“Why not go for the best?” Rusty smiled. "Anyway - I know some guys from Camp Shelby days, who are now doing security in Jackson. Wild’s people called them, but they don’t have a guy with your skill set, so they called me. Now go pack. It’s hot down there. Leave the blazers.”
“Do I get to meet her?” Bryce’s heart raced so fast he couldn’t think. He’d had a crush on Hayley Wild since she’d come out with a runaway single the year before. She’d exploded in popularity in recent months; Bryce seriously couldn’t believe she didn’t have adequate security by now.
“You’ll be part of her security detail until this guy is caught, so…”
Bryce gulped. He’d been around beautiful women before. Models. Movie stars. Wives of sheiks, after he hacked and scammed his way onto a yacht in Monaco. Why did the thought of meeting Haley make him so nervous? He liked her music - so what?
“Try not to be starstruck. She’s just a kid, like you.” Rusty grinned, biting into an apple.
Bryce snapped back into awareness. “I’m not a kid,” he said, but he knew the argument was futile. Everyone at the firm saw him as such. That’s what happened when you dropped out of high school and skipped college to fly around the world with other people’s money, then entered the work force at the ripe age of nineteen. It wasn’t his fault if he just skipped the boring parts of young adulthood, like studying and exams. He preferred real world experience, and if that made him a ‘kid’ in the eyes of his coworkers, fine.
“Try not to forget your name when you meet her,” Rusty said. “Now, go pack your Bermuda shorts or whatever kids are wearing these days.” Rusty adjusted his chair to face his computer, chuckling to himself.
“Work on your dad jokes,” Bryce said, standing.
He strode out of the office, trying to control his nerves. Even if he’d been in the room with celebrities before, he’d rarely worked up the nerve to talk to one. And Hayley Wild was beautiful. She had long brown hair that fell in waves down her tanned shoulders, and thick pink lips that you couldn’t help but notice when she smiled into a camera or danced on stage. She actually reminded Bryce of an older girl on his block he’d had a crush on as a child, but she’d moved away before middle school. That girl had worn her hair in a long French braid, and the swimsuit tan on her shoulders seemed to last all the way until Christmas.
Bryce knew it was silly – having a crush on the girl next door and now, finding her proxy in a pop star. But there was something about Hayley. He’d never seen anyone as beautiful in any of his travels,andher voice! He liked to fall asleep listening to a play list he’d made of her slower songs. He dreamed about her sometimes, though he figured it was probably because he played her music before bed. For all he knew, she could be a fraud, a diva, though he knew he was a hypocrite to not like frauds. After all, hadn’t he made most of his money scamming his way into bank accounts and treasuries?
Still - Bryce had wanted to go to one of Hayley’s concerts when she’d played in New York last year. But he didn’t want to be the only guy there who wasn’t escorting his teen daughter, so he ended up passing on the tickets. Bryce knew he wasn’t her typical fan demographic, but he didn’t care, for the most part. Good music and talent mattered more.
He’d have to dress nice for the trip, even if Rusty had cautioned against outer layers. Bryce didn’t want to look like he’d been raised in some bland, tasteless ranch home with oak cabinets and weedy lawns – even if that wasexactlyhow he’d been raised. He’d pick up his shirts from the cleaners on the way back to his apartment. He’d press his khakis at the hotel. He could do this. He could be cool. After all, he was a professional. Or at least, he needed to prove to everyone at Redmond he was a professional, and this would be his big chance. He couldn’t let them or Hayley down.
3
Of Love And Fame
Hayley Wild started singingin church. Her first songs were written on a ukulele she’d taught herself to play. She originally played flute in her elementary school band, but you couldn’t sing with flute, and Hayley loved to sing. So, ukulele it was.
Her father thought Haley would make it as a country star, and her mom – permanently stuck in the ‘70s - wanted Haley to be a gospel singer. But Hayley never liked being boxed into one category, and it showed in her music. By the time she landed a manager and record label at age seventeen after playing a circuit of clubs, her music was too eclectic to fit neatly into one category, and ‘pop’ covered a broad canvas. She liked that her fans embraced gospel harmonies, country twang, synth beats, catchy choruses and guitar riffs inspired by the classic rock records she’d listened to with her mom, before her parents divorced. Second only to singing, Hayley liked dancing along with her music. Playing guitar – she’d lost the ukulele once the clubs started taking her seriously - just made all of it possible.
Hayley took off her headphones in the recording booth and hung them over the music stand. She flexed her fingers, stiff from playing for the past few hours, as she worked on new songs for her next record. She didn’t want to rehash the elements which had made her first record such a success; she wanted to prove she wasn’t just a one-trick pony, but she was struggling to bring something new to the music.
“You need a boyfriend,” her cousin Mia, said as Hayley came out from behind the glass. Mia sat in a chair next to Hayley’s producer, texting. Hayley and Mia had grown up like sisters, as close as their mothers had been and still were. Mia didn’t normally accompany Hayley as closely as she had in the past week, but since the car wreck, both their mothers insisted it was safer for the girls to travel together.
“What’s that got to do with anything?” Hayley asked. She swept her hair back into a ponytail, and fanned her neck.
“You could write a decent love song,” Mia answered tartly.
“I write love songs,” Hayley defended.
“About your dog!” Mia waved her hand in auh-huhgesture.
“They don’t know that.”
“Anyone who reads the lyrics could figure it out,” Mia rolled her eyes. She stood and pulled her purse over her shoulder. “How about just a fling?” She winked at Hayley’s producer, Mike, a man in his twenties with a beard.
“Let’s go,” Hayley said. “I have to pick my sister up from gymnastics.” As they left the studio and headed to the parking lot, Hayley leaned closer to Mia. “Doesyourboyfriend know you flirt with every man in sight?”
“He’s the one who decided to go to college two states away,” Mia shrugged. “And it’s not flirting. Just a little… confidence boost.”
“Right,” Hayley raised her eyebrows. “Whatever you say.” She pushed open the studio’s front door, and a small group of fans, mostly young girls who looked like they had just received their driver’s licenses, rushed over with magazine photos or printouts of Hayley for them to sign.
“How’d they know you were here?” Mia asked. “That’s creepy.”
“One of our local girls started a fan site,” Hayley replied. “She has a message board where people can post where they spot me. Last week, someone reported me at Walgreens buying tampons.”
“Glamorous.” Mia checked her phone again, before sliding large sunglasses down her forehead to her nose. “Is there another door?”
