Westside Series Box Set

by Monica Alexander

  Girl Almighty – One Direction

  Smile Like You Mean It – The Killers

  Take Your Time – Sam Hunt

  Red Lights – Tiesto

  Different Colors – WALK THE MOON

  Bleeding Out – Imagine Dragons

  Sleepsong – Bastille

  Alive – Augustana

  Here We Go – Alex & Sierra

  I Know Places – Taylor Swift

  Beating Heart – Ellie Goulding

  You and Me – You+Me

  Burning in the Skies – Linkin Park

  Heartbeat Song – Kelly Clarkson

  Sooner or Later – Mat Kearney

  Get It Right – Oh Honey

  Behind Closed Doors – Rise Against

  Haunt (Demo) – Bastille

  Ready to Run – One Direction

  Photograph – Ed Sheeran

  Somebody to You – The Vamps, feat. Demi Lovato

  Safe – The Airborne Toxic Event

  Faint – Linkin Park

  Kiss Me – Ed Sheeran

  Arizona – Kings of Leon

  Into the Fire – Thirteen Senses

  A Deep Slow Panic – AFI

  Like a River Runs – Bleachers

  Wonderland – Taylor Swift

  BURN IT DOWN – Linkin Park

  A Beginning Song – The Decembrists

  In Bright Fire – Stars of Track and Field

  Eclipse (All Yours) – Metric

  Lost Chances

  By Monica Alexander

  Copyright 2015 by Monica Alexander

  ISBN: 978-1-3105-5092-8

  Cover Image: (c) Roman Seliutin / www.shutterstock.com Stock Photography

  This story is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents are either products of the author’s imagination or used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual events, locales, or personals, living or dead, is entirely coincidental.

  All Rights Reserved

  No part of this publication can be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, without permission in writing from the author.

  The information in this book is distributed as an “as is” basis, without warranty. Although every precaution has been taken in the preparation of this work, neither the author nor the publisher shall have any liability to any person or entity with respect to any loss or damage caused or alleged to be caused directly or indirectly by the information contained in this book.

  This ebook is licensed for your personal enjoyment only. This ebook may not be re-sold or given away to other people. If you would like to share this book with another person, please purchase an additional copy for each recipient. Thank you for respecting the hard work of this author.

  Chapter One

  Elisa

  I couldn’t believe I’d taken this assignment. In fact, I’d mentally turned it down about nine times in my head, rehearsing the different ways I could let Katherine Baker, the CEO of the PR agency I’d worked at for five years, know that I wasn’t interested in her generous offer, her once in a lifetime opportunity, the offer my PR friends would have all killed for. I told myself I was turning it down. And I was turning it down for one reason – Van Salvatore.

  Which in my mind was a perfectly legitimate reason. He was someone who’d hurt me, and because of that, I wanted nothing to do with him.

  Of course I hadn’t always felt that way. Once upon a time, I’d been a naïve girl who’d fallen for the sexy, brooding, seemingly shy and sweet musician. And I’d fallen hard – even though we hadn’t even dated exclusively. He was a guy who’d gotten under my skin from from the first day I’d met him, and back then I’d wanted to be with him regardless of the terms.

  I also knew being exclusive was a somewhat ridiculous notion given the worlds we lived in. Van was a member of Westside, an up-and-coming boy band that was traveling non-stop as they tried to gain fans and make a name for themselves. I was on tour with Sydney Chase, working on her promotions team, which meant I was rarely in the same city for more than a day. Our lives were crazy.

  But Van was a guy I’d been instantly attracted to, and I couldn’t seem to stay away from him. We were friends for a year, and then one hot night turned into more. Before I knew it I was doing whatever I could to meet up with him when our schedules happened to collide. It wasn’t often, but we said we’d be together when we were in the same city, and I took full advantage of that promise. Then I tried not to think about the fact that when we weren’t in the same city we had the freedom to see other people.

  I hated that part of our relationship, because as a rule I’d always detested the concept of dating someone and still seeing other people. But I knew Van, and I knew he’d never be able to give me more than that. He didn’t do monogamy, and I spent our whole relationship trying to be okay with that – until one day, when out of the blue, he said he wanted me to be his girlfriend.

  I was completely shocked when he’d so unexpectedly said the one sentence I never thought I’d hear uttered from his lips. Because of that, I’d hesitated, and I didn’t answer him right away. Maybe it was my gut telling me to take pause because I had a sixth sense that I needed to listen to, or maybe I just knew Van that well, but as much as I wanted to say yes, I just couldn’t. So I told him I’d think about it. Then he slept with someone else and broke my heart.

  Two years had passed since the night he’d hurt me like no one else ever had, and it had been just as long since I’d seen or heard from him. I’d never been able to hate him, but he also wasn’t someone I ever wanted to see again. That was why when Katherine had asked me to head up the promotions team for Westside’s upcoming tour, I knew I had to say no. Spending seven months in close proximity to Van sounded like a hell I had no desire to experience.

  But then I took a deep breath and realized that saying no would be like committing career suicide. Being asked to head up the promotions team for a band like Westside when they were as hot as they were and only getting hotter was the most sincere form of flattery that I could have asked for when I was only three years out of college. It was huge.

