Elle was beautiful. She had been Jolene’s makeup artist since the beginning, and she had a carefree vibe with a sharp sense of humor. Jolene could admit that Elle was probably smarter than she was. But neither of her siblings could top her when it came to hard work and discipline. She knew she looked, as Elle had put it, like “Nashville Barbie.” That was calculated. The Lord had gifted her a generous chest, a small waist, and luscious lips, and she had used them to her advantage when she’d come to Nashville looking for her big break.
That had been seven years ago, and not much of anything had happened until she’d met Chance and they’d started writing music together. He was country royalty, third-generation songwriter. His Nashville roots went back to the sixties, to the era of Johnny Cash and Patsy Cline. She envied him that, but mostly she’d been grateful he was willing to give her a shot. Or rather, that he let Ginny strong-arm him into working with Jolene. Their mutual agent had introduced them, they’d started writing songs and sleeping together, and after they’d cut a demo for fun, the ball had started rolling. The rest was history.
Even if the ball had eventually careened down a hill, crashed into a wall, and gotten stuck tight in mud.
Elle’s dating life had consisted of a couple of guitar players who had more hair than talent, and a real estate agent who had been caught with another man in the lobby restroom of the Grand Ole Opry. Jolene felt her pain. Before Chance there had been only the holdover from her early days in Nashville, Dean the Dick. Take what you wanted from that nickname. Both definitions applied.
“You should pack lingerie, just in case.”
Jolene gave her sister a long look. “And what happened to ‘You shouldn’t be sleeping with Chance’?”
“Honey, it’s inevitable. Might as well look good doing it.”
Jolene, too, was pretty sure it was inevitable. She might put up a good fight for, oh, five minutes, but in tight quarters all alone with Chance and no contact with the outside world? One word from him, and she would be on board. It was embarrassing to be that simple. She had to resist. She had to fight her urges. This wasn’t about knocking boots, it was about the future. Their careers. “I’m not going to sleep with him.”
But she put her sexiest bra and panty set in the suitcase anyway. The one Chance had jokingly said brought out the red in her eyes because she was as persuasive as the devil when she wore it. She clicked the case shut.
She sure hoped she knew what the hell she was doing.
And that the cabin was lacking in things for them to throw at each other if it all went south.
—
Glancing out his living room window, Chance saw Jolene pulling into his drive, laying on the horn as she bounced in the seat of her truck. Damn, this was going to be a challenge. Him, Jolene, a secluded cabin, and the condoms he’d packed in his duffel bag, just in case things got frisky.
Which would be stupid, but when had he ever been all that smart? Chance was willing to admit he had trouble getting the hell out of his own way. He knew he did. He didn’t want to be that guy, but it was a defense mechanism honed from years of being surrounded by successful family members and his parents’ friends. He was the only child of Buck Rivers, legendary songwriter with more country hits than anyone else in the eighties, and their house had been filled with talent all the time. There had been jam sessions, and songwriting bursts, and good old-fashioned parties where Chance’s role was to come into the room, show his father’s friends how talented Buck’s progeny was, then make himself scarce.
It had given him both a strong sense of entitlement and a need to prove himself. He knew he was also stubborn and chained to ideas that didn’t always make sense. He tried to work through his own stuff, but sometimes he dug in and it was only after his boot heels were eight inches deep that he realized what he was doing.
His anger was another issue altogether. That,. he was trying to keep in check, though his success was spotty. But he didn’t like to be that guy. The one who tossed guitars in pools and stole award plaques. Who got drunk and slept with women because it was the only thing preventing him from slugging his buddies after they gave him crap for losing Jolene. He hadn’t lost Jolene. He had stomped away. After she’d broken things off with him, citing that very anger as a major issue.
He didn’t blame her for that. But to this day he didn’t understand why she was pissed about him hugging some woman. She hugged men. Everyone hugged fans and coworkers. It was impolite to not hug someone who held her arms open. It shouldn’t have been the big deal Jolene made it out to be, like he was cheating on her. He would never cheat. He’d seen what it could do to a marriage.
All of which was a hell of a lot of baggage to be dragging on this bullshit songwriting expedition. Otherwise known as Ginny Wants Her Paycheck.