satchel in a single trip.
Shauna exhaled and eased back into the chair. “Besides, I shouldn’t have to explain anything to anyone. Rock stars do crazy stuff all the time and get a pass. Since middle school, I have been homeschooled and tutored, so I didn’t do the typical rebellious teenager stuff. I have been working hard since I was fourteen. I don’t do drugs. I don’t drink. I don’t go out to parties. I need to be cut some slack here.”
Craig sighed, then lowered his head again. If Craig thought her sabbatical made her soft, he had another thing coming. Forget what the doctors had said about her making some significant changes in her life. No, Shauna needed to keep on track like she hadn’t missed a beat.
He stood from his desk and planted himself in front of her. He brought his hands to his hips. From under the brim of her hat, she spied his knock-off Rolex watch and simple gold wedding band that glowed against his dark skin.
“What happened to all of your good jewelry?” She flicked his watch.
“This is part of what I wanted to tell you after your last show.” He covered his watch with his hand as he regarded her. “Your accountant ran off with half of your money and fled the country. We tried to get your attorney to sue the bastard, but she was in on the scam too and took off with more of your dough. Then you had all of the other people in your employ.” He brought his hand up and ticked off people on each finger. “Your personal chef, your masseuse, your stylist, your acupuncturist.” He snickered. “The reason you got six months in that place was because each time they asked for money, I fired someone you employed until there was no one left.”
“Not even my vocal coach?” The person who had been with her before she signed her first record deal would never leave her, right?
“He was the first to go.” Craig shook his head. “I don’t mean I fired him. He left on his own as soon as you, um, went away.”
She rubbed the back of her neck to relieve the strain and to keep her hands occupied. When her fingers brushed against the coarse, balled hair underneath her braids, she brought her hand down.
“I can’t even afford to hire someone to style you. You have no money. Nothing. Nada. Zippo.” He made a circle using his index finger and thumb.
She gritted her teeth, snorted like a bull, then spoke. “What about you? You could have gone off and represented some other hot up-and-comer.”
He put his hand on top of her shoulder. It was the first personal touch she’d had since being away. She relaxed, but kept her gaze on him.
“I’m still here, aren’t I?” His already deep voice dipped down to a lower octave. “I gave up my pay months before you went in. I hired my own lawyer to go after the bastards but they made sure to have ironclad contracts. I saw the writing on the wall and I tried to tell you but, well, you know.”
Yes, she knew she hadn’t listened to anyone. As one of the hottest R&B artists out there, no one had bothered to give her any bad news except for one thing.
“I also sold my house, the cars, the jewelry. Delores and I don’t mind the comparably smaller house. She says there’s less to clean, especially since the maid stopped coming by three times a week.” He chuckled again but this time it was meant to ease her mind.
She reached forward to pat his hand, but stopped herself. The old Shauna wouldn’t have shown this much compassion. Chantel Evans threatened to come out, and she didn’t need her old, insecure self with her overwhelming need to please rearing her timid head. Like Craig used to tell her, “Release your ghetto fabulousness.”
If she showed a softer side, Craig would probably worry that she couldn’t be that hit maker again. From everything he had done for her, she knew he expected her to do great things again. Shauna wondered if she could deliver.
“And the restaurant?” Shauna remembered when Craig had bought the place for his wife because it was Delores’s dream to own her own Southern-cuisine restaurant.
He smiled. “I don’t care if I have to dig ditches to keep that place going. Delores has more than earned her right to have Dee’s House.”
It was nice to see a man so supportive of his woman’s goals. It would have been nice to have someone supporting Shauna instead of using her, like her record label.
She scanned Craig’s much smaller space. Bright white paint covered the walls, and it didn’t match the expensive items he’d brought into the room. As soon as her gaze settled on his shelves and she caught a glimpse of her Grammy awards, she raised herself from the chair and strolled to them like a magnetized pull.
When she stood in front of the gold trophies, she stared at them. They reminded her of her old self. Her confident self even if the confidence stemmed from a lie, a fake persona.
She put her hand on the plate and ran her fingertips over her engraved name. A shiver crept up her back as though she had touched a tombstone.
“With no money and a crooked accountant, your taxes hadn’t been paid. When the IRS sold your house and all your possessions while you were resting, I couldn’t bear to let them sell those.” Craig stood behind her. “I didn’t have enough money to buy anything else.”
What world had Shauna returned to? She would have been better off staying at Peaceful Acres but the doctors there had convinced her to go, move on with her life. How the hell was she supposed to do that?
Shauna turned around. She didn’t want to keep staring at her awards, painful reminders of a life she used to have, about a person she used to be.
“I’m going to sing.” The statement made her blink. She’d thought about it during her time away but never verbally expressed her desires. Then again, what else did she have left to use?
“Good girl.” Craig beamed, a smile spreading from ear to ear.
“But I haven’t sung in a while.” She cleared her throat. “I’m not ready.”
She hadn’t sung a note since finding out her mother had passed away. She didn’t know if she could get up in front of a crowd of people and sing like she used to as a former diamond-selling artist. She had to bring that old Shauna Stellar back and make her bigger than ever.
“I figured you would say that.” Craig rifled through some papers on his desk as she approached him.
“So if I have no money, if everything I own is gone, what do I do now? Where do I go?” Shauna reclaimed her seat. This time she pushed her hat back and stared at Craig.
“Since you have no more houses or apartments, you will stay with me and Delores. She’s missed the kids since they’ve gone off to college and gotten lives of their own. You’ll be good for her. She can lay off me for a change.” Craig laughed. “And your cousins are in and out of the house all the time.”
Shauna fell back in her seat. Even though she loved Delores’s home cooking, and her cousins made great substitutes for a brother and sister she never had, she really wanted to branch out on her own once she came out of Peaceful Acres.
Craig clasped his hands together and sat them on his desk. With a grin as big as the Atlantic Ocean, he made an announcement. “You, my dear, are going to get back into the music biz by producing.”
Shauna furrowed her
