‘He’s hot,’ Petal admitted, glancing at the drummer, with his Afro and tattoos. ‘But I like that one.’
She pointed at the bassist, a sulky-looking boy with full lips, wide cheekbones, and heavy-lidded grey eyes that gave him a look of debauchery. Slanting a glance sideways at Tas, Petal cracked a smile of complete and extreme naughtiness. She didn’t smile much as a rule; it wasn’t cool, and it wasn’t how people wanted to see you. They wanted you bored, petulant, resentful, their image of how teenagers should look and behave. Petal was twenty now, her teens behind her. Still, the shots of her sullenly posing outside nightclubs, fag in one hand, spokesgirl for modern youth, were the ones that the paps wanted.
But when Petal did smile, she came to life, going from pretty to completely bewitching. Twin dimples curved on each side of her mouth, like tiny extra smiles; Petal hated them, but they were entrancing. Her eyes sparkled, her even white teeth gleamed (nothing but the best cosmetic dentists for Gold’s only daughter). Her entire face lit up. She looked mischievous and naughty and completely charming.
‘I’m having him,’ she yelled in Tas’s ear. ‘Him, me, back of a black cab. Tonight.’
‘Fab. And I’ll have the drummer boy. Pact?’
‘Pact.’
They spat on their hands and shook, their code.
‘This is so on,’ Petal said, leaning far over the balcony rail, whistling loud enough so that, the first song winding down, the lead singer looked up, head drawn by the piercing sound. ‘Not you!’ Petal shouted cheekily. ‘You!’ And she pointed to the bassist.
‘I’m Petal,’ she said forty minutes later, plopping herself down on the lap of her chosen target. ‘And you’re fucking sexy.’
He went bright red.
‘Um, hi,’ he said awkwardly. ‘I’m Dan Drummond. Do I know you? You look sort of familiar . . .’
‘I do a lot of stuff,’ Petal said, shrugging, hating to have to give her surname and watch people’s eyes flicker in recognition of her famous dad. ‘I caught your show tonight. You were brilliant.’
‘Yeah? Cool! We’ve barely gigged in London at all. I was shitting bricks beforehand. We all were.’
‘Well, it didn’t show.’
He mimed wiping his forehead in relief. ‘It’s a lot of pressure, y’know? We’re just a bunch of Geordie lads. We’ve not done much of anything yet, just wrote some songs and got snapped up by this A&R guy who saw a gig we did back home. And now we’re hanging out with all this high and mighty lot. It’s a bit much sometimes.’
Petal perched back on his knee, letting him get a good look at her. She could tell that, though he was trying to play it cool, he wasn’t at all used to girls like her sitting down on his lap and telling him they fancied him; those bone-sharp cheekbones were still pink, and he was babbling away in a mixture of embarrassment and excitement.
‘Maybe you need someone to hold your hand a bit,’ she purred, looking up at him from under her heavy fringe. ‘Guide you through the mad crazy world of London nightlife.’
‘That’s very nice of you to offer, Petal,’ he said, still looking a bit taken aback.
‘I am nice,’ Petal agreed. ‘Dan, right?’
He nodded. She could smell his sweat, fresh from throwing himself round the stage like a whirling dervish, his hair still damp with it. His T-shirt clung to his torso, and although he was a typically lean twenty-something boy, his arms had nice definition, whipcord veins standing out along his biceps.
‘You smell good,’ she said.
‘Oh hell – I’m all sweaty.’ He pushed his hair back. ‘You’re so pretty, look at your little top and everything. You shouldn’t be this close to me, you’ll get all messed up.’
He actually meant it. It was really sweet.
‘I like it.’ Petal moved towards him till her mouth was nearly touching his. ‘I told you, I think you’re sexy.’ She kissed him, just a brief touch of her pink-lipsticked mouth to his. ‘Remember, Dan, you’re a rock star now. You’re supposed to be sweaty when you come off stage. It’s sexy.’ She kissed him again. ‘It makes all the girls fancy you.’ A final kiss, still light as a feather.
Dan Drummond’s eyes were wide, his mouth open in shock and awe.
‘Don’t worry,’ Petal purred naughtily. ‘I won’t slap your face if you try to kiss me back.’
‘You are something,’ he said, finally finding his voice.
