Conquest (27 page)
“That’s so sad.”
Jesse nodded and took a bite of his pizza.
After lunch, everyone made their way back down to Studio B to begin the afternoon of recording, and since he had some free time, Brandon decided to stay and watch Jesse work. He started to walk into the control room, but Evan caught his wrist and pulled him back.
“Okay,” Brandon said, confused. He glanced back toward the control room, saw Jesse and the others tuning and getting things ready, and turned to follow Evan up the hall.
Evan stopped near Studio A, standing with his arms folded across his chest. “So listen, I know when we met I was sort of a dick and I didn’t talk to you in the best way, so I just wanted to say sorry.”
Brandon stared at him. For the third time that day, shock jolted through him, and this time, so strong it forced his mind blank.
“I’m not really good at this kind of thing,” Evan continued. “Meeting friends and family of lovers. I’ve never been with anyone long enough to get involved in all that, but it’s different with Jess.”
Brandon’s mind began to function again. He looked at how tense Evan stood, listened to the hesitation in his voice. He could easily tell Evan wasn’t accustomed to apologizing and definitely wasn’t used to speaking his emotions.
Evan took a deep breath and spoke again, his voice softer. “I don’t have a lot of friends, Brandon. I could count the people I truly trust on one hand, and even then I wouldn’t use all my fingers, but I’d like to count you among them. You’re very special to Jesse, and he’s very special to me, so that makes you special to me, also.” He unfolded his arms and moved to walk past Brandon. “So anyway, I just thought you should know.”
Brandon snagged Evan by his bicep. “I appreciate it. Nothing would make me happier than to be counted among the people you trust. The truth is, I don’t have a lot of friends either. I know tons of people, but there’s a big difference between that and calling someone a friend, isn’t there? For me, Jess has been my best friend forever, so to be able to call the man he’s fallen in love with a friend, that’s something I’ve always hoped for.”
The apprehension on Evan’s face was vanquished with a bright smile. “I’m glad we’ve got that cleared up. Now you can take me for a ride on your new motorcycle tonight.”
“It’s a deal.” Evan walked toward Studio B. The sound of Jesse singing “Shattered” drifted out into the hall through the open door. He stopped and turned to Brandon. “You asked me that day at the restaurant what I wanted from him. Remember?”
“I wasn’t ready to answer then, because at the time, I was still afraid to admit it to myself. What I want from him is, everything he is, everything he has ever been, and everything he will ever be. I want him and only him.”
Jesse hurried toward the studio doors. After the long hours in what seemed an endless week in the studio, all he wanted was to get home, tear off his clothes, and jump in the pool with Evan. He looked up. Almost to the doors, almost to escape, just a few more feet.
She stopped in front of him. “No. Well, Greg was looking for you, but that’s not why I was chasing you down. I didn’t get a chance to ask because you took off so fast, but do you feel like going out? Just me and you. We could hit a few clubs and listen to some bands.”
Trish let out an indignant snort. “You talk like you haven’t seen him in days. He came down to have lunch with you today. He comes down
every day
to have lunch with you. And you live together for Christ’s sake. Don’t you need some time to yourself?”
“No. I like spending time with him. And he doesn’t come down every day. He stays home when the housecleaners, the pool people, and the gardeners come.”
Trish lifted one eyebrow in a critical expression. “Don’t you think it’s a little obsessive to hang on someone like that all the time?”
“I never said our relationship was normal,” Jesse laughed. “We both have obsessive personalities when it comes to the other and we both know how mental it is, but it works for us.” He caught her hand and swung it back and forth between them. “We’ll all go out another night. Or you know what? I’ll talk to Ev, and maybe we’ll host a big cook-out this weekend and have everyone over.”
“Hmm,” Trish grumbled. She sighed loudly and lowered her gaze. “That’s fine. Don’t worry about it. It’s just, I moved all the way from New York with Phoenix a couple months ago and I’m still trying to get to know this town. When Greg told me he had a band for me, I was so happy because it’s been hard meeting people. How was I supposed to know that my sweet and sexy singer wouldn’t want to make the time to do any bandly bonding?”
“That’s not fair! Don’t go pulling a guilt trip on me.” Trish shrugged. “It’s not like I’m meaning to.”
Jesse looked at her as though he pitied her slow-wittedness. “I
have
dated a few girls in my day, you know.”
Trish’s eyes widened, her hands slid off her hips to leave her arms hanging limp at her sides. “So, you’re actually bi?”
“No. That was way back when I was trying to figure out the whole sexuality thing.” He laid his hand on her upper arm. “I really gotta get going. But I’ll call you tomorrow morning and let you know if we’re all getting together, okay?”
“Later.” Jesse spun toward escape. He would make it this time. Just a few more steps. The handle was in reach. He stretched his right hand toward it.
Jesse cast a wistful glance over his shoulder at the doors, watching them grow smaller as he walked away. He looked forward and saw Kenny, Julian, and Trish coming down the hall.
“Isn’t Evan waiting for you?” Trish mocked.
Jesse shot her an unappreciative glare.
“I’ll try to make this quick then. I wanted to tell you that you’ve been going beyond my expectations these past couple weeks, and I’ll admit my expectations were rather high. You’ve taken full command of working in the studio as if you were a seasoned pro. Most young musicians need time to get used to studio work, but you’ve already mastered the equipment and your work ethic borders on workaholic. And your skill with communicating the music to your members and Jeremy has been incredible. You truly were meant for this, Jess. I really believe that after working with you.”
“I’m not quite done yet.”
