by Cecilia Tan
“Goofballs,” I said, and took it.
“Group hug!” Chino declared as he hopped to his feet, and they must’ve all been feeling as goofy as they looked because they did it. Even Mal, who is not the touchy-feely type. Mal is the broody Dracula type.
Chino was also the one who punched me on the arm. “Sakura told us you skipped out on the rest of the ceremony because you were convinced we were going to lose.”
“Yeah, well.” I shrugged. “I’ve never been happier to be wrong. And you know, Ricki had to get back here to get ready for the party, so I had the limo take us directly here.” Hey, that was almost the truth, too. “Be grateful: she added all of you to the guest list.”
“I know! This is one of the hardest parties to get into, apparently. We went first to the Capitol party, and our A&R rep was like don’t stick around here, get your asses up to the Governor’s Mansion!” He looked around like he was impressed.
After that things were a blur of people congratulating me and introducing themselves. I’ve never been good with names so I usually forgot them before they walked away. Perhaps one of the best things about becoming famous is people no longer seemed to expect me to remember, though.
Christina, when I finally saw her, hugged me so hard I thought she was going to snap my neck. “Ahhh, you crazy bastard, that was perfect! Terrible! But perfect!”
We moved a little ways away from the table laden with hors d’oeuvres. “I think it worked out all right,” I said, assuming she meant my little stunt with making off with the Hamilton heiress.
“Yes. But how about warn me before you do something like that next time? My phone is blowing up! Every reporter in Hollywood is trying to get a statement.”
“You want me to talk to them?”
“No! No no no. The more you keep quiet the more desperate they’ll be. If they’re still calling like crazy in twenty-four hours, then we’ll strategize a response.” She pulled her phone out and looked at it, then shoved it back into the tiny clutch purse that it barely fit into.
“I can’t tell if you hope they will be or won’t be.”
“Well, if they’ve forgotten about it by tomorrow, that’s bad. On the other hand if the reason they haven’t is because they want to run you out of town with pitchforks, that would also be bad.”
“Okay … And what would be good, then?”
“Good would be they’re in a frenzy over the idea that there might be something going on with you and her!” She elbowed me. Chris was not subtle.
My stomach sank. I didn’t see any way that could be good for my prospects of getting something real going with the aforementioned heiress, given how gun shy she was about anyone knowing. I tried to smile, though.
“She’s okay with it, right?” Christina asked, eyeing me closely.
“She didn’t banish me from the party, anyway.”
“Oh. Is she mad at you?”
Well, that was true enough. “A bit miffed, yeah.”
“You want me to talk to her?” She craned her neck, looking around for our hostess.
“No! No, it’s fine, Chris, really. She knows it was … just a publicity stunt. She’s busy. Don’t bother her.”
“If you’re sure. Who’s her publicist? I should check in with them.”
“I don’t think she has a publicist.”
“What? What famous Hollywood person doesn’t have a publicist?” She clucked her tongue. “Maybe I should give her my card …”
That was about as much private conversation as I got. What I really wanted, of course, was to happen upon Ricki and, you know, make the magic apology that would make it all okay, or luckily find out that she was feeling less bitter and angry. It was excruciating knowing that the woman I couldn’t get out of my mind was somewhere right nearby—but given how she’d banished me from her presence, I was pretty sure that if she had laser beams for eyes I would be crispy-fried on the spot. Would it be bad form to kidnap her twice in one night? It gnawed at me that she wasn’t glued to my hip where she belonged. I know, I know, in what universe did a peon like me own a princess like her? But that was how it felt, like she should have been there to receive the congratulations with me, like she was already a part of me.
Like she was mine.
I tried not to show it, of course. Winning a Grammy shouldn’t be taken for granted. But I couldn’t help but feel that although I’d gained something amazing and unexpected that night, I’d also lost something. I’d had Ricki in my grasp and then she had slipped away.
