My phone trilled, the accompanying vibrations loud in my bedroom in the RV.
Last night, I’d barely slept.
Seeing Leo and his family again had gone better than I could have hoped, with the added bonus of getting in my apology to Cameron. Today, I’d get to exorcise demons onstage.
But then it was back to the real world. To my busy schedule, starting with the premiere of Huntswoman, and then on to months of back-to-back filming of the next two movies in the trilogy, Bondswoman and Regent. With my ex and multiple steamy scenes.
A series of battles I couldn’t face.
I didn’t want to do any of it.
With a small groan, I rolled over in the narrow bed and collected the ringing phone. Mom, the screen read.
“Hey.” My voice came out in a rasp. I cleared my throat and wriggled up to sitting.
“Elise? Were you sleeping?”
“Yes, but that’s okay. It’s nice to hear your voice.”
“Where are you?”
“Doing a thing with Leo Banks. Didn’t Janelle mention it?”
Mom made a humming sound, then clanking came down the line—a coffee machine, I’d bet. If Mom could mainline caffeine into her veins 24/7, she would.
“She possibly did, but I’ve been busy. I have some bad news.”
I pressed my fingers to my chest. “What?”
“We have to postpone the filming of Bondswoman.”
My heart pounded. The second part of the trilogy. The movie I’d been dreading making and the source of a high degree of my anxiety. My fingers shook the phone.
“Oh no,” I stuttered.
“Oh yes. It’s fucking obscene. Don’t they understand that jobs rely on this industry, that people’s livelihoods are at stake…”
My mind blipped out completely, and I lost focus on her words. All I knew was sheer relief. For months, I’d dreaded walking onto that movie set again.
For a while longer, I didn’t have to.
Emotion clogged my throat, a child-like burst of feeling.
“How long a delay?” I forced out.
“That’s not clear yet. The press will hear about it later today. Janelle will be in a panic. I’ll be busy fighting with financiers in NYC.”
Of course. This was a disaster for Mom’s production company.
“Is there anything I can do?”
“Call Derren. Tell him to push things his end. We need all the support we can get.”
I winced. “I’m not exactly on speaking terms with him right now.”
Mom paused then sighed loudly. “I heard you trashed his car. Janelle said it was a publicity stunt, but if he’s pissed about it, smooth it over. You’ll be working together again soon. Listen, I’ve got to go.”
My life only occasionally linked up with Mom’s. If I was in LA and working, we’d see each other at home or on set. But we hadn’t been in the same room in months. Sometimes, I wished we could be closer. That she knew I was hurting without me having to explain.
“Wait, Mom? What about next week? The premiere for Huntswoman. Is it cancelled?”
“Going ahead as planned. Why wouldn’t it? Speak later.”
She hung up, and I stared at the phone.
“Rory!” I shouted.
A thump sounded, then my friend appeared at the door, her hair stuck out at angles. A morning person, she was not. “Where’s the fire?”
I waggled my phone. “Filming has been postponed.”
Rory’s mouth formed an O. “Are you fucking kidding me?”
She didn’t even need to ask which movie.
“Seriously. Some problem with budgets. Mom gave me the heads-up before the press release. It’s last-minute.”
“Thank the pretty angels. Are they going ahead with the first one?”
“Unfortunately.” I scanned the messages from Janelle that lurked on my screen. “Shit. The arrangements for the premiere are coming in thick and fast. The dress designer is being difficult. Janelle’s saying we go to our backup. Even if I don’t have to film again, I still have to get stuffed into a gown and see Derren.”
Panic spiked my breathing.
Rory laid a hand on my arm. “Yowser, slow down. One problem at a time. This is a reprieve. For that, you can handle one night, right?”
Rory didn’t know my reason for never wanting to act again. Or at least never wanting to act a sex scene again. She thought it had more to do with my exposure plus Derren and our breakup than anything.
That was only partially true.
I couldn’t tell her the full story, even if I planned to announce it to the world.
“I have no clue where my head is at right now,” I admitted.
Her gaze softened. “You have a big decision to make. If you’re serious about what you said to me, about what your therapist advised you, the minimum you need is a break from acting. The more I think about it, the better an idea it is. Go back to school. Do something else that isn’t so revealing.”
Hopelessness took hold of me. I couldn’t quit. Not long-term. “Mom’s studio will suffer. Even if I can’t film the sequel, she’ll have another project in the pipeline.”
