Page 22 of For My Finale

L ilah stood at the front of the village hall, her arms crossed, her eyes narrowed in concentration as she watched Gloria and Arty shuffle across the small stage.

The scene wasn’t working. The dialogue was fine, the pacing was decent, but the blocking was stiff and unnatural.

She bit her lip in thought, then decided to hell with it.

“Stop, stop,” she shouted, striding forward. “You’re overthinking it.”

“I’m walking across a stage, not splitting the atom,” huffed Gloria. “How on earth can I be overthinking it?”

“Because you’re treating it like you’re walking across a stage instead of just…” Lilah scratched her head. “Instead of just… walking.”

Arty raised an eyebrow at this. “Aren’t we supposed to be acting?”

“Yes,” Lilah allowed. She was struggling to put into words something that seemed utterly natural and instinctive to her.

“But acting isn’t about acting, it’s about being.

” She positioned herself beside Arty. “Try this. You’re supposed to be walking to meet each other.

Don’t think about performing it. Just walk.

Naturally, but with purpose. Like… like you’re going to meet someone at the pub.

You’re not late, not early, just perfectly on ti me. ”

Gloria and Arty exchanged a glance before stepping toward each other again, this time with a more relaxed air. Lilah watched critically, then nodded. “Better.”

“You’re good at this, you know,” piped up Daisy from the wings.

Lilah turned toward her. “Good at what?”

“Teaching,” said Daisy. “You explain things in a way that actually makes sense. You should be a teacher.”

Lilah blinked at this, momentarily thrown.

Teaching? The idea had never occurred to her, honestly.

She’d spent so long being on the opposite side of the equation, being told what to do and when to do it, that the idea of teaching others to do the thing she’d once loved so much had never even crossed her mind.

“Maybe,” she said, filing the thought away for later. It was something to think about, something to add to the list of possibilities.

The rehearsal was winding down. She let Gloria and Arty go, and people began gathering their things and chatting among themselves. Lilah was picking up her jacket when Arty ambled over, hands in his pockets. “Hey, Lilah, can I have a word?”

“We’re not skipping the shirtless scene,” she said immediately. “We’ve talked about this—”

“It’s not that,” he said, sounding a little more urgent.

Lilah frowned. “Alright then. What’s up?”

Arty glanced around before lowering his voice. “Some of my mates mentioned that there’s been a rumor floating around.”

Lilah stiffened. Not her and Blossom. Not already. “What kind of rumor?”

“The kind that says Lilah Paxton is hiding out in Bankton.”

Her stomach dropped into her shoes. She fought to keep her expression neutral. “And where, exactly, did these mates of yours hear this little rumor?”

Arty sighed. “You know how it is, I don’t have to explain how tabloids work to you, Lilah. I’m sure you’ve been on the receiving end of all this often enough. Someone talks, someone else listens, and before you know it, the press is sniffing around.”

Lilah exhaled slowly through her nose. “Have you actually seen anyone suspicious?”

“No, not yet,” Arty admitted. “And I’ve not said anything either, my journo days are long behind me. But I figured you should know.”

Lilah nodded, her mind already racing. Someone must have sold her out.

That was how these things worked. There was no other way the tabloids could have gotten a whiff of her whereabouts.

They spread money around like it meant nothing until they found someone desperate enough to take it and tell them what they needed to know.

But who would do that? The village was starting to warm to her, but money could make people do all sorts of things.

“Maybe it’s just a rumor,” she said finally, trying to sound casual. “People like to talk.”

Arty gave her a long, measured look before nodding. “Could be. But then, it’s an awfully specific kind of rumor, isn’t it?”

“Not necessarily,” she said. “I was born here, remember? Someone will have dug that information up somewhere, or remembered it, and tried to put two and two together.”

“Perhaps,” he agreed, even though both of them knew that was unlikely to be true. “Still, if I were you, I’d keep my eyes open.”

Lilah forced herself to smile, a deep unease settling in her gut. “Thanks, Arty. I appreciate the heads up.”

As he walked away, Lilah let out a slow breath. Maybe it was nothing. Maybe it was just gossip, the kind that never went anywhere. But deep down, she had a feeling that this wasn’t the last that she was going to hear of all this.

“Ready to go?” Blossom said, coming to her side.

Lilah looked at her sweet face, her sweet lips, then shook her head.

She couldn’t do this tonight, couldn’t deal with another person.

She looked at the stage, almost with longing.

How much easier it had been up there, speaking someone else’s words.

“I’m going to stick around here, work on the blocking a while. ”

Blossom smiled. “Alright, don’t leave too late though, you don’t want Billy stalking you home.”

Lilah smiled at this. “I’ll be fine.”

And Blossom was the last to leave.

