Chapter 11
Lizanne
For five days, Lizanne hadn’t moved. The silk sheets, once a symbol of the luxury she and Trina had built together, were now a tangled nest of grief and the stale, sour scent of neglected mornings.
She stayed anchored there because the moment she stood up, the floor would remind her that it no longer echoed with the sound of Trina’s humming—that low vibration that used to drift from the bathroom while she applied her morning serums.
The silence was the worst part. It was in some way deafening. She’d never understood what that meant, but now? Now she did.
She closed her eyes, trying to summon a memory that didn’t feel like a serrated blade.
She thought of three years ago—a rainy Tuesday at their Malibu weekend house.
They had stayed in bed all day, ordering expensive Thai food and arguing over the ending of a classic noir film.
Trina had looked at her, her eyes soft and full of a future that had seemed written in stone.
“It’s always going to be us, honey bee,” she’d whispered, her thumb tracing the line of Lizanne’s jaw. “The world can watch, or the world can burn, as long as I’m waking up next to you.”
A sob caught in Lizanne’s throat, jagged and raw. How had they gone from that to... this?
The last year had been a slow, agonizing erosion. She’d felt it but pushed the feeling away.
She knew. She’d thought the wedding would fix this. The reality show would too, by reminding them of the fun they used to have.
She had been a fool. The people Trina sent to collect her things yesterday or the day before had been efficient.
They hadn’t left a single stray earring or a scent of her perfume behind.
They had taken the books Trina liked, the custom-made luggage, even the tiny porcelain bird they’d bought on their first trip to Paris.
The house wasn’t just empty; it was hollowed out, like a ribcage picked clean.
The door creaked open. The heavy, rhythmic tread of footsteps told her it was Pat. Pat was the only person allowed to see her like this—shattered, unwashed, and human.
“Out,” Lizanne croaked, pulling the duvet over her head. “Go away, Pat. I’m dead. I’ve expired. Call the coroner and tell them I went out with a whimper.”
“Not a chance, Lizanne.” Pat’s voice was like sandpaper—rough, but the only thing capable of smoothing over the jagged edges of a crisis.
The blankets were ripped away with a violent, heartless snap. The sudden influx of light felt like a physical blow to Lizanne’s retinas. She hissed, curling into a tight ball, her hair a bird’s nest of dark tangles against the white linen.
“Get up,” Pat commanded. “You smell like misery and expensive gin. It’s time to face reality.
There are things in this house I can’t handle on my own.
The catering deposits are hanging, the publicist is breathing down my neck, and the world isn’t going to stop spinning just because Trina Holmes found a new lead actor for her life. ”
“There’s nothing to face,” Lizanne moaned, shielding her eyes. “She’s gone. She took the towels, Pat. The good ones. She took the high-thread-count Egyptian cotton but left me with the emotional equivalent of a sandpaper washcloth.”
“It’s a clean break,” Pat said bluntly, sitting on the edge of the bed.
Her expression softened, but only a fraction.
“Look, I know it hurts. I know you thought the show would fix things. But let’s be real, Liz.
Trina and you... you’ve been two ghosts haunting this mansion for a year. Maybe this is a blessing in disguise.”
Lizanne finally sat up, her heart aching at the word blessing.
“A blessing? My life is a tabloid headline waiting to happen. The network has already spent tons on the pre-production. The shooting schedule is set. The sponsors are locked in. I could lose this house if I back out of this show. I have a mortgage, you know?”
“I know,” Pat said quietly. “I’ve already spoken to the wedding planner.
I told them to hold everything. But the network.
.. that’s the monster under the bed. They don’t care about your broken heart, Liz.
They care about the Lesbian Power Couple narrative they sold to the world.
They want the ‘First Year’ and they want the ratings. ”
Lizanne rubbed her face, her skin feeling tight and dry. “What am I supposed to do? It’s a First Year of Marriage show. I don’t have a bride. I don’t even have a girlfriend. I have a void where my partner used to be and a walk-in closet that looks like a looted department store.”
“So we pivot,” Pat said, her voice taking on that sharp, executive tone. She stood up and walked to the sideboard, pouring two generous glasses of mimosas from a crystal carafe. She handed one to Lizanne. “Drink. We need to get the gears turning. Brainstorming doesn’t happen on an empty stomach.”
The cold orange juice and champagne provided a sharp jolt. By the second glass, the heartbreak began to numb, replaced by a cynical, alcohol-fueled clarity. The grief was still there, but it was being pushed into a corner by the growing heat of her anger.
“We could turn it into a show where you look for love again. Or…we find a replacement,” Pat said, pacing.
“We tell the public a new version of the truth. We say you knew about Trina and Marcus for months. We say you two stayed together for the sake of the brand, but in reality, your heart had already moved on. We paint you as the tragic, loyal protagonist who was secretly finding love elsewhere. The audience will worship you.”
“With who?” Lizanne laughed bitterly. “The ghost of my dignity? I haven’t been on a date in years, Pat. I forgot how to even pretend I like someone else’s hobbies.”
