Laid Bare - Lauren Dane [60]
He kissed her softly. “As for the other stuff? I’ll be by your side the whole time. I’d love to see you play, be it just the two shows here or the shows here and in New York. It’s up to you. I respect your decision either way.”
“What do you think? I know you respect my decision, but I’m asking your opinion.”
“I think you’ll kick yourself if you don’t play the MSG gig.” He shrugged. “I know you, honey. I hear the way your voice changes when you talk about it. You’re scared, yeah, but you’re excited. Wistful. I say do it. We’ll be your personal detail. We’ll work with the label, get things set up. I’m sure Jeremy would want to do whatever he needed to in order to keep you safe.”
She tried not to smile, but the way he said Jeremy’s name was cute. “I don’t love him, you know. I love you.”
“Of course you do.” He raised a brow. “But he has something with you that I want very much. He’s lived with you; he’s had a child with you. It’s hard not to resent him just a bit. And I’m sure he has some swank house in Holmby Hills and shit and wears three-thousand-dollar suits.”
“Benedict Canyon, actually. And yeah, it’s pretty swank. He likes suits too. Flies to London twice a year to buy custom stuff. He drives a Bentley. He spends four hundred dollars to get his hair cut and he gets manicures. He’s a nice man who cringed at the very idea of me wanting him to hold me down. Of me wanting the bruises from his hands holding my arms or wrists. He never bit me. He never made me feel even a shadow of what you do every time you look at me like I’m the most precious thing to ever breathe. You are everything to me, Todd. I don’t care what you drive or where you live. You have horrible taste in music, but I’m willing to overlook it. Thank god I exist to cancel out your vote on Election Day.” She grinned.
“I want you to protect me at these shows. I want you to”—she swallowed hard as emotion swamped her—“be with me and to have babies with me in the future. I never thought I’d want that again. I love you.”
He pulled her close, his hands sliding up and down her spine.
“And you were married! I’ve seen her picture you know, at your parents’ house, although I know your mom didn’t like her. Your wife is gorgeous and perfect.”
He snorted and set her away from him enough so that they could see each other’s face. “How did you know my mom didn’t like her?”
“She said, when I was there a few weeks ago, ‘I have no idea what in god’s name Todd was thinking when he married that girl. She had no spine, she didn’t give him what he needed and she was more worried about what fork went where than whether or not she made my boy happy.’ I asked her why she had the wedding photo up and she said,” Erin paused to laugh, “she said she looked really good in the pictures.”
“She thought Sheila did?”
Erin laughed harder. “N-no, your mother thought she, your mother, looked good in them. She said she lost ten pounds just dealing with Sheila’s snotty attitude about the wedding and how much was being spent, and she was sure she’d never be that size again. She asked if I thought it would be bad form if she just cut herself out and left that part.”
Todd laughed then. “What did you say?”
“I said I had scissors in my purse.”
He laughed until he had to wipe away tears. “You fit with my family, you know that? And yes, Sheila is pretty, but she’s my ex-wife and she’s now happily married to someone else. You aren’t pretty, you’re stunning. You make people turn and look when you walk into a room. It doesn’t matter that you might have pink hair when you do it, or that you’re wearing a torn T-shirt. You’re magnetic and you’re mine. Even if you have shitty taste in music, except for what you create, which I freely admit is amazing. Even if you are a bleeding heart liberal.” He winked. “I love you too, and thank you for saying that. About babies. I want that too. I just