The Siren by KATHERINE JOHN (general ebook reader .txt) 📕

her mouth as she turned to me. “I’m so sorry. I know I wasn’t supposed to say anything. But what you’re doing is so amazing, I just—” She had the crowd eating out of her hand. “That’s why Stella hasn’t been acting,” she explained to the sea of faces. “She won’t tell anyone because she’s so humble, but she’s been using her time to do good in the world, building homes for those in need. That’s all I’ll say. Now we really do have to go.”

She seized my hand and led me from the fountain into the house, through the foyer and out the front door. The valet signaled our driver, and we dove into the shadowy safety of the limo.

“I’m sorry,” Felicity said breathlessly as we pulled away. “I couldn’t stand to see her treat you like that.”

“N-no,” I stammered, still trying to wrap my head around what exactly had happened back there. “Thank you for standing up for me. But the refugee thing. I didn’t—”

“I know.” She laughed. “I don’t know why I said it. It’s just what came to mind. She was being such a bitch, and it makes you look like you’re so much better than her, which of course you are.”

“Yeah, but they’re gonna ask questions now. They’re gonna find out it’s a lie,” I protested, my thoughts spiraling into a dark hole.

“No, no, it’s fine. It’s better if you’re mysterious about it. Makes it look like you weren’t doing it for the press. We’ll Photoshop a picture of you in a hard hat to look like it was taken in Central America and leak it. And if anyone pokes around, I have a friend with a construction company. He’ll say you worked for him. No one will ever know.”

“She used to be my best friend,” I lamented. “Un-fucking-real, what she did. Sold horrible lies about me and started dating Cole before our divorce had even gone through.”

“I know,” she said. Then, off my look, “There wasn’t much to do in the town I grew up in. I spent way too much time online and looked forward to my weekly tabloid delivery on Thursdays like it was Christmas. Embarrassing, I know, but I’m pretty much a walking encyclopedia of pop culture.”

My mind reeled. “So what else do you know about me?”

“You were a super-talented kid who got famous young and wasn’t prepared to deal with the stress of it. You suffered from depression, used drugs and alcohol to cope, and ended up losing your career in the process.”

I gaped at her, stunned by the accuracy of her summary. There were parts she couldn’t know, of course, that no one knew—my story behind the story. In the darkness I could feel her kind eyes on me. “You’re not alone.” She squeezed my hand. “It’s actually super common among stars who made it really young. At least you’re here now. You didn’t lose your life or end up in some kind of conservatorship.”

A tightness in my throat, and suddenly tears were pouring down my cheeks. She put her arms around me, and I bawled into her perfect breast.

“It’s gonna be okay,” she soothed me. “You’ll see. You’re gonna get it all back.”

I was so inspired by her kindness that later that evening I put down the story of how Cole and I met for my memoir.

Love at First Sight:

,

When I was cast in Faster, I’d just wrapped the last of the three Harriet films. As much as I’d enjoyed playing a bookish witch dealing with the pressures of college while hiding from an evil coven, I’d spent four years of my life on it and was ready for something different. Something meatier. So I was thrilled when the offer turned up to play an heiress seduced by Cole Power’s con man in a gritty romance. The script was fantastic—something I could really sink my teeth into—and the costar…Let’s be honest, who wouldn’t want to spend a couple of months getting paid to make out with Cole Power? Like most of the girls in the world, I’d had a mad crush on him ever since I saw him in Bad Boy when I was thirteen.

I’d met Cole in passing a handful of times at events, but we’d always been on the arms of other people and had never had a chance to get to know each other. In fact, I knew his ex-wife, Bar Salmaan (the Israeli model with whom he shares a son, Jackson Power), better, which is to say we had mutual friends and had partied together on a couple of occasions. At any rate, when I came in to sign the contracts, my agent at the time asked for a word with me, off the record.

Andy had immaculately gelled hair and pristine suits, but he always reeked of cigarette smoke hastily covered up with cologne, so I generally tried to stay on the opposite side of his desk. However, this time he came around the heavy slab of glass and leaned in close, lowering his voice. “You know Cole was a client of mine for years,” he began. Yes, I knew this. Not only had he mentioned it fifty times, but his walls were littered with posters of the movies Cole had done while they were working together. “I wouldn’t normally share something like this, but I care about you, so I’m gonna tell you. But it needs to stay between us.”

“Jesus, Andy, what is it?” I asked.

“Look, Cole’s charming, right? But he’s a method actor,” he warned. I relaxed a little. I knew plenty of method actors. “And not just on set. He believes his characters live on inside him after wrap, so you can’t ever be too sure what you’re going to get. He can be incredibly sensitive, like Steve in Bad Boy, but he can also turn on a dime, like”—his eyes shot to the posters on his wall, landing on one featuring Cole with a smirk and a gun—“Wesley in Snake