Killer Riff

by Sheryl J. Anderson

  The word was out. And it had already gotten from the tabloids to the mainstream press. Or at least to Peter.

  It had also reached the music community, because I’d barely cleared the line when it rang again. This time it was Risa, who announced she wanted to acquire the Hotel Tapes for her label. “I’ll pay you ten percent over what anyone else has offered.”

  “Who told you I was selling the tapes?”

  “You’re the last person I discussed them with. I heard there was some big announcement coming, and I just assumed you were involved.”

  I had hoped the rumor that someone had found the tapes would be sufficient to force the hand of the person who really did have them: If I said I had them, Claire would be compelled to come forward and prove me wrong. Said rumor exploding into an auction for the tapes in the blink of an eye took my breath away. I just hoped the explosion didn’t take me with it before Claire had been flushed out.

  I told Risa that I didn’t have anything to do with selling the tapes, but I’d certainly call her first if I heard they were for sale. After pushing a little more, she thanked me, I hung up, and Gray Benedek grabbed my shoulder.

  “What the hell are you doing?”

  Such is the power of stardom that a tall, muscular man with fury in his eyes and vitriol in his voice was standing over me, clearly meaning me harm, and my colleagues sat in their places, gazing at him with awe and adoration. I even heard giggling as Gray leaned down into my face, and I hoped that was in honor of his fame and not in anticipation of my demise.

  “Where’s Adam?” he demanded.

  “I’ve been looking for you to ask you the same question,” I said with what I felt was commendable calm. “You were the last person seen with him in public.”

  Gray straightened up slowly, a cobra recoiling after a strike. “Don’t try to make me look bad here, little girl. You’re the sucker, falling for the charming act. You think Adam is the wounded party? He’s the one who’s got the tapes and is telling everyone he’ll sell them to the highest bidder.”

  “Since when?” I asked, wincing at the anxious crack in my own voice. He had to have this wrong, didn’t he?

  “Who the hell knows? But I’ve got press up to my armpits wanting reactions and pictures and producers wanting a piece of the project, and what I want is Adam Crowley so I can teach the ungrateful piece of spineless scum about loyalty and respect, just one more thing his father never bothered to do for him.”

  Out of the corner of my eye, I could see that my colleagues’ awe and adoration were ebbing into the discomfort and fear zone. Not that anyone was coming to my aid, but at least they weren’t batting their eyes at Gray anymore.

  “Why would you think this was Adam’s doing?” I asked.

  “He doesn’t have his own songs,” Gray said with distaste. “The best he can do is ride on someone else’s riff.”

  The sour torque in my stomach acknowledged his point and the fact that I’d ascribed a similar motive to Claire yet kept Adam free of any culpability. The attractive option at this point was to attend medical school, probably in another country. The responsible option was to check on Adam and give him a chance to answer these charges. But I had to get away from Gray to be able to do that. Knowing how well he handled confrontation, I tried a different approach. “I’m really sorry that you’re being bothered. Let me look into this, press my contacts. I’ll see what I can find out for you, Mr. Benedek.”

  Gray actually smiled, and a soft group sigh filled the room behind me. “Good. Good.”

  “In fact, I’ll walk out with you, get right on this,” I said, scooping up my accoutrements and stuffing them in my bag. Even the offending letter went along; it would have to wait its turn in the long line of events wanting to mess with my life.

  As I walked out with Gray, Skyler stood at her desk. “Wait! What about the letters?”

  “Grab them out of the conference room and sit on them if you have to. I’ll call you!” I called back. My giving her a mission seemed to please her, perhaps because she thought it meant we were friends now. Yeah, fine.

  Gray and I seemed to be friends now, too, and we parted with professional politeness in front of the building. I wasn’t sure how he’d feel about me at the end of the evening, which I was still hoping would culminate in the exposure of Claire, but my promise to track down Adam mollified him for the moment. I was willing to take that and run with it all the way back to my apartment, where both Cassady and Adam were happy to see me.

  “Changing of the guard,” Cassady proclaimed, scooping up her work. “I have to go find a fabulous dress to wear to dinner with Aaron. I don’t suppose …” She wrinkled her nose at Adam, then shook her head. “Never mind.”

