13
He woke up. Alone. Normally he’d have been fine with that, but really, he missed turning over to find a tiny, dark-haired woman burrowed down into the blankets next to him.
He frowned at his inability to get used to life without her in it. It wasn’t like she was with him on tour or anything. So why now?
He gave up, looking at his phone to see it was already nine. She’d be awake.
He dialed her number.
“Why hello.”
He smiled. “What’s up, Curly?”
“I’m chopping carrots for a salad. Luncheon thingy for one of Levi’s mom’s charity gigs.”
“Nice.”
“Seriously. His mother is sort of scary, but her friends and all their foundations and stuff keep me pretty busy lately. Can’t complain about that. What’s up with you?”
“Kensey and Maddie, Vaughan’s daughters, are here. We’re doing a cookout and hanging by his pool. You should come down.” He said it so suddenly he surprised himself. “Have you ever seen a pear harvest? It’s set for the day after tomorrow. Stay for a few days. Maybe we’ll go windsurfing down on the river. ATV a little. Ride horses. Have lots and lots of dirty and inventive sex.”
She laughed. “I don’t know if I can.”
“It’s during the week. I’d have you back home for your supper club on Friday. I have a small plane if you can meet me. Then I can get you door-to-door a lot quicker.”
She sighed, but he heard that she wavered. “It does sound fun, but I have jobs every day this week. And the supper club is Wednesday night, Friday night and Sunday night. This is the one week a month it’s on Wednesday too. I can’t be gone for that long right now.”
He frowned. What was he going to say, blow off your job you’ve worked so hard for? “After harvest, how about if I come up? Then you don’t have to worry about not doing jobs. I can even help. And then, you know, the hot-sex part can occur around your schedule.”
“All right. If that works for you. I feel bad that it’s always you who has to do the traveling.”
That did make him feel better. “It’s okay. Right now it’s my schedule that allows for it. It’s worth it to see you.”
“That’s a very nice thing to say.”
“I have a secret.”
“Uh-oh.”
He laughed. “I like to say nice things to you. Mostly because they’re true, but also because I hope it keeps you sweet on me and all.”
“You’re so full of it. My goodness. It’s quite a lucky thing for you that I am, indeed, sweet on you and that you happen to look as good as you do.”
He blushed, filled with pleasure at her compliment.
They chatted a little while longer before hanging up; he didn’t stop smiling for hours.
* * *
“She doesn’t seem bothered that we don’t see each other more. Isn’t that weird?” Damien kept an eye on the girls, who were in the pool with Vaughan and their grandparents. Paddy and Ezra’s dogs were involved as well.
Ezra turned the steaks. “Maybe she’s not into you?”
“That’s not it. I’d know. It’s not that she’s disinterested in me. It’s that, well, other women would have pushed to see me more. She seems content with it. When we’re together it’s smoking hot. We’re both into each other. We laugh. Things are easy. She makes me laugh, Ezra.”
Ezra laughed. “Well, good. But if you’re expecting her to be like other women, and your previous other women had not been the type you’d want to be with, then maybe you need to readjust your expectations.”
“Some of her friends think I’m a drunken man-whore.” There. He said it.
“You are a drunken man-whore.”
“You’re supposed to be on my side, Ezra.”
His brother looked up and into his eyes. Very few people saw to the heart of him like Ezra did. “I am on your side. But you tell me, you go search the Internet for yourself right now. Tell me what the first images are. Go on. I’ll be here.”
Damien snorted. “I know what they are.”
“No. I mean it. My laptop is on the kitchen table. Go. Look.”
He did, annoyed at his brother. But when he did the search he cringed. Hell, he was in those pictures, he couldn’t deny it. They weren’t a lie. But that’s not who he was. Not totally and certainly not anymore. The problem with the media, and with Google searches, is that they only seemed to catch moments of your whole life. They weren’t getting shots of him playing Barbies with his nieces. Or helping out in the orchards or fields.
Was this what she thought he did? He scrubbed his hands over his face before returning to the back deck some minutes later.
“Look, I know what it is to be a drunken man-whore, okay?” Ezra spoke before he did. “It’s fun and all. For a while. But the hangover is a motherf*cker. You can fix this, but it’s going to take some energy. This woman isn’t a groupie. She’s not with you for a backstage pass. She’s a real person with real feelings. She’s got a business and a life. She’s not going to want any of that stuff in her life. Can you blame her?”
