Chapter 39 The Live Wire

Allie

The next morning, I heard Gracie open our door and pad over to the side of the bed. I opened one eye to look at her, but before I could say anything, I heard Nico whisper to her over my shoulder.

"Good morning, princess. You're up awfully early." His low, sleep-roughened voice made me smile. I could get used to hearing that first thing every morning.

"I gotta get ready for school, Daddy. If I'm late, I can't go on the field twip." We really needed to work on those 'R' blend words, I thought yet again. I made a mental note to ask Miss Rosa about it when I dropped Grace off today.

I reached out to snag my phone from the bedside table. It was only 6:12 in the morning. My alarm was set for 6:30, so I could have slept for another eighteen minutes. Ugh! I was so not a morning person.

"Gracie-girl, we have plenty of time to get ready, I promise. Go make your bed quickly, and I'll get breakfast started."

She nodded and padded out of the room.Nico tightened the arm he had slung over my waist, holding me in place against him for a moment before letting me go. He patted my ass as I got out of bed, and I turned to find his eyes glued to my bare legs under my nightshirt.

"I'm glad tomorrow is Saturday, Sunshine. I'm looking forward to snuggling with you in the morning," he said with a soft smile.

"You aren't planning to snuggle with me when we get home tonight?" I asked, arching a brow at him.

"Gracie will be spending the night with your parents tonight. I plan on fucking you until we're both too weak to get out of this bed," he growled, lunging across the bed to make a grab for me. I squealed and hopped back out of his reach, almost falling over my own feet in the process.

Nico flopped back on his pillow and laughed, telling me to be careful before I hurt something important. I flipped him off over my shoulder as I strolled into the bathroom to start my day.

Two hours later, after getting Gracie dropped off at preschool and getting a referral for a speech therapist from Miss Rosa, I headed into the office for the day. I had an overflowing email inbox that took several hours to wade through, followed by a late lunch with Michael and Lana to go over the final arrangements for the publicity tour. The guys were scheduled as guests for several popular talk shows and late-night shows, as well as radio shows, podcasts, and print interviews over the next month.

Tony, Matt, Josh and Nonna had lunch at The Grove as planned, with Marco and one of the other bodyguards along for crowd control if necessary. Apparently, once Nonna had found out from Becca that Tony was going to out himself, she invited herself along in a show of support. Tony was happy to have her with them. The first photo hit online within ten minutes of their arrival. The paparazzi captured them walking together, Nonna strutting along on Tony's arm, with Josh and Matt trailing behind them, all wearing their shirts as planned. Nonna had gotten one for herself that read "Love is Love. If you don't believe that, then fuck you!" God, I adored that woman!

Within twenty minutes, a crowd of paparazzi and fans swarmed the foursome, and Marco and the other guard hustled them back to the waiting SUV. I watched the video on TMZ. Tony, by choice, was the last one to get in the vehicle. The paps had been shouting questions at the group, trying to confirm the story. Since Tony's shirt, with the flag indicating bisexuality, was quite different from the Love is Love and Proud Ally shirts the others wore, the savvier photographers zeroed in on him.

One of them shouted, "Tony, is this a message? Are you bi?"Tony stopped as he was entering the backseat, then turned and flashed a big smile. "Yes," he said simply, then turned and got in as Marco shut the door behind him. I was so fucking proud of that man, yet at the same time, I hated that a person's sexuality was deemed newsworthy. The human race was pretty shitty, sometimes.

My phone pinged non-stop for the next hour, with alerts popping up from every news outlet picking up the story. Speculation was running rampant as to who, or what, had prompted Tony to "come out of the closet". I finally shut my notifications off so that I could get some work done before I headed over to the Live Wire. I would be helping with the last-minute preparations for the show there this evening. It was a kick-off event for the album release next month. The record label liked the guys to do a few shows at small, intimate venues to showcase the new material ahead of any upcoming album release.

The Live Wire in downtown Los Angeles had been around for years. It was a 600-seat capacity venue which typically hosted up-and-coming bands and musicians, along with the occasional comedy tour. Big names, like Storm Front, would do small shows with very little pre-promotion from time to time to try out new material or amp up interest in an act before a new album or a tour. Storm Front had performed there a few times over the years, the last time being about two years ago. They'd headlined a benefit concert to raise money for people who had lost their homes in a huge wildfire a few counties north of here.

