Different Circles

“You know exactly what I am talking about, Jake,” she said. “You and Laura have been engaged in a sexual relationship with Ms. Valdez for several months now. Did you really think you were fooling anyone?”

They looked at each other again and then back at Elsa. “Uh ... yeah,” Jake finally said. “Actually, we did.”

The housekeeper shook her head. “You were not,” she said. “I knew pretty much from the start, and you do not even carry on in this location very often. I am sure that those who live in the house where you do carry on know as well. If they do not, then they are staggeringly unobservant.”

“Uh ... wow,” Laura said, blushing furiously now. “I don’t know what to say here.”

“You need say nothing,” Elsa said. “You do not need to explain yourselves to me. I am non-judgmental when it comes to a person or persons’ sexual practices. To each their own. I am simply pointing out the fact that anybody you invite to live in this household is going to quickly know what is going on between you two and Ms. Valdez. You cannot hide your activities from those you live in close proximity to. I only caution that you take that into consideration when hiring your nanny. If you continue your dalliances with Ms. Valdez, even if you confine them to her house only, the nanny is going to know about it. You will need to know that you can trust her not to blab about what she knows—not to anyone. She cannot tell the press, she cannot tell her friends, she cannot tell her sister the nurse. One slip of the lips and the story is bound to break. And there are already rumblings about you, Laura, and Ms. Valdez floating about in the world.”

“I ... uh ... we understand,” Jake said after a moment. “Thank you for bringing this to our attention.”

“I thought you should know,” she said simply. “And now, if you two are done, I will give Miss Cadence back to you and begin cleaning up.”

With that, she handed Caydee back over to Laura. As soon as she was in her mother’s arms, she issued her first genuine, unmistakable smile. Laura smiled back, thrilled. But in the back of her mind, she could not help but wonder if her daughter was actually laughing at her predicament.

Chapter 23: Negotiations and Disclosures

Los Angeles, California

March 23, 1998

By some miracle of the universe, Matt Tisdale’s fourth solo album, Faithless, was completely mixed and mastered by the deadline of March 12. True, they had finished up the final mastering with only hours to spare on the last day, and true, the corroboration between Jake and Matt had been uneasy at times, downright hostile on a few occasions—an argument over using Little Stevie as a backing singer for a measure instead of simply double-tracking Matt’s voice was probably the worst of these incidents (Matt had won that argument through sheer stubbornness)—but the fact that they had managed to work closely together for six months certainly fell under the category of divine intervention. Or perhaps it was just desperation on Matt’s part as he felt the increasing squeeze of his tax debts.

In any case, the master was done by the extended deadline (though it was considerably over budget by this point) and Matt, Jake, Laura, Caydee, the Nerdlys, and Kelvin the little Nerdly were able to climb into the Avanti on the morning of March 13 and make the flight back to Los Angeles. Celia’s master had been finished the week before and she, Pauline, Tabby, and Obie had taken a private flight back to LA already. It was the following Monday that the fun truly began. That was the day that copies of the masters were delivered to National Records and Aristocrat Records with a request for proposal.

Jake, Matt, Celia, and Pauline had already met with the suits at Aristocrat the previous Friday and listened to their offer. It was not all that great an offer and Jake was hoping that National would present something better. It made sense that they would since National owned the rights to the first three Matt Tisdale solo albums and therefore would not have to factor performance fees into their figures. It was a theory that Jake hoped would hold water.

The four of them met at the National Records Building at 10:45 for their 11:00 AM appointment with the dynamic trio of Crow, Bailey, and Doolittle. Jake had just flown in an hour before and was driving his pickup truck. Matt had chartered a limousine. Celia and Pauline showed up together in Celia’s Mercedes after meeting for breakfast at a trendy downtown eatery.

“How are Teach and Caydee?” asked Pauline as they assembled in the lobby of the iconic building. “Did they stay home today?”

“Yeah,” Jake told her. “She’s going to buy a new car today.”

“A new car?” asked Celia. “She’s getting rid of the little green machine?”

He nodded. “She says it’s not a ‘mom car’. And she has a point, really. It’s a bitch to put Caydee’s car seat in the back seat. And there’s also the fact that I can’t drive it.”