The Beauty Series Bundle (42 page)

L
aurelyn
and I have spent the last two days either in bed or in the shower so we could go back to bed together. I’d say these were the best days of my life except for the reason behind why we’ve been nymphos for the last forty-eight hours.

I’m leaving today, and she’s not coming with me.

We’re standing at the security checkpoint and the sickening feeling I have in my stomach is far worse than I’d imagined it would be. I feel short of breath and my chest aches from my heart being torn out. The pain is even worse than when I found Laurelyn’s goodbye letter.

I’m not a man who cries—ever—yet I feel it right there about to happen. It’s foreign and I’m fighting it, but it’s getting harder and harder with each passing minute. Our separation is imminent, and inevitable.

I’m holding her in my arms. I’m squeezing her harder than I should. I’m probably hurting her, but it’s my attempt at meshing us into one so I don’t leave her behind. And it isn’t working.

I hear her soft, sweet voice against my ear and feel her trembling in my arms. “Don’t leave,” she whispers.

I feel the tears when they come and I bury my face in her hair. “Don’t let me leave without you.”

And we’re back to that place I hate. She won’t come and I can’t stay.

Our time together is winding down. We don’t have much time left and I pull away from her so I can see her face. “This is not at all the way I wanted to do this.”

“I know. I didn’t want you to leave with things between us feeling so… unsettled.”

She doesn’t understand I’m referring to something entirely different. “That’s not what I mean, baby.” I reach into my pocket and take out the black leather box I’ve carried everywhere with me for the last two weeks. I waited for the perfect moment, but it never presented itself. Now I get to do it this way only minutes before I’m about to leave her for God knows how long.

I hold it out so she can see it. I want her to have a moment to absorb where I’m about to go. She looks at it briefly before her eyes dart up to meet mine. She looks like she wants to say something but can’t quite spit the words out.

“Laurelyn, I once asked you to be mine for three months. Now, I’m asking you to be mine forever.”

She opens her mouth to speak and I place my fingers to her lips. “But I don’t want your answer right now because you’re not ready to say yes. You still need time to spread your wings and fly. I love you with all my heart and I want you to experience everything this life has to offer you because it won’t wait. But I will. I’ll wait for you as long as it takes, and you can come to me after you’ve had enough of this life… when you’re ready to spend forever with me.”

Tears fill her eyes. “You can not do this to me right before you get on a plane to leave.”

I hear the last call for my flight to LA, so I flip the ring box open. “When you come to me, I will ask you to be my wife, but until then… “ She cups her mouth when she sees the ring. I take her left hand and slide the diamond engagement ring onto her finger. “I know you don’t usually wear the ring until you say yes, but I want you to wear this as a reminder that I am waiting for you. Every time you look at it on your finger, know that I’m anxiously looking forward to you coming to me so we can begin our forever together.”

Tears spill down her cheeks. “I’m so pissed off at you right now that I can’t see straight. I simultaneously love the fuck out of you while I hate your guts. I don’t know if I want to slap your face or get naked with you.”

“My vote would be for getting naked, but I don’t think they’ll allow that here in the airport.”

“I can’t believe you just did this to me.”

I’m flirting with missing my flight. “I have to go, baby.”

“I know.”

“Think of the story we’ll be able to tell our kids if you say yes.”

She stands at the security point entrance and is sobbing hysterically when I pass the point where I’ll no longer be able to see her. It breaks my heart. That’s not at all the way I wanted my proposal to happen, but I’m not sorry about it. I know what I’m doing. One way or another, I’m going to have her as my wife.

I
have
two hours until I board my connecting flight to Sydney. I take my mobile from my pocket and I’m pretty sure I stare at it for ten minutes. I dread making this call and having the talk—our first post-sort-of-proposal conversation. It’s only been four hours since I left Laurelyn in Nashville and I’m convinced she’s ready to rip me a new one now that she’s had time to think about what I did.

I wait for her to answer and realize I’m nervous—like, really fucking nervous. What if she used the last four hours to think about what an asshat I am and decided there’s no way in hell she’d ever marry me? I want to hang up. I’m even considering it when I hear her voice.

“You are in so much trouble, caveman.”

