Chapter Ten
The following morning Elizabeth found Zander sitting on their hotel’s penthouse deck, reading The New York Times on his tablet with the Vegas skyline a range of man-made mountains behind him. At seven a.m. it was already desert-hot. Fat diamonds of condensation trickled down the glass of pineapple juice beside his plate of half-eaten scrambled eggs and soaked into the starched tablecloth.
He stood to pull out her chair. “Some biographer has been caught sexting her subject—a married politician. You’re shortchanging me.”
Elizabeth spread a snowy-white napkin on her lap and selected a croissant from the basket of pastries. “You don’t get involved with employees,” she reminded him.
“Not permanent staff, but I exempt temporary employees and could probably extend that to contractors.”
She sliced open the croissant with a surprisingly heavy silver knife. “That’s extremely magnanimous, but I’m not interested in sleeping with you.”
“Doc, every woman wants sex with me or at least thinks about it. Even if it’s a passing thought.”
“Nope,” she lied.
“Uh-huh.”
His skepticism drew her attention away from the rounds of butter nestled in a silver disk filled with ice. She was expecting his practiced, “I’m too sexy for my shorts” grin but his smiling speculation was intensely personal and heat rose in her cheeks. Still, Elizabeth held his gaze coolly. Showing Zander weakness was tantamount to a gazelle wandering past a lion with an “Eat Me” sign on its rump. “Besides, the credibility of the memoir would be compromised.”
“We couldn’t have that,” he agreed, picking up his fork.
She should have left it there, but Elizabeth was still rattled. “Not to mention my reputation.”
“Professionally or personally?”
“Both.”
“What would people say?”
“This may come as a surprise to you,” she speared a round of butter, “but not everyone considers indiscriminate fucking a good thing.”
Zander choked on a mouthful of egg.
“Just proving my theory on profanity that less is more,” she said. Satisfied with the last word, she buttered her croissant.
Zander sipped his pineapple juice. “Is it wrong to be turned on right now?”
“Stop it.” He was outrageous. And back to normal. Thank God. “Can we talk about our interview schedule today?”
“Clarify something you said yesterday first.” He poured her some coffee. “These furtive sordid affairs of yours—”
She interrupted. “My affairs may be furtive, but they’re not sordid. They’re based on weeks of friendship and mutual respect.”
Zander yawned. “Incredible that you can make hot, dirty sex sound so boring,” he complained. “Where’s the raging lust, the raw passion? Being so desperate to rip each other’s clothes off you start making out in an elevator or in the bathroom at a party. Ever done that?”
“You may like living your life in public, but I can’t imagine anything worse,” she retorted. “And wham-bam is a male fantasy; most women need foreplay for sex to be really satisfying. Pass the raspberry jam, please.”
“It’s called jelly in the States.” Zander handed over the tiny jar of compote. “And Doc, every girlfriend I’ve had jumped my bones the second I left the stage. Sometimes we barely get to the dressing room. Wham-bam definitely works for women too.”
“I’m not denying the rock-star fantasy is an aphrodisiac for some women.” She wrestled with the lid.
Zander took the jar, his skull ring glinting in the Las Vegas sun. “It’s more primal than banging a celebrity. I come offstage charged with the love of seventy thousand people, a conductor for pure energy.”
“Or rather your penis is.”
His eyes narrowed. One twist and the lid popped off. “Mock the phenomenon all you want,” he said, returning the open jar. “But don’t make the mistake of thinking you’re immune. I could tempt even you, Doc.”
She was too smart to turn herself into a personal challenge. Accepting the jam—jelly—she said mildly, “I stand corrected. So where do I fit into your day?”
“I’ll need to make some calls this morning and hit the gym. Let’s hook up again this afternoon—I’ll text you.” Zander pushed aside his plate and stood. “And plan on coming to the boxing match with me. Even though we’re not introducing you formally yet, it doesn’t hurt to create some buzz.”
“Buzz” was the part of their contract Elizabeth was least looking forward to. She swallowed her first mouthful of croissant and said nervously, “What does one wear to a championship boxing match?”
“Anything one damn well pleases. You’ll see everything from cocktail dresses and gowns to jeans and leather jackets. But dress up, we’ll be attending a celeb party afterward.”
“Wait. Do I really have to go to that?”
“Yeah, you do,” he said remorselessly. “Buy whatever you want and give Dimity the receipts.” His cell rang. “And so it begins.” Walking away from the table, he answered. “Robbie, talk to me.”
Elizabeth could still hear the low murmur of his voice, somewhere on the mezzanine of the penthouse, when she’d finished breakfast.
She got directions from the concierge to a luxury women’s-wear store, where she asked the assistant for a gown that “will help me fit in, not stand out.”
“Where are you sitting?”
“Ringside.”