“She should know me enough to know I’m not that. Not anymore anyway. I’ve always treated her with respect. She’s different.”
Ezra grabbed a pull or two from his cream soda. “Sure. Which is why it suddenly matters. And probably also why she lets you keep coming around. But you’re going to have to work it to get her to see you’re more than a Google search.”
“Like what?”
“Court her. Woo her. Whatever you want to call it. She’s got brothers and a father and family, and they’re all around her. They’re not going to let some pretty boy come in and hurt her. You’ll have to introduce them to the real Damien Hurley.”
He slumped. “This sucks.”
Ezra shrugged. “Not really. You just have to work hard. And you hate working hard. You’re used to getting by on how good you look and your fame. Oh sure, you know what it is to work in the fields all day, and to play one shitty little club after the next until you finally made it. But with women? Well, you’re a lazy f*ck because you’re handsome. You gotta work now. If she’s worth it, you will. If not, well, you already know the road is full of chicks who don’t give a f*ck who you are other than the pretty-boy rock star with more money and booze than sense.”
* * *
Mary looked up from loading things into the back of her car to see Damien’s car pulling up her drive.
Unexpected.
She didn’t bother to hide the flush of delight at the sight of him. She really did have a lot of work to do when he invited her down to his family’s ranch. And she was sorry to have had to say no.
No matter how hard she tried to maintain her distance, she couldn’t deny she liked him. Liked being around him too. Didn’t so much like that she’d received a call from a reporter—though she was doubtful of such a claim—after a picture of her at the Gorge with Damien had hit the Internet. She said, “No, thanks,” and hung up. But it made her wary.
He got out and she took him in and the wariness faded. Damn, he was pretty.
“So glad I caught you.”
He approached and pulled her into a hug. She hugged him right back, tipping her face up to receive a kiss. He settled in until her knees were rubbery.
“You’re here.”
“I am. Harvest is done so I decided to get away for a few days to come see you. What are you up to?”
“I’m on my way to Tart. I have a job. A dinner party. You’re welcome to hang out here until I get back. Should be ten or so. Or Adrian is around. I know because I just spoke to Gillian about twenty minutes ago.”
“I can see Adrian any time. Can I hang out with you for a while? I promise not to get in your way. Obviously not at the party, I get that. But at Tart while you prep?”
She eyed him carefully and shrugged. “Sure. Come on then.”
She drove the quick two miles to Tart and led him through the back doors, locking up behind them.
“Don’t you keep supplies here? Must be a pain to haul stuff here and back home.” He placed the boxes of supplies on the worktable.
“Thanks. Yes, I do keep supplies here.” Her hair was already tied back, but she put on an apron to keep her clothes clean. “But a girl has to grocery shop.” She washed her hands and indicated he do the same. If he was there, she may as well put him to work. “I went to the farmer’s market today and found a few things. I snuck off to Seattle and did a little supply shopping over there too.”
“You’re going to let me help? I’m coming up in the world.”
She handed him a colander, a bundle of carrots and a peeler. “Baby steps, Damien.” She grinned and he kissed her hard and fast. “I’m glad to see you.”
He started peeling carrots as she laid out all the components to the salad. Sometimes she prepared things in the kitchen of the house where the dinner party was hosted. But that night’s party she’d only be taking the completed food and helping arrange it.
“You are? Glad to see me, I mean.”
She cocked her head as she julienned jicama for the shrimp salad. “I rarely say things I don’t mean. It’s unnecessary.”
“Sometimes you get sort of like a schoolteacher. I feel sort of pervy admitting it, but it’s hot.”
She laughed.
“So . . .” He trailed off and she kept chopping. Working in the kitchen always helped her gather her thoughts, so she gave him time to do the same.
“What’s been up with you since I saw you last?”
“Lots of work. So much now that I have to actually say no. Imagine that. Someone asked me last week if I’d consider being a personal chef. It’s not something I’d considered before. I said no. But Daisy brought up that I could prepackage enough meals for a week and have them delivered to certain clients. There’d be instructions on how to combine to make the food. Heating in some cases. That sort of thing.”
