A Matter of When

by Eden Winters

  “You really don’t look too good. Is there someone I should call?”

  Henri barked a humorless laugh. “No one gives a shit. Trust me.”

  The man grabbed Henri’s wrist and raised his other arm to his face to better see his watch.

  “What are you, a doctor?”

  “I’m studying nursing. And your pulse is slow. Your breathing is shallow too. I think I should call somebody.”

  “No, really. I’m fine.” Henri snuggled more firmly into his human pillow. Hell, physical contact was physical contact. He would take what he could get.

  Something loosened in his chest, and he closed his eyes, imagining a lover’s attention, someone who cared about Henry the man, and not Henri, the rich rock star. He conjured up his own bedtime story: they’d met at a party, fallen in love, shared a house, a life. They’d gone out to dinner, made love, and were now settling in for the night. In the morning they’d…. Well, there wouldn’t be a morning for him and Nameless Guy, would there? Nameless Guy would be gone; Henri would wake alone, like he did every morning, even those mornings when he woke to find his bed filled to capacity with naked bodies.

  A tear slipped beneath his eyelid, blazing a hot trail down his cheek. The aching inside flared anew, his heart bursting into a million crystalline shards.

  The guard lay stiffly on the bed and wrapped an arm around Henri. Fingers stroked his forehead, brushing hair out of his face. Well, he’d be damned. One lucky woman had landed this guy.

  But holy hell, was it hot in here or what? His stomach rolled. Oh shit. How much had he drunk again? He glanced around the room. Where the hell was he? On the third try he managed to hoist himself out of bed. Where was the bathroom?

  “Sir, are you all right?” came from behind him.

  Sir? Who the fuck had he brought home? Henri’s stomach lurched again. Why wouldn’t his damned legs hold him? “Oh fuck!” The floor rose up to meet him.

  Two

  Marguerite hovered over the bed in Henri’s hotel room, hands on her hips. “How could you do something so stupid? Think of someone other than yourself for a change! I had to call in a lot of favors to cover up your stupidity. We had to cancel shows because of you. Do you have any idea how much money we lost? How much promoters lost? How many tickets we had to refund? This little fiasco cost us—” Whah, whah, whah, whah.

  Henri tuned out her droning. Any nosey paparazzi lounging in the hallway were getting an earful. “It’s All About the Money” played in Henri’s head, a song he’d written for his manager. She’d been flattered. She hadn’t realized the unflattering double entendres hidden within the words.

  He rolled his gaze up to the ceiling. Yeah, thank God for the small favor of Marguerite keeping his name out of the papers, though not for the reasons she believed. If word of his overdose got out, he wouldn’t be considered legally competent to make certain arrangements without her knowledge, as he’d done in the scant few moments she’d allowed him alone since he’d woken up in the hospital a week ago.

  “What the hell were you thinking? An overdose? Mixing drugs and alcohol? Being found drugged out in bed by a security guard? Do you have any idea what would happen to your career if a reporter found out?”

  “What would happen to your career?” not “what would happen to you?” And “stupidity”? The nerve of her.

  No need to point out that if the guard in question hadn’t been aspiring for better things, i.e. a nursing degree, Henri wouldn’t have a career to worry about. Of all the temporary employees in LA (were they in LA, or was this still Anaheim?) Henri had lucked out to OD in the presence of a trained first responder. And what better way for a creative type to come out of the closet to his fans than to end his life with a man in his room? What a way to go!

  Only, the whole dying thing wasn’t on the agenda.

  “It was an accident. I’m telling you someone put something in my drink.” He’d taken his meds. He hadn’t drunk, except for the one Jack and Ginger foisted on him by the fan who wouldn’t take no for an answer.

  As usual, his manager had dressed herself based on TV’s idea of cutting-edge chic—maybe twenty years ago. The model he’d dated last spring had pursed her surgically enhanced lips and sneered at Marguerite’s lack of fashion savvy. And yet Marguerite had rallied to the woman’s defense the moment Henri cut ties. She’s good for your career! she’d said then. In the here and now, Marguerite huffed, “You can’t do anything right without my help, can you?”

