The Rancher and the Rock Star (15 page)

He could change the whole paradigm by going back for his next two concerts. Had he not canceled in the first place, he wouldn’t be in this situation. But changing his mind now would only stomp on the extremely fragile bond he’d built with Dawson. And fragile was describing it optimistically.

He sat on the back door stoop with Roscoe at his feet, his brain in turmoil while his body basked guiltily in paradise. The hot, June air, filled with sweet grass and wildflowers, smelled like Mother Nature’s dressing table.

After failing to solve his troubles after ten minutes, he entered the relative cool of the house and made his way upstairs. He could at least take what had become his daily morning run. So far, they’d come closest to bringing calm to chaos. When he passed Dawson’s open door, he found his son plugged, as he usually was after chores, into his computer. Dawson’s head popped up when Gray stopped in the doorway and, slowly, he dragged off a pair of huge earphones.

“Hey, Daw.” He hoped his son wasn’t still cringing at the memory of the unmanly hug from last night. He didn’t seem like a particularly demonstrative kid.

“Hey.”

“Some heavy duty earphones you got there.”

“Bose noise reduction.”

“Impressive. Abby pays you well.” He was teasing, but Bose equipment was far from cheap.

“I wish. Mom bought these when I threw a fit about going to Heighton.”

“You? Throw a fit?”

Dawson glared at him and Gray held up his hands. “Kidding, kidding. I don’t blame you. I’m sorry I didn’t stand up for you. Not that you’re supposed to whine to get what you want.”

“It worked on you.”

For one instant, shock at his child’s impertinence stopped Gray’s thoughts, then their eyes met for a furtive second and he caught a flash of shy humor. His heart swelled a tiny bit.

“Don’t be a smart ass, kid.” He eased his way into the room. “What are you working on? Or am I interrupting something private?”

Dawson shrugged and pushed his chair back slightly from his desk in invitation. Gray leaned over the keyboard and studied the frequency lines and slider bars of a well-known music mixing program. “What’s this, ProTools?”

“Yeah.” Dawson nodded. “Asked for it with the headphones.”

“You’re smart as well as manipulative anyway.” Gray took a chance and patted his son’s shoulder. He didn’t flinch. “You’re into this?”

“I guess.”

“This isn’t beginner stuff. How did you learn it?”

“A guy I met at school messed around with it in his room and taught me. The only good thing that ever happened at Heighton. I tried it because one time at a recording session with you I remembered thinking the control booth was cooler than making the music . . .” He trailed off as if he realized he’d spoken heresy.

“It’s okay. This is where a lot of the magic happens, I know.”

Dawson leaned forward, moved several sliders, adjusted a couple of bars and then clicked play. Wordlessly, he offered Gray the headphones. Gray settled them over his ears, surprised but curious. Ambient sound disappeared and an upbeat guitar melody flowed through the earpieces. Gray had heard it once, right after finding Dawson back here at Abby’s. The melody was catchy, starting low then rising until it wove seamlessly into a rocking harmony with a second guitar. Forty-five seconds into the piece, the thumping backbeat from a tom-tom lifted the song into a full rock rhythm. It ended abruptly.

“Whoa!” Gray pulled off the headset. “This is your song. The one for Grandma.” He’d ended up giving a cursory listen-to it the night Dawson had run from the tour.

“You said I should finish it. Haven’t laid down the lyrics yet, just two guitars.”

“But when did you do this much?”

“This week. I’m pretty slow. Now I’m adding percussion and I’d like to record some bass, but there’s no way to do that here. It’s nothing, just messing around.”

“It sure
isn’t
nothing. It rocks. You bet you have to finish it.” He stared thoughtfully at the screen. “I’ve always liked the production side of things, but I’m not nearly as strong at it as I am at the performance part.” Gray shrugged. “I’ve always gotten good technical people to make up for it.”

“Yeah. Well . . .”

The question suddenly burning in him was one he really didn’t want to ask. “So, did you . . .” he said, scratching the top of his head self-consciously, “. . . ever listen to the newest? CD?”

“Yours?” With an uncannily adult look, Dawson grinned at him. “C’mon, Dad, I only hate
you
; I don’t avoid the music.”

“Nice, kid. Real polite.”

Such flashes of camaraderie were unfamiliar and delicate as eggshells. Gray knew at any moment he could, and probably would, blow it.

