Chapter 3

Two weeks at the estate, and my children had transformed.

Junie discovered the studio barn and declared herself "Boss of Music," marching around with headphones on backward, issuing orders to sound engineers who obeyed with straight faces because Marcus Sinclair had told them to "treat those children like executives."

Beckett found the archive room. Of course he did. Gold records, master tapes, sixty years of contracts. I found him on day three, cross-legged on the floor, studying a royalty statement with the focus of a forensic accountant.

"Mom," he said, not looking up. "Did you know Grandpa's company gets paid every time Daddy's songs play anywhere?"

"Part of it, yes."

"So technically, Grandpa owns Daddy's job." He turned the page. "Interesting."

The irony was not lost on me.

Meanwhile, the world outside was on fire.

The kiss had gone supernova — not for the romance, but for the walkout. The internet dissected every frame: the blonde in the emerald dress, the wife in the fourth row, the two small children holding her hands as she left. Someone read Patricia Carter's lips. "You brought nothing to this marriage." Eleven million views in a day.

#GrammyDisgrace trended for seventy-two hours. "Who Is the Wife He Erased?" asked People. Jace's PR team called the kiss "a spontaneous expression of gratitude" — a lie so transparent it made things worse.

And Sienna kept talking. Interview after interview, weaving her fantasy: how she and Jace "wrote together on the tour bus," how the ballad "Stay" came from "a night we can't talk about."

Stay. I wrote "Stay" alone, in a hospital parking lot, the night Jace missed the twins' birth because of a "listening party" that I later learned was a hotel room.

Every word out of her mouth was a match. I let her keep striking them. She was building her own pyre.

Then Jace texted.

"Wren, the press is out of control. I need you to release a statement — mutual respect, amicable split. Also, and this is awkward — I need you to reach out to Songbird's people. New album's due to the label in 90 days and the publisher says the channel went quiet. You're the only one with the contact. Please. For the kids."

For the kids. He was invoking his children — the ones he hadn't mentioned once in his speech — to secure his next hit machine.

I read the text three times. Then I walked into my grandfather's study.

"The album delivery clause," I said. "Ninety days. What happens if he misses it?"

"Breach. The label can suspend the tour, freeze the catalog advances, and decline renewal." Marcus looked up over his glasses. "Why?"

"Because Songbird is about to retire."

I opened my laptop and typed the email myself — through the shell company, the way I'd sent him a hundred melodies over six years. Five sentences. No explanation.

To: Carter Management

From: Songbird Publishing LLC

Effective immediately, Songbird terminates all future collaboration with Jace Carter. All pending demos are withdrawn. All rights revert. Do not attempt contact.

This decision is final.

My finger hovered over Send. Six years of love letters disguised as hooks and bridges. Six years of pouring myself into the mouth of a man who thanked another woman for it on live television.

I pressed Send.

Somewhere in Los Angeles, a superstar's phone was about to buzz with the sound of his career hitting a wall at highway speed. He owed the label an album in ninety days. Sienna Voss had publicly promised to co-write it. And the only person on earth who could actually deliver had just vanished into the dark.

My grandmother appeared in the doorway with two glasses of bourbon, and she was smiling like a woman who had seen empires fall before and enjoyed every one.

"Now, darling," Colette said, handing me a glass, "we do the hardest thing in this business."

"Which is?"

"Nothing." She clinked her glass against mine. "We sit back, stay silent, and let him discover — in front of the entire world — that he was never the music."