by Natalie Ann
“That’s true. Can we separate the two?” she asked.
“We’ve done a good job of it so far. Why do you think we can’t now?”
She nodded her head. “I’d like to ask Sidney, if you don’t mind, about moving in.”
“I expected as much. If she says no, you won’t consider it though?” Sidney was only two. Just the thought of that being the deciding factor made Brody nervous for a guy who didn’t spend a lot of his time being nervous in life.
“I didn’t say that. I just want to see what she thinks. It’s not only me. Are you even ready to have a child underfoot nonstop?” she asked. “There’s a big difference between spending a day a week with her and seven days a week.”
“I know that,” he said. “I’ve thought of it and I wouldn’t have asked if I considered it even being an issue.”
“Then I’ll talk to her tonight when you’re at work.”
He wanted to ask if he could bring it up with Sidney himself but decided to let it go. It wasn’t his place…at least not right now.
***
“So, have you found anything out yet?” Brody asked Cade over the phone. The minute Aimee was out of sight, he placed the call. She wasn’t the only one waiting for answers.
“I’m still looking into things. You know what I know. It looks like there’s a record label interested in them. Believe it or not, this label is pretty conservative. Most of their contracts are with bands or singers that are squeaky clean. No drugs, no excessive drinking or partying.”
“So then why are they interested in Hope’s Breath?” Brody asked.
He’d seen the band in person. The music was loud, but not horrible. He supposed if he paid attention to the words there might have been a message in there. No swearing or violence. Pick had been the only one drinking that night, now that he thought of it, and he didn’t get drunk, just a few drinks in the four hours he was there.
“The lead singer has talent. They like her and like what she represents. It’s almost like family values mixed in with rock and roll,” Cade said. “The big question mark is the band members. Most look just as squeaky clean.”
“Then there’s Pick,” Brody said.
“Yep. He’s not the cleanest person in the band, and has a few drinks during gigs, but he hasn’t been in trouble with the law and has never been caught doing drugs—even though Aimee said he did quite a few back then.”
“So he needs to keep that image in order to stay with the band. That’s what Jackson is trying to do? Keep the band together?”
“That’s my guess. The problem is, if there is even a whisper that Pick has a child that he isn’t supporting, that he didn’t even know about, that might not reflect well. Then add the fact in someone might approach Aimee someday and she’ll say what he told her. Of course, he never came right out and told her to terminate the pregnancy and that will be the story he’ll stick with.”
Brody sighed. “I’m more worried about them turning this all around on Aimee. Playing her off as a partier that didn’t know who the father was, so why bother to tell him? Then when he makes it big, she decides she wants to cash in. They could be trying to find a way to make him the victim.”
“That thought crossed my mind, too,” Cade said. “I don’t like the silence right now. It doesn’t sit well with me. They’ve had plenty of time to make a move one way or another.”
“What move do you think they’d make?” Brody asked.
“In my eyes, just one of two things. Buy Aimee off for silence, which is the less likely scenario. Or have Pick get involved in Sidney’s life. Give him this image of a doting single father trying to make it work with his kid while on the road.”
“I’d rather they try to pay her off,” Brody said.
“I guess we’ll find out soon enough.”
Brody hung up the phone and knew what he needed to do. He was sure it was going to be the wrong choice, but it was the only thing he could think of to protect his girls. Because in his eyes, they were his now.
Come Clean
It didn’t take long for Brody to track Pick down and knock on his apartment door a few days later. He wanted some answers and needed to know the end game. Cade wasn’t working fast enough, so Brody was taking matters into his own hands. Didn’t matter if they didn’t agree with his decision, he could still lead and that’s what he was doing.
The nasty man answered wearing a ripped T-shirt that might have been white when it came out of the package of five from a supercenter several years ago, but now resembled something used to wipe up the floor in the bathrooms at Fierce.
“Dude. The bartender from Fierce, right?”
“Yeah, that’s me. Do you have a minute to talk?” He was surprised the guy remembered who he was.
Pick scratched his belly through a hole, then shrugged. “Sure, come on in.” He rushed ahead and started to move old pizza boxes and dirty clothes off the single couch, tossing some of those clothes in a corner. “Have a seat.”
“No need,” Brody said. He’d have to burn his clothes when he left here as it was. “This won’t take long.”
“What can I do for you?” Pick asked, looking around the apartment nervously. Brody followed his eyes, landing on the pipe in the corner peeking out from under a black lace bra that Pick tried to cover when he tossed clothes in the corner. There looked to be a razor blade on a small mirror and an old used-up straw, but Brody turned before Pick could see what he noticed.
“I’m here about Aimee.”
“Aimee who?” Pick asked, scratching his head this time. The guy just made him nauseous.
“The bartender at Fierce. The one you said you remembered. You came back the next day to talk to her,” Brody reminded him. The sleezeball was clueless. He realized now this was a really bad idea, but he was too far into it at this point.
“Oh yeah. What did she say about me? She better not be spreading shit.”