“There’s no way in this world your mother would want you to hurt for the sake of her company.” Rory took the phone from my hands and put it on the nightstand. “She won’t. I know how business-minded she is, but she loves you. You need to talk to her.”
I chewed my lip. “She’s had my back in the past. Once, when I was about thirteen, we hosted a party at home, and I overheard some industry exec guy bad-mouthing me to his friends. He claimed I couldn’t act and only had a career because of Mom.”
“What a dick. You’re incredibly talented. And more, you’ve worked so much harder for it because of opinions like that.”
I loved her so much. “I was standing right behind him and he didn’t know. But it hurt me, and I ran from the room. Mom found me in tears. I so rarely cry, but it had been a gruelling couple of months on set, and I was beat. Anyway, she tore shreds off the guy. I mean ripped him a new one, and in front of everyone. She had his job and humiliated him.”
My friend whistled. “Shit. Remind me not to cross her.”
“Right?” Maybe it had been an overreaction, but it proved Mom loved me.
Rory took herself off for a shower, leaving me to ponder my impossible thoughts. If I stopped work, Mom’s business might not survive. If I refused movies where I took my clothes off or had to act out intimate scenes with another actor, what did that leave?
No lead roles for me anymore. Reduced income. Mom in despair.
Rock, meet hard place.
My phone bleeped again, and I sighed, collecting it.
Cameron: Tell me what time you’re coming over to see Leo. I’ll guard ye.
My tension suspended, and happiness flooded me like a drug. Even a text from this man sent my nervous system into a better place. He had every right to tell me where to go. Yet here he was, showing up for me again.
I had a chance to be a better friend to Cameron.
God, I’d take it.
Elise: That’s very kind of you.
Cameron: Leo’s entertaining the campsite, busking. I’m just helping out my bored friend.
Even if he was, I didn’t care. I’d get to see him again.
Elise: We’ll be ready in thirty.
Cameron: See you at the gate.
Twenty minutes later, Rory and I were ready to go. I’d already texted the guard saying I didn’t need him today, and as we emerged from the exit, he was nowhere to be seen.
Cameron and Max waited instead.
Early, just like us.
Rory immediately took up her position on Max’s arm and trotted ahead, being the good friend. I sidled closer to Cameron, no longer bothered by his sunglasses. He looked a badass and sexy as fuck.
“Have ye eaten?” Cameron asked.
“Not yet. You?”
“Aye. I’ve been up since five. Baby G doesn’t respect time zone changes, so I helped out Vi and Leo by taking him for a wee walk around the backstage area.” He gestured at a café-van serving pancakes. “Will here do?”
My appetite jumpstarted. “My agent will flip if she sees me eating food like this, but hell yes.”
I called out to Rory, and she and Max joined us.
“Janelle would pitch a fit if she knew you were about to eat pancakes.” Rory read my mind.
“Exactly what I just said, but she won’t find out.”
Rory clasped her hands in front of her, her expression stricken. “But you’ve gained a pound. A pound!”
I chuckled. Like regular people, we stood at the food van and waited for the server. The mid-morning sun warmed my skin.
“Cameron,” Rory asked. “What you think of Elise’s new hair?”
I pursed my lips at my meddling friend. She’d been strangely easy on me last night about the Scot, but I knew it was coming.
Cameron raised an eyebrow. “It’s bonnie.”
She switched her gaze to me. “Can I tell the boob story? You can use it to get an informed opinion.”
I choked on air. “Oh God.”
“What boob story?” Max asked, suddenly interested.
My friend returned to Cameron. “Do you think her boobs are too big?”
He slowly faced her, his shades hiding his reaction. “Why are ye asking?”
“Last year, a director told Elise’s agent that she should consider breast surgery so she could go down a couple of sizes and play the role of a young woman for longer. You, I understand, are a fan of our fair friend’s previous movies. So, I’m asking as an invested party, do you think her boobs are oversized?”
“Stop it,” I hissed.
Rory winked. Not subtly.
Cameron’s neck flushed pink. “I’m naw answering that.”
Max snorted. We all gazed at him
“What?” he said. “I plead whatever it is ye Americans plead when ye don’t want to tell the truth.”
“Hi! What can I get you folks this morning?” the chirpy server interrupted.
“A breast reduction,” I side mouthed.
Rory burst out in laughter and placed her order and mine, hardly missing a beat.
The men did the same then we claimed a table. The food arrived fast, and we tucked in.