“Daisy’s pretty smart.” He held up his hands. “Done with carrots.”
She examined them and must have found his work to be acceptable. Though she took them to her work area. He clearly wasn’t up to snuff yet enough to slice them.
“I’ll let my mom know you found my carrot peeling skills acceptable. She made us help in the kitchen from a pretty early age. She’s teaching my nieces now. Why don’t you want to spend more time with me?”
She tipped the jicama into a nearby bowl before turning to him again. “Say what?”
“God, this isn’t coming out right. Probably because I suck at this stuff. You’re a hard woman, Mary Whaley.”
“I’m what?”
He took a deep breath. “I like being around you. A lot. I want to, you know, investigate to see if this thing could be more than a few days here and there until we get bored. But you’re resistant. Is it the tabloids? Is it me?”
“Get started on that celery. It works better if you leave it together to cut off the bottoms and the tops. Don’t get wild with the peeling, I just don’t need the threads in the salad.”
She pulled out the shrimp and moved to the sink to clean them before she put them in the marinade.
“I like being around you too. I’m not being resistant. I have a job and a life that is here. I can’t just up and go down to Oregon whenever I get invited. And, to be totally honest, this is a fun thing, but I’m not looking for anything permanent.”
“Bullshit. You’re not a one-night-stand woman.”
She burst out laughing. “Hello, I f*cked you the second time I ever saw you. How is that not me being a one-night-stand woman? I don’t normally do that. The having sex the second time I clap eyes on a person.” She frowned.
“If you did, I probably wouldn’t have been so excited to see you again.” He paused. “Look, I dig you. I texted you all those times because I wanted to know you. I still want to know you. You can expect more from me. I wanted you to know that.”
She blew out a breath as she worked. He was so unexpected. She wasn’t sure what the hell to do with this man. The sex part was easy. They had that connection in such a major way it wasn’t anything she worried about. It just worked.
But the rest?
“Last week I got a call from a guy claiming to be a reporter at XYZ. He wanted details about me. A picture of us at the Gorge had made your fan site, I guess, and people were clamoring to know who I was.”
“Ah. I’m sorry. Did you say?”
“No. I mean he knows who I am enough to have my number and call me for a quote. So. Anyway, I told him to f*ck off and hung up. I’m not interested in that life, Damien. I like you. A lot. But I don’t like reporters in trees across the street from my house like Gillian had to deal with. They have a fence and a gate around their home because of fans. People come to Tart now looking for him. I’ve watched her try to deal with it for the last year and it’s been crazy. I don’t want it. I don’t want hateful letters from women who tell me in detail how many times they’ve f*cked you, or what you’re like with two girls at once.” The thought of it actually made her sick to her stomach.
“That happened to Gillian?”
“Yes. It’s very hard. I have enough to deal with. You’re a great guy. You make me laugh. We have some pretty stellar sexual chemistry. But I don’t even really follow the celebrity news and I’ve seen you in it. I just don’t want that. So we keep things chill and casual and I’m no target in the media, and when you move on, no one gets hurt.”
“Are you so convinced I’ll move on? I’m . . . This is different. What we have. I want to see what it can be. I’ve never wanted that before.”
“Maybe you only think you want it because unlike all those other women, I’m not begging for you to marry me and buy me diamonds.”
He snorted.
She created a quick marinade, and after drying the shrimp, she put them in it and closed the lid.
“Okay, so the deal is, I think you not begging for me to marry you is different and it does catch my attention. But not because it’s a challenge or whatever. Because it’s part of you. Because you don’t want me because I’m a millionaire. You don’t want to toss aside your life and be in mine. You’re your own person. It makes you more beautiful. Interesting. I think you should give me a chance.”
“I’m letting you peel my celery, aren’t I?”
She was scared. She liked him. A lot. It could be more if she let herself envision it. But what she could envision a lot easier were those pictures she’d seen, and those letters to Gillian that Adrian’s people dealt with now.
She wasn’t tough like that. A man like this could break her heart and it would be monumentally stupid to let him get close enough to have that power. What they had right then was nice. It made her happy but she didn’t depend on it. If he stopped calling, it would be sad for a bit. A week or two. But she’d get over it and keep on with her life.
