I stared at him. He wasn’t exhausted at all—this was 100 percent for me. And it was the first time he’d really admitted that he wasn’t happy with what was going on.

“Yup, well, it’s bullshit,” Ernie said. “But unfortunately it’s what you signed up for. If you give them an album, I can get you six months off the road instead of three to produce it. They’re only giving you the three in hopes that you actually write something, otherwise they’d just keep you going.”

Jason’s eyes went sorrier still, and he sat heavily on the edge of the bed.

He couldn’t write. It was bad before we went on the road, and now it was the worst it had ever been. I don’t know how they expected him to summon creativity under these conditions.

“And since I have you two on the phone, I gotta tell you something else,” Ernie said. “And I’m gonna warn you, you’re not gonna like it.”

Jason looked up at me and we waited.

“They booked you in Amsterdam for Thanksgiving. And you’re going to Paris for Christmas.”

What little was left in my tank bled out.

Chapter 36

Jason

? i don’t know what to say | Bring Me the Horizon

The light drained right out of Sloan’s eyes. She blinked at me wordlessly for a few seconds, then turned and walked slowly into the bathroom.

“Ernie, I gotta call you back.”

I hung up and followed her. She was sitting on the closed lid of the toilet seat with her face in her hands and I crouched in front of her. “I’m sorry, Sloan.”

I didn’t know what else to say. I was sorry. I was sorry every fucking day out here.

This wasn’t a life. She was run-down and bored. She missed her friends and her family. I did what I could to make it fun for her, but being on the road was just fucking brutal.

She didn’t take her face from her hands. “I just need a minute to process this,” she said quietly.

She’d been looking forward to going home. She missed Kristen, and she wanted to do that commission. It was all she talked about. And now it had just been ripped out from under her.

What kind of fucked-up cosmic joke was it that my passion involved constant motion and travel, and hers required total and complete stillness?

“Hey.” I put a kiss on her knee. “Maybe we can go see the Louvre?” I said hopefully, knowing that they’d probably have me running to the next thing and it wouldn’t happen.

She must have known it too. She didn’t reply.

“Sloan…”

She took a deep breath and pulled a piece of toilet paper from the roll and wiped at her nose. “Okay. It is what it is.” She sniffed. “We can’t change it. So how much longer?” Her beautiful eyes were bloodshot. “How long is your contract? When it’s over, Ernie can renegotiate your terms, right? We can ask for better schedules? More control?”

“Yes, but…” My heart sank at what I was going to have to tell her.

When I got my record deal, I’d been ecstatic. Most musicians got a single album offer with an option to renew if the artist did well enough. You got offered two albums if the label had faith in you. Very few got the offer I did—and I’d gotten it because they’d accurately foreseen what was happening to me now: stardom.

Ernie had warned me it would tie me to them, but I didn’t care. I’d landed one of the top labels in the world. I wanted to be tied to them. I wanted to be Don Henley famous.

I wasn’t afraid of the work. I couldn’t even imagine the scenario in which I wouldn’t want to be represented by one of the most powerful forces in the music industry. Ernie had negotiated great royalties and perks—my advance was more money than I could have imagined in my wildest dreams. I knew they’d push me hard, but I was single, I was used to being on tour, the road didn’t bother me, and writing had never been an issue for me, so I had no doubts that I could produce what we agreed upon.

And now everything was different.

I couldn’t write. There was Sloan to consider. Lola was hanging over my head like a fucking guillotine. This record deal was crushing me under its weight, and all I wanted now was something in the middle. Manageable fame and success that would still give me the possibility of a life—because that was not what this was.

She waited. “How long?”

I shook my head. “It’s not a set time frame, Sloan. My contract is for four albums. The soundtrack was one. I need three more.”

“All right. And how long will that take?”

I paused before I answered her.

She licked her lips. “Six months? A year each? What are we looking at?”

“The average time between albums for most musicians is three years.”

The news hit her like a smack. She actually recoiled from it.

“Three years?” she breathed. Her red eyes dropped to her lap, moving back and forth. “Three years, Jason?” Her gaze came back up to mine. “Each?”

“I know it’s a lot—”

The color drained from her face. “And you can’t write,” she whispered, the reality of our situation truly sinking in. “It could be nine more years of this? More?” Her eyes begged me to tell her it wasn’t true.