Chapter 8

They sucked him dry again in the morning, and then got ready to go home. From breakfast they went straight to the airport. Seventeen hours later, tired, but happy, they climbed out of a taxi at the girls home. There was a van in the driveway that had a home health care logo on it. The girls hadn't taken a key to the house, but the home health aide opened the door with a smile.

"You must be Gabby and Daffy," she said, grinning. "I'm Nancy. I've been taking care of your mother for a week, since she came home. You're all she's talked about since I stared taking care of her. You've made quite a splash on the music scene, I understand."

"We did our best," said Gabby, sinking down into a familiar living room chair.

"According to your mother, you did much better than that," said the woman. "She's been on the phone for the last week, more than was good for her, I might add. People have been calling from all over the world to talk about you two."

"That's all well and good," said Bob. "And I'm proud and happy for you both, but I'm going home. I need a shower and about eighteen hours of sleep."

"Deliah said she wanted to see you as soon as you get here," said Nancy. "She's sleeping right now, and I have orders to wake her as soon as you arrive, but she really needs her rest. Couldn't you stay for a while longer?"

"I've been gone for weeks," sighed Bob. "I need to check on work stuff, and go through the mail, pay some bills and all that. Just tell her I love her and I'll see her tomorrow some time."

"She gave me very strict instructions," objected Nancy.

"Tell her she can yell at me tomorrow," he said firmly.

He turned to leave, and was engulfed by young girls who, thankfully, only kissed him on his cheeks.

"Thank you," said Daphne. "We couldn't have done it without you."

"I'm very proud of you both," said Bob.

"I love you," said Gabby, sneaking her hand to squeeze the front of his pants, which was shielded from Nancy by Daffy's body.

Bob jumped, but forced a grin. "I love you both too," he said. Then he fled.

Bob was awakened by the phone ringing. He let it ring, and heard the machine pick up. Deliah's voice came on the line.

"Bob Hazzard, you get your butt over here!" she yelled. "How dare you do this to me?! If you're not back over here in an hour, you're fired! I know you're there, you lazy bastard." Bob heard the girls' voices in the background, saying things like "Mom! Leave him alone."

He looked at his watch. It was eight fifteen in the morning. He'd planned on sleeping until at least noon. The phone rang again. It was Deliah. "I'm not going to stop, Duke," she yelled into her phone. We have a LOT to talk about. If you don't answer your phone and get over here, I'm sending the police after you! Now get up and talk to me!"

He managed to get to a sitting position on the edge of his bed. When the phone rang again he groaned and stood up, reaching for it.

"I'll be there after I've had some coffee!" he said, without letting Deliah say anything first.

"Great," said a male voice. "I promise the interview won't take more than fifteen or twenty minutes."

"Interview?" said Bob groggily. "Who is this?"

"David Matthews, from Music Insider magazine, Mr. Hazzard. I'm so glad you agreed to be interviewed. I can't wait to talk to you."

"Hang on there," said Bob. "I thought you were my sister, who's been pestering me, and I don't know anything about any interview."

"It was your sister who set it up," said Matthews. "I thought you knew."

"I don't know anything," growled Bob. "I just got back from being overseas for three weeks, and would kill for four more hours of sleep. Call me later, okay?"

He hung up. The phone rang almost instantly.

"WHAT!?" he shouted into the phone. "LEAVE ME ALONE!"

"Uncle Bob?" came an instantly recognizable voice. It was Daphne.

"Oh, hi," said Bob. "Sorry. I just got a call from some magazine guy, and your mother's been calling too."

"You really need to come back over here," came Daphne's worried voice. "Mamma's trying to get out of bed. She's yelling all over the place and she's going to hurt herself or something."

Bob felt his stomach drop. The girls must have said something. Deliah must know what had happened. He remembered her threat to get law enforcement to come get him if he didn't come right over. Daphne's worried voice only added to his feeling of dread.

"Okay, I'll get dressed and be over," he said.

He hung up and chose his clothing for the express possibility that he might be hauled off in handcuffs, and have to live in it for a day or two. He'd already taken care of the hot button issues in the mail. There wasn't anything else he could do to prepare.

When he got there, Nancy met him at the door.

"She has to stay in bed!" she said. "Get that through her thick head, would you please?"

Bob went straight to the spare bedroom, which had been outfitted with a hospital type bed, both to make her more comfortable, and to assist in her recovery. She was on the phone, but when she saw him she made a hasty goodbye and flipped the phone closed with a whack.

"It's about time," she yelled.

"Look, I'm sorry," he said. He knew when she was in this mood she wouldn't listen to anything he said. He knew her well enough to know that. She looked pale, and her body was still swathed in casts and bandages. "I'm sorry about everything. I tried to do the best I could, but I wasn't prepared for it."

"What are you talking about!?" she yelled. "You did superbly! It couldn't possibly have gone any better, you idiot!"

"Would you stop yelling?" he asked. "Just tell me what you want."

Deliah took a deep breath, and relaxed back into the raised bed.

"Bob, I've gotten at least thirty calls asking to book the girls. This tour made them go through the roof! I've already got two more tours roughed out, on paper. I need to make plans to finalize contracts, and I'm stuck in bed. You're the obvious person to help me. You did WONDERFULLY, Bob. I want to hire you as my new tour manager."

