Diamond Star (3 page)

He rode upstairs with Mac in a bronzed lift. While Del looked around, intrigued by all the metal, Mac fooled with his wrist comm. Del had never understood why so many people were willing to carry mesh systems on their wrists, clothes, in their bodies, everywhere. It made him queasy, as if they were all turning into robots.

"Craig should be here," Mac muttered. A blue light flickered on the wrist-mesh.

"Maybe he's already upstairs," Del said.

"Maybe. The AI should have known, though." Mac looked up. "No messages from him."

The lift abruptly opened into a corridor with gold light for walls. Mac motioned Del forward.

"This is pretty," Del said as they walked past the shimmering holo-curtains. "Bizarre, but attractive in its own soulless way."

Mac smiled wryly. "Said like a true undercity cynic." He ushered Del through a light-curtain and into a small room. The upper half of the wall across from them consisted of a window. A control strip ran along its bottom edge, crammed with switches, screens, and lights, none of which Del understood. Mac ignored the wonderland of tech-mech equipment and strode to the window. Joining him, Del studied the room beyond. Set half a level below this booth, it had blue walls that glowed. More strange equipment was stacked or strewn everywhere.

"Damn," Mac said.

"You don't like the room?" Del asked.

"I was hoping Craig would be in it." He glanced at Del. "I have to comm him, but I don't want the Prime-Nova producer who's going to audition him to overhear that he's AWOL. I'll be down the hall. If anyone comes in, just say I'll be right back."

Mischief stirred in Del. "If you leave me alone, I could go to the starport." He would actually rather watch the audition, but he couldn't resist baiting his military-approved babysitter.

"You can't sneak out of the building," Mac growled. "Not past me. But if you try, I'm damn well never taking you anywhere again."

"Go on," Del said good-naturedly. "I'll wait. I want to look at these panels."

"Don't touch anything." With that, Mac strode out.

Del wandered around, trying to figure out the equipment. He wished he knew more about music here. He wanted to leave Earth because he was tired of the aggravating people holding him in custody, but he had no huge desire to go home.

He did miss his nephews. As much as he loved them, though, they were better off without him. He pushed away the thought, burying it with all the other painful memories he kept locked away within his heart.

Ricki Varento was always prompt. As a top producer at Prime-Nova, she had no time to be late. Or sick. Or anything else that interfered in her immensely satisfying work. She molded platinum out of slag and did the best job in the industry. She created stars. Hell, novas. If the basic material didn't glow, well, by the time she finished with them, most blazed like flipping fire-poppers. And bah on anyone who laughed at the way she talked.

Today Mac Tyler was bringing his latest slag. His clients sometimes even had talent. All too often, though,
talent
translated into temperamental. Ricki would break out in hives if one more petulant singer complained he was an
arteest
, thank you, and had no intention of "submitting to slick packaging" that cheapened his integrity or whatever. Well, hell. How did they expect the people who paid them to make money? For every pouting troublemaker, she had a hundred acts waiting for their chance. She had no time for boomallitic blasters, holo-funkers, or undercity divas. Mac knew it, and he played the game even when he didn't agree with the rules.

Some people in the industry disliked Mac on principle, because of his military background. Ricki couldn't care less. In fact, she enjoyed his company, though she never let him know, because it might give away bargaining points when they negotiated. He was good at his job, met his obligations, and showed up on time. He never laughed at how she phrased things, either, though honestly, she couldn't figure out why other people did.

If Mac brought her good prospects, she made money for Prime-Nova. More often than not, she had to turn down his clients because they lacked magnetism, beauty, or youth appeal. Beauty and youth could be arranged with enough money, though limitations existed on how much you could pretty up the slag. Talent could be faked with tech. Those acts couldn't tour worth beans, though, since their abilities consisted solely of technology.

No matter what you did with the exterior, however, innate charisma was harder to come by, some indefinable blend of traits that mesh simulations couldn't reproduce. If Mac spent more time on the aesthetics of his clients and less on their talent, he'd have more success. She suspected a bit of the
arteest
skulked under that professional veneer of his, too, but he didn't let it interfere, so she worked with him.

