Place Your Betts (The Marilyns) (17 page)

“Oh.” Her confident smile crumbled. “I see.” She jumped up and turned her back on him. “Looks like I wasted a trip. See you around.”

Kaitlin raced to the front door.

Why did she sound so sad?

Tom followed close on her heels and grabbed the door handle before she could. Her head was down, and she didn’t look at him.

“I’ll walk you to your car.” Tom opened the front door. The manners were for him, not her.

“Don’t bother. I’m fine.” Kaitlin’s fingers brushed her cheek. “Bye.” Her voice hitched, and she kept her head down as her fingers swiped across her cheek again. She stepped outside.

Were those tears? Was she crying?

His palms began to sweat. Had he made her cry? Usually her tears were a big production involving lots of tissues and making sure the rest of the world knew, but today Kaitlin was different. Softer…not so high and mighty.

Was it possible he’d hurt her feelings? He studied her tear tracks; they were real. He felt like the world’s biggest asshole. Tom caught up to her and touched her shoulder. Nerves rolled around his stomach. What if this really was some sort of joke? He’d never live it down. But if he’d hurt her, he had to make it right.

He took a deep breath. “How about dinner and a movie?”

Kaitlin looked up at him, her eyes the color of bluebonnets after a spring rain. “I thought you didn’t like me.”

“I never said that. I’m disappointed in you and a little angry that you’d consider staying with Lance after he cheated—”

“I told you. Lance is history.” Kaitlin lifted her chin and glared at Tom.

“Then going out with me shouldn’t be a problem. Tonight, dinner and a movie.” His heart beat so fast he was sure she could feel it vibrating from a foot away.

Kaitlin smiled. “Love to. I thought you’d never ask. What time?”

Tom’s whole world turned perfect. This was a hundred Christmases and birthdays all rolled into one. “I don’t…” He shook his head and laughed. “I don’t even know what’s playing.”

“Why don’t you pick me up at six?” Kaitlin opened her car door. “Do you like Chinese food?”

“I guess.” Tom couldn’t stop smiling. He’d never tasted Chinese food in his life because he and his dad ate mainly fast food burgers or frozen dinners, but Tom would scarf down road kill if that’s what it took.

Kaitlin stood on her tiptoes and kissed him on the cheek. She smelled like lemons and honeysuckle. Her tank top gaped open, and the tops of her breasts and most of her red bra peeked out. Tom didn’t look away, and he absolutely couldn’t move because the world’s biggest hard-on throbbed between his legs. With his hands crossed in front of his jeans, he hoped she couldn’t tell.

“I’ll see you at six.” Kaitlin ducked into the car, started the engine, and turned around.

Tom waved until he could no longer see the car. He had a date with the hottest girl in school. Far and away, this was his best day.

***

Betts pressed end on her cell, laid it on her kitchen table, and rubbed her temples. She’d spent two solid hours on the phone trying to find a recording studio close enough that she wouldn’t have to leave Tom in order to finish
City Girl
. The best she could do was Dallas, and that was two hours away. A four-hour commute every day. She folded her arms on the table and laid her head on them. How would she have time for Tom? He was important, and she made a point to be here when he got home from school. Four hours in a car would seriously cut into her family time, and she’d lose the ground she’d gained with him. The album wasn’t worth it…. Her career wasn’t worth it. Tom was the only thing that mattered.

She stood and stretched. It was way too early to get ready for her…whatever with Gabe. Date wasn’t the right word: it was more like scheduled fornication. That was, if he had the backbone to show up. Once they got the physical attraction out of the way, they could form some sort of an amicable relationship for Tom’s sake. In her mind, there was no other way around the sexual attraction but to forge right on through it. It would take once, two times tops, and she and Gabe could move on in a rational manner. It was very clinical and logical and expedient. Betts had never been clinical, logical, or expedient. In fact, the only person she knew who qualified for all three was Spock. Give her a pair of pointy ears and weird eyebrows and call her Vulcan because logic was coming in handy.

She picked up her phone and called Lucky. It went straight to voice mail. Betts couldn’t call Charlie because she went ballistic at the mention of Gabe so she would definitely try to talk Betts out of sleeping with him. She put the phone down. She was on her own.

