Lil hesitated, then asked, “What kind of names?”
Melanie dipped her head and her hair fell around her face. “Things like tramp and slut, some other words I’m not supposed to say.” Through her hair, the tips of Melanie’s ears turned a dull red.
“That must bother you a lot.”
She shrugged. “I’m used to it.”
“Well…” Lil couldn’t think of what to say. Heart aching for the waif beside her, her anger stirred. Her eyes fastened on Melanie’s old shorts. “Surely your daddy can afford some new clothes for you?”
Melanie looked up, her expression earnest. “Oh, he sends us lots and lots of money. Every month. I’ve seen the checks and they always have three zeros, sometimes four. But Mom says it’s never enough and I just have to learn to do without.”
Lil’s anger gathered, but she did her best to keep it out of her face. Impulsively, she put her arm around Melanie’s shoulders and gave her a quick hug. “I’m sure while you’re staying with your daddy, he’ll get you every single thing you want.” Including a new mother?
“I know he will. He already said Tina’s supposed to take me shopping. He called it a spree and said I can get anything I want. Anything! Can you imagine?” Melanie’s face glowed. “And best of all, Michael doesn’t have to go with us. Uncle Zeke said he’d watch him since Daddy says Tina’s no match for him.” She looked up at Lil. “I love Michael, but… Do you think Michael has DDTs?”
Lil laughed. “I think you mean ADD, and no, I don’t. He just has a lot of energy, is all. They thought Daisy had that, too, when she was little, but she didn’t, and she’s grown up fine. So will he. And so will you.”
Melanie smiled. Lil’s heart did a little flip, and she looked away. Melanie had her father’s smile, and it transformed her narrow face into a thing of beauty.
Melanie slipped her hand into Lil’s. It was warm, smooth. “I’m glad he doesn’t have ADD. Mom says he does. She says if he doesn’t calm down she’ll put him in an insti- insti-, a place for crazy people. He’s a pain sometimes, but I’m glad that won’t happen.”
What kind of monster was this girl’s mother? “No, it certainly won’t happen.” Jon wouldn’t allow it. But could he prevent his ex-wife from doing something equally nuts if he didn’t have complete custody?
Melanie squeezed back. “You know what?” she asked, voice shy.
“What?”
“I like you.”
Lil smiled. “I like you, too.” Idly she rubbed her thumb across the top of Melanie’s hand.
For a minute they were silent. Then Melanie spoke again. “I wish my daddy was marrying you instead of Mari.”
Lil started, realizing that for a brief moment, she’d been wishing exactly the same thing.
CHAPTER ELEVEN
“MEL? HEY, MEL!” Jon rounded the path and stopped at the edge of the clearing behind them. “There you are. Daisy’s looking for you, baby.”
Melanie leaped up, her happiness at being wanted so transparent Lil’s throat burned. She flashed a good-bye grin at Lil, then hurried into the deepening shadows of the woods. Lil’s eyes followed Jon’s daughter along the path until the girl’s shorts had faded to a faint lemon glow. Her gaze flicked to Jon. He was still watching Melanie, hands shoved in his pockets, a thoughtful look on his face.
He turned, and their eyes met. “Are you ready to talk?”
Heart moving into her throat, she shrugged and looked away. He approached on cat’s feet, then eased into the place Melanie had vacated, his thigh brushing hers. The gold hairs on his legs glinted in the dusklight. She frowned. She was thinking about his leg hair? She eased away until they no longer touched.
His gaze was on the view, but he smiled slightly. “Sure is pretty out here. Mari said your parents have decided to sell and why. Sound reasons, but I can see why they’d be so unhappy about having to let it go.”
She didn’t think Mari should be discussing the family’s business. “Mmm.”
The discouragement seemed to work. He shifted topics. “Must be great to just be able to kick back in a place like this. Shawnee Bay’s no contest. Boat engines going day and night, mega-homes carving up in the hillsides. What’s kept this side so unspoiled?”
