Let the Music Play - 33. Full Circle

It was strange to be back, Brandon thought. The hotel and the adjoining studio hadn’t changed during the intervening months. For Brandon though, it seemed like a revisit to a former life; so much had changed for him. Sitting in Chase’s suite, Brandon looked around the room, taking in the familiar scene. The same suites Chase, Eric, and Jon had before the tour were theirs again. Brandon glanced out at the Jacuzzi on the balcony, remembering his first meetings with the guys and how everything had begun. Chase, still damp from the shower, walked up behind Brandon’s chair to place a hand on his shoulder. Their eyes met as Brandon turned his head and he reflected on how lucky he had been in so many ways. Chase just smiled, knowing what his lover was thinking.

The days since their return from Australia had been hectic. Instinct had spent most of their time in the studio, bringing to life songs that previously had existed only as scribbles on paper. Rehearsals had taken over their schedule that day, due to the approaching concert in Los Angeles, twenty-four hours hence. Done for the day, they had all decided to make a somewhat early night of it and for Brandon and Chase that did not necessarily mean sleep. Taking Brandon’s hand, Chase tugged him towards the bedroom, though there were very few clothes to leave in a trail.

Breakfast the following morning was, by prior agreement, in Jon’s suite. Strolling in through the connecting door, Brandon and Chase found Helen in full voice, complaining about the logistics. “First, we had our road boss quit and now this...” she motioned at a printout of the shipping schedules as she expounded, “We have the studio for just three days after the New York concert. You four need more time to work on the new songs than that, but it’s booked solid for two weeks.”

With a chuckle, Jon replied, “That’s not a problem; we don’t really need a studio to work on songs. We can do it the same way we did when we got started; just us and our instruments in a room somewhere. Hell, the garage at our place in Telluride would be fine. Besides, remember where you said we should be by this point? You wanted half the material for the new album written and practiced before we left for Telluride. We reached that point three days ago.”

Helen nodded, she knew that Jon had a point on their progress; they were well ahead of schedule. She also knew he was right about their being able to work in a garage. With a sigh, she returned to the real issue. “When Adam quit after the Brisbane concert, that left us without a road boss for the final leg. Jerry offered to fill in temporarily – he said he’s seen enough of how it’s done to have a good idea. I haven’t found us an experienced road boss yet, but I hope to soon. In the meantime, Jerry will be pulling double-duty, so please don’t cause him any unnecessary headaches.”

Eric didn’t like the sound of that – not one bit! He wanted Jerry out of their lives, not more involved. He considered, briefly, initiating a vote to overturn Helen’s move, but quickly decided against it. She’d done the right thing under the circumstances and lacking a road boss, they had few options. However, there was one other option and Eric piped up to suggest it, “What about Brandon? He used to be crew – could he fill in for Adam?”

Shaking her head, Helen replied, “No, Brandon can’t practice all day, perform at a concert, and then work all night. Also, he was a roadie, not a road boss, there’s a big difference.”

Brandon knew Eric’s reason for making the suggestion and he agreed to a point, but he knew Helen was right. “Yeah, I’d have almost no idea what I was doing and I’d be dead at the concerts,” he replied with a shrug as room service knocked on the door.

Once breakfast had been set up, the conversation returned to the topic at hand: the final leg of their tour. With a smile, Helen tapped on her water glass with a butter knife, getting a laugh for doing so. Once everyone was quiet, she said, “We’ve got just three venues left. The Los Angeles concert is two nights and the same goes for San Francisco, then we have the two concerts of the tour finale in New York three days after that. The gear comes back here to go into storage and we fly back here for some public relations stuff for a couple of days and then it’s off to Telluride. I’ll join you there for a couple of days and then Barbra and I are off for two weeks in the Tuscan countryside.”

“What’s our venue for San Francisco?” Eric asked. He already knew the ones for Los Angeles and New York.

