Plain Return (The Plain Fame Series Book 4) (13 page)

The exaggerated movements were not lost on Stedman. Nor were they lost on Dali, who stood beside him watching. Dali frowned at this new, dramatic entrance by Amanda. When Amanda reached the bottom of the stairs, before Viper could approach her to take her hand, she spun so that her skirt flew out from both sides, the sequins catching the lights and reflecting them into the audience. When she stopped spinning, the skirt wrapped around her legs and Amanda snapped her head back as she quickly shifted her body into a promenade position directed toward Viper. She tried to glance over his shoulder at Stedman, who still stood in the wings, shaking his head and laughing while Dali glared at him.

Viper, however, appeared as amused as Stedman. He reached out, and rather than taking her hand to escort her to the front of the stage as usual, he grabbed her waist, yanking her toward him. With his one arm around her waist and his other arm free, he ran his hand down the length of her body as he began dancing merengue with her. The crowd screamed louder, delighted with the playful antics of Viper and his wife. When she let him pull her close and dip her, her knee raised to his hip, the noise from the audience reached a new level. Viper glanced into the stands, grinning mischievously before he leaned down and kissed her neck and then gently helped her back to her feet. She responded by leaning into him, brushing her hand across his cheek, their foreheads touching.

“¡Ay,
Amanda
!”
he said, surprised by such a public display from her. The microphone amplified his words throughout the arena, and the volume of the crowd increased even more.

By the time he finished the song and their dance, she knew that he most definitely had enjoyed her over-the-top performance. He kept his arm around her waist, her hip pressed neatly against his as he yelled to the crowd to cheer for her. When they responded accordingly, he laughed and nodded to them, which only made the noise double. He leaned over and kissed her cheek.

“Such surprises, Princesa,” he whispered into her ear.

He escorted her off the stage and handed her over to Stedman, who, to her surprise, pulled her into his arms and lifted her into the air. Viper raised an eyebrow and took a towel from Dali to dry the sweat from his neck and forehead. “Easy there, Stedman,” he said. “I’m right here beside you, no?”

“You were wonderful!” Stedman said as he set her back onto the ground. “I knew you had it in you, Amanda!”

“See? I don’t hate dancing,” she teased. “Or you either, for that matter. The dress, however . . .”

He laughed. “Sass and vinegar, rising to the top!”

“Did I blind them?” she asked, looking over her shoulder at the stage. Viper was back in the center of it, his next song already begun. “Oh, I hope so!”

“Blind them? You dazzled them!”

Dali pried Amanda free from Stedman. “I’ll tell you who else was ‘dazzled.’” Dali turned her neck so that her head pointed toward Viper. “You both might want to go back to hating each other,” she said. “Might be easier on one of your careers.” She leveled her gaze at Stedman as she escorted Amanda back to her dressing room.

Inside the dressing room, Dali helped to unhook the straps to Amanda’s dress. When Amanda disappeared behind the dressing screen to slip on her evening outfit, a black pencil skirt and sheer white top, she heard Dali grumbling.

“Now what is it, Dali?” Amanda peeked her head around the corner. “You always think he’s going to be upset. He was laughing as much as Stedman was.”

Dali pursed her lips together and gave her a look.

“What is it, then, Dali?”

“It’s not my place to be giving you advice, Amanda.”

She laughed as she emerged from behind the screen and sat down on the sofa to put on her high-heeled white sandals. “Look at these things,” she said. “My word! I’ll be six inches taller!” She stood up and tried to walk, laughing again as she wobbled and reached out for Dali’s shoulder to steady herself. “I can’t wear these! Why, I’d be taller than Alejandro.” Quickly she kicked them off and hurried back to her dressing area to search for the flat sandals she’d worn earlier that day.

“When it comes to their women, those Cuban men are more concerned about other things than they are about height,” Dali warned.

Amanda looked up. “What’s that supposed to mean?”

“They don’t share well,” she said in a curt tone.

Having found her sandals, Amanda sat back down and slipped them onto her feet. She was annoyed by Dali’s comment and knew full well that Alejandro would never suspect her of flirtatious behavior. Her difficult relationship with Stedman was public knowledge. “Neither do I,” Amanda said as she stood up and straightened the bottom of her shirt. “So I suspect we are perfectly suited for each other.”

Dali rolled her eyes and shook her head, looking away as Amanda opened the door. Wanting to hide her irritation, she tried not to slam it behind her.

