Diva (Ironclad Bodyguards Book 2) (28 page)

She’d write an email. He preferred emails, and she’d for sure cry if he rejected her over the phone. She’d share her feelings and leave the rest up to him. She had to hurry, because the Sacramento EDM Fest was just a couple of days away.

Lola M. Reynolds

([email protected])

July 6 11:15 AM

Dear Ransom,

I hope you’re doing great in Vegas. I’m writing belatedly to thank you for your gift, and to thank you for coming to L.A. last week. I’m sorry I flipped out and stormed off. Even though I changed a lot after Barcelona, my inner diva still flares up sometimes, and I behave like a jackass. I don’t have any excuses.

But I regret it now, because I would have liked to spend more time with you. I miss seeing you. I know you’re busy but I’m doing this huge set on Friday at the Sacramento EDM Festival (flyer attached.) I know you LOVE EDM MUSIC more than anything in the world. Ha. Maybe not. But please, if you can, come to Sacramento. I’ll make sure you’re on the list to get backstage. Maybe you can stand by the stairs the way you used to. And maybe, if you felt like it, we could get some coffee afterward…

She wrote more, then deleted more, then simply signed it with her name and pressed Send. God, she hoped the email made sense. She hoped she wasn’t being ridiculous or childish.

She really, really hoped he showed up.

*

Ransom didn’t quit
Ironclad because Caleb ratted him out to the management. On the contrary, there hadn’t been any blowback from his meeting with Lola in the Vanguard lobby, even though Caleb had seen enough to ask some serious questions.

No, Ransom quit Ironclad because Lola never gave him enough lead time to be where he needed to be. She’d invited him to come see her show and he wasn’t going to disappoint her, even if she seemed to have no concept of necessary travel time between Sacramento and Las Vegas.

The bodyguarding was just a job. He could get another one. He could take five years off and not run out of money. Would five years be enough to get Lola out of his system? Would she mature enough in five years to realize she’d be better off with some younger guy?

Maybe. Maybe not. Of more pressing urgency: How was he going to get to fucking Sacramento in time for her festival set? He’d told her he would be there, but once again, the universe conspired against him. Cancelled flight. Lost luggage. He’d had to set up a new rental car account now that he wasn’t working for Ironclad, and he never realized it took more documentation than applying for his fucking driver’s license in the first place.

By the time he worked out the rental car shit, located the festival site, and paid twenty dollars for parking a good half-mile from the actual festival grounds, Lola’s set was already underway. He knew her songs by now, knew every one of them down to the number of beats per minute. He stopped, banged his fists together, and looked back at the car in the far, far distance. His ear plugs. Damn it.

He wasn’t going back now.

As he trudged toward the entrance kiosks, kids sent him sideways glances. It hadn’t occurred to him until now that a designer suit might raise suspicion at a raver event. If only he had a neon necklace or something. If only he hadn’t worn the Ferragamo shoes.

The festival officials, a bunch of hipster college kids drunk on power, asked him three times if he had any drugs or weapons on him.

“I’m supposed to be on the backstage list for Lola—Lady Paradise,” Ransom explained. “She invited me here. I worked in Europe as her security guard.”

Another “official” sauntered over. He was about Lola’s age, with a ring in his nose and a long, braided goatee. “You got some security credentials on you?” he asked.

Out of habit, Ransom reached for his waist, where he usually clipped his badge. No longer there. Fuck. “I don’t work in security anymore,” he said.

The hipster crew exchanged glances. “Can you call someone?” Ransom asked, pointing at the head guy’s two-way radio. “I’ve been traveling since five AM to get here. She’s going to be pissed if I miss her set.”

That wasn’t a lie. Lola had a temper when she didn’t get her way, and Ransom’s own temper was surging just like Lola’s beats and drops. To his relief, the kids agreed it was a good idea to call the backstage manager. The backstage manager responded after the world’s longest five minute silence and confirmed that yes, Ransom was on the backstage access list. Thank God.

Ransom moved through the turnstile only to be stopped by the braided goatee kid with the walkie-talkie. “Uh, sir, one-day passes cost seventy-five dollars.”

“Are you fucking kidding me?” Ransom chewed the inside of his lip as he reached for his wallet, subduing the urge to rip the kid’s goatee out by the roots. He handed over his credit card and waited for them to swipe it. He then submitted to the indignity of having a skull-printed paper band affixed beside his Mont Blanc wristwatch by a girl with rainbow-painted lips.

“Can I go in now?” he asked through his teeth.

“Have fun,” said the main kid, who was damn lucky to still have his goatee.

Ransom shook off his anger and wove through the clusters of ravers dancing at the edge of the main festival field. Apparently they thought he was dressed in a suit to announce himself as a dealer, since several kids asked him, “What have you got?”

“Love,” he snapped back each time.

They nodded or flashed peace signs at that answer. These kids understood love, or at least thought they did. All of this was love and life and beats, and neon and glitter, and drugs they’d regret taking when they were older.

But his love was deeper, tempered by age and experience, and the knowledge that he’d let go of a soul mate, however different Lola might be. He looked up at the stage, at her tiny silhouette, her arms waving, her light hair bobbing to the music as she leaned over the sound console. He remembered another time, just a few months ago, when he’d followed Greg’s bald head through a similar crowd. He hadn’t had ear plugs then either.

