Another suit came in—a middle-aged man who looked like a lawyer: collar and tie, intelligent face and salt-and-pepper hair.
‘This is Neil: he’s got the contract. Did you bring your own legal representation?’ Barry directed the question to Jay.
‘Er, no, Barry.’ Jay looked like he was kicking himself.
‘Then you’ll want to have another pair of eyes look at this before you sign, but for today I hope we’ll make a gentlemen’s agreement—a handshake—if you like what you hear.’
Jay tried to look as if he made such deals every day. ‘Yes, sure, that’ll be fine.’
Hungerford passed copies of the agreement to each of us. I was the last to receive mine so was aware already that Jay wasn’t pleased by what he was reading. I looked down at the first page.
‘Angel Dares?’ asked Jay, trying to keep a hold of his temper.
Hungerford leant back in his chair, fingers steepled. ‘Yeah, the marketing guys say that name tests out well. It has an edge, gesturing to the exploratory nature of your songwriting, taking risks.’
Jay looked blank.
‘And of course it highlights your main attraction and her personality.’ Hungerford winked at me.
I didn’t know where to look.
Matt leant closer and whispered in my ear. ‘Ready to steal the limelight, Angel?’
‘And I’m sure you’ll recognize that Angel here is your selling point. Guys like her—girls want to be her surrounded by all these gorgeous boys.’ He looked over to Ali standing at the door. ‘I do like that—ticks so many boxes its fricking unreal.’ He beamed at us all.
‘You’re moving Angel up to front man—front girl?’ asked Matt.
‘Frick me, yes! She’ll be sharing the spot with Jay. That’s fricking new and fresh—there’s no other leading band at the moment with that lineup so you’ll get more attention.’ He took our stunned silence as assent. ‘Now “Star-Crossed” has to be your first single—the Romeo and Juliet reference very classy. I’m thinking Angel on the cover in a kind of modern version of the balcony scene. Angel’s already in the news as Marcus Cohen’s girlfriend so a song about doomed love will play really well with the music press—human interest angle, you know?’
He was planning to turn my heartbreak into my career break.
‘I don’t suppose you can engineer a little falling out with Marcus on single release day, Angel?’ Hungerford asked in a jovial tone, only half-joking. ‘It would be worth at least a hundred thousand fricking downloads.’
Where to start with my refusals? ‘I don’t think … ’ I began.
Jay cut across me. ‘We’ll do whatever is necessary to make it a success, Barry. None of this need be real, need it? Stars date each other all the time to make a story for their publicists.’
Hungerford nodded and smiled at his star pupil. ‘Exactly: no real pain involved for any of the parties, just good photo opportunities. I’ll talk to Marcus’s people about it.’
This was getting out of hand. I stood up. ‘No.’
‘No what?’ asked Hungerford, his smile dimming.
‘I will not use my relationship with Marcus to launch our band. You’ll have to find some other way.’
‘Sit down, Angel. We’ll talk about this later,’ hissed Jay. ‘Don’t worry, Barry: Angel’s impulsive. Take no notice.’
Hungerford gave me a quizzical look. My fingers were shaking where I rested them on the tabletop. ‘Let’s leave that aside for now. Return to it after we’ve laid down the track in the studio.’ He moved on to less inflammatory matters, touching on the next few months, how we would work on the first album, write or sample new material. Matt tugged at my shirt to get me to sit. He put his arm around me and gave me a quick squeeze.
‘I won’t let them do that to you,’ he promised. ‘Remember, Marcus would have to agree too and that is no more likely than he’d agree to go on stage naked. Let him put these guys off. You don’t have to take the flak for it.’
I nodded. Of course Matt was right: Marcus wouldn’t compromise his art for a story. Dislike him as I did, even I knew he had more integrity than that.
At the end of the meeting, Ali opened the champagne and called in a waiting photographer. Hungerford made sure I stood in the middle as we toasted our agreement. Jay was the one who shook hands with him over the pages of the unsigned document; Hungerford insisted on kissing my wrist, laughing at his courtly gesture but clearly enjoying himself rather too much.
Jay sidled up to me. ‘Angel, I just want to say that I think it’s great—the name change, the contract, everything.’
