I hate that I can still feel the warmth from his hand when he used to hold mine. I hate that the memory of his mouth on mine still wakes me in the middle of the night. I feel a dull ache at the loss of the ring I’ve been hiding under my tops, and I ache at the sound of his voice and the sight of his face, and I hate that I don’t know how to stop it.
When I press my lips to my talisman bracelet as I try to hold myself together, fighting for those in the room not to notice how easily Mackenna gets to me, Lionel steps forward and takes my arm. “Dear, you wanted his attention?” he asks me, both amused and confused.
“I don’t want his attention. I don’t want anything from him!”
“You’re getting a lot of him, whether you two want it or not.”
I yank my arm free. “I’m not for sale. There’s nothing you can say or do to convince me to do this.”
“How about . . .” He leans over and whispers a very long, very big number into my ear.
TWO
THE WITCH FORGOT THE BROOM BUT NOT THE FUCKING TOMATO BAG
Mackenna
“She’s doing it, Kenna. You’ll be surprised to know it didn’t take all that much. I tell you, these new college grads will work for shit these days.”
As I step out of the shower, grabbing the plush terry robe and sticking my body inside it, I find Lionel in my room, beaming at the news.
“You can’t be fucking serious?” I demand, rubbing my head with a hand towel. He looks deadly serious, and I shake my head as I grab some clothes. “Lionel! I snorted fucking egg yolk up my nose. I think I’ve still got some in my ear.” I hold the towel against my ear and jump up and down, shaking the water out.
“You little shit. You said she didn’t exist,” he growls.
I toss my scattered wigs into their trunk and slam the lid shut. “She doesn’t,” I grit out. So what if I had to tell myself she didn’t exist? For six years, it worked. But now she’s here. Like some demon—some poltergeist—reminding me of what I wanted as a teen and could never have. Reminding me what I lost. What I’d do to get it back.
Pandora.
My nightmare, my dreams, my walking, talking fantasy.
Here.
Flinging my ring.
My own fucking ring right in my face. My mother’s ring.
What an irreverent little minx!
And what’s with those fucking boots? Jesus, all she needs is an axe and blood dripping from her fingernails. Or a broom and a cauldron.
God, that woman . . .
Something kicked me on the inside when I heard her. Her smooth voice, flat but not quite. Her voice, unique in the world. It’s like a song that makes you feel like shit. Makes me feel . . . like that worthless teen who craved her like a drug.
The teen who loved lyrics, songs, drums, pianos, melodies, whatever made me feel my life didn’t suck. Songs make friends irrelevant. Songs made me remember her, but also forget her. I love songs. Music saved my life and now it’s become my life. But no song’s ever been as good as hearing her. And no song’s ever been as bad as seeing her there, taunting me, challenging me with that endless black gaze.
“I thought you were singing about a fictional woman,” Leo continues, and when I settle on a T-shirt with a skull on it—to fit the mood that bitch has put me in—I turn to see Lionel’s eyes. They’re glassy and deranged, like they are when we get a record deal, a movie deal . . .
Or when he thinks we’ve just struck gold.
But Pandora is an endless dark mine with no diamonds for me. I want to forget I’ve just stared into her face, but it’s branded into my retinas and she’s all I see. That angry little shrew frown, those dark black lips, that ridiculous pink streak, the boots. I can perfectly picture her straddling a man and hooking those boots around his hips. Yeah, I want them around mine.
Fisting my hand around my mother’s ring, I lift my head in the direction of the door, my voice low. “Where the fuck is she?”
“Waiting. I’ve summoned the lawyers, and I’ve already texted Trenton.”
“The fucking producer? You get her in the movie, she’ll be the target of a million angry fans, don’t you get it? They’ll know her face. They’ll know she was mine, and she’ll never be safe again in her life!”
“Ahh, protective, are we? I like this side of you, Kenna. Never seen it before. Hell! All the more reason we want her in! We want whatever it was that happened just there.” Lionel signals to the door that leads to the Meet and Greet hallway. “We want that. And we want a kiss-and-make-up scene at the Madison Square Garden concert. For the public, and for the camera. Next, we want her at the premiere, on your arm, before we make up a fine breakup story that leaves you home free.”
“Whoa, whoa, whoa, Lionel!”
