Remember My Name (24 page)

He finally broke away from my mouth and moved his attention to my neck, my ear lobes, my throat; pulling the fabric of my sweater away so he could drop soft, sensual kisses on my bared shoulders, and the sensitive skin of my collar bone.

I really, really wanted to be able to see his body, as well as touch it, and started to tug at the hem of his T-shirt, trying to pull it up and off over his head.

‘You have too many clothes on …’ I muttered, smiling as he sat up, still straddling me, and shrugged out of his top. He was, to put it bluntly, magnificent—all lean muscle and flat lines and smooth skin, his perfectly cut torso disappearing off into Levi’s that I’d previously admired, but that now seemed to be getting in the way of what we both wanted to happen next.

In one of those comedic shuffling around moves that romance novels never prepare you for when you read about sex as a teenager; I managed to pull my baggy sweater off as well, getting my arm caught at a funny angle and losing all sense of dignity when it stuck around the top of my head. Daniel, grinning, finally tore it away, and looked down at me in my bra—not even my best one, it has to be said—as though he’d never seen anything quite so fascinating before in his whole life.

The way he looked at me—my face, my eyes, my breasts,
my eyes again—made me feel like a goddess. It wasn’t just lust—I’d seen that from men before—it was amazement. It was desire; it was reverence. It was love.

I blinked my eyes, slowly, and realised that I’d managed to dredge up a few more tears, just when I thought the well had run dry.

‘Don’t worry,’ I said, when he noticed and started to look concerned. ‘I’m not sad. I’m just … surprised. And excited. And turned on. And … it’s been a mad day. Would you like to take those jeans off? You look a bit—uncomfortable.’

He smiled and glanced ruefully at the action-packed denim straining at the seams. He climbed off me, and I waited for him to unbutton them.

*

Just as he was reaching the good part—pulling them down over his angular hips—his phone started to ring. And ring. And ring. At first he did the logical thing and ignored it, letting it skitter around on the table. But as soon as it stopped, it started again—and it went on and on and on.

‘Aaaagh!’ he said. ‘It’ll be my mum—I forgot to let her know I was home, and she’ll be convinced I’ve been killed in some freak motorway accident. She won’t stop calling until she knows I’m all right …’

I nodded, and bit back a smile. Frustrating as the interruption was, I got it—mums were just like that. He did a funny hopping jump over to the table—disabled by a combination of his jeans being half down, and having what looked like some serious problems in the boxer department.

He grabbed up the phone, spoke incredibly quickly to his mum, and switched it off. I expected him to hop straight back over to me and continue where we left off.

But he didn’t. He looked at me, and smiled, and then just stood there, bare-chested and glorious, running his hands through his hair until he left ruffles. He sighed, blew out a long, frustrated breath, and scooped his T-shirt up from the floor.

‘I think that’s what you call saved by the bell,’ he said, still keeping his distance. He started to fasten his jeans back up as I looked on in confusion.

‘What do you mean?’ I asked, caught completely unawares and feeling my own frustrations take hold. I’d enjoyed having Daniel on top of me. I’d enjoyed touching his skin, and feeling his lips against mine, and I’d wanted more. I thought he had—but instead, he was backing off just as we seemed to reach the point of no return.

‘Don’t you … don’t you fancy me?’ I said, feeling suddenly humiliated. ‘Did I do something wrong?’

‘No!’ he said, firmly, sitting down next to me and covering me with the blanket, tucking me in gently until I was completely wrapped up. ‘Don’t ever think that—I have
never
fancied anyone more than I fancy you! Even when you think you look like the elephant woman, even when you’ve been crying so much your baldy eyelashes are glued together, you’re still the most beautiful, gorgeous, and sexy creature on the planet. I’m sure you noticed I wasn’t exactly bored during that, Jessy—and at least a few of my body parts are regretting ending it.’

‘Mine too. So. Why? What’s wrong?’

He reached down, and gently tucked a few stray strands of hair behind my ear. I kissed his hand on the way, and he grinned at me.

‘Don’t do that. I’m only flesh and blood—and I can only hold off for so long.’

‘I’m not sure I want you to hold off—I’d quite like you to hold on.’

‘I know,’ he said, sitting himself out of reach at the far end of the sofa and tickling my toes instead. He knew I was really ticklish, and it was hard to feel sexy when you were laughing so hard you can’t breathe.

‘Okay,’ I said, sitting up myself, and putting my sweater back on. ‘I get it. Fun time’s over. But I’m still waiting for a reason. You’ve not signed up to some kind of chastity thing since I saw you last, have you?’

‘Hardly,’ he smirked. ‘And I’ve not been living like a monk, waiting for you to come back into my life, Jess, pleased as I am that you did. I want this—I want it badly. But I also want it to be right. There’s too much in your life that
isn’t
right at the moment. We’ve spent ages talking about the things that aren’t right, including the fact that you’re still screwed up over Jack. I think, before we start this thing between us, that you have to fix some of those things.

