Page 28 of Spark

KENDRICK

Six days later

“ O h, yeah, this is definitely the fit, baby,” I murmur to the stylist assigned to me as I gaze at myself in a full-length mirror.

“You have the perfect physique to wear it,” she replies, gazing at my reflection alongside me.

She launches into a detailed explanation of how and why she thinks this sick outfit suits me and is the perfect choice for today’s festivities—the press conference announcing this season’s cast of Sing Your Heart Out , followed by a raging after-party.

All of it happening here at Reed River’s sprawling, hilltop mansion in the Hollywood Hills

“When I was Savage’s guest mentor two seasons ago, they didn’t give me a stylist,” I say. “I wore a T-shirt and jeans out of my own closet.”

The stylist tsks . “Well, this time, Nadine said she wants us pulling out all the stops to make you look like a headliner.” She’s referring to the executive producer, a woman who’s well known for being a Machiavellian force of nature.

The handler assigned to me for the day—another new thing, since my last appearance on the show—pops her head into the bedroom I’ve been assigned to use as my dressing room/hiding place, and the moment she sees my flashy duds, she gushes about my appearance.

“Isn’t he stunning?” the stylist agrees.

“Stunning. A work of art. Is he ready for hair and makeup?”

“He’s all yours.”

“Are you doing it in Reed’s guest house?” I ask. That’s where they did it during my prior season. “If so, I know my way there, so you don’t have to take me.”

The woman smiles at me in a way that feels like she’s calling me a dumbshit. “Yeah, it’s over there again. But I have to escort you. Nadine said she doesn’t want to risk you bumping into Cooper before the press conference. She wants all on-camera reactions to be ‘spontaneous’ and ‘real.”

“Okay. Whatever you say.” I say my goodbyes and thanks to the stylist, and off I go behind my handler until, eventually, we’re heading down a winding path through Reed’s spacious backyard that leads to his guest house at the back of his massive estate.

“Well, look at you,” a snarky male voice says. When I turn to look, it’s Cooper coming up the path from the guest house. Like me, he’s dressed to kill. Unlike me, his hair and face are already camera-ready.

“Hey, Cooper,” I say flatly. By now, we both know they’re going to try to pit us against each other this season. I’m sure Cooper’s on board, but fuck him. I’m planning to adopt Ruby’s approach and make it clear he’s not worth the time or energy to engage with.

“Don’t say another word, boys,” my handler barks. “Save whatever you’re dying to say to each other for the press conference.”

“I’m not dying to say a damned thing,” I say nonchalantly.

“Sure, KC,” Cooper snaps.

“Stop. Talking,” Cooper’s handler hisses. “Both of you. Or Nadine’s going to kill me.”

My handler snaps at her colleague, “Why’d you bring Cooper through here now? Didn’t you hear me on the radio? I just said I was escorting KC down the path!”

As the women are squabbling, Cooper sneers and says to me, “You didn’t waste any time, getting with her, did you? The second she broke up with me?—”

“No!” our handlers shout simultaneously. “No talking. Keep it moving.”

Cooper and his handler step aside to allow my handler and me down the path. But as I pass him, Cooper shoots me a look that’s so cocky and self-satisfied, I want to punch it off his face.

“I wouldn’t smile like that, if I were you,” I say. “If I was a guy who couldn’t get my ex to the finish line during sex.”

“Fuck you,” Cooper spits out.

“No, fuck her . And when I do, unlike you, I actually get her off.”

“No, no, no!” both handlers start screaming at once. Both women physically push and pull at Cooper and me, and in short order, we’re both herded off toward our respective destinations once again.

“Didn’t APM open for Fugitive Summer a few years ago?” my handler asks. “I thought both bands were close friends.”

“We were. But then, we all saw what a clingy little prick Cooper was as a boyfriend to Ruby, and we all started hating his guts.”

My handler snickers. “For what it’s worth, I’m Team Kendrick, all the way. That’s why they assigned me to you. ”

“Does that mean that other woman is Team Cooper?”

She looks around. “Yes, but she’s in the minority. Most of us don’t believe for a second what Cooper said about the breakup. We all know he embellished it to make himself look good.”

“In his song, you mean?”

“No, besides that, he’s telling everyone at the show he broke up with Ruby because she cheated on him. With you . ”

I scoff. “That’s not what happened. Ruby broke up with him, and she never cheated on him.”

“I figured. I know a narcissist when I see one. I was married to one.” She smirks. “But even if it did happen that way, I certainly wouldn’t blame Ruby for doing whatever she had to do to get with you. Nobody would blame her for that.”

