A/N: Hi! We're back and I hope you guys like this chapter. It is a bit of a filler but there's also so really good flashbacks!


Dinner

Mercedes walked into the dining room with her head up and the best smile she could muster, if she was going to be forced to play his game she was going to make damn sure he understood she intended on doing it on her term. She looked at the table and noticed that there was a spot next to Tank and a spot next to Sam, she smiled sweetly at Tank as he stood to pull the seat next to him out. She instead walked over to the vacant seat next to Sam and sat next to him shocking her parents and Monica. Tank however was un-amused and cleared his throat and nodded towards the seat he pulled out for her, Mercedes looked at him lazily and shrugged turning her attention to her father. Monica reluctantly sat in the seat next to Tank rolling her eyes when he mouthed "switch" to her.

"So, shall we say grace?" Victor said reaching for his daughter's and Monica's hands. Everyone else followed suite and bowed their heads as her father blessed the meal and they all said 'Amen'. Mrs. Jones prepared a lovely meal, there was stuffed chicken, broccoli, white buttered rice and crescent rolls, which was Mercedes and Victor's favorite meal. Everyone ate quietly before Claire broke the silence.

"Okay so tell me about this album the two of you are thinking of making." She said looking at Mercedes then Tank.

"Well it's really only a thought as of now, there's a few things we need to get out of the way before we can actually move the project along but I'm sure once we're able to it'll be a success." Tank said confidently and smiling brightly.

"Yeah! We have to get some songs together and of course my label and his label have to agree for us to do this venture together but I think I may have found us a songwriter for a few songs." She said nudging Sam who was shoveling food into his mouth before stopping and looking wide eyed at Mercedes. She let out a soft giggle and nodded.

"Wait, what? When did we decide on using Sam to write any songs for us?" Tank said slightly angry and confused at the same time. They hadn't even figured out if it was going to solely love songs or a mixture of different types of songs.

"Oh come on baby, consider it an engagement gift to me." She said with an equally unamused look. She heard the clank of forks and Monica sudden coughing after she dropped the ball and ruined Tank's chances of making some grand announcement of them being engaged. She felt Sam eyes burning a hole into the side of her face and tried her best to ignore it but made the mistake of looking anyway. Sam's eyes were saying so much and she couldn't handle that and her parents look of shock, she cleared her throat and looked at her father then her mother before speaking again.

"Suprise." She said revealing her ringed finger and giving Tank an insincere smile. She knew he had planned a full speach and wanted to finally impress her parents with his smooth talking and now that she had taken that away from him he was glaring at her with dark eyes. Sam saw the look and began to speak before he was saw Monica's expression and her shake her head before pretending to looked shocked as well.

"Well... since Mercedes kinda beat me to the punch, Mr. and Mrs. Jones, I asked your daughter to marry me and she accepted." He said less enthusiastic than he planned. Her parents hadn't said a word and still looked a little shocked by the sudden surprise.

"Moma? Daddy? Aren't you going to say anything?" She said looking at both of her parents intently.

"Congratulations...?" They said in unison it was more of a question than a statement.

"Thank you, I've been trying to get Mercedes to tell you since we got here and with me leaving soon I wanted to make sure we told you together." Tank said obviously not caring if her parents were truly happy or not.

"Yeah congratulations to the both of you." Sam said softly before giving Mercedes a enduring smile.

"I'm going to excuse myself, this seems like a family moment and I have to go and check on my dog." He said getting up and grabbing his plate to clear off. "Thank you moma it was great and it would good to see Poppa Jones." He said as he excused himself, he was done with this conversation and felt completely defeated.

"I think I'm going to follow Sam's lead and head out as well. I'll see you guys tomorrow." Monica said before heading out as well. She needed to get to Sam before he left and she needed to figure out what the fell changed because Mercedes wasn't going to tell her parents and now here she was parading that damn ring around and shouting "surprise". She felt completely shitty for even attempting to do this to Sam and what made it worse was that he had to sit through the whole conversation like he didn't still have feeling for Mercedes. She hurried after him and got to his truck just before he could get in and leave.

"Sam... I'm really sorry, I didn't know... she..." Monica started before breathing heavily.

"You know for a second there I really believed I could do this." He said curtly.

"You still can! There's so much you don't know about why I called you... so much more that what you're seeing." Monica said shaking her head.