“She didn’t say much at all. It’s more about what your agent Jackson said that brings me here.”
“Jackson came to see you?” Pick asked, sniffing a few times, then running his finger under his nose. “What’s he doing talking to you about me?”
“He didn’t come to see me. He went to see Aimee.”
Pick’s face hardened. “What did that bitch say? She better not be ruining my chance of making it big.”
All Brody saw was a red haze. The control he always had to fight for just lost the battle. No one insulted Aimee. He grabbed Pick by his torn shirt and slammed him against the wall. “She didn’t say anything. It’s what your agent said to her. Started questioning her about her daughter.”
Pick didn’t bother to fight back. It wouldn’t have done him any good anyway, being the little weaselly twerp he was. Pick looked confused for a minute, then seemed to catch on. “I don’t have a kid. She better not be telling lies. What’s she going to do, try to hit me up for money once I’m rolling in it? I’ll have my lawyer take care of that.”
Brody let go of Pick’s shirt, stepped back and took a breath. That shed some more light on things. At least it was something he could go back and tell Cade, making this trip not seem like such a horrible idea now.
“You don’t know why Jackson came to see Aimee? You really don’t know anything at all?”
“No. He doesn’t tell us dick. Just gives us our cut.” Brody looked around the apartment and figured it wasn’t hard to imagine what the band’s cut was. “A few months ago, he was rambling on about the big times and drilling us on our past. I told him the truth.”
“What’s the truth?” Brody asked. Pick was looking a little shaky at the moment, so anything else he said could be useful.
“That I didn’t remember much of my past. I did a lot of partying and slept with a lot of women, but as far as I knew I had no kids. I’ve been clean for a few years now too,” Pick said, his eyes edging anywhere in the room but where it proved his lie. “Are you telling me I do have a kid?”
Shit. How was he going
to get out of this? His stupid temper. But he got what he came for. “Talk to your agent. Tell him to stay away from Aimee,” Brody growled and stomped out the door. With any luck the guy was too high to remember what just occurred.
***
“You did what?” Cade yelled.
“I couldn’t just sit back and do nothing,” Brody yelled back. The five of them were meeting upstairs and he decided he should come clean and tell them what happened the day before.
“Don’t you have any faith in me at all?” Cade asked. “I told you I was working on it.”
“It’s eating her up just waiting. It’s eating me up. And I got more information for you. More than you had before. Pick doesn’t know anything right now. How is that possible?”
“Why?” Ella asked.
He turned and looked at her “Why what?”
“Why is it eating you up too?” she asked calmly. She was always calm cool and collected and it forever got on his nerves.
He narrowed his eyes and decided he might as well come completely clean. “I asked her to move in with me. I want to be with her more. I don’t like seeing her stressing about this.”
“That didn’t really answer the question,” Mason said. Always the quietest, but never one to back down. “Do you love her?”
He held his tongue, looked around the room at four sets of eyes and finally said, “Yeah. Her and Sidney. I can’t sit back and do nothing. I can’t sit there and wait for the next move. You know how I am. And don’t tell me any of you wouldn’t have done the same thing.” Okay, maybe they wouldn’t, with the way their stares weren’t wavering.
Cade took a deep breath. “That’s beside the point. I don’t think you helped matters at all. Why do you always do shit on your own when we tell you not to?”
They were back to this again. A year of trying to prove to everyone they could trust him. That he was the same person he’d always been and now he went and did it again. Put his back against the wall and everyone was going to start to doubt his ability and judgment. Maybe even his sanity. He had no one to blame but himself. This time he knew better and still acted on his own.
“Cut him some slack, Cade,” Aiden said. “He’s leading with his heart. It’s not always a bad thing and maybe something you could learn from. Besides, he did learn something. Whatever the motivation is for this, it’s not coming from Pick.”
“What does that mean, that I could learn something from him?” Cade asked, frowning at Aiden.
Brody wasn’t in the mood to have an all-out war between everyone. They needed to focus on Aimee’s problem. “I messed up, okay? What do I need to do to fix this?”
“You’re apologizing?” Ella said. “Wow, I guess Aimee has made a change in you.”
“Stuff it,” Brody said. He didn’t want to acknowledge what Ella said. That he rarely apologized for anything. That even after the whole situation with Craig, it was hard for him to apologize to his family. It seemed like every time he turned around, he was apologizing for something lately.
“Stay out of it right now,” Cade said. “Let me look into Jackson deeper and see what I can find. Something isn’t adding up, obviously. I’ll give you that much for figuring it out. I’ve been focusing on the band, but maybe that isn’t what I need to do.”
“Fine,” Brody said, standing up, feeling better than he did when he walked in. They weren’t happy with him, but he’d made progress and they couldn’t deny that. His ways and their ways weren’t the same, but it still got results.
“Where are you going?” Aiden asked.
“To tell Aimee what I did. That will give you four time to talk about me while I’m gone,” he said, slamming the door behind him.
