Beg (God of Rock Book 2) Page 4

  My coffee had gone cold, but I downed the rest of it, not responding when Wills made his admission. That warmth in my chest shifted then, felt heavy, as though something inside me weighed me down. I slipped another pod into the Keurig, my back to Wills. I knew he watched; felt the constant heat of his stare on the back of my neck as I poured my cup and took a sip.

  “Will you not say a thing now?” There was an edge to his tone I recognized— something sharp, something that reminded me of acid.

  Instead of answering, I took a sip of coffee, ignoring the sounds of carolers on the street below, moving through the downtown area.

  “I don’t want your money.”

  “Not much say in it as of yet, but that’ll come.”

  His tone was a little pathetic, and for some reason, that sound, those words, got under my skin. I whirled, ready to kick the man out of my place for trying to make me feel bad, but he lifted a hand, seeming to know what that last comment sounded like. He returned my glare with an expression I couldn’t quite make out, but knew wasn’t anger, and just the sight of it lessened my irritation. But I wouldn’t stand there all night waiting for him to test the waters. Whatever the hell he wanted, he needed to tell me. And quick.

  “Why are you here? Your woman is gone, and God knows where my mother is.” I slid my mug to the counter behind me, folding my arms over my chest. He’d been pissed at me when I answered the door. The small reprieve from that anger came from his own guilt, maybe from how shitty he felt himself. But I got the feeling that Wills hadn’t forgotten what I’d done or why he was really sitting at my table. I hadn’t either. It was late, and I was still nursing a throbbing hangover. I wanted this done just to get myself out of the company of anything other than my bed.

  “You’ve already said you don’t want my kidney so the only thing left is…”

  “Iris. Yes,” he continued, head nodding twice. “That poor lamb.”

  That look he gave me cut deep. It was half shame, half pity, and I didn’t know who he felt the most for. I may have been his son, but clearly Iris meant something to him. How could she not? There wasn’t a person I knew that could meet her and not fall for her, even a little bit.

  Wills’s features went stern, severe for half a second, and I shook my head, scrubbing a hand over my face, trying to work away the irritation. “I’m aware. You don’t need to tell me what a pendejo I am. But there’s not much I can do about what happened. I’ve tried looking for her. Everywhere, I promise. Cards, letters, messages, private investigators, calling her former bosses, her mother, her cousins…nothing…man…” My throat felt raw when I swallowed, head shaking at how the old man’s face didn’t change. “I looked all over the place to find her, but she’s gone…what?” He grinned, an obnoxious gesture that had me standing straight. “What’s that face?”

  Wills didn’t drink his coffee, but did move the mug around with his fingers, not looking at the small spill of black liquid when it breached the rim and slid down the side of the mug. Instead he watched me, analyzing, calculating, like he wasn’t sure how long he should wait before he delivered the punch line. I didn’t find a damn thing funny.

  Another twirl of his mug and Wills shrugged, the movement slow. “I may know where’s she gone off to.”

  Moving forward, I leaned on the back of the chair facing him, my fingers curling around the top as I waited for him to elaborate. For all the things he’d not done for me, for all the neglect and selfishness, and the supposed guilt he felt, my father was doing a piss-poor job of making amends. I knew what I’d done, but fuck, he was enjoying this silent standoff.

  The metal backing of the chair cut into my palm as I gripped it, waiting, heart speeding because this was something I’d been waiting to hear for six months. Because I wasn’t sure how much longer I’d have to wait. When Wills moved his hand in his lap, studying his nails, I exhaled, releasing a noise that was half grunt and growl. “You want me to beg?”

  “Not your style, is it?” He dropped his hand, leaning on an elbow against the table as he watched me. “From what I can make of you, you don’t ask for anything. But Iris, that sweet girl, has done what she has for me because I asked her to reach out to you.” He moved again, nodding toward my seat, waiting to continue until I sat back down. Like this was his place, not mine. Like he was some innocent old man who hadn’t abandoned me. “The song and all the other things…yes, well. That’s on your head, is it not?”