  Adam leapt to his feet, tossing down my well-worn copy of One Hundred Years of Solitude. “Let’s go. Put me in drag if you have to, to get me through the press downstairs, but I need to go outside.”

  “He does need something to wear tonight,” Cassady said.

  “A condemned man deserves to go in style,” Adam said.

  “You’re not a condemned man. Unless you’re holding out on me and you’ve been working the phones,” I warned, Gray’s slams on Adam’s character reverberating in my head.

  Adam gestured at Cassady. “She confiscated my cell and listened at the door while I was in the bathroom.”

  “I was being thorough,” Cassady explained. “You told me to keep him incommunicado and I did.”

  “We’re on the same side,” Adam said.

  I hoped so, or the chopping block was going to have my name on it right next to his. Relenting, I said, “There’s no press downstairs yet, but incognito is still the order of the day.”

  Which was why, one hour later, Cassady and I escorted Adam into Saks, his sunglasses on despite the overcast weather, his telltale curls crammed into a bright yellow baseball cap from a 5K for diabetes research that I limped through, his chin tucked down into the zipper of a ragged burnt orange zip-pered sweatshirt that had survived a Green Mountains camping trip with a little more flair than I had. Adam managed to be remarkably low-key as we entered the men’s department, though I’d barely begun to sift through the stacks of shirts when he arrived at the customer service desk with a Marc Jacobs ensemble, black sateen trousers and a white sweater, plus a package of Calvin Klein knit boxers and black socks. Either the cashier didn’t notice the name on his credit card or didn’t care, because she didn’t blink an overly mascaraed eyelash as she completed the transaction.

  Adam strolled back to where Cassady and I waited and smiled. “Done.”

  Cassady looked him over with something that approached distaste. “Men just don’t understand how to shop.” She sighed and led us to the evening wear department.

  While Cassady slid between racks, evaluating, dismissing, and moving on, Adam and I loitered near a table of merino sweaters that compelled you to stroke them. “I appreciate this very much,” he said as I slid my hand between two sweaters.

  “The shopping?”

  “Your helping Ollie like this. Figuring out what happened.”

  “Don’t thank me until it’s over,” I said, touched by his loyalty to Olivia but trying to imagine what his reaction would be when the blame came down on Claire. Especially since she seemed to have done it all for him.

  “I’d like to do a lot more when it’s over,” he said with a smile I couldn’t quite read.

  “Like record a jazz album?” I asked, uncomfortable with the slick tone in his voice.

  “Like take you out.”

  A little perturbed that he was playing with me again, I laughed it off. “You don’t have to do this anymore.”

  “Ask you out?”

  “Flirt with me to keep me from suspecting you.”

  “Is that what you thought I was doing?” His smile disappeared. “That’s crap. I was trying to open up to you, share something special with you, and you thought it was an act? So you taking care of me, helping me out, that’s been an act i
n return?”

  “No, I genuinely want to help you,” I protested.

  “And I genuinely like you,” he snapped back, not seeming to care for me all that much at the moment. “Which is why I want to take you out.”

  I deemed a new approach necessary. “That wouldn’t go over well with Kyle.”

  “My other baby-sitter?”

  “Yes.”

  For some reason, that pulled him up. “Sorry. I thought you were old friends.”

  Which pulled me up. “Old friends?”

  “Or cousins or something.”

  Adam was not exactly a neutral observer, but he seemed genuinely surprised. How could the undeniable attraction Kyle and I felt for each other not be plainly obvious, even to him? Kyle and I were meant to be together. Fated. Destined. Force of nature and all that. Weren’t we?

  Though I told myself—repeatedly—Adam was giving me a hard time, I had difficulty dismissing his statement. Sufficient difficulty that when Kyle arrived at my apartment several hours later, looking more handsome than ever in a tailored black jacket I hadn’t seen before and a deep blue shirt that made his eyes radiate, I grabbed him and kissed him as passionately as I could without getting into exhibitionist territory.

