He gave me a creepy vibe when he curled his arm around my shoulder and stuck his microphone in my face. “So how do you feel about Phoenix Steel?”
I love being with him and I hate how I am right now. But I couldn’t let go of his hand either. I must have the word sucker on my forehead.
I smiled and said, “He’s nothing but talented.”
As if I’d given a stupid answer, the host then asked, “That’s it?”
I glanced at our clasped hands and then said with a smile, “And it’s like a dream come true to share the stage with my twelve-year-old crush. He’s cuter in person than he was in my imagination.”
“Cute?” the host joked. “That’s not what most people say about him.”
Rumors were just that, rumors. And the past was the past. I didn’t want to stop whatever was happening with Phoenix over old mistakes. I’d end this because I couldn’t handle it, if I even survived. I shook my head and said, “They haven’t spent time with him.”
Then the host put on his fake, mock-sympathy face as he said, “Unfortunately, I’m going to need you to go stand with Joe, as you’re in the bottom three.”
I let go of Phoenix and walked over to join Joe, who hugged me right away.
The host was somehow popular, I guess, but I thought he was rather smarmy. And he hugged Rihanne a little too tight when he said she, too, was in the bottom three.
She joined us, and I patted her back while we all hugged.
If I survived, I’d figure out how to stop seeing Phoenix. I needed to be on my own if I intended to win.
I held hands with the others as the host said, “Joe, Maggie, Rihanne, tomorrow night you three sing before final elimination.” He then turned to Phoenix and the others and said, “The other five are safe, but we’ll have you practicing a group number for the eight of you.”
I had twenty-four hours to perfect my song, to learn a new routine and to change costumes.
And to tell Phoenix I can’t hold his hand anymore.
This was happening too fast.
The lights went off and I knew we were done.
Joe and Rihanne left. I stood alone on the stage for a minute until I walked off too.
Phoenix waited for me and we headed back to our camp backstage where we all lived now.
Phoenix placed his hands in his pockets and brushed against me when he asked, “Can I help?”
I glanced around. This needed to be said alone. So I grabbed his arm and led him to the same closet we’d been in earlier.
This time I flipped the light on, as there was no one on stage. I stood as tall as I could in the stupid thigh-high boots and said, “No. I don’t think we should have been public about anything. No more holding hands.”
He backed up and said, “I did it because I wanted to help you.”
Or his own image. My lipstick was still on his lips. I cringed. My parents would assume the worst since I couldn’t talk to them. I put one foot forward and asked, “Help me? How?”
He spoke like his words were a foregone conclusion. “You’ll be safe. Final judges are gonna want to see how the ratings play out. It gives you another week.”
Wow. Did he think about TV all the time like this? My skin still reverberated as I asked, “So you expect me to believe you held my hand to save me, and not to help reform your image?”
He reached behind his head and massaged his scalp while his brown eyes pierced right through me, like he saw me when no one else did. He said, “Not in that outfit you’re wearing. You read Mark’s text, and he knows the business better than we do.”
“Right.” I turned away. I put my hand on the door and refused to look at him. “Look, I don’t need saving. You and I are never doing that again—on stage or off.” Finally I’d said it. I turned toward him and added, “I’ll win this on my own.”
He didn’t say another word.
I stormed out before I lost my nerve.
I showered and the water washed off most of the horrible makeup.
I’d never do this to myself again.
This wasn’t fair. I scrubbed some more until I saw myself in the mirror. The only other person in the dormitory’s bathroom was Rihanne, who was clearly doing the same thing.
She caught me staring at her facial cleanse a little too long and she said, “The 1950s theme was hard. If we survive, at least we move on to the 1970s next week.”
My face wrinkled. These past decades weren’t my thing. But hopefully I’d have better luck with the 1970s since at least my mom or her friends would have sung some songs from that era. I scrubbed my face one more time and turned the tap off.
“How do you know that?” I asked.
“Wanda told me in wardrobe,” Rihanne said, and tossed her own corset into the laundry.
I walked over in my robe and threw mine in beside hers so she would see. “Did she pick your clothes?”
“Yeah. I couldn’t sing in this,” Rihanne said, picking her corset up like it smelled of garbage.
I crossed my arms and at least felt normal again. “Me too.”
Rihanne plucked her fake lashes off and tossed them in the trash like I’d done an hour ago. “She must like the men better.”
Outside the window the night was black. “Or she just likes to torture girls with corsets,” I said.
Rihanne picked mine up and shook her head as she said, “Yours is even more extreme. Jane must have escaped this because she’s super skinny.”
This was part of my problem. I gave in to people even when I knew better. I needed to be in command of myself again. I lifted my chin like I was the leader of a rebellion. “Tomorrow, let’s be ourselves. We pick our own outfits in wardrobe.”
Rihanne crossed her arms like we were conspirators. “Let’s go.”
We went to our bunks to sleep for a few hours. Tomorrow would be nonstop, so I needed rest. But I couldn’t stop thinking about Phoenix.
His sweet kisses were like torture I wanted to experience over and over again.
I couldn’t stop myself from dreaming of him, and when my eyes fluttered open in the morning, I half thought he’d be there on the edge of my bed.
