California Dream (15 page)

It was getting harder and harder to stave off the boredom. At first, with the newness of her surroundings, Lee kept herself busy sightseeing and acclimating herself to her new home. By now, she had to admit she was bored stiff. She could only sit in the sun for so many hours, and there was really only so much shopping a girl could do. Roddy had yet to complain about the bills, but she still felt guilty. Lee supposed she could draw her own map of the Los Angeles basin from the hundreds of miles she had put on her car driving aimlessly around it. She went to lunch with people she barely knew and took tennis lessons, even though she wasn’t all that fond of tennis.

It was easy to forget how mundane her days were when Roddy came home at night, though. When they were together, she forgot everything else and simply basked in her happiness. Nothing seemed all that bad when he held her in his arms. In fact, everything seemed worth it when they were together.

That the perfect little bubble popped every morning when Roddy left was something Lee knew she couldn’t hold off facing forever. That day in particular, the loneliness and boredom were particularly crushing, and it made her start to think.

She had to find a purpose in life, aside from loving Roddy O’Neill. Lee was afraid to divulge the depth of her feelings to him, especially after last night, but she could admit them to herself. What she did not want to think about was that it might not be enough to keep them together. She was not really happy living in his shadow, and needed something of her own to strive for. Several ideas were examined and rejected, and in the end, Lee decided to go shopping again and worry about it tomorrow. Sometimes, it was better not to upset the apple cart, and since Roddy had stomped out on her the night before, this was definitely of those times.

Chapter fourteen

Lee’s life soon became as monotonous as the television schedule she followed. She slept as late as possible every day to shorten the hours between the time she awoke and the time Roddy came home. When she awakened, it was to reach immediately for the remote control to watch a few hours of brainless game shows and sitcom reruns. Once she grew bored with inactivity, Lee would roll out of bed to don one of her many colorful swimsuits and then spend several hours swimming laps or lying by the pool. By the time that began to wear, Lee went back into the house to change clothes, no longer taking note of the beauty of Roddy’s marble staircase or the old world art he collected. Dressed in a daytime outfit of painted-on jeans and a tee-shirt, Lee then headed out to drive around LA. A couple times a week, she broke up the routine by having lunch or shopping with one of her new friends, but most of her time was spent in solitude.

Everything changed the moment Roddy came home every day. He always looked so good to her, and she enjoyed the way the weariness seemed to seep out of him whenever they laid eyes on each other. His hair was usually a mess from the number of times he ran his hands through it, and his jeans were always creased and smudged, but no matter what, he always looked wonderful.

Roddy enjoyed hanging out at home with Lee, but he also liked to take her out. She had been on his arm at some of the hottest LA nightclubs, where their picture never failed to be snapped at least once. He also took her to movie premieres, Hollywood parties, and other dizzying social events.

And yet, Lee felt more and more restless by the day. No matter how much fun she and Roddy had together, all the hours she spent alone threatened to cave in on her.

One afternoon, while lying idly by the pool, she decided she’d had enough. She simply was not cut out to do nothing. She needed something to do, a goal to reach for, a reason to get out of bed every day. Some ideas had occurred to her that she wanted to discuss with Roddy, but Lee was not yet ready to make sweeping changes that might undermine what little security she had. Instead, she decided to start with something small and work her way up.

She had made one real friend in Los Angeles, and Lee decided to call her and see if she could find a partner in crime. Helene was the girlfriend of the lead guitarist of a popular LA band called Street Trash. Helene, or Hell, as she was called most often, was close to Lee’s age and seemed to have a working brain in her head, so it was natural she and Lee developed a friendship. Lee realized Helene might not like her idea, but then again, it was just silly and off-the-wall enough that she might love it.

“Hey, Lee! Glad you called,” Helene enthusiastically answered her phone. “I was thinking about checking out a new shop on Melrose and thought you might want to come along.”

“I want to keep it a secret,” Lee suggested. “By this time, I think I’ve read every book ever published and I need something besides shopping to keep me busy. I might as well learn a new skill.”