The other woman’s eyes widened. “Then you need glitzy.”
In the end, Elizabeth opted for gleam rather than glitz and bought a dress of green satin, gold stilettos and matching clutch. As she handed over her credit card she was comforted by the thought that Zander was as good as an invisibility cloak for anyone within three feet. No one would look at her when they could look at him.
She spent the next couple of hours walking around the Strip, admiring the sheer ballsy extravagance of this steroid-fueled fairyland. After losing fifty bucks on the blackjack machines in Circus Circus she settled in the MGM Grand’s lobby with an Earl Grey tea latte, headphones and her laptop to transcribe last night’s interview. Quieter in her room, perhaps, but nowhere near as much fun.
“What kind of life do you see for yourself when this is over?”
“Why does it have to be over?” Zander said. “The Stones are still together.”
“So you see this incarnation of Rage performing in ten, twenty years’ time?”
For a moment Zander didn’t answer. She heard the growl of the car’s engine and the hum of air conditioning. “Sure,” he said. Heartily. “Why not?” But there was a note in his voice that Elizabeth had never heard from him. One she hadn’t picked up at the time.
Self-doubt. Thoughtfully, she made a note to follow it up.
* * *
“This is outside my comfort zone,” Elizabeth said tensely as she and Zander were escorted into the MGM Grand Garden Arena.
She paused at the top of stairs plummeting into a dark amphitheater seething with spectators. Far below, a brightly lit boxing ring awaited its champions. It was a hell of a long way to fall.
Zander offered his arm. “Outside your comfort zone is the only place worth living.”
He followed security, acknowledging both applause and catcalls with a smile and a wave. Elizabeth clung on and concentrated on hitting every narrow stair tread squarely in her high heels.
Their afternoon interview hadn’t gone as planned. She’d arrived at Zander’s suite to find him halfway through a massage and the therapist’s presence had prevented her asking any penetrating questions. Bare, tanned muscle and sandalwood-infused almond oil simply wasn’t conducive to serious discussion, particularly when the therapist kept throwing her complicit grins of feminine delight and Zander, immodest as always, barely covered himself when he turned onto his back…
She stumbled and his grip tightened. “Careful.”
I’m trying to be.
As they drew closer to ringside, she recognized some famous faces. Zander paused to shake hands and exchange pleasantries, introducing her as “the Pulitzer-prize-winning biographer, Elizabeth Winston.” He waited for her to sit first.
“Who taught you gallantry?” And here she was, trawling for information scraps again.
“Dad. Manners are big in Texas.”
The brunette next to her leaned across to talk to Zander and one pert breast spilled from her low-cut bodice. Elizabeth murmured helpfully, “wardrobe malfunction.” With a poisonous glance, the woman adjusted her straps.
“Your constipated expression suggests you’re trying not to be judgmental,” Zander murmured when the brunette turned back to her date.
“Why would any woman believe flashing her boob is a good idea?”
“Think of it like using a lure to attract a Mohave tui chub.”
“I knew you were interested in seeing one,” she exclaimed. “We’ll detour on the way home.”
“We won’t,” he retorted. “I googled a picture and you’d only be disappointed. It was very ordinary, more of an overgrown sprat.”
“You googled it?”
Zander’s eyes narrowed and he opened his mouth, but whatever he was about to say was drowned out by the blast of music heralding the arrival of the first contender. Elizabeth settled in with a chuckle.
“The trouble with armchair moralists,” Zander resumed, when trainers and support crew were swarming around their fighters with last-minute instructions, “is that they’ve never wrestled with real temptation. Anyone can say no to chocolates when there’s only Cherry Ripe left in the box.”
“I love Cherry Ripe.” This was better, she thought as she pulled her recorder from her evening bag.
“You would, but you’re missing my point. It’s easy to be good when you’ve never had access to Willy Wonka’s Chocolate Factory.”
“Why are you saying that pointedly?” She switched off her recorder. “For all you know, I could be a repeat visitor.”
“I doubt it. Only a momma’s boy would agree to all your dating conditions.”
“Says someone who lays down as many rules as I do.”
He ignored that. “Doc, it’s because you’ve never been seriously tempted that you find it so easy to regulate the animal urges that drive the rest of us.”
“Zander, if I didn’t have animal urges I’d be celibate.”
He snorted. “Why, when you say animal, do I picture little lambies gamboling in fields?”
“Because you’re depraved!” The lunacy of their argument struck her and she laughed. “Why am I trying to convince you I’m debauched? Congratulations, you’re corrupting me now.”
“Yeah?” Lazily, his gaze unpicked every stitch of her classically draped, green bodice. She dropped the recorder to clutch the straps, certain they were about to fall.
Zander smiled as he picked it up off the floor. “You’re right. A woman’s body doesn’t have to be on display to be alluring.”