“How about this? Just give me a chance to prove to you that I am more than Damien Hurley, pretty-boy drummer with a bottle of Jack in his hand. That’s all I’m asking.”
She turned. “I already know that. Dumbass.” She went back to work, but didn’t say more and he didn’t press.
He insisted on driving her to the home where the dinner was being held and even helped her unload the food. But he went back to wait in the car while she did her thing. And when she was done, he drove her back to Tart where he helped her clean up all her equipment.
“Would you like to go look at the moon?”
He looked up, surprised. “Yeah.”
“Let’s go back to my house.”
* * *
Once there she grabbed some snacks, a blanket and a flashlight, and they went out through her yard. She pointed. “There’s a rise just through that stand of trees. There’s even a path; just watch your step.”
She wasn’t sure why she was taking him to her thinking spot, but she wanted to look at the moon and be with him, and he was there and the moon hung high and full on a very clear September night, so why not?
“Smells so good.”
“It was a pretty day. The bark got warm. I love this smell. And the pine needles. The water off in the distance.” It was dark out there on her side of the island. Dark enough that the stars above were bright and clear.
“It’s a good thing I work out. This is your idea of an easy walk?”
“Pfft. This is a totally easy walk. It’s just a little steep this last bit. Don’t cry about it.”
He laughed then. “You’re tough.”
“I have two older brothers. If I wasn’t tough, I’d be in trouble. Plus my dad is a retired ironworker. Do you know what an ironworker thinks about weak people who sit on the couch all day?”
“Ha! My dad is a rancher, so I bet I heard the same thing growing up. We were only allowed to watch television or play video games on weekends, and only for very restricted hours. I think now, looking back on it, that they did it when they wanted to lock their bedroom door to get it on. We were too dumb then. But my mom is pretty crafty.”
He laid out the blanket once they’d arrived and they settled. She opened the cooler and popped a stuffed mushroom into her mouth. She passed one his way and he scarfed it down.
“Damn, it’s beautiful up here. You can see everything.”
“This is my parents’ land. I’ve been coming up here since I was, I don’t know, eight or nine? Ryan and I discovered it. I come up here when I need to be reminded of the beauty of the moon and stars.” She laid back on the blanket and marveled at the world just above. “Over the years people have tried to buy it. But my dad loves the wildness all around. My mom would be grumpy too. She likes to do little improvements. Their yard has gotten bigger over the years.” She snorted a laugh.
“Why do you laugh?”
“She’s hilarious. She gets a bug to do something. Build a little water feature, or some decking, whatever. And she starts leaving little articles about it, pictures, how-to guides, that sort of thing around until my father finally relents and does it. It’s a little game between them. They have a zing. It was good to have that example growing up.” It was why she had the attitude that she’d wait as long as she had to to find it for herself. That zing was worth the wait.
“They sound a lot like my parents. My dad is a third-generation rancher. We started in Kentucky and moved out to Oregon when I was six. They’d scrimped and saved and got up enough to buy a good, solid plot of land. Then we all built the house while we lived in a shitty little trailer. That first winter I’m surprised we didn’t kill each other. But when you’re a kid you don’t really know. Anyway. He decided on alfalfa and that’s what he did. We took in the first harvest as we finished the house. That got us through the next year and so on. My mom directed us; he set the course. They both have this intensity of connection. When I was a kid I remember going to other peoples’ houses and wondering why their parents didn’t kiss each other or talk to each other all the time the way my parents did.” He paused for a bit as they watched the sky.
“How did they react—your parents, I mean—when Cal told them about Jules and Gideon?”
“I was there when he showed up to tell them. My dad was downstairs dealing with his computer. Ryan and I have to go over there once a week or so to run a virus check and to get rid of eleventy billion cookies and stuff. Anyway, my mom made us shut the door and get her emergency kit down.”
“Emergency kit? God, I’m starting to wonder if our mothers being together in the same place might rip a hole in the space-time continuum.”
Mary started to giggle and it took a bit to get back under control. “It’s a pack of cigarettes, some whiskey and a few twenties. I can proudly tell you she’s never had to get the emergency kit down for me. My brothers, god, they were so wild. You’d never know it to look at them now, all successful and stuff. But holy cow, they were hard to handle growing up.
