“Just stall everyone, okay? I’ll come up with a new song.” Dakota picked up the newspaper and scanned the morning headlines.
“You want to talk about trouble, now those poor people in the Midwest have real trouble,” he said as he read the front-page story. “Floodwaters have peeled away entire sections of highway, washed out bridges and knocked out water and power stations. The town of Des Moines, Iowa, is pretty much shut down, according to this.”
“Iowa? That’s where Tucker is,” Chelsea said, tugging the newspaper from Dakota’s hands.
“Honestly, neither of you have any manners to speak of,” Melinda said in disgust. “You don’t read the newspaper at the breakfast table.”
“You do if someone you love is stranded in the middle of a natural disaster,” Chelsea retorted. She quickly scanned the newspaper’s account of the flooding, then passed the paper back to Dakota and excused herself. “I’m going to call Tucker and make sure he’s all right.”
“Do you think it’s wise to have that woman in your home?” Melinda asked, when Chelsea had left the dining room.
“What do you mean?”
“What will people think? Look how she carries on with that guitarist of hers onstage. I’ve heard their show is shocking when they do concerts together.”
‘It’s only an act,” Dakota said, sounding unconvinced himself. “Fans of rock and roll expect to see a sexier show than country-music fans. You can’t just stand in one place and sing when you’re a rock star.”
“That’s why rock and roll isn’t our kind of music,” Melinda sniffed.
“Things change, Melinda. Look at Garth Brooks and his high-energy show. And now that Chelsea Stone is planning to move over to country, I suspect things will really heat up.”
“Maybe Chelsea will flop,” Melinda said on a hopeful note.
“I certainly hope not. She’s going to sing one of my songs.”
“You’re really going to do it, then? You’re going to write a song for her?”
“I’m going to give it a shot. But right now I feel like a game of tennis.”
“But I’m not dressed for…” Melinda said, looking down at her pastel business suit.
“Oh, no, I meant with Chelsea. I need you to stall off the record company and the boot company. Let me know how you do. I’m counting on you.”
“I’ll take care of everything. Don’t worry,” Melinda replied, determined to make herself indispensable to him. Let Chelsea play tennis with him. She would be gone from Dakota’s life in a few days or weeks, while Melinda planned to become a permanent fixture.
Excusing himself, Dakota got up from the breakfast table to go and find Chelsea. Melinda remained in her chair for a few moments, dreamily doodling a familiar signature in her mind—Mrs. Melinda Law.
She, not Chelsea, was the right kind of woman for Dakota. It was only a matter of time until Dakota realized the perfect bride for him was right under his nose. She hoped it would be soon. As it was, she’d already changed her mind three times in the past two years about what kind of wedding veil she wanted.
One thing was for certain, she thought, looking around the dining room. These stupid Crayola-colored chairs were going to be the first thing to go when she took over as mistress of the house.
She’d replace them with something tasteful and dignified. Something unlike Chelsea Stone.
Mrs. Melinda Law… Yes, that had an impressive ring. A ring that would finally silence her mother’s bragging about Melinda’s two well-married younger sisters.
BACK IN HER ROOM, Chelsea flopped down on the brass bed to place her call to Tucker. She was relieved to hear his voice.
“Tucker, I was worried when Dakota read me the newspaper this morning, and I heard how bad things are in Iowa. Are you and the band okay?”
“Wait—wait a minute, back up. Dakota read you the newspaper this morning? Is that what you said? What’s he doing reading you the morning newspaper, Chelsea?”
“Nothing. I’ve just moved into his house so we can work things out, that’s all.”
“Work things out? What things?”
“I found out the reason Dakota has been so awful to me is because he’s frustrated,” Chelsea explained.
“I know the feeling.”
“Knock it off, Cheesebrain. He’s frustrated because he has writer’s block.” It had been a relief to know he hadn’t disliked her on general principle. That would have been nearly impossible to remedy. But writer’s block; how hard could that be to break?
“Writer’s block? But what’s that got to do with you? I don’t understand.”
“He’s angry with me because I’m the one who wrecked his car.”
“That’s hardly news, babe.”
“I know that. But what I didn’t know was that he’d written all his hit songs in the back seat of the car I totaled. And now he can’t write anything because he thinks the car was his magic charm.”
“So show him some of your magic charm—you know, the stuff you use on me to get your way all the time.”
“I do not.”
“Right. But what’s all this have to do with you staying at Dakota’s place?”
Chelsea rolled over on the bed. “I’m staying here because I’m trying to help him get over his writer’s block. I feel guilty, Tucker. I’m the cause of it. He blames me.” She did feel guilty—not just about the car, but about the fact that most of her concern for Dakota had to do with his inability to help her if he couldn’t write.
“And you’re really buying this? I think I’d better stop by Nashville and see you after we finish our stop in St. Louis. Ahh… oow-weee!”
“What’s wrong?”
“Nothing. I’m just sore, is all.”
Chelsea laughed. “You’d better retire after your St. Louis gig, Tucker. If playing in a band makes you sore, you’re really old.”