She called me cavemen. That’s a good sign. She can’t be too mad if she called me that instead of jackhole, which she uses frequently.

Should I say I’m sorry? ‘Cause I’m not, and to do so would be lying. “I don’t regret what I did, even if you’re angry with me. The only thing I regret is sitting around waiting for the ideal moment to present itself so I could properly ask you to be my wife. That clearly didn’t happen and I’m sorry. I wanted it to be a perfect moment because you’ve not had many of those in your life, but I messed it up like I always do.”

“I really want to be naked with you right now.”

That sounds promising. “I’d really like that a lot, but I’m willing to accept your answer in its place. I know I told you that I didn’t want your response right now, but if it’s yes, then you can go ahead and tell me.”

“What? And ruin the angst you so deserve to feel? I don’t think so, Mr. McLachlan. You give me a proposal like that and you should expect to wait on an answer—for a while.”

Uh-oh. That part doesn’t sound so good. “So you’re punishing me for wanting to marry you?”

“No. I’m punishing you for that fast one you just pulled on me.”

I was hoping she would be so thrilled about the whole thing that she’d sort of forget the way I did it. “This isn’t much of a way to begin our union. I don’t think tit-for-tat is the best strategy for making a marriage work.”

“I didn’t say I was marrying you.”

But she will. I’ll see to it. “You didn’t tell me you weren’t, so until you say otherwise, I’ll be waiting anxiously for you to come to me.”

“You know, you don’t play fair.”

Was she ever under the impression that I did? “I believe I recall telling you I always get my way, within reasonable means.”

“You put a ring on my finger—which is absolutely stunning, by the way—and teased me with the prospect of being your wife only moments before walking away. You skimmed the surface but you didn’t really even ask me to marry you. And all of this you do while I’m experiencing an emotional breakdown because you’re leaving. You seriously think that’s reasonable?”

“No, but I think it’ll get me what I want, which is making you my wife.” That’s the end result I’m shooting for here. I don’t really care how I achieve it.

“You didn’t ask me to marry you yet, so I’m not giving you an answer until you propose properly.”

She sounds agreeable, so I’m going for it. “Laurelyn, will you please marry me and be my wife?”

“No.”

“No?” That wasn’t the answer I was expecting.

“Asking over the phone isn’t a proper proposal, and I won’t answer you until you’re on one knee in front of me.”

Damn. I should’ve dropped down to my knee when I gave her that ring. “It’s sort of hard to do that when I’m going to be nine thousand miles away.”

“I hate it, pal, but a drunk proposal and a phone proposal are both null and void with me.”

I wondered if she was ever going to bring up Vegas. “This is the first mention of my drunk proposal.”

“So you do remember it?”

How could I forget that epic fail? “Hell yeah, I remember it. I could’ve kicked my own arse for being so careless with those precious words. You deserve so much better than me getting wasted and telling you to marry me.”

“I damn sure do. Therefore, all proposals, drunk or sober, don’t count. You’ve not asked and I’ve not answered.”

I really don’t want to go back to Australia like this. “Should I get on a plane and come back now?”

“No. Now isn’t the best time to talk marriage with me, buster. I’m still pretty pissed off at you.”

I just put a beautiful ring on her finger and told her how much I want her to be my wife, and she’s mad at me. This can’t be right. “Don’t be like that, baby. Think of the thought behind the gesture. I love you and want to be with you forever. Don’t let formality or your anger cause you to forget that part.”

“I won’t.”

It’s a dirty trick but I’m gonna use it anyway to soften her anger with me. “And think of those babies you long for. I’ll give them to you—as many as you wish, whenever you’re ready.”

“Something tells me you want those babies as much as I do. Half of our conversations seem to revolve around them.”

She’s right. Something has happened in me and I want them too. “You think so?”

“Are you asking if I think you want them, or do I think we talk about them a lot?”

“Both.”

“Then yes to both.”

We’ve talked about kids so this isn’t news to her. “I do want them, but only with you.”

She makes a sound of frustration. “This makes me so damn mad that we’re having this conversation now when we should’ve had it before you left.”

