Page 84 of Songbird
I realize my mistake in the split second it takes for someone to slip through the dressing room door, but the person who does isn’t the producer who brought us here. It’s not Pia, either, and it isn’t someone from the television crew. I know who it is, and Rosie does too.
“Lauren?” Rosie’s tone, shocked at first, turns to rage. “How did you get in here?”
“Please don’t be mad, Rosalie,” Lauren begs, clutching nervously at the oversized tote slung across her chest. “I knowthe talent booker. He sneaked me. I had to see you and you wouldn’t answer my emails.”
“You need to go,” I say firmly, setting my phone face down on the dresser, keeping the line between me and Drew open. Fuck.Fuck. How could I get this so wrong? “Now.”
“No, I can’t.” Lauren shakes her head, her once-dark hair bleached as blonde as straw and her lips coated in coral lipstick. She turns her wide eyes on Rosalie. “I have to explain what happened with Chip so that you forgive me and make me your assistant again.”
Rosie scoffs delicately. I try to caution her with a look she doesn’t see, and I’m already debating and discarding the different ways to get her out of here.
“You can’t be serious,” Rosie says. “You slept with the man I was planning to marry.”
“He made me do it!” Lauren cries with a petulant stomp of her foot. “He said he loved me and that he’d make me a star, just like you. But then he blamed me when you left, and now he wants nothing to do with me. I told him I could be just like you, and that he wouldn’t even notice the difference between us, and he called me… he called mecrazy.”
“This is wild! You can’t possibly believe I’ll rehire you. It’s ridiculous!” Rosie crosses her arms over her chest as her attention drops to Lauren’s feet. “Are you wearing myshoes?”
I take a step toward Lauren, and her head whips my way. “Don’t come any closer,” she barks. “I’m not leaving. You can’t make me.”
“Yeah,” I tell her firmly. “I can.”
She’s got a gun in her hand before I take another step, pulled out of the handbag she just flung to the floor. My stomach hits my throat and my thoughts drift to the empty holster at my waistband. Rosie gasps as Lauren lifts the weapon, holding it like she’s not used to it.
“Back off,” she spits, swinging the gun from Rosie to me and back again. “This is between me and Rosalie. And if you even think of making a sound, I’ll kill her. I swear to God I’ll shoot.”
Terror takes me by the heart, and I beat it back with every skill I’ve ever learned in all my years in hostile situations. I lift my palms to let Lauren know I see her and I’m listening, and I stop my advance without stepping back, but I’m still not close enough to disarm her without putting Rosie at risk.
“I hear you,” I say calmly. “You want to talk to Rosalie. Chip took advantage of both of you, and you both got hurt. You want to talk about it, and that makes sense, but this isn’t the way to do it.”
“I don’twantto do it like this,” Lauren says, her tone pitchy and manic as she talks to Rosie and not me. Her hands shake as she keeps the gun aloft. Her eyes, burning and filling with tears, are frightening. “But you won’t listen any other way. Your phone was off for weeks! You didn’t answer my emails. I found your publicist and she rejected me. I commented all the time on social media, but I know you don’t check your DMs. What was I supposed to do? You left me no choice!”
As desperate as I am to look at Rosie to make sure she’s okay, I don’t take my focus off Lauren, and what I say next is as much for Rosie as it is for her.
“I’m sure Rosalie wants to talk to you too,” I say evenly, patience dripping from every word. “If you put down the gun, we can have a real chat. What do you think?”
Lauren starts to sob, and she shakes her head. “It’s too late for that. I know what will happen next. I’ll put down the gun and lose all my power. You’ll have me arrested and thrown into prison. I know it.”
I swallow and edge sideways, sensing an escalation in her emotional dysregulation, which means I’m losing control of thesituation. I need to get between Lauren and Rosie in case… Fuck. In case it’s the last thing I do.
“What do you want from me, Lauren?” Rosie says, her voice shaking so badly that I’m taken by a rise of nausea. “You want to talk? Let’s talk. I’m here and I’m listening. We can talk about Chip if you want or how I can help get your career back on track. Let’s make a plan, okay? Let’s figure this out.”
Lauren chuckles darkly as her grip on the gun grows steadier, and a chill runs up my spine. “You’re just saying that. I knew this would happen. I knew once I had all the power here, I’d finally get what I want, but I wanted itthen. I wanted you to want it too. It’s too late now. It’s too late for all of it.”
“It’s not too late,” I tell her, moving across the room with the subtlest of movements. “It’s never too late to make the right choice.”
“I just wanted to be you.” Lauren’s sad little laugh turns into a sigh. Her tears stop as suddenly as they started, and her line of sight over my shoulder tells me Rosie’s safely behind me now. “You have everything, Rosalie. Fame. Fortune. Talent. Men. And who am I? Nobody. What do I have? Nothing.”
She raises the pistol higher, the barrel pointed right at Rosie, finger hovering on the trigger. “So, I guess that means I’ve got nothing to lose.”
I lunge, predicting correctly that she’s about to fire, and as the first bullet leaves the gun, Rosie screams behind me. I take Lauren to the ground, bile rising in my throat at the possibility that Rosie’s been shot, but then the door flies open, the gun goes off again, fire explodes in my thigh, and the world goes dark.
thirty-two
Rosie
“Whereishe?”Idemand, pacing from one end of the tiny hospital room to the next. It smells like antiseptic and the window won’t open, neither of which is helping my state of mind. “What’s going on? Why won’t anyone tell me anything?”
“He’s in surgery,” John says, and even though it’s for the hundredth time, his gentle reassurance is unwavering. “The doctor will be here as soon as there’s news. In the meantime, I’d be more comfortable if you got back into bed.”
