Chapter 4

Travis dreaded the Monday to come.  At nine o'clock that morning, he entered Raw Studios...and stopped dead.

He could smell her.  Her perfume...that ocean breeze scent which always inspired images of golden sunsets on rippling water and coconut tanning lotion.  Not that his mind actually worked in such a poetic way, but Josie Kirkland usually drew out the muse in him...what little visual inspiration he had inside.  He was an auditory kind of guy.  Could hear an inspirational sound anywhere, which made him good at his job.

And he could hear her, Josie...back in Liv’s office, laughing.  The sound came closer, and he braced himself for the sexy princess to finally become a permanent part of his work days.  There be no avoiding her after all.  She was now Livie’s assistant, and she would be doing most of the grunt work...mostly collaborating with him on artists’ music.

“Oh, hey, Travis,” Josie said when she walked down the front hall and saw him.  “Good morning.  How are you?”

He narrowed his eyes, always on his guard with her.  “I'm fine.”

And it wasn’t just her friendly tone that put his hackles up.  Today...gone were the provocative clothes, the short skirts and killer heels.  No, today, for her first day at Raw Studios, she wore a tailored button shirt and a pair of navy pants with a gold chain belt highlighting the sway of her hips as she walked.  The shoes-- a pair of those platform heels chicks liked nowadays-- were still sexy and suggestive, but overall she looked like a professional.  Even her hair was swept back from her face in a twisted, braided bun at the nape of her neck.  And the fact that he noticed the little butterfly jewel clip holding it all in place meant he was studying her more than he should.

“Great,” she said cheerily, without any hint of her normal tricks.

Okay...what's going on?

She smiled and turned a corner, heading to the elevator.  Travis followed her.  Not because the coconuts lured him, but because his "office" was on the second floor.  It was more of a room where he dropped off his stuff for the day, but he had to go there first thing to get his crap squared away before hermiting himself in the studios all day.  

“Guess what?” she said as they stepped into the elevator together.  She pushed the button for the second floor.

“What?”

She smiled beautifully...again without any of her typical flirtation.  “I have a job and my own apartment, which I do not have to share with a women's liberal study major, and I paid my very first month’s rent this weekend.  Isn't that great?”

Travis stared at her like she was crazy.  “That's great?  Paying rent?”

“Yes!” She laughed.  “I paid the rent.  Not Daddy or Hannah and not with money they gave me.  Money I've been saving up for the past year”

“Really?  And you’re happy about that?”

The doors slid open on his floor, and she exited to the left...heading straight for his office.  Oh, no...no, no, no...did she get the empty office next to his?  The one with the adjoining door?

“You just can’t imagine how happy I am,” she said, walking, walking...walking closer to his corner office, but instead of stopping there, she kept going and turned a corner, pivoting to walk backward and smile at him.  “I'll see you up in the studio in an hour,” she said and entered the office across the way from his.

That office? he thought, appalled.  She chose that one?  Travis gave her a week, ten days maximum before she went searching for another.

Everyone new to Raw Studios always chose the big, second-floor office with the giant floor-to-ceiling windows, wall to wall glass...and an unobstructed  view of the Mississippi River in the distance. Travis would admit, the room across from him was the nicest in the whole building, even better than Livie’s down on the bottom floor.  It was twice the size of Travis’ and had its own private bathroom.  Everyone who first saw it loved it...and then they always ended up hating it.

Because that office had only one air conditioning vent-- when it needed about six.  The big problem occurred around the middle of July and lasted until the middle of October.  Because as beautiful as the view provided, it also showcased the setting sun to perfection.  And in the middle of summer, the sun hit those windows around two o'clock...and stayed there until about nine that night.

The heat was insufferable.  Livie kept saying she’d do something about it, but since no one ever stayed in there long enough to wait for a solution, she usually put off the issue until someone else moved in and complained...then relocated to a cooler office.  It was a vicious cycle.

And now Josie rode that bike.

“Hey,” Travis called to her before she closed her door.  “I'd leave the door open.  It gets hot as hell in there later on.”

