Wicked Bad Boys (86 page)

T
hree down
, four to go. That’s what was running through my mind when I woke up the day after the awards show. Three stops on my tour were complete, and so far we had all gotten through it virtually unscathed. And yes, two of the three people I cared about had suffered minor injuries, but I held out hope we could get through the rest with no further trauma to anyone in my camp.

Amanda had slept in my bed last night, with minimal coaxing too. We were both tired, so sleep turned out to be all we did. It was great to feel her body pressed up against mine all night. For the first time since we left for Greece, there was nothing in my schedule today. It was a luxury to have a free day, so I slept in. Amanda was gone when I woke up. I was not surprised—it was already almost noon.

I got out of bed and threw on some gym clothes. A workout was in order. Just as I was leaving my room, I heard my phone go off. It was the ringtone for Lady and Kevin’s house. I walked to the bedside table and snatched it up to catch it before it went to voicemail.

“Hi,” I answered, sitting on the edge of the bed.

“Hello, Lorne.” It was Lady. “Congratulations on last night, son.”

“Thanks. I wish you could have been there.”

“I do too, dear. I watched you on TV. Your performance was brilliant! I plan to come to the RMVAs for sure. Don’t you worry.”

“I’m looking forward to it. How is Kevin today?”

“Isn’t he over at your house?”

“Probably. I slept in. I’ll check when I get downstairs. So what’s up?”

“I wanted to talk things out. Just you and me. Do you have a few minutes?”

I let out a slow and steady breath, anticipating it would be another difficult conversation. “Of course.”

“Great. How are you feeling?”

I rolled my eyes and stood up from the bed. I paced around. I really wanted to tell her how disappointed I was that she had sided with Kevin on the topic of Amanda.

“Lorne?”

“I don’t know…I’m just tired. Mostly.”

Lady was never one to skirt around issues, so she launched right into it. “I know you think Kevin and I are being unreasonable,” she said softly. “Amanda seems like a nice girl. I’d like to get to know her.”

“Thanks, Lady. That means a lot.”

“I know Kevin would too.”

“I’m not sure I buy that part. He has made no effort to get to know her, and so far, he treats her like the hired help. No, I take that back. He treats her worse than the any of our staff.”

“’Hmmm. I hope you know me well enough to understand that if you’re happy with her, all I’ll ever do is support you. You know that, right?”

My chest tightened. “Yes, Lady. I know.”

“My only concern is for your safety.”

There it was. “That’s why you’ll love Amanda. She’s done an excellent job of being my bodyguard.”

“So tell me. What’s been going on between you and Kevin, son?” Her voice was calmer than before.

I sighed. “I don’t know anymore. We’ve had our differences, but lately we don’t agree on anything. Has he talked to you?”

“Yes. After the physical assault in his car, he came clean with me and told me what’s been going on with the two of you. Until now, I’ve kept at arm’s length when it comes to your working together.”

It was true. I had gone to her on numerous occasions over the years to ask for help dealing with Kevin. Each time, she would tell me she didn’t want to meddle or take sides.

“Today, however, I’m breaking my own rules.” Her words intrigued me. “I love you both too much to watch you let this crazy business rip you apart. Lorne, please believe me, Kevin loves you like his own son…”

I never doubted Kevin cared about me. He and Lady had tried to have children, but it did not work out. Around the time they gave up trying was when my parents were killed and I became theirs legally. Being godparents had always been something they had taken very seriously and to me, they were already family long before my parents passed. Both my mom and dad had full confidence that Lady and Kevin would raise me as their own, and when tragedy struck, they did exactly that. Kevin’s love for me was clear—it was his methods that were the problem.

Lady had a way of tugging at my heart and softening me up. She was not trying to manipulate me; she only said what she did to remind me of what was really important.

She continued. “Lorne, you have to remember, he was my manager too. He can be so infuriating, and his neutral position in business is arrogant, domineering and inflexible. Believe me, it nearly ended our relationship on a few occasions.”

My ears perked up. I had never heard this side of the story before. “Really?” I asked, finding it hard to believe. After they adopted me, Lady and Kevin had been so close and so compatible, I never once questioned their commitment to each other.

She laughed. “Yes! He used to drive me crazy!”

“How so?”

“There’s so much. Where to start? He despised my wardrobe choices. Any song I picked out, he instantly hated. If I wrote it, he disliked it even more. He also had a problem with everyone in my band. And he worked me like an animal on the road. The worst was a twenty-two city tour in seventeen days. What can I say? He’s strong-willed and outspoken. Kevin is an alpha male through and through. And you are too, Johnny. So you’ll never stop butting heads until there’s some give and take.”