She’s right. I feel like such a dumb-arse for holding out for the perfect time. “I’m sorry I waited. I should’ve asked you the day I bought the ring. I was going to propose when I took you to Oscar’s for dinner. I had the ring box in my hand, about to ask, when that reporter walked up to our table.”

“I went nuts right at the moment when you were going to ask. I’m sorry.”

It’s fate. That wasn’t the way it was supposed to happen. “It’s not your fault,” I reassure her.

“I need you to be patient with me.”

“Baby, I’ve waited thirty years for you. I can wait a little longer.”

I
cannot believe
Jack Henry did this to me.

He and I aren’t ordinary. We never have been—and we never will be—so I’m not sure why I’d expect a normal proposal from him. But he’s right about one thing: it’ll definitely be a story to tell our kids.

Our kids. Wow. It’s beyond the realms of reality to think we’ve gone from agreeing to a three month sex-a-thon without true identities to contemplating marriage and kids, especially when he was so hell-bent on neither. Should it concern me that he made a complete one-eighty on issues he was so firm about only a few months ago?

I know he loves me, but I’m concerned that he’s changed his mind about marriage and kids for the wrong reason. I don’t want him basing that on what I want instead of what he wants so he can keep me.

I need someone I can talk to about Jack Henry’s proposal. There’s only one person worthy of a brutally honest conversation about this, and she’s gallivanting around Australia with the love of her life. I look at the clock—it’s 10 p.m. her time. I’m definitely calling that slut puppy.

She answers on the third ring with a greeting that isn’t all that unfamiliar. “Hello, twat.”

It stops becoming a surprise when she says it every time. “Hello, crotch rot. How are things down under?”

I anticipate her reply involving something about going down or getting under Zac.

“I could do a lot with that and say that you walked right into it, but I won’t.”

That would be a first. “Thanks. I appreciate that.”

“So, what’s going on with you since the good-looking suit left? Wasn’t that going down today?”

She still calls him that. “Yeah. He left about five hours ago.”

“Are you okay?”

No, I’m not. It’s far shittier than I’d imagined. “I’m not at all fine with being separated from him again.”

“Then what’s the plan?”

“Addie, he asked me to marry him.” I jerk the phone back in anticipation of the scream to follow.

“What!” she yells, as expected. “Tell me everything.”

“He told me that he knew I wasn’t ready to give up my career, but he’d be waiting for me to come to him when I was prepared to be his wife. He put a ring on my finger. It’s an engagement ring—the most beautiful one I’ve ever seen—and told me it was a reminder of him waiting for me. That’s how he left it, but then he called me from LA and asked me over the phone.”

“What are you going to do?”

I know what I want to do—drop everything and run to him. I want to beat him to Avalon and be waiting in his bed when he arrives home. “I don’t know. That’s why I’m calling you. I need your blunt advice.”

“I only met the guy a few times and it was under false pretenses. Thank you again for that, by the way.”

She isn’t going to let me forget that. “I know. Sorry.”

“It’s difficult to give you advice about a guy I don’t know, but here’s what I have to go on: he’s rich and successful so you’d never have to worry about how he’d take care of you. He’s fucking gorgeous, so that’s a definite plus. According to what you’ve told me, the two of you have crazy monkey sex. He gives your vajayjay a lot of special attention and makes you come a lot, so you’re good there. We both know that one’s a deal-breaker if the sex is terrible. He hired a private investigator to find you, so that proves he wants you bad. He must love you or he wouldn’t have proposed. But do you love him enough to marry him?”

I know I do, but there are other issues at hand. “I do, but I worry he’s talking about marriage and babies because I told him it’s what I wanted. What if he’s going along with it but it’s not what he wants?”

“Laurelyn, do you really think the guy would marry you if he didn’t want to? For God’s sake, he had meaningless sexual relationships with women to avoid the whole commitment thing. He wouldn’t decide to give that life up unless he loved you and wanted to be married to you.”

I guess that makes sense. “But I’m terrified of giving up my career only to have the whole thing backfire in my face. What if I move down there and it doesn’t work out?”

“What if you don’t and you never know what might have been? Can you live with that?”

Could I? I don’t think so. “You think I should give up my career?”

