Unstoppable (Fierce) (14 page)

As had the portable massage unit she had sent along with me. It was tiny enough to fit in my purse, and I could act
ually wear it while out and about. I thought about putting it during the flight, especially after the turbulence. But I would have had to lift up my shirt to affix the pads to my back, and I didn’t want to draw that much attention to my size by baring any unnecessary skin.

I even made sure Eddie wasn
’t looking before I attached it while in bed.

She texted back that she had ordered me a massage during our stay, and reminded me to do my stretching exercises. “
Don’t push yourself
,” she advised, and I could almost see the stern look on her face.

“
Yes, Mom
,” I wrote back with a grin.

I scrolled through my other messages, but Jace had sent me nothing new. Since these were his old stomping grounds, I knew that
his schedule was probably chock-full of family and friends that he hadn’t been able to see much since he got cast for
Fierce
. His family lived just outside of the Metroplex, so he would likely not even make it to Dallas proper until rehearsals on Wednesday afternoon.

Shelby, likewise, had been fairly quiet. I hadn’t talked to her yet about the kiss, but I was eager to probe and get her side of the story. As far as I knew, she was happily in love and believed that her dreams were all coming true. This did not sound like a person who had been rejected when she made a bold advance toward something more.

I decided to text her. “
Are you in town
?”

She didn’t answer right away, which concerned me. That girl had her phone permanently affixed to her hands. She was a lightning-fast
texter who never let a message go unanswered for more than a minute.

What was she doing? And who was she doing it with?

Finally, nearly ten minutes later, she finally responded. “
Not exactly
.”

“
What does that mean
?”

This time her response was much quicker. “
I’m in Weatherford
.”

I gulped what felt like a boulder down my throat. Weatherford was where Jace grew up, and where his mother still lived. “
Oh
?” was all I could say.

“
Jace’s mother insisted I stay with them instead of a lonely hotel. We’ll talk later. It’s family game night
!”

I could hear her cheerful voice in her words. It made me want to punch her right in her smiley face emoticon.

I went back to Jace’s last message. It was the one that asked me to come early to meet his mother. If I hadn’t, would I be the one enjoying family game night in Weatherford?

Instead I was in an opulent hotel suite with an asshole just one room away.

With a sigh I got up and went over to the tray full of food. It was cold but I didn’t care. I rolled it back to the bed quietly.

By morning there was
nothing but crumbs on the plates.

Eddie shadowed me even to rehearsal. He sat in the front row as I performed, which made me even more self-conscious. I hadn’t been on a stage since I collapsed in Los Angeles, so I was tentative in all movements
. The first two songs were fine; it was Jace’s intro and the encore that threatened to do me in. Our stage director, Terrell Simmons, called me on my half-hearted attempts immediately. “Where’s my Jordi? Did you leave her at home?”

“I left her in the hospital,” I quipped back, sweat pouring from my face with the effort of simply walking and standing onstage. I was supposed to walk down a flight of stairs for
Jace’s intro, but there were no railings to support me as I descended. Normally this didn’t bother me, but with my newfound limitations thanks to my back and my hip, I didn’t trust myself.

After the pain I had been in, I was honestly afraid to move. Maggie’s physical therapy had been extensive, but it hadn’t been the hard labor of performing onstage.

“I’m not going to be able to do those stairs,” I told him. “Can’t we choreograph something else?”

His perfectly sculpted eyebrow arched. “And have it performance perfect in two days? You got a wand in your pocket?”

I sighed as I glanced back at the stairs.

“Listen,” Terrell said as he placed a hand on my shoulder. “Shelby has done the number a couple of times. Let’s let her do it for the next two shows, and we’ll work on something new for Nashville. I was bored with that number anyway.”

His flawless smile didn’t comfort me much. The thought of watching Shelby do my song for Jace – in his hometown no less – punched through my gut like a jagged rock.

Had I really been looking forward to Dallas?

“Fine,” I muttered.

“We’ll rearrange the lineup so that you go before Shelby. And you can do this,” he said as he handed me some sheet music. It was the song I gave to Shelby during
Fierce
, the one that made her a forerunner. A beautiful girl, singing about being an outsider, in a cast full of those who would never fit in? It was poetic in its irony.

Now I was the creep.
It was the gift of irony that kept on giving.

“This is one of her signature songs,” I argued. “She won’t give this up.”

“She has to, if she wants your song.”

And both Terrell and I knew that she did.

Shelby arrived with Jace and his mother by noon. I gulped back another boulder when I realized Shelby had one arm hooked with her – they were already fast friends.

It could have been
you
, I couldn’t help but think to myself.

Shut up
, I forcefully thought back.

“Jordi!”
Shelby shrieked as she broke away and ran up on stage. She gave me a big bear hug. “I’ve missed you so much! It just wasn’t the same without you.”

I hugged her back but said nothing.

“Come on, there’s someone I want you to meet.”

I allowed her to drag me off stage, leaning on her for support as we climbed down the steep steps. She brought me right to
Jace’s mother, an elegant Greek goddess with the same dark hair and green eyes as her son. “This is Evangeline, Jace’s mother.”

Evangeline Riga extended a hand politely, so I took it. “It’s so nice to meet you, Mrs. Riga,” I said.

“And you too, Jordi,” she replied. “I was so sorry to hear about your back. Are you OK now?”

I sent a sideways glance to Jace. “Yes.
For the most part.”

“You’re here,” Jace said as he reached for a hug.
“Unstoppable as always.”

