An R&B songstress….
The bad boy that got away…
Can they get a second chance at love?
Monique Starr’s music career is at an all-time low: she’s in danger of losing her label contract and an embarrassing event has her front and center in all the gossip blogs—for all the wrong reasons! She decides to head back to D.C. and the MacLaine Academy of the Performing Arts to revamp her image, give her career a badly needed boost, and get her groove back. But she comes home to find her old Academy ailing financially, her mentor battling cancer, and her ex—whom she left behind to seek fame and fortune—very angry and unwilling to give her a second chance. But being back home reminds Monique of her old dreams and what she lost along the way to success. Now faced with second chances, will the music diva choose between love or fame, passion or ambition?
Copyright © 2018 by Shelly Ellis
Chapter 1
Monique Starr raised her chin, sucked in her cheeks, and turned her head to the left—hoping that the soft light overhead was catching her at her best angle. She noticed a few of the diners in the upscale L.A. restaurant staring at her. One girl, who looked to be in her early teens, whispered something to one of her tablemates. She then held up her pink camera phone, pointed it in Monique’s direction, and snapped a picture.
Monique didn’t mind all the attention—not today, anyway. Some days, she did feel like a monkey in a cage when onlookers stared and gawked at her. It made her seek the privacy of her West Hollywood bungalow or the familiar warmth of the music studio—a place she’d always considered home, but she couldn’t do that anymore.
“You betta get over that shit, girl!” her manager, Sonia, had told her bluntly several months ago. “You need to be seen! If you want to help your career, you can’t do it by hiding. We need you out there!”
It wasn’t enough anymore just to make catchy songs and memorable music videos. You had to go to industry parties, make reality TV show appearances, get in the gossip blogs, and take Instagram photos in designer gear next to flashy cars, Sonia had lectured. And now that Monique’s album sales were lagging and she was dangerously close to getting dropped from her record label, she was willing to listen to Sonia’s advice.
#livingthebestlife, Monique had posted on Instagram only yesterday while posing near some random hotel pool in a chainmail bikini and stilettoes, covered in baby oil. She’d felt like a complete fool doing it, but at least the photo already had 320,000 views and 50,000 likes.
Now Monique was back on her grind, trying to boost her visibility and her music career by appearing at one of the hottest restaurants in town with YouTube star and aspiring rapper, Don E. (Yes, that was Don E, not “Donnie” as some of the gossip bloggers occasionally misspelled in their news items.) Unfortunately, Don E seemed unable to get with the program tonight. He acted as if they weren’t sitting at the table together; he seemed more preoccupied by what was on his phone screen.
She shifted closer in the leather-padded booth toward him, placing her hand on his knee and giving it a squeeze.
“Will you get off your damn phone?” she said, through clenched teeth, still smiling and looking around the room. She saw someone else taking their picture. “We’re supposed to be having a romantic dinner together. Remember?”
Don E didn’t respond or even look up. Instead, he continued furiously typing.
“Don E . . . Don E . . . Don E!” she said, kicking him underneath the table, making him jump beside her and let out a yelp.
“Oww! Damn! Why’d you kick me?” he asked with a wince, leaning down to rub his shin.
“I said it’s supposed to look like we’re on a romantic dinner date, and you’re not even talking to me,” she whispered, tossing her hair over her shoulder. “Work with me here!”
“I’m sorry, Monique, but my man’s losing it right now. I’m tryin’ to get him to chill, but it ain’t workin’,” he muttered as he continued to type.
He really did mean his man—as in boyfriend of two and half years.
Both Monique and Don E’s managers had orchestrated their fake relationship because it was advantageous for them to be seen together. Pairing Monique with an up-and-coming celebrity in the 18-to-30 demographic could raise her profile and her desirability, Sonia had explained.
“Since you’re married to your damn work and haven’t dated anybody in years,” Sonia had lamented.