“You know I gave all of that up for Zac because I love him and wanted to be with him. Will I ever have a singing career for shit now? No. Do I care? No. We’re together and I’m happy. I was willing to walk away. The only question now is, are you?”

Addison is different. She isn’t afraid to fly by the seat of her pants. “You know me. I have trust issues that are damn near impossible to shake.”

“You worry so much about protecting your toes that you miss out on the joy of the dance.”

I’ve never thought of it that way. “I may, but I’ve never had anyone looking out for me. It’s how I protect myself.”

“Answer this question for me: do you really feel like you need protection from Jack?”

No one makes me feel safer than Jack Henry. No one. “No. It’s the complete opposite. He’s always my protector.”

“I think you should marry him—if for no other reason than for me to have you back in Australia with me. I miss you.”

It would be nice to have him and my best friend. “I know. I miss you too, and I do love Australia. I think I could be very happy living there. I can so easily see myself as part of Jack Henry’s family. They’re wonderful people and they took me in and treated me like one of their own.”

“You can take some time to think about it if you feel like it’s necessary, but it’s plain to see that your heart already knows what it wants.”

She’s right. I can think about this day and night but I hear my heart’s plea—and it’s screaming for me to go to him, like, yesterday. On the other hand, I hear my head trying to overpower my heart. All I hear is my head saying no and my heart saying go.

M
y parents have invited
me to dinner at my mom’s place. It’s official. They’re no longer a thing in private. They’re an item in the eyes of the world but the media is so bad that none of us can go out in public anymore.

Becoming a star isn’t what I thought it would be.

My front door is clear for the first time in weeks. I guess there are only so many pictures you can take of a person leaving their apartment before that becomes uninteresting.

Dinner is intriguing—some sort of casserole. I’m not really certain what kind and I choose to not ask. My mom’s never been much of a cook.

We’re busy discussing the schedule for the band and the new music I’m working on when my mom spies the ring on my finger. “What is that?”

She isn’t going to like this. “It’s a ring.”

“What kind of ring?”

She knows. She doesn’t have to ask. “Engagement.”

“So he asked you to marry him?”

I’m not going there with the whole in a roundabout way issue. “Yes. Jack Henry has asked me to marry him.”

My mother huffs as she looks at my dad. A look passes between them and I’m not sure how to decipher its meaning, but it pisses me off. I know it means they’ve been discussing us. “Laurie, you can’t marry him.”

I’m absolutely, positively, one hundred percent not shocked by this. “And why not?”

“Because he’ll have you moving to Australia. If you do, your career is over, plain and simple.”

I’m beginning to care less and less about this career of mine. “Would that be so bad if I was with the man I love?”

“Are you kidding? Of course it would be bad. It would be terrible to watch you walk away from this success after such a short time. If you’re this big today, think of where you’ll be in a year from now.”

It doesn’t take a genius to figure that one out. “I already know where I’ll be—on a tour bus traveling from one show to the next. I’ve already been doing that, Mom, and I know what it’s like. It’s not great.” I look at my dad. “Does it ever get easier?”

He looks at my mom and they have a silent conversation as they sit across the table from one another. “It takes some getting used to, but it gets better with time.” I strongly suspect he’s saying that because it’s what she wants him to tell me.

I should tell them the way I feel so they’ll understand. “It’s like this. If Jack Henry hadn’t come back into my life, I’d probably be thrilled to spend every day on the road, but that isn’t the way it went. He came looking for me because he loves me. And I love him. I know what my life feels like without him in it, and I hated every moment of it.”

“He just left. You haven’t had time to get used to him not being here, but that’ll get better in time.” She’s grasping at straws.

“I don’t want it to get better. I want to be with him.”

“Baby, being with him means you don’t get to have a career and you don’t get to be with me or your dad. We’ll never see each other. Would you walk away from singing? And from us?”

That’s not how it would be. “I would come back to see you when I could and you could come to Australia to visit us. You’d love it. It’s beautiful and the people are so friendly.”

“No, you shouldn’t count on me coming down there because I won’t.”

My heart plummets when I hear my mom say she wouldn’t visit me. I see the look on my dad’s face and I think her resolution even surprises him, but he attempts to cover for her. “I think your mom’s just not excited about flying over the ocean.”