“So far I’ve been doing all the giving and he’s held on to the taking, Lady.”

She chuckled.

“What’s the secret, then? How did you get him to let you do what you wanted?”

“Eventually, over time, we found a way to work together that was more cohesive.”

“Did it have to come out as a threat?” I asked because Kevin only understood ultimatums.

“You know him too well, son,” she admitted, her melodious laugh setting me at ease. “That’s why some of my later albums sound like they were somewhat bipolar, dear.”

“So basically you’re telling me to stick it out and hope that someday he might cut me some slack? Or are you saying I need to put my foot down and stand my ground?” I could not see either option working well.

“No, no, Lorne. It’s about balance. Stand your ground where it matters… and pick your battles wisely. Right now, you both feel like all you do is argue. The two of you need to sit down and get it all out there…without the hostility,” she warned, placing emphasis on her final point. “He has to get credit for some of the things he has done to this point, like the way you were so gracious at the Disk Spinners last night. By the way, that simple gesture put you in a good place in his books. He’s so proud of you, Lorne. Talk to him today. Really talk…and then, you can inject your ideas and find a middle ground.”

“Okay.” If talking alone would get Kevin to come around, I was willing to give it a try.

“He wants to make this right. Please give it another try. I think you’ll get much farther.”

“All right, Lady. Thanks.”

A silence settled between us. I wasn’t sure if the conversation was over, or if she was just thinking.

“How is Amanda doing?” She asked.

I took the opportunity to say, “If I can give him another try, he needs to accept that Amanda will be a part of the picture. Not just during the tour. Amanda is performing her role well…I would argue that she has done more as a bodyguard than anyone we’ve ever hired. I just have to say…I know this is awkward to hear, Lady, but Kevin does not get to tell me who I can care for, be friends with, love…or share a bed with. That part of my personal life is off-limits.”

“I can relate to that, son. But I was asking how Amanda was doing, because I want to know how she is.”

“Oh. Sorry, Lady. I guess I’ve been on the defensive lately. Amanda’s fine.”

“You really care about her don’t you?”

“I do.”

“Have you known each other for long?”

I wasn’t sure how to answer that question without admitting to being a harmless brand of cyber-stalker myself. “I knew of her before, during her MMA days. I only got to meet her in person at the same time Kevin did, less than two weeks ago.”

“Really, dear? Because the way you look at her, I thought you may have known her for ages.”

I let that comment go. I was not going to lie to Lady, or admit to obsessively following Amanda on social media for years.

“Do you think we can have dinner sometime? The four of us? It can be after the tour ends, when you have more downtime.”

Doubtful,
I thought. There was still the issue of after the tour. At the moment, all I had to go on was Amanda would be nearly three thousand miles away, and it was too soon to expect her to disrupt her life to move in with me after four weeks of us knowing each other. The only thing I was sure of was I did not want to be part of her past, reduced to some story she would tell at parties about the rock star she had gotten to know in LA.

“Maybe, Lady. I’ll ask her,” I mumbled. “Um, I have to go now. I’ll catch up with you later, okay?”

“All right, Lorne. Take care of yourself.”

“You too,” I said and hung up quickly.

I sat on the bed again. Just what I needed; another heart to heart with Kevin. Lady might have believed things were on the way to resolution with him. I had no resistance to the idea, as long as he would respect the boundaries of my relationship with Amanda. It was a longshot at best. I composed myself as best as I could and went down to the main floor to look for him. It would be a start.

I
went
to the kitchen to get my hands on a cup of coffee. I had to be alert and quick on my feet for this talk with Kevin.

“There you are!”

I turned at the sound of Kevin’s voice as he came out of the pantry beside the kitchen.

“Hi Kevin. I need to talk to you.”

“Same here. Let’s go to my office.”

“Sure,” I agreed.

I followed Kevin past the back stairs to his office. Armed with Lady’s advice, I mentally prepared for the uneasy dance of negotiation I was about to have. He let me pass through the office doorway and closed the door behind us, motioning for me to take a seat. That defiance in me was already on alert. This was going to be a battle, simply because he was used to telling me what to do, and I had grown used to resisting his bull-headed tendencies. It brought to mind Lady’s point that we were both controlling men, used to leading the pack, and her advice about picking my battles. I sat and crossed one leg over the other, resting my ankle on the opposite knee.

“I talked to Lady this morning,” I said.

Kevin nodded. “She mentioned she would phone you. What did she say?”

“That you were a colossal pain in the ass as a manager, and you treated her the same way.”

Kevin’s jaw clenched at the assessment, but then he let out a booming laugh. “Knowing Lady, that’s just how she said it too.”