  Until then, I’d exclusively worked on Sydney’s team. And although she was a ridiculously successful pop star in her own right, I’d been with her from the beginning, first as an intern for two summers, then as a member of her promotions team, and most recently as the head of promotions. I knew Syd’s format and fans like the back of my hand. I was comfortable with her and her team, and since loyalty was something she valued most, she didn’t like to change the people she worked with unless she had to. The job was easy, and it was comfortable.

  But I also loved a challenge. Working for Westside would be different in so many ways, and ultimately it would be a testament to how good I really was at my job. It was going to stretch me in ways I hadn’t yet experienced, and under any other circumstances, saying yes would have been a no-brainer. But adding Van into the mix brought the whole concept to a completely different level, and I felt the confidence I’d mastered over the years start to falter.

  That was when Katherine had called me into her office and told me why she wanted me on the Westside team. She didn’t do things like that very often, and I knew she also didn’t assign just anyone to their team.

  Westside was her baby. She’d signed on to represent them at the beginning, back when they were a budding boy band hoping to make it, and she was incredibly invested in their success. In fact, they were the only client she served directly.

  As I’d sat in her office, nervously chewing my bottom lip, she listed all the reasons she thought I would be perfect for the team, and I felt the word ‘yes’ on the tip of my tongue. The only thing that prevented me from blurting it out was knowing that working for Westside meant seeing Van, and seeing Van meant admitting that he’d hurt me. It also meant admitting that I still wasn’t over what happened between us. I was over him. There was no doubt in my mind that I’d gotten over him long ago, but I wasn’t sure I could ever forgiv
e him for what he did.

  Aside from the fact that I just plain didn’t want to see him and be reminded of what it felt like to have my heart ripped out of my chest and stomped on, I was concerned that I wouldn’t be able to separate what he did and represent him the way I knew I should. And that wasn’t fair. Of course I’d never tell Katherine that.

  As far as she knew, my history with Van was gone and forgotten, so far in the past that it was insignificant. I’d never tell her that seeing his face on the cover of a magazine still made my blood boil or that I didn’t like to watch award shows because I didn’t want to have to see him perform. That was all way too personal, and Katherine didn’t do personal. She was calm, collected, and professional at all times, and I wished I could have been just like her. With any other client, I would have been, but with Van there would always be this lingering hatred over what he’d done.

  I knew that if I hadn’t been able to get past it in two years, I likely wasn’t going to be able to ever get over it at all, and that was something I was just going to have to accept. I wanted the job more than anything, but I had to be okay with the fact that it was going to be awkward and uncomfortable. I was going to see Van daily, I’d have to talk to him, and I’d have to be nice to him. I was going to have to figure out how to swallow my pride, because the job was too big for me to screw up because I was feeling bad about myself.

  With all that in mind, I asked Katherine for a few days to think about my decision. During that time, I pretty much thought about it non-stop. I talked to Laurie, Sydney’s publicist, who was also my current boss. We’d worked together for long enough that she knew my history with Van. She knew that this was a bigger deal than just accepting a position, but in the same breath, she told me to take the job. She said Westside needed someone like me. They needed someone with passion and drive and organization, but above all else, they needed someone who would work relentlessly for them. That was why she’d recommended me to Katherine.

  It was hard to say no after hearing that.

  When I talked to Syd about it, she flat out told me to take the job. She let me know that in no uncertain terms could I let a guy like Van control any part of my life. I was good at what I did, and I deserved this opportunity. Then she told me, with her prize-winning grin, that if I were to take the job, I was only on loan to Westside. She expected me to be with her the following summer when she was back on tour to promote her new album that was due out in November, right around the time the Westside tour would be wrapping up.

  I let her know there was no question that I’d be back with her as soon as she needed me. In fact, Katherine had told me that the Westside job was temporary, that they needed the extra help during the tour, and after that I’d be free to go back to working for Sydney. That was one of the reasons I was leaning toward saying yes. A commitment of seven months felt a lot better than one with an unknown end date.

  So after three days of non-stop deliberating, I came to a few conclusions. One, I had always considered myself a consummate professional. Two, my career was always important to me, so the last thing I wanted to do was stall it in any way. Three, I’d be insane to turn down an offer like that. And four, Syd was right. Van Salvatore didn’t get to own any part of my life. He’d already hurt me. He didn’t get anything else.

  So I took the job and signed a contract that said I would be committed to Westside for the duration of their tour. My hand was shaking the whole time as I tried to block out the fact that in a short period of time, I was going to be face-to-face with Van for the first time in two years. I figured that would be scariest part. The first time would be the worst, and then it would get easier – or at least I hoped it would.

  I told myself I wouldn’t let him get to me. At the end of the day, he was just another member of the band that I was going to work for. I couldn’t give him any more consideration than that, because if I did, I would give him power. I wasn’t going to do that. Van Salvatore was just a boy. He was a boy I dated and a boy I probably loved, but that was all in the past. In the present, he didn’t matter. The job was what mattered. My career was what mattered. The tour mattered. Everything else was just details.