From my pocket, my phone chimed with the tone of an incoming email. I ignored it in favour of the blueberry pancakes with maple syrup that mingled with my latte on my tongue and sent my senses into bliss.
But a hint of dread interrupted my appetite.
Since the blackmail message back in May, I had a Pavlovian response to email alerts. I’d set up a new business account and shared it only with a select group. It was probably Janelle again with some new disaster.
Rory held the conversation up, asking Cameron and Max about themselves. She found the mountain rescue as fascinating as I did, and Max recounted a story of their latest call-out—of a man who’d possibly injured himself for life by jumping into a river. My heart ached for his awful situation. Likewise, Cameron appeared distracted by the tragedy.
Only once we’d finished the meal and started over to the other side of the park did I check my screen.
Super fan, read the title of my email. I drew up short.
Shit.
Instantly, Cameron went on the alert, his hand landing on my arm, and his body blocking mine. “What’s wrong?”
I stared at the screen. With shaking fingers, I opened the message. That name was the same as the person who’d threatened my dad. Surely it couldn’t be them.
Super fan
Elise, where are you?
Your fans are missing you, and a little bird told me that we might not even get Bondswoman as soon as we hoped. Your work is so important. We need that movie to be filmed as soon as possible.
I don’t like to force you, dear, but this is just too important.
You know what I have in my possession. You know what I can do with it.
I’ll be in touch.
Your super fan
A picture was attached to the email. I opened it, and shock stole my breath.
Onscreen was my dad, by a pool, a bikini-clad girl in his lap.
A slender-limbed teenager.
Definitely not me.
I recognised the location, it was Cabo where we’d vacationed. But the picture cut off the girl’s head.
Maybe she wasn’t that young. Maybe she was just a slight-framed woman. Increasingly frantic, I scanned it for more clues.
“Princess, talk to me.” Cameron pulled me closer, his grip gentle on my arm.
A reassuring brush of his thumb had me peeking up at him. Before I could control my mouth, words emerged.
“This message… I’m being blackmailed.” Then I squeezed my eyes tight shut, because he was the very last person I wanted to immerse in my shitshow of a life.
“Fuck.” Cameron glanced around and then propelled me forward with him, leading me to who knew where.
He called out something to Max, who gave a wave then wandered off with Rory. I was lost to my flash of pain.
Dad was not a pervert. He didn’t target girls.
It couldn’t be true.
My mind rattled over the email, and suddenly we were back at the private area where my RV was located. We showed our passes, and Cameron led me inside.
“Which is yours?” he asked.
I stumbled, leading him to my door. Inside, he flipped the lock, set me on the couch, then crouched in front of me.
“Start from the beginning. Who’s blackmailing ye and what are they asking for?”
“You don’t need any more of my problems.”
Cameron’s gaze remained steady. “That’s beside the point. I asked the question.”
“I’m not going to use you as a sounding board. I don’t want to use you at all.” Then I blinked, because that had come out wrong. Just like calling him beautiful last night had.
“Elise,” Cameron warned. “I asked ye.”
“There isn’t a single other person I can talk to about this.”
As I spoke, I heard the implication of my words, about the level of trust this carried.
Then something curious happened in Cameron’s expression.
Sheer want appeared.
I stared, trying to read him. He needed to be in my confidence?
Wow, but maybe I understood. Previously, I’d shut him out entirely and hurt him as a result.
“You don’t need to hear any of this,” I said. A final test.
“Yet here I am waiting on your words.”
My resistance crumbled. “Three months ago, when I was with you, I got a blackmail email. I don’t know who the sender is. He calls himself my super fan.”
“What did he ask?”
I swallowed. “My visibility, at the time. I’d gone AWOL, and he didn’t like it.”
“And the threat?”
“To expose a lie about my father.”
After everything we’d been through, my rush of trust was pure and easy. I trusted Cameron. I’d started to before, and the swift return of it bowled me over.
Cameron watched me. “Do ye think they were behind the photographer on the estate?”
I considered the point. “I don’t think so. They didn’t contact me again after that photo appeared.”
“But they asked for exposure and then got it. Seems like more than a coincidence to me.”
I frowned, and Cameron continued.
“They’ve contacted ye again today?”
My breath came out in a shudder. “Yes. But it’s worse. Last time, they claimed they had pictures. This time, they included one.”
A muscle ticked in Cameron’s jaw. “And the ask is still the same?”
In an act I thought myself incapable of, I handed him my phone, the email open. I could never tell Rory this information. I wouldn’t tell Mom, Janelle, or any other single person I knew.
