Christian scanned the small article below the photos.
In the face of yet another setback caused by guitarist Rally Michael’s reoccurring drug addition, it appears as if the remaining members of Sanctuary have decided it’s time to move on. While drummer Seth Perillo and guitarist Christian Scofield were recently caught spending their time with former Sanctuary guitarist Holly Decambra, singer Collin Gaffney and bassist Nick Swan have been spotted hanging out with the former Rock Palace guitarist Evan Weir, leading to speculation that the three are entertaining the idea of forming a new band.
“Shit.”
“Exactly,” Seth replied as he plopped down next to Christian. “The record execs from the other labels catch wind of this story and we’re done. Hell, Chris, once they hear of Rally’s situation we may be done anyway.”
Christian tossed the paper onto the coffee table and dropped his head into his hands. “This isn’t a total disaster. We can have management put out a press release debunking the article, but I’m not sure how much good it will do. People tend to believe what they want, no matter what the truth really is.”
“Don’t I know it? If we have any hope of saving the band, we need some immediate damage control.”
Christian shook his head. “That’s not what I mean, Seth. Yes, all this speculation and shit with Rally is bad for the band, but I’m more worried about what we just did to Holly.”
Seth raked a hand through his hair. “That is a complication I didn’t foresee.”
“It’s not just a complication. It’s a deal breaker.”
Seth’s gaze rocketed up to meet Christian’s. “What are you saying?”
“I’m saying that maybe that article is more accurate than you think.” He stood and walked to the window. “Last night with Holly was everything I’d ever dreamed of and more. Then when I saw the hurt in her eyes this morning, I realised just how badly I’d handled this situation.” He turned to look at Seth, knowing what he was about to say would be yet another minefield for Seth to navigate. “I don’t just love her, Seth. I’m in love with her and I’m going to do whatever it takes to win her back.”
* * * *
“So this is your new niece.” Holly handed the photo back to Zoë.
Smiling, Zoë took the picture and slipped it back into its protective sleeve. “Yep. Abrianna Fay Hampton, born at ten-forty-five p.m. on Saturday night, and weighing seven pounds seven ounces.”
“Congratulations, Auntie Zoë.”
“Thank you. So what happened with Christian and Seth?”
Knowing Zoë would want details, but hoping she’d forget to ask, Holly shrugged while she tried to decide exactly how much to tell her friend. “We stayed and rode the rides, and then they took me home.”
Looking dejected with her answer, Zoë sat back against the booth seat. “That’s it? Oh, come on, Holly. You haven’t seen them in five years. I can’t believe they just took you home without any fight.”
“They didn’t have much of a choice when they realised I was mad.”
Zoë frowned. “Why were you mad?”
“Apparently they need a new guitarist and they wanted me to come back to the band.”
“And why would that make you mad?”
“They didn’t tell me until after I’d slept with Christian.”
Zoë nearly spewed her drink all over the table. “You had sex with Christian?”
Holly rubbed at the beginnings of yet another headache. “Yes.”
Eyes wide, Zoë leant forward and rested her arms on the table. “Wow. Okay, so dish, girl. I want to hear everything.”
“I didn’t plan to have sex with Christian, but the storm rolled in and we got soaked. I didn’t want either of them driving the hour in the bad weather to my house and the place they were renting was closer.” She pushed a hand through her hair and closed her eyes, taking a moment to breathe away her frustrations with deep breaths. “Honestly, I don’t know what came over me, but before I knew it Christian and I kissed and then one thing lead to another.”
Zoë’s lips tipped into a rueful smile. “I’m so jealous.”
“Well don’t be, because apparently Christian felt it was better to put his needs in front of the band’s.”
“I’m not following.”
“There’s been this insane attraction between me and Christian for years, but because I had a strict no sex policy with members of the band, we never acted on our urges. Apparently Christian had this ridiculous thought that I’d want to come back so badly that if he slept me first, I’d still agree to rejoin the band.”
“That way he’d have the best of both worlds.”
“Right. Only I don’t think either he or Seth planned to tell me about the band issue so soon. Needless to say, I got angry and demanded that Christian drive me home. I have a life now and it would be stupid of me to turn it upside down just to save their sorry asses.”
Zoë held up a hand, stopping Holly mid rant. “Now wait a second. You’ve never been the same since they left you behind. Not once in the past five years have I seen that same glow in your eyes that you used to get when you talked about a show or anything to do with the band, for that matter.”
“So what are you saying, Zoë? That it’s okay for him to sleep with me under false pretence?”
“Of course not. It’s just…well…he’s a man, they both are and sometimes men think with the wrong head. While their approach lacked something to be desired, you really should be flattered by what they planned.”
“And how do you figure that?”
“It’s simple. When it was time for them to find another guitarist, you were the first person they thought about. They’re giving you a chance to recapture your lost dream.”
“And the sex?”
“It simply means he finds you desirable, even after all these years.” She shook her head. “God, Holly, you lived a lot of women’s dream. You got to have sex with Christian Scofield.”
