A Love Song for Dreamers - Piper Lawson Page 0,60
that your life’s not what you expected?” Beck asks.
“No.” Conviction grows deep in my gut. “It’s not.”
I’ll always love her, but I want more than a fucking feeling. I want to be with her. I want a front-row seat to every success and failure she has for the rest of our lives.
My phone buzzes and I glance at it.
It’s an email from Annie with an attachment.
I click it open, zoom in on the lines of the script.
“What are you—”
I hold up a hand at Beck as I read the first scene.
Then I drop onto the couch and scan the second.
After the third I jump up, heading for the door.
“Where are you going?” Beck calls, emerging from the back of the house.
I snap my head up and head for the front door. “There’s somewhere I need to be.”
Beck points back toward the rest of the house. “But you haven’t checked out my future bedroom.”
“I asked for avocado,” Zeke tells the waitress on the patio that afternoon. His voice is cordial, but his eyes narrow as he squints against the sun.
She disappears through the doors of the restaurant, past the palm trees blowing in the breeze.
“Hard to get everything you want, isn’t it?” Zeke leans forward over the table between us.
“It doesn’t have to be.”
He grins. “The guys said you were at the studio yesterday with some suggestions on the tracks. Glad you’re coming around. You can meet marketing next week.”
I stare at the burger in front of me, waiting for his food to return. Fuck it. I take a mouthful of mine.
After swallowing the first bite, I say, “I’m meeting them right after this.”
Zeke’s brows shoot up in surprise. “I’m pleased to see you’re enthusiastic.”
“That’s not the word I’d use. I’m leaving LA and I don’t want any talk that I’m not fulfilling my contract.”
He laughs. “You’re not leaving LA. You just got back.”
I mentally review the points that came together quickly once I’d decided on my next move. “I know I haven’t been the easiest to work with, but that’s going to change. You’ll still have input on the songs and production for the rest of the album. But I will record it at the studio of my choosing.”
Zeke shifts back in his chair, folding his arms, but I’m not done.
“I will commit to being a better collaborator. Including paying for someone at the label to coordinate promotion, which, as we’ve established, isn’t my strength. In return, what I do on my own time is my own business. It won’t compromise the label or its brand.”
“Tyler. This is impossible.”
“The word you’re looking for is ‘unorthodox,’” I supply. “The label’s ownership is in this to make money. You saw that in me. You gave me a chance and it paid off. Now I’m offering you a chance. If you don’t like it, you can sue me for breach of contract, which will be time consuming and expensive and make us both less valuable.”
He blinks at me. “Is that all?”
His voice makes it clear he thinks I’ve lost my mind.
I rise from my chair and toss a fifty on the table for my half-finished burger. “A summary of what I’m proposing is in your email. You can send me any comments over the next forty-eight hours. After my surgery, I’m leaving town.”
I start for the door, but Zeke calls after me. “Where are you going?”
I heave out a breath. “Where I should’ve been all along.”
The door opens to reveal screaming children and a tired-looking thirty-something woman who straightens in recognition when she sees me.
I rub a hand over my neck. “I’m looking for Jax.”
“He’s in the yard. Are there any more musicians coming?” she calls after me hopefully as I head through the house, a sprawling, new-looking ranch that’s not as big as Jax’s but still screams money.
It’s been two days since my hand surgery, and though the surgeon said it went well, it’s too soon to know if this will make the difference I’m hoping for by taking away most of the pain and stiffness.
But no matter what happens, for the first time, I’m not lying awake at night, willing this to be the thing that fixes me.
As I head out the back doors and into a sprawling yard filled with bright colors, children’s entertainment, and clusters of adults, I don’t have to ask where to find Jax—it’s clear from all the moms staring at him. He’s in one corner, talking to a man who looks like the only other dad