Cy was an ass. Deacon used to think he was a jerk because he was a drunk, but after a few weeks on the road with him, there went that theory. It wasn't just Cy. There were the photoshoots, and the afterparties, and the volume of it all. This was the kind of tour life Deacon might have enjoyed in his twenties, but now it was merely giving him headaches. He was willing to put up with all this, though, for the three hours he spent on stage each night. Those three hours were fun and exhilarating, and he was trying to enjoy every minute of playing guitar for one of the biggest rock'n'roll bands in the world.

The worst part, however, was how much he missed Rayna and the girls. He called them every day, he kept reminding himself it was only temporary, yet it didn't do much to help.

The whole family had planned to fly over for a visit the next weekend, so when the show ended that night, he was genuinely surprised to see his wife waiting at the bottom of the stage stairs. He handed his guitar to a crew member, and before Rayna could say anything, he had his hands on each side of her face and was kissing her like he might never see her again.

She laughed when he pulled away. "Somebody missed me?" she asked as she slid her arms around his waist.

"What are you doing here?"

"I was missing you." He was wearing a light blue t-shirt, a black sleeveless vest and black jeans that fit in all the right places. He was sexy as hell. "Is there somewhere you need to be or—"

"Let's get out of here."

She smiled at that and kissed him again. He wrapped one arm around her shoulders, and they giddily walked in direction of the arena's backstage corridor. The rest of the band was already there, chatting with fans while signing autographs. When Cy spotted them, he headed their way.

"Rayna, as pretty as ever." He held her hand between his a little too long for her liking before he turned his attention to Deacon. "Deac, on Need Me tonight, you really dragged out that lead."

"You told me to step it up."

"Oh, you did. Thing is, I felt a little stepped on," he complained. Rayna refrained from rolling her eyes.

"I'm sorry, I'm just trying to find that happy medium."

"That's why I brought it up, so you will," Cy said with a patronizing tap on Deacon's shoulder.

Rayna waited he was far enough again so he wouldn't hear. "Same old Cy," she snorted. "I see he hasn't changed a bit."

"Nope."

They strode down the corridor to the band's dressing room where Deacon picked up his messenger bag, and they hurried out of the arena.

The ride in the back of the cab to the hotel felt like it would never end, Deacon's hand sliding dangerously high up Rayna's thigh for public decency. He was all over her as soon as the elevator doors shut down, and she laughed when he got annoyed at the room's key card which refused to work on the first try.

They were lying in bed, later, spent and happy, when Rayna purred, "You were so good on stage tonight, babe." The band's manager had arranged for her to watch the show from the VIP area, but she'd asked him not to warn Deacon she would be there, she wanted it to be a surprise. There was someone she had been surprised to see, though. "By the way," she recalled, pushing herself on one elbow, "was it Carmen Gonzalez I saw hanging around backstage earlier?"

"Oh, yeah, she's doing an in-depth article on the band for Tremolo." He smiled at his wife's grimace. "Why, you didn't say hi?" he teased. She huffed.

Carmen had been part of their circle of friends once, a long time ago. She and Rayna had never liked each other. She'd dated Vince for a while, but it had merely been an excuse to be around Deacon. She wasn't even subtle about it, which used to annoy Rayna to the highest degree.

"Has she done an interview with you yet?" she asked.

"She keeps badgering me, but she seems intent on talking about the past, and Vince, and I don't want to." He rarely talked about it with anyone, not even Rayna, so he wasn't going to spill his guts in an interview with Carmen.

"I'm sorry, babe."

"Nah, she's only there for two more shows, so I'm going to try to avoid her until then."

"Sounds like a plan," Rayna was all too quick to approve, which made Deacon grin.

"Want to stay until she's gone and be my bodyguard?" he asked, amused.

"Tempting," she played along. "Does the job entail being in your close proximity 24/7?"

"Obviously."

"Sold."

—

"So?" Rayna asked, turning around on the piano stool so she would face Watty who was sitting on the music room's couch.

It was around eight when she'd called him to ask if he would agree to come over so she could play him something. Truth was it could have waited until the next morning, but these days, she used every opportunity to spend more time with him, and he gladly obliged.

"The second verse..."

"Too clunky?"

"I'd rewrite it entirely."

