The Forest Service! Maybe that was why Derek Marsden and Mom had met. But she didn’t have time to think about that now. Too much information was swirling past, and she couldn’t afford to miss a beat.
“Even though we’re a hundred percent convinced, and even though he looked as guilty as a kid with a hand in the bag of chocolate chips, nobody could prove he did it. He insisted it was an act of nature, and that it was the storm that brought the plane down.”
“He made money off my death. That scum!” He punched his palm, as if he was ready to rearrange Roman’s face right now. “I’ll find him.”
“Hey, Hudson River, watch out,” Giselle chimed in from the piano bench. “You’ll get arrested for assault.”
“You bet I will. Nobody kills off all my friends and takes money for it.”
“Oh, don’t worry.” Mrs. Oaks took another handful of potato chips from the bag. “He didn’t get any of your money. They didn’t find your body, and so it was never official that you were dead.”
There had to be a body. And without it, Oakley’s mom had continued to hope, as had many others, apparently, including Hudson’s family and friends.
“Well, at least there was that,” he smirked, and Oakley could tell he wasn’t exactly satisfied with that result. “And he didn’t get Chris Torres’s money either, did he?”
“That’s right. In the meantime, Ignatius Torres has been working on behalf of Alfonzo and Nick’s families to set things straight.”
All those years, the families hadn’t given up? Wow. That was tenacity. And it was about to come to fruition, it seemed. But if they didn’t have solid proof that the plane wreck was a result of misdeeds, how could they even hope to take it to court? Oakley had been around Sherm long enough to know trials required indisputable evidence most of the time.
Hudson was still grinding his fist into his palm.
“Hudson,” Oakley took his elbow and spoke softly, “it’s not proven. Nobody could prove it in twenty years, so it’s not likely now.” She hated having to tell him this and be the bearer of lame news, but she had to. “Calm down, wait for the wrongful death lawsuit, and then you can rearrange his face. In fact, he’d probably be an old man by now and he probably looks like his face already has been rearranged by Mother Nature.”
“Nope,” Giselle said, gulping down a swig of milk. “His face hasn’t been rearranged a single bit. Roman Levy looks identical now to how it did at the time he was Hudson’s agent—almost as identical as Hudson himself.”
“How do you know this?” Mrs. Oaks turned to Giselle in shock. Hudson mirrored that shocked look, and Oakley could see the similarity between mother and son in that moment. “Have you seen him? I would think the weasel would take his millions and run to buy a private island and never poke his head out again.”
“Are you kidding?” Giselle delivered the coup de grace. “Where’ve you all been? Roman is the creator and producer of The Next Radio Star. It’s airing live tonight, the season premier.”
Scene 16: “Show ’Em (What You’re Made Of)”
Oakley had never been so nervous for a vocal performance in her life—and for none of the reasons she should be feeling like puking her guts out. Singing had nothing to do with the nerves making a hot mess of her. It had everything to do with the fact that Roman Levy, Hudson’s attempted-murderer could be on hand, and if she met him, Oakley had no idea how she would react.
“You look super nervous,” the woman doing Oakley’s hair said. “Are you okay? You’re almost green.”
Brinn had done her hair before they left for Seattle this morning, but the ocean’s spray on the ferry had ruined all Brinn’s work.
“Nerves, yeah.”
The hairstylist poked the pointy end of a rat-tail comb into the nest she’d made of Oakley’s hair. It was an over-the-top style, but it matched the hot pink faux fur jacket better than Oakley’s usual no-nonsense style. If she was going to be a star, she needed to look like one, Brinn had said. Still, she wished Brinn were the one doing her hair instead of this new person. They would have been joking about stupid stuff, and Brinn would have taken her mind off the nerves, not ratcheted them up.
“Well, I’ve never seen a pre-show competition play out like this.”
“Like what?” Oakley looked up, locking eyes with the stylist’s through their reflections in the mirror.
“You know, letting the studio audience decide during sound check which of two contestants will go live.”
“It’s not normal?”
