smug face.”

“I just want to get back to making music. I’m not really alive unless I’m in the studio or on tour. This could ruin everything I’ve worked for since I was seventeen years old, Sadie. I can’t see it end this way, not by some asshole who was taking advantage of us.”

“Look, it’s going to be okay. We’ll get through this. Let’s go meet that woman tomorrow and annihilate Whit White.” She stabbed a piece of egg and popped it into her mouth. “We’ll hit him so hard in the wallet, Mona will feel it.”