Chapter Two
BRYN
The music hits me first, then the overpowering and all too familiar perfume.
Fan-fucking-tastic. Eighteen hours on a plane, first class or not, and I'm shattered. Too tired to deal with Mia Jordan; heiress, airhead and girl I still feel obliged to watch over.
I head to the source of the noise and grab the remote to kill the music playing in the lounge of my London apartment. Almost instantly, Mia appears dressed in a tiny black crop top and pink shorts that barely cover her ass. Mia's brown hair is piled on her head and, for once, face clean of make-up.
“Bryn!” She covers her naked face with her hands
“Why are you here?”
“You said I could if I needed to.” She peeks through her fingers. “Tammy was being such a bitch and I couldn't stay with her; she said some really mean things and I don't know where to go because I don't want to go home to the States and I didn't think you'd mind and...” My eyes glaze over at Mia's ramble, seriously not caring why she's here, just wishing she wasn't.
“You can't stay here.”
“Please? I'll look after you, like, do stuff in the house.”
Did she seriously just flutter her eyelashes at me?
“Do stuff? You can't even cook, Mia!”
“I can order food.”
Mia's rat of a dog appears, walks straight past me, and lifts its leg to pee on the leg of the low coffee table.
“What the
fuck
is that doing here?”
“Oh! Phoenix! You naughty boy!”
Phoenix?
Mia scoops up rat dog and proceeds to scold it like a child, using a stupid voice. The long-suffering animal stares blankly back. “He's my baby; he has to be with me!”
I slump onto the sofa and stare at the ceiling. “Book into a hotel, Mia. I'm too tired for this.”
“Bryn, please.” Her voice enters whine mode. “I promise I'll keep out of your way. And it's getting late; I can't go now.”
“How long have you been here?”
“A couple of days.”
I eye the magazines and clothes strewn around the lounge room. “A couple of days?”
Mia puts Phoenix on the carpet and begins to gather the offending items. “I wasn't expecting you back. I thought you'd gone to Austria.”
“Australia.” My stomach lurches as Hannah climbs into my tired head.
“Oh. That's a long way, isn't it?”
“Exactly, so I'm tired and want to be on my own.”
At my gruff tone, Mia pauses and carefully places her pile of clothes on a nearby chair. “Are you okay, Bryn?” A moment later, she's on the sofa next to me, holding my large hand in her taloned one. “Did something happen? You look so sad.”
This surprises me. Mia never asks how people are, lost in her ditzy world of money and the famous. “I'm tired,” I repeat.
“You're upset. You shouldn't be on your own. Did the girl you go to see hurt you?” She strokes my hand as if soothing a child.
“What girl?” I snap.
“I don't know, just guessing.” She touches my cheek with her small hand and I jerk my head away. “Let me stay and look after you.” She smiles encouragingly. Okay, not concern for my welfare but for hers.
The room spins with jet lag and my bed calls. I can't deal with Mia blackmail right now; fuck knows what I might agree to. I'll tackle this later.
“You know what, Mia? Stay. I'll talk to you tomorrow about what to do, but you and that thing can't stay here for long.”
Rat dog now sits on the chair opposite, staring at me as if I'm the one with no right to be here.
Why didn't I take my key off Mia last time she left?
****
“And you say I'm too nice!” Liam throws a magazine at me across the large dining table.
“What? What did I do?”
In an attempt to focus on something else, the following weekend, I accept Liam's offer of Sunday lunch, a bizarre ritual I'd never thought possible. Liam and Cerys with his soon-to-be stepdaughter, Ella. Happy families.
“I'm surprised Cerys reads these kind of magazines,” I remark, leafing through the glossy pages of beauty product ads, and pictures of the stars who lie about using them. “Why are you showing me this?”
“They're Emily's.” Emily, Ella's nanny, isn't around and neither is Ella. “Keep looking.”
Toward the back is a spread of the week's celebrity news: who's doing what (or who) as evidenced by the latest paparazzi pictures. In one shot, Mia is leaving my house, dark sunglasses, head bowed with rat dog in the pink designer bag she carries the bloody thing around in.
The accompanying text reads:
'Bryn Hughes on again, off again affair with heiress Mia Jordan looks like it's on again
!'
Next to that picture is a shot of me and her. I trawl my memories of the last couple of weeks and can't remember going anywhere with Mia in public. Holding the magazine closer, I study the shot.
“That's from last year!”
“So she isn't living with you?” asks Liam.
“No, I mean, yes. The second picture. That's from last year and it's cropped! You guys were with me, too!”
Liam ignores me. “Mia Jordan is living with you?
Again
? Why?”
“Kind of. Not 'with me', she's staying in one of the spare bedrooms while she sorts her shit out.”
“Hmm. Good luck with that. Don't you remember how long it took to get her to leave last time?”
Unfortunately, yes.
“Okay, I'm a soft touch. She keeps crying every time I suggest she goes.”
“Ah, Bryn, man...” Liam shakes his head. “Can't you see what she's doing?”