  Apparently not went unsaid.

  Another woman’s much calmer voice cut in. “Margo.”

  “Don’t call me that!” the woman who’d dubbed herself “Marguerite” hissed.

  The most recent shrink in Henri’s life persisted. “Given that he’s recovering from a near-fatal mix of drugs and alcohol, yelling at him isn’t in his best interest.” The woman who’d been standing quietly by the door made her presence known.

  Henri gazed with new eyes at the latest in a long string of head doctors. With her short gray haircut and trim, no-nonsense suit, she could teach Marguerite a thing or two about appearing professional. Had he found an ally? She’d seemed so impartial during their daily counseling sessions, though she’d originally raised Henri’s hackles by being an old friend of Marguerite’s. Perhaps she’d been listening after all.

  But Marguerite wouldn’t keep anyone around who didn’t mindlessly echo her own shallow thoughts. How many hours had Henri spent perusing his contract, trying to find a loophole to end her hold over him? But no, if nothing else, his manager had locked on a cast-iron shackle, only to be terminated, like everything else, when she gave the word, and not a moment before. However, her temper ran hot. If he played his cards right….

  He’d never realized until a few day ago how easy it’d be to block her access to his finances and other aspects of his life. Nearly dying gave a man a new perspective, apparently. Even now, the locks and security codes on his three homes were being changed, and he’d removed her name from any accounts. Phase I of the “Free Henri” project neared completion. Now for Phase II.

  Not giving a damn anymore about what she might do lent him audacity, and a possible backer in the room added a boost of courage. “Sit down, Margo,” he barked.

  Midtap of spiked heeled pumps across the floor, Marguerite whirled, righteous indignation twisting her face into a mask of fury. Her blood-red lips formed an O of outrage. Henri beat her to the punch. “Sit the fuck down! I’m your client, dammit, and for once, you’re gonna listen to me!”

  The color drained from the woman’s face, and her furious gaze darted around the room, seeking help. The doctor, appearing smugly satisfied, nodded at Henri. “You’d better do as he says, Margo.”

  Henri hadn’t met this doctor before his overdose, but once he managed to break free of his current manager, he’d keep the counselor—manager’s old friend or not—because she obviously did her own thinking.

  Margo sank onto the bedside chair, crimson talons gripping the padded rests. She had to wriggle in her skirt suit to sit. Years ago she’d watched soap operas to learn how to dress “rich,” never realizing that her outdated styles didn’t paint the successful business image she aimed for. Good thing she’d developed deafness to the snickers behind her back. Why did she insist on trying to be someone she wasn’t?

  The small spark of independence living inside Henri, fanned to life by really good drugs and desperation, crowed. “Since I have your attention, we need to talk. There’s going to be some changes.”

  “Changes?” Margo snarled. “Before you get high and mighty on me, you’d better realize who’s responsible for you even having a career.”

  Oh, hell no, she didn’t go there. “You’d shoot the horse you rode in on? You may have gotten me where I am, but it’s me who makes the money. Without me, you’d be waiting tables at IHOP.”

  “Why you ungrateful little—”

  “No!” Henri held up a quelling hand, something he would never have done before he’d
gotten a new lease on life. He’d taken his existence for granted before—never again.

  Something about being held—and nearly losing the possibility of it ever happening again—had given him hope. He’d have love and respect for himself one day, for real this time, but to get there, he’d have to correct a few wrong things in his world. “It’s my turn to talk.” He sneaked a glance at the doctor, who winked, then slowly released a pent-up breath. Best not to push too far now. He’d already pressed further than he’d ever dared before.

  Dressed in silken pajamas he’d never have picked out for himself, he extracted a sheath of papers from the end table drawer, delivered via courier while Margo had been out for a spa appointment. He donned a pair of glasses she’d forbidden him to wear in public, lest he tarnish his image, and proceeded to read aloud through a list. “Fifty-six thousand for a new car for my father. What’s wrong with the one I bought him last year?”

  “It was last year’s. You want to keep your reputation up as being generous to your family, don’t you?”