“You’re talking about
Luck of the Draw
?” Dawson named Gray’s latest album. “Yeah. I listened to it. You’re singing the title song on tour. I know that one.”

Now what? How did he handle the role reversal, looking for approval from his son? Did he really want to know what Dawson thought?

“It’s fine, Dad.”

Gray slid further into embarrassment. “A ringing endorsement.”

“Look.” Dawson squirmed. “What can I say? You’re good at what you do. You are, and you can play anything. You’re kind of stuck in a time warp, that’s all.”

Aging-rock-star syndrome. He knew
Luck
had stalled on the charts. Number, what, fifteen, Chris had said? Respectable. Disappointing. His lowest showing in years. Still, it stung stupidly to have his son nail him on the reality.

“I’m no Green Day, is what you’re saying?”

“You’re not Green Day. You’re not Sledg.”

“Sledg? Shit, who the . . . Sorry.”

Dawson grinned, and Gray was now on a Bad Parents list somewhere, he had no doubt.

“I’ll play you some of their stuff . . . sometime.”

“Things look grim for the old man?”

“They don’t have to. It wouldn’t be that hard to make something tolerable of your songs.” Dawson’s eyes stayed riveted to the computer screen. A barely discernible tic lifted one corner of his mouth.

“If that’s really true, maybe I should have my people call your people.”

“Sure.”

“So, show me what you’re doing?”

Within three minutes Gray was rapt and amazed at the amount of expertise Dawson had gathered. He was sitting on the corner of the bed, pointing at the screen over Dawson’s shoulder, when they both jumped at a deep, humor-filled voice.

“Lookee here, found the boys’ club. Kim said you’d both be around, so I broke into the house.”

Ed stood in the doorway, gray twill pants low on his hips, a blue-striped dress shirt tucked in neatly, and gray elastic suspenders holding it all together. He carried a battered ball cap in his hands, and his monk’s fringe of gray hair stuck out slightly on one side.

“It’s Ethel Mertz!” Gray grinned.

“I hated that show,” Dawson said.

“Me too,” Ed replied. “I was looking for you, Goddess. Thought I could borrow your muscles.”

“Goddess?” Dawson looked up for the first time with a full, floppy grin.

Ed smirked. “Ask your papa here about his favorite shirt. The one he found in the barn.”

“Just never you two mind. What do you want my muscles for?”

Pleasure drizzled through Gray like refreshing rain. He got asked for donations, for appearances, and autographs. Getting asked for plain old favors was rare.

“Sylvie’s got it in her head I should make up a fancy tack trunk thing for Kim’s birthday next month, and I need several big pieces of wood. Thought mebbe you’d ride along to the lumberyard and help load it.”

Gray’s delight turned to an acid lump in his gut. He didn’t dare leave the farm. If anyone recognized him . . .

“I’d be happy to help you, Ed, you know that. I . . . don’t know if it’s smart to take me into public.”

“You got some sort of communicable disease? You spit at people uncontrollably? What?”

Laughter spilled from Dawson like frogs and marbles from a little boy’s pockets. Gray fixed him with his best parental glare and was ignored. “Look, Ed, I love that you and Sylvia don’t know who I am—”

“I know who you are. Kimmy came and used our computer two, three months ago when her Internet was down to order tickets to see you. I guess she don’t need them anymore, heh?”

Gray didn’t know which surprised him most. That Ed knew exactly who he was or that the Mertzes had a computer. “Your computer?”

“Yeah, yeah. Abby says it keeps us young. Hah. Look, you can sit in the truck while I buy the lumber. I need your strength for five minutes to load it up.”

“You could take Dawson . . .” Gray cut short another sigh. He wanted to go, damn it.

“Scrawny kid like him?”

“Hey!”

For a long moment, the three generations poised in silence. “Oh, fine.” Gray ruffled his son’s hair, and Dawson ducked away. “C’mon hot shot, let’s go. You can cover me. What can go wrong?”

Chapter Fifteen

“W
HAT KIND OF
wood are you after?” Gray asked forty-five minutes later, as Ed drove through rows of stacked lumber, and Dawson took in the surroundings with reluctant curiosity.

“Birch. Be finer-grained for sanding, and it’ll look a little lighter than oak. There.” He pointed to a stack of pale boards and stopped his truck.