‘I am that!’ She jumped up just as he leaned towards her for a kiss, confusing him thoroughly, exactly as she’d planned; then she reached for his hand and pulled him to his feet too. ‘Wanna come to the toilet with me?’
‘I’ve never had an invitation I fancied more,’ he said devoutly, following her out of the band’s crammed dressing room as the rest of KillBuzz whooped encouragement at him.
Tas had already pinned the drummer against the wall with her lavish bosom, and was holding him there, riveted, as he did his best not to stare too openly down her cleavage. Tas always wore low-cut tops to show off her breasts, and tonight the fuchsia lace of her bra showed brightly against her dark skin, the contrast stunning; she was giggling at him while doing her best to shove her bosom up like a shelf.
Hearing the whoops, she glanced over her shoulder, saw that Petal had snagged her target, and shot her a sneaky wink before turning back to her own.
‘So, um, what are we going to do in the loo?’ Dan asked as they walked down the corridor. ‘Are you going to give me a blow job or something?’
‘You what?’ She let go of his hand and planted hers on her hips, furious. ‘Do you think I’m a fucking groupie?’
‘No – sorry – I didn’t mean . . .’ He hung his head in misery. ‘I just haven’t done this much, you know? I mean, we were nothing a few weeks ago, just some lads gigging in local pubs. This is all way out of me league, pet. I’m really sorry!’
She softened, because he was genuinely apologetic, and because close-up he was even more gorgeous than he was onstage. But she still stood there, making him suffer.
‘Petal! I’m sorry, right!’ He dropped to the ground and pretended to kiss the toes of her beaten-up vintage cowboy boots. ‘Forgive me, won’t you? Pity a poor country boy who doesn’t know big-city ways!’
She was laughing now.
‘Get up, you idiot!’ she said, hauling him to his feet again. ‘So – you a friend of Charlie’s, Dan?’
‘You what?’ he said, momentarily baffled.‘Oh, right! Can’t afford it usually,’ he admitted. ‘We’re into the whiz up our way. Cheaper, y’know.’
‘You’ll be able to afford it now,’ Petal assured him, pushing back the door of the unisex loo. ‘Now that you’re a rock star.’
‘Keep saying that, babe,’ Dan said happily. ‘It’s really turning me on.’
JC and Rudy were in the loos already, chopping up their own gear on the chipped old sink surround. Petal joined them, pulling her own supply, stashed in a silver cigarette case, from her Gucci bag. JC and Rudy had a bottle of Absolut Pear vodka, and they all took long pulls at it after they’d done nice fat lines, Rudy snapping some photos on his camera phone that sent them into hysterics. It was a grotty backstage loo, the black paint on the walls chipped and peeling, the red stall doors heavily graffitied, the Formica floor sticky with beer and God knew what: the perfect place for an up-and-coming rock star and an urban girl about town to make out.
Coke always made Petal horny. More people came in and out, more lines were snorted, and after half an hour of vodka and charlie, she was more than ready to be alone with Dan. Grabbing his arm, she pulled him into a stall and slammed the door shut as JC and Rudy and the singer of KillBuzz yelled approvingly after them. Dan was a quick learner, or maybe coke had just the same effect on him; he had his tongue down her throat the moment the door closed, kissing her hard and deep, grinding his long skinny body against hers, making her moan into his mouth with excitement and lust.
She reached down and grabbed his arse, pulling his crotch into hers, the stacked heels o
f her cowboy boots getting her just high enough to wriggle herself where she wanted to be, feeling his instant erection through his tight jeans.
‘God, this is good,’ she mumbled against him. ‘You’re a great kisser.’
‘And you’re wild,’ Dan said, biting her neck. ‘Are you, like, the fastest girl in London? You’re like a fucking lightning bolt.’
‘If I’m not –’ Petal ran her hands under his T-shirt, grabbing his belt buckle, pulling him in even closer – ‘I don’t know who is.’
‘Fuck, you’re driving me crazy!’ he groaned, sliding his hands up under her skirt. ‘You even wearing knickers? What do wild girls wear on their bums?’
‘That’s for me to know . . .’
‘. . . And me to find out!’
