Seeing Red (18 page)

And for what? To sell some records?

“Why don’t you just sign off your rights?” Seth asked. Stephen had said not to talk, but this… He hadn’t expected this insult.

Spike shrugged again. “Rock stars go through shit like this all the time. When Toby’s like thirty and Hollywood has discovered him as the next big thing or whatever, people will expect me to come out of the woodwork. Seriously. It’s a thing. We’ll be best buds by then. He’ll understand.”

“Is there something wrong with your brain? Perhaps you’re missing a significant chunk of it. Maybe you were dropped on your head as a child. Repeatedly.”

Spike turned to his manager and tapped him on the shoulder. “What did my shrink say? Said there was a name for it.”

Stephen propped his chin atop his fist and just watched. That was as close a thing to explicit permission as Seth was going to get, so he decided to go for broke.

“I’m not signing that.” He nudged the proposal packet across the table. “Not only is it despicable and tasteless, but if you’re going to pay me to give my soul away, at least make me an offer higher than what I earn in a year.”

“Two-fifty,” the manager said.

Seth shook his head. “You’re missing the point. I’m not signing that for any amount. And maybe you’re right. When you’re an old man and Toby is grown, perhaps you can hope for the relationship you don’t have right now and people will discover you and that shit you call music again. Maybe you’ll be mature enough by then. But thirty years is a long time to hope your son will forgive you.”

He knew that for a fact, because it’d taken him twenty to forgive his parents. Yeah, he’d grinned through it all, but what else could he do? Make everyone else suffer for his misery? Make them feel his abandonment as keenly as he had? It had taken him twenty years to get to the point where he’d care enough to attend either parent’s funeral, should he be notified of it. There was no worse trust to break than a child’s, even when that child was nearly grown.

Spike pushed his sunglasses back up but wisely kept his mouth shut.

Stephen sat back in his seat. “Hey. Just be decent, okay? Megan’s a grown-up and she’ll take her lumps like the rest of us, but you gotta back off. I’m drawing the line. That’s my uncle voice, not my lawyer one. The lawyer in me says, however, that I’m having my partner draw up paperwork for you to formally dissolve your rights.”

“Not gonna sign ’em. Folks’ll think I’m some kind of deadbeat. I’ll be no better off than I am now.”

“When we leave this restaurant, I do hope you find an old rusty hoe to walk spleen-first into the blade of.” Stephen stood and cocked his head toward the door. “Drive me to the airport, Seth?”

Seth didn’t answer. At the moment, he was locked in a staring contest with Spike’s manager, whose lips kept twitching at the edges as if he thought this was all so goddamned funny. Seth didn’t see anything funny about it. If this guy in an expensive suit and Italian shoes that probably covered cloven-toed hooves was rearing for a fight, Seth would give him one.

It’d been a long time since his last tussle, but Seth’s quick odds-making put him over the greaseball ten to one.

“Where’d she find this guy, huh?” Spike asked. He cocked his head sideways and tipped his chair back onto the back legs.

Stephen sighed. “You know that place where they have all the classrooms and books? Where young adults go to improve themselves? It’s called a university. Of course you would know that if you’d ever stepped out of your parents’ garage as a kid. Fucking vampire, wish I had a stake on me.”

The manager scoffed, and elbowed Spike in the ribs. “Isn’t this the same guy who made a pass at your drummer and bombed spectacularly?”

Spike pushed his shades down his nose and narrowed his eyes at Stephen. “Yeah, yeah, Chester. I seem to remember that.”

“Are you fucking kidding me? Is that what she told you? Wonder if that was before or after she asked for the sperm donation and I said no.” Stephen lurched toward the table, but Seth grabbed him by the cross of his fancy suspenders and gave him a forceful tug backward.
 

Shit
.

People in the restaurant had been curiously, yet discreetly, watching them before. Now, they stared brazenly at the spectacle.