"I don't care... I'm not competing nor am I fighting for a happily engaged woman. I don't know who that was in there but that wasn't Mercy. Two weeks isn't enough time and now that her parents know, it's only a matter of time before everyone else knows. Secret's out and I'm not dealing with another 'her shutting me out because she thinks she cheated and that she's not worthy of love' I'm a grown ass man and I don't have time for these childish games. If she wants me and I mean really wants me, she'll come to me." He said with a hint of anger but mostly sadness. Monica stood there shocked and chewing her bottom lip with a hard look on her face.

"Sam, there's something you need to know about Tank. Something I found out a while ago that Cedes doesn't know about."

"Monica, I really don't care to know. You need to tell her and let her make her own decisions after you do. I have to go... thank you for bringing her here." He replied. She knew if she pushed any further it would ruin things so she accepted defeat and walked to him and gave his hand a slight squeeze.

"Don't give up so easily Sam." She said softly looking at him before giving him a small hug and walking away. Sam shook his head and got in his truck to leave. Monica waved him off and started to go back inside before being stopped by an angry faced Mercedes. Oh shit.

"So, what the hell was that about?" Mercedes asked crossing her hands over her chest with a raised eyebrow.

"Nothing... I was just asking what time would be best for you to come tom-" She started before being cut off.

"You two seem mightly close from where I was standing."

"Wait, what? You know I wouldn't do that."

"Hmph. Could've fooled me."

"Are you serious? You are fucking engaged, you said yes not me and you have the nerve to call me a liar? Oh and for what it's worth, Sam is single and if I wanted to go after him I would have every damn right to do just that. You will not stand here and make out to be some loose woman. You know what, I'll leave. Tell your parents I said goodnight." Monica said in a hushed tone, she was hurt that Mercedes would even say anything remotely like that to her. She shook her head and walked over to her car and slammed her hands down the steering wheel. She needed more help, she couldn't do this alone and she damn sure couldn't let them proceed with this bullshit engagement.

Flashback

Monica was just making her coffee when she was heard the knock at her door, when she went to open it was no one there just a large envelope with her name on it. It was far too early for anyone to be coming to playing silly games at her door. She stepped out a little further to see if anyone was walking away from her door and she didn't see anyone there. She picked up the envelope and went back inside and tore the envelope open. She pulled out its contents and sifted through the papers before reading them all. She caught herself sinking on the wall and placing a hand over her opened mouth while shaking her head.

"Shit!" She said jumping up from the floor and grabbed her keys and purse where she quickly shoved the papers into her purse. She needed to get to Mercedes's so she could read what she was given. She had a bad feeling about Tank's intentionswith her from the minute she saw that damn grin plastered on his face. She looked at the time and knew she would awake by the time she got there, she should've looked into him sooner but Mercedes begged her to fall back so she did and now she regretted it. She looked down at the number written with 'Samuel Evans' underneath and decided it was high time she made that call. She was happy when he answered but she was also very nervous about intervening into her bosses life like this, but she knew she had to do whatever she could. When she arrived there after stopping to grab Mercedes some coffee she knocked on the door and quickly rushed Sam off the phone.

"It's a little early for phone calls don't you think?" Mercedes asked with a sly smile. Monica just rolled her eyes and handed her the coffee she bought. She moved passed Mercedes and went to her patio.

"Mercedes... I need to talk to you about something serious." She said digging into her purse to get the papers.

"Hey, didn't know yourwork day started this early." Tank said making Monica freeze and slowly push the papers back down. She knew she looked shocked and very confused by his presence and quickly plastered a fake smile on her face.

"Hey... oh shit. Cedes, I'm sorry I completely forgot. Look I can go, sorry." She said rapidly before taking a deep breath, she couldn't talkwith him around and she damn sure wasn't about to let him know what she knew about him and his intentions. Mercedes gave her a confused look before it changes to worried, she walked over to where Monica was frozen and gently patted her arm.

"Are you okay?"

"Uh. yeah just a little tired I guess. Just give me a call later when you're ready for me to come back." She said with a stern look and heading towards the door.

"Didn't you need to talk to me about something though?" Mercedes asked walking behind her.

"Yeah, but it can wait. Mercedes don't forget to call me okay?"

"I won't." She said before giggling when Tank began nipping at her neck, Monica just rolled her eyes and walked out.

"Fuck!"

The Next Day

"Monica! You're finally here!" Tank said grabbing her and pulling her into Mercedes's loft with a huge grin and a glass of champagne. He quickly let her arm go and grabbed her a flute and excitedly poured her some champagne as well.

"Umm... what's are we celebrating?" She asked with a half smile and shaking the spilled liquid off her hand. She looked over at Mercedes who was holding a flute as well and had a bright smile on her face but didn't quite reach her eyes.

