Pretty Little Hellion (Rocker Universe: Pretty Little #3)

19. Emmie

Chapter Nineteen

Emmie

Annabelle lived in Nashville with her rockstar husband. Zander was one of OtherWorld’s bass players and a colossal idiot. But after the night I’d had with his band’s drummer, Devlin now owned that title, and I was willing to promote Z from colossal idiot to stupid jackass.

Nashville was two hours ahead of the West Coast, but Annabelle was still in her pink pajamas, legs folded beneath her on her couch, sipping her cup of coffee when my virtual call to her was answered.

She must have read the rage on my face because she slowly lowered her mug and leaned her face closer to her laptop screen. “When was the last time you slept?”

“Dunno,” I said with a shrug, tapping my stylus pen impatiently against the digital notebook I’d been making meticulous notes in all night. Thankfully, Marcus had gone to the office for me in the middle of the night so I could have all my work things.

“Jesus,” she grumbled. “I know you’ve been going through the wringer over how Dev, Nat, and Maddie are acting, but girl, you gotta take a moment to decompress. Think about all the amazing things Autumn’s Slumber will be getting now. They are gold, my friend. Pure gold. Oh, and just an FYI, there is still one social media platform that is out of service from all the views the live show got. Their servers couldn’t keep up or some techno mumbo jumbo shit.”

Her lips pressed into a hard line. “Don’t let Mieke know I said that last part. She gets twitchy when I speak ill of the technical world.”

“Hey, Mom!” Mieke jumped into the call, her smirk reminding me so much of her father’s I wanted to roll my eyes, but I didn’t have the energy to spare. And if I did, as tired as I was, they would no doubt get stuck like that and all I would see would be the darkness of my own traumatic memories.

Annabelle yelped, pressing a hand to her chest. “Stop doing that! I’m old, Mieke. You want to give your poor mother a heart attack?”

“My husband is a cardiologist. I trust that you would be in good hands should you or Dad ever need his services.”

“I need more coffee for this shit,” I muttered, staring longingly toward the kitchen and the empty coffeepot. I probably—definitely—should not have drunk the entire pot on my own.

There was a reason some energy drink company had paid Jesse an obscene amount of money for his recipe. I was fairly sure that a single person should never consume as much caffeine as I had the previous night.

“Let’s rehash our discussion via texts from last night and give ourselves time to think over what we spoke about before we move forward,” Annabelle suggested, always the calmer of the two of us.

Adding her as a partner to my business had tripled the clientele and our profits tenfold. She owned thirty percent of the management part of my business. So did Natalie, while I held the majority stock of forty percent. No way in hell was I able to give controlling stock in my company that I’d built from the ground up to anyone.

“Sonofabitch!” Annabelle snapped when I gave her the latest details of the previous night’s escapades. Her eyes glowed as she grabbed a decorative pillow from the end of the couch, punching it hard. “Let me get my hands on that bastard. He better get right with the Lord, because I’m going to be sending him to meet the man soon enough.”

“On that note, I’m adding Trinity and Natalie to the conference call now,” Mieke informed us, no doubt to distract her mother from her homicidal thoughts.

“Perfect,” I muttered, dreading yet ready for this confrontation to begin. All that coffee had definitely been a bad idea. Caffeine infused my rage, and I was sure I looked half demonic when two other windows opened on my laptop screen.

Trinity’s face came into focus first, her dimples popping as she waved. “Hey! Oh my gosh, I watched the live show last night with Jags, Piper, and Cannon. Avalyn went nuts dancing with Grier and Fallon, all of them shouting Hayat’s name. It was pure perfection!”

Nat appeared on the screen in her little box. Her face was set in hard, tired lines. She was sitting on the couch in her living room with her laptop open. On either side of her, I could see someone’s shoulders.

Dev and Maddie.

My pettiness wanted to see his face.

How badly was he bruised?

How many stitches were needed to close the gap on his forehead?

Would the doctor have needed to add staples to his scalp?

Jesse had held thick clumps of Dev’s hair when he’d released him. I had seen blood and a little flesh on the strands. I wondered if Dev would need to file a claim on his precious, insured dark locks?

I was still waiting for the cops to show up with a warrant to arrest Jesse for assault. Kratt knew to be on alert for my call.

It took a few moments for Trinity’s excited chatter to calm down before she realized no one else was happy for this group chat.

“Hey, Mom!” Trin’s smile didn’t quite reach her eyes as she focused on her parents’ screen. “Is that Dad and Maddie with you? Maddie, honey, I haven’t talked to you in a few days. How has therapy been going?”

The silence was so loud it practically hurt my ears. Strange how quietness could have an echo to it. The isolation of sound could drive a person crazy. My head was pounding from lack of sleep and way too much coffee. I wanted this to be over. To never have to deal with certain people on the screen before me ever again.

Trinity’s smile disappeared. “Mom, why haven’t you kept us up-to-date on Maddie’s therapy sessions?”