Mid-afternoon, I pulled into the parking lot of the venue, with Michael's intern pulling in right behind me. The intern, a nice but slightly cocky college senior named Miles, carried in the boxes of Storm Front T-shirts, posters and assorted band merchandise which would be available for sale that night. Miles would be staffing the merchandise table with help from a friend of his. Normally I would lend a hand, but Michael and Nico had both put their foot down about that. I was now "too high-profile" to mingle so freely with the fans and general public at events like this.

I understood, but it still sucked. I'd always loved interacting with their fans, and hearing how much they loved the guys and their music. For the most part, anyway. At times, some of the fans would get a little over-enthusiastic about their love for particular members of the band. I'd had to deal with a number of groupie-wannabes who would slip me messages, photos, and phone numbers to pass on to the guys. I'd even had a few offer me cash if I would sneak them into their dressing room. I wouldn't miss that part of it. But the general excitement of hearing their favorite band live, or their reactions to new songs? That I would most definitely miss.

After showing our ID, we were allowed into the building so we could begin setting up. After about an hour of hustling around unpacking boxes and setting up tables, I was hot, sweaty, flushed and my Storm Front T-shirt was decidedly rumpled. I really needed to leave soon, but I hadto meet with the venue's booking manager to take care of a couple of last-minute details and she hadn't arrived yet.

I wasn't looking forward to the interaction. Jenna Davis was rude and generally unpleasant to deal with, unless you were a hot male rockstar, of course. Then she was nice as could be. She had hung all over the guys at their last performance here two years ago, especially Nico. She had treated the rest of us like dirt under her shoe.

There had been some scandal involving an affair with the married venue owner a few months after that last show. His wife had insisted that Jenna had to go, so she had gone to work for a club in Vegas. I hadn't been sorry to hear that she was gone. Michael had informed me this morning that she was back in town working at The Live Wire again. Apparently, the once-married venue owner was now divorced, imagine that.

The assistant manager let me know that Jenna had just arrived, and directed me toward her office. I knocked on the open doorway and she turned toward me, a look of barely concealed disgust on her face as she eyed me standing there.

Her blonde hair was perfectly styled in long, beachy waves and her make-up was on-point, if a little heavy for my tastes. I, on the other hand, had started the morning with a ponytail and a bit of mascara, both of which were less than immaculate at this point in the day.

"Yes?" she asked in a snotty tone, as though I were a lower-life form she clearly had no desire to speak to.

Her rudeness of two years ago had morphed into full-on bitch mode now. Lovely. I flashed her my ultra-polite, professional smile and stepped into the room. I extended my hand to her as she remained seated behind her desk.

"Hi Jenna, I'm Allie Donovan, Michael Drummond's assistant. I won't keep you, but I did need to go over a couple of - "

"Alice, or whatever your name is, I don't have time to hold your hand through this process. I'm sure you can figure out whatever it is you need to set up your little table of T-shirts without my input."

Oh, hell no. Nope, not today, Satan.

"It's Allie . Allie Donovan, and I'm not here about the merchandise table. I'm here because you haven't signed the contract revision that our attorney sent over last week, correcting the errors in the original contract you presented to us. You verbally agreed to the changes with Michael, but we do need your signature. You also need to sign the Non-Disclosure Agreement we sent over. We received NDAs from all of your staff, but yours wasn't included." I gave her my most charming smile, which may or may not have disguised the fact that I was gritting my teeth with the effort to be nice to her. What the hell was her problem?

"Look, Annie, I'm incredibly busy and I simply don't have time for this." She opened her mouth to continue speaking, but I cut her off with a raised hand and a shake of my head.

"Jenna, let me assure you, if you don't take five minutes to sign these two documents, you'll have all the time in the world tonight, because there won't be a show," I informed her icily.

"Excuse me?" she sputtered, standing up so quickly that her desk chair rolled back and bounced off the wall behind her.

"I'm quite certain you heard me. If you don't sign the corrected contract and the NDA, the band doesn't play. That won't work out well for you or the venue owner, since this show sold out within minutes of being announced, so I suggest you find the time to pick up your pen and sign your name on both of these. I even brought printed copies in case for some reason you couldn't access the documents we emailed to you." I laid the paperwork on the desk in front of her, then crossed my arms and arched a brow at her. I didn't bother with even a fake smile at this point.

