Page 108 of Places I've Never Been

“I can kick his ass,” Piper offered. “I’ve been taking lessons.”

“So have I,” Della said. “We can tag team.”

Mattie caught a conspiratorial grin shared between the two, and suddenly her heart felt a lot lighter. “No thanks. I justwant…I just wish…I wish I’d never met him. How am I going to finish that third song?”

“You aren’t,” Renic said. “Kat and my lawyers are working on getting you out of that contract. The work you’ve already done will remain, but there won’t need to be any future contact, if that’s what you want.”

The way he said it made her look up.

He knelt beside the couch and put a comforting hand on her arm. “Is that what you want, Mattie?”

She thought she’d run out of tears, but she was wrong.

“Leave it for now,” Lizzie said softly. “She’s exhausted. Let’s get her some tea, then bed. This will all look better in the morning.”

Mattie didn’t want to go to bed. She’d spent the past week sharing a bed with Adam, and now she had a sinking feeling the bed would feel too big without him in it.

Adam had lied to her. He’d used her. He’d tricked his way into her heart, and he was still in there. The sick thing was that even though she knew better, a part of her still wanted him.

Della handed her a cup of tea. “There’s six bedrooms. You get first pick.”

Mattie held the warm cup in her hands. “That’s okay. I like this room. I think I’ll just stay here for now, if that’s okay. Y’all go on.”

Renic squeezed her arm. “Whatever you need, kiddo. We’re all staying right here with you.” He stood up. “The lawyers should be awake by now. I’ll be in the den if you need me.”

“Thanks, hon,” Lizzie said with a fond smile for her future husband.

Renic had been a fixture in their lives for a long time, but this past year he’d become more than just a family friend. Lizzie and Renic were going to get married, and on any other day it would have made Mattie happy to know that they’d found eachother, but today, all it made her feel was sad. They had what Mattie hadn’t known she wanted.

Della plopped down on the couch next to Mattie, while Piper sat on the floor in front of them and leaned against the coffee table.

“No way we’re leaving you down here to stew all by yourself,” Della announced.

“Yeah, we’re not going to bed if you don’t,” Piper said.

Lizzie curled up on the couch next to her. “Want to tell us about the trip?”

“Not really.” Mattie tucked her feet up under her and took a sip of tea. She was so tired. “Can we talk about anything else?”

Della waved a hand at the fireplace. “Did you know Dean Martin used to party here with Frank Sinatra? I hear they used to drink all night and pass out by that fireplace.”

“Want to try that?” Piper asked with a sly smile.

Mattie smiled back at her. “No, thanks. Tell me about your project. How’s that song coming along?”

She leaned into Lizzie, and Della leaned against her, and they all listened as Piper chatted about how cool the animation process was, and how the song needed some spark, and about all the potential male leads they were schmoozing. “They’ve targeted three new guys who can’t sing, and one who’s just meh. At the rate they’re going, it’ll be a decade before they find the male lead.”

“How hard is it to do the voice-over?” Della asked.

Mattie pretended to listen while her sisters provided soothing noise. It had been a long day, and she was ready for all of it to just be over. But she couldn’t bring herself to close her eyes. Every time she tried, she saw Adam’s crooked smile and Delusions of Glory tattoo, and it made her want to cry all over again.

Chapter Twenty-Six

Adam strode into Austerberry Management, Inc., offices in one of the main LA Center Studios buildings like a man ready to storm the castle and murder the king. He’d spent hours in the air stewing over everything Mattie had said. All he had were questions that he couldn’t answer: Did Lucas hire the photographer? If he did, why? Were more photos going to drop?

It was the last one that made his jaw hurt and put him in an extremely foul mood. Mattie already thought he was the worst kind of slime. What would she think if another photo, one of something far more intimate, was posted? He’d do anything to stop that from happening.

He ignored the receptionist, who took one look at him and the gang of jet-lagged rock stars who followed him and picked up the phone.

---