What was his agenda here? Ever ready to be suspicious of him, I waited for him to explain. ‘Really?’
‘No really, I do. I realize I’ve been a bit unfair to you in the past.’
‘A bit?’
He ruffled his quiff, apology-mode not a natural one to him. ‘A lot then. And I’m sorry. I guess I was jealous.’
Now that seemed like the first honest thing he’d ever said to me. ‘Of what?’
‘You—I knew you had the potential to outshine the rest of us and that scared me.’
I didn’t trust this laying-his-soul-bare Jay, but at least I had an answer to that concern. ‘But Jay, I’ve always liked being in a band because, well, because we’re a band. It’s the sound we make together that’s the thing I like—up front or backing, that’s not important.’
He looked sceptical.
‘It’s true. Whatever we’re called, we make our own music together, and that’s what’s going to make us succeed. And I really believe we can. At Rockport, we started to go places.’ I refused to give in to the niggling doubt that my performance had only excelled because it had been Marcus-enhanced.
Jay patted my arm awkwardly, respecting my personal space. ‘So new start then, Angel? For us I mean? We work as a team? No one gets left behind?’
‘Sure, Jay.’
As we filed out, I tucked the contract deep in my bag.
‘I’m getting this looked at,’ I whispered to Matt, ‘separately from Jay. I appreciate he’s trying to make this work, but I wouldn’t put it past him to sell his mother out to get a break, let alone us.’
Matt gave me a peck on the cheek. ‘Good thinking. Cover our backs for us, Angel?’
I gave a firm nod. ‘You bet.’
We parted by the railings around the centre of the square, Matt heading for Piccadilly as I cut through the garden towards Oxford Circus. I hadn’t got very far when I heard someone running up behind me. Thinking it was Matt who had forgotten to tell me something, I turned.
It was Marcus. He was looking amazing in his grey jeans and white shirt over dark blue T-shirt. Why did he have to be so gorgeous? It undermined my common sense every time.
‘Angel!’ He stopped short of me, hesitant as to whether I’d welcome him to come closer.
‘Oh, hi. What are you doing here?’ My eyes flicked up to Hungerford’s office. Of course. ‘You were up there?’
He dug his hands in his pockets. ‘Yeah. In Barry’s office.’
‘Did you set that up for us—ask for the meeting as a favour?’
‘No. Barry told me after he’d spoken to Jay.’ He rubbed the back of his neck. ‘You happy with the deal?’
‘Ecstatic,’ I said flatly, folding my arms.
‘The name change and everything?’
‘That part was very embarrassing. My band mates are going to hate me.’
‘No they won’t—not when you take them to the top.’
My brain was doing a fast catch up. Marcus knew about the details of our deal—had known before I did. ‘You complete arse!’ I swivelled on my heel and stomped off.
‘What?’ I’d caught Marcus by surprise. He hurried to catch up with me. ‘What did I do?’
‘“Oh Angel, I don’t suppose you can engineer a little falling out with Marcus on single release day?” Was that your idea too? You’d use our … our relationship so casually to sell records? I thought you h
ad more integrity than that.’
He caught me at the gate and pulled me off the path onto the grass so I had to face him. ‘No, Angel: it was nothing like that at all. You have to believe me.’ He brushed his fingers down my cheek. ‘Barry suggested it and I told him to see what you said to the offer. I’m proud of you for refusing.’
He had been listening in.
‘You were testing me?’
Marcus shrugged. ‘I guess it might seem like that—but I had to know.’
‘Know what?’
‘If this was real.’ He gestured between us.
Had I not done enough to prove that to him without jumping through yet more hoops he cared to put in my way? I pulled his fingers off my arm where they anchored me. ‘What’s real is me walking out on you, Marcus. Shame there are no cameras to capture the moment, hey? Barry coulda got his story today and done a quick release of the single. By the time “Star-Crossed” comes out, we’ll be history.’ I started walking away.
‘Angel!’
I whirled round. ‘No! Don’t you Angel me, Marcus Cohen! You’ve treated me like dirt—suspicious ever since we met. Testing me is the final straw. You’ve never thought about how your behaviour affects me—not once. You never understood that all I wanted was to be allowed to love you.’ You are not going to cry; you are not going to cry, I chanted inside. ‘Just leave me alone from now on, OK?’
