I crawled out of bed while he slept - just as exhausted and sated as me - looked down at the ground for a moment and realised to my shock, that my heart was gone. No longer there. I knew I'd never feel the same way about someone else ever again.
I'm not one to believe in love at first sight, and if I'm honest with Nick it was more lust at first sight that led me to his bed that night, but by the time I left it, there was no doubt I was in love. His laughter during sex, the way he said "fuck" when he came as though no one had ever made him orgasm so violently before. The way he worshipped my body with his, the soft words he murmured when we lay in each other's arms afterwards. His talk of all the places he wanted to visit, his assumption I'd be right there by his side. It was all words, designed to get me underneath him, or wrapped around him, or on top of him, again. But he'd treated me as though I was his angel, his own personal angel, that night. Someone to treasure and protect and keep forever.
Even if I didn't believe him, he'd done enough to make me realise that was the type of man I wanted. Someone big and strong and sure of themselves. Someone with a sense of humour, a wicked laugh and a sexy grin. And ice-blue eyes. My perfect cowboy.
I've never met a cowboy like him since and he didn't even wear a hat. But Nicholas Anscombe is cowboy through and through.
But he's not my cowboy.
I hated that he'd come back into my life so abruptly, right when I was down. Far from home and my support network. Suffering the last moments of an angry, hurtful man's life who despite never loving me, I loved back. I hated him for moving on to beautiful, charismatic, gorgeous Genevieve Cain. Who deserved a cowboy like Nick.
And I hated myself for still loving him and knowing no man would ever reach the standard he had set. That beautiful night, so long ago.
The sooner I returned the better, but despite Dad's declining appetite, despite his constant weight loss, he was still hanging on like clingfilm at a picnic.
So I sang. The house and shed were still keeping me busy during the day, even though the garbage truck had taken a full load twice from the backyard. But the place was cleaner, there was more space and less things to do. Dad, although clearly fading, didn't require much more than cleaning up in the morning, feeding and showering during the day, and being tucked up in bed after his meds at night. It was exhausting work, but even that didn't stop me from singing.
If I didn't have my MP3 player in my ears, singing along to a Country tune while I worked, I'd pull my guitar out and strum a few chords for Dad. Often he'd fall asleep on the couch listening to my music. I made sure to play him my original work. It's not that I was looking for his approval. But when he was gone, there'd be no other chance to show him what he'd had a part in creating. My father is a no-hoper, a skank-loving, trailer-trash of a Dad, but half of what makes me is from him. Before he dies, I want him to see what I have done with what he's given me. He may not have given me love or his time, but I did get my voice from him.
On Wednesday afternoon, sitting in the week winter sun out in the backyard, I sang him my latest song. About a girl who left her hometown for the lights of the big smoke overseas, dreams on her mind, hope in her chest, but who inadvertently left her heart behind without even knowing it. Through the rough times of trying, the knock-backs and far few breaks, she never realised what she'd left all those miles back. It could have been about her family, her friends, or it could have been about a boy. It was autobiographical, so you can tell where I got my influence from.
The neighbours came out and listened, my Dad had his eyes closed and head tipped down, so I wasn't sure if he even heard the words or not. It didn't matter, I'd sung it to him. That was all that counted in the end. When I finished I went on to some covers, because the oldies in the council flats next door needed to hear something they recognised. Willie Nelson's Always on my Mind, Waylon Jennings' I've Always Been Crazy and a little Kenny Rogers, because every oldie loves them some Kenny. My personal favourite, The Gambler.
It was at the end of this impromptu solo concert in the backyard of Dad's council flat, five other council flats bordering onto the same broken fenced, dirt patched, lawn, that my cousins decided to visit. They would have heard the last few lines of The Gambler, they would have listened to the oldies cheering and clapping for more. They would have spotted Dad in his wheelchair, soaking up the sun, resting his chin down on his chest.