‘I want us to be together. I think we’ve always had something special, and I want to find out just how special—but this isn’t the time to begin. I know what I want, a hundred per cent—and I know, right now, you think you want the same. But that, if you’ll forgive me for saying so, is lust speaking.
That’s not enough. Before this can work you need to sort yourself out, Jessy. I’ll help you any way I can.’

I raised an eyebrow at him, and he laughed. I could think of at least one way he could help me.

‘Any way but that. Look, does that make sense? Any of it?’

‘Annoyingly,’ I replied, pouring us both another glass of Baileys. ‘It does. I don’t want it to, but yes, it makes sense. So. I’m going to have another drink. I’m going to sleep it off. And tomorrow, I’m going to start sorting it all out.’

I
started with the easier ones.

Well, not easier—just more geographically convenient. The London-based items on Jessy’s Giant List of Things to Sort Out. This was a list I’d compiled—mentally—while sitting at Daniel’s big, scarred pine kitchen table on Boxing Day, as he cooked me an omelette made from Girls Aloud’s eggs.

I’d eventually passed out on the sofa halfway through watching
Die Hard
the night before, and when I woke up I was in bed in Daniel’s spare room. He’d taken off my leggings, but left me in my long jumper and pants, and there was a bottle of water and a pack of paracetamol on the table next to me.

My very first thought, once I’d woken up, stretched, and relocated my brain, was that I wished I wasn’t in Daniel’s spare bed. I wished I was in his bed, with him—even if it was just for a cuddle. A cuddle, I now suspected, that could definitely develop into something more, and I was feeling remarkably frisky for a hungover chick who’d recently had her heart broken.

Maybe, I thought, rolling over and hugging the pillow instead, that told me everything I needed to know about my
relationship with Jack. If I could wake up days later dreaming about sex with another man, how real could it have all been? It had felt real. The love had felt real, and the pain had certainly felt real. But perhaps—perhaps—I’d been more infatuated than in love? I now realised that I didn’t even really know Jack Duncan. I’d never met his parents, or heard him talk about his childhood, or seen embarrassing photos of him as a little boy.

I didn’t know what he’d been like at school, or what he wanted to be when he grew up, or where he’d gone to university, even though I knew he had. I’d never met any of his friends, or talked about his ex-girlfriends, or seen what he put in his trolley when he went to the supermarket. Apart from meeting his horrendous niece the summer before, I knew nothing about him—it was as though the Jack Duncan I knew had sprung from the womb, fully formed, as a Starmaker record executive.

He’d been charming and sexy and he’d played me absolutely perfectly—he’d actually made me work for it, which made our relationship even more exciting. Looking back, I felt sick at exactly how naive and trusting I’d been. I’d mistaken a casual fling for something much more. Even one night of
not
having sex with Daniel had shown me that.

Now, I could see things a lot more clearly—even if my eyes were still swollen from crying.

Daniel drove me all the way back to London, and we parted ways outside my flat with a long, lingering kiss that left me breathless, desperate for more, and utterly convinced that I needed to get on with that mental list. If my own conscience hadn’t been driving me, sexual frustration would have been.

I took the rest of the day to let myself decompress and think about what I was doing, and what I wanted to do. My life had been completely mental for so long now—I’d not had a minute to sit still, take stock, and think. I’d been bouncing all over the shop like a pinball in a machine, ricocheting from one set of circumstances to another. In my desperation to become a star, to be a success, I’d lost sight of what really mattered—and it was time to figure at least some of that out.

I started the day after by visiting Yusuf. I found him where he usually was—behind his counter wearing a hairnet and a stripy apron—and stayed for a good half an hour, eating my free kebab and signing a poster of me he had Sellotaped up on the tiled walls of the shop. He now had a new tenant, he told me—but he wasn’t anywhere near as pretty as me, and played loud dance music at all hours of night and day, and if I ever wanted to come back, he’d let me have the flat again.

I didn’t really want the flat again; nostalgic as I felt, I could still remember the damp and the cramped bathroom all too well. He settled for a hug and the promise that I’d stay in touch, and I left.

My next stop was more difficult. I caught a cab from Kentish Town to Clapham, where Neale had a tiny ground-floor flat that looked out onto the Common. On the way, I called at a florist’s shop and bought him an enormous, totally over-the-top bouquet of flowers. He might end up lobbing them at my head, but a girl could only try.

As I stood on the steps, waiting for him to answer, shivering in the icy breeze, part of me was hoping that he might not be in. Even though it was a Monday, and usually his day off, the
cowardly lion section of my mind was wishing for him to be at work so I could run away from it all.

Typically, I had no such luck. Neale opened the door, wearing a red-and-black kimono that yet again made me wonder how on earth his parents hadn’t known the truth about him. He took one look at me, my face peeking out from behind the flamboyant lilies and black orchids, and said, ‘My God. Did you steal that flower arrangement from Elton John’s house?’

‘Yeah,’ I replied, nervously. ‘I had to mug David Furnish to get it. Can I come in, please, Neale?’

He waited for a few moments, his arms crossed over his chest, chewing his lip and staring at me. Eventually, he turned around abruptly and walked back into his flat. I followed quickly, just in case he changed his mind and slammed the door in my face.

‘Erm … where do you want these?’ I asked, gesturing at the flowers.

