Dropping down in the seat beside me, Abby sighed. "I just wish I could do something to help."
"You want to write with me?"
Abby wrinkled her nose. "I've only written songs with Jake. I'm not quite sure how I'd write love songs with my brother."
I laughed. "Well, I sure as hell didn't mean for us to write a duet."
"What about Micah? Do you think he could help?"
Abby was referring to our older brother. Along with Eli and me, Micah had been one of the founding members of Jacob's Ladder. Six years ago, he'd left the band to get married and go to seminary. Now he was working as a youth pastor at a church out in Seattle and had two kids of his own.
I shook my head. "He's busy with his own life now. Besides, the last time I wrote songs with Micah, the band had a different direction."
"That's true. Back before I came on the scene," Abby mused.
Once upon a time, my brothers and I had been Christian rockers. Shocking, huh? When Micah left the band, our new label was interested in us taking a different direction and delving more into our country sound. We'd always been far more Chris Stapleton and Florida Georgia Line type praise music than Creed. They also wanted us to have a female lead singer like Lady Antebellum, and we didn't have to look too far when it came to recruiting. After auditioning for the label, Abby left nursing school and officially became a member of Jacob's Ladder. The rest was history.
"We could always buy our music," Eli suggested.
"Hell fucking no," I practically growled before Abby had a chance to reply.
"Chill out, Gabe. It's not like I was suggesting we sacrifice a virgin on stage. Lots of bands purchase their songs."
"It's not who we are. We've always been about the music and the lyrics." It was more about the fact that it wasn't who I was. For as long as I could remember, part of my identity had been wrapped up in songwriting. It wasn't even the fact that I'd won two CMAs for songwriter of the year. It was that it was the one area where I would always outshine Eli; it was a talent with which he couldn't compete.
Eli gave me a knowing look. "That's true, but at the end of the day, it's not worth giving yourself a nervous breakdown over."
"Or becoming an alcoholic," Abby chimed in.
I rolled my eyes. "I had one drink, for fuck's sake. If I were an alcoholic, I would have drained the entire bottle."
The sound of a vehicle tearing down the gravel road thankfully interrupted our conversation, and I didn't have to look to see who it was. I knew it was the one and only Jake Slater, lead singer of Runaway Train and my brother-in-law. Besides, I knew it wasn't a stranger since only those who knew the code for the security gate would get down the road to Jake and Abby's farm, and as far as I knew, they weren't expecting any more guests for the weekend.
After he'd become a mega star, Jake had been forced to secure the hundred-acre property that had been in his family for over a century. While he and Abby had a place in Atlanta, their true home was the sprawling colonial farmhouse where Jake had grown up. Besides the nostalgia of his childhood, it was special to Jake because it had been a favorite of his late mother, Susan, who had passed away of cancer right after Jake and Abby started dating. Besides my brothers, I'd never known a man who was as close to his mother as Jake.
Although most celebrities would probably hire a security guard to sit in a tower to patrol the property, Jake merely enlisted a security company to watch over it from afar. The main reason he did that was all the locals in the small town of Ball Ground, Georgia, loved and respected him and his family enough to watch out for any crazies who might come by to say hello. He also wanted to keep things as normal as possible, especially after the twins came along. He and Abby were both insistent that they wouldn't grow up in a vacuum.
The Jeep carrying Jake and his twins careened around to the back of the house. As soon as he threw the gear into park, my dark-haired nephew and niece came barreling out of the back. "Mama! Mama!" they cried.
Abby's face lit up as she practically sprinted down the length of the porch to meet them. After she opened the door for them, the twins leapt at Abby and she began smothering their faces in kisses. "Oh, my babies! I missed you guys!"
"They were barely gone twenty-four hours," I muttered through a mouthful of cake. While Abby either ignored my comment or didn't hear me, Eli kicked me under the table. Of the two of us, Eli was the kid-friendly one-or I guess I should say niece-and-nephew-friendly one. He loved entertaining the twins as well as the kids of the other Runaway Train members. Before shows, he looked like the fucking Pied Piper with them all running behind them.