He hooked his thumbs under the waistband of her tights. She was wet already, totally turned on by him, by the smell of his sweat – no aftershave for an indie kid from Newcastle, nothing but him, the sharp scent of his excitement mingling with her own – by his hands on her, the way he’d really got into it, followed her lead and gone nuclear. Boys were all the same: they’d hang around, nervous of rejection, waiting for the signals that it was OK with you for them to go for it, but when you gave them the green light they couldn’t get your knickers off fast enough.
‘You can’t fuck me here in the loos,’ she said, running her hands around his waist, making him moan. ‘Not with everyone right outside.’
‘Nah,’ he said, his grey eyes bright, his grin wide. ‘I’m going to eat you out. Seems the least I can do by way of apology for treating you like a groupie. I’m going to get down on me knees and give you a good old seeing to. How’s that sound?’
Petal was practically dripping with anticipation.
‘Fantastic,’ she drawled. ‘If you’re really good at it, maybe I’ll give you that blow job after all.’
‘Fuck,’ Dan Drummond said devoutly, dropping to his knees and pulling her tights and knickers down as he went. ‘This is definitely the best fucking night of me life!’
Joe
Joe Jeffreys was on top of the world. His world: Hollywood. Which, if he’d wanted to, he could have ruled like a despotic emperor. He was one of the biggest movie stars in the world, he made tens of millions of dollars per picture, and if he threw his weight around, the reverberations would have been heard all round the planet.
But that wasn’t Joe’s style. Never had been, never would be. Everything had always come easily to him; he didn’t need to throw his weight around to get what he wanted, because what he wanted had always dropped into his lap before he’d even figured out what it might be. By seventeen, he’d already been drop-dead gorgeous, and he’d only improved with age. At six foot two, with linebacker shoulders, he was that rare breed of movie star, the kind who is even more physically imposing in person than he is onscreen. Not since Clint Eastwood had Hollywood seen such a hunk of a man. Blond and blue-eyed, tanned to a perfect even bronze, his corn-fed Midwestern handsomeness was dazzling.
Meeting Joe for the first time was as blinding as a visitation from a sun god: you blinked hard, overwhelmed, and fell instantly under the spell cast by his looks and his charm. It had been like that for the model scout who’d spotted him on Joe’s first-ever trip out of state – a family vacation to Disneyland – snapped a Polaroid of him, and signed him up then and there. It had been like that for the agent who’d seen him in a Gap ad on TV, flown him out to LA and got him a walk-on role in a movie as a hot bartender. And it had been like that for the casting director who’d cast him in an action movie as a tough young cop, his breakout role, the one that had precipitated him on his swift upward climb to his current status as the king of the blockbusters.
Joe had never taken an acting class in his life. He was a natural. Besides, Joe would be the first one to acknowledge that he wasn’t an actor: he was a movie star. That was his job. He was damn good at it. And he loved it and pretty much everything that came with it.
Joe was also damn good at being happy, a talent very few people are lucky enough to possess. Most of the time, he felt like the luckiest guy ever, and right then, having just hiked up LA’s spectacular Runyon Canyon, he couldn’t see a cloud in the sky. Literally or metaphorically. He stood at the top, hands on hips, surveying the dramatic, sun-kissed landscape, breathing in the smog with a happy smile on his face, his two Great Danes, Hengist and Horsa, bumping at his legs.
Below, at the bottom of the long steep hill, the bright sunlight gleamed off the lenses of the waiting paparazzi, eager for photographs of the godlike Joe Jeffreys, hot and sweaty from a bracing run. Even though Joe knew they couldn’t see him, not from the distance, he raised his hand and waved at them, a good-old-boy, friendly wave. Joe’d never had a beef with the paparazzi; they were just doing their job. Everyone had to make a living, after all.
Joe took off his baseball cap, ran one hand through his thick fair hair, and jammed the cap back on again. Much as he liked to feel the sun on his face, it was definitely ageing. Plus you had to worry about skin cancer now, and he hated when his dermatologist yelled at him. He took a long pull at his water bottle and squirted some into the open mouths of each of the Great Danes, who had sat down expectantly as soon as he untapped the bottle. They knew the routine; they got a drink when Joe did.
‘Right, guys,’ he said, hooking the bottle back onto his belt, ‘let’s sprint back down, drive home, crack a beer and watch the game, OK? Sound like a plan to you?’