She glanced at him. He actually seemed interested. “The locals didn’t want the same thing happening on this end, so they made it hard to develop homes here. About the only way to get land is to buy out somebody else.” Even with an inch of space between them, she could still feel the heat of his thigh through her skirt. She fell silent, wondering when he’d bring up the proposal, wondering if she was ready.
“And your family is great, too. Especially your mom. I would have given up my guitar to have your mom, and that’s saying a lot. That guitar was the only thing I loved as a kid.”
This family seemed to be full of problem mothers. “Didn’t you love your mother?”
“Yeah, I loved her. She gave me the guitar—stole from the grocery money to save up for it. But she died when I was six.”
She thawed a little. “I’m sorry. Your father—did he die too?”
“Not until long after he’d smashed up that guitar.” He gave a humorless laugh. “I patched it back together with tape and kept it hid over at Dodo’s—Dodo is my ex-wife’s mother. It never sounded quite the same, though. No, the old man didn’t go to his great reward until a few years back. He lasted too long in my opinion. But at least he waited to croak until I’d proved him wrong, not that he ever admitted it.”
She frowned. She couldn’t imagine feeling that way about Pop. “Proved him wrong?”
“He said I was worthless. Worthless little assbite.” Jon’s tone was almost conversational. “His pet name for me. He lived to see my name in lights. That he had to eat crow was the only reason I was glad he did.”
Zeke’s comment on the boat now made sense.
“You know,” she said quietly, “Your dad was wrong. No child is worthless.”
His eyes met hers. Before she could react, he gave her hand a squeeze and released it as fast as he’d grabbed it. Flushing, he looked away “Your cabin’s old, but it looks like your family’s kept it up. I wouldn’t think you’d have much problem selling.” He paused, glanced at her again. “Under certain conditions, maybe I’d buy it.”
Arms tightening around her knees, Lil stayed silent.
“Of course”—he twisted to stare up over his shoulder—“some folks might object to that deck. Looks kind of funny with those trees poking through it.”
She stiffened. “My husband built that deck. My husband Robbie, Pop and my brother Henry.” She remembered the summer they’d worked on it, Robbie’s back glistening with sweat and the beginnings of sunburn, the incessant pounding of nails, the camaraderie of the three men—and Zinnia wringing her hands over her oaks and dogwoods and threatening to never serve them another piece of her apple pie if they damaged so much as an inch of bark. The night they’d finished the deck, the family had held a celebration. Her mother triumphantly lit the lanterns the men had nailed on the deck’s mismatched corners and proclaimed it a huge success. Later, Lil had rubbed aloe vera on Robbie’s back and then… “And they built it that way on purpose. To preserve those trees. My mother loves those trees.”
“And in your family, how people feel is more important than things, right?”
“Every family should be that way.”
“Still, I’d think a new owner with the money it’d take to buy this place would make a lot of changes. Probably tear that deck out and put up something different.”
“They wouldn’t. They couldn’t! It’d be like—” Lil stopped. A new owner could do what he wanted.
“It’d be like ripping out a piece of your heart.” Jon finished for her. He turned his head, and she felt his gaze on the side of her face. “You loved him a lot, didn’t you?”
“Robbie? He was my life,” she said simply.
Jon’s hand brushed hers; she wasn’t sure this time if it was intentional
or not. “Lil?”
“Hmm?”
“I wouldn’t rip the deck out.”
They both stared out over the lake. The moon had pushed up behind a hill into the deepening violet of the sky, laying shimmering crescents across the water.
She thought over Jon’s question about love and decided it was odd. Of course, she’d loved Robbie a lot. Didn’t everyone love the person they married? Why else would anyone take those vows? Then she almost snorted at her own naivete. Of course there were other reasons. Look at what she herself was considering. She started. When had she decided to take his offer seriously?
Around them, more cicadas joined the evening chorus until their rhapsody drowned the lake’s gentle waves. Something shuffled nearby in the earth floor debris, probably a raccoon or possum trundling off in a nocturnal search for food. With the setting sun, the humidity had lifted, and the night, though still damp, was turning chill. Wearing only a thin cotton-eyelet blouse, she shivered. Noticing, Jon shifted until his warmth lay along her side from shoulder to ankle. She appreciated the heat, but her chill deepened. Still, she didn’t move.
