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“Come on… you don’t need to keep quiet on your affair anymore. Rumors are Emily has shackled him down with another kid. He’s not going anywhere. Not even for a girl as pretty as you.”
The crowd hurries to the edges of their seats like their most salacious suspicions are about to be confirmed, so Nicole tries to let them down gently. “I hate to disappoint everyone, but there’s nothing to share. Noah and I are friends.”
When the crowd boos, her eyes sling to the wings of the stage for moral support. I can only imagine how horrifying this is for her. Being mocked over the internet is bad enough, but it’s soul-crushing when the slandering is done in person by someone she thought would help propel her career to the status it deserves.
Unsurprisingly, Knox doesn’t appear upset about the negative light being shone on Nicole. He keeps his eyes locked on his shoes, and his facial expression is arrogant.
Mercifully, Nicole’s attention doesn’t linger on him long enough for her to absorb his moody attitude. Her eyes find mine only seconds later, and within moments, she sits straighter like my presence alone inserted a steel rod in her back before she focuses on the disc jockey’s next question.
“Would it ease your guilt if I reminded you that we’re the only two people in the room? It’s just you and me, Nicole. All alone. Sharing saucy secrets.”
“That doesn’t ease my conscience in the slightest,” she replies without pause for thought. “How could it when there’s one point nine million Los Angeles men I could have been seated across from today, but somehow, I got lumped with the likes of you?”
Emanual, the host who intended to cut Nicole down as brutally as the critics of her first YouTube sensation, gapes his mouth before he gauges the audience’s response to Nicole’s reply.
With them as in awe of Nicole’s wittiness as I am, he changes the pace of his interview from an interrogation to a proper sit-down chat. “All right. I deserve that. But what can I say? I’m a horny dog when it comes to celebrities and their mating challenges.” Once the audience’s chuckles simmer, Emanual returns his eyes to Nicole. The humor in them is pushed aside for lust when he takes her in as a person for the first time instead of a prop for him to toy with. “Talking about celebrities, what do you think your chances are of becoming one with this?”
When he holds up a mock album cover that looks nothing like the one Knox assured Nicole would meet the market, Knox breathes out a snapped cuss word as my chest puffs high.
That’s River’s album cover—the one he designed on the private jet.
She used my little brother’s design on a cover that will be sold worldwide.
I couldn’t be more proud.
Knox is on the opposite side of the spectrum. “He’s got the wrong fucking album cover,” he tells anyone who’ll listen. “That’s not the right cover.”
“It’s giving me Swiftie vibes.” Emanual tilts the cover to the audience when they hum in agreement. “Yeah? You guys feel it, too?”
Their praise makes Nicole smile. “I can only hope to emulate her.”
“Rate your chances?”
“Of Taylor fandom?” she asks. Her smile vanished.
When Emanual nods, Nicole’s breathy laugh whistles through her mic. “Zero to negative ten.” As quickly as her confidence is swiped, it returns more potent than ever. “But with some tweaking and the right guidance, who knows… maybe I could have a handful of Taylor-worthy hits.”
Her reply piques Emanual’s interest as much as mine. “Tweaking? I thought your album was slated for release in…”—he checks his watch, which is as old school as mine—“nine days?”
“It is.” Her honesty is a refreshing change. “It’s just not ready for public consumption yet.”
“What the fuck is she saying?” Knox is seconds from blowing his top. His ears are red, and he’s tugging on his hair so fiercely that he won’t need to wait to inherit the balding gene from his father to consider hair implants. “It’s been ready for months.”
Clearly, Nicole disagrees with him. “After a handful of tweaks, I’ll be confident the audience is purchasing a part of me, not a manufactured hit designed for the masses.”
Emanual looks stunned. He isn’t the only one. I thought it would take more than a night of songwriting to have Nicole believing in herself enough to go against everything her record label wrongly told her was the right direction for her career.
It shows how vastly I underestimated her confidence.
“That isnotsomething I’ve heard before.” Emanual laughs when Nicole’s face whitens. “It isn’t a bad thing. It’s just been a while since we’ve had an artist who places the demands of their heart above their bank balance.” After drinking in Nicole’s blush with more admiration than I like, he tells the live audience and the ones listening in that they’ll be back after a short commercial break to hear Nicole perform “Glitter.”
“I was hoping I could perform something else.” Nicole gets Emanual and the live audience over the fence by announcing it’s a song that’s never been heard. “I wrote it recently with a…friendof mine.”
When the producer seeks Emanual’s approval, he shrugs. “It can’t be worse than the garbage they were pimping before her YouTube video put her interview request at the top of the pile.” He hits Nicole with a truth I’d rather he keep to himself, but with the honesty she deserves. “I was planning to cancel your interview today. The stuff your label was sending through was bad. I thought the trolls got it right for a change, that you’d escaped the circus with Madam Fleur and Dani Trace. Then I saw this…” He taps a tablet on his desk. “This is what weneed. This is what wedeserve. So if you’re guaranteeing this is what we’ll get…”—he once again highlights the video playing on his tablet—“you can perform any song your heart desires.”
“She’s going to fucking ruin me,” Knox murmurs when Nicole promises to give Emanual’s audience the performance of the year. “And when she does”—he turns his narrowed eyes to me—“I’ll make sure you go down with us.”
27