“I think you’re missing the point.”
“No. I think you are.” She leaned across the table and took Holly’s hands in hers. “Try and look past their approach and see the bigger picture here. You have the opportunity to not only live out your dream, but possibly find love at the same time.”
“And that’s the exact reason why I don’t want a relationship within the band. What if it doesn’t work out, Zoë? Then all of us lose because two of us made a big mistake.”
“Nothing lasts forever. After everything that’s happened in your life, don’t you owe it to yourself to at least find out where this could take you? Even if it does blow up in your face later, you can at least say you tried. Besides,” her lips tipped into a large grin. “If nothing else, it will be one hell of a ride.”
Chapter Nine
Seth paced back and forth in front of the living room window. “I know you wanted Holly back in the band. Hell, we all did, but I think we’re going to have to face facts.”
Christian raked a hand through his too long hair. “And what facts would those be?”
“That we fucked up and ruined whatever chances we had with her.”
“Not necessarily,” Christian argued.
“I know you’re in love with her, but the band’s future is on the line here, bro. We’re out of time and out of chances. If we don’t cut our losses now and start a quick search for a replacement guitarist, we’re going to have some serious issues to overcome.”
“We have two weeks,” Christian reminded him. “I’m not willing to give up on Holly just yet.”
“She’s furious with us. What makes you think she’s even going to want to see either of us again?”
“Wednesday is her birthday.”
Seth eased into the chair opposite Christian. “Yeah, so?”
Christian turned his attention away from his guitar and onto Seth. “So, I have a plan.”
“Let’s hear it?”
Christian set his guitar back on the stand and raked his hands through his loose ha
ir. “The first thing we have to do is get her talking to us again. You know how stubborn she can be. So that task alone won’t be easy.”
Seth’s gaze drifted to the window and held there before pushing off the couch. “Maybe it will be if we do it right.”
“Exactly, but we have to be very careful in our approach. Even if she’s willing to give us a second chance, I guarantee we won’t get a third.”
Seth paused at the window his attention focused at a downward angle. “Flowers.”
“Flowers?” Christian wrinkled his brow as he joined Seth. His gaze landed on the small flower bed beneath the neighbour’s house, complete with two blooming rose bushes.”
“Roses,” he whispered, understanding where Seth’s mind was going.
“Roses,” Seth echoed. “They’re her favourite flower. Remember how we’d all pooled our extra money and bought her a dozen roses for her birthday, the year before the band was signed?”
Christian nodded. “She cried like a baby when she saw them, and when the last one died she pressed it in the pages of her diary.”
“Then we send her roses as an apology.”
Christian shook his head. “Not just as an apology, but for her birthday. Let’s do it right. We’ll send roses to the school, to her home and then we’ll show up with roses and dinner Wednesday night.”
“What about a gift?”
Christian pursed his lips as he continued to stare out the window. “Remember that time when she inherited that money from her uncle’s will?”
“Yeah, so?” Seth shrugged.
“She was so excited because she finally had enough money to buy the guitar of her dreams. Then the very next week our PA system stopped working and her amp took a shit.”
“Oh, yeah.” Seth snapped his fingers. “She ended up using the money to buy new equipment for the band instead of the guitar.”
Christian smiled. “I say we find her that guitar.”
Seth’s brow knit with concern. “Her birthday is in two days. With today being Sunday, all of the shipping places are closed. How are we going to find the guitar, pay for it and have it shipped here by Wednesday?”
Mind already churning with ideas, Christian slapped him on the back. “You let me worry about the guitar and you take care of making the flower and dinner arrangements.”
“I’m on it,” Seth replied then set off for the phone book in his room.
Christian turned back to the window and closed his eyes against the sun’s glare. No way would he be able to leave now that he made love to Holly. If this idea didn’t work, he’d have little choice but to make the hardest decision of his life.
* * * *
“Okay.” Holly clapped her hands together as she began her walk around the classroom. “I want to start today’s class by going over the chord progressions I showed you during our last class.”
One of the three female students in the class raised her hand. “I have a question about the transition.”
“Okay. We’ll start with the transition.” She turned back to her desk only to pause for the knock at the door. Once a class was in session most people didn’t interrupt unless it was important. Hoping nothing was seriously wrong, she opened the door to find a dozen red roses staring her in the face. The vase moved, revealing one of the school secretaries. “These came for you.”
Her first thought was that Zoë had sent her flowers for her birthday, but Zoë wouldn’t send red roses.
“Thank you,” Holly said, taking the flowers from her. “But you could have left them in the office and I would have gotten them after class.”
“Yes, but they were so pretty, I thought you should enjoy them right away.”
“That was very thoughtful of you, Mrs. Welsh. Thank you.”
Using her foot, she closed the door and turned back to her students, who had abandoned their instruments to gather around the desk.
“They’re beautiful,” one girl said as Holly set the large vase down.
“Who are they from?” another inquired as she leant forward to sniff one of the petals.