She smiled again.  “I know.”  And shut the door anyway.  

Travis shook his head.  Guess she'll find out the hard way.

An hour later, he managed to weed through the weekend's emails -- every so often glancing at Josie’s closed office, wondering how she was faring.  It had already reached eighty five degrees that morning, and it was only going up from there, but when she emerged with an armful of yellow files, she looked at fresh as ever.  She smiled as she knocked on his doorframe.

“You ready?  I have a stack of musicians with whom Livie wants me to familiarize myself.”

He clicked off his computer screen.  “Oh yeah?  Who?”

She flipped through some files.  “Linda Meyers, the Bossy Babies, Brandon Lane…”  She sighed.  “There's a lot.  I figure we could start at the top and work our way through as we have the time.”

He smirked.  “Well, we can clear those three up now.  Linda is an aging Motown singer hoping for a comeback.  She's good, but not modern enough to make an impact on the radio.  The Bossy Babies probably won't be together long.  They are just what they found like, four bossy chicks who just want to be pampered with stardom.  They're always bitching at each other and can never complete a practice session without one stomping off in a hissy fit.  And Brandon Lane is our hottest soloist right now.  A country singer.  He's currently got two top forty singles and his freshman album is climbing the charts.  Liv wants to hang onto him for as long as it takes, but he has an outside manager who's been talking to studios in Hollywood.”

Jodie opened the top file in her arms.  “The name sounded familiar. Liv wanted me to focus on him first, and now I know why.  We’re having a lunch meeting today with him, too.  But I'm not sure what she's hoping I can do about any of that…”

He shook his head and grabbed his coffee mug from the desk.  “Probably hopes to entice him to stick around because of the new, pretty assistant here.”

She frowned, studying the file and visually clueless to the compliment he just paid, but Travis was wary of anything clueless from Josie.

“Hmm,” she said and closed the file.  “I guess it’s a good thing I'm not on the market.  If he’s is enticed by anything, then it better be my brain.”

She headed toward the stairwell.  “I'll meet you upstairs.”

Travis stared after her.  Off the market?  Did that mean she had a boyfriend of some sort?  And shouldn't he feel relieved about that?

*****

Two hours later, both Josie and Travis were rubbing their foreheads with twin migraines.  As much as they both loved music, sometimes it was tedious to repeatedly listen to various artists over and over.  “Okay...I need a break,” Josie said.  “I get it that Livie wants me to know as much as I can about all our musicians, but they’re starting to all sound the same now.”

She sighed and slumped into a swivel chair next to him.  He twisted back and forth in his own, watching her.  He just didn’t get it.  The girl he saw a few weeks ago had been a tease and a childish vixen.  But now he was beginning to wonder if it had only been his imagination.  Not once, in the morning they spent together did she say anything that could be viewed as inappropriate between two co-workers.  She asked intelligent, thoughtful questions about the soundboard before them, and about the musicians, and about the process of mixing sounds to create hit singles for the radio.   And she hadn’t touched him...well, other than to bump his elbow once while reaching for a file behind her, but that was it.  

And if he hadn’t known her for the past twelve years, he would have thought he was sitting here with just another one of Liv’s highly-competent assistants.  But he had known her...and he knew he could never get comfortable around Josie Kirkland for fear of her turning that stunning, sexy smile on him and saying something that could get him -- and her -- in deep sh*t...the kind of crap where he’d finally have to tell her to leave him alone, and then Liv would get mad at him, and he’d still have to work with both women, especially when they were both pissed at him...all for wanting keep a working relationship professional.

Women…

“Ah, sh*t,” Josie muttered under her breath as she glanced at her watch.  Travis barely stopped the smile from crossing his face.  It was still cute when she cussed, though.  “I’ve gotta go.  Meeting Brandon Lane, remember?  God, I hope he’s not a douchebag in real life.”

She stood up, stretched her back and straightened her clothes.  Travis started piling papers back into files, avoiding the graceful way she stood up from a swivel chair.