Electric eel, Elizabeth reminded herself. Genetic, can’t help himself. Not personal. But it took several minutes before the last charge of electricity zinged through her nerve endings.
* * *
Elizabeth expected to cover her eyes for most of the fight, but she loved it.
Loved the balletic grace and sinuous speed of the boxers, the cathartic roar from the crowd when a meaty punch connected and the exhausted grapples as the rounds progressed.
She rooted for the little guy, though he was small in the way of a baby mammoth. When he won on technicalities, she felt as if she’d gone twelve rounds herself. Euphoria drained her of adrenaline and left her as hungry as a bear.
At the celeb after-party she made a beeline for the buffet table and stared in dismay at the dainty hors d’oeuvres.
She was standing beside Zander, eating her fourth chicken kebab and listening to the boxing promoter wax lyrical on long reaches, knockout stats and comebacks—all to do with Zander’s career—when the surrounding chatter abated.
Zander looked around and muttered, “Fuck.”
Following his gaze, Elizabeth saw a long, lean man with a shaved head and neck tattoos looking stylishly disheveled in a tux and open-necked white shirt. The woman at his side was beautiful in an entirely cosmetic way that had erased whoever she’d been and reimagined her into a big-breasted platinum bombshell. She wore what appeared to be a negligee. It suited her.
Elizabeth recognized both from her research. Rage’s former bass guitarist, Travis Calvert and Zander’s ex, Stormy Hagen. Stormy was swaying slightly, but that could be her towering heels.
They saw Zander and froze as everyone considered their options. Then a couple of cells flashed and a press camera swung in their direction. Zander stepped forward, holding out his hand. “Long time no see.”
Travis’s thin lips curled. “Rot in hell, you sonofabitch.”
Dropping his hand, Zander said pleasantly, “We’ll catch up there, then.” He turned to Stormy and lowered his voice. “We broke up so you could do better, babe.”
“Don’t flatter yourself.” The blonde tossed her head, overbalanced and caught Travis’s shoulder for support. “I’m having the time of my life.”
“And primordial slime would still be higher up the evolutionary scale than you.” Travis skimmed his palm down the silk to fondle Stormy’s bottom. “How are those new bandmates you’ve got on the leash; house-trained yet?”
“They don’t bite the hand that feeds them, so that’s a novelty,” Zander said evenly. “What’s the matter, mate, feeling threatened by how good your replacement is?”
The other man scowled. “You’re a sellout, a joke and I despise how you’ve devalued our legacy.”
“Yeah? The tour has boosted sales of our early albums. I notice your scruples don’t extend to returning additional royalties, you pious prick.”
In a low voice he said to Stormy, “I deserve whatever punishment you want to mete out, but don’t ruin your life in the process of teaching me a lesson.” Without waiting for a response he offered his arm to Elizabeth. “Let’s go.”
As she took it, Stormy gave a brittle shriek of laughter. “You’re kidding, she’s my replacement?”
“I’m not his girlfriend,” Elizabeth said, responding to the pain laced through the insult. “I’m his biographer.”
The other woman seemed to realize she’d exposed a nerve. “Whatever.” She wrapped her date’s arm around her shoulders like a child needing a comforter.
Travis stared at Elizabeth. “Biographer,” he repeated, his hooded eyes gleaming with such malice she glanced around for her discarded chicken skewer. “Has Zee got to the part where he shafted his former bandmates yet? I’d love to hear his justification for that.”
“Then you should have returned my calls,” Zander bit back. “Now you’ll have to wait until the book comes out, along with everyone else. And you and Mick were the ones who walked. It didn’t follow that I had to roll over and accept the end of a band I’d devoted my life to building.”
“Yeah, Zee, because as usual it’s all about you. You know why we left, sweetheart?” Travis asked Elizabeth. “Because we couldn’t work with this asshole anymore. You know why we didn’t come back? Because this asshole wouldn’t compromise. Mick and I were prepared to negotiate and don’t let Zee tell you different.”
Zander’s expression darkened. “You were happy to let me drive the juggernaut for twenty years while you got famous, got rich and got laid.” His tone dripped contempt. “Only an idiot would agree to taking the backseat because the kids suddenly think it would be cool to get behind the wheel.”
As the two men traded verbal blows, Elizabeth saw the same simmering, almost orgiastic anticipation on bystanders’ faces as she’d seen during the boxing match.
Zander’s forearm under her fingers was rock-hard. She squeezed to bring him back to an awareness of his surroundings but he remained focused on the man in front of him. Stormy disentangled from Travis and stepped away, looking frightened.
Elizabeth tightened her grip, figuring at least she could stop Zander throwing a punch.