  Henri clenched his teeth, biting back an angry retort asking why his father hadn’t been to visit him since he’d woken up disoriented in a hospital emergency room. Instead, he growled, “And what about the $8,000 for my kid sister’s boob job?”

  “She is an aspiring model, and she….”

  “She just turned seventeen. She doesn’t need a damned boob job.” Sweet little Jenni, hair in pigtails at age ten. He shuddered. “You’re planning to push her like you did me, aren’t you? You’re gonna dress her in skimpy clothes and show her body in magazines to make a buck.”

  “She’s a model, not a prostitute. And she won’t have the surgery until after her birthday.”

  Only because Margo couldn’t find someone to operate on a seventeen-year-old, most likely. Henri wanted to wipe the smirk off the woman’s face. “Yeah, but does she want to be a model? Last I heard she wanted to study medicine and believed magazine ads exploited women. I don’t mind paying for college. Or did you even consider what she, or I, wanted?” Bad enough he’d given up his late teen years to tour the country and support his family. They weren’t poor anymore. Jenni deserved to be a teenager before being catapulted headfirst into adulthood.

  “Henri, I….”

  “It’s Henry, dammit! I’m named after my great-great-uncle, and while you may now be ashamed of him, I’m not! Finding out he was a riverboat gambler and not a captain was the coolest thing ever.” Oh how Margo had hung her head in shame the day a tabloid went digging and discovered the original Henry Lafontaine’s true vocation of card shark instead of riverboat captain. He’d died by noose on the banks of the Mississippi for his sins. All her hard promoting of the namesake turned to dust in her hands. She’d changed Henry’s name to “Henri” and herself to “Marguerite,” promoting ties to prominent Cajun ancestors who’d probably turn them away if they showed up on the doorstep.

  The truth of his Creole ancestry showed in Henri’s wavy dark hair, nearly black eyes, and bronze skin. He’d spent his whole life being called black by promoters who wanted him to rap and white by promoters who couldn’t accept a dark-skinned lead singer for an otherwise all-white band. Stuck in the middle somewhere.

  However, in Henri’s opinion, being named after the family prodigal only endeared him to his teen and twentysomething fan base. “As of today, if you want money from me, you have to ask. And I’m going to talk to Jenni. If she still wants med school, I’ll pay for that, but I won’t pay for you to force her into a life she doesn’t want.”

  “Your father…,” Margo began.

  “My father can damned well pay for his own boob job, if he wants one! Not a cent, not one more cent, is going to a man who can’t be bothered to talk to me once in a while. If he wants family privileges, he’d better damned well start acting like family.” What was the use? Nobody cared. No one even saw Henri as a person anymore. He’d become a commodity, a moneymaker. Nothing more.

  Voice honed to the low threatening purr designed to back Henri down, she who’d controlled his life for far too damned long declared, “You forget who you’re talking to.”

  Henri trumped her hostility and raised the stakes. “No, I haven’t… Mom!”

  There’d been a time when Henri had gone to school and then come home to nibble grilled cheese sandwiches while doing his homework. Mom had rushed home every afternoon to be there when the wheels of his skateboard sounded a scratch and a whir in the driveway, the scent of coffee and pancake syrup clinging to her clothing as she gave him a hug.

  The woman standing in his hotel room bore little resemblance to the mother of his memories. And though he’d inherited her long nose and pointed chin, he bore little other resemblance to the tall bleach-blonde who’d become a stranger. He’d lost her, though she still lived, vastly distorted from the memory in his heart.

  From the first time she’d cheered him on at a local talent competition to now, she’d changed with each new triumph. She’d been a working mother before, she and Henri’s father struggling to make ends meet. A tailor-made suit hugged a figure enhanced by a personal trainer—a bit out of style, but tailor-made all the same. What Henri wouldn’t give to return to a kinder, simpler time, when he’d had a family, albeit an imperfect one. Only a business deal remained, hardly a decent tradeoff.

  “What did you tell the press about why you had to cancel concerts?” She wasn’t exactly the best with public relations, as his stage name proved. What kind of mother lets her son perform with a band called “Hookers and Cocaine”?

