Rock Star

by Jackie Collins

  Anna looked away. It offended her the way this woman was flirting with her husband.

  ‘Perhaps,’ Lady Elizabetta said casually, drawing smoke deeply into her lungs.

  ‘I’ve done a touch of investigating,’ Cyrus said, getting up and pacing around the room. ‘It seems that your son has gambled his inheritance away, and does not stand to gain another penny until you – please excuse me for saying this – pass away. Fortunately,’ he added, with a dry laugh, ‘you appear to be extremely healthy to me. ’

  ‘I am,’ Lady Elizabetta said. ‘Unfortunately for poor Eddie. Although I understand this girl he’s engaged to comes from a wealthy family. ’

  ‘I gather that is the main attraction. ’

  ‘Hmm, you seem to know all the answers, Lord Egerton. I wonder why our paths never crossed before?’

  ‘Well, you see,’ Cyrus said wryly, ‘when you were coming out as debutante of the year—’

  ‘Please don’t say what year,’ she interrupted, with a tightly controlled smile.

  ‘I wouldn’t dream of doing so,’ he replied, being charming, because Anna wanted him to settle this matter, and whatever Anna wanted he would do. ‘As I was saying,’ he continued. ‘When you were being honoured I was just a copy boy – running errands on Fleet Street. ’

  ‘How you’ve risen,’ Lady Elizabetta mocked, blowing a stream of smoke in his face.

  ‘It took me many years of hard work. ’

  ‘I’m sure it did. ’

  Anna rose from the couch. Let’s get to the point,’ she said forcefully.

  Cyrus glanced at her in surprise. It was unlike his darling Anna to assert herself. And then he realized she was jealous, and it pleased him, puffed him up.

  ‘The point is money,’ he said, taking an authoritative tone. ‘If Eddie is willing to marry our daughter, I will settle an immediate million-pound trust fund on their unborn baby. Plus I will give Eddie a worthwhile job, and a bonus payment of two hundred and fifty thousand pounds a year for the next five years.’

  ‘Generous,’ remarked Lady Elizabetta. ‘Your daughter must really love him. ’

  ‘She does,’ said Anna. ‘That’s the only reason he was able to take advantage of such a very young and innocent girl.’

  Lady Elizabetta raised a sardonic eyebrow. ‘We’re living in the seventies, Lady Egerton. I doubt if Eddie took advantage of anyone. From what I read about girls today, quite the reverse is probably true. ’

  A faint blush of anger suffused Anna’s pale cheeks. ‘Nonesense!’ she said vehemently.

  ‘Ladies,’ interrupted Cyrus. ‘Shall we get to the reason for this meeting? A marriage between our daughter and your son. Let us not waste any more time. Is it arrangeable or not?’

  * * *

  The wedding between Rafealla Le Serre Egerton and Eddie Mafair was a glittering social affair. Rafealla wore a stunning white satin Norman Hartnell wedding gown, and Eddie looked very handsome in his dark morning suit.

  The bride’s mother was clad in pale blue, and the groom’s mother favoured attention-getting scarlet.

  As bridesmaids, Odile and Fenella were pretty in pink. And Rupert was best man.

  The ceremony took place in church, and the reception was held in the ballroom of the Grosvenor House Hotel on Park Lane, where Eddie had booked a suite for their honeymoon night, before their flight to Acapulco the next day.

  Rafealla was incredibly nervous. She’d hardly spent any time with Eddie alone while the wedding was being hurriedly planned. Two dinners with her mother and stepfather present. Tea with Lady Elizabetta. And one lunch with Eddie at San Lorenzo, where he’d drunk too much wine and failed to tell her he loved her.

  Hardly the perfect beginning, but they had their whole lives ahead of them, and things could only get better.

  The wedding passed in a blur of faces. So many people, and only a few she knew. By the end of the day her cheeks were aching from smiling so much.

  Eddie behaved impeccably. He didn’t drink, and was polite to everyone. How handsome he looked in his morning suit. With a shiver of pleasure Rafealla knew she had made the right choice.

  * * *

  Eddie mumbled in his sleep, but didn’t wake. Fortunately. For Rafealla was too exhausted to deal with any, more of his vile behaviour tonight. She brushed her long hair and thought about their baby – Jonathan, or Jon Jon as everyone called him.

  Their baby . . . The only reason she and Eddie were together. The only reason she could never leave him.