I can’t.
Using telepathy was a low blow after all the times he had refused. ‘I think you’ll find you can.’ I set my shoulders and walked away.
It felt like entering a dream world to go back to school on Tuesday after the life-changing events of the last few days. The summer term in the lower sixth is an odd time at best: we were relaxing after AS exams, some drifting off on work experience, teachers starting the A-level syllabus and trying to convince us to concentrate even though the sun was shining. Add on to that the fact that I felt I no longer belonged there. I moved slowly about between class and sixth-form block as if nothing was quite real to me, like the diver I’d seen swimming in an aquarium behind plate glass, separate from the visitors watching her feed the fish. The common room realized something was going on too. They treated me like their own little celebrity, enjoying the reflected glory of my brief brush with the stars. One showed me Fresh’s much retweeted tweet that had claimed I was going to play for Gifted. I laughed it off with a joke but it hurt to do so. I kept quiet about my offer of a record deal, having passed the papers to Mum to get checked out with a savant lawyer friend of hers. I was not going to blurt it out and then have an embarrassing climb down if it fell through.
So I was sitting in the music block staring out of the window in composition class, dreaming of the future, when the head teacher appeared at the door. I hadn’t wanted to put on the school headphones—not after my experience in the boot of Davis’ car—so had been delaying starting work on my piece; that made me the first to hear his knock. An extremely short man, Mr Herriot had to go up on tiptoe to look in the glass panel just as I did, his spectacles flashing in and out of view like a lantern buoy bobbing on the waves. This shared humiliation was one of the reasons I was fond of him.
‘Mr Garfield, apologies for interrupting your class,’ the head said, opening the door and tapping the teacher on the shoulder.
The music teacher took off his headphones: he’d been working on the keyboard and hadn’t noticed the new arrival until Mr Herriot touched him. ‘Sorry, Mr Herriot, can I help you?’
There were six others in the class and, naturally, they all took off headphones to eavesdrop. Mr Herriot appeared extraordinarily agitated, flyaway red hair looking like he had just been standing in the backdraft of a jet engine.
‘Yes—I mean, no, Mr Garfield. I have a very special visitor who would like to talk to Angel. Ah, there you are, Angel. Would you mind stepping out of the class for a moment?’
My first thought was that Marcus had come to find me—but no, Mr Herriot wouldn’t even know who he was and certainly wouldn’t walk him around the school like he was royalty. Still wondering, I stood up. Before I could come out from behind my desk, Kurt walked into the room. The gasp from my classmates was audible. Shocked, I leant my hands on the keyboard, producing an ugly chord.
Kurt grinned. ‘Ow, Angel, I thought you were musical?’
I couldn’t think of a single thing to say. Fortunately, the head teacher stepped in.
‘Class, as I’m sure you will have noticed, our special visitor is Kurt Voss. And yes, it really is him.’ Mr Herriot rubbed his hands together, no doubt checking his memory banks for ‘suitable words to say to gob-smacked sixth formers when rock god comes to school’.
‘Hi, guys,’ Kurt gave them a relaxed wave.
What are you doing here? I asked him, using telepathy so as to keep this private.
Impressing the hell out of your classmates it would seem. He winked at me. So he had come to terms with the fact that he was telepathic, had he? Kurt turned to my music teacher. ‘So you’re Angel’s teacher? Mr Garfield, like that fat ginger cat?’ Only Kurt would be so brazen. Of course Mr Garfield’s nickname was Fat Cat; he was a portly man so was crying out to be so christened by generations of pupils. I hope Kurt hadn’t picked that out of my head.
‘Er … Kurt … Mr Voss … it’s an honour.’ I’d never seen Mr Garfield so star struck as he shook hands. ‘Jagged is my favourite concept album ever.’
‘Thanks, man. Call me Kurt, please.’
Mr Herriot was beckoning me to find my feet again. ‘Hurry up, Angel. I’m sure Mr Voss—Kurt—is a busy man.’