“Candlestick Park. I just hope it’s not too windy,” Helen replied.

Grinning, Eric pointed out a bit of trivia that he found interesting, “The Beatles played their final concert there.”

With a laugh, Helen said, “Yes hon, they did, but I certainly hope the same won’t be true for Instinct.”

Just a few miles away at the halfway house, Phil pulled Joe Clump aside for a quiet chat. “I’ve got a new arrival coming in. He’s about where you were when you arrived; withdrawals and a failed suicide attempt. He’ll be bunking with you and the other two guys in the back dorm, so I was kind of hoping you could take him under your wing a little. I think it would help a great deal, because you’ve trod a similar road.”

Nodding, Joe replied, “I’d be happy to. I’ll help in any way I can.” It hadn’t been easy, but Joe had changed drastically in his time at the halfway house. One of the largest changes had been to his attitude. Now that he was no longer on drugs, he was reverting to form, becoming, again, the teen in search of approval that he had once been.

Phil was pleased by the change in his ‘mystery’ guest. This one, he thought, would beat the odds and make it. With a smile, Phil said, “I’m happy to hear it. By the way, just so it’s not a surprise, there’s something you should know about him. He was tossed out by his folks because he’s gay. He’s had a pretty rough run...” Phil’s words trailed off as he saw Joe’s features change in an instant.

“Keep him away from me. I don’t want nothing to do with a damn queer,” Joe snarled.

“In my office, now,” Phil shot back with an edge to his voice.

Seating his guest in a rickety chair, Phil paced for a few moments and then took his place behind his well-worn, utilitarian desk. Leaning forward on his elbows, he intertwined his fingers and began twirling his thumbs. After several long moments, Phil began, “I think you’d better explain that. You know how I feel about bigotry in any form.”

Studying his own knees, knowing how much he owed the man who sat before him, Joe took a deep breath and said in a soft voice, “It’s because of my mom. She was murdered when I was five. I finally got my father to tell me about it when I was eleven; the police think it was the neighbor, some kind of burglary attempt that she walked in on. She was strangled with a wire. I was the one who found her in the garage...” Joe paused for a moment to wipe his eyes, “All I remember is screaming. My father rushed in and hit me and then he called the police. He told them that he’d seen the neighbor running from the house. The neighbor disappeared, so I know that’s who did it. The police looked for him but... he fucking did it. It must have been him. I also know he was gay, everyone in town knew that.”

Feeling some degree of sympathy, at least for the loss, and taken aback by the father’s actions, Phil replied, “Losing her, especially at that age and worst of all to senseless violence, must have been horrible. I can understand that. However, I don’t understand why you hate all gays because of what one did. Was the suspect black? I’m guessing not, or you’d hate all black people, right?”

Joe glanced up, taking in Phil’s obvious African heritage, and he had to wonder, would he? Sighing, Joe said, “I don’t know. I hope not, but I don’t know. It’s just... No one would ever talk to me about this, about what happened to my mother. It’s like everyone, especially my father, wanted to just forget her.”

Suspecting that there was far more to the story, Phil pressed on by asking, “Your father wouldn’t talk to you about this until you were eleven? Maybe it was too painful for him–”

Phil found himself interrupted by a derisive snort and then Joe replied, his voice adopting a trace of anger, “Him? No way! He never cared about a damn thing, least of all me. After Mom died, he pretty much left me in the care of a nanny. About the only times he’s had much interest in me since were when he took me on a couple of business trips and I think that was for appearances. Oh, he also got me my gig with...” Joe shut his mouth as he realized he was just about to mention something that would give Phil his name.