Jesse sat back down with a thump.
Greg paced behind the couch opposite Jesse. “I was looking over the final documentation of everything last night and I noticed your address looked familiar. Is what you put down your official residence?”
“Well yeah.”
“So you and Evan are living together now?”
“We’ve been living together for the past few weeks.” Greg stopped pacing. He rested his hands on the back of
the couch and looked down at Jesse. “You do know that you’re not going to be able to acknowledge your relationship with him publicly, don’t you?”
“I don’t see why not.”
“You don’t? Then you must be living in a country other than the one I’m in, because in the one I’m in, there’s still a hell of a lot of discrimination against homosexuality. Do you believe that you can come out as an openly gay singer with one of the most popular artists in the world as your partner and everything will be fine?”
Jesse shifted on the couch. “Well, I know it would probably be a big scandal, but we’d get through it. It’s better than lying to everyone.”
“No, Jesse, it’s not. Lies are what this business is, and if you want to make it, you better wise up and learn the game. Not to mention, what about Evan? After all this time, he’s decided to make a comeback. I never thought I’d see the day when he would step foot in a recording studio again, but now he is, and you need to think about how something like this could affect not just your career, but his as well.”
Jesse gazed at him for a moment, then slowly lowered his eyes. “I guess I haven’t thought about how it could affect his career. As far as my own, I just never worried about it. I figured I’d be who I am, and people could either take me or leave me. But the last thing I would want would be to hurt Ev’s career.”
“I know that, and I also know you probably hadn’t thought about it, so that’s why I wanted to talk to you about it now. If this were a perfect world, then this wouldn’t even be an issue. You and Evan could be out in the open, holding hands, and doing all the things straight couples do without having people sneering and passing judgments. But this isn’t a perfect world. In fact, it’s a pretty damn shitty world sometimes, but it’s the world we live in.”
A heavy silence filled the room for several moments. Jesse finally broke it by drawing in an audible breath and asking, “Is that it?”
“There’s something else I wanted to talk to you about.” Greg walked around the couch and sat down across from Jesse. “This is about Evan personally,” he said, his words hesitant. “He’ll probably be upset knowing that I talked to you about these things, but I think they’re things you should know, and I don’t think they’re things he would tell you on his own.”
“If you’re going to tell me about Brian Carney, he already did. I know the whole story about their affair, and we’ve moved beyond it together.”
Jesse nodded. “He told me he passed away from cancer right before his first tour started.”
“Did he tell you that all throughout Ethan’s illness, he had been the one who cared for him?”
“Well, he probably didn’t want to evoke pity from you. It’s not an easy thing, caring for and watching the person you love most in the world slowly fade away, and that’s what Evan did. His loyalty and love for his father was so deep, it broke my heart watching him. But if there was any man in the world worth admiration, it was Ethan Arden. I first met him when I went to their house to discuss bringing Evan under Phoenix. You see, after his performance at the Macy’s Thanksgiving Day Parade, a lot of labels were after him, but he refused to meet with representatives anywhere other than his home because Ethan was too ill to travel around the city and go to meetings, so right from the start, Evan set the precedent that if someone wanted to deal with him, they did it on his terms.”
Greg leaned against the back of the couch. “I arrived at his family’s home early and an A&R rep from another label was still meeting with Evan and Ethan, but Evan’s mother, Sophia, let me in and put me in the den. I was sitting there when all of a sudden there was a huge crash and yelling. I jumped up and ran to see what was going on, and there was seventeen-year-old Evan dragging a man three times his age and twice his size through the house and out the door. He literally threw the man in the street, then faced me with those eyes of his and said, ‘I guess we’ll take your appointment now.’”
Jesse exhaled a shocked breath. “I can’t believe he did that.” “You probably haven’t seen it from him yet, but Evan can have a very nasty temper. Not that it was uncalled for that day. I learned later the man was upset by the slow meeting since at that time, Ethan’s larynx had already been fully removed and he had to write down all the questions he wanted to ask. The rep asked if Ethan would mind sitting out of the meeting and that was all the provocation Evan needed to throw the man out. Ethan scolded him lightly for it, but even I could tell he wasn’t upset. It took sitting in a room with Ethan for about five seconds to realize there wasn’t much Evan could do to raise anger in him, if it was even possible for him to get angry. He was the most peaceful, gentle man I had ever met, and he absolutely adored his son.”
Jesse absorbed every detail of what Greg told him. Evan spoke of his father quite a bit in the past couple weeks, but it was always sharing good memories. This was all new to him, and to hear someone else’s opinion of Evan’s father captured his full attention, but with it came a pang that he would never get to meet this man who sounded so kind and who had been so dear to Evan.
“When Evan began recording, Ethan was steadily declining,” Greg continued. “Evan actually started out his career in debt to the label. Did he tell you that?”
“He blew through his advance money to pay off medical bills and take his father to various specialists. And he spent a small fortune when he bought a restored original ’67 Mustang Shelby GT500 for Ethan, because Ethan had always dreamed of owning one.” Greg turned his head. “But by then, Ethan was too weak to drive it, so Evan would lift him in and out of it, and take him for rides, until the time came when Ethan didn’t have the strength for even that anymore.”
Jesse glanced away from Greg to give him a moment to regain his composure. From their very first night together when Evan told him the Mustang had been his father’s, he knew the car was special. Even though Evan didn’t care if he drove his cars and had never told him he couldn’t drive the Mustang, something inside him had known it was off limits. “He still has it,” Jesse said quietly. “The Mustang.”