"Ouch." Deacon and she had started writing on their own and then sharing their ideas over video call whenever they had some simultaneous time off. It was far from ideal.

"I'm not sure writing a duet album separately is the best option, especially when it comes to the two of you," Watty weighed in.

"I know. We should probably wait until Deacon's back."

"I'd ask how he is doing, but judging by that Guitar Player cover I saw this morning, I guess quite good."

She beamed. "I was gonna ask if you saw that! He's doing good. The girls and I went to see him last weekend." She paused when she was reminded there was something she needed to tell Watty. "On that note, I wanted to let you know... we told the girls. I mean, about you. Like we said we would."

Her daughters were both old enough to understand, and she'd seen no reason not to explain the situation to them anymore.

"How did it go?"

"Daphne had more questions than Maddie. One of them was if she should call you 'Grandpa' now," Rayna reported with a smile.

"What did you say?"

"That she should ask you. So, here is your heads-up."

Rayna had been wondering what she should call him, but it felt too soon to broach the subject. She wasn't ready. She'd been taking baby steps in asking him all the questions she wanted to ask. She didn't want to rush anything. Watty had said it himself the day they'd learned for sure he was her father, there was no hurry. She'd known him for years, but they both needed time to adapt to this new aspect of their relationship.

"Can't say I ever expected to be called that," he confessed, shaking his head in bemusement. "But... I would be more than okay with it."

—

"She's fine, but I swear, Ray... I could have killed him. Not that Scarlett really needed my help, she handled herself pretty good."

Rayna was aghast. She couldn't believe what she'd just heard from Deacon; an hour ago, he'd caught Cy trying to maul Scarlett in the band's green room. Rayna's inital shock soon morphed into raw anger. "She needs to press charges."

"She can't do that, baby. And she doesn't want to."

"Deacon—"

"Rayna Jaymes' niece accusing the lead singer of the Revel Kings? Ray, the press would eat that up. Her life would become a living hell."

"We can't let Cy get away with it," Rayna insisted. Deacon was willing to hold Cy accountable as much as she was, but at the moment, he had no idea how to do that without upending Scarlett's life. "We need to talk to Joe, see what the options are," Rayna suggested.

"Yeah. We should do that." He sighed, pinching the bridge of his nose. It was not how he'd envisioned his stint in the Revel Kings ending.

"You two are coming home?"

"I'm going to book the first flight tomorrow, but Scarlett wants to drive back with Gunnar. She says she's okay, and she doesn't want to bail on him."

Scarlett had made the drive from Nashville to Austin with Gunnar. They'd turned it into a working trip, fifteen hours of writing music.

"It's a good thing." There was a long silence as Rayna waited for Deacon to speak. "Babe, you're still there?"

"Yeah."

"Are you okay?"

"I should never have gone on that tour."

—

"No, no, no, no. You think it's true when Cy says, 'Letting someone go is always hard, but watching him fall off the wagon, that's even harder.' You believe that? No, Carmen! I haven't had a drink in 14 damn years! 5,182 days, to be specific, if you gotta know. And all that crap about me choosing to go on that tour because my marriage is falling apart? You know this is a freakin' lie." Deacon hung up and threw the phone across the room. "Damn it!"

Rayna couldn't remember the last time she'd seen him this furious. On a whim, he grabbed his car keys from the kitchen bowl and his jacket from the hallway hanger.

"Babe, wait," she called after him, but he was already out of the door.

She picked the magazine from where it was lying on the floor. The Axe Falls Hard on Guitarman Deacon Claybourne the article said. On top of being a pack of lies, it had the most ridiculous title.

Rayna waited a couple hours, thinking Deacon probaly needed to cool off, but when noon came around and he wasn't back, she started to worry. He wasn't picking up his phone. She began to call people they knew to ask if they'd seen or heard from him.

When this proved fruitless, she decided to take the car and go to the one place that might explain why he wasn't answering his phone; their cabin. There was no cell service in those parts. It was something Rayna liked about the place, they went there when they felt the need to stay off the grid for a while.

As she drove up the last dirt track leading to the cabin, she spotted Deacon's truck and let out a deep sigh of relief. Having to drive there because she couldn't find him brought back memories from a time she'd rather forget about. They'd made so many good memories there since, alone or with the girls, enough to outnumber the bad ones by a large margin.