What type of person did Dali think she was? Amanda wondered. Sharing? As if she was a toy? All because Stedman had picked her up in a moment of joy over her dancing? Ridiculous. She was Alejandro’s wife, and the idea of anyone suspecting immoral behavior on her part infuriated her. Her job in life, not just on this tour, was to support the man she loved. Her vows to love and honor him had not been made lightly. There was no other person who Amanda could possibly love more than she loved Alejandro Diaz. Not now, not ever, she told herself as she stood in the wings of the stage, peering around the thick black curtain as he performed the last lines to his final song.

As he finished singing, the lights spun around and the stage fireworks exploded, both the noise and the fiery pyrotechnics the perfect finale. The audience cried out in surprise and delight, cheering even more loudly when they realized that the show was over.

Amanda anxiously watched as Alejandro waved to the fans, kissing his hands and waving them in the air as he took in the adoration and love from the thousands of people crammed into the arena. When he turned and glanced in her direction, she smiled and bounced just a little on the balls of her feet. He tossed a kiss in her direction before turning back for one last bow to his audience.

And when he left the stage and pulled her into his arms one more time, she knew that he would never doubt her status as his most adoring fan, the only one who loved him completely enough to heal that gaping hole of emotional need that dwelled so deeply within him.

Chapter Twelve

The old man stood just inside the doorway of the backstage greenroom. His black hat, tilted just a touch toward the back of his head, did not cover his deeply wrinkled forehead and receding gray hairline. His suit hung from his frame, despite the arms being just an inch too short, and the hems of the pants were frayed at the heel, but pride was etched into his eyes. Regardless of his appearance, he was clearly a man of dignity.

At his side stood a small child. The little girl was wearing a dress that, although perfectly ironed and clean, was two sizes too big. The scuff marks on her black shoes indicated that they, too, were hand-me-downs. Her skin, slightly olive in color, shone just above her cheekbones; she looked like she’d been scrubbed clean for her excursion with the older gentleman. Her dark hair was pulled back from her face into a single ponytail with a large pink bow attached at the base. But it was her eyes that caught Amanda’s attention, for they were large and blue and stared in fright at everything around her.

Amanda was standing by Alejandro while he spoke with a reporter in Spanish. She put the cap on the bottle of water in her hand and watched the little girl for a while. She looked to be about four, maybe five, years old. People moved around the pair, ignoring their presence, a fact that piqued Amanda’s curiosity. Most people who came to the greenroom before the shows were part of the tour or reporters with special press passes. Occasionally, other celebrities might also be there, visiting with Alejandro, but not tonight, at the second show in Rio de Janeiro.

When Alejandro finished conversing with the reporter, Geoffrey approached him and leaned over to whisper something in his ear. Alejandro’s reaction was subtle, just a slight stiffening of his back and a muscle twitching in his neck. He nodded, just once, and took a deep breath before the next reporter approached, while a photographer took a few pictures.

The man and the child never moved from their spot.

Amanda remained at Alejandro’s side, holding her shoulders back and stretched down to maintain good posture as Stedman had taught her. She tried to remain focused on the reporter as she had been instructed, but her eyes kept drifting toward the little girl. Once, Amanda thought she saw the child glance at her, just a quick flickering of her eyes to where Alejandro and Amanda stood.

Although Amanda smiled when the photographer aimed the camera in her direction, she could still sense Alejandro’s change in demeanor. His normal pose—his arm around her waist, his fingers gently pressed against her dress as he held her—seemed tense.

“What’s wrong, Alejandro?” she managed to ask when they had a moment alone.

“Nada, mi querida,”
he replied with a forced smile on his face, sounding terse. “But you must excuse me. There is someone that I must see regarding some papers. Sit and relax. I should only be a few minutes.” Unlike when he usually left her side, he did not kiss her cheek or touch her hand. He merely walked away with his assistant Carlos at his heels.

She watched him pass the old man and the child, never once glancing at them as he slipped through another doorway. Within seconds, the door had shut behind him. Whatever Carlos had told him must be important, she told herself and quickly prayed that nothing was wrong with either of their families back in the United States. Glancing at the clock on the wall, she saw that only an hour remained until showtime. A flat-screen monitor hung on the wall, and Amanda could see that the opening act—a band from Brazil that she had found not quite to her liking the previous evening—was still performing. After they finished, it would be time for Alejandro’s Meet and Greet with the VIP ticket holders. During that time, the stage crew would tear down the equipment, remove it from the stage, and begin constructing the set for Viper. For the moment, however, there was nothing she could do but wait.

