Just Sing: An Enemies-to-Lovers Rock Star Romance (Just 5 Guys Book 1)

by Selena

  She still maintained that my music was shit, and unlike Laney, she wanted nothing to do with it. When we did see each other, half the time I was on orders not to speak at all, having to rest my vocal cords as much as possible between near-nightly performances. Just one of the joys of working for Nash.

  With Nash, I often had to remind myself. My shrink said it was all a matter of perspective, but that was bullshit. I had to do Nash’s bidding, while Nash did whatever the fuck he wanted with my career.

  The only exception was when it came to Uma and the baby. There, I wouldn’t budge. I was taking care of them, no matter how many times Nash told me I’d lost my fucking mind. I was not going to let anything happen to my daughter.

  After checking the bus bathroom and the cockpit, I’d pretty much exhausted my options. I checked my phone, a surge of bile collecting in my stomach. She hadn’t called. What if she’d skipped out on me? I yanked open the accordion door to my bedroom, meaning to grab a half-assed disguise, and stopped short.

  Uma was curled up on my bed, on top of the blankets, still in her clothes. For a second, I wasn’t sure what to do.

  Get my shit together, that’s what. She was the mother of my unborn child, not a fucking tiger. Although sometimes that comparison might have been fitting. Though I didn’t miss the party atmosphere of Just 5 Guys, without Laney the bus was lonely as hell. Uma kept to herself, staring moodily out the windows or pacing up and down the bus to stretch her legs. When she did talk to me, it was usually to bitch about something or snap at me for something I’d said. Luckily, she seemed to sleep more and more the closer she got to having the baby, which meant less bitching and snapping.

  I thought about waking her but decided against it and crawled into bed instead. In the morning, she was stretched out beside me, still wearing her clothes.

  After that, in some unspoken agreement, we started sharing the bed. Now that I didn’t have Laney sharing the bed, there was no reason not to let Uma sleep there. We had zero interest in each other, so it seemed meaningless, a simple convenience. I didn’t want her sleeping on the pull-out bed now that she was big, anyway. She needed to be comfortable. When I offered to sleep on the couch, she shrugged and said I might as well be comfortable, too. So that’s where we were when, one night in early February, as the bus traveled from Dallas to Memphis, I woke up with a start to find warm liquid seeping through my pajamas. I sat up and moved away, fumbling to switch on the light.

  “Uma? Did your water just break, or did you piss on me?”

  She sat up slowly, looking confused, and peered down at the wet spot spreading across her pajama pants. “I don’t know,” she said slowly.

  “What do you mean, you don’t know? Can’t you tell?”

  She scrunched up her face for a moment, then shook her head. “No.” While she went to the bathroom, I went to talk to the bus driver.

  Uma came back from the bathroom holding a towel to herself a few minutes later. “I think it’s the water,” she said. “It doesn’t seem to be stopping.”

  “We’re going to pull over at the next hospital.”

  “Where the fuck are we?” she asked, pulling up the shade on the tiny window.

  “Someplace in Arkansas.”

  “This better not turn into some freaky version of Deliverance,” she said, peering out the window. “I don’t see anything out there. I seriously doubt they have a hospital in… Hold on, I see a sign for the next town coming up. Osceola.” She said the name like it was another name for a toilet full of shit.

  “We’ll just see, okay?” I said, pulling her back onto the bed. “How are you feeling?”

  “Aren’t you afraid I’ll get this junk on your bed?”

  “Nah. I bet that’s, like, one of the cleanest things there is. Your baby is stored in it, so it’s gotta be safe. Like formaldehyde.”

  “Yeah, it’s also taking dumps in there,” Uma said.

  I wasn’t sure about that, but I didn’t say anything. I really didn’t want to know. I was kind of fascinated by all the pregnancy stuff, not that I’d admit it to anyone else. It was cool reading about what new things my baby girl was doing in there each week. But when Uma said things like “prolapsed uterus” or “mucous plug,” I got a little nauseous. I had to admit she had a stronger stomach for the gory details than I did.