  Soon Jonathan would be two years old. And he looked exactly like Kris Phoenix.

  Bobby Mondella

  1979

  ‘They want you for a cover on People. Do you realize what that means?’

  ‘The week in England is a sell-out. The tickets have only been on sale three hours.’

  ‘Can you make the July the fourth weekend in Washington? The President’s wife requested you personally.’

  Stardom.

  How sweet it is.

  Bobby Mondella lived in Los Angeles, in a Hancock Park mansion with eleven bedrooms, eleven matching bathrooms, several huge entertaining rooms, and a lush, landscaped garden.

  He lived alone, apart from six servants and two fierce Alsatians.

  Outside the house there was a dark green Rolls-Royce, a white Porsche, and a 1959 vintage pink Thunderbird.

  Whenever Rocket Fabrizzi was in town he stayed with Bobby. Rocket was also a star, a movie star. But since his divorce from the serious Roman Vanders, he shunned possessions, preferring to live out of a couple of suitcases and bed down in friends’ spare rooms.

  ‘Wadderya need all this garbage for?’ he often asked Bobby. ‘You’re not married. You have no kids. I don’t get it.’

  ‘Why not?’ Bobby replied. ‘I can afford it. I like havin’ stuff. It’s a kick.’

  Rocket shook his head. ‘I guess we’ve come a long way from Greenwich Village,’ he said, with a bitter twist of longing.

  ‘The further the better,’ Bobby responded sharply.

  Bobby Mondella, just as Marcus Citroen had predicted, was a superstar. He was Stevie Wonder with more sex appeal. Michael Jackson with balls. Teddy Pendergrass with a mainstream connection. He was that rare happening – a black star who crossed right on over to white America and was immediately accepted. In the two years since his debut concert at the Hollywood Bowl he’d had two smash albums, and seven hit singles culled from them – an unheard-of accomplishment, as most artists were lucky if they got one or two hits off an album.

  He’d received six Grammy awards. Another unheard-of achievement in such a short period of time.

  ‘You’re the greatest!’ everyone told him. It was a soothing mantra.

  Rocket never told him any such thing, and when he jokingly complained, his friend laughed. ‘I’ll cut a deal with ya,’ Rocket said easily. ‘You don’t buzz me ’bout bein’ the new Marlon, an’ I’ll never give ya any of that “you’re wonderful’’ crap. ’Cos, Bobby, ya gotta remember where we’re both comin’ from, an’ never – like I mean never — get caught up in the bullshit. It don’t mean nothin’, man, an’ it ain’t gonna last.’

  Once every six weeks, Nova Citroen flew into town. She and Marcus owned a Bel Air estate and had recently purchased a huge piece of property at the beach. Nova came in to meet with architects and designers. Marcus usually stayed in New York – he was not overly fond of Los Angeles.

  Nova had rented a small house in the Malibu colony under an assumed name. Having embarked on an affair with Bobby, she was quite strict about absolute secrecy. During her brief visits they usually got together for several hours of unadulterated lust. She was a very sensual woman, with extremely sophisticated sexual tastes. Bobby tried to discourage her overt kinkiness.

  ‘Wouldn’t you like to have me and another woman together?’ she often teased. ‘I can arrange it very easily, you know. Most men would kill for such an opportunity.’

  ‘No way,’ he replied. ‘You’re enough for
me.’

  Usually she smiled and called him her ‘suburban lover’.

  ‘Don’t you wish!’ he boasted jokingly. ‘I’m a star, baby. I can have any woman I want.’

  ‘Never forget,’ she said quietly, ‘Marcus makes stars, and he can break them. For instance—’ She paused meaningfully. ‘If he ever found out about us . . .’

  She never had to say any more than that.

  Sometimes he thought he was crazy for continuing the affair. But there was something about her that had him hooked. He needed Nova. This classy, rich woman with the hungry body and cool personality. And it was no longer a grudge fuck against Marcus. It was much more. She was so different from all the other women he’d had, the females who gathered around a star, anxious for any crumb of affection . . .

  When Nova wasn’t in town he forced himself to date other women. Currently he was seeing a bubble-blonde actress who couldn’t pronounce her ‘th’s properly, and was considered adorably cute. And a forty-year-old black feminist.

  Rocket was dating no one. ‘Sometimes I like t’save it, man,’ he explained, when Bobby tried to fix him up. ‘Y’know – put it all into a performance.’