Apart from Cameron.
He held my gaze for a moment then eased himself up and took a seat at my side. He read the message. The moment he scrolled down to the picture, nausea rose, twisting my gut.
“It’s a lie,” I bit out. “I don’t know who that is with him, but Dad wasn’t… I mean, he’d never…”
“I know. It’s okay.” Cameron flicked off the photo then took my hand in his.
The simple act quietened the worst of my thoughts.
The electricity I’d always felt at his touch was now a gentle current of comfort.
“The point of this,” he said, “is to force ye into doing something. What’s the problem with the film?”
“The schedule has been pushed back. I don’t know why but I think it’s to do with money as Mom’s in New York trying to source funding. Plus I’ve been having doubts about acting in them so this delay feels like a gift.”
Even thinking that betrayed Mom.
“You’d have to work alongside your arsehole ex-boyfriend?” Cameron asked, soft.
“I would.”
“What happens if ye don’t do the film?”
I hadn’t truly considered this. “At all? I don’t know. They’d have to recast me. I’ll be in all kinds of trouble. God, all of this is going to blow up at the premiere next week. All the questions are going to come my way, and I don’t think I can stand there and happily chirp how I’m excited about any of it.”
Cameron’s eyebrows merged, and he pointed to the now dark phone. “So the movie is delayed and you’re having second thoughts about working on it. Stands to reason your blackmailer is someone to do with this film.”
“They could be. There are hundreds of people invested in it.”
“Who specifically would be most out of pocket if it didnae happen, or if ye, Elise Darcy, didn’t star?”
My head was too fuzzy to think this through properly. “I need to create a shortlist, is that what you mean?”
“Exactly. Then narrow it down to the person who’d have access to pictures like this one, or the skills to fake it.”
It didn’t look faked. The realisation haunted me. Dad and the girl were hugging, his arms tight around her.
Cameron rose and paced down the sunny RV. “Will ye talk to the police?”
“I don’t want to. That would only give it credence.” Then I registered the scene going on around me, and my brain short-circuited. “Why are you even talking to me right now? I thought you hated me. You should. All I’ve done is be crazy.”
He stopped his pacing, and his full attention fell back onto me. There was a long moment where I waited on his answer. Instead, I got a wry twist of his lips. “Do ye want me to call Leo and say ye won’t be coming over? I can stay a while, but I have to work.”
I sucked in a breath. The email had rattled me to the core, but I wasn’t going to let the sender ruin my peace of mind. Today, I was supposed to be performing onstage, a song with amended lyrics to help me take control of my feelings over what happened to me.
“No. I’ll come. I’ll try to wrap my head around that list.”
“If you’re sure.”
I was, and I had a lot of thinking to do.
In the festival park, Rory and Max waited outside the gate.
My friend gave me a once-over. “Are you okay? You just vanished.”
“I’m good. I just needed a minute to talk to Cameron.”
She raised a quizzical eyebrow but let the subject go, and we moved off together.
At the artists’ camping ground, Leo waited on me. Gordain hollered for Cameron, and he left me with a quick smile.
To say my head was turned was an understatement. I tracked him with my gaze.
Rory skipped over to where Viola sat on a picnic blanket with Baby G, and I took a second to waylay Max.
“Can I ask you a question? I want to do something nice for Cameron.”
Interest sparked in Max’s gaze. “Is this to make up for his car? We were picking glass out of the garden for hours.”
I palmed my neck. “You know about that?”
“Aye. I was in the crofthouse.”
“Why hasn’t he told anybody else?”
“Better to ask him that than me.”
I could only guess at the answer. And it didn’t paint me in a pretty light. I returned to my question. “I still need to somehow pay him back for the damage. I don’t mean with money because he won’t accept that. I need another idea.”
“Cameron isnae a complex man. Buy him a drink, tell him you’re sorry.” Max smirked. “If the mood takes ye, kiss him better. Maybe that will stop him being such a miserable fucker.”
With that, he left me to Leo.
This time, the rock star didn’t linger over rehearsals. Instead we played the song through once, then he led me out of the campsite and to the backstage area. Gordain plus another man I didn’t know escorted us.
As we went, Leo waved at people he knew, the friendly musician clearly in his element. In a quieter alley behind the stage, he slowed.
“After our practice yesterday,” he said quietly, “Viola and I were both worrying about you.”
I swallowed. “Yeah, I wondered.”