“Whoa, my ass! I saw how she rattled your cage. I saw drama. I saw more than what we have for this fucking movie, which is mostly you boys drinking and getting laid. I saw an opportunity, and as your manager, you pay me to cash in on such opportunities.”
“No,” I say.
“Listen, Kenna, all I need from you is a couple of good scenes, a make-up scene near the end of the movie, and her on your arm at the premiere. Give me this, and I’ll give you what you asked for.”
“You’re finally caving?”
“Yep.”
I start pacing, considering his offer. I get what I want, what I have long been asking for. And I also get to have her close. Talk to her. Maybe I can’t tell her the truth, but I can win her back if I want to.
And fuck, I not only want to, my pride demands I do.
Once, her mother told me I wasn’t good enough for her. I vowed to her that in a few years I was going to be good enough for any woman’s daughter . . . especially hers.
“You’re the best singer, and the prime attraction, but let’s face it, Kenna, you’re the shittiest actor among you three. But with this . . . it’s brilliant. With her, you won’t even have to act.” He grins. “Now go out there and finish the Meet and Greet. I’ll take care of your girlfriend.”
“My girlfriend,” I sneer, “is a pervy, tomato-throwing man-eater who seems only too delighted with the opportunity to hang around to give me hell!”
“Yep. That’s good stuff.”
THREE
LOOKS LIKE I’M GOING TO HAVE TO KISS THE FROG
Pandora
“It’s a lot of fucking money,” Melanie says as we ride back home.
“Melanie, I fucking robbed them. I would’ve caved for half. Hell, I’d kiss a hippo’s ass for half!”
What just happened?
I’m still trying to grasp the fact that I just signed my life away. Or more exactly, three weeks, a kiss, and a movie premiere appearance away.
I’m on my way back from the most surreal couple of hours of my life. In the space of ninety minutes, I met Trenton the movie producer, a bunch of lawyers, and a big, fat check.
Now we’re riding in the back of a limo provided for Princess Melanie by none other than her very own Mr. King. The driver is apparently her boyfriend’s driver. I tell you, being with her lately is giving me a fucking complex. Especially after your ex just looked at you the way Mackenna looked at me. Like he wants to murder me, slowly, and then chop off my body parts and hide them in a box. So the legend goes—Pandora in a box, not Pandora’s box.
Melanie raps manicured nails against a crystal glass she’s lifted from the minibar inside the car. The letters on the nails spell G-R-E-Y with a heart on her thumb.
Ridiculous.
Both my friends are in committed relationships with men who’ve proven themselves true by doing the unthinkable—leaving their lives for them. I loathed Melanie’s playboy because I thought he wasn’t right for her, but it turned out he was exactly what she’d dreamed of and more. Hot, protective, dangerous, and alpha to the max, he’d do anything for Melanie. And Brooke? Brooke is already married to her guy—no, he’s not just a guy, he’s like a beast. A tall, lean, muscled, dark-haired, blue-eyed, sexy beast—who looks at her like he lives for her.
I don’t tell Melanie how it hurts when Greyson shows up at the office to steal her away for the day, or how it hurts to see Brooke and her husband instinctively nuzzle each other when they talk. Maybe it’s because I feel uncomfortable letting anyone see that I notice that shit. But I do. I notice it like I’d notice that I’m missing a limb, or like I’d notice slamming into a tree branch and having it stick out of my torso.
Yeah, I notice how Greyson looks at Melanie, and how Remy looks at Brooke. Only a few months ago Brooke and her husband were in town with their baby, and I saw the way he smiled at her across the room. How they each sought out the space in the room where the other was. How, when they were close, he put his hand on her hip, a huge hand, and ducked his head to her, so near that his lips moved against her ear, his lips curled, his eyes twinkling down at her. I noticed Brooke’s smile, almost shy, and the way she turned her body to his and cupped his jaw. You could feel the love in the air, and I almost felt like I was intruding on something intimate and special. Seeing them, I scowled down at my lap, because I couldn’t take it.
And Melanie? She was probably wishing on some stupid star, hoping that one day that would be her. And now, guess what? It is her. Her fucking boyfriend dotes on her. She’s found genuine love. Love that I won’t ever let myself wish for because I will never have that with anyone. I will never duck my head shyly or be the kind of girl who inspires a man to protect her the way my friends’ men protect them. I will never inspire a man to want to change for the better because of me. Because I’m not inspiring. I’m the bitter one nobody likes to hang around with for too long.