Choosing for the moment to ignore Joe’s closing remark, Phil focused on what he felt was the core issue: the craving for attention Joe felt. Phil knew that children want attention. Any attention. They start trying for good attention and if they don't get it they progress down the scale until they get any form of attention that they can evoke. The child is often unwilling to blame the parent, so they sometimes transfer their feeling of rejection into rabid and irrational hate. “I’m sorry to hear that. That must have been rough for you. If you’re anything like me, having a cold and distant father was a true trial; you never felt good enough. Based on what we’ve previously discussed, I’d wager that, in large part, is why you fell into the cycle of drug abuse. However, you must realize that what one gay man did is no reason for you to hate them all.”

Joe sat in silence for over a minute, considering Phil’s points. Joe hated gays on a visceral level, but he knew that was mainly due to his mother’s killer. He knew he owed Phil and Phil clearly wanted this resolved. Surprising himself, Joe said, “I’ll give the new guy a fair shake, or at least I’ll try. About the drugs, yeah, I guess you’re partially right. I just got so sick and tired of trying to please my father enough for him to notice me that I gave up. I know he despises drugs or anything else he considers a weakness, so I guess I kind of liked doing something I knew he’d hate, but he never seemed to care, he just ignored me even more.”

Still twirling his thumbs, Phil thought he saw a pattern, or, he admitted, perhaps he’d been watching too many TV dramas. He suspected that his guest was repressing something, perhaps emotional cruelty he’d been subject to and possibly other things as well. As Phil knew all too well from his own experiences, in his case child abuse, repression could indeed open the door to addiction as well as a plethora of behavioral problems. This, he was certain, called for professional counseling that he was ill-equipped to offer, so he decided to let the issue drop while making plans to bring in a specialist.

There was something Joe needed to ask. Growing even more uneasy, he said, “I can earn some money tomorrow. I need to leave for a few hours. I’m not going to do any drugs, you can give me any test you want when I get back, but I need to do this.”

Wondering what his guest’s reply would be, Phil asked, “I’d like to know what it entails?”

Shifting his feet on the floor and staring at his knees, Joe replied, “It’s at a rock concert. I know a few people and they’ll pay me for working there, mainly dealing with autographed merchandise.”

Stifling a chuckle and intrigued by the fact that while his guest had attempted to misdirect him, he’d taken care to avoid lying, Phil said, “Yes, I hear that rock concert merchandising can be lucrative, especially the autographed stuff.” Reaching into his desk, Phil retrieved a CD he’d left there for the purpose and casually placed it within Joe’s sight, before adding with a smile, “If you want to get started early, you could sign this for me.”

Joe’s eyes opened wide as he recognized the cover of Instinct’s first CD. Leaning back in shock, he gasped, “You know...”

That comment evoked a deep belly laugh from Phil. “I’ve suspected since your second day here, Joe,” he said, using his guest’s name out loud for the first time, “You looked slightly familiar but your refusal to give your name made me very curious. At first I suspected you were on the run, but finally it clicked. I’ve never seen you in concert, but I do have your CD. I can also understand why you don’t want it known that you’re here – the press, right? I hope this proves you can trust me.”

Taking a proffered pen, Joe smiled for the first time in a very long time. Signing the CD insert with a flourish, he snapped the cover closed and handed it back to Phil. “Thanks, for keeping my secret. Yeah, some merchandisers will pay me to sign stuff because I used to be the lead singer. People pay to get their photographs taken with me too, usually ten bucks. There are only three venues left on this tour so I have to get started.”

“I guess that’s a start, but I heard their schedule and it means you’ll be traveling to San Francisco and New York. I want you back here the day after the last concert and you’ll be peeing in a cup. If you agree to that, you can go.” Phil had no legal authority to compel Joe, but sometimes moral authority was even more effective than the legal variety. This was one such time.

“You’ve got a deal,” Joe replied without hesitation.

That night, Joe spent an hour sitting by a cot, listening to the new arrival talk. The guy, he found out, just needed someone to listen. That worked well for Joe on several levels, not the least of which was that it gave him time to think. Joe kept what he considered to be a safe distance; he was still uncomfortable with gays, but tried to keep that fact from being apparent to the new arrival.

