Chapter 7: Who Else Knew

"You knew," Keith said again.

"Yes."

He stood up so fast that the laptop slid on the table.

"How long?"

"A month."

"A month." He crossed the room and turned around and crossed back. "You sat in that green room yesterday and called it a coincidence."

"There was a camera in the corner, and I had a microphone in my ear."

"You could have written it on a napkin."

"I could have." I stood up too. "And you would have read it with a producer standing behind you, and by morning it would have been a promo."

He stopped.

He pushed both hands through his hair, and for a moment he looked nineteen.

"A month," he said, much more quietly. "Who else knew?"

"Ashton. His manager. Vera, obviously."

"Obviously."

"Keith, I'm sorry."

"Don't." He held up a hand. "Don't be sorry yet. Just tell me."

So I told him.

He didn't interrupt once, and his face got harder with every sentence.

I told him I had packed and left that afternoon.

I told him about the call a month later and the show.

I told him I had said yes so that Ashton would think he had won.

I left out the recording.

"He wants to cut me into a woman who begs," I said. "That's why I'm doing it. I let him think I will."

"And what does Vera get?"

"A romance to sell. Their drama airs the same weeks as the show."

Keith sat down on the arm of the sofa.

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