If she looked at Gabe objectively, he was a good father, and he’d let Tom work for her. She had to admit that if the shoe had been on the other foot, she wouldn’t have let Gabe near Tom.

A knock sounded at her door. Betts leaned over and raised the blinds.

Tom stood on her front steps holding something and shifting his weight from foot to foot.

He was nervous. Something was wrong.

She jumped up and pushed the button to open the door.

“Betts, you gotta help me.”

“What’s wrong?” Betts flew down the steps and landed on the grass while she looked him over.

Tom was sweating bullets and practically vibrated with tension. His color was high, and sweat poured down his face. Was he sick? Did he have fever? It took all she had not to feel his forehead. “Are you okay?”

“I have a date with Kaitlin, and I don’t know what to wear.” He held up an ugly green-and-brown tie. “Think this is too much?”

Wardrobe questions? Thank God. Betts took a deep breath and waited for the jackrabbit pounding of her pulse to slow down.

“Way too much.” She grabbed the tie and stuffed it into her jeans pocket. Later, she would burn it and save the world some ugliness. “Let’s go check out your wardrobe.”

“I’m so nervous. What if I say the wrong thing?” Tom opened the front door and let her walk in first.

“You’ll be fine. Just get her talking about herself.”

Gabe sat on the sofa reading the newspaper. He rustled it closed and folded it in half. On his nose sat a pair of horn-rimmed reading glasses.

Age looked good on him. She sucked on her top lip. If things had been different, would this have been her life? Would the glasses have been her idea? One morning, would she have noticed him struggling to read a magazine article and suggested he needed to get his eyes checked? Would they have gone to the doctor together and spent an afternoon laughing as he tried on every frame? Regret was an emotion with which she was fast becoming acquainted. She swallowed the what-ifs. “Like the glasses.”

Gabe whipped them off and tossed them on the small, rectangular coffee table. “Only need them for reading. What brings you to our humble abode?”

She missed the glasses.

A tiny seed of longing took root in her soul. She wanted this life, full of mundane memories, because it was real and mattered and was permanent. Fame and fortune were a fleeting illusion. She wanted the quiet, cozy, simple life of belonging to a husband and son.

“She’s helping me.” Tom grabbed her arm and pulled her into his room.

It was the first touch that Tom had initiated. His palm was warm and a little sweaty against her skin. If she could, she would tattoo that feeling on her heart.

“This is my backup plan.” Tom picked up a pair of dress khakis and a red button-down with so much starch it looked like a poster board cutout of a shirt. “What do you think?”

“That looks fine.” Betts nodded. He wanted so little, but she wanted to give him so much. “Are you wearing boots?”

Tom stumbled over his single bed in his haste to get to the closet. The bed was made, and the room was orderly but well used. “I was gonna wear these.”

He handed over a very worn but recently shined pair of brown work boots.

Why hadn’t she thought to take him shopping? Borderline disreputable boots—no self-respecting mother would let her son tromp around in those. Betts forced a broad smile. Gabe had made a comfortable home for her son. No matter how he’d felt about her, he loved Tom. The last little bit of animosity for Gabe that had protected her heart melted away. “Those are fine. The outfit is perfect. She’ll be very impressed.”

“You think?” Tom wiped his palms on his thighs.

Betts sat on the end of the bed. “She’s probably nervous too.”

“Really?”

“I guarantee it.” Betts patted the spot beside her. She hadn’t given him much, but she could try some piece of mind. “Come, sit, relax.”

Tom lowered his lanky frame down next to her. “I’ve never… I mean, I don’t know what to do.”

“Be yourself. Kaitlin likes you—”

“Are you sure?” Tom’s right knee vibrated like it was marking time until he could get up and pace some more. Betts had been known to pace a time or two. He got that from her. That was soothing on a level she didn’t know she had. He was hers even if he never knew it.

“She drove all the way out here and pretended to need something. Trust me. Kaitlin is interested. Very interested. All you have to do tonight is be yourself.”

“But she’s beautiful, smart, and funny. I’m just”—his Adam’s apple bobbed up and down—“me.”

“I think you’re cool.” Betts sucked on the inside of her cheek. “I don’t wanna toot my own horn, but I’m pretty damn cool.”

Tom grinned. “You’re famous.”