They didn't give a toss. All five of them stomped in, kicked over some carefully placed boxes of crap around the side of the flat - making at least another hour's worth of clean-up for me - laughing their heads off at the "country-bumpkin too big for her cowgirl boots and her expensive-arse guitar."
My immediate thought was they were going to beat the shit out of me. That's what they'd done when I was a kid, when they'd find me down in the far corner of the Reserve near our homes, strumming my third- or fourth-hand guitar to the birds in the trees. My next was they were going to scare the living daylights out of the oldies, causing a few minor heart attacks along the way, but the oldies scattered in the wind, having obviously borne witness to the Russell boys' visits before. My third and final thought before they made it fully into the backyard, taking up every available inch of space, dwarfing my Dad and me as we sat in the centre of the yard - Dad in his wheelchair and me on a stool from the kitchen - was they were going to hurt my Dad. He was in enough pain without having to face off against Aunty Jessie's ill-mannered, sloth-like, trailer-trash brutes of sons.
I stood up, swinging my guitar behind my shoulder, so it hung down my back and started to manoeuvre Dad's chair towards the door of the flat.
"Not so fast, Hoity-Toity," Levi shouted from the front of the group. He'd always been the ring-leader, never got his hands dirty, but sure as darn hell told the others what to do.
"Levi," I said uncertainly. "What ya doing here?"
"Come to see what Mum's been fussing about. Said you'd blown into town to get your stinking hands on his money." His head cocked towards Dad on those last few words.
"Dad doesn't have any money, Levi. If he did, do you think he'd be living in a council flat?" I couldn't help it, Levi always made me feisty as all get-out.
"Still too big for your fucking boots, ain't ya," Tyler snarled from behind his bigger brother's shoulders. Not that any of the Russell boys were small, they all ate their fair share of Auckland's fast food chains' menus. But Levi was the biggest and nastiest of the lot.
No matter what anyone says, I always feel like you've got to keep your eye on the one without the bloody knuckles. At least with the others, you know what to expect, with Levi it was always a game of chance. Dependent on his mood.
"So, ya write ya will out to her, Uncle Ray?" Levi asked my Dad, who had woken up with all the fuss and the movement of his chair.
"You boys go home now, you hear?" Dad said and for a moment I wanted to believe he was saying it for me. To be the father that he had never been. To protect me from the bullies in the world.
But I knew it wasn't. He didn't want Aunty Jessie knowing all his money was going to Gabe. He wanted her to keep visiting him. For some reason he needed that contact with his sister, right up to the very end. Facing death does strange things to a man. Dad couldn't stare St Peter in the face without his sister for moral support.
"Mum's not too happy with you lot," Tyler added and the rest of the bullies nodded their heads enthusiastically.
"But she ain't real happy with cowboy boots here," Bailey threw in, his beady eyes glaring at me from under a backward baseball cap. I held his stare, held my ground, and waited for him to be the first to look away. Maybe that's why they hated me so much, because no matter what they did, no matter how many times they pushed my face in the dirt, I always stood up to them.
Even now, knowing what was coming, I was not the first to look away.
Tyler grabbed Dad's wheelchair and headed for the back door, Levi pushed Bailey and Leo towards me, while the youngest of the Russell boys, Ryder, cut off any escape I might ha
ve had at my back. I was surrounded, out numbered, out sized and I didn't give a flying fuck.
"Grab her!" Levi instructed from his safe vantage point at the back of the group.
I ducked under Bailey's uncoordinated and lazily outstretched arm, spun around and kicked out at Leo's shins. I was aiming for his groin, but the guitar over my back hampered my movements. I cursed having the darn thing around my shoulders, all the while positioning myself to protect my Martin from any harm.
"You're just gonna piss us off, Eva," Levi announced, still from several feet away.
"Come over here and say that, coward," I shot back, swinging an arm up to deflect Leo's strike and receiving an horrific shard of pain down to my wrist when I connected with his forearm.
"You know you'll just make it that much more painful. Girls like you need to be taught a lesson."
"How would you know, loser. Had any girls lately that you didn't need to drug first?"