“Anyway, she took two shots, lit the cigarette, cross-examined Cal, who likes to think he’s smooth but my mother could have been a code breaker in the war. No one can withstand her. Anyway, in the end she said she supported him and would handle my dad. They always took his being bi pretty easily, but you know a threesome is a whole different matter. But they love Jules and that he does too worked out. Gideon is impossible not to love as well. I’m lucky. I know some people don’t have parents like mine. I’m spoiled to live in this little world where I’m supported and loved the way I am.”
“My brothers and I weren’t easy. Ezra and Paddy were the worst. But my mom should have had a parking space with her name on it at our schools, she was down there so much. She used to threaten to homeschool us. Ezra got in fights a lot and later he drank and carried on. I remember my dad having to haul him home by the back of his shirt a few times. But it’s always been my mother who kept us in line. I mean, we got into a shit-ton of trouble, but without her and her very strong hand in our upbringing, it would have been way worse. Ezra was a handful but she kept him out of jail with music. He loved to play music. He was the first of us who learned an instrument.”
“He used to be the lead guitarist for Sweet Hollow Ranch, right?”
“Yeah. He still song writes with Paddy. Ezra got out of high school and flirted with going into the military, and I think my parents would have supported that idea. But then he started on at the ranch and we started Sweet Hollow Ranch. Then Paddy graduated and he worked at the granary part time too. We started getting gigs in places none of us were legally able to go into were we not playing there. By the time Vaughan was done with school we were ready to make that move to L.A. She came with us as I said. Kept us fed, beat off the worst of the people who’d have bled us dry.”
“There’s a big but there.”
“I assumed you knew.”
“I have been a fan of your music a long time. I know there was trouble, but to be totally honest, ever since Adrian came into our lives I try not to look at the tabloids. It’s a self-defense mechanism too, now that you’re around.”
She reached out to take his hand in hers as they watched the sky.
“He partied hard. Harder and harder as things went on. Lots of alcohol. Then drugs. After a while they affected his game. He started to show up late for shows. A really scuzzy element started hanging around backstage. He kept borrowing money. It just . . .” He had to stop to swallow back the emotion.
“He was my hero. The big brother who always had my back, and suddenly he was the guy who I caught stealing shit from my wallet. The guy who left used needles all over the f*cking place. He lost a huge amount of weight. He stopped taking care of himself. I knew he had a problem with heroin but we kept hoping he’d turn it around. We gave him ultimatums and he’d stop. For a while anyway. Finally, he and Paddy threw down after a show when Ezra literally fell asleep on stage. Just nodded out while he was playing. We had to cancel the rest of the tour. He took off. We tracked him down. He was in bad, bad shape. He refused to go to rehab.”
God, he’d never felt so f*cking helpless. They’d had to watch Ezra; worried he’d take off again to get more drugs. Ezra had said all sorts of mean shit to hurt them, push them away. Damien had worried about the band, about their tour, all that money riding on the extra dates. Felt guilty that he’d worried over those things.
“Anyway, my mom showed up. She went in the room with him, locked the door and stayed in there for two hours. Afterward, she came out, told my dad to get the car, we drove him to the rehab facility. He stayed for four months. Did another six in aftercare and he’s been clean ever since. He threw himself into the ranch, taking over the majority of the day-to-day operations from my dad. He quit the band, which he needed to do, but he still writes with Paddy. He produces our records now too. He’s my big brother again. He’s changed a lot in many ways, but for the better.”
“Wow. I’m glad he’s okay now. Sorry you all had to go through it. It must have been so hard to see him that way.”
He sucked in a breath. “Yeah. But he’s strong. Seeing him come through it changed us all.”
“I imagine so.”
“Not that we don’t get wild when we’re on the road. But it was so much less controlled then. It could have been any of us really. My family came together, which is what counts. I don’t know what my mom said to him that day, but whatever it was, it scared him into dealing, facing it and really committing to rehab. She’s a strong woman. ’Course she blames herself.”
“That’s what mothers do.”
She got him. And that should have scared him. But it didn’t.
“Thanks for sharing all that with me.” She squeezed his hand and he pulled her onto him.
“Thanks for listening. Now, I have some other ideas for how to spend this lovely evening.”