“If you make us out to be the bad guys in this, Zee,” Travis snarled, “I’ll sue you for slander.”
“It’s libel when it’s in print,” he retorted. “Slander is verbal defamation—what you and Mick did when you claimed the band’s breakup and my brother’s collapse were all on me.”
“You told Dev the show must go on when any fool could see he was sick as a dog.”
“Then any fool should have spoken up. I had my hands full running Rage remember?”
“Running a fucking dictatorship you mean. Like you’d have listened.”
Elizabeth intervened. “Clearly you’re both still suffering a lot of guilt,” she said calmly. “It’s understandable, but Devin’s alive, healthy and happy now, isn’t he?”
The two men shot her an incredulous look.
“What the fuck is she on?” said Travis.
“Doc,” Zander murmured. “All due respect. Go to your room.”
“Once an oppressor, always an oppressor,” Travis jeered.
Ignoring him, Zander looked at her. “You don’t need this kind of publicity.”
Holding his gaze, she squeezed his forearm again. “Do you?”
For a moment they stared at each other, then the muscles under her fingers relaxed. “No,” he said and steered her away. “Nice seeing you both,” he threw over his shoulder.
“What the fuck,” said Travis behind them.
“Strolling away,” muttered Zander slowing Elizabeth’s stride, “not running away.” In a louder voice, he said, “Nothing to see here, folks, just another custody dispute.” Everyone laughed.
His smile vanished when the elevator door closed. “You okay?”
“Front-row seats at two fights. You sure know how to show a girl a good time.” She added gently, “Are you okay?”
Zander jabbed the button for her floor. “I’m the first to admit I’m hard work, but if I want to insult people I do it to their face. I don’t sneak to the press behind their back.” Though the elevator was already moving, he hit the button again. “And I’m not going to badmouth them in this memoir either.”
“Of course not. Whining isn’t your style.”
“Damn right. Which is why Travis’s holier-than-thou shit drives me crazy!” He was shaken or he wouldn’t be talking so freely. “The bastard’s in a win-win situation. The tour publicity is pumping up sales of our old albums, but if the tour crashes and burns, he gets to crow, ‘I told you the son of a bitch would fail.’” He slammed his palm against the door and the elevator shuddered. “Travis gets rich and I carry all the risk, same as always.”
“The breakup still hurts,” she ventured.
“For years I had those guys at my back and now it’s done, all gone. But once they started laying down ridiculous terms for their return I had to say no. Rage’s future was at stake.”
Elizabeth was silent. Sometimes pain simply needed a witness.
Zander glanced over half-suspiciously, then sighed. “There’s too much bitterness, it’s like a divorce. You want to be grown-up about it, but whenever you get together the same arguments come up. Do I wish we’d found a compromise that worked? Yeah. I loved those guys. Do I regret what I’m doing with Rage now? No. Do I believe I have equally talented musicians to reinvent the band? Hell, fucking yeah, I do.”
He brooded a few seconds. “In the end, our fans will decide if the band succeeds. Not me and not Travis.” The elevator stopped at her floor. “I’ll walk you to your room.”
She didn’t argue with gentlemanly impulses. “Thank you.” As Elizabeth unlocked her door she said quietly, “Stormy didn’t break off your relationship, did she?” She understood now the resistance he had to revealing himself—and the magnitude of her task in convincing him to do so.
“As far as the memoir’s concerned, she did.” A tacit confirmation of her suspicions. Now, when he was upset and angry wasn’t the time to cry foul, much as she wanted to. Softly, softly catch the rock star. Elizabeth took a deep breath. She had to believe she was up to the challenge.
“You’re worried about her.”
“She always had shit taste in men.” Zander frowned. “But it seems every time I see her lately she’s either drunk or high and that’s not Stormy. Travis plays mind games with women and—” He recollected himself. “Not my business.”
“If you still care about her?”
Zander opened her door. “Not your business either.”
Elizabeth didn’t move. “Your business is my business.”
“Clean breaks,” he said. “Don’t look back, no regrets.”
“Remind me to put all those clichés in the book.”
His full mouth tightened at her sarcastic tone. “We’re done with this subject.” Turning on his heel, he walked toward the elevator, then returned.
“I forgot to thank you,” he said.
“For what?” she said exasperated.
“Reminding me I had a choice with Travis. And for not overreacting to Stormy’s bitchy comment.”
She tried not to soften. “I figured it was meant to hurt you, not me.”
“You’re a kind person,” he said.
Elizabeth felt her cheeks redden. “Anyone would have—”
“Just accept the damn compliment, Doc.”
She sank into a grateful curtsy, but Zander caught her chin.
“You’re kind,” he said, “not humble. So don’t pretend with me.” Lightly, he brushed his thumb over her jaw and smiled into her startled eyes.
“Good night, m’lady.”