Great Danes were hunting dogs; they could spend all day running with horses, tracking down wolves or wild boar. Even though Joe was at the peak of physical fitness, there was no way that the pace he set back down the canyon path was a challenge to them. But they lolloped along beside him, tongues lolling out happily, always happy to run with their human, the leader of their pack. The paparazzi had been briefed on the names of the dogs, and called them out as Joe approached, the lenses clicking frantically as they fought to get the best action shot of him, the damp white T-shirt clinging to his firm round pecs, gold hairs glinting on his tanned arms, his strong thighs pounding a steady rhythm down the hill.
‘Joe! How’s Jennifer doing?’
‘Hengist! Horsa! Over here! Over here!’
‘Joe! How’s it feel to be engaged?’
‘Joe, could you lose the baseball cap?’
Joe flashed them all a wide smile, keeping up a steady pace as he jogged to his Lexus Hybrid 4 × 4 and unlocked it, throwing the back open for the dogs to leap in. The paps all knew what to expect by now: he never uttered a word, never reacted apart from giving them the big Joe Jeffreys photogenic grin. There was no point provoking him by yelling insults or foul language, as they did with other celebrities who might rise to the bait; but they’d get what they came for, a great shot of a sweaty, sexy Joe out with his dogs. A good morning’s work.
‘Joe! Did you have a good time in Vancouver?’ yelled one guy just as Joe was pulling his door shut.
Weird question, Joe thought as he drove home. I mean, you go to film in Vancouver cause it’s a hell of a lot cheaper, you shoot a movie, you come back to LA. Who asks if you had a good time in Vancouver? Must be a newbie.
It wasn’t much of a drive from Runyon Canyon to Joe’s compound in the Hollywood Hills. As the electronic gates swung open, Joe was already picturing the rest of the day laid out before him, a whole series of his favourite things, one after the other. A long steamy hydro-massage shower, the body jets turned up to the max, pounding out his tight muscles from the run. A couple of cold beers, put in the freezer by Estrelita, the housekeeper, when he drove out, so they’d be ideally chilled for his return, moisture beading on the green glass of the bottle. Chips, celery, and plenty of blue cheese dip; he’d just wrapped a movie, so for a couple of weeks he could eat whatever the hell he wanted.
And the game, fired up in his private screening room, so vivid you’d think you were right on the baseball diamond with the Royals. They’d done nothing for twenty-five years, the last
time they made it to the World Series, but who else could a Kansas boy support but the Royals? Sure, it’d be easier to transfer allegiance to the LA Dodgers, but where was the integrity in that?
Plus, of course, a couple of bongs of British Columbia’s best hydroponic bud, just enough to get him all loose and happy. Soak in the pool for a while, catch some rays when the sun was past its peak. And then, who knew? Call up a couple of girls he knew, see if they wanted to come over and party. Or just chill out at home, enjoying the peace and quiet after a long hard shooting schedule – rifle through his extensive porn collection and show himself a good time.
Decisions, decisions. Joe sighed, a long happy near-groan of pure anticipation. The dogs, hearing their master’s voice, flopped their tails heavily in response.
Then the Lexus rounded the corner of the long white mansion, turning onto the gravelled parking area, and Joe said, ‘Ah, fuck,’ so explosively that one of the dogs whined in empathy.
It wasn’t the sight of his fiancée Jennifer’s red Prius parked next to the staff’s cars that bothered him. Jennifer lived in an entirely separate area of the compound, in a self-contained house with her own private pool; they could happily go for days on end without seeing each other, unless they had some red carpet to walk hand in hand.
No, Jennifer wasn’t the problem. What had rattled Joe was the vehicle parked next to hers, the gas-guzzling, very much nonenvironmentally friendly SUV belonging to their publicist, the much-feared Carmen Delgado. Joe and Jennifer had to drive hybrids, because otherwise they’d have been slated by the press. But Carmen made the news, she didn’t appear in it. Therefore, Carmen could drive whatever the hell she wanted.
There was only one reason for Carmen to be making an unscheduled visit during the day: some sort of crisis. And even if it were a crisis about some shit Jen had pulled, there was no way in hell Joe wasn’t going to be sucked into it too. Damn. If he’d known the Bitch Queen was dropping by, he’d have made sure to have a couple of beers beforehand. In Joe’s long experience of dealing with Carmen, it was never a good idea to go into it totally sober.
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