“I just dropped a membership, Helene. I was taking tennis lessons, and I was so bad it was just a waste of money. Besides, I’m not into the whole clubby social climbing and backstabbing thing.”

“Probably the main reason you’ll never really be a success in this town,” Helene joked. She got a huge kick out of social climbing and backstabbing, proclaiming it better than television.

“So,” Lee pushed, “are you up for guitar lessons or not? I can go by myself, but I thought it would be more fun to do it with a friend.”

“Isn’t everything?” Helene gave a quick laugh. “Of course I’m up for it. I can’t let you become the next big musician without me.”

From that day forward, Lee and Helene took guitar lessons twice a week. To her surprise, Lee was not quickly bored with it, as she was with everything else she tried. To her amazement, she actually had some aptitude and was having fun with her lessons. Even when Helene dropped out after a few weeks, Lee kept at it.

It wasn’t really enough to pull her out of her rut, but at least Lee wasn’t lying in bed for hours every morning watching mindless television. Learning the guitar alleviated her boredom somewhat, though she still felt pangs of loneliness. She hoped those would go away as she opened up new parts of her life, and had a vision in her head of one day being able to jam with Roddy when she was good enough. He still sang for her sometimes when he wanted her to hear a new song he was working on, and she hoped he would be pleased that they could do even more together now that she was learning the guitar.

For the time being, though, she kept her lessons a secret. She wasn’t very confident in her abilities yet, and wanted to stay quiet until she was a bit more skilled. Lee knew she would never attain Eddie’s level of expertise, because few did, but she wanted to at least be competent. It was easy to indulge her new hobby with the old guitars Roddy left lying around the house. Lee borrowed one for her lessons and practice, and simply made sure she was done and the guitar put back where she found it before he came home at night.



Roddy was in a foul mood. Nothing had gone right that day. It was the day they were supposed to start filming the new video, but fate had decided otherwise. Not one, but three lights had blown within the first fifteen minutes of the shoot. Then, one of the amps refused to work and they had to wait an hour for a suitable replacement. When they were all ready to start filming again, Roddy couldn’t find the right bandanna and refused to use a substitute. They wasted more time while three production assistants searched high and low for it, finally finding it at the bottom of a pile of other bandannas. The rest of the band was thoroughly irritated with Roddy by then, but he didn’t care. He was a perfectionist, and everything had to be just right.

When everything finally fell into place, it suddenly got worse again. Tempers were already high when the dancer who had been chosen by the record company came prancing out onto the set. It was someone else’s job to cast dancers and Roddy had never seen her before, so he lost it when she appeared looking like Lee’s evil twin. Her hair had been dyed to the exact same shade as Lee’s, and it was teased all over her head to fall into a sea of disorganized curls down her back. Her makeup was overdone and her dress would have fit on a Barbie doll.

Roddy had been talking to Mike about a couple fine points, but he stopped mid-phrase and threw a clipboard at the smiling record company executive who was foolhardy enough to be on the set that day.

“Oh, no she’s not!” Roddy clenched his fists and took a couple of steps toward the unfortunate man. “When did I ask for a dancer who looks like my girlfriend on crack?”

“Hey!” the dancer protested, only to be ignored.

“We thought since your girlfriend appears in so many photos with you that it would be good for the video.” The executive wore an earnest expression but looked ready to run away.

“See how good it is for the video when I’m not in it!” Roddy snarled. “I’m not having this bimbo in my video. She looks like Lee turning tricks.”

“Bully for you. Use it to get into someone else’s video,” Roddy muttered, already bored with the situation. “You’re not going to be in mine.”

He turned on his heel and stomped off to his trailer. He knew he would get his way and the new dancer would not only not look exactly like Lee, she would bear no resemblance to his girlfriend whatsoever. The record company would probably provide a brunette with blue eyes and a voluptuous figure.

Roddy smiled. He knew his record company as well as they knew him. “Would you mind telling me how we wound up with the other girl?”

“You never show up for the auditions,” Eddie said with a shrug, “and the rest of us thought you might like her, so she was hired.”