“No, no, leave it,” she said.  “I’ll come back here after lunch and try to finish the rest of it.  This studio isn’t needed today, is it?”

“No,” he said.  “Want me to meet you here when you get back?”

She furrowed her brow as she tapped a photo of Brandon Lane that caught her eye.  “Um...no.  Thanks, but I’m sure you’ve got your own work to do.  I think I can handle the computer programs and audio files.  If I need any help, I’ll call you or someone else.”

“Are you sure?”  He mirrored her frown.  Why so different all of a sudden…?  Previous Josie would've never turned him down.

“Hmm?” she looked up at him, apparently lost in thought.  “Oh, yeah, I’m sure.  I’ve gotta do it by myself at some point.  Why not start now?”

“Okay…”

She inhaled and looked at her watch again.  “I’ll see you later.”  She moved to the door to the sound booth, but stopped and turned halfway around again.  “Oh, Travis?”

“Yeah?”

“Thanks.”

He just didn’t get it.  The sincerity...the schooled expressions, the sudden maturity…

“You’re welcome,” he said, and she smiled briefly before leaving him to watch the door swing shut.

She’s up to something.

*****

She's definitely up to something.

By Wednesday, Travis jerked and jumped out of his skin every time he heard a pair of heels tapping down the hall...or a sultry laugh...or the hint of coconuts in the air.  For three days, it had been the same.  He and Josie worked in the recording studios until lunch; Josie and Liv met with singers or managers over lunch; and everyone went their separate ways until clock-out time.  Unless the three of them had to collaborate on a project...or he bumped into Josie somewhere in the building.

But even then, she'd only wave, or say hi, or not see him at all as she'd shimmy past with her head bent over an iPad, earphones plugged into her ears.

She was driving him nuts.  He kept expecting the Princess to come out, but all he got was...well, nice, friendly Josie.  Assistant to Olivia Williams.  Co-worker at Raw Studios.  It was such a huge change from the girl he’d known for over a decade.  No one altered that much that fast.  No one could be so...so...so ambiguous compared to how she’d acted in the past.  

Travis was going through four cups of coffee in the mornings, only making him jumpier, but the caffeine was a hell of a lot better than the pills he once popped to stay sane in this industry.  Josie was making him crazy, though.  Crazier than midnight deadlines on a twelve-track album when only four singles were perfected.  Crazier than dealing with drunken musicians with mountainous egos and self-entitlement issues.  Wackier than rush hour on the 240 interchange.

He figured out why she wanted that boiling office on Tuesday.  Though not why she liked it so hot.  It had to be because of the open space in front of her desk.  About four o’clock that afternoon, he saw movement and heard odd Aboriginal music coming from inside her office through her cracked door, and he peeked inside...only to see Josie’s @ss sticking up at him.

Ah, ha!  The Princess came back!

But no...he watched a few seconds more, and then he realized that she was…

Doing yoga?

What the hell?

Dressed in black tights and a t-shirt, she moved from a cat-like stretch to standing to stretching her leg out in front of her...all the way up and holding it there.  Then she switched legs and moved through another series of effortless motions, holding them, flowing smoothly from one stance or pose to another, breathing deeply, sweat trickling down the back of her neck.  

She didn’t see him spying on her.  How would he explain that?  Because his eyeballs were probably jumping out of his skull sockets.  F*ck, she was beautiful...tall, lean, muscular, flexible, with one of those Brazilian-shaped butts every girl in the country seemed fascinated with.  And every guy, for that matter.  

Travis flashed through all the crazy dreams he’d been having of her these last few years.  Now, he had a visual.  Now he had ammo for more of those damn dreams, waking up with his heart pounding and a raging hard-on.

Now, he was screwed.

“Jesus,” he muttered to himself and got the hell off that floor, racing down to the break room where the coffee and peanuts were located.

His only relief came after work hours when he met his band down in the basement studio and practiced for the upcoming contest.  With his Wolfgang in his hands, his fingers dancing along the strings, playing rifts and various chords and losing himself in the music...it was the only peace he received all week.

