Starlet: A Dark Retelling - Cora Kenborn Page 0,90

the door to the room flies open. Shadows and light spill through, momentarily blinding me. But it’s the footsteps that kick my pulse into overdrive. Slow, purposeful steps that lead nowhere but to the end.

The girl’s smile returns. “He’s here.” She holds out her hands. “Are you ready?”

I don’t know why I nod. I just know I’m supposed to. So, I take her hands, the sticky smell of pennies binding us. As we kneel together on the hard floor, we take a deep breath and together say the words we both know so well.

“One. Two. Three. Four. Five…”

I wake to the sound of my own screams as I thrash violently while tucked in between the dresser and the bed of a guest room in the east wing.

“Six!” I shriek, tears streaming down my face as I collapse, my eyes rolling back into my head, and a tortured whisper on my lips as I slip into darkness. “Six…”

Chapter Thirty-Seven

Dominic

God, my head feels like somebody drilled a hole in the side of it and stuffed it full of rocks. I don’t know how much whiskey I drank last night, but it’s enough to wish for death this morning.

Or afternoon.

Hell, I don’t know what time it is. All I know is it’s too bright to be awake.

Anchoring a pillow over my head, I drape my forearms across it and block out the world until the phone rings again.

Why the hell didn’t I just turn the damn thing off?

Because then you couldn’t see her text, dickhead.

I admit it. I’ve seen all five of them. Read them. Reread them. Analyzed them like a damn chick. Everything short of answering them. I can’t. Not until I get my shit together and figure out what I’m going to do about Violet.

And Rubio.

And Rosten.

And Luciano.

“Fuck,” I groan into the pillow. “I wish they’d all just die.”

After the third time my phone rings, I’m pissed. Throwing the pillow across the room, I roll back across the mattress, hitting the answer button without bothering to look at the caller ID.

“Stop fucking calling me!” I’m about to hang up when a familiar voice catches my ear.

“McCallum, wait. This is about Alexandra.”

“Who is this?”

“It’s Brent.”

Ah, yes. My Bound Fate spy. “Why are you calling me so early?”

“It’s four o’clock in the afternoon.”

I rub at the new headache forming between my eyes. “Your point?”

“I would’ve called you earlier, but I had to wait for Noah to leave. He has enough problems with Rosten, and if he overheard, he’d do something drastic and ruin his career.”

On hearing that fucker’s name I sit up, the rocks rattling around in my skull calming to a dull roar. “What about Rosten?” Shit in my head starts untangling. “You said this is about Alexandra.”

“It is.” The line goes silent for a moment. “Look, I want you to promise you’ll think of Alexandra’s future before you go flying off the handle.”

“Just say it,” I bite out between clenched teeth.

He lets out a labored breath. “I got to the studio early on Friday because Noah likes to run lines on set before the crew shows up. I arrived before him and found a Bound Fate script just lying around. You know how Rosten is about stuff getting leaked.”

“Get to the point.”

“Right. So, I swung by reception, grabbed a keycard, and went up to his office. Susan wasn’t in yet because like I said, it was early. But I heard voices.”

I close my eyes and grip the sheet. Not because of the bright light, or the headaches, or the rocks in my head. But because of the impending storm I know is coming.

“I heard Isabella and Sebastian’s lines, and not the tame ones. The ones that make me walk off set. I was about to go in when the door opened. The last thing I wanted to do was get caught eavesdropping, so I hid around the corner, but…” He pauses, almost as if he’s battling with himself to say the words I know are coming. “It was Alexandra.”

“She works for him.” The words are hollow, even to my own ears.

“She was crying, Dominic. And before she left, Rosten…” He hedges, a tense silence passing between us. Then he says the three words that knock the air out of my chest. “He touched her.”

“He did what?” My voice is dead calm, but the grip on the sheet is merciless.

“She looked catatonic, man. Like no one was home. Then she just walked away. Noah never made it to the set because he