Our Song (8 page)

Chapter 11

The next morning, I heard my cell phone vibrating. I groaned. Sure,
I
set my alarm to wake me up early, but it was too freaking early.

I grabbed it from my nightstand, determined to silence it for at least ten more minutes.

Forcing my eyes open, I glanced at the caller ID and realized it wasn’t my alarm at all. Mads was calling.

Ugh. Just the person I really wanted to be woken up by.

I swiped my finger across the touch screen anyway and pressed the phone to my ear.

“Hello?” I asked groggily.

“Morning sunshine,” she chirped into the phone.

“Ugh, what do you want?” I sat up in bed and rubbed my eyes. To say I was
not
a morning person would’ve been a total understatement. I was like Oscar the freaking Grouch.  

“There are three important things I need to discuss with you,” she replied, her voice suddenly taking on its usual business-like tone. “The first thing is time sensitive.
Cosmo
wants to do a monthly feature on you for the July edition. We need to let them know by tomorrow if you’re willing to do it.”

“Okay, sure. I’ll do it.” I would take
any
magazine willing to do a feature on me, let alone a magazine as big as
Cosmopolitan
. Plus, I knew if Jimmy Jones heard about me turning down this interview, he would’ve been livid.

“Awesome. Secondly, your statement about Jake Palmer and Alyssa Morgan was
wonderful
,” she went on. “All of the news outlets are applauding you for being such a big person about it. So, I just wanted to give you major props.”

“Thanks,” I muttered, deciding not to confess that I still had no idea what it even said. Apparently it must not have been too bad. Major props to Natalie.

“You’re welcome. The third thing actually has to do with you and Colton. His assistant contacted me last night to let me know that Spin or Sin Radio wants to do an interview with the two of you. They’ve already gotten wind of the fact that the two of you are going to be collaborating together and have requested your first interview as a duo.”

“How did they find out about it? Did we release any statements?” I asked, glancing at the time. It was almost nine o’clock. I needed to get my ass up and moving if there was any chance of me not looking like a train wreck by the time Colton got here.

“No, we didn’t release anything about it. Neither did anyone from his team. It’s a mystery, but somehow, the cat’s already out of the bag. Are you willing to do it?” Mads asked.

“I have no problem with it, as long as Colton’s willing,” I said, pulling a pair of shorts and a tank top out to wear.

“According to his assistant, he is willing,” she said. “So, what I’ll do is get a list of the questions they’re planning to ask so the two of you will have a chance to go over them together. Then, we’ll schedule a three-way call between the two of you and the radio station.”

“Okay,” I agreed. I was still having a hard time getting used working with someone else. I’d
always
been alone. I knew how I got things done. Now I needed to worry about factoring other people into the situation, too, and it was just
weird
.

At that moment, I heard the doorbell ring. “Hey, Mads? I gotta go. I think Colton’s here.”

“Okay, no problem. I’ll talk to you later,” she said. “Have a good time working.”

“Thanks.” Hanging up the phone, I breathed a slight sigh of relief. The nice thing about Mads being so business-oriented was that she never would’ve been the type to suggest that anything more than work should be involved when it came to the Colton situation. Meanwhile, if Natalie knew the two of us were getting ready to start working, she would’ve asked me to give her all the “deets” later on.

I frantically peeled off my pajamas and then pulled on shorts and a tank top. I glanced at myself in the mirror. I didn’t look
too
bad. Thankfully, I hadn’t bothered to wash my makeup off from the night before, so most of it was still perfectly intact.

Pulling my hair into a big, messy bun on top of my head, I stepped out of my room and headed for the front door.

I took a deep breath and reached for the doorknob, just as the doorbell rang again.

When I opened the door, I found an impatient-looking Colton standing on the other side. He had his guitar case over one shoulder and was balancing a bag in one hand and a drink holder with two cups in the other hand.

My eyes widened. “You went to Giorgi’s again?”

“Yeah, I figured I would get bitched at otherwise.”

“I wouldn’t bitch at you.” I folded my arms over my chest in annoyance.

“Oh, no...never,” he said as he stepped inside. “And since I hate working on an empty stomach, I got some bagels, donuts… oh, and a veggie omelet for you.”

“Why would you get yourself all the good stuff and make me eat a veggie omelet?” I wrinkled my nose.

“Because I assumed you don’t eat carbs,” Colton replied with a shrug.

“Why would you assume
that
?” Was he trying to drop hints that I needed to lose weight?”

He shrugged. “Most girls in the industry don’t.”

“Well,
I
do.” I supposed that might’ve explained my “chunkiness.”

His blue eyes met mine. “Good. Girls who don’t eat carbs freak me out a little, if I’m being honest.”

“Why do they freak you out?” I wondered if that meant Mystery Girl ate carbs and wasn’t a size 0. It made me question if she was a part of the music industry, too.

Ugh, not knowing what she looked like was
killing
me.

“Have
you
ever gotten bitched at for taking your date to a restaurant that’s not on a pre-approved list?” he asked.

I shook my head. “Nope, can’t say I have.”

“Probably because you’d be the one doing the bitching,” he reminded himself aloud.

“What makes you think I bitch so much?”

“You just give off those vibes.” Colton shrugged.

“You know what kind of vibes
you
give off?”

“No, why don’t you enlighten me?” His eyes danced with amusement.