Out of habit, Gray glanced warily out the windshield. A handful of people shuffled down the aisle, but they weren’t paying attention to Ed’s ten-year-old Dodge pickup. Gray wore an unadorned white T-shirt and jeans, and a UCLA baseball cap pulled low over his brows. He dug a pair of empty, Clark Kent glasses frames from his pocket and settled them over his nose.

The cords of Ed’s neck stood out from the effort of holding back laughter. “Where’s the fake mustache, Mr. Bond?”

Dawson sputtered like a choking engine. “Not all that funny. Dude, he actually used to have one.”

“Don’t knock it.” Gray adjusted the fake glasses. “In a crowd, it comes in handy.”

“Yah, and I’m sure it’s real handsome,” Ed said. Dawson snickered again.

“You two are getting far too much enjoyment out of each other.” Gray yanked the handle and flung the door wide, ignoring the residual laughter as they all climbed out.

Under Ed’s tutelage, Gray and Dawson sorted through a dozen four-by-eight sheets of wood. After friendly debates and plenty of random laughter, five sheets meeting Ed’s exacting standards were loaded into the truck bed. Gray had forgotten all about fake glasses and mustaches until a voice startled them all from behind.

“That you, Ed?”

Gray turned involuntarily with the others and his heart hit his toes at the sight of linebacker thighs and curled ginger hair. Mr. Lucky Charms himself.

“Yah, Dewey,” Ed replied.

“Hey, Dawson.” Dewey spoke but super-glued his gaze to Gray’s. “This is your dad?”

“Yeah. Bummer, huh?”

Dawson took a subtle step toward Gray, and he caught a glint of steel in his son’s eye. A wave of gratitude rippled through his surprised heart.

“David, isn’t it?” Dewey put his hand out, but a challenge rode his gaze, once again as if he were about to suggest pistols at dawn.

“Right.” He caught a glimpse of Ed’s amused eyes and accepted Dewey’s handshake, a crushing grip full of blatant aggression.

“Still at Abby’s?”

“She’s still putting up with us,” Gray acknowledged.

“ ’At’s right, Dewey,” Ed’s voice soothed. “And Sylvia and me are watchin’ closely.”

Dewey’s brows folded into one feathery line. “You’ve seemed familiar all along.”

“He gets that a lot. It’s the pits.” Dawson curled his lip.

Ed clapped Gray on the back and turned him toward the lumber stack. “It was good to see you, Dewey. We gotta get home before the wimmenfolk know we’re gone. Come on. Quit yakkin’ and shut that tailgate.”

“Nice to see you again . . .” Dewey’s eyes narrowed to green slits. “You sure I haven’t seen you somewhere? Other than Abby’s?”

“Pretty sure,” Gray nodded.

Nervousness jogged down his spine. He’d spoofed his way through enough situations to know when a ruse had worked and when it hadn’t. Dewey wasn’t buying this for long. When the large man ambled off, a leprechaun on steroids, Gray didn’t breathe much easier.

“Thanks for the cover,” he said to Dawson.

“It’s why you brought me.”

Gray slammed the tailgate, and once they were all back in the truck Ed snorted. “You’re more fun than a car of clowns, Goddess. Fake name too?”

“Official alias. Thanks for not blowing it.”

“You really need all this cloak-and-dagger stuff?”

A sigh of frustration escaped Gray’s lips. “I don’t know. It works sometimes. The problem is, Dewey’s on the right track. I’d never forgive myself if Abby was hurt by me being here. If the media catches wind, she’ll be plastered all over the tabloids.”

“Mebbe that wouldn’t be all bad.” Ed spoke almost to himself, dismissing the comment with a shrug.

They headed for the exit and drew up behind Dewey, striding with much more determination than when he’d sauntered off moments before. Gray avoided looking at him, but a sharp stomp on the brakes jerked him forward into his seatbelt.

“Dewey, what the—?” Ed called.

Dewey stood, hands-on-hips, directly in front of the truck. Now he was an
angry
leprechaun on steroids.

“I know who you are.” Dewey slapped the hood, literally jumped around to the door, and met Gray’s eyes with blazing accusation. “You’re that singer on the lam. Covey. Gray Covey. They said you were in rehab.”

“Covey?” Even to his own ears Gray’s forced laugh sounded desperate. “Hell, no. I hate that guy.”
He’s not buying this for a second.