  “Can we please not stop here?” she asked. “I think… I’m having some cramps. Maybe we should go to a real hospital.”

  Blood rushed in my ears. I’d thought I had prepared for this, but now that it was happening, it didn’t seem real. Maybe it wasn’t. Maybe the baby would come out black or Asian, and I’d know I’d been had. But it would all be over. That thought gave me enough strength to tell the driver to keep on to the next town with a good hospital.

  “What if I can’t do this?” Uma said, her face twisting into a grimace.

  “You can,” I said, returning to my seat beside her on the edge of the bed. “People have been doing this since the beginning of time.”

  “People weren’t here in the beginning of time,” she said, clutching the edge of the bed and leaning forward, her face pale.

  “Well, since people have been here, they’ve been making more people,” I said.

  “People have also been dying of this since there were people.”

  I pulled the blanket up around her shoulders and started rubbing her back in slow circles. “You’re not going to die.”

  She looked up at me with eyes frantic and terrified. “What if I do?”

  “You won’t,” I said, taking her face between my hands. “You are going to be just fine, Uma. You and the baby. You’ll see.”

  She closed her eyes and leaned in, and I kissed her.

  After a second, she gasped and pulled away, her hand circling the huge round of her belly.

  “Yeah, this is it,” she said. “It’s definitely coming.”

  Eight hours later, it was still definitely coming. We were in a small hospital in a private room with the most uncomfortable chairs in the world. I had tried to doze in one, but it was useless. I hadn’t been able to stop thinking. This seemed like a long time to wait. What if something was wrong? The nurses and doctor had assured me that it wasn’t that long, and that she’d be fine, even though the water had broken so long ago. Still, it seemed like years. In the movies, the water always broke, and the baby came before the mother could even make it to the hospital. This was better than if I’d had to deliver the baby myself in the back of my tour bus. But shit, if I’d known it was going to take this long, we would have gone on to a bigger town than Faulkner, someplace with a big hospital and surgeons who could help if things went wrong.

  Someone tapped on my shoulder, and I turned to see a young nurse holding out a little pad of paper and a pen. “Do you think you could sign this? For my sister?” she asked, looking like she hated to ask a favor, but she sure wasn’t going to miss the opportunity to ask for one. I sighed and signed the pad.

  Uma was dozing, half asleep now that they’d given her an epidural to cut the pain. When the nurse skipped off, I turned back to the window that overlooked a parking lot, the few cars glinting in the first rays of morning sun. That was the thing about having the most famous face in the world. Even in a tiny town I’d never heard of, everyone had heard of me.

  Not for the first time, I wondered if this would get out to the media. It probably would. I’d told the nurses Uma was my cousin, and there was that confidentiality thing, but news always seemed to leak out. I was so sick of it all. Sick of signing autographs, taking selfies. Sick of living for other people.

  I turned back to the bed. Uma’s eyes had opened. In the morning sunshine, with her hair spread out on the pillow, she seemed more real. Everything was revealed on her face, and she looked frightened and trapped, like an animal in a snare. Not like a mother about to greet her baby for the first time.

  “Are you in pain?” I asked, adrenaline surging through me as I shot to my feet, panic gnawing at my nerve endi
ngs. “Is the epidural wearing off?”

  “Chill, dude,” she said. “It’s fine. I’m fine.”

  “Do you need more ice chips?”

  “I’m hungry as fuck,” she said. “But I don’t guess they’d let me have a Big Mac.”

  “Probably not,” I said, taking her hand and relaxing a bit. “It’s nice to see you still have your sense of humor.”

  “They’re ripping out my twat, not my brain.”

  “I don’t think you have to give them your twat, either.”

  “I might as well. No one’s going to want me after a baby comes tearing out of there. It’ll be like, Want to come over? I’ve got a hallway for your hotdog.”

  I sank back down in my chair, still holding her hand. “I’m sure that’s not true.”

  “Really? Who’s going to want to fuck me then? You? Ha. You don’t even want to now, and everything’s still intact.”

  “You don’t want to, either.”