Moving over to the leather sofa, she sat down and leaned back, resting the side of her body against the arm. Across the hall was another greenroom for the fans with backstage passes. Most of them were Brazilian, and she couldn’t understand what they said. She could, however, understand what they were doing: drinking, smoking, and hoping for a chance to meet Viper.

Instead of watching them, she directed her attention back to the monitor. She tried to listen to the band’s songs, but couldn’t understand a single word. While Portuguese sounded similar to Spanish, or at least to Alejandro’s rapid-fire Cuban Spanish, it was definitely a different language.

“Amanda,” a voice said from across the room.

As she looked up, Amanda noticed that the old man and the child were gone. Whoever they were, they definitely had been escorted somewhere else. And rightly so. Backstage at a Viper concert was no place for a child. Now, Dali stood there, shuffling papers in her hands before she walked over to Amanda. Dali’s jaw was set tight, and she seemed paler than usual. The logistics of traveling was tough on everyone, Amanda observed.

“Are you all right, then?” she asked. “You look tired, Dali.”

“No more than usual,” Dali replied, a strain in her voice. As was typical, she got right down to business. “After the VIP session, you’ll have to go change right away. Viper would like to switch up the set list so that your dance with him is in the first half of the show, not at the end.”

That seemed a strange request. Alejandro had told her that the audience needed to have a buildup, their anticipation for the finale creating a vibrant energy in the arena. He never wanted to bring her out before the show’s final number. His reasoning was that Amanda was part of the finale, and that seemed especially true here, given the Brazilian media and the fans’ fascination with her.

“May I ask why?”

Dali bit her lower lip and averted her eyes. “Just more time to change, I suppose.”

But she was hiding something. Amanda could tell. Dali wasn’t someone who kept her thoughts out of her expressions. Yet it wasn’t in Amanda’s nature to probe. She hadn’t been raised that way, and she knew that the source of the tension she felt in the air would be shared with her when, and if, she needed to know about it.

The level of activity in the room began to decrease as people hurried to prepare for the transformation of the stage. Alejandro reappeared through the doorway. With a look of determination on his face and his chin tilted slightly upward, he paused just long enough to straighten his cuff links and look in her direction.

His eyes. She noticed it right away. Something had changed in his eyes.

“Ready, Princesa?”

Quietly, she stood up and hurried to his side. He held out his hand, and when she took it, he smiled at her. Amanda reached up and, as gently as she could, touched his cheek. When he pressed his face against her palm and shut his eyes, she heard him exhale, a soft noise that, had she not been standing so close to him, she would not have heard.

“I love you,” she whispered.

He turned his face so that his lips brushed her palm. Then, opening his eyes, he gazed at her for a long moment. She saw something soften in his blue eyes, and the look he gave her was one of relief. The corner of his mouth lifted into that mischievous smile that she adored so much. He squeezed her hand and pulled back from her, his eyes never leaving hers.
“Te amo,
Princesa
.”

“Viper!” The voice called out again, sounding more urgent.
“¡Están esperando!”

Amanda knew enough Spanish to know what that meant. People were waiting in the VIP Meet and Greet room, and the manager of that event was anxious for Viper to get started.

This time when Alejandro exhaled, he looked irritated.
“¡Sí, sí! ¡Un momento!”

Giving him a soft smile, Amanda took a step toward the door. “We should go now,
ja
?”

With security guards accompanying them, they walked through the corridors that led behind the stage. Several people stared at them, but Amanda had grown used to that. It was no different from when tourists gawked at the Amish in Lancaster County. And while the hordes of people continually amazed Amanda, she took her cue from Alejandro, knowing that when she was in public, she needed to be “on” and project an image of tranquility and grace. She was finding this increasingly easy to do. While she was growing up on an Amish farm, she had been taught the importance of having peace in her life. Her version of peace seemed to mirror the Englische world’s version of grace.

Over the past few weeks, the routine of the VIP Meet and Greet sessions had become one of her favorite parts of the concert. The fans, most of them women, glowed with happiness whenever Alejandro stepped into the room. He always opened the door and entered alone, standing there for just a moment so that the fans could admire him before he reached through the door for Amanda’s hand, pulling her in to eventually join him. Tonight was no different.