I told myself I’d get another chance, though. I had to. Right now the best strategy was to let her cool down. We both had public faces to put on. We both had obligations to meet.
So I hid my frustration and palled around with my bandmates, being the carefree playboy they were used to.
“Group photo, group photo!” Christina said, trying to get us together in front of a fountain outside in the courtyard. This mansion was fancier than the fanciest hotel we’d ever stayed in. We lined up dutifully, each holding a Grammy. “Oh, so boring! You guys, do something more interesting.”
Chino is always the one with the off-the-wall ideas. “Human pyramid! Hey, Sun-Lee, come get in the picture, too!”
The K-Pop star we’d met that night came over. “What is a human pyramid?”
“You know, like this.” Chino got down on all fours, and gestured to me to do the same.
“C’mon, Mal, you, too,” I said.
“This looks less than dignified,” Mal said skeptically. “Surely Christina wouldn’t—”
“Get in, get in!” Chris said, shooing him toward us.
So Mal got down on his hands and knees also, and Ford and Samson got on top of us, and then Sun-Lee climbed on top. And then Chris balanced a Grammy on each of our heads like a hat. Which took some doing. Those things are heavy. But when you’ve had enough champagne anything is possible, I guess.
A little later Chino instigated an impromptu dance party by the swimming pool and I decided that was a good time to go looking for a restroom. Last I saw of him he was on the diving board, dancing between two women I didn’t recognize. Dirty dancing. That’s quite the feat with multiple partners, you know. Especially on narrow, bouncy fiberglass a few feet over water. Chino was a risk-taker, though. That’s why me and Mal got on so well with him.
Inside the house it was quiet. A staff member pointed me to a restroom immediately, giving me no chance to “accidentally” run into Ricki in the kitchen or somewhere. I’d have to figure out some other way of reaching her.
I was making my way toward the parlor again when I came across the grand piano. The foyer was two stories high, dominated by a huge chandelier and a sweeping spiral staircase that curved around the piano from a landing up above. Paintings of her ancestors lined the wall up the staircase like some kind of royalty. I think we played nightclubs smaller than that foyer when we were getting started. Curiosity got the better of me and I discovered the piano was in working order.
I’m not much of a pianist. Samson, our keyboard player, openly laughs at me when I try to play anything serious. But at one point when I was a scrawny, pimple-faced kid and my family was doing a stint in a small military town, there was a piano in the chorus room at school, and I used to go in there to avoid the bullies and the idiots and play. My mother had made sure I had formal piano lessons whenever we could get them, up until I was about fourteen, when I started playing the guitar.
My fingers still remembered what they could do. And once I started to play and sing, I didn’t have to talk to anyone. I didn’t have to remember anyone’s name. I didn’t have to wonder whether what I was saying was going to be good or bad for my career. And I didn’t have to pretend I wasn’t scanning the partygoers constantly for Ricki’s face. A crowd quickly gathered.
I would’ve loved to play one of our songs, like “Everybody Wants, Everybody Needs,” but I didn’t know it on piano. Instead I played what I knew—what had stayed in my fingers from when I was a kid—mostly
pop songs and oldies I had learned. I improvised a little at first, feeling my way through the chords, but this thing happens in music, where your muscle-memory takes over and your voice almost feels like it’s coming out on its own. When that starts to happen, it’s like my entire body vibrates like a guitar string. From deep in my gut where hunger and lust reside comes this sound: my voice. Maybe that’s why my voice draws people to me. They sense it. Like the pack knows on some primal level to listen when they hear that howl.
One thing that had probably been true for decades and was definitely still true: the Beatles are a surefire hit. After a couple of songs where I sang by myself, I started in on The Beatles and, voila! Instant sing-a-long. Now everyone’s voices were raised together, and that was another experience, a kind of magic to have total strangers come together and raise their voices with me.
