Public Secrets
Chapter 77 : time to stop, Bev.""It's easy for you, isn't it?" She s.n.a.t.

time to stop, Bev."

"It's easy for you, isn't it?" She s.n.a.t.c.hed a blanket from the crib to

press it to her b.r.e.a.s.t.s. "You can sit and drink and write your music as

if nothing happened. It is so b.l.o.o.d.y easy for you."

"No." Weary, he pressed his fingers to his eyes. "But I can't just stop

living. He's gone, and I can't change it."

"No, you can't change it." The helpless grief welled up to rub the wound

raw. "You had to have the party that night. All those people in our

home. Your family was never enough for you, and now he's gone. You had

to have more, more people, more music. Always more. And one of those

people you let into our home killed my baby."

He couldn't speak. If she had taken a knife and slashed him from heart

to gut there might have been less pain. Certainly less shock. They

stood, with the empty crib between them.

"He didn't let the monsters in." Emma stood in the doorway, her books

dangling from their strap, her eyes dark against her white skin. "Dad

didn't let the monsters in." Before Brian could speak, she was rus.h.i.+ng

down the hall, her sobs trailing behind her.

"Good job," Brian managed to say while his jaw clenched and unclenched.

"Since you want to be alone, I'll take Emma and go."

She wanted to call after him, but couldn't. Tired, much too tired, she

sank into the rocker again.

IT TooK HIM AN HOUR to calm Emma. When her tears had put her to sleep,

he began his calls. His decision made, he ended with Pete.

"We're leaving for New York tomorrow," he said shortly. "Emma and I.

We'll hook up with Johnno, take a few days. I need to find her a good

school and arrange security. Once she's settled, and safe, we'll go to

California and begin rehearsals. Fix up the tour, Pete, and make it a

long one." He took a hard pull of whiskey. "We're ready to rock."

SHE DOESN'T WAnt to go back." Brian watched Emma wander around the

rehearsal hall with her new camera. He'd given it to her during their

tearful goodbye at Saint Catherine's Academy for Girls in upstate New

York.

"She'd barely been there a month before this spring-break thing,"

Johnno reminded him. But he felt a twinge for the little girl as she

snapped a picture of Stevie's Martin on its stand in the corner. "Give

her a bit of time to adjust."

"It seems all we do is adjust." It had been eight weeks since he'd

walked out on Bev, and he still ached for her. The women he'd taken

since were like a drug, the drugs like women. Both only eased the pain

for moments at a time.

"You could call her," Johnno suggested, reading his partner's thoughts

with the ease of a long relations.h.i.+p.

"No." He'd considered it, more than once. But the papers had been full

of their separation, and his appet.i.te since. He doubted if he and Bev

would have anything to say to each other that wouldn't make things

worse. "My concern now's for Emma. And the tour."

"Both'Il be smas.h.i.+ng." Johnno glanced over, giving a pointed look toward

Angie. "With a few exceptions."

Brian merely shrugged and began to noodle on the piano. "If she