One Song: book two in the one series

by Best, Victoria J.

  Thoughts of my mother—what she did so I could have a full life, giving up her own to have me, made me have a sudden revelation. My mother refused to terminate her pregnancy with me even though she knew she would die, yet here I was, thinking about terminating my pregnancy because I was a little sick and had a career. I suddenly felt selfish and wrong but also knew exactly what I had to do.

  Carla was right; I would be okay. I needed her more today than I ever had before because she led me straight to a decision without saying much of anything. But, if I was being honest, the decision was already made, she just coaxed it out of me.

  “Thank you, Carla, for the soup and…everything,” I said as I finally sat back up and wiped my eyes.

  “You’re welcome, mija. I’m here if you need me.” She patted my arm one last time before she stood.

  Carla understood I needed to rest and think, so she gathered up everything she came with, tucked the rest of the soup into my fridge in a container with heating instructions, and left. We hugged one last time before she walked out the door.

  I was grateful my dad sent her and didn’t come himself. Telling Carla was the easiest thing to do, but what came next was going to be difficult. I had to figure out what to tell my father and a way to keep the whole thing from Rhys.

  Resting my head back against the couch, I closed my eyes as the remnants of my headache began to fade and my stomach settled. I had finally made one decision—I was keeping the baby, but there was so much I still had to work out. The press would have a field day with it, hounding me about the father and everything else related to my pregnancy, as if it was any of the world’s business. They could never know I got pregnant from a one-night stand. Never. Not only would my father have a fit and possibly take away some of my inheritance, but I could lose my standing in the company and even cost the company accounts.

  No, there had to be another way to make this work without people knowing about my weak moment behind Madison Square Garden.

  An idea, a horrible but plausible idea, came to me, and I sat up so fast the headache threatened to return. I could pin the baby on someone I dated recently, someone with a better social standing. Someone my father would approve of. The only problem was that I hadn’t slept with anyone else besides Rhys since I was with my estranged husband almost five years ago.

  Suddenly feeling more alive than I had in the last two days, I leaned forward and grabbed my laptop from where I had deposited it on the coffee table. A twinge of guilt swamped me as I formulated a way to deal with my situation, but I pushed the guilt deep down inside. There had to be a way to make it seem as if this baby belonged to anyone but Rhys. Well, not anyone, but someone my father wouldn’t disown me for sleeping with. Whoever my fall guy was didn’t have to marry me, or even be part of the baby’s life, but he did have think the child was his.

  Women in Hollywood had babies out of wedlock all the time; it was a different time and there were different standards. As long as the baby wasn’t the child of a no-name rock star who I fucked in an alley, then I should be all right.

  Opening the internet, I went straight to Google, searching for whomever I could find to set up as this baby’s father. The guilt and ramifications of what I was doing started creeping back in, and since I couldn’t drink to drown them out, I grabbed my secret stash of chocolate from the otherwise empty pantry and chowed down as I perused the internet.

  I paused as I came across an unexpected tabloid photo—my “ex” husband, Jackson Radcliffe. He was sitting on a purple sofa at a club downtown, one I knew well, surrounded by blond women, with a smug smile on his face. It was a rare occurrence to see tabloid photos of him and the idea in my head began to fester into a full-blown plan of attack.

  Fervently, I looked up the club and the hours of operation for the coming weekend. It was wrong, the plan I was formulating in my head, but it was necessary, or so I kept telling myself. It was necessary because I couldn’t fathom the ostracizing or the blowback of what would happen if people found out about my indiscretion. One that was born from a crippling anxiety and fear of being found out for a fraud.

  No, I had go through with what I was setting up because I couldn’t even see another option in my future that would let me live my life the way I had up until now, regardless of how stressful and barren it felt most days. I closed the laptop loudly as the final decisions for my plan fell into place.

  I had a date to get ready for and a guy to push away so far, he would never come back again.

  5

  Rhys

  “Thank you, New Jersey!” I yelled after our set to a round of roaring applause and cheer.

  My chest swelled with the feeling, though my head was beginning to pound. This was what all of it was for—the late nights, the lure of drugs and women, and sleeping in a bus for weeks at a time. This was the ultimate goal. I loved performing live. Nothing felt better than the roar of a packed stadium or arena. I could live with the sore throat and ringing ears for the half hour of stardom. Sure, we weren’t Maroon 5, but I didn’t want to be. I just wanted the opportunity to bring my music to people who wanted to hear it.

  We exited the stage and I checked my watch. I told Natalie I would pick her up after the show for dinner. It was a late dinner, but she said she didn’t mind; everyone ate dinner late in Manhattan. My band and I put away our instruments, lugging everything out to the bus, which was waiting for us behind the building.

  I needed a shower and a change of clothes, and almost an hour after we left the stage, I was dragging my exhausted ass into the hotel room to get ready. The bed was calling me, plush sheets and room service, but I didn’t want to cancel my date with Natalie because I had a feeling this was my last chance. I took a quick shower, contemplated shaving but settled for trimming my beard, before I pulled on a pair of nicer jeans, a button-up shirt, and a pair of boots.

