Tycoon Actor C578

April brought Lucas back to Bel Air, Neil trailing him through the front door with a garment bag over one shoulder and a phone still pressed to his ear.

Within a day the house had folded him back in the way it always did; slower mornings, louder dinners, someone's shoes abandoned in the middle of the hallway.

In the living room, Daciana had the floor.

She stood on the rug with her feet planted and her chin up, running a scene from memory, pitching her voice high and squeaky and then dropping it into a growl that scraped the bottom of her range. No script in her hands. She'd stopped needing one.

Jennifer sat on the arm of the couch with her hands folded, watching her the way a coach watches a fighter she trained.

When Daciana finished, Lucas sat forward with his elbows on his knees.

"Okay. Do the growl again."

She did it.

"Yeah, that's new. Last time you were doing the voices, but you weren't switching between them. That's the hard part and you just did it twice."

Daciana's grin went wide enough to show the gap in her back teeth.

"You don't even know," Jennifer said. "When she finished recording her lines on the animated film, the last day in the booth, the producers wouldn't shut up about her. Two of them cornered me in the hallway to tell me she takes direction better than adults they've hired."

"Really..."

"And then she auditioned for the next one and they cast her the same afternoon. They didn't even make us wait for the call."

"The same afternoon." Lucas's brows pulled in. "Hold on. That's not because they know she's a Knight, is it? I'm not precious about nepotism. Half this town got their first job off a last name and most of them turned out fine. I just don't want her carrying it around in ten years when people start counting."

Neil dropped into the armchair and let the garment bag slide off his shoulder onto the floor.

"Relax. The kid's the real thing. Nobody's going to say a word about it even if the door swung open easy because of her last na—" He caught the temperature in the room and reversed hard. "What I'm saying is she can do the job. That's all. Right, kid?"

Daciana nodded so hard her hair swung.

"I worked really hard! I practiced with mom every day and I said every line over and over until it was perfect and I didn't even sleep that much."

"You didn't even sleep that much," Lucas repeated.

"...A normal amount."

He put his hand on her head. "I'm proud of you."

She went red all the way to her ears and buried her face against his arm, which sent Jennifer into a laugh she tried to hide behind her hand. Even Neil snorted.

"Hey." Lucas tipped Daciana's chin up. "But you don't run yourself into the ground. If you're tired, you say so, and we stop. That's the rule. That's the only rule I've got."

"Ye-yes, dad."

"Good."

At the other end of the couch, Daria had gone quiet through all of it, one leg tucked under her.

"I'm happy for you, little sis," she said. "Just also kind of jealous, I guess." She worried a loose thread on the cushion. "You get to do the thing you love, and they pay you for it."

The room dropped a few degrees.

Nobody said it out loud. Nobody had to. The adoption paperwork was still crawling through the system, and until it cleared, Lucas couldn't put her name on a contract for anything. Daciana got to chase what she loved. Daria got to sit and wait for a stranger with a file folder.

Neil clapped his hands once, loud enough to break it.

"Daria. Nobody in the history of the world has ever been in a hurry to start working. You're a kid. And your father over there is, I want to stress, extremely rich."

"Th-that's not what I meant." Her face went hot. "I didn't mean it like that, I swear. I just want to be some help. Around here. You know?"

"Hey. Hey." Lucas turned toward her fast. "Nobody in this house needs your help paying for anything. We didn't put Daciana in a recording booth because we wanted what she brings home. She's there because she loves it. That's the whole reason. Don't hang that on yourself."

"Your sister is chasing something she wants," Jennifer said, gentler, "at an age where most kids don't even know what wanting something feels like. The money is just what comes attached to honest work. And it goes into an account with her name on it. Not ours. We don't touch a cent."

Neil spread his hands. "See? Rich. They've got billions sitting in—"

He stopped. Jennifer was looking at him. Lucas was looking at him. He found something on the ceiling to be very interested in.

Daria kept her head down a moment longer. When she spoke, her voice came out thin.

"Thank you for your generosity. Mom. Dad."

Lucas and Jennifer glanced at each other and both lost the fight against it at once.

