CHAPTER 10

ALICIA

My eyes were burning, and my feet were aching in my heels. There was certainly something to be said for power heels, but it wasn’t necessarily that they were comfortable. I’d been running around all day between my office and Gerry’s, and I was definitely ready to call it a day.

Carefully rubbing my eyes so that I wouldn’t get makeup smeared all over my face, I powered down my computer and got my things together to go home. I’d been given an office in Gerry’s building since I was working on Destitute alone as a client, and he insisted on having it that way. Having the whole team together was one of Gerry’s quirks.

While I wasn’t a fan of the traffic and nearly hour-long commute, the view from his building was definitely worth it. My office was on the ocean side of the building, filled with natural light, and it had a stellar view of the Pacific Ocean.

In keeping with the rest of the building, the floors and walls were a light wood, and my desk was a glass monstrosity with a state-of-the-art computer sitting on top of it. After clearing and storing all the paperwork that had been strewn across it from working on it all day, my heels clicked as I crossed my office and shut my door behind me. I headed into the elevator.

It had been a long week, and I didn’t feel at all guilty for leaving a little earlier than usual. The press and the fans alike were starting to go gaga for the new Destitute album, and while that meant that my hype campaign was going well, it also meant more work. A lot more.

A dull, digital ding signaled the arrival of the elevator car on the parking level of the building, and the doors slid open soundlessly to deposit me in the garage. I was very much looking forward to getting home, pouring myself a nice glass of wine, and spending the evening relaxing.

All was well in the world of Destitute. I just hoped that it stayed that way and that the boys didn’t mess up my plan to relax a little. My first meeting with them had gone surprisingly well, and I was already starting to get a good feel for each of them, but that didn’t mean that I trusted them not to make my life difficult this weekend.

My little red Audi was parked on the far end of the lot, near the exit. She’d been a present to myself when I landed my first big client, and although she was a couple of years old now, she still represented success to me.

When she came into full view, my heart sank and beat faster at the same time. I picked up my pace and rushed over to her. The smell of eggs permeated my nostrils, and sure enough, the concrete around my car was littered in shells.

What the hell? Someone egged my car?

My hands were trembling as I walked all the way around her. There was no permanent damage, for which I was grateful, but her gleaming body was covered in goo, and fury was grabbing hold of my veins and shooting through my body.

I didn’t know who would do something like this. It was both immature and unwarranted, and I couldn’t think of a single thing that I’d done that could have elicited a reaction like this.

My tired eyes and aching feet were forgotten as I hurried to the security office situated in the lobby, determined to get to the bottom of this. I knew that every inch of the building was covered by security cameras, and I would soon know who was responsible for the minor act of vandalism to my car.

Once I knew who it was, I hoped that they were ready for a serious tongue lashing and to live with the consequences of what they’d done because I was calling the police for sure. I wouldn’t have if my time here hadn’t been so short still, but I knew that if I let this go, then the possibility existed that people would think I was soft and that they could mess with me.

They couldn’t. And I was going to make sure that they knew it.

By the time I reached the security office, I was seeing red and buzzing with rage. I swiped my key card, waited for the green light to flash, and the lock to click before bursting into the office.

“Miss Diamond?” a security guard with arms that resembled tree trunks and a shaved head that shone under the harsh lights asked, a confused frown marring his features. “Is there a problem?”

“Yes, there’s a problem,” I snapped, then tried to control my temper. It was highly unlikely that he was the perpetrator, and he didn’t deserve to have my anger taken out on him. He wasn’t a bad guy. His name was George, and he’d helped me get set up with my access cards when I first started.

After taking a deep breath to control my tone, I told him what I needed. “I’m parked in space number twenty nine, and I want to see the security feed for the last few hours.”

Crossing the trunks over his broad chest, his adamant, obsidian eyes met mine. “I’m afraid I can’t do that. You’re not cleared to give that order, our policies say—”

I tapped my foot in irritation, and my hands flew to my hips. “I don’t give a damn what the policies say. I want to see that footage, and I want to see it now.”

“You might want to, but that doesn’t mean that I can allow it,” he said, not moving or giving an inch.