“You’re gonna do fine.” Betts stood and dug in her front pocket and pulled out a handful of twenties. It wasn’t a grand gesture of love; he wouldn’t take that yet, so she would start small. “Here’s your first week’s salary.”

“Really?” Tom’s eyes were the size of saucers. “Thanks.”

“Take your girl out for a nice dinner and have a great time.” She reached into her other pocket. “Here are the keys to the Mustang. I don’t want you getting stranded on FM 449.”

The infamous parking spot—chances were, he’d been conceived on that lonely stretch of road. Christ. She shuddered. That’s the last thing they needed.

Awe washed over his face. “I’ll take real good care of it. I promise.”

“Son, that is the least of my worries.” Betts pulled him into a one-armed hug. “Be safe and have a wonderful time. Give Kaitlin a kiss from me.”

The impulse to hover and preen was too close for comfort, so Betts let go and stepped back.

Tom’s face turned tomato red. “I’m gonna try.”

“That’s my boy.”

And he was, really was…hers.

Betts stepped toward the door.

“Betts,” Tom said.

She turned around. “Yes?”

“Thanks.”

Joy just about squeezed her throat shut. All she could do was nod and stare at him. He was almost grown, but the little boy peeked out especially around the eyes. Had they crinkled in excitement on the first day of kindergarten or been soulful with courageous resolve? Guilt clawed at her stomach like a cat fluffing up a pillow so it could settle in for a while. Betts swallowed. If she’d stood up to Gigi, Betts would have held his hand on the first day. Her cowardice had cost her the collection of moments that made up Tom’s life. One day soon, she would pull him in a tight hug and beg forgiveness, but for now, she would content herself with glimpses of the boy that had been.

“What’s for supper?” Gabe sat on the sofa, one white-tube-sock-covered foot propped on the opposite knee.

Betts did a double take. It was a cross-section of normality. Again, this could have been her life. This was too much and oddly not enough.

Her iPhone vibrated in her back pocket. Thankful for the distraction, she whipped it out, turned her back on Gabe, and answered it.

“Baby doll, you’re a genius.” Honey Jamison’s rich alto voice could sound manly when she was angry or sultry when she wasn’t. Now, it was sultry. “Love, love, love the changes to
City Girl
. You make being a music agent so easy.”

“Least I can do.” Betts massaged the rigid muscles at the back of her neck. Honey always started out with the sugarcoating to sweeten the lethal blow.

“The label wants the tracks not only cut but mixed and perfect by the end of next week for the download debut.” Honey sighed like she knew she was asking the impossible but she expected miracles to happen anyway. “Life in the digital-download-it-now-or-else age isn’t like the old days when fans were willing to wait. It’s now or never.”

Did she think Betts didn’t know this? In order to get the song ready, she would have to return to New Orleans today, work her tail off for the next two weeks, and possibly lose the ground she’d gained with Tom. She shook her head. It wasn’t worth it.

“Tell me that’s not a problem.” Honey’s casual tone had turned all business. “They’re talking about fining you every day it’s late.”

The threat hadn’t even been subtle.

Betts’s blood pressure shot through the roof, and a muscle ticked in her jaw. How dare her record label threaten her? “I wasn’t the one who leaked to CMT that my new single was ready.”

“I know, but they’re expecting it.” Honey’s voice cracked. “Vinny’s serious about fining you. He’s mad as hell.”

Nobody threatened Betts Monroe. Her career just officially went on hiatus.

Betts squared her shoulders and gripped the phone so tightly it was a wonder it didn’t break in half. “Tell Vinny that he can have the songs when I finish them.”

Betts’s hands shook. She’d never been so much as a minute late with anything, she was always professional, and her work was perfect. And now, they had the gall to threaten her. Over her dead body. “I own a third of that record label, and I agreed to hire him because his father’s a good friend of mine. Tell that little shit if he ever threatens me again, I’ll fire his ass. Got it?” Betts set her jaw. The nerve of that little pissant. “On second thought, I’ll tell him myself.”

“Wait. Let me—”

“And another thing…” Betts was surfing the wave of rage. “I’m taking some time off. The tour dates aren’t set in stone, so move them back six months and give the band a bonus to cover the delay. Cut any personal appearances that aren’t tied to a charity, and have Chase and Gary audition replacement lead guitarists.”

“Anything…just let me handle it.” Honey sounded desperate. “What’s the reason?”