“What?”
“Look at the picture. She's pretending to hide herself from the press.”
“But she doesn't need to hide; nothing's going on between us.”
“Exactly! But she's making it look like there's something to hide. She wants the world to think you're together.”
“Oh, fuck.”
Liam laughs. “Yeah, oh, fuck.”
Ella and Emily appear through the kitchen door, Ella running up to Liam and planting a kiss on his head. A shaggy white dog follows and Emily bends down to unclip the lead, brown hair falling across her face.
“Hey, Bryn. How are you?” she asks.
“Dating an heiress apparently.”
Emily smiles. “I read about that. Are you?”
“Seriously?”
“You're a rock star, Bryn. It's expected.”
“I'm not interested in Mia!”
“Well, you know the answer,” says Liam and stands. “Get her to leave and find another chick. Or find another chick anyway, so Mia gets the message. I'm sure it won't be too hard. Be right back.”
“Fancy being my fake girlfriend?” I ask Emily and I'm half-serious.
Tall, slender, with long, long legs, Emily’s one of those girls who attract men without trying. Pretty girls can enhance themselves with the right image and attitude, but will always be outshone by naturally beautiful girls who don’t realise they are, like Emily. Unfortunately, she’s in her late teens like Mia and a great kid, but not on my radar. Too young, for a start,
“Sorry, Bryn, you're not my type.” I open my mouth to retort but she's biting her lip in barely disguised amusement.
“Oh, yeah, I hear you prefer actors.”
Her face loses the amusement. “From who?”
I was teasing but now I'm intrigued. “Nobody. But I think you have a secret.”
“I do not!” An increasingly flustered Emily takes her magazine from the table, a hint of pink on her pale cheeks.
“Is there one you like? I can introduce you if you want.” I point at the magazine. “Cas whatshisname. He's popular. You met him?”
“No! I'm not interested in famous people and I doubt they'd be interested in me!”
Methinks the lady doth protest too much
. Has Emily hooked up with an actor? As nanny of a Blue Phoenix member, Emily’s in the right job if she’s looking to hook up with somebody famous, although I’d never pin the sweet, politely spoken girl as somebody to get into the messed-up world of celebrity.
I shrug. “Fair enough.”
A look crosses Emily's face and I can't figure out what, like I said something to hurt her. I give her one of my grins and she scurries off almost knocking into Liam on the way past.
“Beer?” The question is a formality as two bottles appear on the table in front of me. “So, what's up?”
“What do you mean?”
“Everything okay?” Liam opens both bottles and discards the metal tops.
“Yeah, why?”
“Who're you bringing to the wedding? Mia?”
“Fuck, no!” I pause and drink. “Has Cerys got any decent looking friends?
Liam purses his lips in amusement. “Best man and the bridesmaid?”
“Anybody would do right now,” I say gruffly.
“Whoa. That's not like you. Mr. Secretive Nice Guy.”
“Maybe I’m pissed off with being the nice guy; it doesn't work.”
“Work at what?”
“Being happy. Forget it.”
The smell of roast dinner fills the kitchen, reminding me of family Sundays; and as I sit in the warmth of Liam's kitchen, my heart aches again. I chased this dream too, but I was looking in the wrong fucking place. Why the hell can't I accept what happened and get Hannah out of my head?
Chapter Three
BRYN
Every time this girl turns the waterworks on, I cave. What the fuck is wrong with me?
Mia hugs the dog to her chest, mascara streaking down her cheeks in silent distress.
I run a hand through my hair. “Mia, please. I need my space.”
“But you have so much room, please, Bryn. I can't move until I've found the right place and I don't want to move into a hotel! Not when it's almost Christmas!” She sniffs delicately, rubbing at an eye with one finger.
“What do you mean 'the right place'?”
“None of the apartments I look at are right. I really want to move to Mayfair; it's closer to everything.”
“I thought you said you were going back to the States?”
“Not until the auditions for the new seasons start. I've spoken to my agent and she's found me loads! This year might be my big break! There's this one show planned about a girl who...”
“Wait. What? Aren't you looking for a recording contract?”
Mia waves her hand. “Singing, acting, modelling, I don't care. But since Daddy's new wife decided to be a bitch, he's not helping me anymore. I'm not even going home for Christmas. I hate them!”
The tears stream again and I wish she hadn't mentioned her family. Mia's family is friends with Steve and became mine, too. When Blue Phoenix started out, Mia's mum, Trudy, took the confused teens under her wing and helped us navigate the new world we were thrust into. In LA, we slept in spare rooms at their house.
Trudy ran a PR company and was not to be messed with, had a major reputation as being good at what she did, and she was. She refused to PR for us or get too involved in case it ruined her friendship with Steve, but Trudy smoothed over a lot of our fuck ups that could've hit the press. In a weird way, this Hollywood shaped woman who looked half her age became a surrogate mum to the immature, eighteen-year-old rock stars. I had the hardest time leaving Wales and my family, so I became the closest to her.
