“So, it’s like something only dogs can hear?” I tried to lighten the moment.
He smiled. “Exactly.” He leaned in, kissing me, trying to make it all better.
This beautiful, secret music was a vampire perk. The emotions were what made the afterlife special, the reality of it was the curse. The feelings and emotions that had truly been worth dying for, giving up a real future for a never ending one. Even though I understood these things were meant for only a select few of us, how could I not want to share it with the world?
Everyone should feel like that sometime in their lives, even if it was just for a song.
I had to work up the courage to ask him my next question. “Have you ever considered leaving Immortal Dilemma? Going out on your own?”
Tristan now had his back against the shower stall, his arms around me loosely. He looked off into space, now clouded by steam from the hot, wasted water. He took a deep breath before saying anything. “I think about it all the time.”
“Then why don’t you do it?” I ran my finger down his chest. “Even as a side project.”
Now it was his turn to look like he was going to cry. “No one would come see just me.”
What? Where was the guy who laughed at Blade for kicking him out of the band, insisting he was the entire show? Now he was so afraid no one would come see him play his own music that he wouldn’t even try? My brain couldn’t make sense of it.
“Lots of people would go see just you.” I insisted, this was crazy. How could someone with no fear be this afraid of what people thought? He lifted his chin with my finger, turning his face to look at me. He actually looked frightened.
“Once, maybe.” He turned back away. “And then it would get horrible reviews.”
Now it started to make sense. “So you’d rather play a character in someone else’s show that gets horrible reviews than put yourself out there?”
“Pretty much.” He said it so easily, his words ripped me to shreds.
“Why won’t you let people see you? I mean, really see you?”
He chuckled, but he certainly didn’t find what I said funny, and tipped his head back towards the ceiling. All of this because I thought he sang beautifully.
I rose up on to my knees, so I could look down at him. “You let me in. And I couldn’t let you go.” I leaned in and kissed his cheek. He blinked slowly but otherwise didn’t react. “I can’t be the only one who would think that.”
He pulled me back into him so I landed on his lap. “Maybe you’re the only one I want to know that part of me.”
Resting my head on his shoulder, there was nothing else I could say. How could I argue with that?
There had to be some way to reinvigorate Immortal Dilemma without having to compete with that stupid sex tape. I couldn’t tell any difference in the size of the crowds or the level of enthusiasm in the last couple of weeks. To me, the mania remained at a fever pitch, it vibrated inside me during every show. Because of it, I couldn’t watch the band play every night. There was such a thing as feeling too good. It made me feel crazy.
Maybe that was why Tristan sought the fear and desperation of groupies when they realized what he actually was. No, I thought as I sat with my eyes closed so a makeup artist could get me ready for my big scene. Don’t justify his awful behavior for him.
Even as the day had arrived to film this episode, I still tried to figure out a way out of it.
“Is it okay if I talk to Callie while you work on her?” Denise, the producer who broke news of the tape to us, asked the makeup artist. I saw her reflection nodding in the mirror as Denise took a seat beside us.
“How are you doing?” Denise asked me as she settled in, flipping pages on a clipboard to find her Callie notes.
I smiled unconvincingly. “Great.”
“You don’t have to do anything you aren’t comfortable with.” Denise tried to look sympathetic, but I knew she didn’t really care. Was I a product, or a person to her? Did she understand what we really were?
“Well, then I guess I’ll get going.” I put my hands on either side of the barber’s chair. The makeup artist giggled at my reaction.
Denise rolled her eyes. “You have to film the scene. It’s the whole episode. But if you can’t go through with it, that will make for a more organic episode. Whatever happens, we’ll interview you about it afterwards and intersperse it into the scenes.”
Sure, put all my insecurities about myself and my relationship on tape. It would be organic, all right. I couldn’t even relax in the makeup chair, how was I ever going to be able to go through with this? I sighed and squirmed, painfully aware that if I didn’t sit still, I’d look like an even bigger fool.
