Chapter 6
Chapter Six
For the first time in what felt like forever – but, realistically, was less than two months – Juliet felt a calm quiet in her mind.
Tranquility, that was the precise word.
She shut the door to her studio – the art studio, not the music studio, which was in the basement – with a quiet click, reveling in the moment of peace.
The studio in her home was one of the only places she could guarantee a peaceful space for herself.
Amidst the label and tours and critics and fans and every other voice in the world, this room was quiet.
Mostly because she’d banned herself from having her phone while in that specific room. Laura had helped her enforce that ban, specifically upon the release of her third album when all of the critiques had been rolling in. When they hadn’t stopped rolling in.
Because Juliet had been drowning in them, and Laura had been absolutely correct in pushing her into having one place that was a phone-free-zone.
For the next ten days, she was on a break from touring.
She’d pre-recorded her morning talk show appearance earlier today, and things were calm.
She didn’t always turn toward visual arts when she was home, but right now she needed something other than music to work on.
Today, she was painting. Tomorrow, she’d be spending the morning at the children’s hospital, which was one of the best ways to not only distract herself, but also to really give her some perspective.
She could really use some perspective and distraction.
Otherwise, she’d likely be tempted to write something about Darcy-fucking-Kincaid, her full-name now in Juliet’s mind.
But she’d promised Talia that she would be mindful regarding Darcy, after she’d released her own social media post a few weeks ago without running it by Talia first.
Most of the time, Juliet did run her social media posts by Talia, because from the inception of her career, she’d wanted to keep all ten of her toes inside the correct boundaries. She had never before posted anything inciting or vitriolic, never fed into drama.
Which was probably why Talia had seemed so thrown by the last couple of months.
And she could get in line.
Juliet was thrown by herself, as well. She just… no one had ever gotten under her skin the way Darcy did, so damn easily. Of course, there had been people she’d been annoyed by and people she’d been enraged by, and many people who fell somewhere between those two ends on that scale.
But those complaints were saved for ranting sessions with Laura – and occasionally Robbie – while tempered with a sugary-sweet smile in public.
Then again, none of those people swept in right as Juliet released a comeback album, knocking her feet out from under her while stealing her spotlight. None of those people wrote fucking songs about Juliet that went viral and were still trending, weeks later.
… in fairness, she’d never written a song about any of them, that then became stitched together and made into about a million mash-ups.
Truthfully, Talia was only lucky because Darcy hadn’t hit back. Yet, anyway.
Juliet barely blinked when she walked into the kitchen and saw that Laura was already here. Her assistant was one of very few people who had access to walk into her home at any time.
“If I’d known you’d be here, I would have suggested we do some fencing,” she shot Laura a glance as she leaned against the island opposite her.
Laura looked up from where she was tapping something out on her tablet. “Then you wouldn’t have been able to craft whatever work of art you were painting.”
Juliet scoffed.
She didn’t actually show her paintings or drawings to anyone. Laura had gotten the occasional glimpse, but… it felt far too personal. She already experienced the world devouring the artwork that was the closest to her heart, and this had only become a thing because she needed to cope with that.
But Laura had also gotten her into fencing, which was something Laura had grown up doing. Also a woman of multitudes, her assistant. Fencing provided Juliet with a different kind of mental peace and clarity, and there was something to the physicality aspect that she deeply enjoyed.
“So…” She started, bracing herself against the counter, staring Laura down.
“So,” her assistant looked back up at her, lips pursed.
“Why are you here early?”
As far as Juliet was aware, she had no commitments for the next twenty-four hours. Given that Juliet was fastidious about her schedule, she knew that was true.
And though Laura didn’t only come over to discuss imminent business or issues, there was a look on her face that Juliet knew very well.
“Ah – well,” Laura started.
But Juliet had already pushed herself off of the counter, buzzing back to life. “Did Darcy respond?”
In a flash, she reached down and snatched her phone from the counter where she’d kept it charging face-down while she’d been in her studio.
“Are you hoping she’s responded?” Laura asked, amusement working into her tone.
Juliet narrowed her eyes at her. “You know I’m not.”