And pairing Don E with a beautiful music songstress like Monique could help to squash the pesky rumors that he was gay. Of course, Don E was gay, but his manager had convinced him to stay in the closet for now. Even if rappers like Frank Ocean were out and proud, that didn’t mean everyone could be—especially if you were just breaking into the business.
Don E’s manager figured he could come out as bisexual in three or five years and gay, maybe in 10. Monique felt bad for Don E, but he still had to understand they were on the clock—so to speak.
“Well, tell your man you’ll call him later. We’ll be done in two hours, tops,” she said.
The plan was that she and Don E would kiss and cuddle over a candlelit dinner then exit the restaurant arm-and-arm, only to have their photos snapped by paparazzi who just happened to be waiting across the street. The truth was Monique’s publicist had given the paps the heads up that the couple would be dining here tonight, but Monique and Don E would pretend to act surprised and annoyed that their romantic evening had been ruined.
“I tried but he ain’t listening,” Don E now said. His handsome face was grim. He finally sat down his cell phone next to his bread plate. “He found out I was cheating on him, and now he’s buggin’!”
“What? We’re not cheating; we’re just pretending! I thought you explained that to him already. You told me you did and he was OK with it!”
“He doesn’t think I’m cheating with you!” he whispered shrilly, screwing up his face. “Tyrone found out I was hooking up with my trainer.”
Monique closed her eyes and grumbled. She didn’t have the time or the patience for Don E and Tyrone’s little soap opera. When she got home, she planned to call Sonia and tell her that maybe this fake relationship with Don E was a bad idea, but for now, she’d try her best to make it work. She was a professional, after all. She always had been.
“Look, apologize to Tyrone when you see him tonight. Hell, send him flowers, but we gotta do this Don E. Let’s just get through it! This will help the both of us. All right?”
Don E took a deep breath and nodded. “You’re right. You’re right! I’ll handle this later.”
“Thank you,” she exhaled with relief.
He reached for his glass and took a sip. He then threw an arm around her shoulder, gazed into her eyes, licked his full lips, and gave her a sexy grin. “So what were you saying, baby?” he asked in a louder voice that could be overheard by other diners.
Good, she thought. He’s back on script.
“Oh, nothing really! I was just saying that I spent the whole day working on my new—”
Her words halted when his phone frantically buzzed again. They both sighed.
“I’ll tell him to stop texting me and I’ll call him back later,” he said, removing his arm from around her shoulder and picking up his cell.
Monique let her head flop back against the booth cushion and rolled her eyes to the chandelier above them.
“Oh, shit. Oh shit!” Don E squeaked, sounding panicked.
“What is it now?” she asked, lowering her eyes from the ceiling and side-eyeing him.
“Tyrone leaked a video we made to TMZ. He sent it to the other gossip sites, too. Oh shit! Oh shit! Oh shit!”
“What video?” she asked, scrambling to sit upright.
“We made it on his birthday. I don’t usually do shit like that but he . . . he wanted to do it! It was a special occasion. Oh, God!” Don E groaned, dropping his face into his hands, letting his phone clatter to the floor. “I knew he was mad, but I didn’t know he was that damn mad!”
Monique frantically reached for her clutch and dug out her own cell phone. She saw several texts from her manager and publicist, all within the past five minutes.
“What the hell,” she muttered before doing a keyword search for “Don E” and “video.”
It didn’t take long to find it. On the screen, she could see Don E with his arms wrapped around his boyfriend, Tyrone. They were kissing and undressing, murmuring sweet nothings to each other as they did it. She stopped the video before it got too graphic. She was at a loss for words.
“How could he do this to me?” Don E whimpered into his hands, now crying. “How could he?”
“How could he do this to you?” Monique exclaimed. “What about me? Now everyone knows our relationship is fake! Goddamnit, Don E, why did you cheat on him?”
“We’d been fighting. My trainer was a good listener! Shit . . . I don’t know! I told him I was sorry!” Don E sobbed, reaching for one of the dinner napkins to wipe away his tears and the snot gushing down his nose.