Roddy had calmed down since his outburst, but he was still not in the mood to be placid and reasonable. He snapped at everybody and reduced the new dancer to tears twice when she made mistakes, but they got the video shot.

When the interminable day was finally over, Roddy went back to his trailer to change out of his costume and back into his everyday clothes, which weren’t all that much different. He waved goodbye to his grateful band members and made a beeline for his car, glad to leave the video set behind and get back home to his sweet, sane Lee.

It still wasn’t his day. Halfway home, his favorite Led Zeppelin CD started skipping, and he wound up flinging it out the window in frustration when he couldn’t get it to work right. When he stomped on the gas in frustration, he picked up a tail, and got a speeding ticket on top of everything else. The cop was unimpressed with who he was, and Roddy was in a rare mood by the time he finally got home.



Lee hoped Roddy remembered they were supposed to be present at the grand opening of a record store that evening. She had already been dressed for an hour, and still there was no sign of him. She knew the band was filming a video that day, and that filming was an unpredictable process, so rather than worrying she decided to simply relax and kill the time.

It was a good opportunity to practice a new song she had been learning on the guitar. She was very close to letting Roddy in on her new secret hobby, so she had been practicing twice as much as usual over the last few days in an effort to impress him. She took the guitar that was usually leaning up against their bedroom wall and sat by a chair in front of the window to immerse herself in the music she was so certain would bring them closer together, and waited for Roddy to come home.

Chapter fifteen

Roddy trudged up the steps, his booted feet silent on the thick carpet runner. Now that he was home and much calmer, he felt worn out. He needed a nice, hot shower and a long nap, but wouldn’t you know it, he was supposed to open a record store that evening. At the moment, he would have fired someone over it if he could, but knew he had only himself to blame.

Thank God he had Lee to keep him sane, he thought as a smile began to play at the corners of his mouth. She always knew just how to make him feel better, even on days like this when his schedule seemed to stretch on forever.

He stopped when he heard noise coming from his bedroom. It sounded like an acoustic guitar. He wondered if Eddie had beaten him home and was out by the pool, with the sound drifting in through the windows. But that wasn’t likely since he knew Eddie had other plans that night. Besides, whoever was playing the guitar lacked Eddie’s practiced skill. Curious, as well as perturbed, Roddy silently advanced on his bedroom door and, with a shove, sent it crashing against the wall, hoping to startle the guitar player.

It worked. Lee nearly jumped out of her skin and almost dropped the guitar.

Roddy froze in his tracks. Of all the scenarios he had imagined, he hadn’t thought he would find Lee playing the guitar. He didn’t even know she could play.

He kicked the door shut and advanced on her, his temper slipping again. “You
what?
Why?”

“I needed something to do,” was her simple answer. Her posture was defensive and she stared him right in the eye. “I wanted to learn the guitar so I could—”

“So you could start your own little band and get your picture in the paper without me?” he cut her off in a voice laced with derision.

For a moment, she simply stared at him in open-mouthed disbelief. Then she visibly lost her temper and advanced on him.

“Why shouldn’t I?” she spat, venom in every word. “Are you the only one who’s allowed a career around here? Am I supposed to spend the rest of my life shopping and waiting for you to show up?”

Her words hit home, so he responded with angry bluster. “I see. I guess I’ve been pretty convenient for you all this time. Being linked with my name was just your first step.”

She snorted and let loose an ugly laugh. “My name isn’t linked with yours, Roddy. You don’t make commitments, remember?”

“Maybe I just don’t make them with users,” he heard himself say, even knowing full well it wasn’t a fair accusation. Lee didn’t give a damn about his money or fame, but he had to lash out at her somehow.

Lee reached him in three long strides, fire and brimstone in her eyes. “Explain to me how I’ve used you, Roddy.”

A tiny voice in his brain screamed at him to shut up, but he ignored it. Instead, his arm swept the room in a broad gesture.

“Explain to me how you’re not,” he countered. “How much stuff did you bring with you when you came? A suitcase? You didn’t even have a car when I met you.”

Hurt leapt into her eyes before they narrowed to slits. “You bastard. I didn’t ask you for anything. I didn’t
want
anything! You made me take it!”

