Page 3 of The Ex Factor

‘Reva, stop. Please,’ Ashley begged.

‘Why?’ Reva laughed.

Ashley reached for her arm. Reva stepped away.

‘You know what I love about Ashley Malone?’ Reva called out.

Now people were definitely listening. The carpet seemed to quiet around them.

‘She acts like she’s this big authentic artist.’

‘Reva—’

‘But she didn’t write her new album by herself.’

Ashley actually felt the blood drain from her face. It wasn’t even true. Was it hard to write her second album? Fuck yeah. But she did it by the skin of her teeth. Reva had had to pull it out of her at times. But it had come out of her. Why was Reva saying this?

Reva smiled. ‘Oh, is that shocking? Ask her who finished Halfway Home.’

The hell?

‘It sure as hell wasn’t her,’ Reva sneered, her chin tilted up with the absolute conviction of someone who had entirely rewritten the past in her own head. ‘I did. I wrote the bridge, the chorus, the lot. She just took the credit.’

The silence that followed was heavy, broken only by the sudden, frantic click of a dozen camera shutters. Ashley stared at her, suddenly dry-mouthed, realising with horror that Reva wasn’t even doing this to be malicious. She genuinely, truly believed the delusion she was selling.

‘Ask her how many times she told me she hated being famous. Ask her how many times she said she wanted to disappear.’

Okay, that bit was true.

‘Stop talking,’ Ashley said aloud, because it didn’t matter now.

It wasn’t just the photographers. People’s phones were out. Ashley could practically hear the internet booting up.

Reva grinned like a shark. ‘Give them a big smile, honey.’

A talent wrangler appeared from nowhere and started shuffling them into the building.

But it was too late. Because Ashley already knew what tomorrow’s headlines would be.

ASHLEY MALONE EXPOSED BY GIRLFRIEND

POP STAR DOESN’T WRITE OWN SONGS

ASHLEY MALONE WANTED TO QUIT MUSIC

The wrangler’s hand was firm on Ashley’s elbow, pulling her through the heavy glass doors and into the air-conditioned safety of the foyer. Behind them, the carpet exploded into a muted frenzy of shouting reporters, but Ashley could only stare at the gold-embossed programme someone had thrust in her hand, watching the print blur as her entire career dissolved into a joke.

Two

Ashley sat in Simon’s plush office in Soho, pulling the cuffs of her faded, oversized navy sweatshirt down over her knuckles. It was a room full of glass desks, heavy awards, and framed platinum discs, making her baggy corduroy trousers and worn-out trainers look entirely out of place. Simon sat opposite her in a leather ergonomic chair, his expensive suit trousers perfectly pressed.

‘Meth?’ Ashley asked.

‘Meth.’

Ashley shook her head. ‘Meth?!’

‘What I don’t get is how you didn’t notice your girlfriend was on meth,’ Simon mused tiredly.