Facing the Music

by Andrea Laurence

  She was happy to change the subject to something less serious. “Much to my personal trainer’s dismay, I’m always hungry.”

  Blake chuckled and went to the refrigerator. “Pancakes or waffles?”

  “Yes,” Ivy said as she joined him in the kitchen.

  Blake started mixing up a pancake batter, eyeballing Ivy from his position near the gas range. “Do you realize what shirt you’re wearing?”

  Ivy looked down. It was the Auburn SEC Championship shirt from the year Blake led the Tigers to an undefeated regular season. That was the win they were celebrating at the infamous party where Ivy and Blake broke up. “I just grabbed a shirt from the drawer in the dark so I wouldn’t wake you. I should’ve looked closer.”

  She felt silly enough walking around in nothing but one of his oversize T-shirts, much less an Auburn one, but she didn’t really have much choice. It was either the T-shirt or last night’s prom dress.

  Ivy pulled a stool up to the island and sliced fruit while she watched Blake cook. When the food was ready, they took their plates and a pitcher of orange juice out onto the deck.

  It was a completely different experience in the daytime. Now, the mysterious darkness was a tangle of trees and bushes. She could see the part of his lawn that stretched out beyond the deck behind the house. In the distance, she could make out more water. “Is that a pond out there?”

  “It is. The creek feeds into it.” Blake sat down at the table. “I keep it stocked with fish and I have a smaller boat I keep at the dock. Maybe we could go out there sometime this week.”

  Ivy wrinkled her nose and shoved a piece of cantaloupe into her mouth. She chewed thoughtfully for a moment. Fishing. Fishing meant bugs and slimy things. And even worse—sitting idle for hours. That sounded like pure hell to her. “I think that’s a terrible idea. I haven’t been fishing since I was eight. There’s a reason for that.”

  “Yes, because you’ve never gone fishing with me. I’m certain you’d enjoy it if I was there.”

  Ivy didn’t think even Blake’s company could salvage it. “Being trapped in a tiny boat with a box of live crickets is not my idea of fun, even if I’m trapped with you. What if there are water moccasins?”

  Blake listened to her thoughtfully, but she could tell he wasn’t about to give up his idea. “What if we went out on Willow Lake instead? It would be more convenient and comfortable for you. I could pick you up at your dock in my bass boat. There’s more room, for sure. Would that be better?”

  “It sounds better,” she had to admit.

  “Great. What are you doing tomorrow night?”

  Ivy breathed a quiet sigh of relief. She had plans that would most definitely push out any fishing trips. “I’m driving to Birmingham in the afternoon. A friend of mine is flying in to spend a couple days. He’s always wanted to see where I grew up. I’ve tried to convince him that it’s not as exciting as he imagines it to be, but he’s got this overly romantic view of the South, like we’re walking, talking Gone with the Wind cast members.”

  Blake frowned at her. Judging by the odd expression on his face, he was no longer concerned with fishing but focused entirely on this guy coming to see her. “Who’s coming?”

  “My friend Malcolm. You’ve probably seen him in a couple of movies. He does a lot of guy-friendly action flicks. He was in that cop movie—Outlaw Justice—this past summer.”

  “Malcolm Holt?”

  Ivy smiled. “That’s him. I can get you an autograph if you’d like.”

  Blake didn’t seem impressed. Or interested in her offer. “Is he staying at Miss Twila’s while he’s in town?”

  Ivy opened her mouth to respond, but her answer was stolen by the positively jealous expression on Blake’s face. She was eating breakfast with Blake while she was half-naked, but he was jealous of Malcolm. “I think so,” she lied.

  The truth was that he was staying at her cabin, but she didn’t think Blake would take that well at the moment. She and Malcolm were friends. Former lovers, according to the tabloids. But there was nothing Ivy could say right now that would make Blake feel better about her hanging out with a sexy movie star. Some secrets weren’t hers to tell.

