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3
BRYN
Every timethis 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—closer to everything.”
“I thought you’re 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?” I ask.
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 that 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 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 spoiled 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 this 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 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 we 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 an attractive 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 likethat, 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.