“Anyone,” Pat waved a hand. “Tori, the cleaning lady? You’ve known her for a decade.”
“She’s sixty-four, Pat. And she’s straight. And married. Unless she’s been hiding a secret while she vacuums the foyer, that’s a non-starter.”
“Okay, okay. Maria from the nail salon? She’s stunning on camera. We could give her a makeover, call her a rising influencer. The Woman Who Buffed Lizanne’s Heart Back to Life. It writes itself.”
“I’m not marrying my manicurist for a TV deal. Besides, she’s engaged with a baby on the way. Don’t think we can pass that one off as mine.”
“What about Jose, the director?” Pat grinned wickedly. “The Gilden Duchess fans would lose their minds. A behind-the-scenes romance with the man who helped you take the small screen by storm! We can say you realized you were bisexual for the right man just like Trina.”
“Pat, you’re drunker than I am. If I marry Jose, I’ll have to listen to him talk about lighting ratios during our ‘intimate’ scenes.
I’d rather go bankrupt,” Lizanne said, leaning back.
She looked at the empty space where Trina’s vanity used to be.
It was just a bare patch of wall now. The anger surged again, hot and metallic.
“If I’m going to do this... if I’m going to sell a lie to the entire world and save my skin, I want someone who is already a professional at it. Someone I can keep under my thumb.”
“Who?”
She thought for a minute. Then smiled. “Rose Delaney.”
Pat stopped mid-stride. “The wedding planner? Liz, she’s engaged too.”
“No,” Lizanne said, her eyes narrowing. “There is no Derek. That photo of her and her ‘husband-to-be’ on the registry? That was Quinn, her brother. Same jawline, same eyes. I saw the comments on her old Facebook posts—her hometown friends were all confused, asking when she even got a boyfriend. No one had ever met this man because he’s a figment of her imagination. ”
“Why would she fake an entire life?” Pat asked.
“To sell the dream, Pat,” Lizanne whispered.
“She’s a wedding planner in a town where reputation is everything.
Being a happy bride-to-be is her business card.
She’s a fraud. And right now, a fraud is exactly what I need.
Someone who knows what it’s like to live behind a curtain.
” She leaned forward, the idea growing bigger in her head.
“It can work. We can say that Trina and I were separated for months but kept up the facade so that I could plan a wedding with the woman I really love. Rose.”
Why exactly it had to be Rose she didn’t know but she blamed that on the mimosas.
“Let me look into this. If we can prove this whole Derek thing is a lie, then we might have something we can use as leverage to entice her into all of this.”
Pat spent the next hour making calls, her face shifting from skepticism to a dark, triumphant joy.
By late afternoon, Pat had what they needed.
“I have the leverage,” Pat said, sitting down in the living room where Lizanne had managed to drag herself.
“You were right about the fake fiancé. But it’s deeper than just a ploy.
Rose Delaney is drowning. She has a mountain of personal debt—credit card balances that would make a CFO faint, one huge loan to a creditor on a line of credit with her name and some guy called Jeremy Planter.
Apparently, the kid’s father. She’s been robbing Peter to pay Paul for years.
She’s one bad month away from being a very pretty homeless person. ”
Lizanne rubbed her eyes, her head throbbing with the rhythm of a heavy drum. “And her past?”
“Her history is perfect,” Pat continued.
“She had two serious relationships aside from this Planter guy. Both women. She fits the narrative we need for the show perfectly. She’s lived in the city, she knows how to carry herself, and she’s desperate.
She’s a professional liar who happens to actually like women. It’s a match made in Hell.”
Lizanne felt a cold, sharp resolve settle over her. The heartbreak was still there, a dull ache in the background, but it was being pushed aside by the necessity of survival. This wasn’t about love anymore; it was about the empire.
“I say we ask her nicely first if she’d consider it. As a favor to you. To herself, since she’d be getting paid.”
“And if she refuses?”
“Then we threaten to go public,” Pat said simply.
“We tell the world that the sweet wedding planner is a con artist who fakes her own life to trick her clients. It would ruin her career and her reputation. She has a kid, Liz. She can’t afford to be a pariah.
She’ll do whatever we tell her to do, and she’ll do it with a smile for the cameras. ”
Lizanne reached for her phone on the floor. Her fingers were trembling slightly, but her voice—when she spoke—was steady. She didn’t want to explain. She didn’t want to beg. She just needed a pawn.
I need you here tomorrow morning, she typed. We have an urgent matter to discuss regarding your future. Please come by at 8 AM. Do not be late.
She hit send and looked out at the sprawling, glittering lights of the city.
The glass palace was empty, but it wouldn’t stay that way for long.
She would pay Rose enough to wipe out every cent of her debt and secure her child’s future, and in return, Rose would help Lizanne keep the only thing she had left: the image of a perfect life.
It wasn’t the dream she’d had with Trina, but in Los Angeles, a well-executed lie was often more profitable than the truth. Lizanne took a final sip of the lukewarm mimosa. “Well, Pat,” she whispered to the empty room. “Let’s see how much a soul costs.”