Except he wasn’t. My imagination was on overdrive.
I got up at the crack of dawn to practice, and sang my song multiple times, without the corset constraints.
At nine, when the crew showed up, Rihanne and I locked arms and went into wardrobe together. I said, “Chris, no extreme makeup tonight. I need to glow.”
“Me too. We’re in this together,” Rihanne said.
Then together we both told Wanda, “And no corsets, ever again.”
She shrugged like it wasn’t a big deal. Maybe it wasn’t to her, and this was only a job. But to the pair of us, our dreams were on the line.
Once we had new outfits decided, we headed to group production.
I took my place opposite Phoenix, like he’d picked out my spot.
The final five had been practicing for hours, but I learned the routine quickly and didn’t mind the part where I danced skin-to-skin with Phoenix.
Touching him was like I’d returned to heaven. It was a place I wasn’t ready to go to, but desire rushed through me and made me wish I could.
The rest of the day zoomed by. Practice, performing on stage, everything was a blur except for the moments I saw Phoenix.
Those seconds burned into my soul. But the next thing I knew I was back on stage, standing with Joe and Rihanne, waiting.
Any second now the host would say who stayed and who left.
Rihanne and Joe each held one of my hands, and Rihanne whispered, “I’m glad we became friends.”
“Me too.” I said, and hoped this wasn’t my last moment.
I wanted Rihanne and Joe to stay too, but then the host said “Joe, you’re going home.”
The lights went off me and Joe stepped forward to sing.
I hugged Rihanne. We both had a second chance. As we walked off stage, Rihanne said, “Girl, your boyfriend is looking
for you.”
“He’s not my boyfriend.” My skin was all pins and needles despite my denial, and I said, “But I should go talk to him.”
“Good luck,” Rihanne said and went to join the others.
Phoenix’s brown eyes mesmerized me. I couldn’t understand the power he had over me. I didn’t want to. I wrapped my arms around his strong frame and let my head rest against him when I said, “Phoenix.”
“Maggie, I thought you were avoiding me,” he said, and held me close.
I could hear his heart was steady and I hoped he was true to his word when he’d said that I was important to him. I didn’t want to completely ruin “us.” The embrace was fleeting. I let him go and glanced way up at him as I said, “I was, but I wanted to talk. During the competition, we need to avoid being close together at all, unless directed.”
His hand brushed against my chin and he asked, “Why?”
I ignored how every part of my body sizzled from his touch.
“Because I can’t handle the distractions,” I said. “But after the show ends and I find my own place in L.A. … I’d like to see what happens on a real date, out of this bubble.”
He reached into his pocket and took out a jewelry box. He said, “Okay, but I got you something.”
“What?” I asked, and took it from him. He couldn’t be asking me to marry him.
I was absolutely distracted and this wasn’t good. I unwrapped the box and he said, “I wanted you to remember me on stage.”
I opened the box and saw a small yellow butterfly necklace. I glanced up at him and asked, “What is it?”
“It’s yellow citrine,” he said, like that explained everything.
Did he think he knew my birthday? We hadn’t discussed that, and I told him, “It’s not my birthstone.”
He unclasped the yellow gold clasp like he wanted to put it on me and said, “Yellow citrine is also for meditating about success.”
“I don’t meditate. I pray,” I said, but I lifted my hair so he had access to my neck.
He put the necklace around me and every cell in my body bloomed alive as he fastened it and said, “It’s for good luck. And I want you to have something physical to remember me by.”
“It’s … Thanks,” I said, unsure what else to say, and turned toward him. I’d never forget him.
My lips ached to kiss him. I closed my eyes and opened them. His hands curled around me to hold me tight as he said, “Don’t think anything beyond this moment, Maggie.”
And his kiss was like sunlight for a flower. I needed him. I needed this. And I needed to stop. I shouldn’t want this, but I couldn’t help it.
In a moment I’d scold myself with all the reasons not to trust him.
But right now, all I could do was lose myself in his kiss.
7
Phoenix
My lips sang all afternoon and my body danced to the show-stopping group number the producers had us doing.
But no matter what I did, Maggie’s kiss was a lingering taste better than melted chocolate in my mouth.
I needed to forget her.
But her name had been repeated in every call I’d made this morning, so if I’d been avoiding her, I’d been hit over the head with the fact that she was talented and amazing.
Not that I needed the reminders.
But I hadn’t seen her since I walked her to the women’s quarters and the door closed in my face.
She’d not been staged in the group number as she and Rihanne had a meeting with production about costuming. I knew about it only because Jane mentioned it to me.
It was near eleven now so that had to be over.
I was lingering in the hall on my way to my solo track rehearsal when I finally saw her walking out of a conference room with a smile on her face.
She must have won.
I waved at her and she came closer. The butterflies in my belly had to mean I actually liked her. I said, “Maggie.”
She glanced at my white t-shirt, damp with sweat, and asked, “How’s your practice going?”
The lights were brutal, and the rehearsals exhausting, but I needed to prove myself. I needed the crowds. She didn’t have a clue what a high that was.