***
Aimee had never been so livid in her life. Not when Pick told her to end her pregnancy. Not when she was fired from two jobs because she had daycare issues. Not even when she’d been looked on like a whore by other women for what she did for a living.
But now she was furious with Brody for going behind everyone’s back and approaching Pick.
“This is my life you’re risking,” she said. “Did you even think of that? Did you think of anyone but yourself at all?”
“I was thinking of you,” he yelled. “I was thinking of Sidney. I was trying to get answers for you. I’m sick of seeing you stress and worry over this.”
“This is my battle to fight, not yours,” she said through gritted teeth and walked away from him. The urge to throw something was huge, but there was nothing to throw in the corner she and Brody were in, out of the way in the kitchen where he’d pulled her to start this conversation.
“It’s both of our battle. I don’t know how many times I have to tell you I’m in this with you. You aren’t on your own. You aren’t alone. Why won’t you believe me?”
“It’s not as easy as you think. You’ve been surrounded by people your whole life. By a family that cares for you. That are there to help you. You just don’t get it,” she said, lowering her voice. She hurt right now thinking of all the times she’d been on her own. “I’m trying, but it’s not easy. And when I try and crap like this happens, it makes me want to crawl back in a hole.”
“I get that,” he said, moving toward her and pulling her into his arms.
The comfort he was offering was slowly melting her fury. She wanted to give in. She wanted to rely on him, but internally she kept seeing herself alone, trying to hold it together for Sidney. It was hard to wipe away a lifetime of memories.
“I’m scared, Brody. Pick didn’t even know about Sidney. Now what?”
“I don’t know. I thought for sure he knew. Why else would Jackson have approached you?”
Nothing was making sense to her right now. “What does Cade think?”
“He’s going to look at a few more angles. He asked us to let him do it without interference. He’ll come to us if he needs anything. Can you do that?” he asked.
“I was doing that. The question is, can you?”
“I don’t have much choice now, do I?” he said. “At the moment I’m thinking you’re the propeller and I just need to get out of your way.”
“I’m really upset with you, Brody,” she said, sniffling. “There is so much on the line. Didn’t you think of that?”
“I did.” She leaned back and eyed him. “Maybe all I thought about was how I wanted this over with. I just want to protect you and Sidney.”
“I appreciate it. I love it, if you want to be honest. But you’ve got to think first. This isn’t just about you. This isn’t you trying to find redemption for what happened with Craig.”
“That was low,” he said, dropping his arms and taking a few steps back.
“It was and I’m not sorry I said it. You need to understand things. You need to stop going off on your own and making decisions that you think are right. You’re used to being a leader. I get that. I get you’re trying to find that identity again.”
“You don’t know anything about it.”
“I know more than you think,” she said, snapping at him. “And you’re going to have to think long and hard if you can step back and let others lead. If you can’t, then you’re going to have a hard time moving forward in life.”
“What does that mean?” he asked.
“It means for someone who hates being alone so much, you better stop doing things that isolate you. If you can’t change. If you can’t accept it, then there is no future for us.”
Airing Dirty Laundry
Two steps forward, three steps back. That’s how Brody felt right now.
Aimee was wrong. Absolutely, positively wrong in her opinion of the situation.
How dare she say he was isolating himself?
He was looking out for her. Couldn’t she see that? Couldn’t she see that he cared about her and Sidney? That he loved them? Maybe he should have told her that. Maybe that would’ve helped.
It seemed nothing was helping this situation though.
Brody looked around the b
ack of the kitchen where he’d pulled Aimee into a private area to confess his sins. He should have brought her up to an office, but he was too agitated to do that.
Too frustrated to think clearly.
He probably shouldn’t have led in with, “I just had a talk with your ex. He’s a bigger tool than I first thought,” either. Maybe it was wrong. Maybe he was wrong. Right now he didn’t have a clue about anything other than that everyone was pissed off at him for doing what he thought was right.
“What are you looking at?” he snarled at two of the kitchen staff.
“Nothing,” they said swiftly and put their heads back down to work.
Airing dirty laundry at work wasn’t the wisest thing to do. Nothing was going right, when he finally thought everything was.
He pushed the back door open with the palm of his hand, slamming it against the outside wall. Then he marched to his car, got in, slamming that door even harder. Slamming things wasn’t even helping him feel better. Maybe he should go put his fist in Cade’s face again. That had felt awesome.
Instead, he drove away.
“You’re the last person I thought would be walking in the door right now,” his mother said.
“Honestly, I’m surprised I’m here myself. It was this or hit someone.”
She laughed, then turned her back on him and walked toward the kitchen. She’d always done that: greeted people, then went back to the gathering place. He followed like the lost little kicked puppy he was feeling like.
“Were you afraid I’d punish you if you did?” she asked, turning the coffee pot on. He really needed a beer, but didn’t say that.
“Not afraid, so much. I’m just not in the mood to see what else you could come up with to torture me with right now.”
She sighed and set the coffee in front of him and took a seat. “I hate that wounded look in your eyes. I’m the only one that ever sees it and it tears me up every time. You do that on purpose.”