Chapter 9 Birdie
Chapter nine
Birdie
Two days later I rolled up to the recording studio downtown in a limo. Forrest was throwing everything at this reconciliation, but I was still pissed as hell.
His expectation that I would just be waiting for him at home galled at me. The fucking filthy rich ego on him.
He absolutely hadn’t cared whether I was a gold-digger or not. The matter was of complete indifference to him, because he was so attracted to me.
It was probably my sheer delusions that we were well-matched. Had some special connection. Otherwise, he never would have paused the wedding, no matter what he was scrambling to argue now.
Though I knew Hieronymus and Paige were begging him to start rehearsals for Phantom of the Bloody Opera, he was insistent that recording my album came first.
Even though I was not at all thawing, I’d have to be an idiot to refuse this album. It could be the start of my career.
Even though it wasn’t going to be anything like he expected.
Forrest had told me to bring my favorite twelve songs. I believe he was under the impression that I was going to bring some of the throaty folk ballads I’d written.
That he’d never offered to produce before.
But I wasn’t going to do that. For him.
Instead, there were some very unappreciated people I thought needed space on the track. And I had to bet on my own voice. I hadn’t bet on it before and regretted it.
So when I rolled up, it was to do whatever I wanted with this damn album and dare him to make it a success.
Forrest was waiting for me. Collared shirt with the sleeves rolled up, collar up, buttons undone, taunting me to resist the silvery hairs on his powerful chest.
“You look so beautiful, Birdie,” he said, helping me out of the limo.
“I am so sorry I didn’t produce an album for you before.
It was because of my own jealousy, I absolutely assure you.
You have such a sexy as hell bedroom voice that I wanted it all to myself.
Nothing to do with your own talents, which are considerable. ”
“So you promise this album will be a success?” I asked.
“Baby girl, I assure you,” Forrest said. “With your voice and my connections? There is absolutely no question. I can get you on the Billboard Top 50.”
“Good,” I said. “Because I have some friends accompanying me on this track.”
I opened the door wider and out stepped Percy with his accordion, Lulabel with her harmonica, and of course, Mortimer.
“What the hell,” said Forrest, “are they doing here?”
“You said I could do whatever I wanted on this track,” I reminded him. “And you guaranteed success. Well, I expect success, because there’s a lot of polka music Percy has been bottling up.”
“Father, it’s a musical style I feel you’ve never really appreciated,” Percy said seriously as Mortimer snarled at Forrest.
“Now is his chance to,” I chirped, linking arms with Percy.
“And I’ve got a little number with Mortimer,” Lulabel said. “I’ve trained him to accompany me vocally on some old show tunes.”
For a moment I thought Forrest would snarl back at everyone, but I saw him visibly swallow his anger.
“I’ve seen more of you this month than I ever did when we were married,” he snapped in a harassed way to Lulabel, but I brushed past him. “Let’s go.”
I swore I could hear his teeth grinding, but the door shut behind us and then I felt his disturbingly gravelly voice all along my spine.
“Whatever you want, baby. You aren’t going to outlast me.”
“I always have,” I retorted. “Which of us was always ready to go a second round faster? Besides, with you, there’s always another woman.”
Suddenly he grabbed me around the waist and pressed me against his body, where he felt hot, hard, and urgent behind me.
“That’s a damn lie, Birdie. I don’t want any other women. I’m gonna be waiting for you when they lower me into the goddamn ground. Do you understand me?”
“Have fun down there,” I retorted, kicking his shins.
His hands tightened on me.
“Please, baby girl. I rebuke my behavior. I fucking loathe Phee.”
“Right. You loathe her so much you cast her as the lead in your upcoming show.”
“That was Paige,” he gritted out. “I gave her free choice for the casting. But she is no longer involved with the production.”
“Move along!” Lulabel caroled in her sweetest voice, but I heard Forrest grunt as Mortimer told a hold of his elbow and began to tear his shirt back and forth.
“Oh, I’m sure she’ll worm her way back in,” I said cheerfully. “Seems like she really has you wrapped around her little finger.”
“Absolutely not. I’ve never begged for her. I’ve spent the last week groveling on my belly for you.”
“Well,” I said, ignoring how my skin prickled. “Let’s get going.”