“I might come from a small town, but I can put two and two together as well as any hot shot singer. Kennison Falls doesn’t need any trouble, man.”

Dropping his head forward, Gray removed the glasses. “You’re right, Mr. Mitchell. You’re right. That’s more important to me than you know.”

To his astonishment, the Dodge jerked again as Ed slammed the shift lever into park. A second later his new old friend was out his door and onto Dewey like metal to a magnet. Not-so-gently, he took the big man’s arm and urged him half a dozen steps away from the truck. His words were inaudible, but his jaw thrust in and out at Dewey like a fencer’s blade.

“Go, Ed!” Dawson cheered.

“No, no.” Gray held his pounding temples in his hands. “This is a disaster.”

Two minutes later, Ed slipped back into the cab, as calm as if he’d never left. They passed Dewey, who rubbed his chin with a hooded stare. Once Ed handed his paid slip to the attendant at the lumberyard gate, they were on the road back to Kennison Falls.

“I’m sorry.” Gray’s voice echoed dully in his own head. “I knew this was a bad idea.”

“Give it up,” Ed admonished. “You’re a free man. You got a right to go where you like.”

“What did you say to him?” Dawson asked.

“I told him if he cares for Abby, and you should know he does, by the way, he’ll keep his mouth shut for the next few weeks. I think he saw my point.”

Gray had stopped listening. Ed had just explained a whole lot about Dewey’s attitude. “He and Abby have something . . . together?”

“No, but not for lack of effort on his part. Folks say he’d marry her tomorrow if she’d look twice at him. I don’t listen to that sort of talk.” He winked at a smiling Dawson.

“I’m serious. If there’s anything between them, I shouldn’t be out there with her.”

His heart’s nervous riff angered him. Maybe he shouldn’t have kissed Abby yesterday, since more than a few complications had risen from that selfish act. But she certainly hadn’t kissed him as if there’d been anybody else. A latent thrill detonated deep and low at the memory.

“Weren’t you listening?” Ed asked. “Dewey Mitchell’s not a problem.”

“Fine.” Gray mashed on his throbbing temples. “But those sound like famous last words to me.”

“W
HAT THE HELL
are you doing here?” Chris Boyle’s stunned tone and his wide, caught-in-the-gun-sight eyes brought Elliott a deep satisfaction.

“I could ask the same,” he replied. “What’s a big-shot manager doing in an empty dressing room? Finding a dramatic place to slash your wrists over the money your golden goose is costing you?”

A folding chair flew unexpectedly through the air, landing three feet from Elliott’s boot and shattering the quiet with a metallic screech. Chris rushed him, a tan-cashmere-sweatered grizzly advancing on fresh meat.

“Where is he, Boyle?” Elliott held his ground, unperturbed. “Or, have you lost control of him?”

Chris grabbed a fistful of Elliott’s T-shirt and hyperventilated half-a-dozen garlicky breaths straight up his nostrils. “You ballsy little bastard.” Then, as if catching himself, he released Elliott’s shirt with a five-finger flick, as if throwing off a distasteful bug.

“Ballsy? Maybe, but I’ll never have the stones to be a good manager. That takes, how should I put it? Creativity. Framing me for that picture, for example? Very creative. And now we all know he suspects I took the one of his mother. Once again, I think that was a hundred percent your genius.”

“I had nothing to do with it. You’re getting desperate to find a way out of this, Elliott.”

“Me? You’re a very rich man because of Gray Covey, and you’re the one who’s desperate to keep it that way. I believe you’ll do just about anything to keep him in the news, including pull something cruel like that stunt with his mother.” Elliott curled his lip in distaste. “It was supposed to bring him running back here, but it didn’t work, did it? He’s playing hooky with his son, and I know there’s a woman involved. What if I sort of let something like that slip?”

“I’d say you don’t have your facts right, and I could prove it.” An anxious tic at Chris’s temple gave Elliott the first sign that the manager’s words were bluster.

“What if I simply planted more and more very big questions about Gray’s character in peoples’ minds? The public will only take so much spin before its skepticism kicks in and you have a bona fide scandal. Gray blowing off concerts and lying to his fans because he’s pissed over his worst chart position in twenty years? His loyal peeps won’t like that. Tell me where he is, and maybe I’ll keep my mouth shut.”