I took a step closer to him and jabbed my finger in the air, my eyes narrowing. “You can allow it, and you will, because my car got vandalized on your watch, and I’m pretty sure that those precious policies of yours won’t protect you from getting fired under the circumstances. You’re responsible for the security of this premises, and you’ve failed dismally in that task today.”

George took one more look at my reddened face which, from the feel of the heat in it, was about the same shade as a traffic cone, but I didn’t care. Then he wheeled his chair over to the bank of screens housed on the other side of his office.

“What happened?” He started tapping on buttons, and soon, the center screen showed my vehicle. I breathed a heavy sigh of relief. I had no idea whether he would actually have gotten fired here, but I knew that he would at some of the other places that I’d worked. Now that he was cooperating, I worked hard to let the rage boil back down to a simmer.

“My car got egged, if you can believe it,” I told him, walking up to stand behind him where I would have a good view of the incident.

George frowned and sped up the footage of the last few hours. “Are you serious? Here?”

“Yes, George.” Why else would I have been asking to see the footage? He might not be a bad guy, but he definitely wasn’t the sharpest tack in the box.

“Okay, there.” Pointing to a tall figure, dressed in all black and wearing a ski mask of all things, George glanced at me a couple of minutes after we’d started searching, and we both turned our attention to the screens.

The figure on screen was carrying a basket of sorts and walked right up to my car before it started flinging the eggs at it. There was no hesitation, no targeting of any other car, and it was clear that the vandalism was aimed at me from the deliberate movements of the figure.

It hadn’t been an accident that it was my car that was egged. An exasperated sigh escaped me. I still couldn’t think of anything that I’d done to deserve this. I was confused as hell as I stared at whoever that was. A hoodie was pulled up over their head, and the ski mask completely hid their face.

All that I could see was that the person was lean and tall.

About Jared’s height, actually. I shoved the thought away to deal with later.

“Please, don’t call the police,” George begged, his eyes wide as he stared up at me. “I’m certain to lose my job if you do.”

Frustration, irritation, and confusion mingled and formed nauseating knots in my stomach. “What do you mean? This might only have been a minor infraction, but it’s still a crime, and crime needs to be reported.”

“I understand that, and I respect the system, but like you said, it was a minor infraction, and it doesn’t look like there was any lasting damage to your car. It’s just that getting them involved means I get fired, and I really need this job.”

“It’s not like you’re the person who did this, George. I’m sure you’ll only need to give a statement to the police, and then we’ll both be done with it.”

George shook his head, his eyes pleading for my understanding. “No, it’s not that simple. A guy I know was contracted by a recording label once, and one of the client’s cars got vandalized. Shaving cream had been wiped all over it. My buddy got the police involved, and long story short, he ended up getting fired because of the negative attention that was drawn to both the label and the star.”

Hands on my hips, I sucked in a deep breath and exhaled a long sigh, contemplating my options. Sure, I didn’t want to appear soft, and I didn’t want to open myself up to being the target of more incidents like this, but I also didn’t really want George to lose his job over it.

At the end of the day, the reality was that his livelihood by far trumped my paint job. I could get my car detailed to protect it. George would have a much harder time finding a new job. Mind made up, I let my hands drop to my sides.

“Fine, I won’t call the police, but I want you combing through the footage of every inch of the building, and I want to know if you find anything that shows the perpetrator before the hoodie and the ski mask came on.”

George nodded enthusiastically and held both of his thumbs up, the relief evident in his wide smile. “Will do. If we’ve got anything that shows who did this, I will find it.”

“Thanks, George. I’m going to take my car to get detailed. Call me if you find anything.”

Leaving George to do his job, I headed out, and after calling ahead to inform the professional detailer that I used that I was on my way, I started playing back the footage in my mind. There was no doubting that the figure who’d vandalized my car was around Jared’s height, and while I wasn’t sure exactly why he would’ve done it, a guy like him might do something like that just for shits and giggles. Maybe he’d gotten bored at the studio or something and decided to prank me.

The traffic light at the end of the street turned red as I considered Jared’s possible motives, and once I came to a complete stop, I pulled out my phone and called up his number. My thumb hovered over the green button for a second, but then I punched down on it.

A couple of rings later, Jared answered, and his slurry voice flowed through the speakers in my car. He was quite obviously drunk.

“Alicia, this is a surprise. What can I do for you, baby?”