He looked away and ran a hand through his hair before turning to regard her again. “It sure didn’t seem like it was all that hard for you, Lee. You sure adjusted fast.”

Roddy was used to tears and wailing from women, but the angrier she got, the more quiet Lee became.

“Yes, I did.” Her voice was so soft he barely heard her. “Because being with you was important to me. I didn’t have much when I met you, Roddy, but it was all mine. And I gave it up for you.”

His smile was snide. “Such a sacrifice. I guess I should be grateful.”

Lee never did anything like other women, and that day was no exception. Her mouth worked for a second, and then she gave up on the argument and just punched him in the jaw. She hit him so hard he nearly went down. He stood there and rubbed his face in disbelief while she held him immobile with a stony glare.

“I don’t know what happened to you today, and I don’t care,” she hissed through her teeth. “Because from this moment forward, I’m going to start caring about
me
again. I need a life and living in your shadow isn’t it! You think it’s okay that you’re out living your dreams while I sit and wait for you, but I’ve got news for you, Roddy. It isn’t. I’m so bored I’m losing my mind, and I haven’t stuck it out for shopping I don’t care about or a stupid car. I stayed here because I love you.”

Her bottom lip quivered and she turned and grabbed her purse off the floor before stomping out the door and slamming it shut behind her.

“I love you, too,” Roddy finally admitted, but it was too late. She was already on the other side of the door.

He ran a hand over his sore jaw again and shook his head at his own stupidity. He wasn’t sure what had gotten into him, or why he had said the terrible, hurtful things that passed his lips. He didn’t mean any of them. If he wanted to really think about it, he knew he had done it because he was scared of her and the power she held over him. He was frightened of the way she made him feel. He knew what he offered her was not enough, but was terrified to open his heart and give her more.

How could he ever have thought it would last? Why would it when he couldn’t even make her any promises? He knew if his money really mattered to her, that would have been enough, but it wasn’t. Fame wasn’t part of her program, either. She had made a number of important contacts around LA, but she didn’t make use of any of them. She only wanted to be with him, and he knew it.

Now that she had stormed away, he suddenly looked at their relationship from a new perspective. Maybe opening his heart a little more wouldn’t kill him. Truthfully, though he hadn’t been willing to admit it even to himself, she already owned his heart. He just couldn’t let her know.

He wondered why it was so hard to admit he loved her, even to himself, and didn’t like the answers. He was a rock star, and women threw themselves at him. Falling in love with one woman and making a commitment to her would mean giving up his special status and acting like a regular guy, and Roddy O’Neill held himself above that.

What a moron.

Almost too late, he realized just how foolish he was. None of the hundreds of women who had visited his dressing room meant a thing, but Lee was his salvation. He realized how bored and dissatisfied he had been with everything until she came along, and then he just took her for granted.

Well, it wasn’t too late. He would go after her and tell her he loved her, and even offer her a future. It made him grit his teeth, but he vowed he would even help her start a music career if that was what she wanted. Whatever made her happy was worth it.

He strode over to the bedroom door and flung it open, but the house was quiet.

“Lee!” he yelled.

The house sounded even quieter after his outburst. Scowling, Roddy left the bedroom and quickly searched every room on the second floor, but all were empty. His perusal of the first floor had the same result. By the time he went outside to check the back yard, his heart was slamming against his ribs. Lee wasn’t there. He felt a glimmer of hope when he remembered to check the garage, but became alarmed again when he found her car there, yet no sign of Lee.

Roddy slumped and dragged his feet as he went back to the house. He went straight to the game room and poured a stiff drink before picking up the phone to dial Eddie.

Eddie sighed. “It had to happen sooner or later. I can’t believe you didn’t mess it up before this. That woman doesn’t take crap from anybody.”

“Yeah, well I’m glad you’re so impressed,” Roddy grumbled. “This is serious. I said some nasty stuff and she even hit me before she left.”

“She slapped you?” Eddie was incredulous. Obviously, he cared more about the juicy details than Roddy’s predicament.