It was freezing cold, and when she got out of the car, she wrapped her arms around herself and hurried to the cabin. She pushed the sliding door open. She saw the smashed-up guitar before she saw Deacon slumped in the couch.

"It was out of tune," he deadpanned.

After she'd slid the door closed behind her, she went to squat down in front of him, putting one hand on his knee. "Babe."

"I'm fine, Ray. Didn't do anything stupid. Well, nothing more stupid than this," he gestured at the guitar on the floor.

"You disappearing like this... you know it kinda scares the hell out of me."

"I know." He sat back up straight in the couch. "I'm sorry I got you worried. It's just... it makes me insanely mad. Cy not only got away with trying to assault our niece, but then, instead of shutting the fuck up and lying low, he goes around spreading lies about me, about us."

Deacon was good now, but he'd worked hard to get there and was still working hard to stay that way. It was important for him people knew that.

"What do you want to do? Because we can threaten them with a lawsuit, and—"

"No, I just... I don't want to bring more attention to the story. Hopefully no other paper will pick it up and it will all go away soon enough."

He slid down to the floor, so he was sitting at the foot of the couch, and she nestled against him. They'd spent so many evenings there on this old rug, across from the wood-burning stove. It was the very place he'd asked her to marry him.

"Do you want to hide here a little longer?" she asked.

"You don't mind?"

"With you, never."

—

Rayna wasn't proud she'd had to use Scarlett as a bait, but since the article, there wasn't much that could persuade Deacon to go out. Scarlett and Gunnar performing at the Bluebird was the perfect pretext to drag him there.

When Rayna and Deacon arrived, their niece and songwriting partner were waiting outside the venue.

"What are y'all doing out here?" Deacon asked.

"Making sure you turn up," Scarlett quipped, hugging him and Rayna.

"We keep hearing about this hot new duo. Looking forward to it."

Deacon regretted his words as soon as Gunnar held the door for he and Rayna to get in. "Happy birthday!" the crowd inside shouted as one voice. He tried to do a U-turn, but his wife blocked his way. "Don't make me seal the exits off to keep you inside, because you know I will," she warned. The huge smile on her face, though, undermined the seriousness of her claim.

"Can't believe you did this," he grumbled.

His birthday was next week, but Rayna knew there was no way she could have tricked him on the official day. The real miracle was that Daphne hadn't spilled the beans. Their youngest daughter couldn't keep a secret to save her life. They'd told Deacon the girls would spend the night at Tandy's, so her sister had had an excuse to come pick them up and drive them to the Bluebird earlier.

People started to come over to him to hug and greet him, and he recognized so many familiar faces. It had been easy for Rayna to reunite all their friends. Half of them said they would pay good money to see Deacon's reaction to a party thrown in his honor. He usually refused to spend his birthday with anyone but his family.

"Were you surprised, Dad?" Daphne asked.

He picked her up in his arms. "I'm even more surprised you were able to keep it a secret."

"Not gonna lie, it wasn't easy," his daughter admitted with an exaggerated sigh. "We've prepared a song," she let it slip then.

"Daph!" Maddie admonished.

"What? We can tell him now."

Deacon pulled Maddie to him and kissed the top of her head. "I can't wait to hear it, sweetheart."

Rayna then took the mic to thank everyone and to introduce Scarlett and Gunnar to the stage. "That part was true," she playfully told Deacon.

The evening went on with music, drinks, laughter and all-around cheerfulness. Maddie and Daphne performed their song, backed up by no other than Adria and Watty. Rayna knew Deacon would never admit it, but he was having a good time.

The party was well advanced when Adria stepped to the mic. "How about a few words from the birthday boy? Deacon, get your butt up here," she requested.

Deacon reluctantly agreed. "You all know I'm not one for speeches, so I'll just say this. It's easy to forget how many friends you have, and you guys sure do know how to make a man feel, uh... appreciated." At that, he looked over at Rayna. He knew it was the reason she'd put this party together. He'd been feeling down since the article, and she'd assumed being reminded how many people loved him, and that none of them would believe a single word of that crappy article, was what he needed. She was right. "Please don't do it again," he joked. The room laughed, and everyone toasted to him.

Deacon went straight to Rayna then, pulling her in a tight hug. "Thanks, Ray."

"Happy birthday, babe."

—

TBC