“That’s privileged information for my clients only. Are you my client?”
“You’re kidding, right? You come over here while I’m busy…”
“Doing nothing,” he finished the sentence for me.
I glared. Maybe if I’d been properly informed he was coming, I wouldn’t have met him poolside in a pair of rubber duckie swim trunks.
“No offense, Quinn, but this setup you got going on here, this is why you’re going to sink with the ship. Where’s the urgency? Do you even realize how tight a corner you’ve backed yourself into?”
“I get it. My lawyer is working on it as we speak. I don’t need some Hollywood player to tell me what needs to be done.”
“No? Tell me, Quinn, how many studio heads have you heard from? You’ve got a whole new legion of fans dying to buy whatever you send their way. The labels should be knocking down your door. Where are they? Oh wait, I forgot— you’re poison. See, the minute you took on Andrew Hollis, you became the kryptonite of the music world.”
Goddamn, this guy went straight for the danglers. “So, if all of that is true, why are you here?”
“Because I know how to get you in the back door. And I’ve got the know-how, the power, and the determination to launch you straight to the top.”
“How? And don’t give me that crap about privileged information. How do you plan to get my music back from Hollis’s grip?”
“By making itnotyour music.”
“Not my music. What are you talking about?”
“Hollis owns solo artist Quinn… and all future music written under that name for a certain timeframe. What he doesn’t own is your band or the music you’ll write for it.”
“My band? I don’t have a band.”
“You will if you hire me.”
My eyes narrowed in on Tucker Beckett. It seemed too good to be true. There had to be a catch… and then it hit me. My voice dipped in octave. “You want me to join a fucking boy band!”
“No,” he said. “Not a boy band. I’ve moved away from that. I’m looking to manage the next big rock band, and I absolutely believe that it’ll be the one you’re fronting.”
Jesus, it seemed so simple. Too simple. “And what makes you think Hollis would leave that loophole open?”
“It’s not a loophole. He could only take what was available to him at the time of the signing, and that was you. Quinn McKallister, solo artist. Look, I have a friend on the show that owed me a favor. He ‘loaned’ me the standard contract they make all the contestants sign. I had my business attorney look it over. He’s dealt with these deals in the past and has signed off on my plan.”
“So, if you’re saying all I have to do is start a band, what do I need you for?”
Tucker lowered his glasses, peering at me over the top of the rims. He then whipped out a business card from the same pocket the handkerchief lived and thrust it in my direction.
“Oh, you need me.”
* * *
Call me—sooner rather than later,he’d said as he walked away.We’ve got a lot of work to do and not much time to do it.
Fuck Tucker Beckett!
I watched him stride off, convinced I’d rather shove bird seed up my ass and let a blue jay go to town than hire that guy. He thought he had all the answers. So smug. Tucker was so wrapped up in slick packaging you’d think he was the spokesperson for a condom commercial. No wonder his son had risked first-degree burns to get the hell away from him.
And just because he said I was doomed didn’t make it true. Although, okay… yes… it probablywastrue, but that was beside the point. Look, there was no denying that I was wrapped in lead and Tucker Beckett might possibly be the only one in Hollywood strong enough, and ruthless enough, to lift the chains off me before I sank to the bottom of a very muddy pond. But the question remained: did I want it bad enough to trade one captor for another?
My father met me halfway to the main house. “So, how’d it go?”
“You couldn’t have given me some warning?” I asked.
“You would’ve said no.”