I wondered if she’d been avoiding me, and Mark too. My agent had said he’d tried to get in touch with her.
Meanwhile, to distract myself once more from thinking about how I had ruined another singer’s life, I had helped rewrite everyone’s assigned song again. Except for Maggie’s and Rihanne’s. They hadn’t been around to ask.
I ignored the goosebumps on my arms and said, “Fine. Have you checked your phone?”
She glanced down at my feet and said, “No. I turned it off when I was in the meeting. My parents have been texting a lot. I need to find a few minutes to call them, but I’m late for hair and makeup already.”
My shoulders relaxed. She didn’t know. I wrapped my arm around her so if anyone was looking, they’d give us a moment, and then said, “Look, Mark is desperately trying to get you on the phone.”
She didn’t shrug me off, and her eyes widened when she asked, “Mark Powers?”
Wow. She really had no idea about the emails or texts. I took her phone out of her back pocket and handed it to her.
“Yeah,” I said. “He wants you to sign.”
She took the phone and turned it on as she asked, “He told you that?”
Her phone beeped as it found a signal and I said, “Yeah, and he wanted to be the one to tell you.”
Seriously, she didn’t know. She was probably the only woman on the coast that wasn’t glued to her phone. She asked, “Tell me what?”
I came closer and could smell her light floral perfume as I whispered in her ear, “He’s talked to a record label. They want to put out our Christmas album.”
Her face brightened like she’d just won a prize, but then her gaze narrowed. “This is low. Don’t distract me with false promises to get me off course.”
“Check.”
“Fine.” She opened her emails and found the one from Mark with the PDF attachment while I said, “It’s a pretty good deal.”
She covered her lips and tears formed in her eyes. She then wiped them away and said, “I don’t know if I believe any of this.”
Her innocence was like a drug I needed. I hugged her.
I didn’t even remember my first time, or who she’d been. But I’d never forget Maggie. I put my hands in my back pockets and said, “You can call him and set up a meeting.”
“Maybe.” She sucked on her bottom lip and stared at me. Then she crossed her arms and asked, “Have you read contracts before?”
I narrowed my gaze and said, “Yes.”
She took my hand and started towards the conference room she had just vacated as she said, “Then come with me.”
I skidded to a stop. Those rooms were wired. I pointed to a camera and asked, “Where?”
She put her phone in her pocket again and held my hand as she said, “I need you to give me some advice, and to explain what things mean.”
The hair on my body stood on end. No one needed to hear this. I nodded and said, “Okay, go get your music and afternoon schedule. In half an hour, everyone’s going to grab lunch. We can find a corner to sit.”
“Perfect,” she said, and kissed my cheek.
At least she hadn’t told me to get lost today. My heart lifted in my chest.
Practice went faster than I’d expected. The musicians learned the new arrangements I’d drawn up and commented that I’d made the entire show more fun for them with the way I’d retuned the old hits.
A happy band behind me meant they’d try harder.
The music had their energy in it.
Then I rushed to the cafeteria and grabbed a plastic tray.
I found a metal table near the docking station that was more private, and waved at Maggie when she walked in like a breath of fresh air. She came over to me and I jumped up from my seat. I took her tray from her and set
it on the table and then she hugged me.
I didn’t deserve happiness, but Maggie made my muscles go hard and my insides turn mushy. I waited for her to sit and then tried to ignore how wound up I was. I asked casually, “How was hair and makeup?”
She shook her head and picked up her spoon to try her soup as she said, “Wanda hates me.”
I snorted. She’d dressed my girl so unnaturally there was no excuse.
“Well, that was obvious when you wore that outfit on stage,” I told her. “What are you wearing tonight?”
She finished her spoonful and curled her nose like she’d hated the taste and put her spoon down quickly.
“Pants,” she said.
I pushed toward her an energy bar I’d taken from the buffet and said, “Well, if that’s all then I’ll definitely record the episode.”
She sighed like she wanted the energy bar, but put it back on my tray. She picked up her apple as she said, “And a simple top. Form-fitting, but no corset.” She took a bite and grabbed her phone. She opened it and handed it to me. Once she finished her bite of apple, she said, “So, can I trust you to read the contract you say is mine and tell me if it’s fair?”
I let her eat her apple and said, “Sure.” She ate like she was starving. Part of the meeting must have been about her diet while on set and my body tensed. I should have been able to protect her. However, I kept quiet and read the contract. Mark hadn’t done anything strange. I said, “This all seems standard. Fifteen per cent is the norm.”
“I suppose if it’s a hoax he wouldn’t go out of the ordinary with promises,” she said. She put the core of her apple on the plate and peeled her banana. Then she added, “But I don’t trust any of this. I refuse to lose my chance that I earned here.”
So this was it. We could have an album that bound her and me forever. I thought she would be thankful. I said, “We are both getting what we wanted here.”
She closed her phone.
Did she doubt me this much? I took out my phone, with the same email and contract that I had already signed, and said, “It’s the same as my contract. I can show you mine if you want. And I can sign without you, as you already signed releases.”
Legendary Rock Star: Enemies to Lovers Romance (Steel Series Book 1) Page 5