“No. No-ho-ho.” The stylist rolled her eyes. “I mean, I saw both you guys’s auditions, and he’s out of this world.”
“He who?”
“The other guy, the one you’re singing against. Guido, maybe?”
Guido! Into Oakley’s mind popped an image of a cool Italian guy in semi-shaven suaveness, the kind girls go crazy for. Like Girl Crazy.
She gulped.
“So they’re pitting us against each other to see which plays better for TV?”
“Bingo.”
Great. That was just great. She’d be going head to head with Guido, or whoever, with her only weapons being frog throat and fab boots— all the time worrying that Hudson’s friends’ killer was lurking, watching, waiting to pounce.
“You’re looking sick again.” The stylist smirked. “Calm down.”
It was dumb to be this nervous. There was no way the show’s creator would be at Oakley’s performance. This was Blue and Mr. Levy’s show, and Blue was great, in Oakley’s experience. She wasn’t going to meet Hudson’s former agent, Roman, and even if she did, he couldn’t do anything to her—and probably not even to Hudson at this point.
Wait. Mr. Levy. Roman Levy. She smacked herself in the forehead with her palm.
“I am so dense.”
“You are? Do you want a fruit smoothie or something? Those are like helium for your soul.”
“No, no.” Oakley groaned inwardly. All this time, she’d been texting back and forth with Blue about Mr. Levy this and Mr. Levy that. And she hadn’t put it together that Roman and Mr. Levy were one and the same.
What kind of a dimwitted fool didn’t look up the information on the people she was trying to make a business deal with?
This kind.
Thank goodness she had Sherm checking out all her contracts and paperwork. Ha, and after all her ridiculous protests after her initial tryout. What a difference a week made.
She pulled out her phone and texted him the shortest but most sincere apology she could muster.
Hey, Sherm? Remember when I told you I didn’t want you butting in on my TNRS contract? That was stupid of me. Sorry. You were right. You’re right a lot more often than I give you credit for.
“Texting your boyfriend?”
“Nah, my dad.”
“Oh.” The hairstylist got bored with that quickly and went back to creating the scare-nest on top of Oakley’s head. “There ya go.”
Oakley slid out of the chair, her head at least two times heavier with all the product that had been slathered on her tresses.
She glanced at the clock. Not long to go until her showdown against Guido, or whomever. The Latin singing sensation who Hairstyle Girl obviously thought would clean Oakley’s clock.
She bit the inside of her cheek. Everything was going to be fine. Fine. Right? She didn’t believe herself.
“I guess since it’s my first time to sing on TV I’m just freaking out a little.” And the fact she had no idea what Guido’s style or strength was, or what she was going to sing. Eyeing herself in the mirror, she tugged at her faux fur pink jacket, unsure of everything in this moment. Even the boots.
“Don’t worry about it. You already have a humongous fan base.”
Oakley jolted. “Excuse me?” What was this girl talking about?
“Oh, don’t play innocent with me, Oakley Marsden.” The hairstylist rolled her eyes, and Oakley caught sight of it in the mirror. “You know you’re the most popular thing to hi
t TNRS since Troy Bolton sang on High School Musical. You’re cute, happy, and you have a voice that lures people’s hearts like a siren. Everyone—and I mean everyone—has fallen for you.”
“For me?” Oakley stared in abject disbelief. “You’re kidding.”
“Are you telling me you haven’t been watching your social media followers explode? Come on. What rock have you been living under since your audition?”
The time-traveling-pop-star-boyfriend rock, Oakley guessed. Not that she could tell this hairstylist so. “I must have missed it.”
“Geez. Did you also miss the line of fans you have stacking up outside the studio? The ones holding all the signs that say your name? The ones where teenage boys are offering to Take you away from all this?”
“From all what?”
“Right? From fame and fortune, where they can love you and treat you like the sweet, noble girl they know you are inside.”
“Oh.” Oakley had no words.