  “We’re probably going to spend some time in Birmingham, too,” she elaborated. “I’m doing interviews with the local news affiliates on Tuesday morning, so we’ll probably stay at a hotel Monday night and come back Tuesday afternoon.”

  “When does Malcolm go back to Hollywood? Is he staying until the concert?”

  He hadn’t even arrived yet and Blake was trying to send him packing. “Wednesday. I’ll drive him back first thing in the morning. He wanted to stay for the concert, but filming on his current movie resumes on Thursday.”

  Blake nodded thoughtfully, chewing a bite of pancakes. “Okay. Well, once you’re done eating sushi and drinking champagne with movie stars, you’re going fishing with me.”

  Ivy opened her mouth to argue with him, but Blake was probably right about her upcoming agenda. Malcolm was very fond of sushi. He might insist on some authentic southern food while he was here, but odds were that while they were in Birmingham, there would be sushi. And champagne. They’d made a habit of drinking champagne together on the occasions when their schedules lined up. It seemed indulgent and celebratory and they both loved that.

  As much as she didn’t want to go fishing, she would. There was precious little time left to spend with Blake. That hadn’t been an issue when Malcolm made his plans to come out, but there was nothing she could do about that now. Instead, she would make the most of what time she could with Blake. If that meant fishing, so be it.

  “Fishing on Wednesday,” she said. “It’s a date.”

  Thinking of you. Thanks for a great night.

  Nash looked down at his cell phone and cursed softly, drawing looks from a couple sitting at the table beside him. He had another text from Cheryl. She was apparently unfamiliar with the etiquette of the woman waiting to hear from the man after a date. Of course, he had no intention of contacting her ever again, but she didn’t know that. Even so, it was the seventh text he’d received since he took her home the night before. That was a little much.

  He should’ve known he would have a problem when she’d looked at him on her front porch with those smitten eyes. She wanted him to kiss her. She was a nice-enough-looking lady, but he couldn’t take his ruse that far. It had already gone far enough.

  It seemed that in his attempt not to be a total jerk and just use the lonely woman to get into the dance, he’d been too nice and encouraged her ideas about their “relationship.” He’d danced with her and brought her punch. He even took dance photos with her under the balloon arch, although by the time they arrived in the mail from the photography company, he would be long gone.

  Despite her blowing up his phone, the night had gone fairly well, he thought. He was able to avoid the fireman who had threatened him in the diner. No one else recognized him as a reporter, most importantly not Ivy or Blake. Cheryl never seemed to notice that they danced only when Ivy and Blake danced. She would rest her head on his shoulder during the slow numbers, unable to see him slip his cell phone out of his pocket and snap a shot of the famous couple nearby.

  Thankfully, he’d only have to avoid Cheryl for a few more days. There weren’t any more public activities with Ivy until the concert on Saturday. Not being able to return to the ice cream parlor for his favorite flavor was a small price to pay for the photos he’d nabbed at the dance.

  Nash had uploaded his shots from his memory card first thing in the morning and went downstairs to shop them to a couple of sites while he ate breakfast. He sold some before he finished his second cup of coffee in Miss Twila’s breakfast room. No one could pass up the chance to plaster Ivy and her latest romance all across the Internet. Especially knowing the man she was kissing was the same man from both last week’s viral video and from that s
ong.

  It was a far more enticing story than the horse debacle of the previous morning. Nash had several shots of that disaster playing out, but he’d opted not to shop those. Despite what most people seemed to think, he had an honor code under which he operated. Selling those photos didn’t seem right. Ivy had nearly gotten killed and several people might’ve gotten hurt if that horse had made one wrong step.

  Now, the shots he got of that sneaky little blonde with the firecracker were another matter. Nash hadn’t noticed until he went through his pictures on his laptop later, but he’d snapped two shots in the moments before Ivy’s horse reared up. In the first, on the fringe of the picture, a woman was squatting down behind the crowd. She had a lighter in one hand and she was holding something in the other hand. In the second shot, the item was more easily identified as a small firecracker. She was tossing it into the street just as Ivy and Blake were riding past her. In the next picture, as the horse panicked, the blonde was gone.