That evening, he’d looked up at Lola and thought she was just a crazy, dumb kid.

Now, he understood her emotional complexity. He understood how her worst choices mostly came from anxiety and fear. He understood how many feelings she stuffed down in order to keep up her Lady Paradise persona. He understood she could be violent as a tornado or playful as a puppy, usually within the same half hour.

He understood that he needed to be with her—if she could forgive him for taking so long to figure that out.

He made his way toward the front, sliding into spaces and muscling through when he needed to use more force. He didn’t take much notice of the spirit hoods or glittering bindis now. He didn’t mind the reek of patchouli and sweat. He just needed to get through this crowd so he could meet her backstage the way she’d asked.
Yes, please, I want to try again, and not fuck up this time.

If he didn’t show up, she might make one of her snap decisions and cut him out of her life for good. She had security around her that could keep him out as handily as it allowed him in. One word from her, and he’d be a
persona non grata
, with no access.

No access but standing out here among thousands of other people, bathed in her light.

He moved faster, moved closer, pushing past kids who were too high to care. He could tell she was nearing the end of her set. The lights flashed faster, the beats boomed deeper, and she danced harder, waving her microphone. Then everything went silent, and he and one hundred thousand other spectators froze and looked up at her figure atop the console.

“I want to play something for you,” she said. “Can I play something for you?”

The crowd came to life again with shouts of agreement. A slow beat thumped every few seconds, as if left behind from the previous wall of sonic noise.

“You can’t dance to it,” she teased. “So maybe you’ll hate it.”

Fervent shrieks of denial greeted this warning. A group of girls to his left screamed, “We love you, Lady Paradise.”

Her head turned in their direction. He was close enough now to see her eyes, her blonde hair, her beautiful features…and the delicate silver bracelet on her wrist.

He could have yelled that he loved her too. Maybe then she would have turned to him, but she was back in motion, taking her guitar from behind the console. As soon as she sat and began to tune it, a hum spread through the crowd. When a techie carried over a mic stand, the hum rose to a roar.

“Yeah, kids.” She adjusted the mic and did a quick
check, check
. “I’m going to sing you a song. Like around a campfire, but more sparkly.”

She worked crowds so well. Her audience had gone quiet, but it was a pleased, expectant quiet. All he could see were smiles. Her smiles, their smiles, even the guy who’d brought the mic stand was standing to the side with a smile.

“I’m gonna tell you the truth.” She crossed her bare legs and cradled the guitar in her lap. “I played this for my record company and they thought it sucked. But I love it, and I love you.” Screams of adulation interrupted her speech. She yelled over the noise to finish her thought. “And I hope you love this, because I wrote it for someone I love. Make some noise if you believe in love.”

The screams and shouts of a hundred thousand love-mad ravers assailed his eardrums. Ransom covered his ears against the din, then lowered his hands. He didn’t want to miss one note of this. Her silver bracelet caught the light as she began to play.

*

Lola felt caught
between excitement at the audience’s reaction, and devastation. She threw a glance at the stairs again, but Ransom wasn’t there. He’d written that he was coming, but he hadn’t come. Maybe he couldn’t come?

Maybe he’d decided not to come.

Either way, she’d made a promise to herself that she’d play this song in Sacramento. She’d promised she’d put it out there to be judged by the greater world, and had even cleared it with festival management so they’d help her set up the microphone and stand. Now she only had to sing it.

The audience got quiet as she strummed the first chords in time with the slow beat she’d programmed ahead of time.
Just put a beat under it.

I know, Ransom. I know.

She’d decided to sing “Worth the World” because out of all her songs, it showed her heart the most. If Ransom had come, he could have heard the words she was too afraid to say to his face. Maybe he’d still hear them, if the song ever got any legs. She’d uploaded it to all the indie sales platforms a couple days ago, under the name Lola Mae Reynolds.

Doing that had been easy. Anonymous and quick, the push of an upload button. This was way harder, this massive audience and her simple, wistful melody having to stand on its own. She looked out at the sea of faces, curious and mostly accepting of this slow-beat interlude.

Help me, pop. Help me play like you. Help me feel it.

She closed her eyes and sang the first verse along with the sultry, sexy bass accompaniment. Here, now, in front of all these people, the words felt painfully personal, but the one person she wanted to hear them wasn’t here. “
You forced me to go/where I didn’t think I could survive
,” she sang, thinking of their early days. “
And once I was there/I started remembering I was alive. I didn’t notice the cold/or the stares of the passersby/ just tossed my hair from my eyes/to take in the big sky.
”

The big sky and the big picture. He’d helped her see the bigger picture of her life, and no matter what happened, she’d never forget. That was the next verse, all about changing and needing, and never forgetting. She chanced a look out at the audience. Some of them danced slowly, waving their arms along with the back beat, while others only stood and watched. A few lighters flickered in the air.

It was enough to sustain her to the final chorus. She strummed louder and gave the audience all her frustration and grief. “
You say I’m worth the world, love/but what does that mean?/You’re worth way more than the world to me.
” She took a breath and closed her eyes. “
You say I’m worth the world, love/but when are you gonna see?/You’re worth way more than the world to me.
”