Kurt shrugged. ‘It’s fine, Nick.’ Nick? The head teacher was called Nick? I’d always thought his colleagues knew him as Nicholas. ‘I’ve a few minutes. I was planning on spiriting Angel away for the afternoon if that’s OK with you? I’ve got her parents’ permission.’
‘Yes, yes, they rang me. Well then, er, Kurt, perhaps the students have some questions for you about the music business?’
That’s right, Mr Herriot: turn this excruciating moment into an educational opportunity, why don’t you?
‘Sure. Fire away, guys.’ Kurt perched on the corner of Mr Garfield’s desk as I quietly packed my school bag. My friends lost their shock-and-awe expressions and dug up some decent questions about how Kurt became the mega-success he is. None of them succumbed to the temptation to squeal ‘We love you!’ and ‘Can I have your babies?’ though I thought Mr Garfield looked quite close to it.
The bell rang for the end of lesson. The school erupted into movement as a thousand of us began to shift rooms. Mr Herriot said some appropriate words—don’t ask me what—then dismissed the rest of the class.
‘You coming, Angel?’ asked Kurt.
‘Where?’ I asked. I pulled what I intended to be an earnest face. ‘I mean, I have biology next.’
Mr Garfield and the head teacher looked shocked at my hesitation but Kurt must have guessed I was only joking because he smiled. ‘I thought I’d take you to lunch—in Paris.’
‘Seriously?’ My voice squeaked. Though I was still cross with him for expecting me to play after my ordeal, I couldn’t help but be impressed.
‘There she is—the old Angel.’ Kurt appeared relieved to have surprised me. ‘Dead serious. Margot’s just picking up your passport from home. We’re flying over to a favourite restaurant of mine.’
‘This is so cool!’ I regretted my classmates had already left to spread the word of my treat.
‘I take that as a yes. Thanks, Nick—Mr Garfield. Let’s go.’
Mr Herriot escorted us off the school grounds to where Kurt’s car was waiting. We had to pass through the crowds of students on lesson change-over and I could hear the gossip doing the rounds. Kids came running from all directions just to get a glimpse of Kurt. I was both thrilled and embarrassed to be running the gauntlet like this. The embarrassment racked up a notch or two above thrilled when I heard Mr Herriot mentioning the fundraiser for the new school auditorium. He ha
d to do that to me, didn’t he?
‘Well, if you are producing talent like Angel here, you’re gonna need a decent performance space, Nick,’ Kurt agreed. ‘Contact my people about it, OK?’
We got in the car and I bent my head to my knees and groaned. ‘Tell me he did not do that. My head teacher did not just beg money from you?’
Kurt laughed. ‘Of course he did. It’s his job, darlin’. I’ll have him calling it the Kurt Voss hall before I’m finished. John, take us to the airport please.’ The car pulled away. Through the blacked-out windows I could see the stunned school population watching us leave. The leather of the seat squeaked as Kurt turned to rest a warm hand on my hair. ‘Forget about it, Angel. Tell me how you’ve been after that psycho took you prisoner?’
I sat up and brushed my hair off my face. ‘I’m OK, I think.’
Kurt nodded grimly, studying my expression. ‘You’re not totally OK but you’ll get there. I’m sorry I didn’t get how bad it was for you. Victor only told me the full story after you left. Must have been terrifying.’
‘It was—but no permanent damage done. I didn’t have to do anything to reveal my gift to anyone.’ I felt a little less angry now I realized he hadn’t grasped the severity of what had happened when he had appeared in Marcus’ trailer.
He sucked on his lower lip and looked away.
‘I’m sorry you found out about us that way. It’s not always like this, Kurt. Savant skills are usually just nice gifts to have. People don’t normally hunt us down like rats just because we can do a few little extra things.’
He turned back to me and gave me a superstar grin. ‘I know, darlin’. I was worrying about you. I know that cold dude Victor has a plan to get Davis off the streets but I won’t feel happy for me and mine until I know he’s neutralized.’
Me and mine. It was heartwarming to hear that Kurt counted me in that group. ‘Have you worked out what your gift is yet?’
He gave a gruff laugh. ‘It seems you called it right. Will thinks I have an instinct for people’s motives, like a tracker dog sniffing out drugs. I can live with that—I always have.’
Angel Dares Page 21