  “So,” Kyle said when I let him come up for air, “we’re not going to Jordan’s party?”

  I allowed myself a glance at Adam, who sat on the couch in his new Marc Jacobs ensemble topped with a Simon Cowell scowl. “Interesting,” Adam said.

  “What?” Kyle asked.

  “Nothing,” I said quickly, shooting Adam the narrow-eyed frown that translates universally as, “Shut up. Now.”

  In the taxi on the way to the club, I wound up between the two men, holding myself in my own space so tightly that I could have cracked walnuts between my knees. I was experiencing serious eleventh-hour anxiety about my strategy, and I didn’t need Adam playing with my mind, heart, or any combination thereof, either by declaring his own feelings or by questioning Kyle’s. Was he doing it just to do it? Or because he really meant it? Or because he sensed I was closing in on his mother?

  The question was, would the pressure of the press, paparazzi and legit, swarming all over the front door of Pillow work its magic on Claire the way it already had on Gray? If I got up onstage in front of the party tonight and announced that I had the Hotel Tapes, would Claire be provoked enough by the ensuing hysteria to grab the spotlight back for herself and insist that she had them—and, by doing so, admit that she had killed Russell Elliott?

  I kept my eyes down as we walked the gauntlet of photographers to the front door of the club; I didn’t want to be accused later of playing to the crowds. Adam smiled and waved at everyone, and Kyle focused on the front door. This evening was the polar opposite of his idea of a good time, and my heart pounded with appreciation for all the things he was doing for me against his better judgment.

  But just short of the doors, I realized that the power of the press was that much more powerful when it was in your face. Asking Kyle and Adam to wait just a second, I backpedaled down the red carpet. “What are you doing?” Kyle asked, puzzled.

  When I stopped in front of the knot of photographers straining against their velvet ropes, it was Adam who yelled, a little tightly, “What the hell are you doing?”

  “Kenny?” I called, squinting into the nebula of flashes.

  Kenny popped to the front of the crowd like a bubble surfacing in a glass of soda. “Hey, Molly, gimme a smile.”

  “Don’t take my picture, just come inside,” I said, tossing my head in the direction of the front door.

  I’m not sure who liked the idea less, Kenny’s fellow photographers or Adam, but Kenny needed no persuading; he ducked under the rope with surprising agility as his compatriots screamed questions about the announcement, about Adam and Jordan, and one exceptionally catty question about who did my hair. Refraining from replying, I walked up the carpet with Kenny, pausing beside Adam and Kyle. Brow knotted, Kyle asked, “What’s going on?”

  “Not out here,” Adam hissed, casting a troubled look at Kenny. “But you better know what you’re doing, Molly.”

  “She’s using me and I’m fine with it,” Kenny said with a cheeriness in direct opposition to his sour demeanor. He hoisted his camera. “I’m proud to record the announcement.”

  “What announcement?” Adam asked.

  “Not out here,” Kyle said, herding us past the doorman and into the club.

  Pillow is an odd but intriguing space, dominated by the all-brass bar on one wall and the stage opposite it. The room is not that big, yet it’s decorated with huge, billowing, jewel-toned fabric drapes and cushioned panels on the walls, an outer ring of booths with heavily padded banquettes, and then clusters of “pillow pits” elsewhere in the room, where fashionable New Yorkers in outfits that easily crossed into four figures basically sat on the floor, pretending to be pashas or praetorians. At least when they got too drunk, they didn’t have far to fall.

  Onstage, Bonnie conferred with the stage manager and the light-board operator, her small hands swooping through the air as she described some effect. She was dressed simply, more low-key than I’d ever seen her, yet she caught your eye immediately. She was luminous—with pride or excitement, I couldn’t tell.

  As I scanned the room, looking for Olivia, Peter, Henry, Eileen, Risa, or any of the other people for whom I felt responsible, Tricia rushed up to us, dressed in a stunning silver Robert Rodriguez baby-doll and acting like a giddy newly-wed throwing her first party rather than a seasoned professional who did this sort of thing twice a week. “Isn’t this a fabulous Space? It’s going to be a memorable night!” She winked at me a little too extravagantly, but Adam didn’t notice. Kyle did, but his forehead was already furrowed as he examined the decor, so the furrows just deepened slightly.