‘I don’t know. My bouquet room is being refurbished at the moment. Just put them down in the corner there. What do you want, Jess?’

‘I want to apologise,’ I said simply. ‘I messed up. I didn’t think before I spoke, and what I did was unforgivable—well, hopefully not completely unforgivable. I just wanted to say how sorry I am, even if you never want to talk to me again. And to tell you I’ve learned my lesson—I promise I have. I’ll always think before I speak from now on, at least to the media—I probably can’t promise it all the time, you know what I’m like.

‘You’ve been such a good friend to me, Neale, and I don’t
want to lose you. I’m gutted that I hurt you. I never intended to, I was just a naive idiot. And I’ll do anything to make it up to you, if you will just give me the chance.’

He looked undecided for a moment, and I wasn’t sure if he was going to kick me out or not. Then he pushed his little glasses back up on his nose in a gesture I was so familiar with, and said, ‘I’m making coffee, with brandy and squirty cream. Are you in?’

‘I’m in,’ I said, more relieved than I could ever have imagined.

T
he next thing I had to fix was a lot more complicated. In fact, it took several days of scheming, several secret meetings between me and Vogue, and a call with Daniel where we all spoke over each other on speaker phone.

Ultimately, we came up with a plan. It was ambitious and risky and brave, and if we pulled it off, it would change our lives—mainly mine and Vogue’s, admittedly, but Daniel was right behind us. I think he genuinely believed in what we were doing, but he also probably wanted to stick it to Jack in a way that he knew would probably hurt him a lot more than a punch in the chops would hurt him.

We’d checked with Heidi that Jack was at the office and not in one of his many ‘meetings’—which both of us now assumed could very likely mean shagging someone else—before we turned up. We didn’t have an appointment, but we did have killer outfits and a lot of righteous justification, which was just as good.

The look on his face as we walked into his office together was absolutely priceless—a combination of terror and a vain attempt to seem professional and in control. He gestured at the seats in front of his desk, instead of inviting us to sit on
the casual sofas in the break-out area—obviously, he felt a bit safer with a block of wood and steel between him and us. As Vogue had threatened to remove his testicles the last time we were all together, I can’t say that I blamed him.

‘How can I help you?’ he asked, pushing some paper around on his desk, checking his phone, tapping his fingers and generally looking like he had ants in his pants. It was so strange, how I’d once found him irresistible; now, when I looked at him, I saw how handsome he was, but it did nothing for me.

‘I’m leaving,’ said Vogue, simply. ‘And I’m taking Jessika with me.’

He stared at her for a moment, frowning. Clearly, what she was saying did not compute. His hands finally stopped fidgeting and he gave us both his full attention. I’d seen this face before—this was Serious Starmaker Jack. This was business—and possibly even more important than his testicles.

‘You can’t,’ he replied. ‘You’re both under contract.’

‘I think,’ I said, stepping in and loving every second of it, ‘that you’ll find I’m not. Legal never drew one up for me, and, as you told me, I didn’t really need a manager because I could trust you with everything, nobody ever chased it up.’

‘But we’ve been paying you …’ he spluttered, completely and ironically outraged at my apparent lack of loyalty.

‘For services rendered,’ I said sweetly, giving him a wink. ‘I’ve worked hard for Starmaker. I’ve done everything you asked—I was on the single, the video, did all the promo, all the appearances. Plus, you know, I was sleeping with you as well, in case you’d forgotten. I’m not sure if that counts,
but I’d be happy to discuss it with HR and accounting if you need me to.’

Jack narrowed his eyes and glared at me. I had him, and he knew it. I felt Vogue stifle a laugh in the chair next to me, and silently high fived her under the table.

She was hurting a lot more than I was at Jack’s betrayal—it had been going on for so much longer for her, and she’d sacrificed so much more than I had. I knew she was still in pain—but she was taking the direct approach to recovery. The Girl Power approach.

‘And you, Paulette?’ he asked, turning his gaze to her. He even managed to look sad. ‘You want to leave me too?’

‘Oh, yeah,’ she said. ‘More than you can possibly imagine. And I
am
under contract—but my lawyer is going to talk to your lawyer, and we’re going to sort it all out as quickly and amicably as possible, aren’t we Jack? Because you promised you’d make things easy for us. And because you owe me. And because … we still have the photos. It’s a liberal business—nobody would really care if you were a secret S&M trannie. Apart from you, that is.’

He nodded, taking it all in, and leaning back in his chair. He looked at us both for a few more seconds, obviously turning everything over in his scheming little mind, wondering how he could get out of this mess.

Presumably, he didn’t come up with anything—and the next words out of his mouth were: ‘Fine. Now both of you, get out of here. Leave the building, and don’t come back.’

We stood up, and Vogue gave him a jaunty salute before
we walked out of the office, out of Starmaker, and into our brand new world.

The world where In Vogue Records was about to be born, with a completely fresh approach to music, performing, and talent. The world where In Vogue Records would work with cutting-edge producer and songwriter, Wellsy. The world where In Vogue Records would, within a month, make its very first signing—the incredibly grateful, incredibly excited, Jessika.