  Privately Bobby thought Rocket still had a case on Sharleen. Well, he was too late. Sharleen had just announced her engagement to a well-known clothes designer in New York. Bobby wondered how Marcus Citroen felt about that. The rumour was that she and Marcus continued to be an unspoken item. Bobby had lost touch with her a long time ago. He’d realized life was too short to live it for someone else.

  Rocket wandered into the bedroom as Bobby finished dressing. They’d been invited to a party for the opening of Nichols Kline’s new discotheque in Beverly Hills, and neither could resist the temptation of seeing their former boss from the Chainsaw.

  Nichols had done very well for himself. He was the biggest concert promoter on the West Coast, and he’d started Nichols Hit City, his own extremely successful record company. Now he was opening Nichols as an ego trip.

  Bobby wore an immaculate white suit, while Rocket looked suitably scruffy in creased chinos and a workshirt.

  ‘The odd couple,’ Nichols said, greeting them both at the entrance of his new club with overly familiar hugs.

  Settling them at his own table, where there was champagne, caviar and plenty of pretty women on tap, he gripped Bobby by the arm. ‘I gotta talk to you, it’s important,’ he said, nose twitching with the smell of money. ‘Hear me out, Bobby baby, ’cos this’ll make us both billionaires. You can count on it, my man. Have I got a deal for you! Infuckin’ credible!’

  Kris Phoneix

  1979

  Doktor Head was a flamboyant character. In his mid-thirties, he was six feet four inches tall and portly, with wild, shoulder-length, flaming red hair, an out-of-control beard, permanently bloodshot eyes, and a crazed facial tic which gave one the impression that every few minutes he was winking obscenely.

  An American citizen, he had lived and worked in England for ten years, originally coming over with Nellie and the Knockers, an all-girl group whom he had managed for three rambunctious years. When Nellie decided to become a nun and the group disbanded, he’d taken over the career of Michael Hollywood, a young solo artist. Under Doktor Head’s management, Michael Hollywood became very big very quickly – and for several years the unlikely combination of the laid-back young singer and his outrageous manager flourished.

  Michael Hollywood was killed in a plane crash in 1974, at the peak of his career. Doktor Head never forgave himself for not being on the plane. He went on a four-year rampage of drugs and booze, and when he walked into the audition hall for The Wild Ones, with his new discovery – a female keyboard player whom he’d named Fingers – he’d been straight for exactly five weeks.

  Kris, grabbing a can of Coca-Cola from a machine in the back, noticed the odd duo first. Thinking that Doktor Head was the one preparing, to audition, he figured he’d do him a favour and tell him to forget it.

  ‘Hello, mate,’ he said casually.

  Doktor Head fixed him with alarmingly bloodshot eyes. ‘Where can I take a piss?’ he demanded.

  Kris was tired. It had been a long day, and not one of the people who’d auditioned were up to par. ‘I dunno,’ he said irritably.

  ‘In that case,’ Doktor Head replied grandly, with an un-preventable wink, ‘I’ll give this plant the gift of life.’ And with that, he unzipped, and proceeded to deliver a steady stream of urine to a wilting fern in a large clay pot.

  Fingers, a tomboyish American girl in faded blue jeans and a sweatshirt, yawned. She had obviously witnessed Doktor Head’s eccentricities before.

  ‘Go ahead,’ Kris said sarcastically. ‘Take a slash wherever y’want. Don’t mind me.’

  ‘Thank you,’ Doktor Head replied, zipping up with a satisfied expression.

  ‘Listen – I may as well tell you now,’ Kris continued. ‘Don’t bother to stick around for the audition. You’re too old, an’ even if you’re the greatest keyboard player in the world, y’aint got the look we need.’

  ‘I’m so glad you told me that,’ Doktor Head said gravely.

  ‘Yeah, well, at least y’got a piss outta it!’ Kris joked, and wandered back to the others, who were busily watching an acned youth do a major kill on ‘Dirty Miss Mary’.

  Half an hour later Fingers jumped up on the stage ready to show them what she could do. She sat down at the piano and immediately began to rock and roll.

  ‘Hold it!’ Buzz yelled. ‘What the frig – it’s a bleedin’ girl, ennit?’

  Mr Terence came to life. When Buzz spoke, he jumped. ‘We’re not auditioning females, dear,’ he said tartly.

  Fingers made a rude gesture and began to play the hell out of ‘Skinny Little Slider’.