I don’t know what to say to that, so I say nothing, and a moment later, we reach the guest house.

Inside, hallelujah, I discover the friendliest of faces: the perfectly symmetrical one that’s owned by my lifelong best friend.

When I enter the guest house, Savage is sitting in a chair with a hairdresser working on him, looking like he’s in good spirits.

“Look at you!” Savage calls out when he sees me bounding toward him. “Hot damn, KC, you’re looking fine as wine! Wooh!”

“Same to you, brother. You look like a goddamned rockstar.”

“I try.”

I take a seat next to him, and we chat for a bit while the hairdresser finishes her work, and my handler scrolls on her phone. But when the work on Savage is completed, and both women have stepped outside to make phone calls, I quickly tell Savage the tea about my exchange with Cooper.

“He’s such a dick.”

“The worst.”

“Have you seen Ruby yet? ”

“Not since we drove here together this morning. She texted me she’s getting ready in some far-off guest room with Laila.”

“Yeah, Laila told me.” He arches an eyebrow. “So, how’s it been going with Ruby the Roomie? Mission accomplished yet?”

I flap my lips together. “We’re still BFFs.”

“Fuck.”

“On day one, right after Ruby got to my place, things looked really promising, man. In fact, I stupidly thought the mission was going to be accomplished that very night. But then things stalled after that, for reasons I don’t understand, and I haven’t been able to steer them in the right direction again. ”

“What the fuck have you been doing every night for almost a week, when she’s been lying next to you in bed—singing her lullabies?”

“That’s the thing. She hasn’t been sleeping next to me. She got herself a goddamned air mattress. So now, it’s like we’re nineteen again, and she’s got a boyfriend, and I’m the depressed bestie who dropped out of college who visits her on weekends and sleeps on her goddamned floor.”

“How did you let this happen? What about the insomnia thing? I thought Ruby was going to cuddle you to?—”

“She said she’d still help me with that, if needed.

But I keep forgetting to fake insomnia because I’m having so much fun talking to her.

It feels like old times, man. We talk and talk and never run out of things to say.

I mean, that’s the good news and the bad news, I guess. We’re genuinely having fun together.”

Savage grips his newly coiffed hair for emphasis. “Did you not listen to me at all?” he shouts. “I told you to make things sexually charged. I told you to?—”

“I did! Savage, I swear, I executed your plan perfectly, on day one. And it was totally working. But then, I don’t know, everything just kind of went straight back into the friend zone from there, and that’s where it’s stayed.”

He sighs. “Tell me exactly what you did on day one, when you were cooking with gas. Tell me every fucking thing.”

“Dude, I was a Jedi Master. When she first arrived at my place, I had my fridge stocked with all her favorite foods, and I had bouquets of her favorite flowers sitting nice and pretty on my?—"

“What the fuck? No, no, no! I asked what did you do to seduce her, ya dumbfuck, not romance her.”

“I was getting to that.”

“We’re not at the romance stage of the plan yet, remember? We’re at the seduction phase. The fling-as-endgame phase.”

“I know that.”

“Obviously not. Kendrick, Ruby likes bad boys she has to chase—a guy who needs fixing and taming. Not a golden retriever on a fucking leash!”

I scowl. “I’m not a golden retriever, and I’m not on a leash.”

Savage snorts. “Yes, you are. To both. For Ruby you are, anyway. Now, don’t get me wrong, that girl adores that about you.

But it’s what makes you her bestie . If you want her to actually want to fuck you, though, then you’re going to have to be a Doberman—the same way you are with all the other women you actually fuck.

You have to think of Ruby as a tour fling and treat her accordingly. ”

“I can’t do that. I don’t even know what that means.”

“Yes, you do. You treat tour flings like you don’t give a shit about them. At least, compared to the way you treat Ruby.”

I scoff. “I love Ruby, Savage. I treat other people differently because I don’t love them. Because I can’t love anybody but her. You think I haven’t tried? I have! To death. But it’s not possible, because nobody I’ve ever been with has even come close to making me feel the way Ruby does.”

He looks at me sympathetically. “I get it. I really do, man. But that’s all the more reason you need to stick with the plan and make her chase you, not the other way around. Fuck flowers. Fuck stocking the fridge. Seduce the girl.”

“Giving her flowers and all that was only the first items on my list. You cut me off before I got to the good stuff. Trust me, on day one, I was killing the Doberman game. I was smashing it.”

Savage crosses his arms. “Okay, tell me every Doberman-like thing you did.”

“Okay, so for context?—"