Because, objectively, no, she didn’t want to hear any more of Darcy singing about her, slinging some sort of insult in her throaty voice. Something that would merry-go-round in Juliet’s mind without pause for far too long. Obviously she didn’t want that; she wasn’t without reason.
“It just doesn’t make any sense that she hasn’t responded,” she muttered, unlocking her phone, vibrating with anticipation.
The truth was that Juliet had barely been able to sleep the night after she’d posted her piece. Waiting on pins and needles, all tied up inside waiting for Darcy’s response.
Darcy had proven in the last couple of months that she always had a response to her. She always had something to say, some way to wiggle deeper under Juliet’s skin.
And even though Juliet didn’t want Darcy to have some sort of witty rejoinder, she’d been holding her breath waiting for it.
Juliet, obviously, wanted to win this little tit-for-tat they’d gotten into.
But she couldn’t imagine it would end there.
She snapped back at Darcy through song, and now… nothing? Silence?
Why that bothered her just as much as Darcy’s song did in the first place was something for her therapist to figure out.
But she’d been waiting for this proverbial shoe to drop for nearly three weeks, and there were crickets.
As she checked her notifications, though, there was nothing about Darcy.
Her only alerts of note were from her mother.
Three texts, and that was more than enough to take the wind out of her sails, wrapping her up in confusion.
Mom – 11:21A.M.
Hi Jules, I hope you’re resting up now that you’re on your break from the tour
Just wanted to let you know that I sent some of those cranberry orange muffins with Harrison, so I hope you enjoy them!
See you soon
Juliet read her mom’s texts multiple times. Nothing in them was inherently wrong or alarming. Unless, of course, you could read the language of Tiffany Jacobs, which Juliet happened to be fluent in.
This message from her mom was to let her know that she would, apparently, be seeing Harrison soon. Her mother had leveled up in her ability to double-speak after getting married to Harrison, and she’d never sent a warning text that was so blunt.
Especially because that would mean she’d have to acknowledge any friction between Juliet and Harrison, which her mother was an expert at overlooking.
Stomach tying in knots, she exhaled deeply through her nose as she looked back up at Laura, who was already wincing at her.
“Bad news is that Darcy hasn’t responded. Worse news is that you now have a meeting with Thomas and Harrison at Copper Canyon in two hours.”
She gripped the marble countertop so tightly, it bit into her palms. But she welcomed that feeling right about now.
“Could have really used a bout of fencing earlier,” she muttered.
“Look on the bright side: if we do it later, the inner-rage you feel will give you a leg-up in strength,” Laura said back in a voice that was half-encouraging, half-sympathetic.
Juliet scoffed in response, grinding her teeth.
She’d been in L.A. on her touring break for fewer than twenty-four hours. She was tired. She’d been wearing her sweet-as-pie smile almost constantly for weeks whenever she was in public and not in the middle of a performance.
She’d been planning to treat this break as exactly that: a break.
But she’d learned very early on in her career that as soon as Thomas and Harrison were involved, the smartest thing to do was put all guards up.
Juliet sat in one of the conference rooms, perfectly made-up, exactly two hours later.
Even though she felt dread twisting through her, she kept her chin angled up as she looked between Thomas and Harrison expectantly.
In theory, Thomas was her manager; he worked for her.
But, of course, that was in theory.
Sure, Thomas was genuinely great at his job. He managed some of the top musical talent in the business, and he hadn’t ever led her career astray. He got her into events, rubbed elbows with all of the right people. And he did work in tandem with her goals – for the most part.
Unless whatever she wanted was in opposition to what her stepfather wanted.
Because when push came to shove, Thomas preferred to answer to Harrison. Juliet had discovered how true that was only after signing his six year contract extension nearly five years ago.
She hadn’t known the extent of just how buddy-buddy Thomas and Harrison had become over golf games at Harrison’s ultra-exclusive club down in Texas. Much like she hadn’t known how Harrison had used her career as his way of extending his business ties into the entertainment industry.
Hell, he already had high stakes in real estate, agriculture, and oil. Why not entertainment?
Nearly ten years into Juliet’s career, and Harrison had several execs and their families from Copper Canyon out to his private lake house every summer.