“I’m sore from sandbagging. The band and I pitched in for a couple of hours to help out. It was the least we could do for a town that gave us a sold-out show.”
“Is the flooding really bad where you are?”
“It’s pretty awful here in Des Moines. No water to drink, and the power’s out, too. You wouldn’t believe the damage a flood is capable of doing. The rising water is awesome.”
Chelsea heard a knock on the door and a familiar bark. “Hang on a minute, Tucker,” she said, then called out to Dakota to come in. Pokey bounded in with typical exuberance, while Dakota remained standing in the doorway. “What’s the phone number and address here?” she asked him, then relayed the information to Tucker.
“You be careful driving, Tucker,” she admonished. “And be sure to call me when you get to the Riverport Theater in St. Louis, okay?”
“You worry too much, babe,” Tucker complained.
“Just promise you’ll call me.”
“Okay, okay. I’ll call as soon as we get into St. Louis tomorrow.”
“Good.”
“But babe, you’ve got to promise me one thing, too.”
“What?” she demanded.
“That you’ll give me a massage when I get to Nashville,” he said, groaning.
“Just get here in one piece and I’ll give you all the massages you want,” she promised, and hung up.
“Tucker’s coming here?” Dakota asked, crossing his arms in front of him.
“He’s stopping by to see me. You don’t mind, do you?”
“No, why should I mind? Tell him to bring the whole band with him. My cook will be thrilled,” Dakota said, sardonically.
“It’ll just be Tucker. St. Louis is the last stop on this tour, and then they’re taking a break.”
Dakota didn’t seem all that reassured.
“You want to see me about something?” she asked, tossing her hair back.
“I thought you might like to play a game of tennis with me. You do play, don’t you?”
“Sure,” she lied. How hard could
it be to hit a tennis ball back and forth?
“Come on, then, let’s go.”
She followed him downstairs, through the foyer where a magnificent crystal chandelier hung from the molded ceiling, and outside to the tennis courts located to one side of the balustraded terrace. Pokey accompanied them, running back and forth excitedly.
“Pokey thinks she’s the ball girl. She is good at retrieving, I have to admit,” Dakota said. He lobbed a ball and told the black Lab to fetch.
Pokey bounded after it, retrieved it and dropped it at Dakota’s feet.
Dakota picked up the ball. “The only problem is she slobbers on the balls,” he said, wiping his hand.
“I’m sure it won’t affect the spin I put on my ball,” Chelsea assured him. She wasn’t lying, as she hadn’t a clue how to put a spin on a tennis ball in the first place. “Let’s play.”
“Why don’t you serve first….”
“You mean because I’m the woman?” she demanded, her eyes narrowed.
“No, because you’re the guest, and I’m the gentleman.” Dakota tossed two tennis balls her way and she dodged them. Realizing she should have caught them to serve, she bade Pokey go fetch.
Thankfully, the dog returned the balls to Dakota. “Since you have the balls, why don’t you go ahead and serve,” Chelsea suggested, hoping to pick up a few pointers before she tried it.
Dakota sailed one to her right.
“Wait, I wasn’t ready.”
She wasn’t ready for the entire set. Her serves were mostly double faults. Dakota ran her all over the court, and took enormous pleasure in doing so.
By the time he’d thoroughly trounced her, Pokey was sprawled on the sidelines, her tongue lolling. The only thing that kept Chelsea from joining the dog was her pride.
After Dakota declared game point, Chelsea announced unnecessarily that she guessed her game was a little rusty.
Dakota laughed. “It’s so rusty you should get a tetanus shot.”
She threw her racket at him.
“Whoa, woman,” he said, catching it with one hand. “Anyone ever tell you that you’re a bad sport?”
“Not and lived,” she grumbled.
“So are you ready for another game?” he asked, pushing his luck.
“Any game but this one.” Forgetting her pride, Chelsea collapsed beside the panting dog. When they’d started to play, Dakota had looked like he’d been born to wear tennis whites. He still looked that way, annoyingly so. Why wasn’t he sweaty and disheveled?
“You know what your problem is, don’t you?” he asked.
“You?”
“No. Well, maybe in a way. Instead of looking at me, you should have been watching the way the ball bounces. It changes direction when it bounces a lot.”
“I don’t think it matters when you slam-dunk the ball. Haven’t you ever heard of a friendly game of tennis?”
“Guess I don’t think of you as being particularly friendly,” he said, shrugging.
How, she wondered again, could he look so good. He was just moist enough to look inviting, while she, on the other hand, was sopping wet and looking anything but inviting.
She would get even with him.
“What are you smiling about?” Dakota asked suspiciously.
“I’m not smiling.”
“Good, because you make me nervous when you smile.”
Dakota lowered himself to the ground beside her with a groan.
“Oh, please, I can do without the groaning,” she said, hitting him. “You barely worked up a sweat out there on the court.”
“Does that mean you’re not going to offer me one of your massages?”
Chelsea ignored his question and changed the subject. “Let’s talk about the song I want you to write for me.”
“Okay,” he agreed, his voice lazy and resigned. “What about it?”
