In the end, she didn’t have to say anything, though, because Ryder spoke up. “I beg to differ. Wyatt’s on a whole different level than Li. But either way, we’re not arguing that the guy isn’t talented. We’re just saying he doesn’t fit in with us. And neither did Owen or James.”
“So we keep looking,” Caleb slid in, smooth as silk. “You’ve still got two more bassists lined up to try—”
“Both who come with their own problems,” her father interrupted. “Correct me if I’m wrong, but doesn’t Marc have a massive ego that makes him prone to temper tantrums? And Johnny’s bipolar.”
“That doesn’t mean they aren’t good musicians,” the management guy said. “Personally, I think Marc is going to work out well—”
Poppy winced, because she disagreed. Marc Roundhouse was a dick, pure and simple, and he refused to adjust his playing style to fit in with anyone. There was no way he and Shaken Dirty were going to mesh. No way. And Johnny was a good bassist…when he decided to take his meds. Which, unfortunately, wasn’t nearly often enough.
A fact that her father was very much aware of, considering he’d been a part of one of Johnny’s other bands for years. Right up until they had dropped him at her father’s behest…
“Marc isn’t going to work out at a
ll,” her father told the now silent room. “And neither is Johnny. They are entirely too high drama and”—he gave a hard stare she was sure was directed at Wyatt—“you’ve got more than enough drama in this band already. So I say you take Li. He won’t cause any trouble, and frankly that matters a hell of a lot more to me right now than whether or not his bass playing meshes perfectly the first time out of the gate.”
“With all due respect,” Wyatt jumped in before the others could say anything. “It’s not about him not meshing perfectly. It’s about him not meshing at all.”
“Yeah, well, they’ve got a month to fix that,” her dad said. “Because this band already has one liability. It can’t afford another.”
“First of all,” Quinn interjected. “You can’t force us to take on a bassist we don’t want. It’s in our contracts. And secondly, we don’t have any more liabilities. Micah’s gone—”
“And Wyatt’s still there.” Her father’s voice sliced through the sudden silence in the kitchen like a razor blade through skin.
“Wyatt’s not a liability,” Jared grated out.
“Of course he’s not—” Caleb started to soothe, but her father cut him off.
“I have an empty bank account that says otherwise,” her dad said. “And an insurance company that is making me pay through the nose to keep him. If we add in someone else unreliable, the cost of this tour is going to be prohibitive.”
Poppy’s stomach hurt, and she crowded a little closer to the camera, met Caleb’s eyes. He looked as sick and unprepared as she felt, which meant her father was blindsiding him with this, too. She couldn’t help thinking it was because she was here instead of her brother, couldn’t help thinking their father was taking such a hard line because he expected her to fail at keeping Wyatt in line.
The bastard.
“All I’m saying,” her father continued, “is Li doesn’t have a drug problem. He’s as sane as any rocker gets, and he wants this job. He isn’t going to screw it up. So if you want to keep Wyatt, you take Li, too. Frankly, one addict is all any band needs for street cred.”
Poppy gasped at her father’s callous words, and it took every ounce of strength she had not to hurl something back at him. But she wasn’t here as the label’s marketing director—or as Bill Germaine’s daughter. She was here as a lowly social media expert who needed to keep her mouth shut.
Still, she couldn’t help easing forward some, as if putting her body between Wyatt and the computer screen would somehow shield him from her father’s attack.
Jared must have had the same thought, because suddenly he was there, too. “Wyatt doesn’t do drugs,” he grated out. “Not anymore.”
“Fuck this shit,” Quinn snarled at the same time, yanking out his cell phone. “I’m calling our lawyers.”
“He just got out of rehab,” Ryder said, as Quinn started scrolling through his contacts. “You need to give him a chance, Bill. He can handle this—”
“Let me be very clear here. I don’t need to do anything,” her father said. “I have lawyers of my own, and we’ve already let a huge breach of contract slide because Caleb wanted to show you guys that we believed in you. But Wyatt’s addiction is a liability. It cost this label a lot of money and it can’t be allowed to happen again. The insurance company and I both need some reassurances—”
“You already got your reassurances,” Quinn told him, and he looked colder and more frightening than she had ever seen him. Even in concert, he was the jokester. The one who kept things light. But as he stared down her father there was none of that lightness in him. Instead, there was only rage. “And you’ll get triple whatever money you lost with this tour.”
“Yeah,” Jared agreed. “We settled this nearly two months ago. Nothing has changed.”
Her father didn’t back down. Instead he lowered his eyebrows in that way that told her he was digging in his heels and preparing to be a total jerk. Not that he had to try very hard at either—the stubborn jackass gene was strong in him. “I’ll only get my money back if this tour actually goes ahead as scheduled.” He shifted his gaze to Wyatt. “And so far I have to say I’ve seen nothing that encourages me to believe that will be the case. Everything about Wyatt Jennings is a construct or a lie. Why should this whole rehab thing—his third time in rehab, by the way—be any different?”
“You want me to quit?” Wyatt asked, his voice hoarse but steady.
“Of course not—” Caleb started, but again her father interrupted him.
“That’s exactly what I want you to do.” He stared Wyatt down. “It’s what you’re good at, isn’t it? Better you quit now than in two months when it costs me tens of millions of dollars.”