“Didn’t you love your wife when you married her?”
“I thought I did.” He hooked his hair behind one ear.
She liked his ears; they kept him from being too perfect. She sighed. First his leg hair and now his ears.
“But maybe I was more in love with the idea of marriage, of a family, you know? She followed me from Monaco down to Nashville. I took off when I was eighteen, and she dropped out of school and found me a year later. I didn’t know she was coming. Before I’d left she’d latched onto some other guy. I was lonely, and— Anyway, she got pregnant. And I married her. And then I hit it big. She, uh, didn’t handle success well.”
“I would think your success would have thrilled her. No more money worries.”
“Yeah, you’d think.” His shoulder shrugged up, a gentle rub against her arm. “But, as you already pointed out, there are some things more important than money. And I didn’t give her any of them. Not my time, not my attention. I was too busy making sure the band’s first hit single wasn’t a one-shot deal.”
“So your marriage died of neglect?”
He hesitated. “Yeah, neglect.”
Lil thought about the gossip she’d read. She’d re-read those articles yesterday, not really understanding what she was looking for or why. Still, no matter what the papers reported, she hadn’t seen any depravity, and he didn’t seem the type. Not that she’d know the type. Still, she doubted he had a yen for teenage girls and orgies.
Up the hill, the stereo started up again. The soft country music harmonized with the night.
“That’s why I’ve never gotten hitched again or even serious about anyone. I’ve seen what my life can do to a partner, and I don’t want to hurt anyone.”
Lil’s hackles, lulled by his story, went back up. “Unless it’s my sister. Or me.”
“That’s different. She doesn’t love me. I don’t love her.” He didn’t mention her. She guessed it was a moot point. “Besides, just say the word, and I’ll call the whole thing off. Have you thought about my proposal anymore?”
Up the hill, on the deck, Mari’s excited giggle could be heard over the music.
Lil’s chill deepened. Would he really marry her sister if she didn’t say yes herself? She closed her eyes. Behind her eyelids, a collage of images jostled for position. Mari’s face, flushed, over-excited. The odd angles of the cabin deck around the trees. Patsy Lee’s strained and shadowed eyes. The shabby facade of PicNic Poultry. Melanie’s smile…
“I’ll do it.” Lil barely breathed the words. She was astounded at herself. She wasn’t lying. She’d really do it.
“What?” Jon twisted abruptly. She opened her eyes and his gaze, now deep brown shot with flickering gold light, was pinned full on her face.
“I said, I’ll do it.”
“You mean it? You’re sure?”
She nodded, afraid if she opened her mouth again, she’d bite back the words. Her heart pounded until she thought it would jump out of her chest and into the lake. In the moonlight, Jon’s eyes deepened to almost black as his pupils expanded. In them, she thought she saw an odd excitement, relief, pain and… something softer, something promising. The moment passed, and his eyes resumed their normal tawny color. She’d only imagined that strange look of mingled fear and hope. It was just the intensity of the occasion born out of her own tumble of emotions.
“I’m sure. But I have a few conditions.”
He gave a half smile. “Of course you do.”
“First, it’s a marriage in name only. Mari told me why you want to get married so I’ll pretend for your ex-wife and the reporters and whoever else I have to pretend to, but between the two of us, it’s strictly a business agreement.”
She darted a look at him, but he just nodded. “Go on.”
“Second, just like with Mari, I walk away in two years, and you won’t try to stop me.”
“Three years. And I’ll make you one rich woman.”
Her eyes whipped to his. “I don’t want your money! At least, not like that.”
The amused look returned, and she wanted to slap it off. “Then how do you want it?”
She tried to pick out the right words. “I’ll accept your support—a salary—during the time that we’re—we’re —”
“Married? How big of you.”