“Do you have any ideas?”
“One or two,” he answered, lifting a dark strand of damp hair from her cheek.
“Great!”
“Ideas don’t write themselves, so don’t get too excited,” he warned.
She looked at him curiously. “You do plan to write a song for me, don’t you? You didn’t ask me here just so you could torture me for wrecking your car?”
He didn’t give her a direct answer, which told her a lot. “I can’t write if I’m blocked. I told you that coming in.”
“But writer’s block can be broken, the same as batting slumps and bad luck.”
“We’ll see.”
“Try to work up a little enthusiasm. I don’t want just any old song, you know. My whole career might be riding on the song you write for me.”
“I never write just any old song,” he said tersely. “I write songs to touch people. I write songs I expect will be around for a long time because they mean something—to others as well as myself.”
Chelsea smiled. She’d pricked his ego. Maybe that was the key to unblocking him.
DAKOTA WAS RIGHT.
He didn’t write lame songs.
Chelsea sat in the audience at Dakota Country that evening, listening to him perform, and thought it was no wonder he had sponsors lining up at the door to underwrite his concerts. She was amazed a blue-jeans company hadn’t seen the windfall his endorsement would bring. It ought to be illegal to wear jeans that tight… and probably was.
The ballad he was singing was an emotional minefield, and the audience was totally caught up in it. She had made the right decision; Dakota was a genius. When he finished the song, she and every member of the audience was drained, wrung out, content.
But Chelsea wanted something different. The song she wanted Dakota to write for her had to be uplifting and optimistic.
Like her.
Despite a childhood that would be fodder for a half-dozen or so movies-of-the-week, Chelsea had refused to be a victim. She believed that if you let the bad things that happened to you in life control the rest of your life, then you lost. It was how people reacted to what happened to them that decided who won and who lost.
Winning was not giving in, not accepting a life or a fate you didn’t want. It was fighting back, going on—surviving.
“I’d like to get someone in the audience to come up onstage and sing a song for us. Ladies and gentlemen, give a big round of encouragement to Chelsea Stone!”
Chelsea heard her name and then everyone started clapping.
She was going to kill Dakota Law—right after he wrote her a song. But at the moment she had no choice but to go onstage and act like they were friends. He’d put her on the spot and in the spotlight.
The crowd’s enthusiasm and anticipation were both scary and exciting. She’d never suffered from stage fright, but then she’d sung before rock audiences who knew what they were getting. This audience wanted country music. What would they think of her?
Would they accept her or boo her off the stage?
Surely, with Dakota there, they would give her a chance.
“What am I supposed to sing?” she whispered to Dakota when she reached the stage.
“Whatever you want. Here’s your chance to try out a country-music audience and see how you like it. Don’t freak. It’s only a small club. Just pick out a song and go for it.”
The audience had quieted and waited expectantly.
Chelsea could feel her heart pounding. She wasn’t prepared. It was warm. She felt dizzy.
She couldn’t do it.
Oh, yes, you can, a voice from her childhood insisted. And she listened to that voice—the voice that had never failed her. The voice that had gotten her through the emotional and physical cruelty. The voice that told her never to show fear.
She didn’t know where she found the nerve or the presence of mind, but she launched into a parody of “Kentucky Woman,” only she sang it as “Dakota’s Women.”
She was relying on humor and good fun. It wasn’t a real test of whether or n
ot country-music fans would accept her, but it was ever so much better than a kick in the stomach.
Somehow she got through the song.
The rest of the evening and the ride home went by in a daze for Chelsea. The full reality of how much of a risk she was taking had sunk in when she’d performed without her accepting fans and a backlog of hits to support her.
“You haven’t said a word since we left the club,” Dakota remarked, as they pulled into the long winding drive to his home.
“I’m thinking,” she explained.
“About what?”
“Where the gardener keeps the rat poison,” she joked, hiding her doubts and fears.
“Aw, come on, I thought you’d enjoy it. Besides, the audience loved you. And I’m the one who ought to be sore about that ‘Dakota’s Women’ bit you sang.”
“You deserved it,” she said, stifling a smile.
He came around to let her out of the car, ever the gentleman.
She followed him to the front door.
As he was putting his key in the lock, he asked, “Are you hungry? I can have the cook make us a snack if you want.”
“No, I’m too keyed up to be hungry.”
“In that case we could play tennis”
“No,” she said. “What is it with you, today? Why are you so bent on embarrassing me?” “I’m just doing my job,” he said, standing aside after he’d opened the door.
“What are you talking about?” she asked, as he followed her into the house.
“I’m observing you in order to write a song for you. Isn’t that what you wanted? Oh, look—someone’s sent me flowers,” he said, going to the vase of fresh tulips on the round table in the foyer.
Dakota reached for the tiny envelope tucked in amid the flowers. He slipped the card out and read aloud.
“Happy Birthday!
Love, Me”
A look of puzzlement crossed his face. “There’s obviously been some sort of mix-up. My birthday isn’t for months.”
“What time is it?” Chelsea leaned over to smell the white tulips.
Love, Me Page 5