Chapter 7
STEPHANIE
Two and a half years ago
I’m standing in the middle of the arena, looking around and enjoying all of the electric excitement that only the first day on a new job can bring.
I take in another slow breath, soaking in that distinctive concert-arena smell.
It’s not the kind of scent you’ll find at the beauty counter, but it soothes me because it’s another reminder that there’s a concert tonight: my favorite part about working in this industry.
A ping of anticipation courses through me.
I’m the new assistant stage manager (ASM) at Vision Design Productions, an Austin-based production company that specializes in the artistic design and execution of all types of concerts and events. Simply put: we make our clients’ events look good.
It’s not normal to start a job on the same day as an event, but somehow that’s how it worked out. Today isn’t just any concert either—it’s for Icefall. They won three Grammys last month for their self-titled debut album. They’re taking the world by storm.
Tonight my only job is to shadow Alyssa, the stage manager (SM), and learn how she does things.
I haven’t seen her yet today, but our first meeting with the client is in a few minutes, and I know she’ll be there.
I’ve already been here for over an hour, but that’s my standard operating procedure on event days: show up before everyone else so that I can soak in the atmosphere and find a piece of calm before the wonderfully controlled chaos begins.
My early arrival isn’t helping as much as it usually does.
I was so anxious this morning that I changed outfits no less than ten times before leaving my apartment.
In the end, I went with what I hope screams casual professional: a brand-new, classic-white Ralph Lauren cotton blouse with eyelet lace around the cuffs and bottom hem; wide-legged olive-green pants with a wide belt; and my tan Louboutins—my shoe brand of preference.
I begin to pace so I can organize my thoughts. I have so much energy that at any moment my pacing might turn into dancing or leaping—needless to say, I’m trying to keep those physical manifestations under control.
This morning’s thoughts are a strange combination of feeling like an adult with a kick-butt job and like the new kid at school who doesn’t know anyone. Which—now that I think of it—is accurate, since I am the new kid, and I don’t know anyone.
“G’day. Don’t believe we’ve met yet.”
I’m so startled by the masculine voice behind me that I quickly spin around and bump into a hand holding a hot cup of coffee, causing it to spill all over my new blouse.
My new, white Ralph Lauren blouse.
What the parking ticket!
Surveying the damages, I’m so annoyed with both my clumsiness and my choice to not wear a camisole under my blouse this morning.
Mostly because I’d worn my lucky bra—which is bright pink.
Normally it can’t be seen under the thick cotton of this shirt.
I checked before I left my apartment this morning.
However, at that time my shirt wasn’t soaking wet.
A camisole would have at least helped to partially hide the bright-pink bra that can now be clearly seen through my wet shirt.
“I didn’t mean to startle you!” The words come from a man with a familiar face, but I’m so rattled that I can’t put any effort into why that might be.
Somewhere I register that he has an accent, but I’m trapped in the blank stares we are sending each other and can’t seem to fully analyze.
Suddenly, he perks up. “Hang about!” He walks past me and out of sight.
Hang about? What does that even mean? Does it have something to do with his accent?
Before I get much further in piecing together an answer, he returns with two fistfulls of napkins.
I try to hold the shirt away from my skin, both because the coffee was hot and because I’m wearing nothing but a bright-pink bra under a white, now-wet shirt. The man raises a fist full of napkins like he’s going to wipe off my shirt—but then freezes.
It’s my chest that took the brunt of the coffee spill, and if he tries to dry my shirt, it’s going to be the equivalent of getting to second base. His eyes look up, and his brows pull together with a crease in the middle.
“That’s alright.” I take the napkins and pat the wet parts of my shirt, still trying to keep it away from my skin.
It’s not working. I look around for anything else that might help.
Nothing. If I want to get a new shirt, it’s an hour drive back to my apartment, which means a two-hour round trip.
Out of the question on a day like today.
I didn’t bring a change of clothes because—who brings an extra shirt to work?
The nearest shopping center is a solid thirty minutes away with traffic.
Not much of an improvement considering I’m supposed to be in a meeting in a matter of minutes.