  “You don’t sound like a man with any guilt.”

  “Is that so? Well, my boy, neither do you.” He shook his head when I opened my mouth, ready with an excuse that would probably make me look like even more of an asshole. He shot me down, waving off whatever loco thing I might say before I made a sound. Wills relaxed his features, rubbing one long finger across the bridge of his nose.

  “I know the mess I’ve made of my life, and the mistakes I’ve made when it comes to you, but Iris, she has done nothing.”

  “No,” I said, voice low. “She hasn’t.”

  “And yet you treated her like a …”

  “I damn well know what I did.” I hadn’t used the upper register of my voice in months. There hadn’t been anyone around to shout at. There had only been the low muttering of my drunken calls to Landon and Isaiah, and the occasional weak prayer I wasn’t sure anyone heard. So the quick rise of my voice at my father seemed to surprise us both. Seeing Wills’ surprise, and the wide stretch of his mouth when he frowned, had me quieting and grasping at straws that might deflect my behavior. “Not…not that it’s any of your business.”

  “Maybe not, but I feel responsible, in a way.” His voice rose too, the insult and anger coming across before he matched my stance, easing back into his chair to stare at me. It seemed my temper and reaction to frustration wasn’t the result of generations of Boricua DNA. This was an Irish trait, I supposed. At least, it was a Lager trait, showing itself in my father’s familiar slip of control. Looked just like mine.

  Wills relaxed further, scrubbing his fingers through his thick hair before he rested his elbows on the table, watching me through his long fingers as he linked them in front of his face. Sighing once, he finally took a sip of his coffee, before he pushed it away. “I’m here to make amends. I’m here to help.”

  “With?”

  “My friend Russell just signed on to produce for your label.” He moved his gaze to my face, squinting when I sat up straighter. “He called after you were a no-show for that interview. He wasn’t the only one calling that night, but he was the only one willing to warn me.”

  “About?”

  We sat across from each other, calmer, voices softer, but mirroring each other’s stances. My arms were longer, but Wills’ fingers stretched a full inch past mine. We each had our own fingers linked together, leaning on our elbows like this was some business meeting and not the first heart-to-heart I’d ever had with the man who made me. When he continued, the sharpness that colored his tone was missing. “You, and the suits wanting to get you on track or get you out the door.”

  It wasn’t unexpected. You can’t fuck up over and over, you can’t insult fans and media types, you can’t get your tours canceled, and not expect kick back. I’d heard the rumors too. So had my cousin, something Isaiah warned me about a few weeks ago. Hearing it from Lager, though, made it seem serious. Why the hell would he be told if it wasn’t serious? “And you think you can help with that?”

  “I’d like to try.”

  It was the first time since he’d barged into my apartment that Wills didn’t seem angry or irritated. There weren’t any expressions on his face warning me of his anger just then, or glares shooting at me because I’d done something stupid. Wills just watched me, his features softening as though he was worried I’d shoot him down.

  “Why?” I asked, because I needed to know.

  He didn’t hesitate with an answer that I thought might be sincere. “Because I left you alone with a drug addict, and because Iris was a fan, and I took adv
antage of her relationship with you. I’ve worn blinders for a long while now. But when you’re sick—sick as I am anyway—you gain perspective.”

  There was color in his cheeks now and a smile flirting somewhere around the corner of his mouth. I didn’t know if I should trust it. I didn’t know if I could look past the deadbeat and see my idol again. I didn’t even know if I wanted to try. But Wills was sick. He was dying. The bags under his eyes and the pallid complexion told me that the second I opened the door. Some of the anger inside me cooled, and I watched his face, studying the sharp features to see if there was anything my bullshit warning flagged. There wasn’t anything but that almost smile and the worried eyes of an old man fighting for something he didn’t know if he deserved. I was familiar with the feeling.

  “That perspective tells you to warn me that I’m being bounced from my label?’