"Sweetheart," Lucas said, "you don't have to talk to us like you're accepting an award."

"Sorry."

"You don't have to apologize for that either. We're family. That's the whole thing."

Daria's smile came out crooked and wet. "Thank you."

He let it sit, then knocked his knuckles against the couch. "So. What's the new one? What did they cast you in?"

Daciana sat up like she'd been waiting all evening for someone to ask.

"It's a Warner movie! The Cat in the Hat."

"That one?" Lucas sat back. "That's a classic. Everybody's read that book."

"They're animating it," Jennifer said. "Feature-length. From what I hear, it lands somewhere around 2025, 2026."

Lucas nodded, and did the math he'd been avoiding.

He came from the future. That was the whole engine of it. He knew which films landed, which songs stuck, which companies were worth buying before anyone else looked at them. But his memory of that future only ran so far. Late 2025, 2026, and after that the trends were as blank to him as they were to everyone else in the room.

'Doesn't matter.' He'd already built most of the life he'd come here to build. Whatever came after, he'd chase for its own sake.

Daciana was tugging his sleeve, asking if she could run the scene one more time.

---

Coachella was days out at the Empire Polo Club. Until then, Lucas and his family had a rented house at the Madison Club in La Quinta.

It was a big place, and it needed to be. Martha came along to run the household side of it, with Daciana, Daria, and Sera all under one roof, and Jack and Simon splitting security in shifts.

Neil had been in a few expensive neighborhoods in his life. He still went out to the balcony and stood there with both hands on the rail like a man who'd wandered into the wrong postcard.

"Look at this. Look at it. That's a golf course and it's shaped like money." He leaned over the rail. "This is a billionaire neighborhood."

"Yes."

"Actual billionaires. Sitting out there. Drinking things."

"Neil."

"Right." He straightened up. "Forgot. My client is a billionaire."

Jennifer rolled her eyes. "You do this. Every time. Every single time you remember he's rich you have to say it out loud like it's news."

"It never stops being news to me."

"He can't help it," Lucas said.

Neil turned around from the rail and his eyes had that shine.

"Okay, but hear me. This place is a networking paradise. Half the serious money in this country is sitting inside these walls right this second, with their wives and their kids, because they're all going to Coachella too. Nobody's working. Everybody's friendly. That never happens."

"And?"

"And we already got invited. Guy named Hallorand, two doors down. Sent word over like we're the new family on the block and he wants to know if we like casserole." He put his hands together. "So. Will you go, Saint Luke?"

Lucas let it pass. Neil had been running that nickname for weeks, and reacting to it only fed him.

"You want to go."

"I want to go very badly."

"Then we'll go."

"See, this is why I love you. I knew I could count on you, Saint Luke."

Jennifer's arms folded. "Okay, what is that? Are you mocking my husband?"

Neil's hands came straight up. "No. No! It's a compliment. It's respect. He's a saint. To me, to everybody, to the general public—"

"He'd better be."

"He is."

"Good."

Neil swallowed and turned back to the view.

Lucas said nothing at all. 'That's what you get, greedy guy.'

They took a golf cart over an hour later and knocked on the door like neighbors.

Hallorand opened it himself. Silver-haired, golf shirt tucked into slacks, grinning before the door was fully wide.

"They came! I told them you wouldn't come!"

"Dad? Who is it?" A woman's voice, somewhere deep in the house.

Hallorand called back over his shoulder without turning. "The one we were just talking about! Mr. Knight is standing in my doorway!"

"He's what?"

Footsteps. Real running footsteps. Then a woman in her thirties came around the corner, saw them, and stopped like she'd hit glass.

"Oh my God. Oh my God, it's actually them. Dad. You said maybe."

"I said maybe because I didn't want you buying a cake."

"I bought a cake."

"Hi." Jennifer put a hand up. "Hope we're not intruding."

"Intruding? You're a guest, I invited you," Hallorand said, waving them through. "Come in, come in, the whole family's here."

