Home: A Novel (11 page)

Chapter 11

I
t was nice having Sarah around. Although Justin wasn’t happy I cancelled our date the night she arrived. 
T
hankfully, he quickly got over it. I told him I wanted her to have the full small town farm life experience. Even through her look of horror, I knew she was secretly super excited.

I spent the day after her arrival showing her around town. Okay, so it really only took me the morning, but I had every intention of it lasting the entire day. I guess being gone for so many years it slipped my mind just HOW small this town really was. After we drove down Main Street and I showed her where I went to high school, we went out to Glenview Lake.
 
T
hen, I was stumped. It was time to call in the big dogs.
 
W
e stopped to grab a bite to eat at the café and regroup.

“Good morning, Bright Eyes.” I loved how Justin answered his phone.

“I need a huge favor.”

“What’s that?”

“Well, my main goal today was showing Sarah around. It seems I underestimated the amount of time, or should I say lack of time, that would take. So do you think we can come out to your place and saddle up the horses this afternoon?”

I heard a groan from across the table. Apparently Sarah didn’t think this was a great idea.

“You bet. Actually, do you care if I tag along? I don’t have much going today and it would be nice to spend some time getting to know Sarah.”

He could be so freaking sweet sometimes. “I’d love it if you came with us.”

“Yeah?
 
Y
ou miss me a little, Raftzen?” he teased.

“Shut up, jerk.
 
W
e’ll be out your way in a couple hours, okay?”

He chuckled. “Yeah honey, we’ll see you then.”

I clicked off my phone and looked up at Sarah who made no attempt whatsoever to hide her grin. “You are so completely over the top for this guy, aren’t you?”

I rolled my eyes and looked at the menu.

“Admit it!
 
Y
ou just had a three minute conversation with him and grinned like a lovesick teenager the entire time. So when do I get to meet this hunk of burnin’ love?”

Oh Sarah. She had a way of keeping things interesting, that’s for sure. It was so nice to spend time like this with her and not have a mob of people chasing us. I knew when I told her we could go to the café for lunch it was a foreign concept to her. She hadn’t been anywhere with me since I hit the big time without a group of security surrounding us. It was refreshing. Just the two of us sitting in a normal café in small town America enjoying a conversation.

“This afternoon,” I said after I ordered my salad. I may be off the grid in terms of my celebrity status, but I still watched my calorie intake.
 
T
he last thing I wanted was to gain a bunch of weight. “We’re going horseback riding at Justin’s farm.
 
Y
ou’ll love it. He has a huge pasture with trails and stuff. And the creek runs right through the trees. It’ll be fun.”

“Sure. Fun.
 
W
ill it smell like shit the entire time we’re there, too?”

I laughed. My little city girl. “Um, I think they call that fresh air.”

“No, Lil. It’s shit.
 
T
rust me.
 
T
hat awful smell may now live in my nose permanently.”

I shook my head as I remembered another task for today. Calling Colton.

“What’s wrong?” she asked after my face changed.

“When we leave here, I need to make a phone call to a certain someone in Nashville.”

“Oh shit,” she muttered.

“Yeah.”
 
W
e dug into our food and ate in silence. I’m sure she was going over all the details in her head from last night. After we got her settled in the other guest room, Sarah gave me the low down on all Colton’s threats.
 
T
he sad thing was his threats weren’t anything new for me.

“All right Lil, I think we got it.” I heard Colton come through the speaker into the recording booth. I had recorded my first single. It was exhausting. Growing up, I dreamed of this moment so many times. I imagined walking in, singing my song and being done. I knew nothing of this process. It wasn’t anything like what I saw in the movies when people recorded songs. I figured a few touches with a few of the million buttons and dials in the control room and we’d be good to go.

Wrong.
 
T
his one little song took me almost a week to perfect. It didn’t help that Colton was here every day. He made me nervous. He had taken me out almost every night this week after the recording sessions.
 
W
e basically hit every hot spot and trendy place in town. Part of me felt a little odd by all the extra attention, but I suppose I needed to get used to it.
 
T
his was going to be my life going forward.

A few times during recording, I caught him looking at me like he was going to tackle me and rip my clothes off right there in the studio. I swear I watched him adjust his pants on more than one occasion.

“Thanks,” I said after removing the headphones and shaking out my hair. I set them down and walked over to where Colton opened the door from the control room.

“How did that feel?” he asked.

I nodded. “Good, I think.”

“Yeah, I can’t wait to hear it after post production.”

He put his arm around my shoulders and pulled me close. “Proud of you,” he whispered in my ear. I couldn’t help but smile. Even though he would only introduce me as the next big thing in Nashville, and not his girlfriend, he had his sweet moments too. “Let’s get out of here.”

“Oh, um, I made plans tonight.
 
W
ith my friend Sarah. I need to call her actually and let her know I’m finished for the day.” I reached for my bag and grabbed my cell phone from the front pocket.

Colton immediately snatched it from my hands. “Not tonight.
 
W
e’re going out.” He said it with such finality I didn’t think I’d even have a chance to argue.

“Colton, I haven’t seen my best friend enough lately.
 
Y
ou and I have gone out every night this week. Give me a break here, I need a little girl time.” I tried to sound whiny so maybe he would give in.

“Oh, Okay. Did you not record a fucking single in there just now for RCA Records?”

I stared at him.

“And are we not in the middle of planning your first tour as the opening act?”

I felt too sick to my stomach to respond.

“If you need to spend time with your little friend, hire her as your personal assistant. But at night, sweetheart, you’re mine and we are going out on the fuckin’ town. How many times have I told you, I gave you this shot I can take it away just as quickly. Now, get dressed for dinner. I need you to be seen around town as Lily Rae so we can work on cementing your public image.”