“We don’t want you to actually have sex, Callie.” Denise continued. “We can’t show that on TV. We’re just planning on showing enough to get the point across.”
Could I control myself? I wasn’t an actress. Could I run right up to the edge of a cliff and stop to look over? Usually I just jumped without looking and then dealt with the bumps and bruises later.
“I’ll do my best,” I said, but slumped down in the chair and sulked as the makeup artist contoured my cheeks and neck. What, now I had a double chin? Her brush made its way into the opening of my robe, tickling between my breasts. Great, she was trying to make me look like I had bigger boobs. Good thing I wasn’t going to look like my usual hot mess self during this nightmare.
“That’s all we want.” Denise smiled. “Do you have any questions for me?”
Did I ever. How could I get out of this? Could I kill Blade on camera? Oh, God.
Tristan came in to the room, kissed the makeup artist on the cheek, me on the head, and then squeezed Denise’s shoulder. He sat down at the other end of the room so one of the hair people could start straightening his hair.
“On camera,” my voice was small as I asked my question, “will it be obvious that I’m a vampire? My family, they don’t know.”
Denise’s eyes widened and she looked down on her notes. “Do they know that Tristan is a vampire?”
Keisha did. I don’t know if she’d tell my mother the whole truth, or if anyone would believe her. “Some of them do.”
“You’ll have final approval over editing,” Denise tried to reassure me, but my heart sank. “We’re not doing this to make you look bad, Callie. We’re on your side, remember that. But we are trying to make money.” She squeezed my hand before she rose from the chair and went over to Tristan to go over his part of the scene.
I opened my robe as asked, and the makeup artist sprayed my shoulders, arms, and chest with airbrush makeup. I kept my little tube top on, it was flesh colored so in the right light, I’d probably look like I wasn’t wearing anything at all. Totally detached to what was happening to me at this point, I watched Tristan talk to Denise like it was on TV, and not just five chairs away. They laughed and joked. Business as usual.
Tristan didn’t mind everyone seeing this talent. He knew how good he was at this.
“You’re all set.” The woman smiled at me, standing between me and the mirror and cleaning brushes. I stood up, legs rubbery, and thanked her. I made my way out, walking by Tristan and Denise, to see if maybe the whole idea had been canned in the last three minutes.
Tristan caught me off guard and pulled me into his lap, laughing when I shrieked. “We’ll practice in the green room.” His teeth grazed my neck, probably scraping off a layer of makeup.
Mortified, I pulled myself away from him without saying anything and headed out of the makeup room. After I went to wardrobe and they gave me something tight and revealing I’d never in a million years be caught dead in to put on, I headed to the green room. It wasn’t even green, I don’t know why they called it that. I couldn’t go back to the apartment. It had been declared a hot set and was full of crew members, all ready to watch me have fake sex twenty or thirty times in a row.
Shivering or maybe just trembling with fear, I sat by myself in the windowless room and
went over the notes I’d been given about our scene. The producers assured me there was no script, just a suggestion of what they wanted to happen. Tristan and I were supposed to discover the sex tape, and react “accordingly and realistically.” Not a problem. Then we were supposed to figure out a way to put a stop to the tapes. Would a little manufactured, cable-friendly soft-core porn satisfy everyone’s appetite?
We just had to make out on camera. Or maybe get to second base. I wasn’t sure if I trusted myself to know where to draw the line, and I knew I couldn’t trust Tristan. He’d push the envelope and think it was hysterical. Was it his public display with me that night at Embrace what drove Blade over the edge? Had he not seen Tristan licking my stomach on a bar full of people, would he have been angry enough to incinerate Talis? Would he hate me as much as he did?
God. It was all so cyclical, swirling around me like a tornado.
Tristan joined me in the holding area, dressed like his rock star self in leather pants and a T-shirt. Of course he would get to keep his normal clothes on. Wasn’t he the one everyone wanted to see? Well, I could do something about that, even the playing field. Not like he cared, but it would make me feel better. “Relax, beautiful. This isn’t anything we haven’t done a thousand times.”
