Chapter 133

I heard a snort of disgust from the lounger beside me.

“Let me guess, ” she said, “you want your car and fifty bucks for gas.”

“Pretty much, ” I said. “If this … if we can’t make this work then I walk out with what I came in with.”

“It’s not going to work that way and I think you know that, ” she told me.

“I think it should work that way, ” I noted.

“Maybe it should, ” Liz said. “But it doesn’t. Do you know where I’d be right now if I hadn’t run into you again?”

“Anywhere you wanted to be, ” I said.

“As you like to say, ‘Not a prayer, ’” Liz said.

She had shifted until she was in a sitting position with her feet on the concrete. I moved to sit up, too.

“Dallas would have failed, ” Liz said. “I’d be almost unemployable. I’d be stuck with a manager that was … not what I needed or even wanted. Just … being with you for this long has shown financial benefits to my career. We can toss out the fact that I’m happy and the fact that my happiness played a big part in the success of the end of my tour. You’ve provided a … let me think of how Morrie phrased it … a ‘tangible benefit’ to my career and to my financial profile.”

“And you’ve paid me a salary to do that, ” I countered. “A … very nice … salary, I might add.”

Liz dipped her head, raised her sunglasses and pinched her nose again.

“Let me try things a different way, ” Liz said. “If we can’t come to an agreement …”

“We can’t get married, ” I interrupted. “Yeah, I get that.”

“No, ” Liz said. “Exactly the opposite, in fact. We’ll get married without an agreement in place.”

“That’s not going to happen, ” I said.

“Is this your way of saying that you don’t want to get married?” Liz asked.

“No!” I said. “I want to get married. It’s my way of saying that I don’t think you should have to … pay child support … for an adult.”

“Well, I think we’ve established that you’re 30 going on 15, ” Liz said. “We need to have something concrete in place. It would make it easier if you’d think in terms of the structure I just told you about. There needs to be a fixed monthly payment for a set number of months; a lump payout of some form and a division of property. The courts are going to make it that way if we don’t come up with something first. Because of how some of my assets are structured, they can’t be included by name but if there is something that you’d like to have then we’ll figure out how to make it possible.”

“Did you say I might be able to keep your ass?” I asked.

Liz chuckled.

“I think you’ll have access to that for as long as we’re alive, ” Liz said. “This is …”

She paused and looked out toward the water.

“It’s just a harsh reminder of how life is this world, ” Liz said. “You have some great lifelong partners. Glen and Erma come to mind. They’ve been married for 46 years.”

I nodded and smiled when I thought of the pair.

“But he wasn’t her first husband, ” Liz added.

“Really?” I asked.

“He wasn’t even her first famous husband, ” Liz continued. “She was married to the lead singer of a group that had a dozen hits before Glen had a record released. He was in his early 20s when they met and her marriage was already in trouble. It was the late 1960s and … fidelity wasn’t any more of an issue then than it seems to be now.”

“Yeah, ” I said. “But that’s not a problem with us.”

“It’s not, ” Liz said. “At least not right now and maybe not ever. But it happens. A lot of things could happen. So … we need something in place.”

“I understand that, ” I said. “It just doesn’t have to be something this … expensive. I think we both know if this comes crashing down – it’s going to be because I did something stupid.”

“We don’t know that, ” Liz said, smiling at me. “Think of all the stupid things I’ve done just since we’ve met. There are always going to be a lot of people whispering in my ears. There are always going to be people around me that have their own agenda. Yes, I’m trying to do better but Stephanie wasn’t the last person that is going to be jealous of you.”

She patted my hand softly.

“The structure is pretty standard, ” she said. “We can tweak it a little but if you’re opposed to what Morrie is going to suggest then you need to have different numbers in place. Those numbers can have zeroes attached to them but they can’t just be zero. OK? Talk to Ben and Lucas or even Conny and Melissa. Melissa and Brandon had a prenup even though they’re both pretty famous. Conny and Evan have an agreement in place even though he makes a really good living. Did you know he gets paid $2.6 million a year?”

I shook my head but I wasn’t really paying attention.

“I’ve talked to Lucas and Ben about the necessity of … protecting your interests, ” I said. “Ben and Kim are like Conny and Evan. They have an agreement about division of assets and property. And, yes, it’s set up just like you told me. Lucas and Gwen don’t have one. They were married before he did anything at all.”

“I sorted of figured that was the case, ” Liz said. “You know, this is designed to protect your future earnings, too.”

“My future earnings are entirely predicated on yours, ” I responded.

“For the next few years, yeah, ” Liz said. “After that, probably not. Your career isn’t going to end in eight or 10 years. Mine is very likely to dry up by then. I’ve already quadrupled the life expectancy of a female country performer. Most of them have one or two discs and then disappear. You can search for days and not come up with the names of 10 female country singers that had success that extended past their early 40s in the past 30 years. It just doesn’t work that way for women in Nashville.

