Kill For Love (5 page)

Chapter
Seven

September 21:

"Jesse would like to see
you." The accent was American English with Russian intonations.

It was Petra Kerinova finally returning her call at just
after 10.30 on the Tuesday night.

"Right! When would that be?"
Kate had been watching
Newsnight
on
BBC 2.

"We'll send a car in fifteen
minutes."

"Tonight?"
 

"Preliminary discussions
only. No interview yet."

“But tonight…? It’s already late.
I mean…why now?”

“The driver is on his way.”

Kate didn’t know whether she
should be amused or irritated that a rock star would expect her to be available
on a whim. Even tin pot presidents usually had the guile to make a summons appear
otherwise. For a moment she considered telling Kerinova to cancel the car
because she was going to bed. But this behaviour was
so
presumptuous it was actually funny. Besides she was a reporter.

She was ready when the front door
bell rang.

“Kate?” A bulky, mid-thirties
driver with a shaved head and wearing a black track suit was waiting. A black
Mercedes limousine was at the kerbside.

"Where are we going?"
she asked as the limo pulled away. A Jesse Gadden album was playing through the
sound system.

"To see Jesse."

“Well, yes, that was rather the
plan. I’m sorry, I don’t know your name.”

“Stefano,” the driver replied and
the music went higher.

Once again Kate listened to the
high, sad voice and howling guitars. She was getting used to it.

"And you’re a Jesse Gadden
fan, right?” Almost every chauffeur in the world could be relied upon to let
slip some small nugget of information if a pretty girl reporter got him into
conversation.

Stefano was not any chauffeur. “Aren’t
you?”

Kate grimaced to herself. No, she
thought, I’m not. And you’re not very friendly, and deciding against further
attempts at conversation she settled into the blackness of the limo. In the
back of her mind something was puzzling her. How had Kerinova got both her home
phone number and address? WSN would never have given them out. She must be a
resourceful woman.

From the wide, tree-lined street,
Jesse Gadden’s headquarters looked like many other early Victorian mansions in West London. Dressed in wedding cake Italianate stucco
with an imposing front door, it could easily have been a foreign embassy. But
as Kate stepped from the Mercedes, and, squeezing past a cream 4 x 4 Lexus on
the forecourt, went up the steps and into the house, she found herself stepping
from one age into another, anything nineteenth century having been ripped from
the interior of the building in favour of white marble modernity. And as a
smiling youth, a Glee Club foot soldier, conveyed news of her arrival, it
struck her that the place looked like nothing so much as a modern palace of a
merchant bank.

That makes sense, she thought. As
the centre of the Jesse Gadden business empire, through which hundreds of
millions of pounds were annually channelled, it was probably exactly as it
should be.

She was still looking around
when, at the back of the hall, a glass door opened, and Petra Kerinova, wearing
a black tunic over black leggings, appeared.

There was no friendly welcome.
"If you'll come this way…" Kerinova said brusquely, and led the way
down a short flight of stairs and along a corridor decorated with framed
platinum records to a double sequence of sound-proofed doors. "Jesse's
recording. You can watch in here.”

 
The music hit like a hammer as Kate entered
the control room. It was
so
loud. But
she was doubly surprised. All the Jesse Gadden music she’d heard previously had
used only electric instrumentation. But on the other wide of a large studio
window a small orchestra was playing.

Aware that Kerinova hadn’t
followed, she made her way awkwardly behind three sound engineers seated at a
giant console and sat down on a leather sofa. Directly in front of her, through
the glass, stood Gadden; headphones on, a hand over his face in concentration,
his slender body loose inside his black shirt and trousers.

Abruptly the music stopped. A conductor
turned to the composer with a query. Gadden was shaking his head.

"He's not satisfied,"
one of the engineers murmured.

"I thought we had it that
time," another replied.

"No. He's right. It's not
quite there."

"Not quite," the second
engineer dutifully chorused.

At that moment the youngest of
the three, a pale teenager with straggly hair and wearing a Jesse Gadden
T-shirt approached her. "I'm sorry, I've only just recognised you. You're
waiting for Jesse, right? He doesn't often invite anyone to his sessions. Would
you like a drink or anything?"
  

"No, thank you," Kate
replied. Despite herself, she was rather pleased that she should be an
exception. And, as the other engineers considered her, intrigued by her
presence, she looked back into the studio.

Gadden was now standing in the
middle of the orchestra, explaining something. The conductor and every musician
on the floor was watching him, alert, professionally interested. As he stopped
speaking Kerinova appeared and going up to him put her mouth to his ear. She
was so close it looked intimate. But suddenly Gadden span away and looked
straight at Kate.

Embarrassed, feeling that she’d
been observing something she shouldn’t, Kate shrank back in her seat.

But Gadden just smiled. And, even
from this distance, she could see the blue of his eyes.

"I thought you might enjoy seeing
how we make records." It was five in the morning. The session had
finished, with the orchestra leaving quickly and wearily, allowing the
engineers to log the night’s work. Seemingly pleased, Gadden had now flopped
down on a chair alongside Kate.

 
For several hours she’d listened to the orchestra
play the same sequences over and over, the emphasis of each take often indistinguishable
to her from the preceding one as the singer had sought the sound he wanted. She
would have been happy to have watched from the control room, but, mid-way
through the session, Gadden had insisted she come into the studio and sit to
one side of the violins. And although she'd felt a fraud because she couldn't
play anything or even read music, she had to admit she’d enjoyed being present
at the creation of something people would soon be buying or downloading in
their millions.

"What did you think?"
he asked, relaxing.

"I think…I expected to hear
you singing."

