By the mid-'90s the Chicks were selling their three self-made CDs out of their RVs. Their steel player was often Lloyd Maines, who proudly gave the sisters daughter Natalie's Berklee audition tape. If they were blown away, it wasn't mutual. "We'd play Lubbock, and Lloyd would have us for dinner," says Martie, "but Natalie always had something else to do. She thought we were so uncool." In a rut in late 1995, the Chicks fired Lynch (Macy left early on) and invited Natalie in as lead singer. Immediately her high-octane swagger and powerhouse pipes recharged the Chicks. "It was destiny," says Emily.

Personal bonds took longer to forge. "We knew nothing about each other," says Natalie. Then in 1999, as the trio's debut CD took off, Maguire's and Maines's marriages collapsed. "One day I just burst into the studio and said, 'I'm getting a divorce,' " recalls Natalie, then married for 19 months to bass player Michael Tarabay. "And Martie burst into tears and said, 'I'm not happy either.' It broke down a wall between us. We hadn't been honest with each other about our lives outside the Chicks." Natalie, who blames her breakup on being "too young," offered support to Martie, who says long times apart caused her eventual split from drug firm rep Ted Seidel. "Night after night," says Martie, "Nat and I had facing bunks in our RV and we'd have our curtains drawn and talk. Our divorces made us real to each other." And almost too real for Emily, who was planning her wedding to musician Robison, 38. "They were trying to save me from the drama," says Emily. "I just wanted to know, 'How much is the caterer?' I was on cloud nine, and my way of empathizing was staying out of their way."

There's no staying out of anyone's way now. Maines met Pasdar, 37, at Emily's wedding, where he was a groomsman to pal Robison, she a bridesmaid (they married in Las Vegas in June 2000); Martie met husband Maguire when he was best man for his brother Shane, who married Natalie's sister Kim in August 2000. At the time, Martie was not looking for a serious romance. "My divorce had been final for two days," she says. "I wanted to play the field." "You were in the mood for a fling," says Natalie. The Irish-born Gareth, too. "He had a girlfriend in Ireland and another at the wedding," says Martie. "I was third string." Not for long. "As soon as I saw her, my heart leapt," says Gareth. "She was the one." (They married in Hawaii in August 2001.)

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