“High-strung for a lawyer, ain’t he?” Spike asked Chester in a stage whisper. “Must be all the inbreeding. By now, I bet that family has blood that’s pus yellow instead of royal blue.”

Nothing Seth could have done at that point would have kept Stephen away from Spike. He’d probably been tamping down that spark of violence for years, and it exploded with a fist to Spike’s jaw so hard the little fucker flew backward in his chair.

Seth stood and grabbed the back of Stephen’s shirt, keeping him from causing Spike further harm. Where had the man learned to throw a punch like that?

Maybe he didn’t want to know.

“You’ll be hearing from his lawyer over that,” Chester said, and his grin was predatory. It was almost as if he’d planned this disruption. After all, shouldn’t he have been helping his client off the floor?

“Here’s my card,” Stephen said, and he freed himself from Seth’s hold and dug a business card out of his wallet. He flicked it across the table at him. “Have him call my direct line. You want to get off your ass and give me a reason to countersue, or are you afraid of scratching up your manicure? Come on. At least make it look like a good fight. Imagine the headlines, Chester—‘Tight Spike Went Nite-nite.’ He’ll probably lose a few groupies over that.”

Spike pulled himself up, growling, as Chester pushed his chair back from the table. “I’m getting sick and fucking tired of dealing with your family,” Chester said.

“Simple solution,” Seth said. “Stop dealing with them. It’d be healthier for you.” Seth looked up to find the restaurant manager making his way through the tables pressing a cell phone to his ear. Probably calling the cops. “Shit.”
 

Seth hadn’t been in a real fight in about five years, and even that one was mostly Curt’s fault, but his gut said he was going to get into one now. Cops or no cops.

“Why don’t we take this outside?” He got between Chester and Stephen, who’d started shoving each other in the aisle, bumping nearby tables, oblivious to the cell-phone camera flashes lighting up around them.

“We can finish it right here,” Spike said.

Seth turned and looked over at Spike just in time to see his full water glass leave his hand. The glass that was evidently meant for Stephen clocked Seth in the jaw before it tumbled, shattering, to the floor.

All the practiced serenity he’d been exhibiting for so many years suddenly gave way to something darker. More ruthless.

He swallowed. “Now I see why Megan calls you a grease stain when she thinks no one is listening.”

Spike lunged toward him, growling like a wounded bear as he charged, and Seth didn’t think. He was vaguely aware of Stephen having Chester in a headlock, and of the restaurant manager shouting, “Break it up, or I’ll make sure you get charged for destruction of property.” Seth registered Spike landing an ineffectual punch to his chin, but beyond that, he didn’t feel. Didn’t plan.

He just saw red.

Chapter 16

“You boys better be glad I was on duty tonight. Anyone else would have thrown you in lockup. I know you’re mostly harmless, Seth, but I don’t know nothing about your friend here.” The desk sergeant sighed and her shoulders fell in the same way Seth had seen Carla’s do so many times before. Like mother, like daughter.

Seth rubbed the blooming bruise on his jaw and cringed. That should be fun to explain away at work. “Stephen is Megan’s brother.”

Connie narrowed her eyes at Stephen, and after a few seconds, grunted. “Yeah, I can see it. Nice to meet you. Sorry it had to be under these circumstances, but then again that’s how I met Seth. Meg’s on her way down to rescue one or both of you, I don’t know for sure. Sounded angry, though. Someone’s going to get it tonight, and I’d say you both deserve it.”

Seth and Stephen shared a look.

“How’s that fist of yours?” Stephen asked.

Seth brought his hand in front of his face and studied the swollen knuckles. He balled his fingers into a loose fist, then straightened them. “I don’t think I’ll be wearing shoes with laces for a couple of days.”

“How’s yours?”

“Tolerable.”

Connie snorted but didn’t look up from the paperwork she was scratching information onto. “You should see the other guy, Seth. He looks like he ran face-first into a sledgehammer. You oughta register those fists of yours as deadly weapons.”

Great. Exactly the kind of reputation he wanted.