“I’ll just . . .” I shake my head; I have no idea how to finish that sentence.
I look up into his strangely familiar face. His eyes are focused, and he’s studying me intently—like he’s either an artist about to paint me or a serial killer deciding how best to dispose of my body. Neither option seems very realistic right now, but they’re the only ones my brain offers.
“I’ve got an idea. It’s a nuts one, but you’ll be apples in the end. Let’s shoot through.” He signals for me to follow him, then turns and walks away.
You’ll be apples in the end? Let’s shoot through? Is that serial-killer code for something? And it still seems like I should be able to place the accent . . .
I hesitantly follow him to an open door, and he gestures to have me enter first. Every true-crime documentary I’ve ever watched where someone gets lured into a very small room before becoming an unlikely victim plays through my head.
Why has my mind latched onto this serial-killer concept? Not helping!
I reluctantly enter the room, thinking that this is either the dumbest thing I’ve ever done or that I have the most overactive imagination on the planet.
I survey the small space. It’s filled with boxes. Lots of boxes. I turn around to face him and realize how small the room is—just as he slowly shuts the door and turns to face me. Though we’re on opposite ends of the open space, he’s less than an arm’s length away.
He looks at me with the same intensity as before, but it’s different. He scrutinizes me slowly, his eyes scanning from my shoulders to my waist and narrowing in an analytical way. Is he trying to figure out how many boxes my body will fit into, or does he think he’s going to have his way with me?
My nerves take off like a pinball machine that I’m ill-equipped to control, and I second guess all of my judgment skills. I’ve willingly followed this stranger into a small room, and now he’s between me and the closed door.
I realize he’s checking out my chest. “Hey! Eyes up here, buddy!”
His eyes immediately fly up to meet mine. He takes half a step back so that he’s almost against the door. “I’m sorry . . .”
But he’s too late. I’ve already raised a defensive stance, fists ready, should they be needed.
At that moment, the door flies open and hits him, knocking him toward me.
He quickly puts his hands up, like he’ll be burned with fire if he touches me.
I bounce awkwardly off the hard chest of Mr. Coffee-Spiller and into the tall stack of boxes behind me, losing my balance and falling to the floor.
A box from somewhere high above me proceeds to fall onto the floor and break open, spilling out what appears to be dozens of T-shirts.
No one moves.
Mr. Coffee-Spiller still has his hands in the air like he’s being arrested.
The man who threw the door open simply stands there, taking in the bizarre scene with his hand frozen on the knob.
I’m on the floor with T-shirts all over me and look down to see Mr. Coffee-Spiller staring up at me.
Wait . . . what?
I look up to see that he’s also still standing with his hands in the air. Looking down again, I notice that there is not one Mr.
Coffee-Spiller—but dozens. There are dozens of Mr. CoffeeSpillers staring at me from the T-shirts now littering the ground.
The realization hits me like a freight train: Mr. Coffee-Spiller is actually Chase Collins.
Chase Collins. One of People magazine’s “Sexiest 30 under 30.”
Chase Collins. The lead singer of Icefall, whose concert we are working tonight.
Chase Collins. The man whose face is on all of these shirts—because they are his band’s T-shirts.
Chase Collins. The man I just raised a hand to like I was going to punch him in his perfectly sun-tanned face.
I slowly close my eyes as my heart hits the ground. I’m pretty sure I was wrong about the serial-killer option.
And if frisky was what he wanted, why hadn’t he taken the opportunity to get a little handsy when he came back with all the napkins a few minutes ago?
Or when I fell against him? He went out of his way to not touch me when he realized what I was implying about him—so much so that he let me fall to the ground.
And sure, he was checking me out, but why only from my shoulders to my waist? I slowly open my eyes, again staring at Chase Collin’s face all over the floor. Then I realize why he brought me into this room: to get me a clean shirt.
I want to disappear and be anywhere but in this tiny room. Preferably in a galaxy far, far away.
“Mr. Collins . . .”
“Chase.” The soothing sound of what I now realize is his Australian accent circles around me like a fuzzy, soft blanket. “Call me Chase, love.” His smile is soft and friendly. One that has no superiority or arrogance. Not what I was expecting.