  The presence of Kenny and his cameras in our group threw her for only a moment. “I trust you,” she said happily, patting me on the arm. “I also know where you live.”

  “So do I,” Kenny said happily.

  “No random snapping,” I warned him.

  “Got it. Announcement only.”

  “What’s this announcement?” Adam asked again.

  I didn’t have to figure out how to answer because Claire swooped down on us at that moment, smothering Adam with kisses. Wearing a black Max Mara suit that accentuated her long, slender frame, she looked equal parts businesswoman and assassin. Or maybe that was less her fashion choice and more my subconscious talking.

  “I’ve been so worried about you!” she said, not being all that discreet about checking if Kenny was immortalizing her maternal concern on film. It wasn’t until she’d given Kenny the once-over that she registered I was standing next to Adam.

  “Is this where you’ve been?” she asked him, her tone equating being in my company with wallowing in subterranean caverns rife with incurable viruses.

  “Mrs. Crowley, I just had fresh champagne delivered to your table,” Tricia said with the firm-handed cheeriness of a rehab counselor.

  Claire didn’t budge. “Things have been a little out of control, Mother,” Adam said, his voice heartbreakingly weary.

  “So you run off to hide with a woman who’s crazy enough to believe she has your father’s tapes?” Claire snapped. “Most of these people are here because she’s making some fraudulent announcement, not to listen to your half-brother’s new songs.”

  Kenny looked at me in surprise before Adam did. Adam turned to me slowly, as though reluctant to take his eyes off his mother, though I couldn’t be sure if that was motivated by distrust, habit, or both.

  “You’ve been talking to Gray Benedek,” I said, and Claire flinched enough for me to know I was right.

  “That’s the announcement? You have the tapes?” Adam asked with chilly incredulity. “How did you get them?”

  “One thing at a time,” I said, hating the fact that I was causing him pain, but sensing Claire wasn’t quite at the point of confessing yet.


  “They aren’t yours,” Adam said angrily, his hand shooting out to grab my arm.

  Before either he or I could react, Kyle was standing between us, catching Adam’s wrist in his hand. “Bad idea,” Kyle said quietly, but I wasn’t as sure as I wanted to be that he was talking to Adam and not to me.

  “You better be careful, Ms. Forrester, or I will wreck your world,” Claire said, her voice alarmingly even.

  “I’m sorry,” I said, leaning forward as though I were having trouble hearing her over the sounds of the party. “You’re going to rock my world?”

  Kyle pulled me back in one direction, and Tricia shepherded Claire off in the other. Adam hesitated a moment, then followed his mother. I spotted Gray installed in the booth just to the left of the stage, receiving guests as though it were his party and not Jordan’s. Claire shook off Tricia, took Adam’s arm, and went to join Gray.

  Kenny looked at me analytically. “Are you crazy?” he asked with no judgment.

  “Yes, she is,” Kyle said, not quite so judgment-free.

  “It’s a bogus announcement?” A wicked grin spread across Kenny’s face, and he checked his camera for readiness. “This is gonna be great.”

  Groping for a defense, I was saved by the arrival of Cassady, who ran up to us breathless, Aaron doing his best to keep up with her in the crowd. “Did we miss anything?”

  Kyle shook his head. “We’re just getting started. Hey, Aaron.”

  The men shook hands, and Kyle introduced Kenny to both of them as Tricia ran up from the other side of the room. She greeted Cassady and Aaron briefly, saying, “I think we need to get Molly off the floor. I saved a booth for us, you should come sit.”

  “I’m not sure I can,” Cassady said with a weird little trill in her voice.

  “Your dress isn’t that tight,” I said.

  “I’m just too excited.”

  “Why?” Tricia asked, yanking on her arm. “What happened?”

  Cassady quivered a little and rolled her eyes at herself. “You’re not going to believe this. I’m not sure I do.” And she raised her left hand to show us a magnificent marquise-cut diamond in a raised setting with emerald-cut baguettes on all four sides.