Page 22 of Now Their Starlet

If her public image were completely ruined, any hope of her having her own independent career once the dust settles will have burned right along with the conservatorship. And that’s no good. Because while any one of us—Beck, Eli, Everett, her father, hell, even Cameron—would do our best to support her financially, she’d lose a part of herself if she couldn’t create.

Even caught under the thumb of her mother’s rule, she still found ways to exercise that freedom of hers. Like her vlogs, the ones I’ve found myself re-watching before I go to bed just so I can hear her voice and see her smile.

With the amount of time we’ve been spending in Andi’s childhood home and the way Edison has preserved so much of her childhood through the space, I’ve been noticing details that remind me of her endlessly—it’s like a constant buzz at the back of my mind, but there’s nowhere to direct it to.

Not with her stuck in her mother’s custody.

My phone chimes with a notification. I have alerts set for a bunch of keywords related to Andi, the conservatorship, and the case. We got lucky that Cameron’s boss knows someone at the tabloid that released the first report of Andi’s conservatorship, but because Cameron’s news outlet—Northline—is so drastically different from most tabloids, the likelihood of that happening again is slim.

My mouth goes dry when I see what the notification is for.

It’s Andi. This is the first new photo that’s been released of her so far, probably because this is the first time Gina is actually letting her out of the house.

She’s dressed in a sheer black dress that highlights just how much weight she’s lost. The only things hiding her modesty are strategically placed lace flowers embroidered on the sheer fabric. There are heavy lines of tension around her eyes, despite the near-flawless, picture-perfect makeup that must’ve meant she was in a chair for hours.

She looks like the life has been violently sucked out of her over the past week and a half since we’ve seen her. If you put a photo side by side of her on the trip back from my hometown, and her now, I would’ve thought she’d gotten terribly ill.

My blood roars through my veins at the sight of the solo shots of her, but I’m pretty sure my heart stops in my chest when I swipe to the right and see the other photos that’ve been released of this event.

“Fuck,” I curse, drawing the attention of the others towards me.

I’m certainly glad Beck and Eli aren’t here with us right now. They’re resting in one of the many guest rooms of Edison’s home that the five of us seem to have capitalized on. Beck hasn’t been doing well since all of this started, and we’re worried the stress could make him sick. Eli’s been doing everything he can to keep Beck as relaxed as possible.

Eli would lose his shit at the sight of these pictures. And Beck… would just lose it.

“What?” Everett asks, pushing himself to his feet at my silence.

“Sorry,” I say with a shake of my head, flipping my phone around to showcase the first photo of Andi. “It’s Andi. She’s with Ezra.”

Everett takes my phone from me and swipes through the photos far quicker than I had. His expression transforms instantly; his piercing blue eyes hardening into cold, steely resolve.

“Ezra?” Cameron asks, his brows drawing down. “As in, Ezra Fletcher, her abusive ex?”

“It looks to be that way,” Everett grunts, handing my phone to Cameron and Edison who are seated at Edison’s desk together.

“What happened to her?” Cameron asks, making a sound of distress at the back of his throat.

“My God,” Edison mumbles, going pale at the sight of the photos.

“Seems to me that Gina Sterling thinks skeletally skinny is all the rage,” I bite out. The words are far harsher than my norm, but if any situation calls for harshness, it’s this one.

I wouldn’t be surprised if that were Gina’s plan. Since over the counter weight-loss drugs have started becoming widely accessible, an unnatural sort of skinniness has been the latest “body trend” in Hollywood, not that bodies should be considered trends at all.

The only issue with those weight loss drugs is that they primarily work on betas. The ones that work on omegas and omega hormones are still in clinical trials, which means Gina is starving Andi the old-fashioned way.

Cameron’s phone buzzes on the table, and I watch him ignore it twice before he finally snatches it up, more out of irritation than curiosity.

“Probably just my editor,” he mutters, thumb swiping across the screen. “He’s been riding me about⁠—”

He goes very, very still.

“What?” Everett asks, not looking up from where he’s still staring at the string of photos on my phone like he can set them on fire through sheer force of will.

“It’s an assistant from Northline,” he says, his voice going tight. “It’s a voicemail that was left for me at the office.”

The room goes quiet in a way I’m all too familiar with at this point. It’s the same quiet that settled over us the day the emergency conservatorship first hit the news.

“Play it,” I say, already halfway out of my chair.