They were. Five of them counting Hallorand and his daughter. Two teenage girls who had clearly agreed on a strategy of playing it cool and were both failing, and a boy of maybe eleven who kept looking at Lucas and then away and then back, shifting his weight like he had somewhere else to be and no intention of going.

And in the armchair by the window, a man who did not belong in the picture at all.

"Hallorand." The man didn't get up right away. "You brought a superstar into your house and you didn't lead with that."

"I wanted to see your face."

"You got it."

Neil's eyes went round. "E-Elon Musk? What the heck?"

Lucas and Jennifer both needed a second.

Elon stood. "It's a pleasure. The one and only Lucas Knight." A nod sideways. "And Jennifer, obviously."

"Hello," Jennifer said.

Lucas nodded and left it there.

He'd taken the invitation because Neil wanted the room and because saying no to a neighbor was rude, and there was nothing wrong with either reason. Nobody had mentioned this.

Elon noticed. He usually did.

"Hallorand's an old friend of mine. Also an investor who stayed in when a lot of people were running for the exit. He called, I came. That's the whole thing."

"I hope it's not a confusion," Hallorand said. "I should have said."

"Not at all," Lucas said.

"It really is good to meet you in person. I mean that." Elon put out his hand and Lucas took it. "I show up to things. It's a habit. Coachella's on the list, and then I heard you were performing, and that made it easy. I'd like to see that live."

"Appreciate the support."

Elon held the handshake half a beat longer than he needed to, the way a man does when he can tell someone hasn't opened up yet.

"Bahrain," he said. "That's when I became a fan. That lap."

"Ah."

"No, I'm serious about this. That lap made no sense." He let the grin come. "Are you human? Is there a chip in your head? Because if there is, I'd like to know who put it there, that's my whole business."

It landed. Neil barked a laugh, Jennifer laughed, Hallorand laughed, and one of the teenage girls got her hand over her mouth too late.

"Within a second of pole," Elon said. "Nobody does that. That's the answer to the question. Nobody."

"I didn't expect to pull it off either, honestly," Lucas said, riding it. "Surprised myself."

"Ha. Sure. Surprised yourself."

"I did."

"Out of this world, is what it was." He was still smiling, but his eyes stayed on Lucas a moment too long. Half a joke. Half something else. "So. McLaren locked you down. Two years, exclusive ambassador, that's real?"

"That's the deal."

"That makes me jealous." Elon sat down on the arm of the chair. "Because I had the same idea. Sign you as Tesla's exclusive. And they got there first."

Lucas sighed and put on a face like regret. "If I'd known you were thinking about it, maybe I'd have held off. But they've got me now. Exclusive."

"I know. And that's on me. I talked myself out of it, because you're already a Tesla shareholder. I figured, a man who owns a piece of the company isn't going to put his face on somebody's car." He shrugged, one shoulder. "Wrong. It happens."

He tapped the arm of the chair twice.

"But I'm not late. I'm early. Your deal ends, I come back around."

"Oh?" Neil's head came up like a dog hearing a can open. "Now, that's something we can definitely sit down about."

"Sure." Elon nodded at him. "And to show good will in the meantime. What if I gave Lucas the second-gen Roadster?"

Neil's eyes went wide. "The Roadster. The Roadster? The one you announced in 2017 that's been sliding ever since?"

"You follow the product line."

"Everybody follows that product line. It's a running joke."

"That's the one," Elon said, no flinch. "It's coming. 2025, thereabouts. I can get Lucas an early unit before anyone else touches one. Now, there are still things wrong with it, so I'd say don't rely on it. Park it in the collection."

He looked over.

"You still want it, Knight?"

"Of course he wants it!"

Lucas turned. Neil was halfway out of his seat.

"You want it," Lucas said.

"I want it for you."

"Right." Lucas looked back at Elon. "It's a gift. Why not?"

"Ha. I'll have it sent to your address."

Hallorand raised a finger. "And what about me? Old friend. Loyal investor."

"Wait for the release."

Hallorand sighed.

---

Lucas and the others spent a good while with the Hallorand family. By the next day, they were at the Empire Polo Club.