“You really didn’t know, did you? Wow. You are as sweet as all of them think.” She sprayed one last spritz of aerosol toward Oakley’s hair and blew her a kiss. “Kinda the opposite of Guido, or Greevo, or whomever. Though he plays well to the camera, what with his moves like Jagger and all.”
Jagger’s dancing had never done anything for Oakley. Maybe the women his age liked him. Sherm sure liked the Rolling Stones.
Was it weird she wished Sherm were here right now? With Hairstyle Girl’s reassurances, she could feel the rumblings of a contract coming at her. How would she know what to sign or not sign? She hadn’t heard back from Sherm yet.
“What are you going to sing out there? I overheard Blue saying she still needed your number so she can get a backup track ready. Who does that? Who waits until way after the last possible minute? You’re treading on thin ice if you don’t do it the way the producers say and jump when they say jump. Just a hint, she doesn’t like that kind of uncertainty, no matter how much you’re turning TNRS into a hit again.”
“Oh. I, uh …” Oakley had been so distracted by everything going on with meeting Hudson’s family that she had never actually settled on a performance number. Dread filled her whole body. It felt like a dark cloak, suffocating her.
With her voice quavering, Oakley asked the question that had been tickling the back of her brain ever since this callback turned into a potential live performance. “How do they feel about an original song? Do you know?”
If she could have Hudson on stage with her—just spring him on the audience—there was no way she could lose. Not even to Gleedo.
“Chuh.” The girl’s lip curled. “Nobody who sings an original song wins. In fact, they get lampooned.”
“Lampooned?” Oakley didn’t know what lampooned meant, but it didn’t sound good.
“You know, ridiculed. Nobody’s homespun songs are as good as the ones already on the radio—at least that’s the rule of thumb. The track has to rock, seriously rock. So you’d better just drop the idea of doing something other than a cover of something that’s a hit right now. Hey, I heard your preliminary audition. I bet your voice would sound good doing a Jerica Jones cover. Have you tried her music?”
“Uh, a little.” The thought made her skin crawl. “I mean, this song I’m thinking of doing doesn’t sound, er, homespun. Not at all.” She had full confidence in the changes she and Hudson had made to “Lunch Lady.”
“Trust me. It’s not just that you can’t do homemade and sound good enough for TV. It’s also that they need licensing rights, and broadcast rights, and if it’s not something they already know about, their lawyers get antsy.” The stylist’s eyes rolled again. It seemed like her talent. “Jerica Jones. Trust me.”
“But—”
“No buts.” She beamed, as though she’d fixed all the problems in the universe with two words, like an athletic shoe slogan. “I can’t believe you came to the show and really didn’t know what you were going to sing.”
“Yeah. Me neither.” She’d known she wasn’t singing Jerica Jones, but not much more.
“Then do a Jerica song—and don’t go lying and telling me you don’t know the lyrics. Every person in the solar system knows the lyrics.” She hummed a few bars, and the words popped unbidden into Oakley’s head. “See? You know them.”
Oakley winced. “Yeah.”
“Look, no matter what you pick, if you sing like you did before, you’ll knock ’em dead.”
Well, dead didn’t sound good. Not when she knew what Hudson’s family suspected about the show producer’s interaction with previous teenager singers.
Dead was exactly what some teens had become.
Maybe this was too dangerous. Hudson was attached to her now. If Oakley made it past the pre-show voting and onto the live program, cameras would become part of her life, and Hudson’s existence would come to light.
That Roman guy will find him. Hudson was probably worth millions to Roman Levy dead. This was so dangerous.
She had to protect him. There was only one possible course to choose.
Quit. Quit now while Hudson was still alive.
***
“I’m quitting the show,” Oakley told Hudson as she slid out into the hallway where he was waiting for her. “It only makes sense.”
“Quitting! Are you kidding me?” Hudson fell hard against the brick wall. “You’re far too good to quit.”
“Far too good? I don’t even know what I was going to sing.” She wasn’t sure how to tell him that she had her own hunch—that Roman Levy would kill Hudson if Oakley didn’t walk away from TNRS right now. “I don’t think I’m ready. Have you seen my stage presence? It’s the worst.”