I don’t know how long I played. I played anything I could remember. For a while Mal sat down on the bench next to me and sang, too. He’s got a much deeper voice than mine. I wasn’t even really paying attention to the people around us, only in the sense that they were a crowd and they were singing along. I was caught up in the music and in performance and letting it all flow, almost as if it were someone else’s hands and not my own hitting the piano keys.
And then the bubble burst. I ground to a halt with a laugh and said, “That’s all folks! That was every song I know!” I stood on the bench to take my bows as they showered me with laughter and applause. Ah yes, that is me, a jester, a traveling jongleur, here for your amusement. So glad to be of service.
That was much better than shaking hands with people in suits and diamonds. It would have been the perfect cap to the night had I not glanced up from my bows to see Ricki, poised at the top of the spiral stairs, looking down at me with an air of disapproval.
She was alone. I saw her shake her head and start to descend.
I excused myself quickly from the crowd, hoping I might be able to intercept her this time.
* * *
RICKI
My feet were killing me and my head hurt from trying to remember the names of all the people I was supposed to know, and it wasn’t even midnight.
You know what I should have done? After I’d made a round of greeting and glad-handing, I should have taken myself back to my room straightaway with a mug of cocoa and hidden for the rest of the night. Once Gwen had emerged—which she did, looking more radiant than any of the starlets there—I should have handed off the hostess duties to her and fled.
But I didn’t. I kept hoping maybe I could pick up my interrupted conversation with Meyers. I tried to keep tabs on the catering.
And I kept circling past Axel Hawke. I confess. I wanted to see if he would put the moves on Sun-Lee. Or even Sakura. If he did, I thought, that would give me all the ire I needed to burn the idea of him out of my mind, proving the “playboy” thing was real. So it was confusingly disappointing when, from what I could tell, Axel Hawke was a perfect gentleman to everyone around him. Including Gwen, who I introduced to one of the other band members and who took her over to meet the others. He didn’t even take her hand, just nodded and half-bowed, and then I lost track of watching him while his manager caught up with me. Thank goodness she agreed with me that the “just a publicity stunt” angle was the best and she thanked me for playing along. Ha.
I both dreaded and couldn’t wait to hear what Gwen had to say about the night’s events. That would definitely have to wait until tomorrow.
It wasn’t difficult to keep an eye on Axel. He wasn’t the type to fade into the background. I hadn’t expected him to actually play the piano, though. I’m not sure why: he was a singer, why wouldn’t he play an instrument also? I guess in my head I was trying to pretend he was nothing but a talentless attention whore: Hollywood has plenty of those. But no, he could really sing. I watched as those hands danced and tickled and pounded the keys, by turns creative and gentle and forceful, exactly like he was during sex. With every word he sang I felt like I could hear the echo in my ear of the way it would sound if he growled it just for me, his body pressing mine down … Damn him. He was expressive and captivating and, and … maddening. I watched him from the top of the stairs and reminded myself not to grind my teeth.
I don’t think anyone had touched that piano since my mother died, other than the tuner the staff brought in once in a while. I certainly couldn’t remember anyone playing it.
This was not the time to be thinking about my mother.
Axel’s impromptu concert broke up and I was about to flee to my room, when I caught sight of Meyers near the front door, waiting for his wife’s coat to be brought to her. Helena Meyers was in her mid- to late forties and was going gray, proudly, it seemed, since she hadn’t dyed it. Her glossy black pageboy had a few prominent streaks and she had crow’s feet starting at the corners of her eyes when she smiled. She had been a political journalist and always seemed like she’d be interesting to talk to, although I had never really gotten much of a chance. I swooped in for one last schmooze opportunity with Meyers.
“Helena, so glad to see you. I missed you earlier,” I said, clasping her hand.
“You, too, Ricki. So nice you’re working with David now. I hope we can have you ’round to the house for dinner some evening.”