“I don’t know,” Holly replied, though she had a good idea. Despite her best efforts to break all ties with the band so she could fully move on with her life, the guys wouldn’t let her. Every year either on or around her birthday, Zoë would show up with a present for Holly sent to Zoë’s address from the band.
One year they had sent her an authentic kimono from Japan along with a Japanese tea set. No matter what they sent, they’d never forgotten. She had no reason to think this year would be any different.
“I found a note,” one of the boys said. He pulled it from its holder and read it before Holly could protest. “Please forgive our stupidity. Love. Christian and Seth.”
“Wow,” two of the girls said in unison. “Two guys apologising with roses? What did they do?”
“Wait?” one of the boys said, holding up a hand. “Christian and Seth? As in Christian Scofield and Seth Perillo from the band Sanctuary?”
A quick shot of panic raced through her system. As far as she knew, none of her students was aware of her connection to the band. To make that connection now would completely disrupt her class and undermine her ability to effectively teach.
Holly shook her head. “No—”
“O.M.G.,” the girls squealed. “You know the members of Sanctuary?”
“Yes, but—”
“Of course she does,” Wyatt Wright, her most talented student cut her off. “Ms. Decambra was their original guitarist.”
“You?” the girls said.
“Ms. Decambra, that’s wicked cool.”
“I suppose it is, but I need—”
“Then you were in that car accident and had to leave the band, right?” Wyatt started again, bowling over her.
Frustrated at her loss of control, Holly slapped her hands against the top of her desk. “Stop!”
Instant silence filled the room as each student looked at her wide-eyed. She certainly hadn’t planned to spend the day explaining her situation to a bunch of teenagers. Thanks to Seth and Christian she now didn’t have much of a choice. “Everybody sit down and we’ll talk.”
Chair legs scooted and the sound of feet shuffling filled the silence, until all of the students were once again seated, some of them with their guitars now sitting on their laps.
“Good. Now Wyatt, why don’t you tell me how you know about my connection to the band?”
He looked shocked by her question as he glanced around the classroom. “Any true fan of the band knows about its lineage. You are a founding member and if you hadn’t been in a really bad accident while driving home from a local promotional event, you’d still be in the band.”
Holly drew in a deep breath and held it for a moment. Why had she never considered how easy it would be for people to find out about her past? “Go on,” she urged, knowing Wyatt was chomping at the bit to reveal more information. Might as well get it all out in the open now and deal with the fall out.
“Well,” he began again. “From everything I know about the band it appears that Rally Michaels is nothing more than a hired gun. While he does have writing credits on the last two albums, he’s not in any of the band photos and doesn’t participate in interviews. I once read somewhere that the rest of the band members hadn’t wanted Rally from the beginning. That they were willing to wait for you to recover, but the record company wouldn’t. So the two entities struck a deal that allowed Rally into the band, but not as your official replacement.”
Holly sank into the nearest chair. Even she hadn’t known about ‘the deal’. Of course, she’d made a point to cut all ties with the band after the car crash. While they’d continued to write and call, she’d stopped answering the phone and never wrote them back. The only reason she hadn’t returned the birthday presents they sent was that they never came with a return address.
While it had hurt her to end her friendship with the guys, she knew in the end, it would hurt her worse to watch th
em achieve their dreams without her. She pinched the bridge of her nose with her thumb and forefinger. “Who else knew who I was before they signed up for my class?”
A little over half of her students raised their hands and Holly wanted to groan. She wanted to be judged on her merits as a teacher, not as the former member of one of the hottest up and coming bands in the world.
Tony, one of her most talented and most lazy students spoke up. “I get it now.”
Holly arched a brow. “What’s that?”
He stood and looked from her to the other students in the class. “You know how you always say at the end of class to practice what we’ve learned, but to make sure we complete all our academic work first? That it was okay to reach for the brass ring, but to make sure you had a back up plan in place if you missed it.”
“Yes.”
“I always thought you said that because you didn’t want to encourage us too much, but that’s not it at all. You’re speaking from experience. You reached for the brass ring and the accident snatched it away.”
For a split second it felt as if someone had jabbed her with a knife. She held her breath while the pain passed, then slowly nodded, knowing there wasn’t any way out of this particular conversation. “I did and it wasn’t easy to watch my dream go up in smoke, but sometimes life hands you something you aren’t prepared for and you have to adjust. I’ve made the best of a bad situation and watching all of you grow your talent is extremely rewarding.” Hoping to cut off any more conversation about the band, she clapped her hands together. “Now, let’s get back to work.”
Chapter Ten
Emotionally drained, Holly unlocked the front door and let herself in. The last thing she expected when she left for school that morning was to end up having her students teach her a lesson. Yet, that’s exactly what had happened.
Tony’s words still echoed in her head as she dropped her bag on the sofa and headed to the kitchen for a drink. She always knew she’d missed her opportunity to snatch the brass ring, but to hear the words spoken in such a matter of fact manner hurt more than it should.
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