“Have you seen your boots? Have you seen you in your boots?”
“The boots aren’t enough.” Not to shield Hudson from the danger of a guy who’d already killed four people. How? How had he managed it and made himself look innocent all these years? “I’m not ready.”
“You are. You have a great voice, Oakley. When I said you were special, I didn’t just mean the essence of you, but that’s absolutely true, too. You have music in you. Your voice is one-of-a-kind. It’s memorable, as are you. Plus, without going through this door that’s gaping wide open in front of you, how are you going to get the lyrics of your soul out to the largest possible audience? People need to hear those lyrics.”
“They do?”
“Uh-huh.” Hudson sounded so convinced that he was almost convincing her too.
“Hudson, you do know that Roman Levy is producing this show.”
“That’s what Giselle said. I came partly because I’m ready to confront him.”
“Oh, I don’t think that’s such a good idea.” Oakley tried not to show her freak-out. “He’s not a great person, or I’m wrong about him.”
“We always had a good relationship.”
“Not if your parents are correct.”
Hudson’s mouth pulled to the side like he was thinking.
“Last time you trusted him over your parents, how did it work out?” Oakley hated to shoot the arrow right at his achilles heel, but she needed him to think clearly. “Tread carefully.”
It took a minute of Hudson looking down into her eyes, searching back and forth between them before he slowly nodded his head. “I get it. Yeah.” A reluctant smile pulled at the side of his mouth. “You’re good for me, Oakley. Have I told you that?”
“You’re good for me, too.” It had been a long day already, and she hadn’t even sung yet. There was so much more left ahead of her. She just wanted to go hide under the covers.
“We’re good for each other,” he said, pulling her into a hug. “So go sing our song.”
“I can’t.” Oakley sighed softly in his arms. “The sound people keep saying they have to have a track.”
“You’re singing it.”
But it was bigger than that. “I can’t.” Not without him. Not without Hudson at her side, adding the harmony. It wouldn’t feel like she was singing it right,
and she’d get thrown off her game. Her mind raced. She couldn’t believe she still hadn’t committed. It was minutes to show time. She started grasping at straws. “What about ‘The Eyes Have It?’ That’s your song.” If not their song, it was still something she knew all the words to.
“Yeah. You sound good at that. I heard you singing it in your sleep once.”
Not again.
“One hitch, though, it’s a guy’s song to a girl. Unless you’ve updated those lyrics, too. Have you?”
“No.” If only. Oakley crumbled inside. With her free hand she dug her nails into her palms. “Everyone’s pressuring me and I just don’t know what to do. I don’t know who the other singer is, or what he’s singing, what his style is or skill level is. What I’m up against, you know?” How good did she actually have to be? How much pressure was there?
She was woefully unprepared. It was like an algebra II test all over again.
“Wow. Oakley M. from Wood River, huh?” A long, tall guy with a shock of red hair hanging over one eye and a total rock star vibe walked up to them, scowling down at her. “You look shorter in person.”
“And you look like a bigger jerk.” Hudson stepped between Oakley and the redhead.
“Hudson!” Why was he being rude all of a sudden? “I’m sorry. I’m afraid we haven’t met.” There. Her mom would be so proud of her manners, especially in the face of such a rude introduction.
“Oakley—don’t you ever look at your smarty phone?” Hudson gave an exasperated sigh. “This is Greed.”
“Greed?”
“Your competition for the sound check audition.”
Scene 17: “Climbing the Walls”
Greed—not Guido, or Greevy, or Greasy—sneered down at her. “It appears I have nothing to be concerned about.” He gave a low, menacing chuckle. “After I turn the studio audience to putty in my hands singing ‘When Doves Fly,’ it sounds like you’ll get up and blubber your lips and start crying because you don’t even have a song.”
My 90s Boy Band Boyfriend: A YA Time Travel Rockstar Romance (Teen Queens Book 2) Page 26