  Anxiety gripped my stomach as I wondered what Natalie would think of me this time, especially since I knew more about her. Would I measure up to her ideal of a man suitable for a Manhattan socialite? I told myself it didn’t matter and without glancing at myself in the mirror, headed out to meet her at the restaurant.

  I arrived five minutes early and walked inside to look for her. The place she chose was a small Italian place on the outskirts of the Times Square area. I wasn’t too familiar with New York but even I knew this place wasn’t going to rate high on the radar of someone from the Upper East Side. She didn’t want to be seen with me. I tried not to let the thought get to me, but an unsettling ache deposited itself deep in my gut.

  Spotting Natalie at the bar, I stopped in my tracks. She looked beautiful, as much as she had the first night I saw her, but something was different. Her hair was shinier, her cheeks pinker. But her smile, the one she greeted me with when she saw me walking towards her, was stiff. The look she gave me didn’t bode well and I wondered why the hell I even bothered.

  As I approached her, the self-consciousness and regret I was feeling when I walked in began to subside. The look in her hazel eyes was the same injured puppy look I noticed the night we met. She was trying to hide it with a confident smirk and straight posture, but I saw right through her.

  “Hey,” I muttered as I sat next to her on the empty barstool.

  “Hi.”

  We stared at each other for a minute, electricity crackling around us. I wanted to touch her, hold her hand, brush my fingers over her cheek, but I knew it wouldn’t be well received so I balled my hands at my sides.

  “Our table should be ready,” Natalie said as she hopped from the barstool.

  I noticed a slight wince as her feet met the ground, and her hand pressed against the apex of her ribs. For the first time, I noticed she didn’t look well.

  “Are you sure you want to do this?” I asked her, despite the warning bells going off in my head to let it go.

  She nodded. “Yes.”

  Her answer wasn’t followed by an explanation, so I didn’t say anything else. The hostess led u
s to our table, handed us each a menu, and walked away, leaving us to sit there in silence. Natalie lowered her eyes to the menu, refusing to look at me, coldness rolling off of her now in waves. I was getting mixed signals from her and for the second time, I wondered why I even bothered to ask her out.

  “Natalie, is everything okay?” I hated the uncertainty in my voice as I asked the question.

  “Everything is fine, Rhys. Are you going to order?” Her voice was detached and icy.

  I frowned at her. This was a bad idea. “Look, you don’t have to do this,” I said, giving her an out.

  “Don’t have to do what? I agreed to dinner, we’ll have dinner.” She said it like it was business transaction.

  I sighed, loudly and deliberately so she would see, then picked up the menu. We didn’t speak, only looked at our menus in silence, until the waiter came back and took our orders. Just as he walked away, I flagged him down.

  “Can I have a beer, please? Whatever is on tap?” I asked him with exasperation because if I was going to get through what was shaping up to be one of the worst dates ever, I was going to need a drink. “Want anything?” I asked Natalie as a second thought.

  “No,” she answered quickly, her hand at her throat.

  Natalie looked a bit piqued and swallowed hard. She kept shaking her head as an answer, even though the waiter had already walked away.

  I nodded at her to acknowledge that I got it and she could stop shaking her head.

  We stared at each other for a minute after the exchange. Her hazel eyes were staring right through me, something in them haunted. What was she thinking about? Why did she even show up if she didn’t want to be here? I could tell she was trying to look away, wanted to look away. But just as I couldn’t look away, neither could she.

  “Your beer, sir.” The waiter came back and broke the tension, setting the full glass in front of me without sloshing it over the side.

  “Thanks,” I mumbled as he walked away before gripping the glass and bringing it to my lips.

  Natalie watched me from the corner of her eye as she tried to pretend she wasn’t, and when I licked the foam from my top lip where it had deposited itself on my mustache, she inhaled swiftly. Her cold indifference was an act.

  “How’s work?” I asked her, to break up the silence when I couldn’t take it anymore. I had to get through her shell.

  “It’s fine. Busy.” Her answers were curt and clipped.

  “Just fine?” I was trying to get a rise out of her. At least if she got angry, it would be better than the detachment she was giving me.

  Rolling her eyes, she lifted her water glass to her lips and took a dainty sip before clunking it down on the table harder than she had intended to, the water splashing over the side and onto her lap.

  “Fuck,” she said under her breath, fumbling with her cloth napkin to sop up the water from the table and her lap.

  I tried to hide the smirk that rose with her irritation, but she saw it and narrowed her eyes at me with annoyance.

  “Work is ‘just fine,’ thanks,” she said, then slapped her cloth napkin down on the table, before standing and pushing her chair back.

  She was bolting. Making her mad at me was having the opposite effect.

  “Natalie! Natalie, wait!” I called after her, patrons of the restaurant watching us with curiosity.

  She turned to me, taking in the curious stares as her own face turned beet red.

  “Keep your voice down. You’re making a scene.” She hissed the words at me through gritted teeth.

  “I’m making a scene? You’re the one storming out like a toddler throwing a tantrum.”