  “Yeah, but it would be nice to think someone would find me attractive again someday. But after seeing a baby pop out of there, I don’t expect you to want anything to do with that.”

  “Did you want me to?” I asked, shifting in the chair that had suddenly become, impossibly, even more uncomfortable. “I mean, we did kiss…”

  “Yeah, thanks for the pity kiss, but sorry, that didn’t really do it for me.”

  “If you’re worried about it, I don’t have to watch.”

  “Yeah, fuck that. You put this thing in me, you’re damn sure going to watch it come out. You don’t get to sit outside and have a cigar and have everyone pat you on the back while I’m in here bleeding and screaming and tearing in half.”

  “Okay, I’ll watch,” I said, holding up my hands. “Whatever you want.”

  “What I want is for this bullshit to be happening to you, not me.”

  “I wish it could,” I said, squeezing her hand. “I wish I could take the pain instead of you. I really do.”

  “Yeah, easy for you to say, since you obviously can’t.” She turned and glared out at the parking lot, her throat working as she swallowed.

  “I’m sorry,” I said, putting a hand on her knee. “Someone will want you again, Uma. You’re nineteen. Your life isn’t over.”

  “It might as well be,” she muttered to the window.

  I didn’t know what to say, so I said nothing. I checked my phone, hoping against hope that my mother would come through for me this time. Somebody needed to rescue me, that was for damn sure. I had no fucking clue what to do in this situation, how to make Uma see reason or even feel better. Probably not the best time to tell her she was being crazy, but then, what was I supposed to tell her?

  My mother would know. Sure, she was a pain in the ass, but she’d done this three times. Maybe she’d change her mind at the last minute, when it became real to her that she had a grandchild. But then, she already had grandchildren. The only thing special about this one was that it was a bastard, as she’d so lovingly put it the last time we’d talked. Even so, I’d texted her when Uma had been admitted, thinking maybe…

  Of course, she hadn’t texted back. Uma wouldn’t have wanted her there, anyway. She needed her own mother, and she didn’t have one. Her cousin was back in Seattle, but she wouldn’t make it to Arkansas in time for the birth. All Uma had was me, the shitty father of the baby she didn’t want. No one who knew what to say to her, or even what to say to women under ordinary circumstances. She needed someone she could be close to, someone she had a connection with.

  I thumbed through my phone, stopping at Laney’s number. I wanted to call her, to tell her. She wasn’t exactly close with Uma, though they’d gotten along better than I’d expected. But her being there would probably have upset her and Uma both.

  More than anything, I wanted to call her for selfish reasons. I wanted to hear her familiar voice, to feel her steadying presence beside me, my anchor in any storm life could throw at us. But I also wanted to share this moment with her, to include her in the pride and unbelievable awe of it. I wanted her to be part of the biggest moment of my life so far.

  But she wouldn’t want that.

  In a way, she would be a part of every moment of my life, if only because I had her there in my thoughts. But this time, it wasn’t enough. I needed her to be more than a memory, a fantasy.

  She had made her decision, though. She’d cut me out of her life. When we’d said goodbye after Christmas, the politeness in her voice had nearly killed me. For good measure, she’d driven the nail into the coffin by saying she hoped we could always be friends. The memory of it still smarted.

  Instead of calling, I sent her a text. I wasn’t sure what she’d say, what she’d think of it. But I knew that I had to say something to her while still respecting her boundaries and letting her move on with her life the way she’d asked.

  Uma said the contractions were starting to hurt, and I was drawn from my thoughts back to the present. I called the nurses to check on her, and then she needed a doctor. After eight hours of waiting while nothing happened, suddenly everything was happening at once.

  “I’m sorry, sir, we’re going to have to ask you to leave,” said a nurse whose name tag said Eden. “Only immediate family is allowed during the birth.”

  “He’s staying,” Uma bellowed, her face glazed in sweat. “Either he stays, or I’m walking out right now with the baby hanging halfway out.”

  She glared so fiercely that Nurse Eden only nodded, her lips tight. After that, they left me alone, focusing all their attention on Uma.

