Commitment (98 page)

After the brief reception, they found a
family-style
Greek restaurant that Shawn judged as authentic based on the
people
eating there who seemed to be
actual Greeks.
And better yet, no
one seemed to know who he was.
They ordered almost half the menu, and sat around a large table with Brendan, their driver Clive, the
some of the roadies and their guests. When they were
finally
seated, it turned out they number
ed
sixteen
in all,
and three tables had to be joi
ned so they could eat together.
It was definitely a different vibe from previous shows when the production was bigger, and Shawn might not even meet most of the folk
s
wh
o’d worked to make it possible.

They were a raucous group, eating and drinking almo
st until the restaurant closed.
But instead of stumbling away drunk with women they barely knew
,
this time a couple guys brought along their girlfriends
or wives
.
Riley chatted with some of them throughout the meal and even exchanged
pe
cks on the cheek before she
and Shawn headed for their car.
They almost hadn’t spoken at all during dinner, but
she kept her hand firmly on his thigh, or carelessly rubbed the back of his neck as she chatted with the other women.

The drive back to the hotel was made in silence, Riley resting against his ch
est and looking out the window.
In the suite, she kicked off her sandals, removed her belt, and peeled off her dress, stepping out of it and heading straight for bed
, crawling across it on hands and knees
.
Sha
wn’s eyes widened in surprise.
No un
derwear.
Had he known that, he wouldn’t have been able to concentrate all night
and would
definitely
have suggested they head for the hotel much earlier.

“Don’t even think about it,” Riley said wit
hout even looking back at him.
“I’m still sore from this morning and exhausted.”

Shawn laughed.
“I didn’t say anything!”

“You don’t have to,” she pulled back the covers and crawled under them, h
ugging the pillow to her chest.
“
I know you
.”

The sun was already high in the sky when he woke up and Riley was on the
terrace, typing
away like crazy on her laptop.
A breakfast tray sat nearby with half-finished juice and a coffee-pot. 

“Hey, what time is it?” he called. 

His voice was hoarse. They’d forgotten to turn off the AC again.

“Hey,” she looked up
but barely paused her typing.
“Ahm . . . after nine.”

“B didn’t stop by?”

“Not that I noticed.”

Shawn got u
p and headed for the bathroom. That was unusual.
Of course, if Brendan had gone out and
found
some company for the evening,
it was probably to be expected.
But even then,
for him not to have called or stopped by around eight or so was out of character.

“How long does it take to drive to Richmond?” Riley called.

“Less than three hours.”

Shawn joined her on the terrace and poured himself a cup of coffee. He didn’t like coffee, but he needed somet
hing warm for his throat pronto if he was going to be 100% for the show tonight.

“I’ll order you some tea,” Ri
ley said still not looking up. “And a full breakfast.
You hungry?”

“Yeah.
I wonder where B’s at.
”

“Call him while I order.”

She got up and went in, while Shawn reached for his cell pho
ne and dialed Brendan’s number.
It rang three times before it was forwarded to voicemail. 

“We have
a
sound check around three,”
Shawn said, almost to himself.
“I know he’d want to get out of here
around
ten.”

What’s that?” Riley stuck her head back out onto the terrace
, a hand over the mouthpiece of the telephone
. 

“Nothing.”

“Are you anxiou
s about Brendan?” she grinned.
“That’s so cute.”

Just as he leaned back, there was a knock on the door and then Riley was opening it up and greeting Brendan.

“Hey man
, what’s up?” Shawn asked him.
“I just called you.”

“
I’ve been on the line all morning,” Brendan said quickly, twirling his phone ar
ound his fingers like a baton.
“We got a press conference in half an hour.”

Shawn sat upright. “Press conference?
What for?”

“The grand jury
.
They
re
fused to return an indictment.”

“What?” Riley came out to join them.

“It’s over,” Brendan nodded.
“Doug found out late Friday and wanted to
confirm.
He called
last night
but n
one of us answered.
He finally got me this morning.”

Brendan kept talking, but Shawn hear
d almost none of what he said. It was too good to be true. It couldn’t be true. It was over.
The
cloud over his head that had been there for so long, he almost didn’t notice it
anymore
, was gone.
And what he saw instead
—
the ray of possibilities
—
was
so much brighter t
han he could possibly deserve.