I nodded. There just wasn’t enough zeal in me to muster a smile.

“I’ll get right to the point, Lorne,” he said, leaning forward to brace his elbows on his knees. “I know I’m hard on you, and I’ll be the first to admit that I have a very specific vision for your career. Nothing is beyond your reach. You have the raw talent and the natural charisma to do anything you want. I’m just afraid you’re going to squander it. That’s why I’ve had to be so inflexible—”

“And overbearing, arrogant, intrusive, meddlesome, obstructive—”

“Okay I’ll give you that. I was and I still am all those things. I didn’t want you to lose your spark, or your motivation, and end up kicking back like so many artists who hit it big right out the gate. This is one of the reasons I continued to book you for small events like the one in Greece, and Whiskey River in two days. It’s to keep you grounded, connected to the fans, and to propel you forward.”

I understood his perspective. I viewed myself as the least talented of my original band members, yet none of them went on to do much with their music after Kevin had kicked them out. They had gone from first hit single to twenty-four seven rock star party mode in no time at all. Still, he seemed a little harsh. I would like to believe I was more ambitious and driven than his fears seemed to allow.

“But, after talking with Lady, I’ve realized just how short life really is. I mean, in that car, anything could have happened. That crazy bitch had a knife against my throat, Lorne, and I—” his voice faltered slightly and I shifted in my seat, uncomfortable with his sudden break of emotion. “There was a moment where I wondered how you would remember me, if things had gone south.”

Besides my initial adrenaline-filled reaction the night Kevin was assaulted, I had not really thought much about it once we found out he was okay. Even now, I could not wrap my mind around how different things would be if he had been seriously hurt or worse, if the woman had taken his life.

Kevin continued. “I don’t want you to look back and resent me someday for wasting some of your most precious years, chasing after you to help reach the goals
I
set for you. Honestly, they were my dreams, and like any father…I wanted only the best for you. Maybe I was focused on my own selfish image of how your success should play out.”

I did not expect any of this. My chest tightened like a vice with all the emotion coursing through me. All of a sudden it was hard to remember why I had been so angry at him in the first place.

“I want to show you something,” he said. He picked up a large brown envelope on the small table between us, and he pulled a stack of papers from it. “This is our second contract, the one you signed when you were twenty-two. It’s a five-year contract, so only one year is left.”

I took the contract from his hand and glossed over it. A rush of memories came rising to the surface as I glanced over my sketchy signature. I had been so young…so much had changed since the first contract. My band had been replaced, I had recorded numerous albums, produced many music videos, performed in front of millions of fans, made hundreds of TV and radio appearances, and done countless media interviews. I had been on magazines and my face had been splashed all over the internet with pictures from photo shoots and the paparazzi. I had done a lot. Now, anything was possible.

It had been a wild ride, to say the least.

This was our second contract. Thinking back to when we first started out, I had no idea I could attain this level of achievement. I had figured on it being something of a vanity career. The kind of thing kids with parents in the industry did when they got bored. Mom or Dad would pay for their music to be professionally produced, even a music video or two, and they could call it a dream realized and move on to the next thing. When I had signed the first contract, I was still looking to party. To travel, hang with my buddies, and get some attention. If Kevin had not cut them from the band one by one, I would probably still be spending way too much time drinking, experimenting with every drug we could get our hands on, womanizing, brawling, and getting into a world of trouble.

The difference for me was I had always enjoyed being on stage. Singing and entertaining people made me feel useful, constructive, alive. Seeing fans so energized from my performances became just as important to me as delivering the music to them. My career was my foundation. And I had no doubt that without it, I would have no purpose.

Kevin took the contract from me. “Here’s what I’m proposing.”

I looked on in disbelief as he held it on one end and ripped it down the middle.

“I’ve wanted to do that for a long time, Lorne. You know why? A piece of paper should not dictate how family should be to each other. What I’m proposing is I’m not going to change much. I’m going to keep pushing you if you want me to continue as your manager. I will try to hear you out on the creative side, but I can’t promise you I’ll bend every time. The other option is…we can cut ties professionally, with no court battle, no issue of money, no hard feelings…we just go back to being Lorne and Pops.”

Lorne and Pops. I had not called him that for almost ten years. The name brought back only the fondest of memories of them pampering me like a treasured grandchild before my parents passed, and of all the time he and Lady spent helping me through their loss. Even through those dark days, he was Pops, and would find time in his crazy schedule to sit silently at the foot of my bed with Lady, almost every night he was in town. Just sitting there, letting me know they were there for me if I needed them.

He had become Kevin back when we signed the first contract. And Kevin was a hardass. Nothing like Pops. Until now, it never occurred to me that he had to fundamentally give up our personal relationship, and a part of himself, to become my manager and help me move in the right direction with my life.