Her husband, Frank, was a businessman, who made his money through a successful transport company, and between them, they rolled in wealth and spoilt their little girl, Mia.
Trudy died of breast cancer three years ago, devastating her family. At that point, the rest of the guys didn't have anything to do with the family anymore, but I'd stayed in touch and the grief hit me too. Mia was already going off the rails and had her dad wrapped around her finger, the fifteen-year-old who had everything decided it wasn't enough and needed more.
Before she died, Trudy asked me to keep an eye on Mia, made me promise to keep her safe the way she kept an eye on me early on in my career. Of course, I agreed but never thought I'd need to. Unfortunately, Mia's life of hanging around the rich and famous wasn't enough; she wanted more – her own fame.
Since then, Mia has jumped from project to project, using Frank's endless stream of money. In the last year, this involved a fledgling singing career and Steve passing UK guardianship of the naïve eighteen-year-old to me. Always me, soft touch Bryn with nothing better to do.
What I didn't bank on was Mia's growing obsession with the band, notably with me as the one single member. I don't think she's attempting to make the world think we're a couple for mercenary reasons. She's immature and selfish, unable to accept it will never happen.
Maybe I have sympathy because of my own inability to accept when something isn't going to happen.
So, the promise I made to a dying woman and my too fucking nice-ness perpetually leaves me in Mia's life.
“You need to get rid of the dog then,” I say.
“Nooo!” Like a child with a favourite doll, Mia hugs the animal to her chest. “Please, only a couple more weeks.”
Couple of weeks?
Knowing I'm done for, I shake my head. “Okay, but Mia...” She straightens, smiling expectantly through her panda face. “Can you please stop walking around the house half-naked? I am not interested. At all. You are too young and not my type.”
I've lost count of the number of times I've bumped into a lingerie-clad Mia at night, who's hoping to arouse more than just my interest. Yeah, she's a sexy girl but I've known her since she was ten and that memory of her supersedes the attraction. I have four sisters; she's like a fifth in some ways, or a cousin. Not a girl I want in my bed.
Mia bites her lip coyly. “Okay, sorry, I didn't think it bothered you like that.”
“It doesn't bother me like
that
, which is why your plan won't work.” I sigh. “And you need to tell people we're not a couple and stop with the smug-faced 'I'm not telling'. They don't listen to me when I deny we are.”
Apparently unable to hear me any longer, Mia stands with her dog, raining kisses across the poor animal's snout.
“Mia?”
“Fine,” she replies but I don't believe her. At all. “What about the wedding?”
“What about it?”
“Liam and Cerys's wedding is next week. Who are you taking?”
“Not you.” Mia's face falls and I temper my tone. “I just told you why. I don't want the world thinking we're together.”
“I can tell people we're not! Please! I'd literally
die
to go to the wedding.”
“It's not upmarket, Mia. Very understated.”
She wrinkles her nose. “I guess it would be. I mean, they're not very ... you know.”
“No. Enlighten me.”
“Like...” I watch as Mia attempts to find words that won't sound insulting. “They're not very star-like.”
I shake my head in disbelief. “The wedding will not be your thing.”
Mia pulls a tissue from a nearby box and continues to wipe at her streaked face. “I just thought... if the girl from Austria wasn't going with you...”
“Australia. And there's no girl, please keep out of my business, Mia,” I say tersely.
“You should find yourself a girl.”
“Like I said, that girl won't be you and keep out of my business.”
Pissed off she's dragged the spectre of Hannah up after three weeks of trying to push her away in my mind, I stand and head to the kitchen. Grabbing a carton of orange juice from the fridge, I rest against the counter and drink without pouring into a glass.
I'm damn happy for Liam and Cerys, but I'm not looking forward to the wedding. They're perfect for each other and Liam's a different guy around her, relaxed, happy, like he's found what was missing in his life. Dylan and Sky, they're happy too. It won't be long before they're married I'll bet. Fuck knows what's going on with Jem and Ruby and their on/off whatever the hell they call it, but they’re solid.
Everything's changing and I'm still here waiting for my past to catch up, investing my time in other people so I don't have to confront my own emotions. Look at Liam and Cerys, kept apart for years and they weren't even as close as me and Hannah.
I'd kill to have Hannah with me, and take her to the wedding. When I last visited her in Australia, I was going to suggest to Hannah she should come. I intended to ask Hannah to step into my life, so I could show how Cerys and Liam aren't pursued with the same rabid fervour as Jem and Dylan, and she’d be safe with me. Hannah could sneak into the Blue Phoenix world while the spotlight was on others.
Instead, we're over and I'm best man at a wedding I know will depress me.
Not that anybody will notice.
Mia. Hannah. What the hell am I doing? I’m pining over Hannah who doesn't care; she fucked with my head and I need her out of my system. Mia’s taking advantage of me being such a soft touch and I need her out of my house. No more girls walking over Bryn Hughes. Next girl I meet, I use the fame to my advantage because it’s about time a chick fell at my rock star feet. Then the girl after that. And the next. Fuck being the nice guy.