“Tell me to back off if you want, but my un-asked-for opinion is that going onstage and telling people how hurt you’ve been, and pointing the finger at an individual, might not be the best way to solve that pain.”
He gestured at himself. “This is coming from a guy who sold my soul in my lyrics since I was a teenager. It helps to get the demons out, but once you put something like that out there in the ether, it belongs to the consuming public. You lose control of it.”
We walked through a series of narrow corridors, some made up by stacked equipment, and with people bustling through. Out the other side, we emerged into the wings of the rear of the main festival stage. A blues band strutted their stuff, the sound jarring and loud. Beyond them, on the scorched grass, people danced.
I’d never been on the stage before, only attending festivals as a face to be seen, booked by an agency. I’d spent more time picturing the message I had to give than the method I would have in delivering it. Fresh anxiety awoke in me.
It would be dark when I performed my piece, but could I really stand there and sing lines about the abuse I’d suffered?
Leo had a point.
I folded my arms against a sudden chill. “I’ve had this in my head for over a month now. To walk out there and show the world that I’m a real person, not a headline. You heard the alternative lyrics I wrote for Thief. I have no clue how else to handle it, and I can’t let that go. I want people to see the real me.”
“You still can. The original plan was for you to come onstage with me. We can strip back the performance to you playing, but not singing.”
Which would help with only half the problem.
Leo glanced around then dug his fingers into his fair hair. “I want to help you do this, but I also want to give you the benefit of my experience. Our worlds are similar. Are you aware of the way Viola was treated by the media when we started seeing one another?”
I cast my mind back. “A little, but I’d never have read an article.”
“They slammed her. Slut-shaming, dragging up old boyfriends, everything possible that could hurt her. I’m lucky she didn’t leave me to burn. I’d previously been friendly with the press, but that killed it for me. I wanted to take each and every hateful site apart. Sue them into non-existence.”
“What happened?”
“We took another approach to own our narrative. I recorded a song with another performer, kind of what you are I are planning, and we featured Viola in the video. The whole attitude was that we didn’t give a fuck about their bullshit, but also to show them they hadn’t broken us. It eclipsed all the bad press.”
I stared out over the open field. “I remember that video. You didn’t give them the response they wanted and instead catered for your fans.”
“Kind of. It was the start of a huge shift in how I interacted with both the press and my followers. I’d been an open book, and for some, they felt they had a place in my life. That was fine for me as a single man but not for me as part of a couple.”
My heart rate picked up. “Did you ever have a problem with fans?”
Leo scrunched his nose, freckles shifting. “Yeah. It’s why Gordain is so rigorous with my security detail. Because the more real you are, the better strangers can identify with you.” He tipped his head back to where Gordain kept a watching vigil. “It only takes one messed-up mind to overstep the mark.”
“You mean like a stalker?”
Or a super fan.
“Exactly. The more personal insight you give, the more likely you are to attract that kind of attention. I have people who believe that they’re in love with me. That they are better for me than Viola. I will never again take the risk of letting them too close.”
“So you think by me singing the words we practised yesterday, I’ll be playing into that mindset?”
“I do. I’m not telling you to stop, I just want you to be aware of the repercussions.”
Leo’s new music was far less exposing of his soul.
It hadn’t occurred to me why, but now I understood.
He wasn’t warning me off from getting sued or pissing off the industry, but a whole different angle I hadn’t considered.
If Cameron was right, and my super fan was involved in my work, I didn’t want to give them a single additional piece of me. Yet I still had the burden of what to do about Derren, and about my public exposure.
“I do still want to do this,” I gestured at the stage and the crowd beyond, “but I’ve got another problem as well. Something your warning is very timely for.”
Leo rested a hip against a wooden crate, and his gaze turned shrewd. “Want to talk about it?”
“Maybe later. I’m stuck on what to do about today.”
“How do you feel about walking out onstage right now?”
I shivered visibly.
Leo dipped his head. “There’s your answer. I have another idea. Put a pin in the performance. Just relax instead. Spend time jamming with me and hanging out with Vi, then come with us tomorrow to the next festival. You can decide then.”
Tomorrow, I was meant to be seeing Rory home and then returning to LA. Back to the world of agents, and meetings, and everything I didn’t want.
If I stayed, I’d get more time with Cameron. Perhaps figure out a way to pay him back, too.
“Maybe I could,” I said slowly.
Leo pushed upright, his smile instant. “Perfect.”
I turned my back on the stage, and we strolled to the campsite.