My smile was genuine. “I’d like that very much. Thank you.” Apparently Helena Meyers was as interested in getting to know me as much as I hoped to know her. And that would be a much better time to cozy up to her husband, businesswise, as well. I relaxed a little. One step at a time, Ricki, I reminded myself. What was it Grandpa Cy used to say? You have to walk before you can fly. “How about in a few weeks?” That would give me a little more time to get my feet under me at Blue Star.
“That’d be lovely. Wouldn’t it, David?”
“Surely.” He took his wife’s wrap from Jamison and draped it over her shoulders himself, giving her an adoring peck on the cheek.
As they went out the door, Jamison turned to me, then looked at someone behind me. I startled to find Axel standing there.
So much for him not blending into the crowd. The sight of him so close to me gave me a jolt, all the longing that listening to him sing had brought out surging suddenly to make my throat far too tight and my legs far too wobbly.
“Ricki,” he said quickly. “I just wanted you to know—”
I slammed the lid on my raging hormones as hard as I could and went into highly formal ice queen mode. “Mr. Hawke. How nice to see you again.”
His jaw clicked shut and he gave a small nod of acquiescence. He cleared his throat, his eyes flicking to Jamison, who was standing at my back like a lieutenant. What he said, although it sounded polite to anyone who might have been listening, of course, was full of erotic charge. “Ms. Hamilton.”
Oh, damn it, why did I prompt him to call me that? His purr went straight between my already unsteady legs. But while my mind raced for something to say that wouldn’t betray to him how I was feeling, we were interrupted by the sound of loud laughter—too loud—as my father and Grant emerged into the foyer from the hallway. Where was security?
Axel ignored them. “I wanted to express, um, my gratitude for the excellent time I’ve had tonight. Truly a night to remember.”
I bet. “Congratulations again on the rare achievement.” Anyone listening might think we were talking about the party, the award. My father leaned heavily on Grant. I tried not to look at them, instead glancing back at Jamison, who moved to intercept them.
Leaving Axel and me alone. He didn’t change his tone, though, keeping it formal. “You’ve been an excellent hostess, and I apologize sincerely if I’ve overstepped my bounds as a guest.” He waved in the direction of the piano, but I knew that wasn’t what he was talking about. “I truly, truly intended no trespass.”
He bowed, one hand over his heart, as corny as could be. Then he took my hand and kissed it like a courtier.
Even the touch of his lips against the backs of my fingers w
as perfect, soft and teasing and sensual without being too wet or too firm … Just that tiny touch, his agate eyes looking up at me from under his lashes, and I was spiraling down into fantasyland, into wishful thinking, into impossible ideas of being kidnapped all over again.
Damn it, damn it, damn it, how did he know the effect he had on me? It was terribly unfair. Why did he have to be so perfect when I couldn’t have him? I pulled my hand back quickly. “Thank you for coming,” I said, keeping a straight face. “Good night.”
That was as much of a dismissal as I could make it. He took it as one, nodding his head again and heading for the door.
How? How could one little touch flood me with such desire? How could that one brush of his lips on my hand affect me like … like … Nothing had ever affected me like that before, actually.
But it wasn’t just one little touch, I thought. It’s his voice and his eyes and the things I know he could do to me and …
And I had no time to think about it because the next crisis was presenting itself. “Ricki!” Grant called, as he and Jamison appeared to be lowering my father to the floor. Grant looked a mess. His bow tie was undone, trailing down his lapels, his hair tousled and shirt unbuttoned in a way that could have been kind of sexy but just looked ridiculous on him.
Jamison was already speaking to security through his earpiece. When he looked up at me, though, and I saw the worry on his face, I suddenly knew this was more serious than merely my father being drunk. I hurried closer as he began to convulse, his chest heaving. Grant tried to hold him down, hands pressing down on my father’s shoulders.
Idiot! I had no time for an argument. I kicked Grant aside, literally, shouting, “Turn him over! Turn him over!” as Reeve came running down the hallway and Jamison and I struggled to get my father facedown so he wouldn’t choke on his own vomit.
Yes, it was quite the party to remember.
CHAPTER SIX