  “That you have the flu.”

  Now to test the limits of her resolve. “And if I need time to recover? Say, a month or more?” Tired, so tired. And being on the road with a bunch of backstabbers, constantly on guard, didn’t allow much time to recover from his last few days in Hell.

  Horror shone from eyes tinted by green contact lenses. “I’ll say you’re in rehab. Again.”

  “Why can’t you tell the truth? I’ve had enough bullshit for one lifetime. I screwed up and nearly won a starring role in my own obituary. You can use it as a public service message.” Besides, every time they lied someone always called them out anyway.

  The bristling businesswoman softened somewhat, and a flash of something close to maternal affection crossed her face, gone in a heartbeat, dammit. “Because while you wallow in ‘poor little me,’ thinking only of yourself, I’m concerned with your career and the family, not to mention everyone counting on you for a livelihood. You’ve let us all down. Your fans can accept partying too hard—they expect it, even—better than your being a batshit crazy selfish little brat with no thought for anyone except himself.”

  Ouch! “Yes, they will, thanks to an asshole bassist who sold us out to a tabloid, calling us a bunch of drugged-out losers.” And then Henri had to go and prove him right.

  “He told you about his tabloid deal?” Margo snapped to attention.

  “No. I found out anyway. He’s not too good at being sneaky.”

  “And you didn’t tell me?”

  “What?” Henri faked stunned disbelief, adding a gasp for good measure. Maybe he should have been an actor instead of a singer. “You mean something’s gone on with the band you didn’t plan?” Served her right for firing anyone not pretty enough because she wanted more eye candy onstage. Eye candy usually came equipped with massive egos.

  Henri’s band once consisted of friends, until Margo interfered, preferring Henri to surround himself with newsworthy but shallow celebrity hanger-ons who reported his every move. Anyone close enough to influence Margo’s own personal goldmine had to go. And now she planned to sink her claws into Jenni. Over Henri’s dead body. Shit. If he’d died, what would have happened to his sister?

  If he checked out now, the tragedy would spur headlines, lining Margo’s pockets even more. He peered at the woman who’d birthed him. Did any love for him still linger in her heart, or had every ounce been driven out by greed? It’d happened gradually, his turning over his
life; well, actually, it’d never been his. He’d passed into adulthood two years after gaining the public’s notice on a televised competition. He hadn’t won, but he’d earned enough fans to launch a career—his mother giving up her day job to act as manager. The day he’d waited in line for ten hours for a ten-second audition, Margo’s hand on his shoulder had kept him from running. Back then she’d been merely supportive, if a bit aggressive. Now? Now she demanded.

  He’d trade everything he owned for his family to be uncomplicated again. He glared at his mother. “Hug me.”

  “What?” She blanched, pulling back as far as the chair allowed. Professionally painted fingertips petted her crisp jacket.

  “I told you to hug me.” Don’t I mean more to you than wrinkles?

  Her wary gaze ricocheted between Henri and the doctor. The doctor tipped her head sharply toward Henri.

  Henri waited. An aggrieved sigh wafted out of the woman that the little boy in Henri still wanted to idolize, and she awkwardly bent in to wrap a loose grip around his shoulders. Even begrudgingly given, Henri sought comfort from the gesture, until she warned, “Watch my hair.”

  He jerked back, smacking his head against the headboard. All warmth fled and he flung back the barb she’d used to hurt him. “You’re my manager, something I can’t change—right now. But you’re not acting like my mother. You’re too damned worried about the money and what people might think. Get out. I could’ve died, and you’re more concerned with wealth and power and your fucking hair. I ask for a simple hug and you can’t give it. Get the hell out.

  “You can stay,” Henri told the doctor.

  Margo opened and closed her mouth several times, outrage bubbling to the surface of her faux-polished exterior. Exhaling a slow breath, she turned up the corners of her lips in a terrifying smirk. Shit was about to get real.

  “Dr. Worthington?” she asked, voice syrupy sweet. “I believe my son may not be competent to make his own decisions. What’s your professional opinion?”