by Amber Lin
Without a word she climbed under the covers, careful to lie on her uninked side.
He tucked her in. “I’m going to order room service. You’ll feel better after you eat something. Any requests?”
“Get me a cupcake, candy boy. One with lots of icing. Mountains of it. And champagne.”
Her over-bright tone struck him as ominous. “What are we celebrating?”
“Independence Day.”
Chapter Fourteen
Maddy woke up feeling lighter than ever. Lighter than air.
Then she heard voices. Worried whispers just outside the door. She hopped out of bed and winced at the tightening of her skin. It came to her—the tattoo. The trouble. Independence Day.
The hotel bedroom was dark and the door was shut. Krist must have tucked her in. He’d let her sleep away the afternoon, and it struck her as the sweetest thing anyone had done for her. That was him outside. How could she recognize a whisper? But she did. He had barricaded the door against whoever had come to wake her, her own personal dragon. Except this princess didn’t want to leave the tower.
“Ward is blowing up my phone,” came an urgent whisper. Paige?
“I don’t understand,” Krist said. “What’s the fucking problem?”
No, he wouldn’t understand. Not unless she explained it. She hadn’t planned on doing that, not ever, but the tidal wave was about to crash over them. The least she could do was warn him.
Maddy opened the door to find Krist and Paige looking at her, concerned expressions on both their faces. So very different from the expressions they’d worn that night, both curious and aroused, both eager to please.
“Section thirty-four,” she said, feeling more tired than when she’d laid down.
Krist frowned. “What?”
“Artist shall keep Label apprised of all activities, on a consistent and continual basis, through digital and phone communication, in intervals not to exceed three hours.” At Krist’s blank look, she explained. “I went off the grid this morning. No phone calls, no texts. They didn’t know where I was.”
“And that’s…in your contract?” he asked, incredulous. “That you have to check in with them like you’re a goddamn teenager?”
“I am a goddamn teenager,” she reminded him. Nineteen going on thirty.
“Maybe so,” he growled. “But they aren’t your parents.”
“No, they’re my business partners. Or domineering overlords. It depends on your perspective, really.”
“And Alex Ward let you sign this thing?”
“That was before her. I had a small-town contracts lawyer eager to get his percentage. By the time I signed with Ward, I was already locked into this.” She hadn’t understood the ramifications when she was fourteen years old and desperate to get out of her mother’s house. And even if she had understood, she would still have taken the deal. Back then, escape had been more than a desire—she’d needed to get out of there.
Just like she needed it now. She’d hopped from under one thumb to another, but it would never be enough. It would never be okay until she was free to go and do and be whatever she wanted.
Krist was pacing, looking adorably rumpled and confused. “Well, Ward knows where you are now, right?” He turned to Paige. “You texted her, and now she knows. Crisis fucking averted.”
Paige bit her lip, not meeting Maddy’s eyes. “I’m sorry.”
Maddy’s heart clenched. “Don’t be. I knew what I was doing.”
“Does someone want to explain this to me?” Krist demanded.
“I told her where you guys were,” Paige said, sounding far too worried. “I told them what you did.”
She didn’t have to stress. No one would shoot the messenger.
Maddy wouldn’t let them. “When Ward shows up, I’ll talk to her.”
Paige checked her phone. “She’s on her way.”
“Go down to the lobby,” Krist said. “Distract her. We need a minute up here.”
After a beat, Paige nodded. She still looked torn as she left the suite.
Krist tugged her hand until she sat on the couch. He pulled up an overstuffed armchair until it was right across from her. Her hand felt cold against his, and only then did she realize how clammy she was, almost shaking. Anticipation. Excitement. Fear?
It was how she felt the day of a huge performance, knowing this one trip could make or break everything she’d worked for.
“Is this about the tattoo?” he asked. “Look, if you regret it… Shit, I’m sorry. I should have made you wait.”