Shit. He was going to own me. I really had made a deal with the devil.

“And I can tell by your silence that you’re working through this in that pretty little head of yours. Just know, we can do this the easy way, baby, or the hard way. It’s your choice. If I give the word that song you just put down will disappear forever. Do you want this bad enough?”

I did. Damn it. I just laid down my first single in a REAL recording studio. I signed with RCA Records and would go on tour in a few months.

“Yeah, I want this.”

“Good. Because soon I’ll have to share you with the whole world.
 
T
onight I just want you to be mine,” he said as he ran his hands down my back and swatted my ass. “Let’s go.”

I rolled my eyes and grabbed my phone to send a quick text to Sarah. I knew she’d understand but it still sucked. Maybe when I hired her as my personal assistant one of her duties could be to decipher this crazy relationship I had with Colton. He ran so hot and cold it was hard for me to follow.
 
T
his new thing of threatening to take away my career was a little scary.
 
W
as that even possible? I mean, pretty soon I would have fans, right? I assumed they would keep my career going, not Colton. But what the hell did I know? So I did what he told me and kept my mouth shut.

When we left the café I could feel Sarah staring at me. “What?” I finally asked.

“Nothing. Are you okay?”

“Yeah. I just,” this was really hard to explain. “I just sometimes remember things about when I first started out. Colton stuff. God, I was so stupid back then.”

She nodded. She’d been with me long enough to remember for herself how things used to be.

“I need to get this over with.” I turned the car on but didn’t put it in gear to pull away. Instead, I snatched my cell phone from my purse, scrolled down to Colton’s number and hit Send.

It only rang twice before he picked up. “You have got to be fucking kidding me.”

Just the sound of his voice made my blood boil. I curled my lip in disgust and gripped my phone tight.

“Listen, Colton, this is not a social call to chit chat. I know what you’re up to and I’m calling to warn you it won’t work. I’m not coming back. I don’t care what you do or say.
 
Y
ou can’t threaten to ruin my career anymore because there IS no career.
 
T
he only reason you were able to hold that over my head all these years was because I wanted to keep singing. And if you haven’t noticed, that’s not a high priority in my life anymore. So you can take your control and shove it up your ass.”

I looked over to Sarah and nodded.
 
T
here, I guess I told him.
 
She covered her mouth trying to hide her giggles. I swear I could see the pride beaming from her eyes.

“Well, Lily,” he sneered at me. “That was cute. But you seem to have underestimated me.
 
Y
ou see, I know what you’ve been up to over there in po-dunk Iowa. Don’t think I haven’t been fully briefed on your little escapades with Mr. DeLuca.”

I sucked in a breath hearing Justin’s name. In all those years I had never mentioned him to Colton, not once. Someone must be watching us.

“Yeah, boy he’s a keeper Lil.
 
T
aking you out to dinner, and the football game?
 
W
ow.
 
T
hat’s pretty big stuff. And a farmer!
 
W
hew! I don’t know if I can compete with that shit.
 
Y
ou really reached for the stars with that one, baby.”

“Fuck you, Colton,” I sneered at him.

“No you little bitch, fuck you.
 
Y
ou think you can plot behind my back for months and then up and quit this business? I own you. I made you a fucking star.
 
Y
ou are a millionaire because of ME.
 
Y
ou owe me, bitch. I swear if it’s the last thing I ever do, you’re gonna pay. And trust me when I tell you, you’re gonna pay big, sweetheart.
 
Y
ou and that
 
fucking boyfriend
 
of yours.”

Holy shit. I couldn’t believe this was happening. And even worse, it now involved Justin.

“Are you threatening me?”

Click.

I pulled the phone away and looked at it. He hung up on me.

“Son of a bitch!” I screamed at the windshield. I tried to calm my breathing, but I couldn’t stop it.
 
T
he panic was settling in. Before I knew it a sob bubbled up from my chest and out. Squeezing my eyes shut, I tried to erase everything he just said to me. Maybe if I didn’t think about it, I could pretend it didn’t really happen.

“Did he threaten you?” Sarah reached over and put her hand on my arm.

“I hate him,” I whispered as I opened my eyes. I couldn’t even look at her. She witnessed me shed so many tears over this man, I felt awful making her watch me do it again.

“Lillian, answer me. Did he actually threaten you?”

“Sort of.” I was still whispering. I couldn’t seem to get my voice to work any louder.

“Then you need to tell Justin, or your brothers. Somebody, Lil.
 
Y
ou can’t let him get away with this. If he made a threat you need to take this seriously.
 
W
hat if he comes after you? Or your family?”

I turned to look at her. She was right. It hadn’t even sunk in yet what he said.

“He knows about Justin, and that we’ve been out on dates and to the football game. Oh God.”

We sat in silence. I don’t even know how much time went by. I calmed myself enough that I could push it aside for now.

“Okay, I need to deal with this later,” I said. “I promise to tell everyone about this, and soon, but today is about you meeting Justin, not thinking about the mess that’s become my life.”

“Are you sure, Lil?” she asked. “Because we can do this another time. It doesn’t have to be right now if you need to deal with this.”

“No, it’s okay. I’ve wasted so much of my life worrying about Colton Jefferson. For real. I can push this aside because I’ve been doing it for years, okay? Now let’s go have some fun on the farm.”

She rolled her eyes. “Jesus, Lil, fun and farm are two words that should never be used in the same sentence.”

I laughed at her comment but it was forced. I was still distracted by Colton’s threats. I needed to shake this off because Justin would instantly recognize something was wrong. I promised myself I would tell him later. Maybe Mama could have a family dinner or something tonight and I could tell everyone at once.