“I wish I could go back, wrap my arms around that woman I was then, and protect her,” she says, before adding thoughtfully, “I’m not afraid of what happened anymore. Looking back reminds me how far I’ve come.”
On the record, Audrey tells me that she decided to take the role in this play because it is about a passionate, reckless, haunted woman with sinful secrets, a character she can understand andhopes to do justice. Determined to live in the here and now, Audrey Abbot won’t dwell on regrets.
“Everyone has bad days,” she says with an impish smile. “Like everything else I do, mine was particularly spectacular.”
“Cosmo, you havegotto listen to me,” I plead, exasperated. “It’s Audrey Abbot.TheAudrey Abbot. She has to be front page.”
Cosmo puts his hands behind his head and leans back in his office chair. “I’ve already decided that Don Bright is our cover story, Harper.”
“If you decide to bury the comeback story of Audrey Abbot behind a cover story on a boring businessman, the whole industry will think you have lost your mind.” I rub my temples, taking a deep breath. “Cosmo, this is a very important story and sixty-one percent of our audience is made up of women.”
“Exactly.” He shrugs. “They’ll want a bit of eye candy on the front. Don Bright is a good-looking chap.”
“Eye candy is great, but they’d rather read about a woman who they looked up to and who, after being torn down by the press, has come back to the stage stronger than ever! You have to trust me on this, Cosmo, this isthestory.”
His brow furrows, as though he might be considering it, and I press on with a glimmer of hope.
“This is the first time she’s spoken to a journalist since 2007. People will talk about this; it will trend on social media. Audrey Abbot isback.”
Cosmo rubs his chin and then lets out a long sigh.
“Sorry, Harper, the answer is no. I’ve got the clever ‘Future Is Bright’ cover line. That piece is a surefire hit, ready to go to press, and I’m not willing to brush—”
“Cosmo, we have a problem!”
Rakhee comes rushing into Cosmo’s office, her eyebrows knitted together in concern.
“I’m so sorry to disturb your meeting, Harper, but this couldn’t wait,” she says breathlessly, before turning to Cosmo. “We can’t run the Don Bright piece this week.”
“What?” he splutters.
“It looks like he may have lied to us.”
“Who?” Cosmo demands to know. “Who lied to us?”
“Don Bright! His quotes and statistics about some of his business ventures don’t quite match up,” Rakhee explains. “We’re going to need more time for our fact checkers to run it past his lawyers. They’ve said they’re flat out with a case at the moment—I think he’s being sued by a disgruntled employee?—but they can have a look over it this weekend.”
Cosmo bangs his fist on the table. “This weekend! We go to press tomorrow!”
“I’ve told them that.”
“Well, we’ll just have to publish it how it is,” he says, his expression thunderous.
“We can’t risk it,” Rakhee says simply. “If we publish incorrect details, it will cause embarrassment for usandDon Bright. And it will open us up for legal repercussions.”
“Let me speak to these lawyers,” Cosmo huffs. “If they hear from the editor himself, they might make some time in their hectic schedules to run some bloody numbers.”
Rakhee grimaces. “I already said that you’d be calling them, and they said it didn’t matter—they’re up to their neck in this other lawsuit and this article is not a priority in comparison. It can wait until next week or we can pull it altogether, they said. I said we’d wait until next week. We don’t want to lose Don Bright altogether, do we?”
Cosmo’s jaw clenches.
“No,” he seethes. “I suppose not.”
“The only thing is, we need to find a good cover story to go to press tomorrow,” Rakhee says, biting her lip.
I turn to Cosmo triumphantly.
Rubbing his forehead with his right hand, he glances up at me through the cracks in his fingers.
