Page 115 of When I Picture You

It was raining in L.A. when Lola landed, and traffic was a nightmare. The flight over the Pacific had been interminable and very dehydrating, no matter how many sheet masks she did. Now, she dozed in the backseat, dreaming of falling into Renee’s arms.

Cassidy nudged her awake. The iPad was in her hands and a fearful look on her face. “Um, Lola? You should see this.”

Moments later, Lola was on a FaceTime with Gloriana, tears streaming down her cheeks.

“How could you let this happen?” Lola cried.

Lola felt dizzy, like the ground had gone sideways. Staring up at her from Cassidy’s iPad was a tabloid article about her and Renee.Just between them? Lola Gray spotted canoodling with gal pal, the headline read.

Days after she ducked out of the premiere for then-boyfriend Nash Walker’s box office smashFit to Live, the singer was caught getting handsy with doc director Renee Feldman. In photos taken weeks before Gray and Walker announced their split, the “Just Between Us” songstress got cozy with the short-haired woman at a brewery in her home state of Michigan.

“They were definitely on a date,” said a beer lover who witnessed the couple. “Holding hands and everything.”

According to a source close to the star, the pair are just friends: “Lola isn’t over Nash. She’s been begging him to take her back.”

Representatives of Lola Gray did not reply to requests for comment. Renee Feldman could not be reached.

And thephotos—Lola couldn’t look away from the photos. They’d been taken on the street outside that brewery. A real date, with the girl she’d always dreamed of. Lola had felt so happy in that moment. She’d feltsafe. She’d dared to pull Renee in for a kiss, and that beanie she’d stupidly been using as a disguise had fallen back and let her hair loose. It was undeniably her. The photos were clearly the moment after a kiss: their faces were only inches apart in one.

“I don’t control the press,” Gloriana said. “We tried to kill this, but we couldn’t. I have to tell you that social media is really responding.”

“I don’t understand,” Lola moaned. “They never ran stories this direct while I was with Ava, and she was famous. No one knows who Renee is. And why did they wait so long? The trip was two months ago.”

“As I tried to tell you, they know who she is now,” Gloriana said, a little sourly. “With Ava, you were careful. You weren’t kissing her in the street.”

Stupid, stupid, stupid.How had she let herself believe no one was watching? But then again, there really hadn’t been any reason to think a pap with a telephoto lens would be tailing them in Petoskey, Michigan—and these were the work of a professional, not grainy phone footage, like the clip from Saint Satin.

The only silver lining, thin as it was, was that the pap had missed the kiss itself. He must have, since the tabloid hadn’t released photos of it.

“We prepared a statement denying the whole thing. I’m sending it over now.”

“Denying it?”

“It’s standard ‘nothing to see here’: violation of privacy, respecting the breakup with Nash, you and Renee are purely professional.”

“I don’t want to say that,” Lola said.

“Honey, this is the best way to take care of it.”

Lola’s nails dug into her palms. Gloriana knew the best way out of any mess. But Lola wasn’t sure she could do that to Renee—or to herself.

Gloriana read the hesitation on her face. “Lola, this is getting ridiculous.”

“Let’s say nothing. A statement calls more attention to it. You already got a denial into the article—a source close to the starwas us, right?”

That unnamed source had denied it by saying that she was desperate to get back with Nash. A few weeks ago, when Nash’s scandal threatened to break, his people had asked if they’d consider reuniting the couple. Then, Gloriana had declined, but now it was clear the option was on the table again.

“Fine. But you and Renee need to start keeping a bit of a distance. I don’t like the effect she’s having on you. Renee has nothing to lose from this and you have everything.”

“We’re still filming,” Lola said.She practically lives with me. She sleeps in my bed. We’re in love.

“Then keep it strictly to filming. No more slipups, no more little dates. If I see you two together in public, Renee better be holding a camera. If she objects to that, I’d be happy to remind her that her contract allows us to terminate her at any time, and the production company owns her footage.”

Lola’s heart leapt to her throat. Renee couldn’t lose this film.

“No, I’ll explain everything to her,” Lola said. “We’ll be good, I promise.”

“And on that point, given this development, I can’t sign off on any sort of big announcement about you and your—” Gloriana fumbled for the right word. “Aboutyou. We don’t need to stir things up right now.”