“She’s his daughter?”
“That’s what people are saying.”
“I can believe it.”
“What do you think? Is this just one of those publicity things? Or you think she really didn’t want people to know?”
Brando presses the off button so hard he nearly breaks it. We drive on in silence for a few minutes, but the sense of something wrong hangs in the space between us.
“What do I do?” I finally ask, turning to Brando. “What do I do about this?”
Brando focuses on the road, sighing deeply before he speaks.
“Rowland wants to use this, of course. Play up the connection. Milk the publicity, really drive home the ‘estranged daughter of the musical legend is just as talented’ angle. He’s already talking feature pieces about how you always knew the music was in your blood. Me: I want this to go away. Disappear. You can stand on your own talent, you worked your ass off for this career, and you’ve got no reason to want to be associated with a scumbag like him. If it were up to me, this story would be dead and gone yesterday.”
I nod. “Me too. But how? Is that even possible?”
Brando’s lips press together as he thinks of how best to let me down.
“I don’t know. Worst case scenario, this thing catches fire – more than it has – and the fans turn against you. They find out the truth, you get branded a wannabe who rode her daddy’s coattails, and nothing you ever do is judged fairly. If you even get the chance to make another record.”
“And what’s the bad news?”
Brando smiles.
“Best case scenario: The story gets buried in all the other garbage people write about, and in a year or two is nothing but an urban myth. I’ll be honest, that one’s unlikely. This is the juiciest thing in the news right now. Unless the Pope decides to streak at the Cubs game tomorrow.”
I look out at the view over the rocky cliffs, the ocean below looking a little more overwhelming than I remember it.
“Do you have his number?”
Brando drops me off at my apartment before zooming off to perform damage control. I check the time and groan when I realize Jenna is still on her shift and won’t be back for another four hours. When I get inside, I drop my duffle bag to the floor, toss my leather jacket to the side, and head straight for the refrigerator.
I’m eighty percent of the way toward deciding I should order Chinese when there’s a knock at the door.
“Who is it?” I shout, as I slam the refrigerator closed and walk over to the door.
The knock comes again, loud and impatient. I swing it open.
“Hey, babe!”
“Lexi?”
“The one and only,” she says as she strides right on past me into the apartment. Impossibly confident in just a pair of white cut-off jean shorts and a pink tank top.
“What are you doing here?”
“Just checking up on you,” she says as she glides around the room, looking around casually as if she’s considering buying it. “How’s your throat?”
I touch my throat as if remembering it was supposed to hurt suddenly. Despite the shouting match with Brando, the stress of crying all night on the plane, and the fact that I’ve been doing anything but resting since fucking Brando at Lexi’s show – it feels way better than it should.
“Fine … I guess?”
Lexi laughs wildly. “Oh! What a surprise,” she says with open derision. “I suppose that strange, unnamed, random doctor was wrong.”
I step toward Lexi, and she moves sideways.
“What do you mean by that?” I ask, making it clear from my tone that I don’t appreciate hers.
She grins menacingly as we circle each other around the furniture like wrestlers before a bout.
“Why don’t you take a guess? And show me just how gullible you can really be?”
“That wasn’t a real doctor? And I wasn’t sick enough to miss the show?” Lexi looks at me with mock-pity as she slow-claps. “You made me miss the New York show for nothing?”
“No. I never do anything for nothing. You missed the show because you were getting in my way.”
I shake my head in disbelief. Lexi leans back against the kitchen counter, stretching her long, bare legs out in front of her.
“You’re … you’re a bitch.”
Lexi laughs as she picks up an apple from the fruit bowl and plays with it in her hand.
“That’s not even the bitchiest thing I did yesterday.”
I take a couple of steps closer to her, my limbs feeling like coiled springs.
“What are you talking about?”
Lexi takes a loud bite of the apple and looks at me expectantly.
“No,” I say, refusing to let the thought take root. “No. You didn’t.”
“I probably did.”