“This is a bad idea,” Victor complained, swinging on his chair as the pop artist moved across the screen before them. They had spent the day researching the artist, and a simple internet search had popped up a seemingly endless litany of drama. “She is a live wire.”Vice blew out a breath. He did not disagree with his business partner, but their manager, Aaron, had offered them the opportunity, and they would be fools to turn it down. “She has been in the top ten for pop for six years, produced four multiplatinum albums, and one which went diamond, which is more than we can say,” he pointed out. “She has sold out eight tours in that time as well.”“She has also been on every gossip mag cover for the last twelve months because of her lifestyle habits,” Victor argued. “Drugs, alcohol, rehab, eating disorders.” He ticked them off on his fingers.“So, she is a hard-working screw up,” Vice shrugged. “She is pretty.”Victor laughed out a sigh. “Filters.”“No, I saw her briefly on the red-ca
“Alright,” he gestured for Victor to bring him out a drink; he sensed he was going to need one. So, the girl was angry, and probably with good cause. She had the eyes for it, a fine edge between vulnerability and hardness was contained within those blue-green depths.They would make a good cover image, he speculated, but the entire package was nice. On the edge between curvy and athletic, as if she fought hard against her body’s natural inclinations and lost more than she won. Plenty of woman, he thought with a flare of heat that caught him by surprise, for a man to hold onto. “But there are different types of pissed off,” he added.She struck a chord and then ran through it a string at a time. “Girl anthem, pissed off.”“Okay,” he took a seat across from her and wished he had brought a notepad or a phone out with him. “There have been a few different types of girl anthems recently, many successful, all with a different feel to them.”“A call to arms,” she said as Victor placed a bott
Victor was lifting weights in the gym when Mirage entered in the morning. She paused in the doorway, as if debating entering and then shrugged and did so.“’Morning,” she said, and stuck a bottle of water into the holder of the treadmill before setting a gruelling pace that had him drooling within five minutes of watching her run.After thirty trialling minutes for them both, he thought wryly, she finished her run and moved to the pull up bar. She had her earbuds in, and whatever she listened to, it certainly motivated her. She pushed herself beyond tolerance, and he grimaced seeing the shake in her muscles as she lowered to the ground after the last set.He followed her into the infrared sauna. She had taken out her earbuds and left them on her phone on the bench outside. They sat together, sweating, and panting, and, in his case at least, lusting, he thought. She seemed indifferent to him. It was not something that he was accustomed to, a woman being disinterested.“So, Vice doesn’t
“Oh, hey,” she glanced over her shoulder. “I am making omelettes.”“We will set the table,” Vice offered, pulling a lustful face at Victor as Mirage turned back to her cooking. “Did you sleep well?”“Great,” she replied lightly. “It is so quiet here. I have been bouncing around hotels and motels for a few months now, and they are never quiet.”“You don’t own property?” Vice set the table as Victor brewed coffee.“I do,” she flipped the omelette. “But the addresses were leaked to the press. I move around a lot, to avoid, you know,” she shrugged. “Photographers.”“You have had a lot of publicity over the last year,” Vice prompted taking the opening.“Yeah,” she was grim in her response, sliding an omelette onto a plate and beginning another. “I can’t seem to avoid it. That saying: no publicity is bad publicity? So not true. I go to a club, and I am battling alcohol. I visit my doctor, and I am being checked into rehab. I go to a hot yoga session, and I am having a meltdown in public – w
Mirage drifted on the inflatable pool lounge, one hand holding a mocktail that Vice had mixed for her, and the other trailing in the water, as she watched the two men from behind the shield of her sunglasses. There were worse ways to spend a hot summer afternoon, she thought, and there couldn’t be a better view.If there was a God, she definitely was a woman, Mirage concluded, because only a woman would have crafted Vice and Victor. They belonged on the covers of the romance books her mother used to read. Victor was a sun-kissed idol of a man, all broad shoulders, bronzed skin, strong jaw, and almost white-blonde hair, reminding her of movie superheroes, and Vice was lean, his hair like thick black silk, all sharp cheekbones and smouldering eyes, reminiscent of the models that sulked their way across the billboards, hands in pockets, and moody darkness in their eyes.A man for every taste, she joked to herself, except for hers. She was done with men. She was not into women, either how
“Should we get out of the pool?” She did not want to. It was nice floating with Vice’s hard body against hers. “No,” he lifted his sunglasses, watching the inside of the house. She heard voices and saw a group of people enter. “Ah, they brought the whole band,” he added, unbothered by the additions. “Hey!” Two-Way Street’s drummer James’ hair was an overgrown ash-blonde, and he wore a scruff of stubble on his face as if he had not bothered shaving for a week. She recognised him from the promotional videos and gossip pages. “No fair, Vice,” he complained already stepping out his shoes and pulling off his designer-faded t-shirt. He had the sort of physique that was naturally given to skinniness, she thought with envy, and with lean muscles that were reflective of his instrument’s demands. “I want to float with Mirage.” He shoved his jeans off his hips and waded into the pool in his underwear, completely uninhibited by the fact that he wasn’t wearing swimwear. “Beat you to it, James,
Vice was not surprised when Aaron called with the news that the label wanted a meeting to discuss their progress on the album. They were nervous, Aaron suggested, about two producers so new to the role handling such a major album for the label and just needed some reassurance. Vice had other thoughts. “Mr Rich is causing waves,” he said to Victor. “Well, we are prepared for that, aren’t we?” Victor was not flustered. “So, we will go, let him try to bring us down, and show him up.” Mirage spent half an hour on the phone to her lawyer, and then another twenty minutes talking to Aaron when she was told. They leaned against the kitchen bench and watched her pace the patio, on the phone, her body language growing tenser by the minute. “Something went down,” Vice murmured. “What do we know about Mr Rich?” “Leans more towards popstars, seems to like young women as artists,” Victor replied, bracing his arms against the bench, and leaning into them. “Solid results as a producer, but Mirag
The driver opened the door and Victor slid out, reaching a hand back to help her out. She caught the flash of light as photographs were taken. She always thought the label notified the media when meetings were held so that a photographer was on site to snap stars coming and going through its doors, advertising the star drawing power of the label. Vice linked his arm through hers and she felt Victor’s hand resting warm against her lower back. “Smile,” Vice said through his teeth as he flashed the photographer a wide grin, and she plastered a bright smile on her face in an almost automatic reaction. The two men changed angles, maximising the photo opportunity, laughing, and chatting to the photographers cheerfully, answering questions thrown at them with a comfortable ease. “We are working with Mirage on her next album,” Vice schmoozed to the woman photographer to the left. “It is a very exciting piece of work.” “Yes, it is coming along,” Victor responded to the man on the other sid