“My next release might not sell 50 copies and I’ll be left to perform in Branson and Las Vegas if I want to make a living doing this. Sure, a lot of what I’ve invested in has staying power but my apparel line will drop off at the same rate as my musical popularity.

“In five years, you could be the head of the largest public relations firm in the world. Look at the last week. You have pushed the credit off on the folks in San Diego and I know they deserve their share but you’re shining right now. When Ben asked if LLE could take over some of the things he needs done, he was asking if you would take over his marketing and PR. Conny and Melissa have already said that they are going to pull that from their labels at the first opportunity – but only if you are in shape to handle things for them.

“No one would be the least bit surprised if, in five or six years, that you’re making as much per year as I am!”

“I would!” I said. “And, by the way, even if this all comes to pass, anywhere I go from here is because you made it possible.”

Liz gave me her best smug look. She did “smug” very well.

“And anywhere I go from here is because you’ve made it possible, ” she said when my scowl didn’t lessen. “So get the numbers together if you have a counterproposal. You have until Tuesday.”

“OK, ” I said.

“Now, a couple of other things, ” Liz said. “I will need you to clear your schedule from … let’s say noon until four on Tuesday. You might have to push your harder workout back until 4:30 and move the others up a little bit. Can you do that?”

“Well, yeah, ” I said. “Why?”

“Morrie is coming, ” Liz reminded me.

“That conversation is not going to take four hours, ” I said firmly. “I doubt it will take four minutes. I’ll offer; he’ll agree; and that’ll be it.”

“He might agree but I probably won’t, ” Liz noted. “Plan for an hour with him. If it’s shorter … we’ll find some way to occupy our time.”

“Fine, ” I said. “What’s the other three hours for? Don’t tell me that we’re having a formal lunch.”

“No, ” Liz said. “But that’s a good idea. George Carter is coming to visit us. That’s the real reason Morrie is coming down in person. I want George to meet all the important people. Ryan is coming out; Jill and Skye will be here; my crew leader and my lead costume designer will be here. We’ll see if Veronica can put together lunch for us.”

“Uh, we haven’t actually hired her yet, ” I said.

“Oh, please, I called her yesterday to offer her the job, ” Liz said. “She starts Monday. Those other two weren’t any better than Lynwood.”

I tilted my head at her. It was supposed to be my decision. I couldn’t see it behind her sunglasses but I knew Liz rolled her eyes at me.

“If we didn’t hire her, you were going to start showing up at her house for leftovers!” Liz said, laughing at me. “She’s not going to board here. She has her own place and she wants to stay there. So no late-night snacks unless you tell her beforehand.”

“Fine, ” I said. “She was the best choice.”

“There were choices with better resumes, ” Liz noted. “But they wouldn’t have fit in out here. While we’re on the subject, what about the trainers we talked to this week?”

I shook my head.

“I wasn’t favorably impressed, ” I admitted. “We have to remember, these people are going to be working with Ryan and Brian and Dom as much as they work with me. They’re going to be dealing with Jill and Skye … and maybe Melissa and Conny … as much as you. Ryan has gone through NFL training camp. He doesn’t need another coach yelling at him. Brian and Dom are real-life military heroes. They aren’t going to do well with some wannabe drill sergeant with no military service barking at them.”

“I’m glad we’re on the same page, ” Liz said. “I … they made me feel like they were interviewing us instead of the other way around. I hope the one tomorrow is better. He’s the last one we’ve got lined up to talk to.”

“Is Conny going to be pissed if we pass on the guy she sent our way?” I asked.

“I told her that I didn’t think he was going to work for us, ” Liz said. “She said it didn’t make any difference to her. She just knew he had the skills we needed but it isn’t like it was the brother-in-law she was trying to get off her couch.”

I chuckled. The second person we’d interviewed had been a woman who had been a former student of Bill Black’s at Vanderbilt. She was about as strident a person as I’d ever been around. I’m sure she thought she was just being exuberant but in truth it fell well on the side of being annoying after the first 30 seconds or so.

“We can hope tomorrow is better, ” I said.

“Anything else we need to talk about before we head upstairs and drop our inhibitions?” Liz asked.

“Uh, one thing, ” I said.

She had already stood, seemingly ready to jump right to the part where we lost our clothing. I would have agreed but I’d been meaning to bring it up for the past day or two.

Plus, I doubted it would cause her legs to slam closed.

“It’s about the wedding, ” I said.

“Oh, OK then, ” Liz said, smiling and sitting back down.

“Are we still looking at San Diego?” I asked.

“Yes, ” Liz said. “In fact, with the house closing so quickly, I was thinking about having it there.”

I tilted my head and smiled.