“I don’t think Mr. Coffman will be making his sound check tonight,” she said.

“That’s par for the course, because Mr. Coffman didn’t make much of anything. Wasn’t much of a father. Wasn’t much of a husband. Wasn’t much of a boyfriend, either, so don’t ask me why I fuckin’ married him.” Meg slammed her wallet on Connie’s desk and turned to look at the inmates. First she glowered at Stephen, who blew out a breath, then Seth.

He wouldn’t dare look away, although the hurt in her expression tore a hole in his heart.

Stephen, brave man, cleared his throat and spoke first. “It’s my fault. You know how he makes me react. Knows exactly what buttons to push, the little shit.” He said that last part in a mumble. “I’m not sorry I started the fight, but I am sorry it was public. You don’t need that attention. I fucked up. Hey, Sarge? Can you charge me so I can get out of here? I gotta catch a flight to Bermuda.”

Bermuda
?

“And what, precisely, am I charging you with, Mr. Lawyer?” Connie asked, rolling her head on her neck.

Stephen cleared his throat again and strode to the desk, starting with, “Witnesses said he threw the first punch, so…”

After that, Seth tuned him out because Meg stood in front of him, arms crossed over the chest of her oversize sweatshirt looking very small, hurt, betrayed, and angry.

No, not angry. Furious.

And he had nothing to say for himself, except…

“Where’s Toby?”

She seemed to have to temper her words before she answered, because she swallowed twice and raked her hands through her loose hair. “Sharon has him. Don’t worry. I didn’t tell him you got tossed in the clink.”

Connie clucked her tongue. “Cut him some slack, sweetie. Any of the boys would have done it, including my two. Don’t know what that says about you all, but…”

Meg shook her head and squatted in front of him, resting her forearms on her thighs. “What were you thinking, Seth? Huh?”

He opened his mouth, then closed it. She didn’t know any of it. All the drama would have come crashing down on her without warning. He’d tried to minimize some of it but maybe he’d made it worse. Megan’s current husband had gotten into a public brawl with her rock-star ex-husband. With all the cell phones in the room, there were probably dozens of pictures. That’s exactly the kind of publicity she didn’t want.

“Tell me. Why were you two even with him? What do you have to say for yourself?”

“It’s not like that, kitten. I would never betray you. I was trying to help.”

“Help? In what way?”

If it were up to him, she’d never know about Spike’s rude offer.

“I thought I was doing the best thing for you and Toby. Wanted to make sure you were taken care of. Just trust me.”

She shook her head and stood. “I’m not sure I can. Connie, what’s his bail set at? And Stephen’s?”

“Thanks, sis, you know I’m good for it.” Stephen sank into the chair beside Seth and gave him a punch in the arm as acknowledgement. “Sorry.”

“Welcome to the club.”

“The what?”

“It’s an elite group,” Seth said in a flat voice. “My friends seem prone to public fisticuffs. Grant currently holds the record for longest abstinence from fighting, and I guess Curt just slipped into the number-two spot.”

“I’m really more of a lover than a fighter,” Stephen mused. “Speaking of love, I gotta go.” He straightened up and called to Connie, “Can I go?”

“Come sign these forms, then get the hell out of my station.”

“Great.” He jogged up to the desk, signed, then made a beeline for the door. He stopped just before opening them.

“Uh, actually, Seth picked me up from the airport. Can you drive me, Meg?”

Meg cast him a glare that could have wilted a cactus.

“Please?”

“Let me finish bailing my husband out, okay? That all right with you?”

Stephen shrugged. “As long as you leave the other one in his cell to rot.”

* * * *

Seth didn’t say a word all the way from the police station to the airport. Stephen ran off after leaning across the front seat and kissing her cheek, twenty minutes before his plane was due to board.

“My car is at the restaurant,” Seth said as Meg navigated out of the maze of Raleigh-Durham airport roads.

“Anxious to get home now so you can cower and hide, I bet.” She locked her fists firmly at ten and two, and stared at the traffic ahead.