Tarek hesitates then looks me in the eye. “Carla spiked your drink.”
I blink at his words. What?
“Why?”
“Why indeed?” He shrugs, staring at the wall. I get the feeling there’s something he’s not telling me.
It’s at that moment one of the doors opens. Seth comes out, looking troubled, though his gaze instantly shoots to me. A huge, relieved smile splits his face.
“Thank God,” he says quietly, and he pads over to me.
His calm manner is like the sweetest balm, putting me at ease straight away. He pulls up a chair, his biceps surprisingly taut beneath a black shirt, and settles beside Tarek.
“I’ve been so worried,” Seth says, leaning forward so his dark hair falls into his face. “Barely slept. How are you?”
I smile at him, sensing the truth of his words, if only just from a glance at the dark crescents beneath his blue eyes. “I’m fine. I think. Though I’m trying to come to terms with the fact that my drink was spiked by my own boss.”
“Yes, well...” He looks across to Tarek, who shrugs. “MCM does what it wants. Always has.”
“I don’t understand why they did it, though.”
“Perhaps to put you out of service. Maybe there were things going on that night that weren’t for idle cameras to capture.”
I frown. “There were more cameras there than mine.”
“Yes,” Tarek says. “Official ones.”
I glance down at my clasped hands and the tall glass of water between them. “I thought I was official. I’m contracted by MCM.”
Seth looks sympathetic. “Alternatively, they could have just wanted you out of action for a while.” And here, his eyes flick to Tarek again. “The people at the very top... those are sociopaths we’re dealing with here. Who knows what drives them.”
Another of the doors opens, and I watch as Adam steps out, practically moon-walking with joy. My breath catches in my throat. He’s half-naked, wearing only casual lounge pants. He looks radiant — fresh from the shower, with a crisp white towel slung over his broad, bare shoulders. Drops of water fall from the ends of his water-darkened blond hair and slide down his chest. Arms thickened with muscle bulge beside his torso.
I’m like a starving woman presented with a red velvet wedding cake. My gaze demolishes him, gorging on every inch of his wet, naked skin.
I picture my tongue licking up his chest in one single, smooth line.
I picture my small self trying to push against his body, only for him to flip me last minute and trap me against the wall instead.
I picture him climbing into this bed and fucking me senseless in front of Seth and Tarek, as the two of them watch on in horror and desire.
“MCM meeting!” Adam sings. “Everyone loves an MCM meeting! Tarek, you dick, have you still got my shirt—”
Adam freezes when he notices I’m awake. His glance slides back to Tarek, then darts between him and Seth.
“You’re up,” he says, looking me in the eye, and there is a gruffness to it that I wasn’t expecting.
“Yes,” Tarek says amiably. “She’s just heard that Carla spiked her drink.”
Adam softens at that. “A terrible, ungodly act.” He strides across to me, like a swaggering peacock. “How are you, my dear?”
My dear? What?
Even Seth raises an eyebrow at him.
“I think you’ve been in London too long,” I tell him, and he laughs at that.
“Lor’ luv a duck, guv!”
I have no idea what he’s saying, but he seems to be entertaining himself.
Unexpectedly, he grasps my hand. I marvel at it. It’s so wide and tanned against my small, pale hand. “I was out of sorts when I saw your debilitated state. A truly despicable act, only one of rational mind would say.” I don’t know why he’s suddenly swallowed a dictionary, but I find myself growing enchanted.
In the periphery of my vision, I notice Seth rolling his eyes and shaking his head softly.
I pull back slightly, reclaiming my hand before he does something to it that will truly destroy my mind, like kiss it.
“Thank you for taking care of me,” I tell them each in turn. “You didn’t have to, but I’m glad you did.”
Tarek laughs. “Didn’t have to? Girl, you were incapacitated. You think we were gonna leave you?”
I blush. “Well... It was your big night.”
“We were more than happy to leave that place,” Seth says, his expression grave. “Seriously. What a drag.”
“And now we have a meeting with our wonderful management company this afternoon,” Adam adds. “What joy.” He sounds sarcastic, but there is a frenzied manic energy to him, as though he’s overdosed on sugar.
Tarek looks grim. “I hate these things.”
“Yeah, we got the email yesterday. It’s one big manipulation act. Corral us in a foreign city then have their way with us.” Seth seems nervous in a way I haven’t seen him before: he’s rocking on the balls of his feet, his chin leaning into his hand, his elbow digging into his knee. “We sit there for hours and they demand stuff while pretending they’re innocent requests. If you’re not careful, it’s a slippery slope that goes from ‘Would you like something to drink?’ to ‘Would you like us to own a 100 percent stake in the band?’”
These guys seem battle-hardened, if not traumatically scarred, by top-flight company meetings like these.
A worrying thought crosses my mind. “Do I need to be there?”
Seth nods. “All of us, yeah.” He raises the following delicately: “And they asked to see some of your footage.”
It’s like an anvil has landed on my stomach. I have zero desire to meet MCM and, probably, the spiker of my drink. Then again, it sure would be sweet to enact some kind of revenge plot on them...
Suddenly, it’s as though the world is so very large, and I’m a tiny meek mouse ready to be trampled upon by the elephantine corporation.
They can do what they want; they’re above the law. What the hell can I do?
But shit. Even if I were to attend this meeting with honorable intentions, I have nothing to actually show them of the work I’ve been doing. My footage isn’t in any semblance of order — just a bunch of potentially usable clips in bins and a collection of subfolders for each member in a master folder helpfully labeled “TO BE SORTED.”
I try to think over my options. “When is this meeting?”
As Tarek studies his glinting silver watch, I admire his long dark eyelashes. “In about five hours.”
Fine. That’s fine. I can muster something rough and semi-presentable in that length of time. I breathe a sigh of relief.
The band, however, still looks nervous. I want to ease their worries somehow. “Is there anything I can do?”
Tarek glances at Seth and seems hesitant — which is odd, because I’ve never seen him hesitate over anything before. “I heard Leon has a...” He thinks for a moment, a small “V” forming between his brows, as though weighing his words. “Proposal.”
Adam glances at Tarek curiously. “Proposal? A proposal for what?” He pauses, then asks, “When were you talking to Leon?”