She stopped at a gold wall and touched a panel there. An opening shimmered in front of her and she walked through into the booth beyond. She expected to find both Mac and his client waiting, but only one person was there, a boy across the room with his back to her as he peered at a mesh panel.

Ricki paused, looking him over. Odd. He had no costume, or if he did, it was too bland to make much of an impression. He wore dark blue pants, a white shirt, and sports shoes. The overall effect wasn't bad, though. The pants clung to his legs and fit low on his hips, with a belt drawing attention to that portion of his anatomy. It was worth the attention; he had a good, tight bum and long, well formed legs. His shirt was too loose to reveal much of his physique, but what she saw, she liked. He wasn't overly bulked up with muscles, and he didn't look like he had any fat, either. In the holo-rock scene, thinner worked just fine.

His hair surprised her. Mainstream artists wore it short. Quite frankly, that buzzed-off style was getting old, and it had never made sense to Ricki for rock stars to look like military officers, anyway. This guy could pull off the longer style. The color of his tousled curls was just strange enough to work, like red wine streaked by the sun. The streaks looked natural, but they were obviously some weird genetic tattoo, because they had a metallic cast. Interesting. In fact, the effect was gorgeous.

Ricki folded her arms and tapped her finger against her chin. If his face matched the rest of him, she could work with this one. Maybe Mac was finally getting the aesthetics part straight. Hell, if the kid had a little talent, he could go a long way. Of course, that assumed the rest of him looked as good as what she could see. Time to find out.

"Hello," Ricki said.

The guy jumped, turned with a start--

And smiled.

Holy mother shit.
He had an angel's face. Big, bedroom eyes and eyelashes luxuriant enough to make a woman jealous. He had done something to make them sparkle. But he didn't look feminine, oh no, not this one. He did have that androgynous quality that worked so well for male holo-rockers who could pull it off. The kid was a well-put-together package. Maybe she ought to offer him a contract so she could take him out, get him drunk, and take him home to find out what he could do with those full, pouting lips.

"Hello," he said.

"Hmmm." Ricki walked over, cool and slow, and he watched her with a warmth she recognized. She had on a white tunic that barely came to mid-thigh, white tights, heels, and not much else. She had no objection to him viewing the scenery; she had purchased the best body that cosmetic biosculpting could provide.

She kept her voice professional. "Are you with Mac?"

"Yes, that is right." He shifted his weight self-consciously, his hips moving with a sensual tilt she doubted he realized. She had long ago learned to sum up clients and intuit how much of their behavior came naturally. This one wasn't acting. He seemed unaware of his own body.

"Mac, he have call on comm," he said. "He come soon."

Ricki noticed two things immediately, one good, the other bad. His voice had a deep, sultry resonance; if he could sing that way, she had even more to work with. But he had a heavy accent. Sexy, yeah, but if he couldn't enunciate clearly, they had a problem. She couldn't place the accent, though it sounded French. Or maybe Irish. Or Swedish. Hell, who knew?

"Is something wrong?" he asked.

"No, nothing." She offered her hand. "I'm Ricki Varento."

"Del," he said. "Del Valdoria." If her name meant anything to him, he gave no sign.

Valdoria. It didn't sound familiar, but she hadn't had time to look over the bio Mac had sent her. Del's hesitation before he shook her hand told her volumes. The gesture didn't come naturally. Huh. Even if he came from someplace where they didn't shake hands, he ought to know the custom, unless he had hidden on a farm in the middle of nowhere all his life. She liked his grip, though: firm, confident. The strong muscles in his hand were unexpectedly erotic. Except they didn't feel quite right. She glanced down--

What the . . . ? He had a
hinge
in his hand.

A memory jumped out at Ricki, the image of the knife scar on the hand of her mother's boyfriend, the man who had lived with them for a year when Ricki was eight. The scar had run down the back of his ugly-assed hand the same way this hinge thing ran down the back of Del's. She dropped his hand with a jerk.

Del was watching her face closely. He lifted his arm, showing her the hinge. "This part of me, it intends . . . what is the word? It is meant to make better my hand. My ancestors, they design it." He folded his hand in lengthwise, from his knuckles to his wrist.