"What? I was just making an observation."
"You were being a dickhead."
With a smirk, I replied, "It's something I do well."
Eli snickered. "That's true."
Jake had taken the twins camping on the far side of his property to give me the quiet I needed for songwriting. In my state of mind, the last thing I needed was Jax and Jules disturbing me. It was common knowledge among my family that I wasn't a kid person. Don't get me wrong, I loved Jax and Jules with all my heart and would kill anyone who laid a hand on them, but I just wasn't one who really knew how to relate to kids. While Eli was ready to settle down and have a family of his own, I wasn't sure that life was for me. Sure, I thought about finding that special girl to spend the rest of my life with-in fact, now that I was thirty, I was growing to like the idea of settling as well. I just didn't know if kids were going to be a part of that future, and that fact made it seem extremely hard to find a wife.
Some people would think my aversion to children came from having a terrible father, but nothing could have been farther from the truth. There wasn't a better father than my dad. While he might've been selfless when it came to his ministry, he was even more selfless as a father. He had ensured that my siblings and I had a wonderful childhood. Others might have resented the fact that we lived off the grid and didn't have the cool modern gadgets or devices, but I appreciated the hell out of my raising. It was an endless adventure that molded my outlook on life, and I certainly wouldn't have been in a successful band without my childhood.
Not only did my dad give me the perfect model of a father, I'd also seen the men of Runaway Train, who we toured with, almost effortlessly take to parenthood. I just didn't know if I had it in me. In my mind, I couldn't seamlessly merge the two worlds. I was bound to screw up, and in the end, screw up my kids.
Maybe it was the perfectionist in me, or maybe it was the part of me that always felt inferior. While my siblings all had amazing voices and played multiple instruments flawlessly, my only talent was in songwriting. I didn't have Eli's outgoing personality or Abby's sweetness or Micah's spiritual and emotional strength.
Abby brought me out of my thoughts when she asked, "Did you catch anything?"
The twins bobbed their heads enthusiastically. "My fish was this big!" Jax exclaimed, his small hands widening to indicate a huge catch.
"Not quite, bud, but it was pretty big," Jake countered before bestowing a kiss on Abby's lips.
"It's still big enough for us to eat, right, Daddy?" Jules asked.
Jake grinned. "Of course it is. All the fish we caught are. I'm going to start cleaning them right now."
"I'm sure TMZ would pay big money to see a video of rock star Jake Slater cleaning fish scales," Eli teased.
With a laugh, Jake replied, "Before you get any ideas, they won't give you jack for any video that doesn't involve me and Abby in a compromising position."
Abby's eyes bulged. "Jake!"
"Like the twins know what compromising means, Angel," Jake replied.
I fought my gag reflex as Jake called Abby by his pet name for her, one he'd given her right after they met. She'd taken it so far as to name their Golden Retriever Angel as well.
Huffing out a frustrated breath, Abby said, "I don't know why I even bother. With everything they see and hear on the road, my babies are going to corrupt their classmates next year at kindergarten."
"There's nothing wrong with corrupting others. I think I did a fine job of it with you." He playfully smacked Abby on the ass while giving her a look that made an older brother want to throat punch him.
Abby's outrage waned, and instead of giving him a piece of her mind, she winked at him. "Go get the fish."
Jake saluted Abby. "Yes ma'am."
As Jake headed back to the Jeep, Abby steered the twins over to our table. "Are you hungry? I made your favorite kind of pound cake."
While Jax dove at the dessert, Jules hopped up into my lap, threw her arms around my neck, and placed a kiss on my cheek. "Hiya Uncle Gabe."
"Hi Jules," I replied as I squeezed her tight. She was a tiny thing like her mom, but she had a personality that surpassed her size.