No Josie.  No confusion or suspicion.  No visions of her bare feet stretching upward, wrapping around her head...or his head.  Just him and his band brothers and the music.

The Keychains were lucky to get Lydia, who was a really good singer in that Joni Mitchell kind of way, but not housing that godd@mn self-entitlement attitude he’d seen from so many female singers nowadays.  She had the perfect contradicting-complimenting voice for the kind of music The Keychains played.  She was nice.  She could read music and play a little guitar.  And when it came to practicing late into the night, she was a get-it-done person.  

Just the kind of girl Travis liked.

But thankfully, this girl kept her boyfriend around.  A big one.  Quiet, too.  Linebacker for Florida State, weighed two-eighty on his slim days.  Stood nine inches taller than Travis...which came out as three inches taller than Dave, who never had to look up at a person's face in his whole life.

The whole boyfriend thing actually worked out.  Now they could focus on the rehearsals and the music without their lead singer running off with competing band members...or hitting on Dave, because they see the size of his boots and wonder about the rest of him.  It was going great....Lydia caught on fast.  She had the song memorized by the second run-through and made suggestions about changes that made sense and worked fabulously.  They were going to smash the competition that weekend.  Travis just hoped that Josie didn’t turn back into her Princess before then.  He couldn’t handle that kind of stress.  Not now.  Not when his band was so close to be as great as they once were.

On Thursday night, just after midnight, another fabulous practice wrapped up, and Travis headed to his office to grab his keys so he could lock up the basement studio.  A shaft of light chased shadows along the second floor hallway as he reached his office.  Dammit.  Josie left her light on.  Travis sighed and reached around her doorframe to flick it off.

"Hey!"

He froze.  "Josie?"  He turned it back on.  She came out of her bathroom with a wet washcloth pressed to her neck.  "What are you still doing here?"

She smiled wanly.  She looked exhausted.  "Working. You?"

"I just finished practicing with the guys."

“Yeah?” she said, smiling.   "How has practice been going?”

“Great,” he said.  “Everyone is gone, and I was heading home for the night.”

She glanced at her wrist watch and frowned.  "Oh...I didn't realize how late it was."  She wiped her face quickly and tossed the rag back into the bathroom.  “I guess I should be going home, too."

Jesus...she better not be waiting because I’m still here…  And then he thought, F*ck, Fisher...talk about a giant ego.  But then again, that’s exactly the kind of thing the Princess would have done...waited for him to leave so she could leave with him, another one of her stalking acts.

“What are you working on so late?” he asked warily, watching her closely.  Any second that tiara would pop out on her head, and he’d be screwed.

But a heavy, tired breath came out from pursed lips.  "You know how you said the Bossy Babies won't be together for long?”

“Yeah.”

“Well…” she drew out.  “They're really talented, Travis.  Livie thinks we should cut them. The studio doesn't need bad press and thinks that's all they'll bring for us, but I think I can save them.”

Tiara...where are you?  Stop f*cking with me.  “Save them. How?”

She smiled again, excitedly.  Not flirty, just excited.  “I convinced them to go country.”

He was staring at her head -- no crown sparkling there yet -- and didn’t register what she said.  But when it hit him…  “What?”

“Country music,” she said with a gleam in her happy green eyes.  “How many girl bands are out there right now?”

He narrowed his gaze at her.  “Too many.”

“And how many of them split up to follow solo careers?”

Travis shrugged.  “It happens to all of them.  There's a Beyonce in every group.”

She nodded.  “But how many country girl groups are there...on the charts, not just small town county fair groups?”

“Uh…”  Too much coffee...too many later hours.  His brain congealed.  Where’s the damn tiara?  He could handle the Princess.  Even the Yoga Princess.  He always could.  He knew that Josie Kirkland.  Not this one, the one from all week, not the one with brilliance and sense in her eyes...and in her voice.

“Can't tell me, can you?” she said.  “That's because