I muttered, “Thanks,” as I pulled away. Jace glanced off behind me and I turned to see Eddie approach. He placed an arm possessively around my shoulders. “This is my husband,” I managed to say. “Eddie Nix.”

It was an interesting quirk of fate. All my teen years I had doodled
Mrs. Eddie Nix
on every scratch piece of paper I could find. Now the title felt like a prison sentence.

“It’s nice to meet you, Eddie,” Evangeline said. To me she added, “It must be so nice to have your husband travel with you, especially since you are recovering from a recent health issue.”

“Eddie is the perfect husband,” Shelby gushed. “I got to stay with them in Los Angeles. He waited on her hand and foot.”

Jace’s
eyes locked with mine, which Eddie must have noticed because he clutched me even closer. “What can I say?” Eddie quipped cheerfully. “When you have a wife as amazing as mine, you do what you can to hold onto her. Right, Chief?” he added pointedly.

“Absolutely,” Jace answered coolly. He turned back to his mother. “Let me show you around,” he offered with a smile.

The happy trio said their goodbyes as they turned toward the stage. I swung on Eddie. “Why do you have to be such an asshole?” I grit out in an angry whisper.

He clutched me to him and said, just low enough for me to hear, “Why do you have to be such a disrespectful whore?”

I swung my hand but he caught it effortlessly before it made contact with his cheek. Instead of being mad, an evil little smile crossed his face. “Now, now. We’re happy newlyweds, remember?” With that, he pulled me close and planted an angry kiss on my mouth.

He was laughing as I jerked away. I glanced towards the stage, where Jace was staring directly at us, having caught the whole thing.

I stomped away toward the snack table. I grabbed the first bag I came across and found a nice, quiet corner to lick my wounds.

The longer I sat, the more I realized that my little encounter with Eddie had aggravated the strain in my back. Immediately I wanted to take some pills, but they were at the hotel. Since I always passed out the minute I took them, it seemed pointless to carry them around.

Terrell called me to the stage. He told me that he had cleared the song change with Shelby, so I needed to rehearse before I could leave for the day. I grabbed the sheet music and painfully walked to center stage. I did it a cappella, channeling all the discomfort in my body – and my soul – into the words. They were lonely words, frustrated words… words that conveyed an exquisite longing I thought I had finally satisfied when I found Jace.

I had only been kidding myself. I still feel like a weirdo, completely out of place.

There were tears in my eyes as I finished. I was shocked to discover that Terrell was crying, too. He gave me two thumbs up with a big smile.

I slowly made my way down the stairs so that I could get Eddie and we could go back to the hotel where my merciful pills waited. Shelby met me at the bottom step. “That was great,” she said, as though it pained her to admit it.

She almost looked betrayed.

“Thanks,” I said softly, feeling guilty though I didn’t know why. I mean, it was my song first, right? “I’m going to head back to the hotel. I’m kaput.”

“Of course,” she said as she forced a smile. “I should get back to Evangeline,” she added. The unintentional barb hit its mark. I nodded and brushed past her. Eddie caught up with me, offering his arm for support.

I took it.

Halfway back to the hotel, Jace sent me a message. “
We need to talk
.”

I di
dn’t answer. Of course we did, but what was there left to say? I was still stuck in this marriage, and he was being thrust toward Shelby at every turn. Now, with Eddie in town, we couldn’t even be alone since he was staying with his mother.

All we could do was
wait. Our happily ever after was stuck on pause for the foreseeable future, and no amount of talking could change it.

That night followed the same pattern as the one before it. I got to the room, I took the pills and passed out, Eddie ordered food and I awoke some time later to eat it all by myself. He mercifully stayed on the couch, either watching TV or unconscious himself.

I guess being a deceitful, manipulative bastard can really take it out of you.

I was back at rehearsals the next morning, as were Shelby and Jace and all of DIB. Vanni watched my new performance of Shelby’s song, and
pounced me the minute I stepped backstage. “That was stunning, Jordi,” he praised. “I’m surprised you didn’t pick that song for the show. It’s perfect for you.”

I shrugged
. “I can’t complain where I ended up,” I added with a slight grin.

“With that, you might have won,” he said.

I just laughed. “No. Jace would have won. He’s a superstar.”

Vanni glanced over to the band, where Jace was warming up for his song. “He’s certainly giving me a run for my money.”

“Does that bother you?” I asked before I could stop myself. It was a deeply personal question for my mentor and, essentially, my boss.

He shook his head. “There’s enough to go around. Besides, fame is much too capricious to
measure anyone’s worth. You have to find your self-worth in what you do, not what you get for what you do. Sometimes you’ll get money thrown at you by the barrelful. Sometimes you’ll get jack squat. You really can’t control that part of it.” He saw me struggle to wrap my mind around what he said, so he added, “You’re still on the hungry side of fame. You haven’t really hit your stride yet. You think selling a million albums or winning an award will validate what you can do, but like I told you when you were on the show – you’re a star. You can either sit around and wait for the world to agree, or you can go out on that stage, grab ‘em by the balls and give them no other choice.”

I laughed. “You sound so certain.”

He bestowed his heart-stopping smile. “You have to be. If you don’t believe it, how will you convince anyone else?” He paused as his eyes searched my face. “You’re in pain, still, aren’t you?”

I shrugged. “The show must go on.”

He nodded. “I hate that you had to give up Jace’s intro. That song was specifically selected for your voice.”

“Terrell and I will work on different choreography. That should help. I won’t be out of commission for long,” I added with a big smile.