She glared at me, clearing trying to intimidate me. It didn't work. I just arched my brow even higher and returned her glare. Fucking bitch. I noticed that she'd had way too much Botox to be able to arch her brow, or even really move her face much at all, beyond a narrowing of her eyes. Michael had long ago given me carte-blanche to deal with the over-inflated egos in this business. His motto was to kill them with kindness, and if that doesn't work, then just go in for the kill. So, I stood my ground and allowed a small smirk to grace my lips, just to piss her off.

With a huff, she snatched up a pen and scrawled her name on both forms with barely a glance at them, shoving them back toward me. She sat back down in her seat and turned to face her computer again, clearly dismissing me.

"Thank you so much, Jenna. I'll be sure to let Michael and the band know just how cooperative you've been with me," I said sweetly as I picked up the papers and left the room with my head held high. I'd only taken a couple of steps into the hallway when I heard what sounded like a hand smacking the desk and something small - a pen maybe? - being thrown at the wall. I couldn't help the snicker that escaped my lips, not that I tried very hard, mind you.

I headed back toward the merchandise table and grabbed my purse, shooting a quick wave to Miles on my way out the door. He could handle setting up the last few bits and pieces on his own. I hurried to my car, eager to be on my way. I was going to meet the guys at the venue later since I had to pick Gracie up from preschool and drop her at my parents' house on the way home to get ready. This was my first public outing as Nico's fiancée, and I wanted to take a little extra care with my appearance.

The shirts we'd ordered for tonight had been delivered yesterday. Both shirts were black, and Nico's said "Peace, Love, Equality" in rainbow-colored letters. Mine had a heart, with the phrase "I see your true colors shining through, and that's why I love you," also in rainbow-colored letters. We wanted the world to know that we supported Tony, even though we hadn't been able to go with the group this morning. I knew that Josh and Matt were planning to wear the shirts they'd worn that morning, and Tony had one made that simply said "Yes, I am. Any other rude questions?" We were definitely making a statement, and I was damned proud of Tony for doing it.

After showering and applying a deep-conditioning treatment to my hair, I dried and styled it, showcasing the curls that Nico loved to wrap around his finger. I applied a bit more make-up than usual, still keeping it fairly natural-looking though. I pulled on my favorite pair of distressed jeans that fit like a glove and my new shirt, liking the way the deep V-neck showed enough cleavage to look sexy, but not enough that my boobs were in danger of falling out. I added a silver studded belt, a pair of high-heeled ankle boots, hoop earrings and a few silver bracelets to hide the worst of the healing scratches on my wrist, then decided that was as close to being a "rocker chick" as I was going to get.

I had arranged for a car to take me to the venue and arrived as the guys were finishing up their sound-check. As they left the stage, Nico saw me and blew me a kiss, then nodded his head back toward the dressing rooms backstage. I nodded and held up a finger to indicate that I'd be there in a minute. I took a few moments to detour up to the front near the lobby to speak with Miles. I wanted to make sure everything was ready and that his friend was still coming to help at the merchandise table. He assured me that Joey was on his way, so I made my way back toward the dressing rooms, stopping to exchange greetings with the head of security along the way. I passed Matt in the hallway, who told me that Nico had gone into the one at the very end of the hall to get ready.

I didn't bother knocking on the door, but had just placed my hand on the door handle when I heard Nico yell, "What the fuck do you think you're doing?"

I quickly opened it and my mouth fell open asa bare-chested Nico whirled around toward the door, with Jenna's arms wrapped around his neck. I vaguely registered that Nico's hands were raised as if he were being held at gunpoint, and Jenna looked like a rag doll clinging to him like that.

His eyes widened in horror and he scrambled to push her away from him, all the while pleading with me.

"Oh shit, Allie, this isn't what it looks like, I swear," he begged, reaching for me. I noticed her bright red lipstick smeared on his jaw. What is it with women and red lipstick? First, that redheaded hoebag who had accosted him at the Grammy after-party, and now Jenna the WonderBitch?

I let Nico pull me into his arms before I reached up to grab his chin, tilting his head to get a better look at the lipstick mark. Nico was still talking, but I wasn't paying him any attention as I peered around his shoulder to see Jenna standing there with a nasty smirk on her face. She was making a show of arranging her clothes, as if she had been in the middle of stripping, or being stripped.