“I don’t regret it.” She placed a hand on his arm. He was built beautifully with sinewy muscle and warm skin a few shades darker than her own. He’d enhanced that beauty with the colorful shades of ink.
And now she was marked the same way, by the same hand. A part of him was hers now, and she could never regret that. The only thing she regretted was involving him in the shit storm about to happen. But she’d take full responsibility.
“You should know there’ll be some drama about this,” she said. “But it’s my drama. Not yours. It’s not going to affect you…or the engagement thing.”
His gaze was wary. “Drama?”
“It’ll happen just like we planned. Sooner even. We’ll do the breakup tomorrow, that way you won’t even have to be around for the fallout.”
“Fucking hell, Maddy, I’m not worried about the breakup. Or any of the PR bullshit. I want to know what you’re talking about. I want to know what the hell you meant when you said Independence Day.” He was glaring at her, looking fierce and tender at once, looking like he cared about what happened to her. When had that started?
Only then did she notice the room service cart loaded down with silver domes and a bucket of ice and champagne. Were there cupcakes on those plates? She bet there were. He hadn’t even understood why she wanted them, but he’d gotten them anyway.
She had to speak past the lump in her throat. “Section twenty-four, clause A is what this is about. No tattoos. No scarification. No piercings that haven’t been preapproved. Hair colors need to be submitted seven business days in advance—”
“No. Fucking. Way.” The disbelief in his eyes was hardest to take.
Her hands turned into fists. Her eyes clenched shut. “Look, I know you got a raw deal with the press. I know they’ll never accept you totally if you’re gay. They barely acknowledge that people can be bi. It’s stupid and it sucks. I had sympathy for you the moment I saw that tape, because I knew. I knew exactly what it’s like.”
“Because you’re bi too,” he said softly.
“It’s not just that. I have an entire lifetime of people telling me I’m wrong. That what I’m wearing is wrong and how I’m acting is wrong. The fans, the press. Even the label. I have a contract dictating my every move, a noose so tight sometimes I swear I can’t breathe.”
“Then break it,” he burst out. “Find a loophole, do what you have to do to get out of the contract. You’re Madeline fucking Fox, you don’t need that label to be a star. You covered the damn Beatles, and there wasn’t a dry eye in the house. You pack amphitheaters. You’ve got your own brand. Your own goddamn empire. So screw them. Break the contract and walk the fuck away.”
He was breathing hard by the time he was finished. Maddy heard his breath, but she didn’t see his nostrils flaring. Didn’t see his eyes, dark and angry and caring. She couldn’t even look at him, not when he’d hit so close to home. “You watched me?”
“Fuck yeah, I watched you at The Trib. I don’t know how I missed it the first time, but I’ve watched it twenty times since then. More than that” He laughed, a little self-deprecating. “I can’t stop watching you, Maddy.”
The seconds spun out into minutes, and there was only the sound of her heart beating against her eardrums, heavy with warning.
“Shit,” he said, his voice thick.
And she knew he’d figured it out. She didn’t have to confess her sins. After all, they were written on her skin, wrap
ped up in antibiotic goo and bandages.
“You did it on purpose,” he said. “You did all of it on purpose. The tattoo…the partying…the sex…you did it all to get out of the contract, didn’t you?”
She shook her head, though it wasn’t a refusal. It couldn’t be. Not when he spoke the truth. “I don’t just want out of the contract. I want out. Of everything. I’m done.”
There was a pause, his shock saturating the air. “No. This is what you do. It’s who you are. You can’t just walk away from it all.”
“Why not?” she asked, keeping her voice light. As if it didn’t matter. “You said yourself I can’t sing for shit. I’m not doing anything valuable here. Anything good.”
“Maddy.” He ran a hand through his hair. “Fuck, Maddy. I was wrong.”
Her breath hitched in her chest. She didn’t know whether he meant it, but it hardly mattered. Her plans had been set in motion long before he’d shown up on the set of her music video. And they’d been inevitable long before that, when she’d been a desperate fourteen-year-old signing on the dotted line. “I can’t see any other way.”