She sucked her teeth in disgust and climbed out of the booth. As she wound her way past a few dining tables and stomped to the restaurant doors, she dialed Sonia’s number.
When Sonia answered, the older woman didn’t even say hello.
“Did you see the video?” her manager squawked just as Monique pushed open the restaurant door and stepped onto Santa Monica Boulevard. She headed straight for the valet, holding out her ticket to him.
“Yes, I saw the damn video! I told you this would—”
“Hey, Monique!” someone yelled, making her whip around. “How’s it feel to have a man who’s on the down low?”
Monique didn’t have a chance to respond. Her mouth fell open in shock at the question. Her eyes went wide. She looked utterly horrified as all the cameras flashed, snapping her at the worst possible angle.
***
“This is a nightmare!” Sonia cried as she paced back and forth in Monique’s living room, staring down at her iPad screen and watching the video of Don E and Tyrone for the hundredth time.
Sonia’s giant gold hoop earrings flapped against her cheeks like door knockers as she walked. Her top knot almost hit the living room chandelier.
In the music industry, Sonia Sanchez had a reputation for her hard negotiating skills and big mouth, but it was her size that many really found intimidating. At six-foot, four-inches tall in heels, she could make most men feel puny in her presence, and she used it to her advantage. She was not a woman to be trifled with, or she would knock you down—literally.
“A goddamn fiasco!” she boomed. “I swear to God, the next time Shaun comes asking me to set up something with one of his clients, I’m gonna throw a brick at his damn head! I can’t believe this shit! What was Don E thinkin’?”
Monique poured the last of her orange wheat grass smoothie from her blender into a tall glass. It was her second smoothie of the day. She was dieting again. She always dieted when things in her life seemed to be going haywire. It gave her a sense of control to basically starve herself, and she felt badly out of control at this moment.
“But don’t worry, girl!” Sonia finally came to a stop and looked at Monique through the cutout between the living room and kitchen. “We’ll fix this! Won’t we, Hailey?”
“Yep!” Hailey, Monique’s publicist, assured over the speaker phone. “We’re working on a strategic response at this moment. I’ve dealt with worse. Believe me! We can do this!”
Monique leaned over her kitchen sink to peek out the blinds at her front lawn and the roadway in front of her bungalow. She could see a few cars parked along the street. A photographer reclined against the hood of one of the SUVs with a camera with a telephoto lens dangling from his shoulder. He was probably waiting for her to leave the house, but she hadn’t left in days, not quite ready to show her face to the world.
It was bad enough to see Don E’s video plastered everywhere. Even worse to see the photo of herself taken as she was leaving the restaurant under headlines like “Poor Monique!” or, her personal fav, “Twinkle, Twinkle Little Starr, Guess Whose Man Went Too Far . . .” She was humiliated and felt stupid for allowing herself to be put into this situation. When Sonia had suggested the hare-brained scheme that Monique pretend to the date Don E, Monique had thought it was ludicrous and said as much. She should have stuck to her guns.
“We’ve already issued your statement in response to the video, Monique,” Hailey’s voice crackled over the phone’s speaker, “but we need to switch from defense to offense. We need to find something that can distract everyone from the video . . . something that will keep them from seeing you as just—”
“Poor Monique?” Monique asked with raised brows as she sauntered into the living room. She sat on the arm of her sofa and sipped from her glass. She cringed at the taste of her smoothie. It might help keep her figure trim, but it tasted awful.
“Well, yeah,” Hailey said with an anxious laugh. “Maybe if you started dating someone else—a hottie who could make folks forget that Don E even existed?”
“Oooo!” Sonia exclaimed. Her face lit up. “I know just the guy! He would be—”
“No!” Monique said, furiously shaking her head. “No more fake relationships! I’m not pretending to date another singer, actor, or Instagram star just for buzz. I’m done with that shit!”
“Well,” Hailey began again with a huff, “then our only other option is for you to do something that could distract everyone from what happened.”