  Her talent was formidable – a fact Mr Terence ignored. ‘Enough!’ he shouted, going red in the face. ‘We don’t have time to waste. Get out of here.’

  ‘Wait a minute, hold on,’ Kris began. ‘She’s good—’

  ‘Leave it out,’ sneered Buzz. ‘That’s all we need – a fuckin’ girl.’

  Kris hadn’t really thought about it, but why not – if she was sensational?

  Doktor Head strolled into the picture, waving his arms in the air. ‘If you want her you’ll have to act fast,’ he said with studied authority. ‘She doesn’t come cheap, but she’ll be worth it to you.’

  ‘Who the hell are you?’ demanded Mr Terence, bristling because he sensed competition.

  ‘Her manager,’ Doktor Head replied, gesturing for Fingers to cease her frantic pounding. Fixing Kris with bloodshot eyes he handed him his business card. ‘Call me,’ he said. ‘Soon.’

  They auditioned for another three days, and not one applicant sparked any excitement. Kris kept on thinking of Fingers, with her tomboyish looks and fast talent. He got the lowdown on Doktor Head, and was impressed with his background. Michael Hollywood and Nellie and the Knockers had both been big at one time.

  Without telling the others he called Doktor Head, who calmly informed him he’d changed his mind. The Wild Ones were not the right group for Fingers.

  Kris was perplexed. ‘Are you crazy?’ he asked in amazement.

  ‘So I’ve been told,’ replied Doktor Head. ‘But then crazy is merely a state of mind, isn’t it?’

  They met for a drink in a Hampstead pub. Kris got plastered, while Doktor Head drank only warm milk, which stuck disconcertingly to his beard. He gave a long discourse on the pursuit of real stardom in the rock world, and the perils of booze and drugs in general. ‘I survived the sixties,’ he noted with satisfaction. ‘A lot of people in rock ’n’ roll didn’t.’ He then proceeded to relate the story of how he had acquired the name Doktor Head. It seemed that at one time he was famous for giving young ladies haircuts, specializing in a certain part of their lower anatomy. ‘Wonderful days,’ he sighed reverently. ‘Ah . . . the sixties . . .’

  ‘So what’s Fingers gonna do?’ Kris asked, avoiding eye contact with the barmaid,
who wanted more than an autograph.

  ‘There’s a new group – The Mission. I’m thinking of managing them. If I do, Fingers will join them. She’s only eighteen, you know. She has a big future.’

  Laughing disbelievingly, Kris said, ‘So like there’s this unknown new group, an’ you reckon she’ll have a better future with them? Come on, man – where are you at? We’re friggin’ huge.’

  ‘In England.’

  ‘An’ Germany.’

  ‘Holland too, no doubt.’

  ‘Yeah, an’ bleedin’ Finland, an’ Denmark.’

  ‘Congratulations,’ Doktor Head said dryly. ‘And if you stay with Terry Terence, that’s about as far as you’ll go. You should have conquered America years ago.’

  Kris swigged his beer. ‘Tell me about it,’ he said glumly. ‘America ain’t that easy.’

  ‘Especially when you’ve got a manager who sells you short.’

  ‘What?’

  ‘Terry Terence fucked you over.’

  ‘No way. He’s always done his best for us.’

  ‘Really?’

  ‘Yeah.’

  ‘Remember “Lonesome Morning’’?’

  ‘How could I ever forget it. Our first recording.’

  ‘And a big hit for Del Delgardo.’

  Kris grimaced. ‘Distribution. He had it. We didn’t.’

  ‘Not at all. Your great manager sold out on you. The American record company didn’t want your version on the market. A deal was made. You got shafted.’

  Kris felt the anger begin to build. ‘How do you know?’

  ‘Everyone in the industry knew. Ask around. Ask your producer at the time – what was his name? Sam something?’

  ‘Yeah. Sam Rozelle.’

  ‘That’s right. Call him. He’ll tell you the truth. He wasn’t happy about it, I can assure you.’

  When the pub closed, they went back to Kris’s house, and talked until four in the morning.

  The next day Kris went to see Sam Rozelle and learned the truth for himself. Terry Terence had sold them out on what could have been their first big hit. ‘He just didn’t have enough faith in you,’ Sam said, too embarrassed to look Kris in the eye. ‘When Marcus Citroen said jump, he did so. I’m sure he regrets it now.’