Chapter Nine
Anotification lit up his phone just as Rick was taking a sip of his coffee. He ignored it at first and continued reading through an email thread he’d already read twice. Nothing in it mattered.
The notification buzzed again, so he put his mug down and checked it out. A headline sat at the top of the screen on some entertainment site he couldn’t remember following. He nearly scrolled past it, then paused when a photo loaded and he saw who was in it.
It wasn’t a clean shot. It looked as if someone had taken it outside a venue after a rehearsal or a show. A cluster of people in coats, a security guard, a man in a cap smiling at someone off-camera, and a woman turned slightly toward the lens as if she’d heard her name being called.
Rick stared at the screen. He knew who it was. Cass.
Her hair was darker than he remembered and pulled back in a ponytail. She wore a long coat that looked expensive, fitted at theshoulders, the kind of thing you bought when you had money. Her mouth was open mid-laugh, and one hand was lifted as if she were waving at someone.
Rick scrolled down and saw the caption.Cassidy Lane spotted leaving rehearsal with rising star Jalen Cross ahead of U.S. tour launch.
He read it again, slower this time, like he’d misunderstood. Rising star. Tour launch. Rehearsal. He tapped the article. It opened with a few paragraphs of filler, quotes pulled from someone else’s interview, and the usual things reporters used when they didn’t have anything to add but wanted to report something. Tight harmonies. Live setup. The team behind the sound.
Cassidy Lane, longtime backing vocalist and vocal coach, reportedly part of Cross’s new live setup. Longtime. Vocal coach. Rick’s throat tightened.
He scrolled to the next photo, which showed Cass again, walking beside the singer. She was glancing back over her shoulder and smiling at someone out of frame. She looked relaxed. Comfortable. As if she belonged there.
Rick didn’t move for a minute, then his fingers tightened on the phone. He forced them to relax before he did something stupid and threw it across the room.
Cassidy Lane. Rick hadn’t said her name out loud in years, but now he wanted to know more, so he backed out of the article and opened a browser. Typing her name, Rick tapped search and waited for the results to load.
The results loaded fast. At first, it was a few old clips and a short interview from years ago where she’d been asked about working with him. A red carpet photo where she stood behind him, smiling politely while he’d been shoved forward. A list of credits on a music site that looked as if it hadn’t been updated in a while.
Rick stared at the screen and felt the anger build inside. Working with Rick Marcus like he’d been some stepping stone. He clicked another result. More photos and more mentions. Her name attached to other artists. Some small. Some bigger. One thing stood out as he scrolled. She’d kept working.
Cass had always been like that. She showed up early, did her warm-ups, and then did the work. Came back and did it again the next day. She didn’t chase attention the way some others did. She treated it as a job because she was good at it, and she knew what it took.
Rick clicked a photo from an older rehearsal clip. Cass with a mic in her hand, mouth open mid-note, eyes closed as if she was in the sound.
It didn’t feel fair that she was still in rooms like that while he sat in an apartment scrolling headlines. It didn’t feel fair that anyone was writing about her now, even if it was only because she was standing beside someone else who was more famous.
Rick couldn’t stop himself from searching more. A newer interview. A post from Cass herself with a caption about being grateful and proud of the team. Rick read it once, then again, clenching his jaw until he felt his teeth ache.
He clicked on her profile and went through the posts that came up. Studio photos and short clips of harmonies. Posts about vocal health and technique. Comments from people who actually seemed to listen to what she was saying.
Putting the phone down on the counter, Rick glared and stared at it. “It doesn’t matter,” he muttered to himself. Cass had her life and Rick had his. They hadn’t spoken in years. She could carry on with her singing, but that thought didn’t help.
Rick picked the phone back up and searched for Jalen Cross. Another headline and a photo appeared with an article talking about momentum and buzz, and breakout.
Breakout. That’s what it said. Breakout.
The tour list was there, too. Cities listed down the page. Rick went over it twice, noting where the tour dates were located. Los Angeles. Phoenix. Dallas. Atlanta. Nashville. Chicago.
He didn’t care about the singer, not really. The part that hit him the hardest was Cass being there beside him, being part of the group of people being praised, being asked to help while Rick sat in his quiet apartment.
The memory came up without warning. Years ago, after a show when his throat had been raw from pushing too hard and the next day’s schedule had been brutal, he’d asked her in the dressing room. Rick slumped on the couch, sweaty and tired. Cass stood with her bag over her shoulder.
“Can you do the next run with me?” he’d asked.
Cass had looked at him for a second, then nodded. “If you take care of your voice.”
Rick had tried to laugh, but it came out more like a grunt. “That’s not an answer.”
“It is,” she’d said. “If you want me there, don’t burn yourself out for no reason.”
He remembered how it had felt to have her talk to him like that, like he was a person and not some product making money for an agency. He remembered how easily she’d been gone once Graham had cut the budget.