“She’s got that guest spot on Love & Hip Hop coming out next month,” Sonia piped before sitting in one of the chairs and crossing her long legs. “We can play that up!”
“No, it has to be bigger! Bigger! And it has to be positive. No, one wants to see her throwing drinks and fighting. Are there any projects you have going on that I don’t know about, Monique? Any volunteer work?”
Monique lowered her glass from her mouth and frowned. “What do you mean? Like donating to a soup kitchen or Toys for Tots?” She shrugged. “I’ve written checks to a few places and gone to some benefits but—”
“No, this will require you to get your hands dirty, unfortunately,” Hailey insisted. “We don’t want it to be obvious that you’re trying to distract people. We want it to look like you’re really focused on it . . . that it’s your passion . . . that you’re too concerned with it to even care about Don E and his sex video!”
Monique loudly exhaled, making her blunt bangs ruffle. “But I don’t have anything like that in the works!”
“Yes, you do,” Sonia interrupted, slowly nodding.
Monique frowned at her manager. “I do? What?”
“You have something that’s kinda like what Hailey is talking about.” Sonia scooted forward in her chair. “Remember that note you told me your old dance teacher sent you a couple of months ago? The one asking you to help out at her performance academy?”
Monique’s frown deepened.
Yes, she’d received an email from Miss Yvonne asking her to come back to the MacLaine Academy of Performance Arts, which “wasn’t doing too well” and needed someone like Monique to “bring it back to its greatness,” according to Miss Yvonne. But Monique didn’t even entertain the thought of going back to the Academy. She’d asked her part-time assistant to have the nicest bouquet she could get for 500 bucks delivered to Miss Yvonne. Monique had even written the note herself declining the invitation—a personal touch she didn’t usually do with business correspondence, but she’d made an exception because of how much she respected her old teacher.
“I already told her no!” Monique now exclaimed, sipping from her smoothie again. “Besides, I can’t just drop everything here to head back to D.C.! What about my album? What about the appearances I have scheduled for—”
“That album is going to sit on the shelf if we don’t get you poppin’ again, baby,” Sonia said, snapping her fingers. “Your label doesn’t care who you were five years ago. They care who you are now! And right now, you’re just a singer with low sales who got cheated on by a so-so rapper who, according to his sex video, likes to start from the bottom and take it to the head—and I ain’t talkin’ about Drake and DJ Khaled!”
“Cute,” Monique mumbled sarcastically, narrowing her eyes.
“We have to improve your brand, Monique,” Hailey added, “and right now it’s ailing!”
“This is ridiculous! I can’t go back there!” Monique shouted in frustration. “I can’t!”
She watched as her manager shoved herself to her feet and strolled towards her. Monique had to peer up to look at Sonia. It was like gazing up at a Egyptian monolith.
“You can—and you will. Besides, it’ll only be for a couple of months, girl! Just enough time to reboot your image and get people talking about somethin’ else.”
“We can even go with a whole storyline that you went back to your roots to find yourself, that you wanted to take a break from L.A. and help the kiddies!” Hailey gushed over the phone. “Oh, I like this! I like this a lot!”
Monique pursed her lips.
She didn’t want to try yet another scheme and tell even more lies, but she loved her new album. She’d put her heart and soul into it. It was too good to just sit on a shelf. And if the label got behind it, it could be the hit she sorely needed. Plus, she had worked too hard for too many years and sacrificed too much to just give up without a real fight.
“Fine,” she finally said, shaking her head. “I can’t believe I’m saying this but . . . fine! If it’s only for a couple of months and you’re sure . . . you’re sure this will work!”
“Of course, I’m sure!” Sonia shouted. “Have I ever steered you wrong?”
“Actually, you have,” Monique was about to say just as the older woman yanked her smoothie out of her hand, took a drink, and winced.
“Ugh,” Sonia cried, “I don’t know how you can drink this shit, girl!”