At the Port of Los Angeles, Mario, acting on The Scar’s orders, watched through binoculars from a quarter mile away as the freighter pulled into a berth. He’d been told to keep an eye out for any suspicious activity, but nothing more had been said beyond some instructions on how to deliver his findings. No customs agents were in evidence so Mario sat back in his rental car and ate his Burger King lunch, chuckling at the notion that he was being so well paid to do basically nothing, at no risk to himself. He neither knew, nor cared, what the shipment might contain.

He watched with interest as fourteen flatbed trucks arrived in line, pulling onto the dock. One by one, each was loaded with a cargo container by the gantry crane before chugging off, belching diesel smoke. As near as Mario could tell, a cursory paperwork check was the only scrutiny the containers or trucks received. Wiping the remains of his lunch from his mouth, Mario flipped open his phone and dialed a local number he’d been given. As expected, a recorded voice asked him to leave a message, so Mario said, “All clear, nothing to report.”

Turning the car around he laughed out loud, thinking that this was by far the easiest job he’d ever done.

The fourteen cargo containers, unopened since leaving the stadium in Brisbane, traveled north on interstate 110, from Terminal Island towards downtown Los Angeles, lurching through the Metro area traffic on their way to Chavez Ravine.

Checking his voicemail, The Scar breathed a heartfelt sigh of relief – his shipment had cleared customs. He hadn’t wanted to be anywhere nearby, or downwind, if the bombs had detonated due to an inspector attempting to open them.

An hour later, The Scar arrived at Dodger Stadium, pulling into line behind Instinct’s trucks. The security detail waved Instinct’s trucks through with only a cursory glance at each of their paperwork. One quick glance at ‘Jerry’s’ credentials and pass were all it took. He parked near Instinct’s trucks as their drivers, their jobs done, walked away.

Within minutes, the road crew gathered under Jerry’s direction to begin unloading and setting up for the following night’s concert. The shipping containers would travel mainly by rail for the remainder of the tour, so some unneeded pieces of gear could remain within them without arousing undue suspicion. Jerry’s new position as interim road boss made things far easier; no questions were asked regarding the five subwoofers. He checked them quickly once the container had been emptied sufficiently to reveal them, sparing only a moment to caress the black plastic of their cases, and left them where they sat.

The downside to his new position was that he had to spend the entire night supervising the unloading and setup of the gear, a job he found both hectic and annoying, but he considered it all well worthwhile; he knew he’d have unfettered access.

The following afternoon, the setup work was at last almost complete. With only hours to go before the concert began in the late afternoon, The Scar, though very tired due to having been up all night, drove to his home in the Pacific Palisades. Walking around back, he hopped into the cab of a panel truck he’s purchased. Digging into his briefcase, he selected the needed documents and ID. He then began to prepare himself; he replaced his ‘Jerry’ toupee with another; this one having long, silver hair that he tucked up under a baseball cap. He then added a pair of inserts to his cheeks which puffed them out a little and then applied a mustache. With that taken care of, he tugged on a waiting set of ill-fitting green coveralls. Starting up the truck, he let the engine idle for a few seconds, then slipping it into gear and driving it and the trailer it towed towards Dodger Stadium.

The Scar, though nearing exhaustion, had no regrets over his decision to handle the job alone, for the sake of security. Dimitri had remained in Australia to keep an eye on the facilities and workers, and for something as critical as what he was about to do The Scar did not want any loose ends.

An hour later, The Scar arrived at the stadium. Waiting his turn at the service entrance, The Scar pulled forward, rolling down his window to smile at the security guard and hand him a clipboard, containing a work order. The guard looked back at the panel truck, which bore a fresh paint job with the logo and name of Chevo Landscaping. After examining the paperwork and finding it in order, the guard flicked his head towards the back of the truck and asked, “Is it open?”

The Scar replied with a slight shrug and a friendly wave towards the back of the truck. “It’s open, go ahead.” He had no objection at all to it being searched.

