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Quinn stops at the top of the stairs, looking down at us. “Take your time. We are right up here, and we will be fine.” She disappears, and I turn my attention to Maddox, who’s gripping his neck.
“I did try Ryder first,” I tell him, hating how stressed he looks.
He rolls his head a few times, then lets out a heavy exhale. “Ryder is with Heaven at a doctor’s appointment. It’s fine. I’m fine. Quinn is right. It’s fine.” He says it so many times I really wonder if it’s actually fine. He takes another deep breath with his eyes closed, then looks at me. The shadows that were in them evaporate. “Really. I’m good. But I know why you’re here, Lily, and the answer is still no.”
I shake my head as I stand. I walk across the marble tiles and stand in front of the window, unable to face him like the coward I am. “I don’t want to talk about working with someone else. I want out of the contract.”
“Sorry, Lil. That’s not happening either.” His reflection shows his heavily inked arms folded across his chest, looking right at me, somehow finding my eyes. How a man who was having a panic attack moments ago can command a stage—and a boardroom—like he can should be confounding, but I get it.
Fake it ‘til you make it until it becomes true.
“I’ll pay back everything, Maddox. I still have the advance.”
He chuckles and shakes his head. “Lily, that advance isn’t a fraction of what we’ve spent so far.”
“Then… we’ll work out a payment plan. Or something, I don’t know what, but I can’t do this anymore.”
“No.”
I spin on my heels, but my hard glare falters when I see he’s completely unfazed… and deadly serious. “Then I’ll walk on the contract.”
He shrugs as he walks forward and sits at his piano with his back to me as if nothing I say matters. “And I’ll sue, but it won’t be for money, Lily. It will be for the fulfillment of your contract. And I’ll win.” His fingers glide over the keys in a quick glissando with so little effort, it makes this conversation that much more infuriating.
I stomp around the piano so we’re facing each other again. “Oh, my God! Why?” I yell, throwing my hands in the air. “Are you that invested in my love life? Has your life become so boring that you need to meddle in mine? I’m sorry if you’re miserable, Maddox, but don’t make me miserable, too.”
How I expected him to react, I don’t know. Anger maybe. Hurt feelings. Something other than to continue playing whatever the song is he’s playing, eyes closed as his fingers drift over the white and black keys, and his head falling back with laughter. He says nothing for several more seconds. I guess finishing whatever he’s playing is more important than anything I have to say.
Then he stops and looks at me. An amused, patronizing smile shows all his dumb teeth. “Lily, I have to take a pharmacy every day so I don’t see or hear shit that’s not there. Something else to control my moods so I don’t jump off the roof. Something else to stop me from climbing the walls. I fucking crave boring. And I am way too goddamn busy to give two shits about who you fuck. I love you and Liam both like family, but I had to accept everyone’s happiness is not my responsibility.”
“Then why won’t you let me out of the contract?”
“Ryder and I are doing a favor for someone. And because you have a lot of natural talent. It needs to be honed and refined, but it’s there. It’s bad business to let that go. And I would be a shit friend to watch you walk away from something you very clearly want to do, even if you’re afraid you aren’t good enough. Trust me, you are.”
My head dips, and my shoulders slump. Defeat hits me like a tidal wave as fat drops spill from my lashes. “I can’t do it, Mads. I can’t keep working with him.”
He grabs my wrist, pulls me to the piano bench next to him, and wraps his arm around my shoulder. “Yeah, ya can, darlin’. You’ll be great.” More tears fall as I bury my face in his chest. “The pain only lasts as long as you fight it, Lily.”
“Fight is all I have to give.”
“No, darlin’. Your fight is holding you back.”
But he’s wrong because if I stop fighting, I will crumble.
Liam
Words and numbers blur on the screen after hours of creating a budget and schedule for Jacob’s Ladder to start recording their sophomore album while ensuring to slice out time for them to lay tracks for Lily. I lean back in my chair and squeeze the space between my eyes with my thumb and ring finger. What the hell made me think I wanted this job? However, I wasn’t really offered the position. I was told it was mine. Maybe I shouldn’t have felt so grateful because while I can spot talent, spreadsheets and I are not simpatico. Maybe I should delegate this to the guy playing receptionist.
I’ve barely closed my eyes when my office door flies open. Only one person would walk in here like that. Well, maybe two, but I know which sibling it is before I open my eyes. The mental countdown begins…
Five… Four… Three… Two…
“I get you a time alone with her, and you can’t close the deal?”
Well, I wasn’t expecting that. I was prepared to get bitched at for his sister going to Maddox and trying to quit. For hurting her again, even if that was not my fault. But this… It sounds like… I shake my head and ask. “What are you upset about, exactly?”
“You were supposed to get her back, you jackass. I asked Maddox to make sure you two work together. Made sure she needed to go on this trip with you.” He paces back and forth in front of my desk, pushing his hands through his hair. Irritation rolls off him, confusing me more.
“Are you… You’re telling me all of this I Love Lucy matchmaking bullshit was you? Not Thing One and Thing Two?”