“Sure.” I’m certain she wouldn’t hesitate to fly anywhere with him if he asked. Nothing has changed. I’m still taking a back seat to Jake Beckett like I always have. Why would I give up the man I love when it’s obvious she’ll always put the one she loves ahead of me?

“I gotta go.”

“Baby, you want to say yes. I can see it in your eyes, but it would be a mistake to give up your career and family for this man. You can find someone else to love—someone from here. Maybe even a man in the music industry who will understand what this kind of life is like.”

She’s such a hypocrite. “Oh, you mean find someone else the way you did?” She gives me that look that says she doesn’t like what I’m saying—and it’s because it’s the truth. “Wait. I got that all wrong, didn’t I? You didn’t find anyone else because you could never move past loving him.”

My dad puts his hands up. “Maybe we should all take a step back for a minute.”

His role isn’t to referee. I’m still undecided about what I think his part is here, but I’ve been handling this woman by myself for twenty-three years and I don’t need his help now. “I’m outta here.”

I don’t have time for this shit. I have a decision to make and not with any of her kind of help.

I leave my mom’s house and end up driving around for an hour before I park my car in front of Charlie’s apartment. His living room light is on, so I take it as a good sign that he’s probably home.

I sit in my car for at least fifteen minutes trying to decide if I want to do this—tell him I’m leaving the band. He’s going to be so disappointed in me. I feel terrible doing this to them after they took me in the way they did. He was there for me when I needed him most, and now I’m going to abandon him just as things are really taking off.

I can’t keep having these kinds of thoughts. I have to start living for me at some point and to hell with what’s best for everyone else. They can figure that out on their own. I’m the only person in control of my destiny.

I’m nervous as I stand on Charlie’s doorstep and want to run away when he opens the door. “Hey. What are you doing here?”

“I’m sorry. I know I should’ve called first, but I was out driving and found myself in front of your place. Can I come in?”

“Of course.” He opens the door wide for me and I walk into his living room. My eyes go for the couch immediately to check for a chick and then I remember that’s probably not where she’d be if he had a girl over. “You don’t have company tonight?”

“Nah. I have a friend coming over in a while, but it’s just me for the next little bit.” He gestures for me to sit on the couch and I can’t help but think how his apartment looks so bachelor. None of Jack Henry’s houses look like this—like a bunch of guys should be sitting around drinking beer, watching sports. “Did everything go okay with Jack leaving today?”

“Yes and no.” Charlie looks at me and I can tell by his expression that he’s waiting for an explanation. “I let him board his plane, if that’s what you mean. He should be arriving in Sydney in a few hours.”

“I was wondering if you’d let him go,” he laughs. “So what is the part that didn’t go okay?”

“He wants me to marry him.” I wait a moment before I drop the next bomb, but Charlie saves me from saying the words.

“And he wants you to move to Australia.”

“Yes. But I haven’t given him an answer.” I think he’s waiting for the rest of the story. “I love him and I know what being apart from him feels like. It’s terrible and I don’t want to do it again.”

“So this is you telling me you’re leaving the band?”

I tell myself to be strong because I’m doing this for Jack Henry and me. “It is.”

“Randy’s gonna flip out.”

Flip out is probably putting it gently. “I know. I hate doing this to you, but I can’t stay when my heart isn’t in it.”

“I understand. And I’m not mad. I’d do the same thing if the situation were reversed. There’s nothing I wouldn’t do to have a love like what you have with Jack.”

He doesn’t seem disappointed or shocked. “Thank you for not making me feel like a asshat.”

“I could never make you feel bad about loving Jack, but you may think I’m a huge ass after you hear the request I have for you.”

What kind of request could make me think poorly of sweet Charlie? “I could never think that about you. You’re too adorable for that.”

“We’ll see how you feel after I ask.”

Now I’m a little frightened. “Okay… “

“Will you stay through the next tour so we don’t have to cancel?”

That means I’d have to stay until the end of October. “That’s over three months away.”

“We don’t have time to find a replacement for the tour, but we could start fresh with someone after we finish the tour and get back in the studio.”

I don’t want to do it. But I sort of owe them that after the way they took me in when I didn’t have a chance in hell. “I can do that.”