“She punched me,” Roddy corrected, rubbing his jaw again. The woman had a mean right hook.

“She
punched
you?” Eddie erupted into gales of laughter. “Oh, man, I’d have paid to see that!”

“I’ll come and get you,” Eddie said on a sigh. “You can’t not go. I’ll call Helene and ask her to wait at your house until Lee gets there. They can talk trash about you until we get back.”

“Who’s Helene?” Roddy wondered, suddenly feeling like I heel for not knowing. Apparently, there was a lot about Lee he had ignored.

Eddie’s tone was a bit accusatory. “She’s Lee’s best friend in LA.”

“Can’t you just do the promo without me so I can wait for Lee?”

“No,” Eddie said firmly. “You promised them Roddy O’Neill, and they expect Roddy O’Neill. Unless you want to see stories about your fight in the tabloids tomorrow. You know those reporters are psychic sometimes.”



Roddy looked like hell, in Eddie’s opinion. He supposed it stood to reason, after Roddy knocked back half a bottle of scotch. His pants were fine but his shirt looked slept in, his eyes were bloodshot, and his hair was a mess.

Feeling like Roddy’s mother, Eddie ushered him upstairs to change his shirt, comb his hair and get a bandanna in place, and find a nice, dark pair of sunglasses to hide his eyes. Finally satisfied, he propelled Roddy down to his Mercedes, which had a pouting girl in the backseat.

The record store opening was tedious, and Eddie gritted his teeth through the whole thing. An absolute mob of girls was in attendance, all screaming, “We love you!” to both Roddy and Eddie. Roddy seemed even more annoyed than Eddie that his picture was taken more than ever, but Roddy was alone for once, and he looked like hell. That was far more interesting to the gathered paparazzi than everyday, pretty boy Eddie.

After what felt like an eternity, the festivities were over and they could finally leave. Eddie was only too glad to see the last of Roddy, who had been a royal pain in the ass all night long. When he wasn’t leering and making loud, inappropriate comments, he moped and stared off into space.

Eddie wasn’t sure if it was a good idea to leave Roddy alone when he dropped him off, but he had never been so anxious to get away from his best friend.



Helene sniffed. “Eddie said you were pretty upset. I’m glad. You must have messed up pretty bad if she left you. I hope she comes back.”

Helene’s words were not reassuring, and Roddy gulped. “I do, too.”

Her expression softened somewhat as Helene opened a can of soda and took a sip. “Look, I don’t want to get in the middle of your business, but maybe I can help. Maybe I can find her and talk to her or something. But it would help if you told me what’s going on.”

Roddy sank onto a barstool at the kitchen counter and stared at a spot on the wall for several seconds before he spoke again. “I said some really dumb things about her being with me for my money and my stuff.”

Helene just laughed. “That’s a good one. I shop with her a lot, and she’s always talking about how this or that would look good with what you wear. It’s always about you with her. She could probably go out and buy herself some jewelry or some other investments for the future, but I don’t think her mind works that way.”

“I know,” he agreed as he ran a hand through his hair for the umpteenth time that day. “I didn’t mean any of what I said. I had a bad day that just kept getting worse and worse, and then I came home and found her playing the guitar. I didn’t even know she could play.”

Helene took another sip from her can. “She just started taking lessons not long ago. She was bored and wanted to find something useful to do, and figured you guys could jam together if she learned the guitar.”

“So she’s not getting into a band?”

The look Helene fixed him with made him feel an inch tall. “Lee in a band? Roddy, you’re so stupid.”

Apparently, there was another woman who wasn’t in awe of him, but Roddy was in no mood to appreciate it that night. He just wanted to find Lee and bring her home.

“What’s so stupid about that? Everyone in LA has an angle.”

“What makes you think Lee would ever want to be in a band?” Helene countered. “She had just barely started getting used to having her picture taken with you. That was all the publicity she needed. She liked being a librarian, you know. And she liked that it made her different from everyone else around here. Besides, if Lee wanted to be in a band, don’t you think she would have talked to you about it? Who’s more connected than you?”