“You want me to call you Chase?” My voice is small and squeaky. He gives me a little wink and a nod as his smile deepens and a dimple appears on his left cheek. Great. A dimple. As if I wasn’t struggling enough.
His wink wasn’t a creepy one either—it was friendly and charming.
I’m realizing that while the magazine covers and music videos do justice to how handsome he is, they don’t capture how laid back and friendly he appears to be.
His beach-blonde waves are perfectly tousled, while his light-blue eyes smile at me.
How did I not recognize him at first? I guess I wasn’t expecting to see someone from the band hanging around the venue this early—and in jeans and a simple T-shirt instead of pop star apparel.
“I am so, so sorry. I wouldn’t have really punched you.
Well, unless you did try for either murder or manhandling .
. . Then I’m sure I would have put up a good fight.
” My stomach drops as I hear my rambling begin.
“Not that I thought you were going to murder me . . .” Make it stop.
“Because murder . . . would be bad.” Because murder would be bad? !
I smack my forehead at how out of control I have let this get. I tend to ramble when I get particularly nervous, but I can truthfully say that I’ve never rambled about my possible impending murder to the man I’ve suggested might be the one to carry it out.
I’ve hit a new low.
Chase finally puts his hands down and reaches to help me up. “No worries. You simply sound like a person who’s a tad rattled.”
“Um . . . yes. That’s exactly what happened.” If he’s going to throw me a lifeline, I’m going to grab onto it.
As he pulls me up, I notice the man who opened the door, hand still on the knob, surveying what’s been going on. “Um . . . I came to tell you that the production company is ready for you in the green room.”
Great. Not that either of these two men should know it, but I’m supposed to be at that meeting too.
“Let them know I’ve run into something and will be there as soon as I can.”
“Run into something?” The man, with his hand still on the doorknob, furrows his brows in confusion. After everything he just witnessed, why is it this statement that makes him confused?
Chase’s eyes drop to the coffee stain on my shirt. “I guess I should say I ran into someone. I need to help clean up my mess. I’ll be there soon.”
The man doesn’t even question him. He simply nods his head and closes the door behind him, leaving the two of us alone—once more—in this small room. Chase bends down and rummages through the T-shirts on the floor.
I stand stunned, watching a pop star pick out a shirt for me.
He lets out a noise of dissatisfaction as he stands up with one in his hands.
“This is XXXL, but it looks like the only size in the box. I’ve got a meeting, so we don’t have time to look through the others.
” He hands me the shirt and shrugs his broad shoulders, smiling so wide that two dimples pop out.
Oh, that’s really nice. Something inside me begins to buzz.
“If it’s okay with you, can I meet you back here in about an hour, and we can find you a better-fitting shirt? ”
All the words in my brain scramble and I can’t seem to make a full sentence, so I slowly nod my head.
He steps outside the room and then shuts the door. His voice was easy and friendly. His face was open and relaxed. Nothing harsh or judgmental. Nothing arrogant. How is this man being kind to me after the last ten minutes?
Attractive and nice. With dimples! This is a deadly combination for me, but I try to reel in whatever daydream was starting.
I gather my wits, slide off my coffee-soaked shirt, and attempt to dry whatever’s still damp on my body.
Then I bring the T-shirt he’d given me up to my nose and smell it.
Don’t judge me. I have a thing for smells, and I want to know what a pop star smells like.
Unfortunately, Chase Collins never wore this particular shirt, so it simply smells like screen-printing ink.
It’s disappointing. I slide it over my head and feel even more like a small child than I already did after today’s events.
It’s dripping off my shoulders and is so long I could wear it as a dress, so I tie a side knot in the bottom and call it good.
I refold and clean up the T-shirts on the floor, and as soon as I’m done, I step into the hallway and head toward the green room, where I’ll be late to my first production meeting.
Will Chase tell McKay, my boss, what happened? I can’t worry about that right now, so I pull myself together and keep walking, my Louboutins clicking down the hall as I go to face the music.
No pun intended.