Technical rehearsal ran through the afternoon. He was headlining Saturday, and a headline set is less a performance than a machine with a few hundred moving parts, so he ran it until every one of them landed where he'd put it.

Somewhere in the middle of it, a man in a hood came out of the wing and stopped. He didn't wave anybody down, didn't check a clipboard, didn't do any of the things people do when they've got a reason to be standing there. He just watched.

Lucas gave it a minute. Then another one.

"Hey. You need something?"

The guy seemed almost surprised to be spoken to.

"Guess we've never actually met." He pulled the glasses off. "Paul Tollett. I run Goldenvoice."

Lucas came off his mark. "Oh. You're the president." He laughed at himself once. "Sorry, man. That came out rude."

"Nah. I'm the one standing in your rehearsal in sunglasses." Paul folded them shut. "That's on me."

Lucas nodded.

"I wanted to meet you properly when we put the offer together. Was gonna pitch you myself, sit down, do it right." Paul lifted a shoulder. "Couldn't get near you."

"Yeah." Lucas didn't soften it. "That happens."

"I like that better than the answer I usually get." Paul turned and looked at the stage instead of at him, which felt like a choice. "Mind if I hang around a minute?"

"Go for it."

Paul stayed. The band ran the top of the song again, and he listened to it the way a man listens to an engine he's thinking about buying.

"There's nothing on that yet," he said eventually. "No production, no lights, no crowd. Just you and a rough monitor mix." He tipped his head. "And I can already hear what it turns into. That's the tell, with the ones from your generation that actually stick."

"Thank you."

Paul liked the answer.

"That said." His voice didn't change, and somehow that made it worse. "I like it, I like all of it, and I still need you off that stage on time. Curfew hits, we pull the audio. That's the rule. I don't care how big you are."

"I know. I heard about the curfew." Lucas held his eye. "I built the set backward from the cut. It ends with room."

Paul looked at him for a second longer than he needed to.

"Backward from the cut." He slid the glasses into his shirt pocket. "Alright. Then I'm expecting something out of you Saturday."

"You won't be disappointed."

---

The next day was Friday, and Friday belonged to Taylor Swift.

The site was packed by afternoon. The roads into Indio locked up and stayed locked, cars sitting nose to tail with their windows down, going nowhere.

Lucas, his family, and the team had to fly in from the Madison Club to the Empire Polo Club.

He still didn't like helicopters. He never had. He got into one when the aircraft and the pilot and the sky all came back clean, and not otherwise, and he'd said no to enough of them by now that nobody bothered arguing with him about it anymore.

It was dark by the time they landed. Taylor was closing the night, and somehow, an hour and change before she had to go be Taylor Swift in front of a field full of people, she made time for them at the artist compound.

Daria got within a few feet of her and locked up.

"I'm so happy right now. I'm actually seeing you up close." She was gripping her own hands. "I'm a really big fan. Like, a really big one."

"Hehe. That's good to hear." Taylor bent down to her level. "And I've heard plenty about you, you know. Your dad talks."

Daria stopped breathing. "He talks about me?"

"Yes!"

"What about me?" Daciana wedged herself into the gap.

"You too, obviously. What kind of question is that?" Taylor got a hand on each of their heads and ruffled hard enough to ruin the hair.

The two of them came apart giggling.

Then Taylor straightened, looked around, and did the count.

"Hold on. Where's little Sera?"

"Back at the rental," Jennifer said. "She'd never handle the noise out here. She's with our staff, and I've got her on video, so I'm watching my baby from a field in the desert."

"Aw, that's a pity. I wanted to see her." Taylor shook her head. "Tell her I'm offended."

"She'll take it badly."

"Good."

"Thank you for agreeing to this, by the way," Lucas said. "The girls, all of it. Tonight of all nights."

Taylor turned to him, and the warmth in her face went sideways into something drier.

"Are you kidding me? Thanking me." She pointed at the ground between them. "I'm standing in this field because of you. If you hadn't gone on and on about this festival, I'd be on the other side of the world right now."

"Which is the part I still can't get over," Jennifer said. "Everyone knows you'd rather be on tour than do something like this. That's basically your whole policy."

"It was my whole policy."