“Because she hasn’t been going,” I answered for Natalie when she still refused to speak, breaking the silence. “Your parents haven’t been taking her to therapy. And before that, when she did go, she sulked quietly for the entire hour before getting up and walking out. Every time.”

“Why?” she asked softly. “Maddie, why haven’t you been going to therapy?”

Finally, her blond head appeared in front of the screen, blocking out Natalie’s face with her own. Angry hazel eyes glowered at us all. “Because I don’t need fucking therapy. Stop trying to force it on me. I don’t want to go. I don’t need to talk about my past. It can stay there, for all I care. All that matters is now.”

“Okay, but right now, in the present, you are struggling,” Trinity argued. “You haven’t been in a good place with your mental health in weeks. The way you have been acting, that is not you. Sweetheart, please, just give it a chance.”

“No. And stop trying to make me. I’m an adult. You can’t force me to go if I don’t want to.”

Squeezing the bridge of her nose, Trinity blew out a heavy breath. “I don’t want to argue over this. Just because you are legally an adult does not mean you are capable of making adult decisions. If anything, you’re acting like a fucking child.”

“It’s my life!” Maddie exploded. “I’ll do what I want.”

Dropping her hand, Trinity glared right at the camera. “You and I are going to discuss this later with your dad. I got a text saying that Emmie and Annabelle needed to have an emergency meeting. Can we please discuss whatever happened so I can figure out what to do with my daughter?”

Annabelle glanced at me, signaling that this was my rodeo. Time to round up the clowns. Or rather, take them out of the equation.

“Natalie, as of nine o’clock, Pacific Coast time, this morning, your partnership with Annabelle and me will be voided. A courier will be at your house within the next twenty minutes with a check for the net worth of your thirty percent of our partnership. I added on an extra five million because I was feeling generous. And also because, if you decide to run your mouth to the press—which you can’t, by the way, what with that NDA you signed when you first started working for me and still stands to this day, damn, I sure do appreciate my legal team—you can’t cry you got cheated out of anything.”

Nat gasped at the same time Dev started cursing. “This isn’t right, Emmie. Just because of what happened last night, you’re going to shut Nat out of the company?” Half his face appeared on the screen. His nose was bandaged, and there looked to be a line of stitches going from the middle of his forehead back into his hairline. Trinity released a startled sound at the sight of her injured father. “She helped you build that company. Without her, you wouldn’t be where you are now!”

“Ah, I predicted one or both of you would throw out that phrase. Don’t make me hurt Natalie’s feelings, Dev. I trained Nat. I guided and mentored her for years before offering her the option to buy into the company. But only after she had worked her way up through the ranks. No, I didn’t just hand over a piece of my company. But with or without her, it wouldn’t have made a difference in me getting to where I and my company are today.”

“You’re nothing more than a petty little bitch,” Dev snarled.

“Yes,” I agreed with a grin. “Yes, I am.”

Trinity’s face scrunched up, confusion darkening her blue-gray eyes even as she continued to gape at her dad’s bandages.

“What’s going on?” she demanded. “What… I don’t understand. Emmie, why are you doing this? Annabelle? Do you agree with what Emmie is doing? Wait, you would have to, wouldn’t you? Someone… Oh my God, someone please tell me what is going on.”

“To answer your question, Trin, yes. I agree with this,” Annabelle told Trinity softly, empathy coating her voice. “Emmie and I discussed it last night before she instructed the lawyers to dissolve Nat’s share of the business. We had a more in-depth talk this morning, but to be completely transparent, I was in complete agreement that Natalie should not continue to be a part of the company. We feel that your mother’s recent attitude, as well as Devlin’s abhorrent actions, would ultimately ruin our company’s brand, and we aren’t willing to risk that. No, let me rephrase that, so that we are totally clear. I am not willing to risk the company that I had a very large contribution in building.”

Flicking her gaze over the screen, taking us all in, including Mieke, who hadn’t spoken, Trinity tried to make sense of what few details Annabelle had given her.

“Okay, someone—and I don’t give a fuck who at this point, but someone—better tell me exactly what is going on.”

Natalie’s eyes were filled with tears, but her chin was lifted at that stubborn Stevenson angle that I was used to seeing on her brothers. Even though she had cost herself her shares in the company, she still thought she was in the right?

“Trinity.” I pulled her attention to me. “I’m going to tell you everything. Every last shameful detail that has happened this past week. I don’t want you to interrupt, but to listen. To everything. And once I’m done, I will ask you two questions. Your reactions and answers to those questions could potentially change everything. And I mean everything , Trin. Do you understand?”

“Yes.”

I ran through the list of things Maddie had done since Abi’s wedding. Secretly sharing Ky’s location with herself so she could follow him. The horrible things she’d said to Hayat. Trinity nearly lost it when I told her about that, but she pressed her lips together firmly to keep whatever she wanted to say locked away until I was finished.

I explained Hayat’s reaction to Maddie calling her a whore. Her punching Maddie. Then I moved on to how Devlin and Natalie had reacted to Hayat explaining what had happened. Continuing, I told her what had happened after the live show at First Bass. Mieke brought up the CCTV footage from the club, showing it to everyone as I explained. Not just the recordings of the employee parking lot, but of Maddie running around to the front entrance and lying to Tiny about what had gone down.

