He nodded and swallowed hard. “I saw him,” he whispered. He shook his head and bit the inside of his cheek, looking away.
Sparrow carefully moved Journey’s arm and leg off of her and stood up. She looked at the mantle, making sure the monitor was on. She walked toward him and took his hand, leading him to their bedroom.
Ian pushed the door behind him but didn’t close it all the way. They’d be able to hear the little one crawling when she woke up. She was nearly seven months, but Journey had inherited her mom’s long legs and her—as Sparrow put it—‘complete lack of gracefulness’. Sparrow couldn’t help it if occasionally her feet got ahead of her. And even if nothing stood in her way, Journey seemed able to make a racket when she went mobile.
Sparrow turned and wound her hands around the back of his neck, studying his face.
“I’m worried about you,” she said. “This with Donny and leaving soon … the stress of moving everything into storage. It’s a lot.”
“It is. And there’s more. I’ll tell you all about it, but right now I just want to sink into you and not think about anything else.”
Her eyes widened and then she smiled, pressing closer to him
He kissed down her neck and whispered: “How long do you think we have?” He lifted her short skirt and had the tiny scrap of lace underneath pulled off before she even answered.
“Maybe a half hour,” she whispered, unbuttoning his jeans and moving his boxer briefs down, as she took hold of him.
“Oh, you’re not messing around,” he said, grinning.
“Neither are you, apparently.” She smirked, her hands cool on his hot skin.
His fingers dipped inside her, one at a time. “What’s got you all worked up, baby?”
She shifted her hips toward his hand, greedy.
“You,” she purred.
He had barely moved his fingers aside and inched into her, making contact with his favorite place on earth, when the sounds of their monkey crawler came barreling down the hall toward them.
Sparrow’s legs unwrapped from his waist, and he was hanging in the cold air, hurriedly pushing himself back into his boxer briefs, all in split seconds.
When Journey pushed through the door, looking for them, they were both grinning at her.
“Dadadadada,” Journey chanted, crawling toward him.
“Pumpkin! Prettiest little cock-block I ever did see,” Ian cooed at her, picking her up and hugging her.
“Ian!” Sparrow smoothed her skirt down and turned pink.
He loved making her blush more than anything. He tried to get her good and flustered at least twice a day.
“Just telling it like it is,” he said. “She doesn’t know yet how she’s making her daddy suffer.”
“And hopefully she won’t ever figure it out,” Sparrow mumbled, nuzzling into Journey’s chubby baby neck.
Ian blew a raspberry on Journey’s cheek and the sound of her laughing made them all laugh. He sighed a long sigh when he stopped laughing, some of the heaviness coming back to him.
Sparrow touched his cheek. “Come tell me about it while I make dinner.”
He nodded and then took her hand from his cheek and kissed it. “Okay. And I intend to finish what I started as soon as the little blue-baller goes to bed tonight.”
Sparrow groaned and her eyes narrowed, her cheeks doing their thing.
“You need to get out of the naughty name-calling habit right now,” she said.
He laughed and she growled, which only made him laugh harder.
Journey wiggled out of his arms when she heard the phone ringing and scuttled over to try and pick it up. He hadn’t even remembered where he’d left it, but his daughter had a keen sense of where the cell phone was at all times. It was just out of her reach, so Ian grabbed it and thanked her for finding it before she took it too hard that it wasn’t in her little hands.
She didn’t care that he’d thanked her—her lower lip stuck out and instant tears filled her eyes. He tried saying ‘hewwo’ before he answered, to distract her. Sometimes that made her laugh, but this time it wasn’t working. Something like ‘Heww-lo’ came out when he pressed talk. Sparrow giggled as she picked up Journey.
“Hello. Am I speaking to the Sexiest Man Alive?” The guy started laughing midway through his sentence.
“Uh…” Ian paused. “Who’s callin’?” People had crowned him with that doozie last December and it never failed to embarrass him.
“Sorry, Beckham Woods calling. I hope you don’t mind—my manager got your number from Donny…”
“Holy hell. Of course I don’t mind. You’re Beckham Fu-rickin’ Woods.” He’d tried desperately to clean up his mouth, especially since Journey was born, but holy shit he had a rock star on the phone. “I think you might have been elected Sexiest Man Alive a few dozen times yourself.”
Beckham’s laugh came through much louder than his voice.
“Time to pass along the title to someone more deserving, Ian Fu-rickin’ Sterling,” he said, the smile still in his voice. “I’ve admired your music for a long time. Saw you in San Francisco once before you got all big and famous.”
“What an honor, man. You’re as good as it gets. I’ve been a fan of yours forever … hoped we’d meet one of these days.”
“Well, that’s what I’m calling about, kind of. Actually a lot more than that, but…” Beckham cleared his throat.
Ian thought he sounded a little nervous. This might be the weirdest day he’d had in a long time.
“Listen, I want you to be completely honest, and say no if it doesn’t sound like something you’d want to do, but … I’m wondering if you’d consider touring with me. I heard about your tour being canceled and I know that’s pretty much the worst thing that can happen to a working musician. Your band, and wife, daughter … whoever you need to bring—they’re all welcome to come. I’ve been wanting to do something different for a long time, and the thought of you on this tour makes it actually sound interesting. Fun, even. We could go a variety of ways. Split the time right down the middle, or integrate into each other’s sets … I’m open to anything.”
It was quiet for a moment.
“I’m speechless,” Ian finally said. “It sounds … amazing. When are you heading out?”
“Rehearsals start just a month from now—mid-October. We tour January 5th to December 6th.”
“I can’t … believe this. Thank you, first of all. Thanks for even considering having me along. I’d love to do it. I’ll talk it over with my wife—but I’m sure she’ll be behind it all the way. I was just getting ready to tell her about ours being off, so this will help ease the blow, considerably.”
“Great! Think it over and let me know when you decide.”
“Will do. Thanks again.”
“If you do this I’ll be thanking you. I hope it works out.”
The next month for Beckham would consist of guest hosting on Saturday Night Live and all the top late night talk shows, as well as The Ellen Show. Beckham always played his part so well. Smile in place, humor intact, charismatic bachelor: check. Ever since he’d stopped drinking and using, life had gotten easier in some ways but more exhausting in others. It wasn’t really drudgery for some of the interviews—Fallon and Ellen were two of his favorite people. And he’d gotten a few Emmys from hosting SNL, so it felt like a party now every time he was on the show. But there was something missing, and it wasn’t just getting sloshed.
He’d had an awakening one morning after tossing three girls out of his bed. He’d been so high, he didn’t even know where they’d come from, and in the light of day, they looked worse than he felt. Disgusted with himself, he checked himself into Hazelden and got clean. He was lucky: he hadn’t had any relapses and besides missing Jameson, he’d not really had the pull back to it that most of his friends did. It probably helped that he’d lost some friends in the process. The only problem was that his whole lifestyle worked so much better being intoxicated. It dulled the pain and made him feel like he could do anything—like sing for thousands each night in packed-out stadiums.