Chris’s pasty, businessman’s complexion deepened in color like a marshmallow held to the fire, even as his voice took on a false tone of camaraderie. “What do you want, Elliott? I’m sure we can figure this out.”

“You know? I’m sure we can. Tell me where he is, and give me exclusive rights to his story.”

“I can’t do that, and you know it. It’s not my right to decide those things.”

“That’s bullshit. You’ve been deciding these things for twenty years. You know full well all I have to do is print something, anything, and all hell breaks loose. For the tiny price I’m asking, I’ll lead the media on a wild golden goose chase as long as I can, and that could be valuable since I’m hardly the only one digging for information. Gray’s the hottest quarry out there right now.”

Chris’s lips twitched. “Why should I believe you?”

“Gray tossed me out of the band’s life without a trial. I owe him no loyalty, but I want to be the one who deals with him. I want my moment before the vultures swoop. Then you can spin it however you like.”

He withstood one more, long, angry assessment before Chris capitulated.

“Fine. I’ll tell you where he is, but here’s my deal. I see any story you write, any picture you take, before it goes to press. If new pictures turn up anywhere before that, a kitten-killer will have a better reputation in this town than you do.”

Elliott snorted. “I have no doubt someone’s reputation will end up on the chopping block, Chris. No doubt at all.”

I
T DIDN’T MATTER
what control Ed thought he had over Dewey Mitchell; now that a jealous suitor knew Gray was here, the world was only moments behind. That the safe time left was limited Gray had no doubt.

He powered his last wheelbarrow full of reeking shavings and mounded horse turds out the barn door. Ribbons of sweat bound his T-shirt to his back, and dust-tinged grit freckled his skin. He grunted and wondered how he’d come to such a lower-than-sewer-water task. And, more remarkably, how come that task had become more soothing than an arena full of adoration. He should have felt tired. He should have been cussing at the flies and the sweat smeared across his forehead from wiping it with his shoulder. Instead, the pungent horse-tailings were all that kept him from punching frustrated holes in the stall walls. He’d cleaned all eight stalls since returning from the lumberyard. He wished he had eight more.

His band would be gobsmacked, his mother . . . annoyingly delighted.

His mother. He wondered if he’d be in this position at all were she well . . .

“Hi.” A soft voice interrupted his sightless musings over the manure pile. “What’s wrong?”

He lifted his eyes to find Kim, in short jean shorts, snug yellow tank top bearing a regal, full-sized horsehead, and rubber muck boots, eyeing him from the barn door. His heart scrambled into panic. Time and again he’d shown he had no skill for handling Kimmy’s out-of-control crush, and the teasing little smile she wore now, one reserved strictly for him, proved he hadn’t made a dent in her teenage infatuation.

“Nothing’s wrong.” He smiled. “Enjoying the view.”

“Very weird.”

“Hmmm, your mother says that about me.”

She frowned at the mention of her mother but curbed it as she sidled closer. “Weird is fine by me.”

“What do you have there?” He distracted her by pointing to a slender, rolled-up magazine under her arm.

“A tack catalog. Hey, can I show you what I’m saving for?”

“Sure.”

She opened to a page filled with pictures of saddles. They all looked the same to Gray, but Kim pointed very specifically. “There.”

“A new saddle.”

“Yeah, a dressage saddle. See, I have a jumping saddle with these short, curved side flaps, but the dressage saddles have long, straight flaps. They keep your legs in the right position when you’re not jumping.” She pointed out the differences and explained, with excitement Gray found blessedly lacking in flirtatiousness, why she’d chosen the one she wanted.

But he’d never have guessed a slab of leather could cost thousands—as much as a high-end Les Paul guitar. “Big goal,” he said. “How’s it looking?”

“I get paid for teaching a few lessons, and for extra work around here. Sylvia pays me for helping in her garden. It might take years, but I’ll get it eventually.”

Gray could detect no complaint in her voice. In fact, she shrugged with a resigned smile. She really was a good kid. Unselfish and kind. Like her mother. “Times are tough all over,” he teased, “especially for a couple of single women trying to feed eight horsey mouths.”

Kim’s smile blinded him like a spotlight. “Too bad horses can’t eat soup and soda crackers, Mom says.”

“You and your mom work hard. It must be a bigger struggle than it looks, keeping up a place like this.”