  That was the pep talk I gave myself before I took a deep breath and swiped my keycard to enter the fifth floor. It was the floor where we brought our most exclusive clients, so I wasn’t unaccustomed to meetings in the lavish conference room with sweeping views of downtown L.A. and the surrounding areas. I’d been there countless times for meetings with Sydney, but that small fact didn’t calm my nerves at all. I knew today was different. It was bigger and more intense, and I was so nervous that I thought vomiting might be a very real possibility if I didn’t keep my emotions in check.

  It would be better if I didn’t have to speak, but I wasn’t going to get that lucky. Since I’d taken the job a month earlier, I’d worked round the clock to fix the mess that Jeremy, the previous head of promotions, had left. And when I say mess, I mean a huge, sloppy, stinking mess. Looking at what he’d left behind for the first time, I hadn’t been surprised that he’d gotten fired. Even though he’d had months to get everything in order for the tour, all he had to show for his work was a subpar promotions plan that would have failed spectacularly if it was put into action, because almost all the details were missing.

  Fortunately for me, I’d always been good at details. I was meticulous and diligent, and I didn’t let things slip through the cracks. That was why Katherine had hired me. It was also what got me through the mental mindfuck I’d been experiencing every time I saw Van’s name on a piece of paper. I could do the job. I was good at what I did, and Westside, needed me.

  So my social life had gone away, sleep had followed it, and I’d put everything I had into my work. I’d spent countless hours with the four other people who were a part of the PR team that would travel with Westside during the tour. When it was all said and done, we’d put together a killer plan that would give the band the exposure they wanted and align with the two product launches they had planned for the summer – a Westside fragrance, and an interactive Westside singing game, similar to Rock Band.

  It was more work than I’d ever done in such a short amount of time, but in the end, I was proud of what we’d accomplished. Better than that, I’d impressed Brent, the publicist who traveled with Westside and who would, for all intents and purposes, be my boss for the next seven months. When Katherine told me how happy she was with the work my team had done, I considered it a victory.

  The last step was to present everything to the band, which I knew was just a formality. Damon, their manager, and every other person who needed to weigh in on the specifics of the promotions strategy, had already done so. The guys could share their thoughts or concerns if they had any, but in my experience, nothing would really change after this meeting. The tour started in a week, so any changes we could make would be minimal.

  But I still had to be present and on my game. Katherine was leading the charge, and Brent was going through the details of the product launches, but I was presenting the logistical aspects of what we wanted to accomplish and how, from a promotional standpoint. I was going to be front and center, and Van’s eyes would be on me.

  With my hand on the conference room door, I told myself I was okay with that. I was a professional, dammit.

  Chapter Two

  Van

  I was mid-bite into the donut I’d snagged from the platter in the middle of the table when she walked in and time seemed to stand still. It had been almost two years since I’d laid eyes on Elisa Donovan, and suddenly she was there, all blond and tan and sexy as hell, and I almost swallowed my tongue.

  “Are you going to eat that or just hold onto it?” my bandmate Cam asked me, leaning into my personal space.

  I pulled the donut away from my mouth and set it on the plate in front of me. I suddenly wasn’t so hungry. I swallowed hard as I watched Elisa take the seat next to Katherine, wondering what the hell she was doing there.

  “Is
that Elisa?” Phillip, one of my other bandmates, and my best friend, asked from my other side, lowering his voice so only I could hear him.

  I nodded slowly. “Yeah. It is,” I said, my voice sounding hoarse and disconnected, like someone else was saying the words.

  “That’s awkward. What’s she doing here?” Phillip asked.

  I shook my head as I watched Elisa laughing and talking with our publicist, Brent. She still hadn’t made eye contact with me. I knew that because I hadn’t taken my eyes off her since she’d walked in.

  “No clue,” I told Phillip.

  I knew Elisa worked for Katherine’s agency. When I’d met her she’d been doing PR for Sydney Chase, and we were represented by the same agency, but I assumed Elisa worked solely for Sydney. Because of that she was pretty much the last person I’d expected to see today.

  “Okay, everyone,” our manager Damon said loudly, silencing the conversations that were taking place around the table. “I think we’re ready to get started. Katherine, I’ll defer to you and your team.”

  “Thank you, Damon,” Katherine said, opening the iPad in front of her. “I’ll start with the promotional events we’ve layered throughout the tour, and then I’ll let Brent tell you about the merchandising partnerships and sponsorships we’ve lined up throughout the summer, including the fragrance and video game launches. Finally, I’ll let Elisa Donovan, the newest member of the Westside team, who I think most of you already know, wrap us up with how this will all be orchestrated while you boys are on the road.”

  I swallowed hard, not sure what to say. Elisa was working for us? Was she seriously on our PR team now? What the hell was going on?

  Thankfully I didn’t need to say anything, which was fine by me, since I wasn’t sure anything I said in that moment would sound witty or even coherent. Katherine had started speaking, but I was barely listening as my mind drifted back to the last time I’d seen Elisa. It had been a few years, but I remembered everything so clearly. She’d been in tears and was pissed at me, and she’d told me to go fuck myself.