He must have read my mind. “I’m just not sure the answer is to fight fire with fire. Maybe we should do something else.”
Sprawled out on the couch, comfortable as ever, he shook his head. “The time for that has passed. All we can do now is keep it on our terms.”
I’d been on the show before, but always in the background, never playing a part. This felt so different. “Is it scary?” I asked. “Being out there, in front of all those people?”
“At first it’s terrifying.” He softened, not making fun of me anymore. “There’s no way around it. But once you get into it, you forget about the people around you. It just becomes your job.”
“I don’t want to make this my job.” I got up and repositioned myself against Tristan on the couch. He wrapped his arms around me loosely. “I have enough to worry about without trying to build a career in porn.”
Tristan laughed. “That would be the most effortless thing you could do.”
I turned against Tristan’s chest, not saying anything. Not because the world saw me as a gold digging whore, I couldn’t care less about that. It was Blade’s words that thundered in my brain. You don’t want the world to know you’re a lousy lay? Did he say that just to hurt me, or was being with me really that awful? I got it, he hated me. But why would he have done something he didn’t enjoy over and over again? Was sleeping with me like Tristan’s singing, something you could only appreciate when you were dead?
Even worse.
Maybe it was just in an effort to win his now never-ending pissing contest with Tristan. Whatever it was, it made me feel like a slab of meat, one that needed to have her boobs cosmetically enhanced to make anyone believe someone would want to make out with her.
We both jumped when someone knocked on the door. Denise poked her head in. “They’re calling for talent.”
Showtime.
No one said a word in the elevator. We entered our apartment, now a work zone, complete with the fully stocked snack table, and more people than I realized could fit in the living room. Lighting stands surrounded the couch and one camera pointed at it, another at the big screen TV.
My heart pounded against my ribcage. I clutched Tristan’s arm, wild-eyed.
“All nonessential crew off set!” Denise picked up on my fear and kicked out as many people as possible. “If you don’t need to be in here, go back to into the staging area.” Three quarters of the crew grumbled as they picked up their belongings and left.
A short man with a scruffy beard approached me. He looked familiar, but I’d never talked to him before. He held out his hand to me. “I’m Michael, the director.”
“Hi.” I could barely speak. This was going to worse than seeing the actual sex tape.
“Have you ever done this before, Callie?” What a loaded question.
I assumed he meant go in front of the camera. I shook my head.
“Okay, I’ll call action, and then let Tristan take the lead.” What a horrible idea that was. “And just react to what happens. I’ll call cut at the end of the scene, and we might want you to go back and do things again. We’ll make this as painless as possible, I promise.”
Impossible. I smiled at him anyway. I just wanted this to be done.
We were led in to the couch, like it wasn’t our couch, and placed on it, with me closer to the TV. They decided I should sit almost in Tristan’s lap, like we were just having a quiet night watching TV. You know, like everyone did, surrounded by a film crew.
After Michael called action, Tristan switched on the TV. He whispered an absolutely filthy joke in my ear and I burst out laughing. I melted against him a bit as he pulled me in tighter. I looked back at him, smiling down at me, and for a second I thought this wouldn’t be so bad.
Behind me, I heard a girl voice’s giggling and moaning. I narrowed my eyebrows, still looking at Tristan, whose eyes darkened as he looked over my head, towards the TV. His smile faded completely as the girl started crying out.
At first, I’d hoped maybe one of the crew members slipped and laughed when they weren’t supposed to. But these were professionals, I’d seen the payroll numbers, and they were paid well enough to keep their mouths shut when the cameras rolled. Slowly, I turned towards the TV, knowing full well that this was one of the sex tapes I did not star in.
I watched the redhead writhe against Tristan for a few moments before I realized I knew her. She threw her head back as Tristan buried his head between her massive breasts, then turned to the camera and smiled like she knew she was being filmed.