Forrest’s other long-time producers and assistants almost fell out of their chairs when they saw us enter the studio, but he snapped his fingers imperiously at them, and they hurried to set up the equipment for us.
And I thought his big blonde friend Jerry would faint when Percy started in on the fourth stanza of his polka.
“That was good,” I said, daring Forrest to contradict me. “I think you really did that old Polish wedding song justice.”
Forrest met my eyes and didn’t look away. He was infamous for his control freak ways in the studio, how every single album he produced had to meet the demands of his musical genius.
“Pretty good, Percy,” he said. “A few of those notes were a little flat. Let’s take it from the top, shall we?”
“There’s also a little arrangement with Mortimer that’s really going to wow the audience,” I put in, adjusting Mortimer’s bubblegum-pink bow. Only the best for a Davies-Jones production.
And Forrest sat in his chair and recorded eleven songs involving his ex-wife, oldest child, and an angry Pekingese.
Of course, I couldn’t resist doing one of my songs either, one of the folk ballads I had written myself. It was in a very old-fashioned style, but it seemed to fit my voice well.
I wasn’t trying to sing in the classical style, either, but the one that suited me.
The songs I had done on America’s Most Enchanting Virtuoso had never really suited my voice either. And I had tried lots of classical songs, but they weren’t really my range.
This was.
And I knew he wasn’t lying about how my voice affected him.
His shirt was open a few buttons at the top, a sight that might have driven me mad with lust in the before times, and his heart was pounding so hard I could see it through the silvery hair on his chest.
There was a muscle throbbing in his cheek.
“That was—beautiful, Birdie,” he said in a voice low with throbbing emotion. “Absolutely stunning.”
“Yeah,” I shrugged. “I know.”
There were times a casual word of praise from him would have sent me into ecstasy for days. But now I knew he wanted my voice to himself out of jealousy, I threw myself into the song, allowing each note to really sit in my throat and gut and between my thighs.
“What do you think?” I asked Jerry as we finished. Like all Forrest’s friends, he too was wealthy and handsome,
“You have a gorgeous voice,” he said.
“Oh, thank you,” I said, taking another step closer. “Forrest always said my voice was too rough for commercial success.”
Jerry looked shocked at this.
“Absolutely not,” he said as I dropped my cellphone in front of him and he bent eagerly down to get it. “I would totally disagree with that assessment. You’re a star, Birdie.”
Jerry reached his hand out with the cellphone, and I took it, my fingers sliding slightly down his palm.
He gulped, his eyes glued to the inches of belly above my low-hanging sweatpants, but as I took one step closer, Forrest yanked Jerry’s rolling chair backwards so the other man had to clutch the sides to keep from falling off.
“She is a star. She’s my star. So you can put that slobbering tongue back in your mouth.”
Jerry looked wary, but I made sure to hold his eyes before I finally dropped my own, so he knew one thing for sure.
I no longer do what Forrest says.
“He can appreciate my voice if he wants,” I said coolly.
But Forrest stepped between us.
“No, he can’t. Because you sound like sex and sin on a stick and neither he, nor any other man, is allowed to properly appreciate it. Let’s go.”
Forrest walked us all outside to the waiting limo, and I couldn’t help being pleased at how happy Lulabel and Percival were. Even Mortimer hadn’t attempted to bite random passers-by.
“I didn’t like how he was looking at you,” Forrest growled in my ear.
“It is unfortunate when men fall victim to their lusts,” Percival said unctuously.
“It sure as hell is,” I agreed.
“When other men do? It is,” Forrest said, then he shut the door behind the two of them and tapped on the top for the limo driver to take off.
“What the hell? I was going with them?” I complained, when I felt Forrest’s hand on the back of my throat, long seductive fingers tangled in my hair.
“I will not just let another man have you.”
“Oh, and what do you have to say about it?” I snapped, my temper flaring. “If I want to get another sugar daddy, it’s nothing to you.”
“It’s everything to me,” he retorted as another sleek black limo pulled up behind him.
“You lost your right to complain,” I shot at him.
Forrest opened the other door with one hand, and I tightened my lips. His chest was slick with sweat, and he was breathing hard, one muscle flexing in his tanned forearm.
This proximity could be dangerous. But, on the other hand, he was the one who was emotionally attached. Not me.