  Nash had seen the same blonde at the dance and asked Cheryl who she was. She’d said Lydia Whittaker’s name with such distaste, he’d let the subject drop. That was all he needed to start, anyway. From there, he could figure out what she had against Ivy and who would be willing to pay the most for those pictures.

  Blake had been furious after the parade, and Nash had no doubt he would be interested in the photographic proof of the guilty party. Of course, there was also the blonde herself. Lydia looked like the kind of woman who had plenty of money and would pay to keep those pictures from becoming public.

  Blackmail was a dirty word, but sometimes it paid better than the gossip blogs.

  “What are you doing?” a woman’s voice asked from over his shoulder.

  Nash turned to see Miss Twila, the older woman who owned the B and B, standing behind him with irritation twisting her face into a wrinkled frown. She seemed like a sweet old lady, but that was far from the truth. She’d tossed a couple of reporters out since he’d gotten there. Nash had kept his cameras and equipment in the trunk of his rental and tried to keep a low profile. He had only brought his computer downstairs to email out some pictures because it was the only place the Wi-Fi worked.

  “Good morning, Miss Twila,” he said with a smile, closing his laptop. Hopefully she hadn’t seen what he was doing.

  “That was a picture of Ivy and Blake kissing on your computer.” She pointed at it accusingly. “You’re not a real reporter. You’re another one of those gossipmongers, aren’t you? You should be ashamed of yourself, stalking that poor girl and putting every private moment of her life on the Internet for everyone to see. I won’t have you conducting your sleazy business in my inn. Pack up,” she said, snatching his breakfast plate away, half-eaten. “I want you out of here by checkout time.”

  “Where’s Ivy?” Grant asked, salting the eggs that Ruth had just brought him. “I haven’t seen her since the dance the other night.”

  Blake frowned into his mug and sipped his coffee. He should’ve canceled breakfast with his brother today, but they had a standing breakfast appointment every Tuesday. Now he’d be forced to discuss the Ivy situation with his brother over biscuits and gravy. It was bad enough he’d been going over it in his mind almost endlessly since he took Ivy home on Sunday afternoon. He hadn’t seen her since.

  “She’s in Birmingham with Malcolm Holt.”

  “Malcolm Holt? No shit?” Grant seemed really impressed—of course, Malcolm wasn’t off with his woman. “That superhero movie he did last year was pretty good. A better choice for Red Rhage than one of the Hemsworth brothers. Hey, didn’t they used to date?”

  “Malcolm and one of the Hemsworth brothers?” Blake asked drily.

  “No, dammit! Malcolm and Ivy. I thought I remembered reading that on a checkout-stand magazine once.”

  Blake turned to his brother on the stool beside him and punched him in the upper arm. “Thanks a lot for that terribly useful information. I feel so much better now about her being off with him instead of with me.”

  Grant winced and rubbed his arm. “Sorry. I thought you knew. It’s been a while, if that helps. A few years, actually. Well before People magazine named him Sexiest Man Alive. He’s probably taken. Do you want me to look on my phone and see who Malcolm is dating now?”

  “No,” Blake snapped. “She says they’re friends, so that’s all it is. And even if they’re humping like rabbits as we speak”—he winced as he said the words—“it’s not really my business. We’re hardly exclusive.”

  Blake was the one who’d made a big deal about how their relationship was just casual fun for old times’ sake. He’d only said it because Ivy seemed nervous he would think otherwise. It was a nice idea that something real might develop between them, but he wasn’t stupid. He would take what he could get while he could get it. But he couldn’t very well turn around and complain about her being with another guy, even a “friend,” after saying something like that.

  “Besides, what’s the point? Soon she’ll be back in LA, where he lives. It might make more sense for them to be together in the long run.”

  Grant narrowed his eyes at his brother. “What the hell?”

  “What?” Blake asked.

  “Where’s my supercompetitive brother? The one who wouldn’t let me win at anything growing up? That Blake wouldn’t just step aside and let the movie star win. It . . .” He hesitated, studying Blake’s expression. “It seems like you’re into Ivy again. Are you?”