Bob had been prepared to defend himself on charges of molesting the girls. He was not, in any way, shape or form, prepared for this. He felt weak in the knees, and stumbled to a chair beside the bed to sit down.

"I can't do that, Deliah," he gasped.

"What are you talking about?" demanded his sister, tensing back up. "I have to have you, Bob. I won't be in shape to take the girls back out for months, and the next tour could be scheduled as early as three weeks from now!" She looked at the panic on his face. "If it's money you're worried about ... don't. Their fee has tripled, and all because of how this tour went. They never played as well as they did while you were with them. Even I was amazed when I got the recordings. And the Bluegrass! That was a stroke of genius, Bob. I've got people calling me wanting them to make a whole album, just of bluegrass favorites!"

Half of Bob was ecstatic for both Deliah and her daughters. Their career had gotten the jump start that could make them world famous. But he couldn't go on tour with them again. The way they felt, he'd never be able to keep from turning the tour into breeding season with Uncle Bob!

"That's great Dee," he said, using the nickname he had called her all their lives. "But I can't go with them. There are ... problems."

"Problems!" barked Deliah. "What problems? I don't have time for problems, Bob. This is the chance of a lifetime. If things keep going the way they are now, the girls could be set for life by the time they're twenty!"

Bob tried to think of a way to get out of this without spelling it all out. Obviously she didn't know what he had been afraid she'd known, and he sure didn't want to tell her.

"There are ... personality differences," he said. "It makes it almost impossible for us to ... function."

She stared at him. "What in the WORLD are you talking about, Duke? The girls obviously love you. They talk about you more than they talk about the tour! They can't WAIT to get back on tour with you!"

Bob closed his eyes and slumped.

"Bob?" asked Deliah, her voice lower now. There was the tinge of concern in it. "Duke?" she said, slipping, again, into the use of his nickname.

"Dee, you know I love you," he started. She took a breath and he put his hand up to stop her. "I sort of stumbled on them while they were ... prepping for a concert," he said.

Her eyes got big, and her mouth went into an "o" shape.

"I couldn't tell you about that, Bob," she said in an urgent whisper. "I'm sorry. I should have warned you. It's necessary, Bob. It's part of their performance."

"Oh, I understand that," said Bob. "And you're right. It inspires them, but..."

"But what?" she asked.

"They transferred their attention from the pictures ... to me," he said miserably.

"What?" she gasped.

"That's what I'm trying to tell you, but don't want to tell you," he moaned. "We got very close on this trip ... too close. If I go out with them again, very bad things could happen, Dee."

"You had sex with my daughters?" asked Dee, astounded.

"NO!" he said hastily. "But it was all I could do to keep them from doing that. They got more and more insistent, and demanded things, and I didn't know what to do, and I tried as hard as I could to control it and resist them, but there are TWO of them. I tried, Dee, I really tried."

"What did you do, Bob?" she asked quietly. "And when did you do it?"

Bob blinked. Her second question seemed completely odd.

"Well, the second night I was so excited about how they played that I just walked in on them after the concert was done," he started out. "They were ... um ... well you know what they were doing. It was embarrassing for all of us, but they wanted to explain why it was ... necessary."

Now that he had started, it wasn't quite as hard to go on.

"Then there was a mix-up with the rooms and we all had to stay in one room. I was wearing the boxers you got me ... with the little hearts on them?" He waited until she nodded. "Well, in the morning, I had a ... um ... well, you know what happens to men in the morning, right?" She nodded again. "Well, it sort of came out of the fly while I was asleep ... and they got up first ... and they ... um ... saw it, and I didn't MEAN for them to see it ... but they did."

He had to take a breath.

"And then, they wanted to see it again, but I wouldn't let them. But I knew they played so much better when they were..." He trailed off.

"Horny?" asked their mother. Her frown wasn't nearly as pronounced now.

"Well, yes," he said, blushing. "So anyway, I thought it would be okay if I just put a picture of it in with theirs - I snooped and found them, because I was curious - and anyway, I did that, thinking that would be okay, that it might be all they needed ... except they kept wanting more..." He shot a pleading look at his sister. "I screwed up, I know, but I didn't know what else to do. They were very insistent!"

"I know how insistent my daughters are," said Deliah, her voice calm. "You said this happened for the second concert? The one where they invited you out on stage for the first time?"

Bob blinked. "Yes," he said. "But I didn't ask them to do that. I didn't even know they were going to do that."

"This is making a lot more sense, all of a sudden," said Deliah, almost to herself. "Go on."

"Go on?" he whined. "Do I have to?"

"Yes, you do," ordered Deliah.

"Well, they don't put on much to sleep in, and they're so beautiful, and I know I shouldn't have looked, but I couldn't help it and I kept reacting to them." His eyes got owlish. "They KISSED me before the encore, and I mean they KISSED me!" he gasped. "And then they had a fight and Daffy was half naked, and by the time I broke that up, she said I'd seen her that way, so she didn't need to wear anything more than panties." He looked about ready to cry. "And they wouldn't LISTEN to me when I told them how wrong all this was, but they insisted and the next thing I knew they were touching it and..."