  “No. It’s telling me that you might need more help than you’ll ever ask for.” Wills grabbed my wrist, a slight graze that shot something warm into my chest. “It’s also telling you that you need to learn to deserve her.”

  “And…if…” I cleared my throat, choking on the hope that bubbled hard and high. “If I do?”

  “Then I’ll bring her here,” he said, smiling now. “I’ll bring her here to you.”

  You don’t leave an old, dying man out in the cold on Christmas Eve. At least, I couldn’t. Just like I couldn’t make him sleep on the sofa. He and his assistant, Jimmy, a tall, brawny type with no neck who never spoke more than “yep” and “sure” got comfortable, taking over my place around 2:00 a.m. It was then that Jimmy helped Wills, the rock legend who I’d always idolized, fall into my bed, snoring before his head hit the pillow. I left him there while Jimmy used my bathroom then made up a pallet on the floor next to Wills. “Guarding him,” as he said, though I wondered if he was guarding his health more than anything else.

  As Jimmy moved around the room, I stared down at my sleeping father in disbelief. I’d spent my childhood dreaming of the moment I’d meet my father, dreaming while Hawthorne played on in the background. Now those worlds were colliding. Now there was a hope I hadn’t let myself have for a long damn time.

  Outside the wall of windows that stretched across my living room, Willow Heights was blanketed with snow. It should have been a perfect Christmas morning— something out of a Rockwell painting. Snow banked along the storefronts and layered over the town square. In the distance, Lake Williams was frozen solid and glinted against the Christmas lights strung up on every surface of the buildings that made up downtown. Perfect, except for the loneliness. Except for the seclusion of my own making.

  I watched it all with my cell between my fingers, debating the wisdom of making the call to the same number I’d pestered for months. Iris loved Christmas. She loved her mother’s meat pies and fry bread, and the dusting of powdered sugar she’d drizzle over the bread and plate on Christmas morning. She’d start decorating in early November because Thanksgiving had never been a popular holiday in her mother’s household, and when Iris decorated, she did so like an elf on a sugar high.

  Those lights around my hometown reminded me of that—of her and the manic way the holiday took her over …how she made everything feel so magical when nothing in my world was. Except her.

  The phone rang four times before the message sounded. Same voice I’d heard for months. Same sweet tone I knew wasn’t meant for me.

  Hi! This is Iris. You’ve reached my emergency line. I’ll get back to you as soon as I can.

  Iris was sixteen when her mother got a cell phone. “Emergencies only,” she’d dictated. A number they could both dial into in case it was needed. Their cousins in Arizona had it, as well. They’d call in to update the Daine women about their lives, about who in their large family had died or given birth, or who was sick. Mostly, the cousins called to ask for help, for money or food when things got tight. The cell got used when no one texted or hopped on live chats. It was a number I knew Iris would never get rid of, and one I believed she’d check with more frequency than the iPhone I’d seen her with on the tour. For the past six months, once a week, I called the number just to hear her voice. Just to see if the words would come to me—the words that meant the most. Words we’d never said to one another.

  “It’s Christmas, and Willow Heights is covered in the white stuff.” I kept my tone light, something neutral. “It reminded me of us and that nativity play my mother made us go to when we were seventeen. You remember how Bessie Lucas kept forgetting her lines? She only had two. Giraffe number one at the birth of baby Jesus.” I laughed, the memory making me feel nostalgic before I realized no one would be joining me.

  “Anyway, tonight reminds me of something that occurred to me a few months ago.” The wind picked up, snatching a few loose papers from the recycle bin across the street from my apartment, and I watched the slow trajectory of their movement and the funnel the wind stirred them in.

  “I sat on the balcony of my room at the Plaza, thinking about Willow Heights and how much it changed me. It changed us both. I watched New York move on below me, people all over the place, walking to get from one point to another, and all I could think of was how there were no points to get to in Willow Heights. I had no destinations. No parts unknown that would keep me busy.”