"Well... we're engaged!" Tank said pulling Mercedes in closer to him and kissing her on the cheek. She held up her hand and danced her fingers so Monica could see the huge rose gold diamond ring on her finger. Monica's eyes grew big and her mouth was agape for a few moments before she was able to speak.

"Oh my! Well congratulations Cedes!" She said walking over and hugging her before giving Tank a side hug and congratulating him as well.

"How did it happen?" She asked looking at them both and taking a long slip of her drink wishing it was something stronger.

"He just called me and told me to meet him at the diner where we first met and we had dinner and talked and before we got ready to leave he order our dessert to go. Then when we got back he asked me to plate it and BOOM! There was this beautifulvalor box and I turned around and he was on one knee. It was really thoughtful." She said smiling and looking down at her ring.

"Sounds too good to be true. I'm really happy for the you. Well... let me go so you two can celebrate. I'm sure we'll have to discuss telling each of your parents and setting up interviews and what not but I'll worry about that. Congrats again." Monica said hugging Mercedes again before she put her flute down and walked towards the door before she could get out she was stopped by Tank.

"I wanted to thank you in advance for handling all of those things. Also, don't worry about contacting my family... I can handle it." He said.

"Oh, it's no worries. I would need to speak to them anyway so that hers and yours were on the same page about not saying anything until the two of you made it public and it'll make-" Monica started before Tank held a hand up.

"My family is mine to deal with and that's it. Now if you excuse me I want to get back to my fiance." He said harshly before walking away. Monica scuffed and made a mental note to look into his so called family as well.

When she finally got back home she got the documents she received and combed through them again until she found the one she was looking for and reread it.

Tank's real name was James A. Taylor she knewthis as much and she knew he was in the music industry a little while longer than Mercedes but it wasn't until then that she finally knew where she knew him from and she was thankful he didn't remember her and if he did she had to act quickly. She pulled her phone out and called an old friend of hers to confirm her final suspicions.

"Hey, it's me. I need to ask you something about the guy Tish dated a while ago, you know the one who promised he could pull some strings and get her an interview with his company? What was his name?"

After ending the call she felt herself getting sick, she knew then she couldn't just flat out tell Mercedes what she knew without something more concrete than what she already had, he was clever and this proposal was going to ruin her career and her life. She needed to get her back to Lima, she needed Mercedes to distracted enough to not need her but her first plan had just blown up. He had hinted at wanted to propose to her and she thought she convinced him to wait until her album release party but clearly she was dead wrong. She was about to call it a night before she got a text from Mercedes asking her to come back. She had to text Sam because she wasn't entirely sure how her plan would work now but she wanted to keep him updated and she also needed to convince her to go back home.

"Cedes?"

Silence

"Mercy, I'm here." Monica said as she walked into the living room where she expected to find Mercedes but she didn't so she went to her bedroom and she wasn't in there either. There was only one more place she could be and she quickly walked into her study and froze. She had seen her cry before but never like this, she should be happy… shouldn't she?

"Mercedes… what's wrong? Did something happen?" Monica asked sitting down on the floor next to her.

"I said yes Monica… like I should be happy right?" She said through sobs.

"Did you not want to say yes?"

"No, I did… I just feel like something is missing. You know?"

"Like what?"

"I don't know… just something. Maybe I'm just overwhelmed and over thinking it." She said with a soft sniffle.

"Maybe you should go home for a while? Like recharge and be around old friends and family… you have the time." She said softly rubbing her back.

"Maybe… It has been a while and I could use a change of scenery."

"How about this I'll get everything planned and call your parents, then we can look at a few flights?"

"Yeah, that sounds good but don't mention the engagement okay? I'm not really ready to tell them." She said looking at Monica finally with a half smile. She let out a deep breath and wiped her eyes once last time.

"What was it you wanted to talk to me about?"

"Huh?"

"A few days ago you came over here in a hurry but stopped, what was it?"

"I don't even remember." She lied.

"Oh okay. Thanks for coming over and sitting with me." Mercedes said hugging her and getting off the floor.

"No worries. Are you going to be okay if I leave? I can stay if you need me to though."

"No, Tank will be back soon. I should be fine until then."She said with a weak smile.

"Okay, call me if you need me." She just nodded and Monica left.

End Flashback

Mercedes knew she was wrong for accusing Monica of anything remotely to do with Sam but she couldn't understand how they could talk so easily after only knowing each other for a few hours. She would barely even look at Tank and now she was having secret conversations with him. She wanted to come and talk to him before he left, she wanted to see if he really would want to write a song together.

"Lover boy left huh?"

"What do you want Tank? I just need a minute okay?"