A translator had been assigned to interpret for Alejandro, if needed. But many of the fans spoke either Spanish or English, at least enough so that he could understand what they said. Amanda always tried to stand off to the side, not wanting to impose herself on the fans’ time with Viper. Getting that was, after all, the reason they’d paid the price of VIP admission. But they always seemed to be just as interested in her, and after they’d hugged Viper and posed for a photograph with him, they would ask her to join them.

If they spoke English, Amanda spent another few seconds with them, listening to them gush about their admiration for her. While the adoration of the fans bothered her from a spiritual perspective, the elation on their faces warmed her heart. She still could not understand why meeting another person could cause such an abundance of happiness, and she felt humbled that she was capable of bringing that emotion into the lives of strangers. Amanda could only pray that they also felt a stronger version of joy and peace that came from adoring God more than they adored a celebrity.

On their way back to the dressing rooms, Alejandro kept his hand protectively on the small of her back, guiding her through the path that opened up between people as they walked.

“Well done,” he said, smiling at various people who greeted him along the way. “Again.”

“You enjoy meeting the fans,” she observed.

“
¡Claro!
They are the reason we are here!”

She already knew that and that he did, too, but she liked to remind him. Unlike other celebrities who seemed to get caught up in the world of fame, Alejandro seemed for the most part to be grounded in what was truly important—although Amanda wasn’t certain that that had always been the case. From the way some of the women dressed, both in the audience and backstage, Amanda got the impression that they did not care whether Viper was married. In the past, those were the kinds of women who might accompany him to an after-party or a dance club in the city. His past reputation as a womanizer continued to haunt her, especially whenever she noticed him greet one of the scantily clad women with a warm hug, as if he knew her.

She reminded herself that it wasn’t about the women for Alejandro, not anymore. Nor should it ever have been. The most important part of Viper’s success was the fans: the average people who enjoyed his songs, the lyrics and music influencing their lives. Most of his fans would never meet him, a thought that saddened Amanda. And the ones who did were often the wealthier ones who could afford expensive VIP tickets. It didn’t seem fair to Amanda, but she knew that life was not fair and to question it was to doubt God’s plans.

As they stopped in front of her dressing room, Alejandro rapped twice on the door, signaling for her wardrobe assistants to open it. “You get changed now,
sí
?”

She nodded her head once.

“And you are wearing the black dress?”

“Sí,”
she replied, loving how he tried unsuccessfully to suppress his smile.

There was no more time for talking. The stage manager grabbed his arm and began speaking rapidly in Spanish. Alejandro transformed back into Viper, smoothing out his black shirt and adjusting his sunglasses to shield his eyes from the bright lights that shone onstage. Amanda watched as he walked away, his broad shoulders the last thing she saw as he turned the corner.

“Come, Amanda,” one of her assistants said from the doorway. Her Spanish accent was heavy. “We have not much time.”

Sighing, Amanda turned around and followed the woman into the room where a small team of people waited to dress her, fix her hair, and touch up her makeup. This was, without a doubt, the part of her role in the tour that she disliked the most, especially the part when they sat her in a chair facing a mirror. Short of shutting her eyes, she had no way to avoid looking at herself, and that was something that she didn’t think she’d ever get used to doing.

She could hear the music begin and knew that Viper was preparing to go onstage. In her mind, she saw him, standing beneath an opening in the stage. Above, the stage would fill with smoke, and when it dissipated, the audience would in one perfect moment see Viper standing there, having appeared as if from nowhere. His back would be turned to the audience with his hands folded before him; the platform, unseen by the audience, would slowly turn so that he was finally facing them. She could always tell the moment when he looked up; the noise of the audience often drowned out the music from the band.

“There!” The makeup artist stood back and admired her work.
“¡Qué linda!”

Amanda lowered her eyes at the compliment.

Two quick raps at the door. It was time for Amanda to head to the stage. She wondered how the band had reacted to the change in the set list and hoped that the switch had not inconvenienced them. Over the past few weeks, one thing she had learned was that routine was one important way, if not the only way, to survive constant travel from one city to another. Inevitably, something always went wrong: the sound system didn’t work properly, pieces of equipment did not arrive on time, or lighting failed. Such moments of temporary crisis were less stressful when the rest of the schedule remained intact.