  She sighed, pushing her raven-colored hair out of her face as she looked away from me for a second. When she turned back, tears shone in her eyes, but her voice was steady. “I can’t do this. I thought I could, but I can’t. I’m sorry.”

  I didn’t want her to get away, but I also left my leather jacket back at the table. Rushing back, I threw several large bills on the table so the waiter wouldn’t be inconvenienced by us skipping out on a meal, and snagged my jacket from the back of the chair. Natalie was fast in stilettos and I had to practically jog through the restaurant to catch her, just making it as she pushed through the doors and out onto the street.

  “Wait, Natalie. Please.” I was aware of how pathetic I sounded, begging her to not walk away, but I needed to know I wasn’t the only one who felt something that night behind the Garden.

  She stopped, hands on her hips and practically panting. It looked like she may double over but was forcing herself to stand upright while taking deep breaths in and out. I wondered if she was ill.

  “Why are you doing this?” I asked her suddenly.

  She sighed again, tucking errant pieces of hair behind her ear. “Doing what?”

  The mask of indifference was back in place, but her voice wavered.

  “This.” I waved between us and the restaurant.

  “I thought I wanted to see you again, but I realized I was wrong. I don’t feel the same way about you as I did before. I came to let you down easy.”

  Her words cut like a knife deep in my chest. How could the rejection of a woman I barely knew hurt me so deeply?

  “Oh. Right. Okay. I’m glad we got that out of the way before we went any further then.” My voice was hard and less accommodating than before, and she flinched from the tone.

  “Yeah.” She said the word quietly.

  Something was going on, but I couldn’t pinpoint it. One minute, she was acting like I was dirt under her shoe and the next, she was the wounded kitten.

  Though her words hurt, I had a feeling she wasn’t being honest with me when she said them.

  “Natalie, can we just go somewhere else and talk. I feel like you aren’t telling me something. I don’t think you’re telling me the truth.” I was giving her one last chance before walking away.

  Natalie shook her head swiftly, looking down at the sidewalk. “I-I can’t, Rhys. I can’t do this.”

  The tears were back in her eyes and she blinked rapidly to dispel them.

  “Why?” I asked, stepping closer to her.

  She didn’t move away from me, folding her arms protectively across her abdomen. I stopped when I was close enough to feel the heat of her body but not touching her. We were both breathing rapidly at this point, neither of us touching but our eyes locked.

  “Rhys, please.” It was her turn to beg.

  “Why?” I asked her again.

  “It…it’s complicated.” Her voice caught on the last word.

  “Then let me uncomplicate it.”

  I didn’t give her a chance to react or push me away, though her hands came up to rest on my chest. I captured her mouth with mine, tasting her, pressing my tongue against the seam of her lips. She parted them easily, willingly, and we stood there, lost in each other, our mouths warring, without embracing.

  Loud laughter coming from the door of the restaurant behind us broke the spell and Natalie jumped away from me, her hand on her mouth.

  “Fuck,” she cursed again quietly.

  “Natalie,” I said, to get her back but I could tell by the look on her face I had already lost her, and she was going to leave me standing on the sidewalk like a fool.

  “I’m sorry, Rhys,” she muttered, turning around and bolting down the sidewalk, disappearing around a corner.

  I wanted to go after her, to plead with her to come back to my hotel, but I knew it was futile. Natalie wasn’t mine and had no intention of being, and I should let her go. But the part that pissed me off was that I didn’t want to. So, instead of doing anything, I stood outside of the restaurant like an idiot, trying to collect my errant thoughts while the one woman I felt anything for in years ran away from me.

  6

  Natalie

  I was going to vomit. That was the thought that sprang into my head as I sped walked down the sidewalk, my stilettos pinching my feet and my stomach heaving. Not from the kiss. That wa
s amazing. I was going to vomit because the baby growing inside of me obviously hated me for rejecting his father.

  Gagging, I pushed through the doors of a garishly lit McDonald’s in Times Square, the worst place to be in my situation, and pushed my way through the small crowd of people in the back to find the bathroom before I puked all over the floor.

  “Restrooms are for customers only,” a pimply-faced teenager with buck teeth barked at me from the counter.

  Swallowing hard against the nausea I had no control over, I walked to the counter and looked him straight in the eyes.

  “Fine. I’ll have a Coke, but please give me the key before I vomit all over the floor and you have to clean it up.”

  I stuck my hand out and he shoved the key into it, horror on his face.

  Without looking back to see who was watching, I pushed my way into the bathroom, trying to touch minimal surfaces as I bent over the toilet and retched up the soup I had for lunch. This “morning” sickness stuff was no joke and I couldn’t wait for it to be over. I’d have to ask the doctor if there was anything to take for it. But first, I would actually have to make an appointment.

  Groaning as I stood back up, I splashed water on my face and frowned at my reflection. I looked wretched and tired and lost. Perfect.

  You should have canceled the date.

  My inner voice was scolding me again. I tried to tell myself I kept the date because I had to let Rhys down in a way that would make him leave me alone. That was why I didn’t cancel. But I knew better, and knew the only reason I went there tonight was to see him again one last time before I locked myself into a life without him.