"What you did in there was dirty and you know it." He said stepping closer to her and making her turn around to face him.

"Why? Because you didn't get to make your grand announcement or because you didn't get to one up Sam? For a man who says he has all this confidence you sure do a bad job at showing it and I'm not the one who is playing dirty you are having me followed. You ask me to marry you but you have little faith in me so you have someone tail me and for what a video of me kissing an ex? We were in a High School auditorium and I can easily say we were rehearsing for a play or some bullshit. Yeah you should've thought about showing me that video, I had time to think about how easy I could spin it in my favor." She said standing toe to toe with him never losing eye contact. Tank chuckled and shook his finger.

"Oh Mercedes, you never cease to amaze me with that beautiful mind of yours. It's partially why I was so attracted to you. You really think that's the only thing I have on you? Let's think about a few things here, you two dated in high school and you two kept going back to each other over and over again. You haven't announced our engagement until tonight when you thought you could one up me but baby, I had my phone out the entire time and in about an hour the whole world will know because you will have let it be known." He said with a devious smirk.

"Why are you being like this? What did I ever do to you?" She said backing away from him.

"Did you really think I didn't know about this torch you still carried for your precious 'Sammy'? Yeah, I know about that dumb ass nickname and knew exactly who he was when I saw him. You think I wouldn't research the one person holding you back from loving me fully?" He asked moving closer and grabbing her arms then leaning down to her ear.

"You think I don't know what you do when you think of him? You think I haven't noticed that picture of the two of you in your desk drawer?" He whispered with so much venom that she shook a little.

"What are you talking about? I haven't seen Sam in years, today was the first time in years since I've seen him." She said softly.

"You know exactly what I'm talking about, drunk Mercedes is a rather honest woman… she likes to think about her Sammy in ways she should have been thinking about me." She started to say something but closed her mouth and looked away.

"You won't have to worry about that anymore, Sam isn't helping us write shit and he damn sure isn't about to ruin my chances at moving up. After the wedding you're free to do as you please but for now you will play the role you were given. Before you think you can turn down my offer I should probably let you know something important, I own your career and without me you won't get it back. You worked so hard to get here and I'd had to see you throw it all way for some down home white boy."

"What? You don't own shit! It's my car-"

"Remember when I brought the idea up to you about doing the joined album?" He asked sweetly.

"Yeah… what does that have to do with anything?"

"You signed some papers that night. Do you remember that?"

"Yeah it was just some standard forms. I don't really remember what they were because you kept distracting me…" She said stopping and looking at him with wide eyes.

"What did you do?"

"It's not what I did, it's what you did. You allowed yourself to be distracted and you only skimmed what the documents said instead of taking the time to read them over. You signed your career over to me in less than three minutes, I OWN YOU." He said with that beautiful smile he had. She stood there frozen in place and feeling like her life was being ripped to shreds in front of her, it was like she left her body for a moment and watched as he told her that. I need to get out of her… this… I can't… he can't… she heard her phone buzz and then buzz again and it kept buzzing. She pulled it out and saw the notifications begin to roll in by the dozens.

"Looks like we're going to be all the buzz for a while, better practice your "I'm beyond happy and in love" speeches now. I'll see you back at the hotel." He said fixing his tie and planting a swift kiss on her lips before she could move away.

"You may want to work on that too." He said with a wink.

"I'm not going back to the hotel, I'm staying here with my parents tonight." She said finally.

"I'll see you tomorrow before I leave at eight." He replied walking towards his rental and getting in then driving off. She let out a deep breath and let the tears she had been holding fall. She needed to get out here, she needed a place where she could think, she needed a safe place and she knew going back in would only mean another unwanted conversation with her parents. What did she get herself into? Why hadn't she seen all the signs… was she that misguided that she allowed herself to get this deep into with someone this vindictive? SHIT!

Before she knew it she had taken her shoes off and began running, she didn't have a particular place in mind she was just running. She didn't stop until she couldn't fill her lungs with air making her stop and scream out loudly. She screamed until it hurt, she didn't care if anyone heard her and she didn't care how crazy she looked. After she had enough she laid on the grass and closed her eyes listening to the nature around her and the subtle rustle of the water. Of course she would run here, it was the only place she knew she could be without anyone else to bother her. There were so many memories here, so many amazing nights and hot summer days spent her with…

"You done screaming like a mad woman?" She shot up and looked behind her and sighed.


SOOOOOO? I promise this is going somewhere good! Also Tank is a whole bastard and he's not even shown his full self yet! I hope you enjoyed this chapter and let me know if you did! Thanks!