He looked like he was going to say more, leaning forward, eyes earnest—
The mechanical sound of the lock drew her gaze to the door. It opened. There stood a pissed-off Ward and a worried Paige.
Maddy stood. “Let’s get this party started.”
“Please tell me this is a joke,” Ward said.
Maddy raised a shoulder in a half shrug. “Why, is it funny?”
Ward glared at her. “Everyone out.”
Paige hurried out of the room. Krist started to follow…except he didn’t. Instead he stepped in front of her. Protecting her? Her dragon again, covered in colorful scales.
“It was my fault,” he said. “So you can just tell the label. Tell the press that. Tell everyone, I don’t give a shit. I’m a bad influence. No one will be surprised.”
Maddy was surprised. Surprised that he was letting the blame fall to him. Surprised that he would care.
Ward raised an eyebrow. “Are you finished?”
“Hardly,” he bit out. “What the fuck kind of contract dictates what people can do like that? What they can wear. Where they can go. It’s supposed to be a business partnership, not a fucking life sentence.”
“You and I can have a long discussion about the unfairness of this industry…later. For now, I’d like to speak to my client. Alone.”
Krist started to speak again, started to argue, but Maddy put her hand on his arm. “Hey. It’s okay. I have to do this.”
“It’s bullshit,” he muttered, fierce and protective. God, he was sexy like this.
She managed a small smile. “Bullshit is a language I speak. Fluently. Now get out of here before Ward has a stroke.”
His eyes searched hers, for what she didn’t know. But he seemed to find it. “I’ll be in the bedroom,” he said with a small nod.
Then there was only Ward and herself in the room. Only silence and the lingering regret she’d tried to quash. The people who depended on her for their income, people like Ward, would suffer—but Maddy wouldn’t do things differently if she could rewind the clock.
“Are you proud of yourself?” Ward asked.
Relieved, maybe. It hurt to dismantle what she’d built. But it had felt so damn good. “So what if I am?”
A shake of her head. “Did you even stop and think about the ramifications?”
“Give me a little credit. I’ve thought of nothing but the ramifications.”
“Then how could you do that? Maybe for someone else we could chalk it up to a small rebellion. But you’re already at the end of their rope. They’re fed up, ready to cut you loose.”
“About damn time.”
Ward’s gaze sharpened. “I knew it. You wanted out of that contract.”
“I didn’t make that a secret, Ward. I told you, again and again. I want out. I need out.”
Her words seemed to ring in the minutes that followed. Ward slowly rounded the couch and sat down, her movements slow and stiff. How old was she, anyway? Ward had always seemed invincible to her, like a force of nature, but now she looked brittle. Tired. Neither of them got much rest.
Maddy sat across from her in the armchair that Krist had used. She sat just like him, almost holding hands. And it meant the same thing. It meant caring and confronting. It meant giving a shit about what the other person was going through.
“I’m sorry,” she said finally. “I know this will mess things up for you. Maybe burn some bridges. I didn’t want it to affect you.”
“I told you I’d try to negotiate out the check-ins.”
“That’s not enough,” Maddy said.
They both knew the check-ins would likely get reduced when she turned twenty. But not eliminated. She had signed a contract with horrible terms when she was fourteen. That was common enough for people breaking into the biz. But hers went a step further. Due to the phrasing of the renewal section, the contract could be extended almost indefinitely.
And had been, again and again. With no real option for renegotiation.
Because Ward was a shark, she’d managed to get them to budge on royalty numbers, bringing her up to industry standards. Maddy made up the difference with endorsements, side appearances, and merchandising. Yeah, she had enough money now that she could produce her own albums if she wanted to. She didn’t need a label, but she had them. She was good and stuck with them, because she didn’t have any leverage to get out. All she had to use was her body, to use in ways they didn’t like, to use as a weapon.