The guard shoved the roller door up and open, finding little besides a few bags of potting soil and some plants and shrubs, along with shovels, rakes, and a few other gardening implements. He glanced back, at the trailer containing a small backhoe. A typical setup for landscaping, and no sign of the counterfeit Instinct concert merchandise he’d been asked to keep an eye out for. He shut the rollup door, walked around to the driver’s side door and out of idle curiosity he asked, “What’s the metal detector for?”

With a smile, The Scar gave a truthful reply, “I don’t want to hit any buried utility lines. It takes too long to get the county guys to come out and mark the utilities, so that’s my insurance policy.”

With a mumbled, “Have a good one,” the security guard waved the landscaping truck into the stadium grounds. Minutes later, he parked his truck and trailer across the end of one of Instinct’s shipping containers; the one containing the bombs.

Due to the risk that someone might see him in Instinct’s shipping container, he changed disguises quickly. Removing his coveralls, cheek padding and moustache, he changed to his ‘Jerry’ toupee, relieved that he’d only have to do so a few more times.

With care, he removed the backing from one of the subwoofers, exposing one of the real nuclear devices, thankful that he’d thought to have wheels welded to its case. After easing the bomb out and wrapping it in burlap, it was time to move the device. A few roadies remained at the site, but they were supposed to be running sound checks. One of the forklifts, though, was waiting nearby, as he’d specified. Using a cable attached to the forklift, he dragged the bomb towards the open end of the shipping container, trusting that the friction of its small wheels on the container’s flooring would not allow it to over-run and topple from the open end. Disconnecting the cable, he then used the forklift to lower the bomb to the ground, leaving it between his landscaping truck and the shipping container. He then re-attached the backing to the empty subwoofer case and locked up the shipping container.

As he clicked the padlock into place, he was startled by a voice from behind. “Anything I can do to help, Mr. Clump?” one of the young roadies asked, while puffing on a cigarette.

With an amiable smile, Jerry replied, “I’ve got it, thank you. Are you finished with the sound checks?” knowing that he was not.

Stubbing out his smoke, the roadie replied, “Just having a cigarette break, we can’t smoke in the stadium.” The roadie turned and trotted back inside. The Scar breathed a sigh of relief. He’d paid close attention to the roadie’s eyes to ensure the young man had not even glanced at the bomb. Had the roadie displayed any inquisitiveness, it would have been his final act.

Leaving the bomb between the two trucks, The Scar returned to his panel-truck and resumed his landscaper’s disguise.

Dodger Stadium had proven perfect for The Scar’s plans. It is situated on a small rise, which would increase the lethal blast radius by over forty percent. A mile and a half to the southwest, he could see the soaring skyscrapers of downtown. The destruction at that distance would be near total. The real destructive ability of the bomb, though, was not the nuclear blast itself, but the cobalt. That element would, under neutron bombardment during the detonation, produce cobalt-60, a highly radioactive isotope. The prevailing winds from the west would spread the lethal fallout cloud downwind, most likely to the east, in an ever-widening zone of contamination that would extend well past San Bernardino. If the bomb detonated, most of the Los Angles basin and vast areas to the east would become uninhabitable for decades.

During his first visit to the site, The Scar had noticed and fully approved of – for reasons having nothing to do with aesthetics – the landscaping. The stadium’s designers had faced terrain of varying heights. Hundreds of acres of parking lots surrounded the stadium on all sides. Because of the differing elevation, sloping bands of landscaping were introduced to segue between them – especially near the stadium. The one he’d selected, which bordered the area reserved for trucks, was bounded by one such band; a sloping, curving strip of grass, twenty feet wide, with trees spaced along it every few yards. His forged work order called for the installation of a row of bushes between two of the trees, eighty yards from the stadium itself and right next to where Instinct’s trucks were parked. Printing up the work order had been a simple matter of obtaining a real one, buying a matching book of blank work order sheets from an office supply store, and filling in the blanks. Stadium security was not set up to detect people coming in to do work for free. The stadium itself was more secure, but the parking lot was not. The fact that the Los Angeles Police Department Academy adjoined the stadium no doubt gave a false sense of security, in The Scar’s opinion. He smiled at the irony: he was planting the bomb under their very noses.