He snorted, amused. "Ah,
you’re all the same. There’s more to making a record than just some fella
singing, you know. You came on the wrong night if that’s what you wanted. First
we put the rhythm tracks down…that's bass and drums. You’ve heard about them,
have you? They’re the foundation to everything we do. Then there’s the guitars.
Tonight we've been working on some overdubs…backing tracks…getting the
orchestra to drown out all our mistakes and add a bit of drama. We’ll need them
for the concert.”

He was now so easy and friendly
Kate was having difficulty reconciling him with the perfectionist she’d been
watching at work. “Your final concert, you mean?”

 
"The very one.” He looked at her. “To be
honest, I didn't think you'd come.”

"I want that
interview."

"Oh yes, the
interview." He pulled a face as though in discomfort. "Tell me
something, be honest now, is there anything in this entire world as boring as
listening to rock stars talking about themselves."

"They don't have to be boring."

"No? Maybe not. But they
are."

"Not all of them."

"But most. Did you ever hear
Bruce Springsteen being interviewed? Or Madonna? Or Sting? They'd bore the
devil out of hell." He was laughing now, coming on the Irish joker, his
accent much stronger than when he'd addressed the orchestra.

She knew he was deliberately
charming her, but she was enjoying it. "Is that why you don't do
interviews, because you think you might be boring?"

"Let's just say, it saves a
lot of time which can be more usefully spent. It's one thing less to think
about."

"But doesn't that leave you
open to misinterpretation?"

"Well, it might. But then
wouldn't you say that fiction sometimes has the edge on fact. More fun
like."

She was puzzled. Gadden was as
different from his enigmatic image as she could have imagined. "If you
really don't like doing interviews why did you ask me here tonight? I
understood I was being invited for a preliminary discussion."

He considered his answer.
"Because I like you," he smiled at last, and watched her carefully to
see how she would react.

"You don't know me."

He smiled. "Of course I know
you, Kate Merrimac. Everyone knows you. You're on TV."

She did hear him sing, albeit on
a recording. At six o'clock a couple of cleaners arrived and began moving through
the studio, picking up discarded scores and polystyrene cups; and though they
whispered quietly among themselves when one of them recognised her, and were
thrilled to be in his presence, they had to get on with their jobs.

Apologising for keeping them from
their work, he led her back into the control room. Only the young studio
assistant was still there, tidying away the night's work. "You couldn't
play us a couple of tracks before you go, could you, Peter?" he asked.

Mindful of the time, Kate began
to remonstrate, insisting that it was too late, until glancing at the assistant
it struck her that he actually wanted to play something.

 
"Sure, Jesse. What would you like?"

"What about..." Gadden
hesitated, considering, "
Knights of
the Night
.”

The studio assistant nodded and
disappeared into the adjacent machine room to line up the track.

He’s keen for me to hear this, Kate
thought. He'll want me to tell him I like it. But what if she didn't like it? Would
he know if she lied?

He read her thoughts. "Don't
worry, we won't mind if you think it's the most awful piece of caterwauling
you've ever heard and rush out of the door with your hands over your ears.
Isn't that right, Peter?"

The studio assistant re-entered the
control room. "But you won't. You'll love it." And, as Gadden passed
Kate a sheet of paper showing lyrics scribbled in capital letters, the young
man pressed the button for playback.

At first she thought the song was
just another monotonous dirge, with Jesse Gadden's reedy voice accompanied by an
acoustic guitar. But this time the words seemed more straightforward, what
sounded like a first person plea to a girl to go home with him. Finally it
began to build into a mantra:
 
"Knights of the night, looking for the
light, Knights of the night, looking for the light",
as electric
guitars began to rage against an orchestra.
 

Glancing into the studio at one
point, Kate was aware of Kerinova standing by a door watching. Then she was
gone.

As the record finished Kate turned
back to Gadden.

He stopped her before she could
speak. "Don't tell me. I don't want a review. I just wanted you to hear
it." Then, just as quickly, he relaxed again. “Besides that was just a
vocal guide.”

Now she astonished herself.
"Would it be all right if I heard another one?" she heard herself
say.

"You really want to hear
more?"

"If it isn't too late?"

He looked at the assistant.
"It's never too late, is it, Peter? What shall we play for her?"

But already the boy was setting
up another track.

It was the perfect English
September morning with London
rosy through a thin autumn veil of mist as the city came alive, and early-bird
drivers and the occasional cyclist headed to work.
 

Beside her in the limousine
Gadden was watching everything. They said little on the journey. As they’d left
the studio he’d suggested she go home with him to his house in Chelsea for some
breakfast. She’d declined the invitation. She had to go to work.

Now, after pulling off the

“Well…it’s been a …fascinating
night…” she began.

“You’ll be too tired to work. I should
have got you home earlier,” Gadden half-apologised.

“Oh no, not at all. I can get by
on a couple of hours sleep.”

He pulled a wry face of
disbelief.

“Well, you know what I mean.”

He smiled. He had a way of
staring into her eyes when she was speaking, listening intently as though she
was the most interesting person in the world.

“Anyway…”

He moved towards her. For a
moment she thought he might be about to kiss her. But, putting out his hand, he
ran his fingers gently across hers. “Thank you for coming, Kate. You made a difference.”

“I don’t think…”

He interrupted. “Can I call you
sometime?”

She was surprised.

“I mean, I’d like to see you
again.”

Now she found herself practically
blushing. She felt pathetic, a grown up version of Beverly. He was only a rock singer, for God’s
sake. “Well, you will… I mean, the interview. Is it on?”

He sighed. “You drive a hard
bargain.”

“I need to know. Yes or no?”

“All right. We’ll be able to work
something out.”

“That would be…” She stopped
herself. “I’m very pleased. We, WSN, I mean, will need to make plans. Who
should we liaise with? Your publicist or…?”

“Petra. She’ll give you a call.”