  Blake shrugged. “Well, yeah. I mean, we slept together, if that’s what you mean.”

  “No,” Grant said with a sharp shake of his head. “I sleep with a lot of women and you’ll never see that moony look on my face.”

  Blake snorted at his brother’s rude assessment. “That’s because you’re a man whore.”

  “I’m uncomplicated,” Grant argued, without the slightest hint of offense in his voice. “There’s a difference. Anyway, you’re not exactly president of the Chastity Club yourself.”

  Blake focused on his omelet, adding some ketchup to his plate for his hash browns. He didn’t want to talk about this any longer. His brother was crazy, looking for things that weren’t really there and meddling in affairs that weren’t any of his concern.

  “So did you guys do it with the lights on or off?”

  Blake turned to his brother with a warning glance, and then looked around the diner to see if anyone else was near enough to hear. Fortunately, it was a slow morning at Ellen’s. Grant had never been very good with social volume control.

  “Say it a little louder, jackass,” Blake hissed. It made him miss his brother Mitchell. Mitchell was a year younger than Blake. He was always more focused on his studies than the ladies, unlike Grant, but he was easier to talk to. He was quiet, serious. When you went to him with a problem, Mitchell would give you a reasonable and well-thought-out answer.

  Unfortunately, Mitchell was at Vanderbilt finishing medical school. It would be years before his residency was completed and he could return to Rosewood for more than a few days at a time around the holidays.

  That just left Grant, unless Blake wanted to confide in his youngest brother, and he most certainly did not. Just the sight of Ivy at the dance had made Simon blush like he was smitten. Talking about his sex life with Simon seemed very, very wrong. Hell, he wasn’t sure if his brother had even slept with a woman yet.

  “Well?” Grant pressed.

  “Technically the lights were off, but there was plenty of moonlight coming through the windows.”

  His brother knew how self-conscious Blake was about his leg. He didn’t like people looking at his scars. He never wore shorts, even out on the field in the summer. In his sexual encounters since the accident, he’d found ways around exposing his injury. Dim lighting helped. Undressing himself at the last moment did, too. Grant seemed to think that until Blake was screwing in broad daylight, he was disguising
his issues.

  “Before you get all preachy with me about my leg, you should know I’d already shown it to her when we were out on my deck.”

  “That’s certainly progress. Is Ivy the first person you’ve shown that wasn’t family or one of your many doctors and therapists?”

  He shrugged. “I guess. At least that I’ve shown on purpose. I don’t want my injury to be the constant topic of discussion. Everyone knows what happened to me. The scars just bring it to the forefront of their minds, making them forget about what I’ve achieved and focus on feeling bad for me. When I’m seducing a woman, the last thing I want is her pity. Or worse, for her to be thinking about my leg and how it might . . . impact my performance.”

  “That’s not really good for the mood,” Grant admitted. “Although some women might eat that up. Plenty of women dig a man that’s ‘damaged.’ They get off on healing you with their bodies or something.”

  Blake groaned. He wasn’t going to use his leg to pick up chicks. He’d rather just get to the point where it wasn’t a big deal anymore. When the scars faded and he had a state championship under his belt, maybe people would think about something else.

  “So, how’d it go with you two?”

  “Excuse me?”

  “I mean, how’d it go with your leg,” Grant clarified. “Please don’t give me details about anything else.”

  “It was fine. It held up much better than the last time, so I can see an improvement. We were able to go several rounds without a problem. I paid for it in the morning, though. I woke up hurting, even after taking a couple of pills before falling asleep. And after I took her home that afternoon, I spent the rest of the day alternating between the whirlpool and sitting on the couch icing my knee.”

  “Sounds pretty rough, but congratulations on going all night with a rock star. Next time, maybe she can be on top and make it easier on you,” Grant suggested with a devious wiggle of his brow.

  “You’re a pervert.”

  “I’m practical. Again, there is a difference.”