That little comment made Bailey chuckle, but earned a kick in the back of my knees - I was guessing from Ryder - that made me stumble to the hard ground. I felt the skin on my knees tear and clenched my teeth to stop from crying out.
I was up and swinging before the sting had even registered, landing a decent blow to the side of Leo's head, spinning to confront Bailey and managing a solid punch in his gut, that doubled him over. It was at this point things usually went bad. I'd always land a blow or two, a kick here and punch there. If I was lucky, I'd get a decent scrape of my nails down someone's cheek, leaving a message behind when all was said and done. But four against one was not fair and any moment now Tyler would return from depositing Dad in the flat.
And even if it was just me against Levi, he had to have had at least fifty odd kilos on me, not to mention a foot and a half in height. Still, I never gave in. I always fought as though I would come out on top. Always. I never stopped until I was on the ground and some arsehole was sitting on me. Usually Levi, because although he'd never land a blow himself, he'd always be the one to claim victory and rub the loss in my face hard.
I felt a tug on my back, which at first didn't register, I kept swing and kicking out at anyone who came too close to my front and sides. I caught Bailey again, this time a beauty in the nuts that would have had him down for the count and left only three - until Tyler returned. With renewed energy at my victory hit, I swung around to confront whoever was still tugging on my back, in the process unhooking my guitar over my shoulder and handing them the one thing that would get me to stop.
Ryder stood there holding my Martin, an evil, satisfied grin on his face.
"Hold her!," Levi shouted, racing towards the spoils of the fight, to claim them as his own no doubt.
Tyler, back from depositing Dad, got to me first yanking me down to my already abused and aching knees on the ground, with Leo offering support in the shape of an arm around my neck from behind. I didn't struggle, I should have, because at this point nothing would have stopped Levi from his goal.
Ryder handed over my dream guitar to an almost panting with anticipation Levi, who turned slowly to look me in the eye.
"This ain't the one you used to play on at the Reserve," he said slowly, strumming his fingers down the strings in a piss-poor attempt to look like a rock star.
"It's one of my spares," I muttered, the only defence I could muster right now. To claim it wasn't my precious, favourite, expensive Martin D28 Acoustic Guitar.
"I always wanted to be a rock singer," Levi announced.
"You got the name for it, Levi," Tyler said from beside me, his fingers biting into my upper arm. Levi just continued to strut his stuff around the backyard, strumming too heavily on the strings, whacking the back of the guitar against his fat thighs, wrenching the neck as though he could wring a tune out of the darn thing just by being a prick.
"That's where you went wrong, Eva. Rock songs is where it's at," Levi declared, but as he wasn't expecting an answer and I was now holding my breath with every heart wrenching strum of the those strings, I stayed mute.
"Or rap," Leo said at my shoulder.
"R & B," Ryder threw in and received a few punches in the side of his arm from Levi, which thankfully ceased the strumming for all of ten seconds. It sucked to be the youngest of the Russell clan it seemed.
"Well," Levi said, returning his attention to me, a gleam starting up in his eyes. "As you're obviously too important, too big, for us now, I think we should get rid of your toy. Make you go home to get your others, then maybe you won't come round here anymore."
I closed my eyes, knowing now there was nothing I could do to stop what was going to happen. I didn't want to watch. For the first time in my life, I considered revenge. I can take a beating, as long as my fingers don't get hurt. They can call me any name under the sun. Tell lies about me to all my friends and family. Let down the tyres on my bicycle, chuck my school bag in the creek on the pathway home, make me trip over in the cafeteria in school, so I land in a pile of sodden sandwiches and stolen chips at the feet of the cutest boy in tenth grade.
They could even cut off my hair. I'd fight them, but when it was done, I'd let them walk away.
But no more. This was it. The straw that broke the camel's back, so they say.
"Open your eyes, bitch," Levi ground out from directly in front of me.