“I’m not your baby. That was real mature, what you did today.” My voice dripped with sarcasm, and it was a couple of octaves louder than it should have been. “What were you thinking?”

Jared paused for a beat, but he seemed beyond confused when he finally answered my question. “What do you mean, what was I thinking? And what was so immature this time?”

“Cut the crap, Jared. You know exactly what I’m talking about.”

“No. I really don’t. I’m wracking my brain over here, but I honestly don’t know why you’re yelling at me right now.” Genuine confusion marred his tone, but I knew what I’d seen.

“My car got egged.”

“Okay, sucks for you, but what the fuck does that have to do with me?” He sounded even more confused now, but it very well might have been an act.

“I went back to the security footage, and a hooded figure wearing a ski mask was responsible for egging it. Said figure also just so happened to be about your height, and since we just talked about your lack of maturity a couple of days ago, I have no doubt that you would be capable of doing something like this.”

Jared had the audacity to chuckle, and it ramped up my irritation about a hundred notches, but his response gave me pause. “I admit that I’m immature sometimes, and that I’m right about in the middle of getting lit right now, but even I realize that I’m not the only person who frequents that building who is my height. Hell, all the guys in the band are just about my height.”

“Yeah, but I didn’t just have an argument about their maturity with them, now did I?”

“How would I know? Point is, it wasn’t me. If I wanted to mess with you, or anyone else for that matter, I wouldn’t hide my identity.”

His confusion had given way to amusement, and the more he talked, the more his amusement was stroking the irritation in my belly. “I don’t know why you do half the things you do, so maybe you just hid your identity to annoy me even further.”

If that had been his intention, he’d definitely achieved his objective. His chuckles were turning into laughter, tightening the knots in my stomach. “I’m the Emperor—”

I cut him off immediately. “Spare me the Emperor of Rock bullshit.”

“It’s not bullshit,” he whined, still laughing. “But since you’ve had an unfortunate afternoon, I’ll save it for now. What I was trying to say anyway was that if I want to annoy people, I annoy them openly. If you don’t believe me, look me up on YouTube. There are thousands of videos posted of the pranks I’ve pulled over the years, and you won’t find one where I’ve even attempted to hide who I was.”

“If it wasn’t you, who was it then?”

“It was probably just some stupid kid,” he suggested, his flippant arrogance so complete that I was actually starting to believe him.

“Fine, you’re off the hook for now, but I’m telling you, Jared, if I find out this was you, they’re going to hear about it all the way to Timbuktu.”

Booming laughter flowed through the speakers, and despite my best efforts and extremely high levels of irritation, the corners of my lips were desperately trying to twitch up at the sound of it.

“Bring it on. I’m not afraid of anything, definitely not of a tiny little slip of a thing like you, and since I know that I didn’t do this, there really is nothing for you to yell at me about. I can think of much better ways to get you screaming—”

I groaned out loud and interrupted him. “That’s enough. I’m pulling up to the detailer’s now so I need to get off the phone.”

“But there are so many more fun ways to get off than that.”

“Oh my God, Jared. I’m hanging up now.” I didn’t wait for a response before I did exactly what I’d told him I was going to do.

After I’d explained to the lady checking the cars in what had happened, I handed over my keys and settled in for the wait, still thinking about what Jared said about the videos of his pranks on YouTube. Without really thinking about it, I opened the app on my phone and typed in “Jared Larsen prank.”

He was right. There were thousands of videos of him getting up to all sorts of things, and as I watched him doing stupid things and causing trouble, I couldn’t help but laugh every once in a while. There were videos where he was sneaking everything from a plastic snake to a donkey into people’s dressing rooms, usually things it was public knowledge they were afraid of.

I watched as he talked a popular talk show host into starting a water balloon fight with him at a festival, but he’d filled his with paint. He called out several interviewers by asking them such personal questions about things that had recently leaked about them that my cheeks heated just watching it.

He spray painted “Always #2” on a rival band’s tour bus and got in a fight over switching out a tape of a new music video that was being premiered with a sex tape of the same artist. Some of the videos were funny, while others made me cringe, but they all had one thing in common: Jared never hid his face. Not when he was messing with celebrities or band mates or fans. He certainly wouldn’t bother to hide it from me.