Shit. I didn’t want to give up on him. I couldn’t. Not when he had been insanely protective and loyal to me. And now, with the reality that it could all be over so easily, panic jolted through me.

“Kevin, I never wanted to give up on my music. I love this business. And…I want you to be the one helping me. You’ve gotten me this far, and you can help me get even farther.”

“I know,” Kevin said. “That’s what I’ve been trying to get you to see all along. But there’s so much more to it, Lorne. This tour is really the beginning of some unimaginable leaps in your career. And being asked to perform at the RHVAs…I mean, that’s huge! That did not happen for Lady until over twenty years of pushing the boundaries in punk rock. I want you to see. You didn’t get that offer because of who your parents were, or because of Lady or me. They want you, because of
you
. And with that, comes choice. You can cross into acting, collaborate with any artist out there with just a phone call, or choose where you tour next. You can have anything you want now.”

I swallowed hard to keep from any emotional reaction, still slightly in awe of the ripped contract papers. “I understand that now. I just need to see myself in the music we put out. There are some creative changes that need to happen.”

He looked off in the distance, pensive. “We can discuss it after the tour is over. Right now, your fans who have paid to see you are expecting a certain type of performance. It’s your obligation to give them what they want.”

“I agree. All right. But after the tour, I need a say on the lyrics and tone of what we put out.”

“Good,” Kevin said. He got off his chair and clapped his hands, seeming to conclude the meeting. I was not quite finished, but stood up as well. He smiled and reached out to shake my hand. “Partners?”

“Partners,” I agreed. “And there’s one more thing.”

I needed to make some headway where Amanda was concerned.

“Let me guess.” He leaned back on the edge of his office table. “Amanda, right?”

“Yes.”

“Do you love her?”

“Um…We’re getting to know each other. I care about her a lot.”

“Don’t try to deny it, Lorne. You cared about her long before she got here.”

I reared back in my seat, speechless.

“It took me some time, but I figured it out. That’s the big fight you snuck out with Charles to watch. You think I don’t remember? He drove you to Vegas to watch her fight. She lost, and you were broken up about it for a while. At the time, I just thought you were a fan, like any sports buff who chattered on and on about their favorite athlete. I never made the connection when you suggested we hire her. Something just never added up, Lorne. Now I know. And at the moment, you’re in love with her.”

Busted. Fuck.

He must have read the terror or dread on my face, because he asked, “Wait a minute. Does she even know you hired her because you’re a love-sick, crazy, obsessed fan yourself?”

I could not react fast enough. Words refused to make their way from my distressed brain to my speechless, tongue-tied mouth.

“Fuck. She doesn’t, does she? If you weren’t my son, I’d laugh at the irony. Well, Lorne, let me be the first to say, you’ve romantically screwed yourself up the ass.”

“I meant to tell her,” I finally got out. “I never got the chance…You can’t tell her about this, Kevin!”

He laughed. “Me? I have no time for games, Lorne. You should know that by now. But if you love her, you need to tell her. And here’s the kicker, son. Now there’s something more important than telling her. If you care about her, you need to get her out of harm’s way. As sexist as this is going to sound, real men
never
put their women in danger. She could be the female incarnation of Chuck Norris, and still, as the man who loves her, you
cannot
put her in the line of fire.”

God, I hated that he was right. He echoed every sentiment that had been running around my mind since the night Amanda got stabbed with the scissors. What kind of man was I to endanger the person I claimed to care about, on top of hiding the truth from her?

“Can you wait until after the tour to fall in love?” Kevin asked. “Because on top of all that, you’re a distraction to each other right now when you’re both supposed to be on top of your games. Either wait, or forget about the bodyguard thing and make her your girlfriend. But take it from me. You can’t have both. Ultimately, she can’t protect you and be your woman at the same time.”

Even with all the sense he made, I rebutted with, “Says the man who managed his wife’s career for almost two decades.”

“It’s not the same.”

“Explain.”

He looked out the window, seeming contemplative. “I made a lot of sacrifices with Lady, Lorne. This business could have easily torn us apart. I don’t want that for you.” He turned his head to look directly at me. “And are you honestly going to stand there and tell me you like the idea of turning the woman you love into a human shield to protect you?”

Shit. He had a point.

“Look, here’s what I’m willing to do. I’ll add more people to the team, just as you and Fred recommended. That means you’ll have a few more bodyguards. Fred still wants her to continue her role as they investigate, so I won’t come in the way of that. Beyond that, son, you have the reins.”

He walked past me and patted me on the shoulder before leaving the room.