"That's, uh, fine." Ricki knew perfectly well he wasn't going to hit her with his damn hand. But she didn't want to talk about that scarlike hinge, look at it, even think about it.

She said only, "You aren't from Earth?"

He lowered his arm. "Not Earth. A planet called Lyshriol."

She had never heard of it. "Is it a colony?"

"Just a few hundred thousand people. Farmers mostly."

Well, jumping Josephine. He
was
a farm boy, and from some offworld dump to boot. She didn't know whether to be fascinated by him or irritated with Mac for bringing her the best-looking prospect she had seen in years and not preparing him for a major audition. Most clients would have been alert the moment she came in. They would have gone into their best game, trying to impress her with their professionalism and appeal. They would have offered their holo-shots and a vid detailing their experience. Farm boy here hadn't even recognized her. He acted as if he couldn't care less.

Had Mac set this up on purpose? It sent an audacious message:
We don't even have to try.
This kid had better be good, or she was going to be annoyed. And irritating Ricki Varento was a good way to crash and shatter in this business.

"You're a long way from the farm," she said.

"Never far enough," he answered in a low voice.

Interesting response. "So did you bring your music?" She didn't normally ask, but given how unprepared this guy seemed, who knew what he had with him?

For a moment, he looked startled. Then he tapped a ticker on his belt. "Here, yes, I bring music."

"Great." She gave him one of her high-wattage smiles and motioned at the studio below the window. "Let's hear what you can do."

"Just like that?" he asked. "I can go down?"

"Yeah, sure." Ricki held back her frown. The kid didn't come across as stupid, but his inexperience was obvious. Either Mac was losing his edge or else he was playing hardball at a level he had never done with her before.

She pointed the lift out to Del, then stood and watched while he left the booth. The lift hummed and a moment later he walked into the mesh-tech studio below. Greg Tong must have been waiting in the cockpit, because as soon as Del appeared, Greg opened a door across the room and walked in. He hadn't turned on the audio feed to the booth, so Ricki couldn't hear them, but Greg was plainly introducing himself. Although she could have switched on the audio, it intrigued her to watch their body language. Del seemed relaxed and curious, not keyed up the way most artists were before an audition of this magnitude.

Greg took the ticker from Del and went to the wall where the michaels, bobs, and janes hung. After choosing a bronzed mike, he brought it over to Del. And that was it. Greg returned to the control room they called the cockpit and closed the door.

Ricki flicked on the line to the cockpit. "Greg?"

"Heya," he said.

"What was that all about?"

"I asked him what he needed when he sang, what configurations, all that. The usual." He snorted a laugh. "You wouldn't believe what he told me."

"Try me," Ricki said.

" 'Nothing.' Just play the music on his ticker."

"That's it?" What was Mac doing, wasting her time with someone who wasn't ready? She was tempted to tell Del to forget it. She had worked with Mac a long time, though. For the sake of that relationship, she would give this kid a few minutes.

"What's he going to sing?" she asked.

"I don't know." The comm crackled the way it did when Greg shook his head and his hair brushed the oversized collar of those metallic shirts he wore. "He's going to, uh, warm up."

"Well, hell." Ricki couldn't believe this. "He couldn't be bothered to warm up before his audition?"

"Can't say. It's not like he doesn't know what he's doing. He isn't nervous at all. It's weird."

"Why does he need a mike? The studio can pick up his voice."

"He wanted something to hold."

"Huh." Ricki didn't care if he wanted a michael, mike, or mic as it was historically called, after the antique word microphone. Added to everything else, though, it didn't help her opinion of him.

Down in the studio, Del flicked on the mike. "Hello?" His voice rumbled with a sultry quality. It sounded good even when Ricki was pissed off.

She put a comm in her ear that linked to the cockpit so she and Greg could converse without Del overhearing. Then she switched on the audio to the studio below where Del waited. "Go ahead and start," she said.

Del looked up with a jerk, then glanced around, obviously trying to figure out where her voice came from. Ricki swore under her breath.