Brendan’s lips were still moving, and he could feel Riley’s arms wrapped about his neck and the dampness of her tears on his shoulder, but all he could think was
thank you, thank you, thank you.

g

He couldn’t help it. He sometimes thought about what he would d
o if he ran into her somewhere.
What did you do, what did you say to someone who’d
tried to ruin your life?
Steal from you everything that was good?
It had been well over four months since the grand jury refused to indict and things had
only gotten better since then.
But ever
y once in awhile, he wondered,
what if?
More often
though, he looked at his life as it was now and thought about how it bore no r
esemblance to how it had been.
A
nd that was fine by him.
Just fine.

g

Riley
was reclining on the sofa, her f
eet up and resting on his lap.
They were watching the Music Video Awards on television, having decided at the last minute not to ma
ke the trip out to California.
Brendan was pissed, of course, but Riley had a work thing she couldn’t get out of and when he thought about it, Shawn decided he wasn’t that excited about the event anyway. 

In a coupl
e months, his new CD “Phoenix
”
was due to drop, so of course, B and the label thought i
t was a big wasted opportunity.
But he underst
oo
d the art of appearing elusive and knew his absence was more intriguing to his fans than yet another shot of him sitting in the audience in a designer suit, or onstage performing rhymes they’d heard a million times before.
Let folks wonder where he was for a change.

Lately, the
‘wondering’
had begun to include Riley
as well.
The interest she’d generated since
Darnell’s
article was something she was just beginning to take in
stride—
mostly by ignoring it.
Shawn
was still having a hard time
get
ting
used to it himself.
Seeing paparazzi shots of her every once in a
while still got under his skin.
The idea that someone was
,
unbeknownst to her,
taking
his wife’s
picture while she was having lunch with Tracy or walking from the subway to work made him
want to jump out of his skin.
But she
was
so different from what they expected a rapper’s wife to
be that
he understood why
the
curiosity
persisted
well after the controversy that had forced her into the public eye
.

The latest scuttlebutt was
that she was pregnant
.
She wasn’t.
Not that he
hadn’t
wondered what that would be like
.
And
Riley
hadn’t seemed opposed to the idea either the last time the
y talked about it. 
S
ome
actor’s
kid
was
caught with heroin and they wound up discussing
whether they thought city kids or subu
rban kids were better adjusted.
Not surprisingly, she wanted their kid
s
to be raised in the city
while
he preferred the suburbs
.

Riley pointed out that he felt that way mostly because he’d grown up without money in a city which was a very different experience from that whic
h any kid of theirs would have.
It was true, he tended to forget that they
had more than enough money to insulate
their kids
from the worst parts of the city, and
gain
them
access to all the good
.

Still, the conversation had sparked something in him and even though neither of them acknowledged it, it was the beginnings of an idea between them that they might soon think about becoming parents
.
He was starting to relish the
thought
of seeing Riley’s body change, grow and swell with a baby they made together. It would be a good thing.

Shawn glanced over at her, engrossed in the program,
with
her head tilted to one side so that her hair hung in a
coiled
mass, partially obscuring her face.
It
was
almost
shoulder
-
length now
,
k
inky, and curly
and soft and wiry all at once.
It suited her
.
The tomboy was all but gone, even though she
still occasionally
broke out h
er cargo jeans and white tanks.
She
said
she’d just gotten sick of seeing pictures of herself in the paper walking aroun
d looking like a housepainter.
He loved lacing his fingers through her hair, tugging it gently but firmly when they were making love, and watching her neck arch backward in response.

“Loo
k, there’s Chr
is,” she said now, sitting up.

Once again
Chris had chosen an all-white ensemble,
including his signature baseball cap.
W
hen he’d just started out,
Shawn remembered Chris schooling him on what to wear for television, telling him that
in a crowd,
white was a surefire way to get on camera. He probably
wanted to draw atten
tion because his newest protégés were with him.

“I think his shoes ar
e white too,” Riley said dr
i
ly.
“Interesting.”

“I should send him a text telling him he looks like
an ice cream cone
,” Shawn said, grinning.

“That’s mean. Don’t do that,” Riley said.
“He looks
fine.
Can’t say the s
ame for Mike and Darryl though.
A little overkill on the
jewelry
.”

Mike and Darryl
made their entrance along with Chris, dressed in ridiculously oversized jeans, with studded belts, and draped in gold rope chains
circa
1985.
They seemed to
have
color-coordinated their shirts
,
with Mike wearing black, red and white with more black than red, and Darryl wearing the same colors
with red as the dominant color.
They were practically bursting with
undisguised pride
as they strutted down to their seats next to Chris, who was of course seated in the front row
reserved for
recording
industry
heavy hitters.