  It was only here on this line that I could be honest. She had never answered when I called. Iris had never returned my calls, and in some ways it gave me freedom to be who I really was with the only person who ever really knew me.

  “There was only you and me and Hector’s record shop. There was only those Hawthorne songs and the smell of your hair when you’d lean your head on my shoulder. There was no point to get to because you were always where I wanted to be. You still are. I hope one day you can believe that.” I let the phone slip from my ear, a little caught by the emotion that admission worked up in me. A small cough and I returned the receiver back in place. “I’m sorry I hurt you. I’m sorry I ruined us. I’ll never stop trying to win you back.”

  Memory is a funny thing. It can come at you at the most inconvenient times. It comes at you when you know you don’t need it. Memory is like a headache you never expect and spend hours trying to eradicate. But there was no pill to take that would numb the ache memories of Iris gave me.

  And it wasn’t just the memory. It was the sensory reality that came with it. The smell of the air around me the night Iris kissed me back. The way the warmth of her tongue shot wave after wave of erotic emotion through my body. The sensation of flying when I was inside her; how she’d hold on to me like she thought she would float away and never be able to control her body again. If I thought hard enough about it, I’d recall the exact shift of her soft hair against my neck as she kissed me. Those fingertips were sharp but sweet. I could not keep away from her. I swore I’d never let go and in a lot of ways I hadn’t. No matter how far from her, from Willow Heights, I’d gotten, I’d always come back to Iris and the way she haunted me. The way those memories ached.

  She’d come to me one night after midnight. It was summer then, just after graduation. Before my world spun out of control. It had to have been over ninety degrees that night, and sweat covered my body. But the cool tingle of her skin against mine worked something inside me enough, I could recall the taste of her skin and the way her fingers scraped against my scalp, how her naked breasts felt against my nipples as she straddled me. How deep inside her I went, how tight she felt around me.

  “Coño.”

  No, it did no good to remember. It was pointless. I couldn’t remember her and not feel something. Wills believed I might be able to earn seeing her again. He believed I could fight hard enough, fight and mean it, and deserve just a glimpse.

  Maybe my birth father thought there was still something good left in me. Maybe he still believed in miracles. Maybe he believed that no one could love Iris like me. I just needed to prove to him I was capable.

  There may have never been anything good in my life, or anyone
good enough to show me what love was, but there had been Iris. I didn’t have the delusions my father did. I knew it would take a miracle to win her back. But right then I didn’t pray for forgiveness. I prayed for the chance to earn it. Until then, I kept Iris locked inside myself. I kept that hope there and let it sleep. I kept it there because I knew forgiveness wouldn’t come easily even though I knew you can only push love so far. Sometimes even the truest love bends so much it can’t be mended. I decided that night to never stop trying to fix what I broke.

  Chapter Three

  Music always felt like spell casting. The lines of lyric, the sway of tunes, all came together, swirled and spun in time to weave magic. It transformed me. It moved me, and I’d never known a greater weaver of musical magic than the man that snored a floor above me. My father. The legend.

  “Mierda,” I said through a sigh. The idea was still bouncing around in my head, something I should have squashed months back when I’d overheard Iris talking to Wills on the phone. Plotting, I thought. Scheming, I’d been convinced.

  Worse than getting used to the idea that the man I’d idolized most in the world as a kid was, in fact, my father, was the idea that I’d decided he was a bastard and Iris was a bitch before I’d reacted at all. But then, I’d always been an act first, question later kind of pendejo.

  The stool under my ass was hard, an old silver metal thing I’d used as a kid while stacking Hector’s records in this run-down shop, and it didn’t make a lot of sense to sit on it while I played. Or, I should say, while I attempted to write songs. That’s all I’d been doing for months now—making attempts. Trying to weave my own magic, but nothing was coming to me.

  A few tries at a new chord, the small bundle of notes that sounded just okay, and I hummed, words flitting through my head like a burlesque dancer teasing, giving me a glimpse but nothing worth the effort at looking hard.