“Don’t interrupt me. I’ll accept your money during that time, but what I really want is for you to buy this place. Buy it and then at the end of the two—” He straightened, frowning. “Okay—three years, you deed it back to them.”
“So how much are we talking here?”
She named a figure she suspected was way over market value.
Jon whistled. “That’s a shitload, but I could manage it. From what I’ve seen of your tribe, though, your family won’t like it. There’s something medieval about it, selling off the daughter for land, that kind of thing.”
“No more medieval than buying a mother, which is what you intended with Mari. Besides, I have another condition.”
“I figured.”
“You’re right. My family won’t like it a bit, if they know the truth. They’ll object as strongly as they did with Mari. None of my family are to know we have an agreement. As far as they’re concerned, I fell head over heels in love with you and vice-versa. And the last condition—” In the gathering gloom, she was pretty sure Jon rolled his eyes. “—I’ll become attached to your children. In fact, I already am. More important, they’ll become attached to me. At the end of three years, we’ll need some kind of visitation agreement.”
Jon’s teasing stopped. “I hadn’t considered that. I don’t want to hurt them.”
“From what Mari has told me, you’re trying to protect them—and your record sales.”
She felt his body tense along hers. “I’m not—”
“I don’t give a fig about your image or your sales, but I will help you protect those children.”
“Let’s get something straight. I’m doing this for my kids. The image spin won’t hurt things any, but it’s a bonus and keeping a clean public image’ll help my case. It’ll also keep what the band’s built back up from crashing around our ears, and, yeah, that’s important to me. Damn important. I’ve spent most of my life creating Van Castle. But it’s not the main reason.”
“At least you don’t think it’s the main reason.” She held up a hand when he opened his mouth. “It doesn’t matter what your reasons are. Still I’m curious. Why marry a perfect stranger?”
“Because perfect strangers can’t be hurt.” As soon as the words left his mouth, he fell quiet like he wanted to take them back. He sighed and leaned forward, elbows to knees. “Look, I don’t know what kind of picture you have of my life, but I can tell you it’s not the norm. I’m guarded twenty-four/seven, my schedule is crazed, the only guys I hang with are other musicians. I don’t hunker down long enough in one pl
ace to join a block party or barbecue or whatever the hell else it is that people do in the‘burbs. I have houses but no home. People come in and out of my life all the time, but they don’t hang around long enough for me to decide if I like them. Or can trust them. It’s not the kind of life most women can live with.”
The way he lived wouldn’t matter to her. Unlike Mari, she wouldn’t be after his heart, his bed or his money. At least not much of his money. She’d be a nanny with a ring on her finger. A few years of indentured servitude to his children beat hacking poultry at PicNic. She could help her family, and she’d fallen… for his children. “Melanie and Michael’s best interests will always be my first priority. You have my word. Now, the sixth condition”—Jon groaned—“I want all of it in writing. Detailed. All spelled out.”
“A prenup that will go down in legal history. Well…” Jon looked out over the lake, lost in thought, then turned back to her. “Peter will get off just thinking about how to pull this over. He’s been wanting me to play Ozzie and Harriet ever since I split from Belinda. He’ll drool over you. If he can cross all the Ts and dot all the Is, and I’m sure he can, then, Lil, we’ve got a deal.” Was it her imagination or was his face closer? “I’ll have the papers ready to sign tomorrow. Is tomorrow okay for you?”
She was not imagining things, his face was closer. Before she could react, though, his lips had settled on hers. There was no pressure, and he didn’t touch her anywhere else. His lips were soft, quiet, and she sat stone still like a startled rabbit, eyes wide open. His eyes were open, too—merged into one big eye at this distance, and she felt sucked into their vortex. She breathed in his breath, felt the slight whisker growth above his upper lip, and then his hand lightly curled around her upper arm, warm, so warm, against her chilled skin. Inside, a quivering started that suddenly had her trembling with fear. Another animal rustled through the underbrush, the cicadas sang, and all else was quiet.
SING ME HOME (Love Finds A Home - Book One) Page 11