  I held her hand while she panted and pushed and sweated and screamed. I was glad Laney wasn’t here. If all women had to go through this hell—and it was a hundred times worse for her than the hell I was in—I didn’t know how humankind still existed. There was no way I was ever, ever, ever going to put anyone through this again. I didn’t think I’d make it through this one. I had no idea how Uma could bear whatever was happening inside her.

  And then suddenly, with a final roar of pain, she pushed the head out. I felt woozy, but I clutched her hand tighter. I wasn’t going to be one of those guys who fainted at the sight of a baby being born. But goddamn, did I want to.

  The doctor told her to push again, and in what seemed like an anticlimactic push compared to the epic last one, she gave a little push and the doctor drew the baby out. It was slimy and red and wailing with a hoarse little cry that echoed through the room. The nurses took it for about thirty seconds and then lay it on Uma’s chest. I couldn’t tear my eyes from the scrunched up little face. It looked so tiny, like a kitten.

  It continued wailing, its little hands working up and down, but Uma didn’t seem to hear it. Her arms hung limp by her sides, and her face was turned toward the window, her eyes blank and unseeing. For one ball-shriveling moment, I thought she was dead.

  “Don’t you want to hold her?” the nurse cooed at Uma.

  “Can I?” I asked, already lifting her off Uma’s chest. If anyone didn’t believe in love at first sight, they’d never held a baby for the first time.

  I rocked the little bundle back and forth, and after about thirty seconds, her cries tapered off into sniffles, and then she lay still, looking up at me with eyes the color of the sky on a winter evening. This was someone I could live for, someone I wanted to live for.

  Her perfect little bow of a mouth scrunched up as she looked up at me, and her fragile fingers clenched around my thumb when I stroked her palm, her translucent skin so delicate I was afraid to touch it with my guitar hardened fingers, afraid I’d tear it.

  With one blink of her tiny eyelids, she shifted the whole world.

  forty

  Laney

  I stood on the lid of the toilet in Piper’s tiny bathroom, trying to see my full outfit in the mirror. If I bent my knees and kind of crouched and looked up, I could see all but my shoes. Not that I should care, really, what a stranger thought of me. If he didn’t like me, so what? I didn’t know him. It was no loss to m
e. I’d already lost the love of my life and survived it, so what was one blind date’s opinion going to do? Nothing.

  Clambering down from my perch, I straightened my little black dress. At the last minute, I decided against the pearl earrings. Even the dress might be too much. But he worked on Wall Street, which sounded so glamourous to my country ears. I didn’t want to look like a hick who wore ragged jeans on a first date.

  I’d probably worn ripped jeans on my first date with Brody.

  Pushing the thought away, I ran my hands over my torso, my slender waist, the swell of my hips. After ditching the pearl earrings, I settled for a pair of simple studs and a ruby teardrop necklace. With my blonde hair now cut just below my shoulders, I looked much more New York and much less Kentucky cowgirl. I stepped back from the mirror. I was ready. Designer heels, a pair Brody had given me, completed the ensemble. When guilt started to leak in at the edges of my mind, I reminded myself of the text I’d gotten the day before.

  5:16am Brody My Love: The baby is here.

  Brody had moved on. It was high time I did, too. Starting with changing the sappy name he’d programmed into my phone for himself. And this time, I wouldn’t sit around mourning my broken heart any longer than I had the last time. That time I’d had Paul. This time I had…

  I wracked my brain, trying to remember the name Piper had given me when she’d said she had a friend I might like. “He’s young and self-made,” Piper had said, then laughed. “Well, his dad’s an investment banker, but he’s also made a fortune on his own on top of that.”

  Piper rarely dated, but she had gone out with one of his friends for a while. She assured me he could make me forget Brody. I doubted that, but still. If Brody was off having babies with someone else, I could certainly go on a date. It wasn’t like I was going out clubbing every night. We were just going for drinks. And even if I had been slutting it up all over New York, that was my business. Brody had moved on. My choices no longer affected him.