“Every day is so wonderful
Then suddenly
It's hard to breathe.”
Performed by Christina Aguilera
Written by Linda Perry
The limousine stood with its dooropenas Brady, Lee, and I left the airport surrounded by four bulky men. I wanted to roll my eyes at the way his security stood. They were more concerned withlookinglike they were security than actuallybeingsecurity.
I’d grown up around military professionals. I’d worked around Secret Service for twelve years. This private firm of wannabes had a lot to learn. But then—I reminded myself—I had a lot to learn as well, and no one was kicking me to the curb yet.
Instead, Lee had been nothing but kind and helpful.
I’d met him for the first time in his office in New York City the Monday after Mac’s wedding. Brady hadn’t been messing around when he said he wanted me on board, setting up the meeting on Sunday and all but insisting I find a way to get there.
I’d liked Lee immediately. His smile had been friendly, even though he had to be unsure about me being there. His deeply tanned skin and black hair shouted out the indigenous heritage residing in his DNA somewhere. He was tall and lanky and somehow ageless. Neither old nor young. His perfectly tailored suit flattered him as much as the square glasses perched on his nose. After shaking hands, I’d sat down across his desk and shot an eye at Brady who’d gone back to lying on the couch, pretending not to listen.
“Brady says he’s offered you a job,” Lee said, a frown wiping his smile away, and I couldn’t blame him. He didn’t know me, and my résumé wasn’t exactly filled with music industry knowledge. But it was the words he wasn’t saying that were the real question:Are you sleeping with my client?
“First, I’m not going to hold you or him to that offer,” I tried to reassure him. “Second, no, I’m not sleeping with him. He isn’t my type.”
Brady snorted, and Lee sat back in his chair, assessing me all over. I was in my dark-blue suit that shouted stability and expertise with a mild-yellow shirt with white polka dots, because yellow was both creative and intellectual. I’d wanted to scream success, but many people had a negative reaction to orange, so I’d stayed away from it. I wanted to look professional, smart, but also trendy enough for the music industry.
“Brady is pretty much everyone’s type,” Lee said as he tweaked his glasses back into position.
I laughed. “So I’ve heard, but honestly, he’s not mine.”
“She’s more the dark and broody kind of girl,” Brady shot out from the couch.
Lee and I both ignored him. I wasn’t sure how Brady had pegged me in that manner. Nash was definitely dark and broody, but the previous men in my life had not been. Sure, they were all dark, tall, handsome, but they weren’t broody. For example, Russell had been almost geeky with his Ph.D. and multiple languages.
“Let’s just say we’ll come back to that topic later,” Lee said. “Let’s start with why you’ve decided to transition after twelve years in politics.”
We’d gone back and forth, me often asking more questions than Lee, and finally, after answering about my twentieth question, Lee had held up his hands and laughed. “I get it. You’re smart, professional, thorough. You care about what you do, and you care about Brady without wanting to get into his pants. You’re hired.”
I hadn’t even needed to negotiate on salary or benefits. They’d offered me more than I’d expected for my first civilian job. I quickly found out why. It was pretty much a twenty-four-hour, seven-day-a-week kind of job, which wasn’t any different than my job with the senator. I was usually up at four in the morning, on calls or social media starting at six, and then slugging my way through a whole series of to-dos. Those ranged from organizing interviews, making sure Brady was prepared for interviews, or responding to a host of companies who wanted to sponsor him in some way from cowboy boots to underwear to earbuds.
It was all-consuming, and I was loving every second of it. It was keeping me on my toes, filling my brain, challenging me in a way working for the senator hadn’t done in a long time. I was learning again. Learning people, motivations, and an entirely new industry.
Outside the Miami airport, where we’d all connected, we were ushered into a limousine. I was in my new uniform of jeans, a tailored jacket, and a tank. Lee was in his suit, and Brady was in his concert uniform because we were heading straight from the airport to the venue. He wore his torn-up jeans partnered with a flannel shirt opened to reveal a white tank underneath, like any rock star. With the casual ease of a lion. And he’d have all the cubs and lionesses swooning over him by the end of the night when he was in just that tank with sweat pouring down him.
As the door to the limousine shut behind us, Marco, the security guard I knew best, slid in next to the driver and said into his earpiece, “Ghost moving out.”
Brady and I shared a smirk. Ghost was the name they’d given him after I’d teased Tanner, the guy in charge, about not being up to snuff with the Secret Service. “You don’t even have a code name for him,” I’d said flippantly, and they’d promptly chosen the name of his latest single. It wouldn’t be hard for anyone to figure out.
“This is your first show, so don’t be surprised by the crush of people backstage,” Lee said to me. “I just sent you a list of things I’d like you to do at the venue. Make sure the sponsors all get their shot of Brady with their merchandise. But your number one job is to entertain the VIPs until he can meet with them.”
I opened the list, scanned over it, and sent it to my private folder. I liked that Lee was all tech and very little paper. It made things easier. Especially when I’d spent a considerable part of the first two weeks on the job at home in Wilmington.
I wasn’t quite ready to find a place in New York City to rent. The city was Lee and Brady’s home base, but I wasn’t sure it was for me. Neither of them had made being in the city a requirement, even when Brady had offered me a room at his place when I was in town. I’d declined and, instead, just used the train for the days I had to be with them. The two-hour journey had allowed me to continue to work both ways.
Starting today, we’d be together for a few weeks as Brady kicked off his official tour. It was a trial run for the worldwide tour that really began in January. The goal of these five early stops was simply to work out the kinks in the show. He had dancers, backup singers, pyrotechnics, and the band themselves to coordinate with. I’d been pretty floored with the number of people involved.
At the practices at a sound stage in New York, I’d taken pictures and posted tantalizing hints of what was to come on his social media accounts. Lee said I was single-handedly responsible for increasing their ticket sales by ten percent. I very seriously doubted it, but I wouldn’t know because I was in the dark when it came to the money side of the business.
His last PR manager, Fiona, had been part PR and part business manager, which meant she’d had access to his accounts. It had ended badly, but I still hadn’t been read in on the full thing. I just knew she’d stolen money and left with the nondisclosure agreement in place that Brady had mentioned at Mac’s wedding. Since Fiona had been gone, there’d been an increase in threats made against Brady, and most of his staff believed they were coming from her. But there was no proof.
