My DMs are a church service.You saved me. You are my mirror. Will you touch my hands and tell me I’m not a monster?I favorite them like I’m stocking a pantry. A well-fed woman can feed many.
“Door,” someone calls from the hall. “We’re back in five.”
I stand—and then a voice I don’t want to hear says, “Don’t start without me.”
Lila.
She blows in like a winter draft that wears lipstick—legs, expensive coat, sunglasses that suggest she believes in witness protection for beginners. She pulls them off and smiles like we’re old friends. We’re not, but she’s decided we are, which is the same thing.
“Hi, star,” she sing-songs. “You look edible.”
Blake’s jaw flexes. “How’d you get past the door?”
“Smiled,” she says. “Told them I was delivering a subpoena.”
“Funny,” I say. “Security enjoys jokes.”
“They love me.” She walks right up and air-kisses my hair like she’s blessing it. Up close, she smells like wealth and a candle store. “I came to congratulate you.”
“On what?”
“On being inevitable,” she says, eyes shiny. “You’re doing the thing we talked about.”
“We didn’t talk about this,” I say.
“We did,” she says softly. “You said the world doesn’t forgive women like us. We have to rebrand. Remember?”
I don’t. Which doesn’t mean it didn’t happen. My life is a parade of women like her insisting we shared a cigarette, asecret, a moment outside a bathroom. They want to be origin stories. It’s cute. It’s leverage if you let it.
Blake clears his throat. “We’re mid-block. This is a closed set.”
Lila ignores him. Her eyes stay on me, smile tilting intimate.
“Also,” she adds, lowering her voice, “Harper Lane’s obituary is up. Drowned in the bathtub at her AirBnB in Ojai after a long recording day. They’re calling it a freak accident—something about herbal tea. Guess she was allergic to cheap chamomile.”
I look at her like she’s a spreadsheet. “Shame.”
I let the beat stretch long enough to give her nothing. Blake goes still—men do that when they smell a landmine.
Lila’s smile widens, satisfied. “I’m not here to be a problem,” she says. “I’m here to be a solution.”
“To what problem?”
She counts on manicured fingers. “You need a woman beside you at the retreat so it looks like community, not coronation. You need someone who can hold a mic and cry on cue but won’t outshine you. Someone who can improvise when a participant confesses to the wrong thing. And someone who won’t call a lawyer when she sees how the sausage is made.”
“And that’s you,” Blake says, flat.
“That’s me,” she agrees, and flicks him a look that undresses him to the bone and finds it average. Then she returns to me. “I’m a fast study. I know your rhythms. Your brand. Your weaknesses.”
“I don’t have weaknesses,” I say.
“You have appetites,” she says. “You mistake them for a compass. It’s endearing. It’s dangerous.”
I sip coffee to buy a second. Caffeine skates my tongue.
“What do you want?” I ask.
“A seat at the table,” she says. “Ten percent of gross for the retreat. A producer credit on the podcast. If there’s a book, a byline. I’m not greedy.”