The press. Always the press. There was no privacy, no letting things alone. Lilah’s stomach hurt and she thought she might be sick. This just wasn’t fair. Fine, when she was working, the press had a role to play. But she’d quit, retired, whatever. Wasn’t it time they left her alone?

It was just a rumor, though. Maybe she could get away with this.

THE NEXT MORNING, Lilah strode down the high street, the brisk air doing little to cool the heat that was simmering under her skin. She’d been upset, now she was just angry. This little rumor about her had taken root somewhere, and this morning she was going to find out just who had planted it.

She started at the village shop, pushing the door open to the sound of an old brass bell. Mrs. Wilkins, standing behind the counter, barely glanced up from where she was tallying numbers in a well-worn ledger.

“Morning,” Lilah said, adopting her most charming smile. She’d played a PI once in a movie, and charm seemed to be high on the list of skills a detective needed.

Mrs. Wilkins pursed her lips. “Morning. No eggs in yet, I’m afraid.”

“Ah,” said Lilah. She recovered herself. “That’s… that’s fine. I was just wondering if perhaps you might have heard any gossip lately?” She leaned casually on the counter, disturbing a display of women’s magazines. “Specifically about… well, about me?”

Mrs. Wilkins sighed through her nose. “I don’t pay any mind to gossip.”

“Not even when it concerns a certain famous leading lady now residing in your beautiful little village?” Lilah tried, almost batting her eyelashes.

Mrs. Wilkins frowned and then peered over her glasses at Lilah’s face. “Are you saying that you’re an actress?” she asked doubtfully.

Lilah blinked. “Um, I’ve been coming in here nearly every day for almost a month now.”

“I’m not saying I don’t recognize you as a customer, dear. But as an actress… No.” She shook her head. “No, you’ve not quite got the right face shape, I think. No offense intended.”

“Right,” Lilah said faintly, standing up. “Ah, thank you then.”

Lilah felt slightly shaken as she left the shop. Mind you, Mrs. Wilkins was famously tight-lipped, she was quite sure that no one even knew her first name, let alone whether she’d heard any whispers about tabloids sniffing around. No, her first stop had not been a successful one.

She was walking down the street and wondering where to go next, when Daisy came pedaling along on her mail bike, her satchel bouncing against the frame. She skidded to a stop when she saw Lilah.

“Morning, Lilah,” she said, waving. “I’ve got nothing for you, I’m afraid. I keep waiting for a postcard from Brad Pitt or someone, but no luck so far.”

“Mmm, Brad’s not known for his interest in women over the age of thirty, I’m afraid,” Lilah said. It couldn’t be Daisy, could it? Not sweet Daisy. But she did like to gossip. “I’ve got a question.”

“Anything,” Daisy said, almost breathless with enthusiasm.

“Have you heard anything about, say, a tabloid looking for me? Anything like that?”

Daisy’s nose wrinkled in disgust. “Tabloids? Ugh. Nope.”

“That’s what I thought,” Lilah said. “Only, Arty told me last night that there’s a rumor floating around that I might be here.”

Daisy pressed the brakes on her bike over and over in thought, considering this, then she shook her head. “I mean, I’d tell you if I’d heard anything. But I really haven’t. If you ask me, anyone gossiping to the tabloids should be kicked into the canal.”

A small relief. It wasn’t Daisy. “There’s a canal?” Lilah asked, curious.

“Oh, yes,” said Daisy. “Not sure it’s deep enough for anyone to drown in. It’s green and stinky though, so being kicked into it wouldn’t be pleasant.”

“Good to know,” grinned Lilah. “I’ll let you get on with your rounds, then.”

Daisy rode off and Lilah got back to thinking. Who could it have been? She highly doubted that it was Arty. He was the one that had warned her in the first place. Which left… who?

As she walked toward the cafe, she tried to think of anyone who had enough to gain from selling her out. Most of the village barely knew who she was. She didn’t think anyone would outright betray her.

Then again, money could be a powerful motivator. And someone had clearly been motivated.

She turned onto Blossom’s street, her mind still ticking through the possibilities, and then she saw it.

Through the cafe’s large front window, glinting in the morning sun like an altar to betrayal, was a brand-new, top-of-the-line coffee machine.

Lilah’s heart dropped, practically stopped beating for a second.

She stopped dead on the pavement, her brain struggling to process what was right in front of her own eyes.

Blossom had just been worrying about money. She’d been struggling, barely making ends meet, worried that her big new idea was both too complicated and too expensive. And yet here was a pristine, professional-grade espresso machine that looked like it could only have cost a small fortune.

So where had the money finally come from?

Surely not.

Surely Blossom wouldn’t…

Lilah swallowed.

Would she?