Harris, Jesse, and Devlin entering the security feed room. Rewatching everything. The three of them going into the green room, but there were no cameras in there since that was where the bands got ready before a show. But then Dev came out of the green room and met us in the hall soon after.

Every terrible thing Devlin had spoken to his granddaughter replayed for us all to watch and hear. Even though I had been present when it happened, my stomach knotted up again as I watched.

And then came the grand finale. Jesse grabbing Devlin from behind, crashing him face first into the wall. Once, twice, before releasing him to console Hayat. Hearing her sobs tore my heart open again, which only pissed me off more.

Mieke ended the recordings, and we all sat there quietly so those who hadn’t seen the footage before could absorb every last detail.

Trinity sucked in a sharp breath, dashing her fingers over her face to wipe away her tears. “Emmie.” She stopped, clearing her throat before trying again. “Emmie, you said you were going to ask me two questions. Ask them now, please.”

I held up my index finger. “Are you ready to get Maddie the therapy she needs? Because that, in my opinion, will require in-depth, inpatient treatment.”

Her lashes lowered, and she swallowed several times before looking back at the screen. “Maddie, how could you say such terrible things like that to your cousin? How ? Did you forget that she fought ferociously for you, and no matter how big the bully was, she never once backed down. To protect you. And now, you treat her the same way those idiots treated you? Why?”

Maddie’s silence was like a trigger to Trinity’s anger. “Why?” she shouted. “Because she fell in love with three guys, one of them you might have grown a crush on? Tell. Me. Why. Right fucking now, little girl. Is this over Ky, really? She took the guy you wanted? He fell for her and is in a relationship with her, so you treat her how hundreds of people treated you?”

“I don’t want her to hurt him like his brother hurt me!” Maddie cried. “She’s whoring herself out to three different guys. Jumping from one dick to another—”

“Shut up!” Trinity shouted. “I am not going to sit here and let you talk about Hayat like that. You are not going to be the judge and jury regarding her life. If they want to be together, all four of them, then that is their right. And you will respect that.”

“She doesn’t deserve him!” Maddie ranted. “She has all three of those hot guys. All of them salivating over her. I only wanted one of them. Ky and I should have been together all along. At Abi’s ridiculous wedding, I thought Hayat was flirting with those other two to make him jealous. I should have known then what she was like. Trash. A fucking whore who spreads her legs for any willing dick. I would never treat Ky like that. Never!”

“No, Maddie. You’re the one who is undeserving. With your actions over the past few weeks. Your attitude. Your lack of empathy. I look at you right now, and I don’t recognize you. I don’t see the girl who would have done anything to protect her best friend. I don’t see anyone who even resembles my Maddie.”

“M-mom,” Maddie whispered.

“Shut up,” she commanded, her tone hardening, then she shifted her gaze to my box on the screen. “To answer your question, Emmie, yes. It’s time. I’m going to assume you already found the perfect place for her to have treatment.”

“What?” Maddie shrieked. “No, Mom! You wouldn’t, and your opinion doesn’t even matter. You can’t do anything! I’m an adult. You don’t have any say over me.”

“Actually, she does. If Trinity and Jarrett both sign the order Mieke just emailed to them, you can be held for seventy-two hours under a court-ordered psychiatric evaluation,” I informed her coolly. “We are all worried about you, Maddie. And given you have already self-harmed and almost succeeded in the past, it is reasonable to believe that you could be a current risk to yourself.”

“No!” she screamed. Jumping up from the couch, she moved out of view of the camera, but we could hear her having a complete meltdown. “No. Why are you doing this to me? Huh? Why ? Because perfect Hayat got her fucking feelings hurt? Because I want to be with Ky, and he wants to be with me? But everyone is standing in our way, thinking he should be in some freak show of a relationship with those creeps?”

Maddie continued to rant, but no one paid her any attention. Her delusions were escalating. That much was evident with each word out of her mouth.

Scrubbing her tears away, Trinity opened her email app on her phone and nodded. “We will sign the papers,” she choked out, which caused Maddie to start throwing things in the background.

Glass breaking. Loud thumping of books crashing to the floor. Natalie yelled for her to stop, but she hadn’t done much to discipline the girl up to this point, so there was no use in trying to now. Devlin just stayed where he was, and I figured it was because Jesse had given him a concussion.

The authorities would be at Nat and Dev’s house soon. Two cops, along with the social worker and the attorney I’d found for this delicate situation. No one was coming out the winner when it came to this particular issue. Maddie had tried to kill herself in the past. Her behavior was escalating. Soon, she would be a danger to herself.

Trinity blinked rapidly, fighting the emotional maelstrom she was being forced to face. Putting on that outer shield that I knew well, because I’d been forced to wear it most of my life, she spoke with clarity. “Now, ask the second question.”

“Do you want to buy the thirty percent shares of the company that your mother previously owned?”