“Not even close to enough.”
Ward shook her head. “How long have we worked together?”
Since she was fifteen. “Four years.”
“Four years, and each one a whole century in this business. I watched you grow up from a girl into a woman.”
“I was already a woman when you signed me. I was dancing in front of ten thousand people in nothing but body paint.”
“I put a stop to that,” Ward said sharply.
Yeah, she had. She’d insisted they develop a wholesome image. The girl next door. She was still sexy, but no more stars-and-stripes bikini, no more riding a mechanical bull for the Fourth of July. Maddy had always assumed Ward had developed the image to sell more records, but she wondered if now there hadn’t been some other reason. Like maybe she’d seen how much Maddy had hated it. Maybe she’d seen how it was warping her.
“And now they want me less wild,” Maddy said. “So which is it?”
“You’re older now. They’d like to mature your image, show you settling down.”
“I’m nineteen.”
“Melody is the same age as you,” Ward said, referring to another actress from KidMania. “She’s married to that DJ, with a baby on the way. You know you age differently in this job.”
Oh yeah, she knew all about that. Years of her life had blinked away, leaving her feeling raw and much older than her actual age. It was dizzying.
“Too late,” Maddy said softly. “I’m already the wild one. No going back.”
The agent gave her a level look. “I’m not even sure you enjoy all that partying. I think you just do it to be contrary.”
“So what if I do? I’m not even sure the label wants to be more mature now. I think they just want to control me. I’m tugging on my leash, and that’s what bothers them.”
Ward sighed. “You keep pushing them to cancel your contract. What are you going to do when they do?”
She meant did Maddy want a new contract, with another label. The rules of that contract wouldn’t be as severe. She was older now. Wilder. But there would still be rules. People telling her how to dress and act. Like she was a doll they could move around and have tea parties with. What had Krist said in bed? Paige and I aren’t dolls. You can’t dance us around the bed and make us kiss.
He had been right. They weren’t dolls, and neither was she.
“I’m done. Done singing, dancing. The whole
bit.”
Ward didn’t appear surprised. “You’ve put a lot of thought into this.”
“God, Ward.”
“No, don’t look at me like that. I don’t buy into the bimbo act, that’s not what I’m saying. But I had wondered…if maybe Krist was part of this. If there wasn’t some truth to what he said before he left.”
She paused, wondering if it was true. Not that he had forced her to do the tattoo. Wondering if she’d finally taken the leap because he’d been there to catch her.
“He’s not a bad influence,” she said finally.
Ward’s voice was softer than she’d ever heard it. “But Madeline…there’s a problem with your plan.”
Dread settled in her gut. “They let Adrianna go because she shacked up in the Playboy Mansion. And Neko was just partying a lot when she got bumped. I’m like them.”
“You’re not like them. You’re better than them, and the label knows that. They know what you earn, and how much potential you have to keep earning. You’re right, by the way. It’s not what you’re doing that bothers them, it’s that they don’t control it. They’re not going to let you go.”
*
Krist might have left the room, but he wasn’t really leaving the conversation. He knew the industry was fucked. He knew kids got screwed with shitty terms all the time. He’d never imagined that an institution like Madeline Fox could have such an invasive, gum-ball contract. Maybe Maddy’s first lawyer couldn’t negotiate pink M&M’s onto a tour rider, but Alex Ward filed her nails on the backs of greedy executives. If Ward couldn’t get her out…?
He stretched on the bed and strained to hear Maddy through the door. “It’s over. I wanted to find a way to keep working, but I don’t even care anymore. They can sue me for breech. The fans can hate me. I’ll disappear until the contract runs out.” His lips twitched into a half smile. Good girl.
“You’re committed to three more albums, with options, and you don’t have to sign for it to renew. You have to actively pursue dissolution and show cause. I tried to do it for you last time, but they own your name. The name that you merchandise and monetize. They get ten percent of that too.”