Leo began to cut off my air by tightening his hold around my neck. Ryder just dug his fingernails into my flesh, drawing blood - I could feel it trickling down my arm. And Bailey, having recovered from my booted foot to his nuts, yanked on my hair to bring my head upright, from where I'd been frowning at the ground. All that left was Tyler and Levi. Levi was holding my guitar before me, a snarl marring his face.
"Watch," he whispered, as he raised my guitar in two hands above his head, lifted his knee and brought the back of Martin down hard across it. Shattering it in two.
I didn't show a reaction at all. I just stared at him in the eyes, let him see my hatred, let him know to watch his back from the look on my face alone.
His smile grew bigger. He nodded, the hell if I knew who to, and then dropped the remnants of the guitar in the dirt and turned and walked away. Leo's arm relaxed at my neck, Ryder released his hold, his fingernails no longer drawing blood in skin and Bailey gave one more hard tug on my hair, then stepped back.
And Tyler swung his fist at my face, connecting with my jaw.
I could hear their laughter as they stormed off around the side of Dad's flat, while I lay stunned on the hard packed back lawn. My jaw ached, a bruise already forming. But what was left of my tattered heart, shattered even more. I rolled over and reached out for my guitar, pulling it towards my chest, tucking it protectively underneath my body.
It was like this, that Nick found me an hour later, after a neighbour had placed a call to the cops.
Chapter 4
Shook My Head And Set Off To Soar
"I still don't understand why you're here," I muttered beneath the tea towel wrapped frozen bag of peas against my chin.
"I've got friends at North Com," Nick murmured, eyes on my father, who had eyes on him from his wheelchair across the lounge from where we sat in the open plan kitchen.
"North Com?" I asked, wanting his attention on me and off my Dad. I didn't like the way he was glaring at him as though my bruised jaw and broken Martin guitar were all his fault. The poor man was dying, he didn't need Nick Anscombe's high and mighty opinions thrust down his throat.
"Police communications centre, where they take the emergency calls," he said, not removing his eyes from my Dad.
For Dad's part, he was holding the Anscombe glare pretty well. I knew I inherited something else from the man, other than my voice.
"That doesn't explain how you knew it was me. They must get thousands of a calls a day. Why this one?" I could be stubborn and determined when I wanted to. Right now I was darn sure I wanted Nick looking at me and not my sick and dying Dad.
"You're on radar," was all he said, eyes on Dad.
Nick's head swung lazily back to look me in the eye. Ice-blue met my chocolate brown. I gave him a serving of my stare down. He stared impassively back.
"Who were they, angel?" he asked, surprising me with the question, but not as much as the fact he was using his nick-name for me.
"What does you're on radar mean?" Determination, that's me.
"As soon I knew you were in town I put your name out there, any hits come back to me."
What?
"Why in the darn hell would you do that, cowboy," I Tennessee'd back at him.
His lips twitched, causing my heart to race. It didn't need the workout, it had irreparably been damaged when my Martin D28 was smashed in two.
"Angel," he said and nothing else, as though that answered the question.
I frowned at him and then - I must be slipping, because I was the first to look away - frowned down at the floor. I heard my Dad make a choking sound from across the room, I was thinking I'd just let the Rowe Family down.
"Who were they, Eva?" Nick asked.
"Are you the cops?" I shot back at him. "Because I'm sure when people dial triple one they expect a blue and white to appear outside the door."
"I'm worth ten cops," he answered arrogantly. Dad chuckled. Traitor.
"Why do you care, Nick?" I asked, realising that was the first time I had called him by name since I'd been back, since I'd been faced with him at Sweet Seduction, had all those sordid, beautiful memories of my past refreshed in my brain. I thought the moment deserved some respect, maybe little cupids playing on their harps or something. At the very least a Garth Brooks song blasting out in the background.
"You're playing at Gen's big night. I don't want anything to spoil it for her."
And there you go, shattered heart just pulverised. How could I forget Genevieve Cain, his gorgeous, lovely, fiancée?
"I'll be fine to play, you can leave."
"Who were they, Evangeline?"
Sweet Seduction Serenade Page 4