“That’s Amanda,” I gasped. My roommate Janelle’s former BFF. They probably still would be attached at the hip if Janelle was alive.
“Is it?” Tristan asked, with the same level of interest as if I’d just declared it was Thursday. I looked back at him, indignant, but he didn’t see me. He was too busy staring at the screen.
Before I could register what I was doing, I slapped him across the face. That got his attention. He looked down at me, not quite sure what to say. I pushed away from his body so hard the couch rocked back and forth on its legs. I could barely see, I was so furious.
Why, of all the Vultures willing to spread their legs for these guys, did they have to pick this tape? I can’t even imagine the satisfaction she must have felt, fucking my boyfriend after spending so much time insisting that I wasn’t his type.
At least Tristan knew my name.
“You’re so beautiful.” It was Tristan’s voice but he hadn’t said a word. It came from the TV. He had the audacity to call Amanda by my pet name.
I jumped up from the couch, as if Tristan’s body repelled me, then kicked the couch, sending it over onto its back with Tristan still on it. “How dare you?” I growled through clenched teeth, doing anything not to bare my fangs.
“You knew about this.” Tristan’s head popped up from the wreckage of the couch, looking ridiculous. “I told you. Fear. Desperation. That chick was desperate,” he said, pointing at the screen. “That’s what you can’t give me.”
My skin vibrated with anger. I wanted to storm off this stupid set, but I knew they’d just call me back and make me relive this nightmare. And where was I going to go? I lived here. No place to run, no place to hide.
“Among other things.” Amanda’s voice was no longer on TV. That slut was standing right in front of me. This had to be a joke. The most unfunny joke I’d ever heard.
“What the hell is going on?” I turned to Michael, ignoring Amanda. “Why is this whore in my house?”
“Your house.” Amanda snorted. “It’s Tristan’s house.”
“Cut.” Michael sounded annoyed. “Callie, you can’t talk to the crew while we’re shooting.”
“You really think you’re g
oing to tell me what to do right now when you spring this slut on me?” My hands were on my hips. I wanted to rip Michael’s throat out.
“I’m the director.” He sighed. “That’s what I do. Rolling?”
“No,” I interrupted. “Not rolling. Cut. Whatever the hell you people say that means stop.” I turned to Amanda and stomped my foot, like I planned to attack her. “Get the hell out of here!”
She fluffed her hair and tapped her foot in a nervous rhythm. She and her friends thought I was responsible for what happened to Janelle, so she had to have been a little nervous. There was no reason for her to know anything about Blade. “I’m being paid to be here. I’m sorry, Callie, if you can’t keep your boyfriend satisfied. Thank God Blade released those videos, now we all know we have a chance with Tristan again. All this lovey dovey stuff was getting so boring. We don’t go to the shows because the music is good. Sorry, Tristan, but it’s the truth.”
Blade’s plan had worked in spades. Who knew he was such a businessman? I walked over to Amanda, and pulled her head down by her hair so she was at my eye level. I hissed at her, knowing my eyes were as red as her hair and not giving a damn. Whimpering, she tried to pull away from me, but my hold was too strong. “Get away from me, you freak.”
“If you don’t get the hell out of here, I will rip you into tiny pieces and feed you to Blade myself, do you understand?”
Amanda’s whole body shook violently. I almost couldn’t register her nod. God, I hoped she didn’t pee herself. If she peed on my foot, it would send me right over the edge. If there was one person’s mind I had no interest digging around in, it would be Amanda. I would love nothing more than to suck the desperation and bitchiness right out of her, but I’d scare the hell out of everyone in this room when I let her body fall in a heap at my feet. How many of them knew what it really meant to be a vampire? I let go of her, sending her tumbling into one of the light stands. She scrambled backwards, taking a few seconds to collect herself before climbing back to her feet and running out of the room.
We Own the Night (The Night Songs Collection Book 3) Page 15