After a careful check with the metal detector, The Scar used a shovel to remove some of the grass turf, setting it aside before using the backhoe to dig a series of seven holes for the large bushes, right at the edge of the pavement. The holes were four foot on a side and four foot deep, tapering only slightly towards the bottom. It took him two hours to complete the digging, and after a big slug of coffee from a thermos to ward off fatigue, he unloaded the six large bushes from the truck, standing them on the far side of the fourth hole to help obscure what he was doing. This, he knew, was the most dangerous part of the job; if security saw him and demanded to know what he was burying, the jig would likely be up. Of its own accord, his hand sought out the converted cell phone in his pocket. All he had to do was flip it open, as if to make a call, and hit three specific keys in sequence, which would send the command to detonate the nuclear device. He didn’t want to die but if cornered he’d take as many with him as he could. In his case, that was a very large number indeed.

Trusting his luck – plus a careful glance around – that no one would notice, he cut the one bush remaining in his truck off at its base and placed it atop the bomb. He then used a second sheet of burlap to loosely wrap the bomb and tied the loose cloth ends in a bundle, with the bush sticking out of the top. He gave it an appraising glance, satisfied that, to a casual observer, it would appear similar to the other bushes with their burlap-wrapped root-balls, even though this one was incongruously large. Using the backhoe as a crane, he lifted the bomb with the aid of an eyehook in its top and swung it towards the hole. In less than a minute, he had the bomb in the hole, its top ten inches below ground level. Hurrying, he pulled the bush and burlap away and tossed them in his truck. He then backfilled the hole, tamped down the soil, and used some of the turf he’d salvaged to patch it. The grass in the areas was dead in places to begin with and The Scar was pleased with his handiwork; nearly undetectable. The bomb was close enough to the surface to get a clear signal from the nearby cell towers and would, he hoped, remain undisturbed.

An hour later, he completed planting the bushes and used the backhoe to dump the excess dirt into his truck. The watering would be taken care of later that night by the automatic sprinkler system, so he carefully swept up, returned the backhoe to its place on the trailer, and headed home for some much needed sleep. He was quite satisfied with his plan so far; the bomb should be undetectable.

The thick layer of cobalt inside the case, which had added hundreds of pounds to the bomb’s weight, would block most residual radiation and the layer of earth would add an additional level of protection. The one risk was that a clumsy construction crew could inadvertently unearth the bomb, causing its anti-tamper device to detonate the bomb, but that was a risk The Scar was willing to take. He didn’t plan on being in the area for long, so its future destruction would be of little concern. Relaxing at last, The Scar drifted off to a sound and restful slumber.

That evening, twenty minutes after The Shadows completed their final set, Instinct roared onto the stage at Dodger Stadium and the crowd’s cheers echoed through the parking lot, where one nuclear bomb sat in its hole, safely ensconced within the earth.

Dimitri raised both eyebrows. “Roast goat?”

“It is traditional,” the engineer said, leaning casually against the completed nuclear device that remained in the Toowoomba facility. “Back in my home village, whenever a major task is finished, we roast a goat in a celebratory feast.”

"I see." Dimitri didn't, but he knew that he had to humor the engineer for just a little bit longer.

“We owe it to our workforce. They have served us well and they are deserving of a celebration.”

Dimitri struggled to maintain a civil tone. “Vladimir, I will see what I can do. However, you may need to wait until the demonstration. Would that not be better? We would have a major success to celebrate, much more than just the completion of the bombs. We must also focus on producing additional components; our time is, after all, finite.”