"And then?"

"And then he wore me down." Taylor pulled a face at Lucas. "I couldn't help it. He talked about it so much I said yes just to make it stop. My agent's still baffled. My manager asked me twice, in writing, if I was feeling okay."

Jennifer smiled. "My husband's charming like that, isn't he."

"That's one word for it."

Lucas stood there and let the two of them enjoy each other's sense of humor at his expense.

After that they took the side stage and watched her play. The crowd went out into the dark past where the lights could reach it, and kept going.

The night ran long. Then it ran too long. The audio cut, and eighty thousand people made one sound of loss at the exact same moment.

"Aw! I wanted to watch my queen more!"

"Me too! She wasn't even done!"

"They actually pulled her audio. Are you serious?"

"Ugh. Well, whatever. Tomorrow night's Lucas as headliner. I can't wait."

"I heard Justin Bieber's the sub-headliner."

"Bieber. Under him. Think about that."

"Tomorrow, man."

---

The next day. Saturday.

Kobe had invited them over, so Lucas took the family across the Madison Club to see him and his.

"We got down here as fast as we could. Cancelled my whole schedule for this." Kobe put a hand on Lucas's shoulder and left it there. "And I want you to understand, this is not for me. My daughters are out of their minds about you. I'm doing this so I can keep living in my own house."

"Well, now that you're all out there watching, I'll feel the pressure."

Kobe took his hand back and looked at him.

"Say that again."

"I'll feel the pressure."

"Man, don't joke around." He laughed once, short. "I watched you in that car. Whatever it is that's supposed to be in a person that gets scared, they left it out of you. You don't get to come to me about pressure."

Lucas chuckled.

"Roads are gone," he said. "Solid all the way into Indio. You flying in to the Polo Club?"

"There's no other way to do it."

"Take the cars."

Kobe's eyebrow went up. "We're doing this? You're still on that? Your whole thing about helicopters?"

"Take the cars."

"It's twenty minutes in the air."

Lucas didn't move. "Then don't put your family in it until somebody's actually checked it. The aircraft, the pilot, the weather. All of it. Not one guy telling you it's fine."

Kobe held his eyes for a second. Then he raised both hands.

"Alright. Alright, I'll have it checked."

---

Saturday was the heavy night. Justin Bieber and Lucas Knight on the same bill.

People still couldn't believe Justin had agreed to go on under Lucas. But that was where things stood. Right now, Lucas was the name.

Bieber's time had come and gone.

He was in the catering tent, easy and unguarded, no wall of handlers around him. Other artists drifted over and he had time for every one of them.

Then the tent filled with a wave of gasps. He turned, and there was the man of the hour, Lucas, his family behind him.

'So that's the guy shaking the world right now.' Justin watched him come through the room, watched everyone in it bend his way without meaning to. 'I can't believe it. Back then I looked right past him. He was nobody to me. Now he's the one getting all of it.'

He didn't mind. He'd grown up. It just made him feel nostalgic.

Then he realized Lucas wasn't passing through. Lucas was heading straight for him.

'He's coming to me?'

"Bieber." Lucas put a hand out, easy, no ceremony to it. "Really glad you're on tonight. My kids are all over you."

Justin took the hand a beat late.

"Hey, man. Pleasure's mine, honestly." He looked past him. "Wait, these are your kids? I could've sworn Jennifer only had the baby a couple years back, and these two are already grown—"

His manager was at his ear before the sentence finished, barely a sound. "Justin. Those two girls are the adopted ones. The rumor."

Justin shut his mouth.

"Okay. Forget I said that." He winced at the girls. "That was clumsy. Hope it didn't land badly."

"We don't mind." Daciana shrugged like it cost her nothing. "We're huge fans of yours anyway."

"Huge," Daria said. "We had your songs on constantly back then. It's nostalgic now."

"Nostalgic." Justin put a hand on his chest like she'd put something through it. "She said nostalgic. To my face." He looked between the two of them. "Alright. You want to hear one? Right now. Private show, nobody else gets it."

"We'd love to!"

He sang, and his voice took the whole tent.