“You seem like the type of person who’s
really
fun and easy to work with,” I said before I could say what I
really
wanted to tell him: that he regularly shoved corncobs up his ass.

“That’s because I am.” He shot me a cocky grin. “You, on the other hand…”

I rolled my eyes, glancing down at the coffee cups as he set them on the dining room table. “I need caffeine.”

He motioned to the one on the left. “That one’s yours.”

I smiled at him. “Thanks.”

As I took a sip from it, I nearly gagged. “That is
not
a French vanilla signature latte.”

“I thought you could use a change. Green tea, it is.” His lips twitched, and I could tell he was trying to suppress a smile. “Just because I went to Giorgi’s again doesn’t mean I got you what you wanted.”

“How
thoughtful
of you.”

He laughed. “I’m actually kidding. Yours was the other cup. That’s my green tea.”

I swapped cups and cautiously took a sip. It tasted right this time.

As he began to unpack the food from the bag, my stomach growled. It was a stark difference from the day before, when I was too nervous to eat. I wasn’t sure if it meant I was beginning to loosen up around him or if it simply meant I was that hungry, but either way, I found myself reaching for a monster-sized blueberry muffin.

Just as I pulled out a chair for myself, my phone pinged. I glanced down at the notification and found that I had one new email from Mads. The subject of the message was
Interview Questions
.

“Wow, that was fast,” I murmured aloud as I peeled the liner off of my muffin.

Colton’s eyes darted over in my direction. “What was fast?”

“My manager sent me the questions the radio station is going to ask us already,” I explained. “Do you want to go over our answers now?”

“I guess.” He shrugged as he grabbed a bagel and sat down across from me.

I opened the email and read the first question to him. “What gave you guys the idea to collaborate together?”

Well, I had the option of working with him or watching my career fail. Which would
you
choose?

“Hmm.” He seemed to consider it for a few moments and then glanced over at me sharply. “Why don’t we just wing it? That’s what I usually do anyway. I feel like people can tell if we’ve rehearsed our answers.”

“Okay. Well, I’ll have Mads set up a time for our intervi—” I began to say, but Colton was already reaching for the phone.

He dialed a number and then turned on the speakerphone. The phone rang twice before someone answered and said, “Spin or Sin Radio. How can I help you?”

“Hey, this is Colton King.”

“Hey, Colton,” she said warmly. “How are you?”

“I’m good. Look, I’m calling on speaker phone with Viola Pierce about the interview we’re supposed to do together,” he said. “We were wondering if we could do that now.”

“Okay, sure. Hold on,” the woman on the other end of the line said.

“She just believes it’s you?” I asked with raised eyebrows.

“Oh, that’s Mindy. We’re actually on a first name basis,” he explained quietly.

“Oh.” I guess that was what happened when you were Colton freaking King; people just knew who you were. Me, on the other hand… I would’ve needed to verify it was really me in some way or another. “I thought we would have a little more time to prepare for this interview.”

He shrugged.

“We might as well just get it out of the way now, right?” he said quietly.

“I guess,” I whispered.

The sound of music filled the line as we waited. A moment later, there was a click and then she said, “We’re going to put you on air with our deejay, DeSean now. Is that okay?”

“Yeah, no problem,” Colton agreed.

“Okay, hold on again,” the woman said.

A moment later, a man’s voice came on the line. “And we actually have a surprise phone call right now from Colton King and Viola Pierce. Hey, guys.”

“What’s up?” Colton said confidently into the phone.

“Hello,” I added.

“So, let’s just jump straight to the chase. Rumor has it that the two of you are collaborating together. Can you confirm if this is true or not?”

“Yeah, it’s true.” I inhaled sharply, nervous about what he was going to ask us next.

“What made the two of you decide to work together?” DeSean asked.

“We were both looking to collaborate, so we figured why don’t we just do it together? We thought it would be fun,” Colton replied.

“From what I’ve heard, you’re actually planning to do more than one song together, is that right?” the deejay questioned.

“Yeah, that’s right,” I agreed.

“So, whose album will these songs be on?”

“Mine.” I swallowed hard. Apparently it didn’t even matter that I hadn’t finished reading the questions, since DeSean didn’t seem to be following them, anyway.

“What’s the album gonna be called?” he asked.

“It hasn’t actually been decided yet,” I replied honestly. I’d had a few ideas in mind.
Shattered
had been my top contender, along with
Broken
and
Lost
, but that was when all of the songs on the album were going to be about Jake. Now that my songs were taking an upbeat direction, it was back to square one.

“Do you know when the album will be dropping? Or when we’ll get to hear the first song from it?”

“Not yet. We’re still in the really early stages,” I explained.

“Well, I’ll tell you one thing. I’m excited to hear something from the two of you. You’re both so young and fresh, and so full of potential.”

“Thank you,” I said.

“We’re really excited about it, too,” Colton chimed in. “Neither of us has actually collaborated with
anyone
before, so it’s like one of those career goals we can knock off our bucket lists.”

I just stared at him from across the table in awe. He actually sounded…excited…to work with me, when I knew that wasn’t the case at all. Lying about it just seemed so
effortless
for him. It told me one thing.

Colton King was a damn good actor.

“Awesome. You both have very different styles. What approach are you planning to take when you work together?”

“It’s sort of a surprise.”
Even to us.

“Yeah, everyone will find out what we’re planning once the first song drops,” Colton added.