Seething, Dimitri walked away, not trusting himself to say more. The engineer, alone in his workshop, felt his suspicions return; every personal request he’d made had been deferred until after the test detonation. He cast a glance in the direction of his gold-lined briefcase, thankful that he’d planned ahead.

Helen accompanied Instinct into their private dressing room after they came in off the stage, their second concert at Dodger Stadium behind them. She’d waited until after the concert to give them the news, to avoid any additional stress onstage. Getting all four guys together, she thrust a print from her computer into Brandon’s hands and waited while he and Chase looked at the photo it contained. Chase saw the problem first and then handed the photo to Jon and Eric. “That’s us at Bunyip Beach Resort and we’re holding hands,” Chase said to Helen, feeling a few butterflies in his stomach.

With a grave expression on her face, Helen nodded. “It’s on the Internet. Some tourist snapped it and posted it to an online celebrity discussion forum. It set off all kinds of speculation about you two. The good news is that some of the comments gave me an idea. Two comments suggested that it had been photoshopped; that you two were just standing close and the hands are faked. Unless you guys think of anything better, that’s what we’ll need to go with. I’m bound to get press inquiries any minute now, so I’ll say we saw it, and it has been altered. That’s technically true; the person who posted it said it was an enlargement, so this way we can mislead without actually lying. I’ve also made some arrangements for the party tonight that should dampen any rumors, or more precisely start some that suit our purposes. However, you two either need to be more careful, or come out in a planned way.”

Recalling Helen’s prior statements on the risks of coming out, Chase asked, “Wouldn’t coming out, especially as a couple, wreck the band?”

Helen nodded. “It’s a big risk, but you’ve got enough momentum as a band that we might get through it. We make most of our money from concerts and merchandizing and both could take a sizeable hit, at least for a while.” Helen glanced at each of the four members of Instinct in turn, seeing from their expressions that none of them wanted to jeopardize their careers.

With the issue of coming out taken care of, or at least set aside for the time being, Helen led Instinct out to the backstage area, which was infested with press. Barbra latched onto Brandon’s arm and moments later Jim’s girlfriend Linda did the same for Chase. Both had been instructed to keep the two guys well apart while the press was about.

A few questions were shouted by reporters, but Brandon just shrugged and shook his head, doing his best to act as if the questions about the photo were absurd. The most direct question came from a reporter who asked Brandon, “Will you comment on the rumors regarding you and Chase Carlisle?”

Laughing, and with Barbra hanging on his arm, Brandon replied, “You guys need to find some real news. I don’t know what I can tell you except that I’m happy with the relationship that I have.” With that, Brandon smiled at Barbra, intertwining his fingers with hers. Brandon felt a trace of unease over the deception, but he felt that the blame lay with the press itself, for their relentless examination of the private lives of anyone in the public eye.

An hour later, a paparazzi in a hotel across the street from Instinct’s snapped a low-light picture of Chase and Linda sharing a kiss on Chase’s darkened balcony, precisely as Helen had planned. The following morning, Helen browsed through the press reports, relieved to find that her ploys appeared successful. The main rumor-mongering involved Eric, who had been seen with two girls on his arm, kissing each in turn. That hadn’t been planned, but it served their purpose so Helen didn’t mind it, not one little bit.

© 2008 C James

Please let me know what you think; good, bad, or indifferent.

Please give me feedback, and please don’t be shy if you want to criticize! The feedback thread for this story is in my Forum. Please stop by and say "Hi!"

Many thanks to my editor EMoe for editing and for his support, encouragement, beta reading, and suggestions.

Thanks also to Shadowgod, for beta reading, support and advice, and for putting up with me.

A big "thank you" to to Bondwriter for final Zeta-reading and advice, and to Captain Rick for Beta-reading and advice.

Special thanks to Graeme, for beta-reading and advice.

Any remaining errors are mine alone.