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When she inspects her short fingernails, I get my answer. What the hell is Jem's game now? "You're in a relationship with Dylan Morgan." Her words are a statement, not a question.
"Fine. What do you have to tell me?" I ask. "I've read most of what's on the internet about him; I doubt there's much new you can add. They pretty much dug all the dirt."
"Sometimes, things can be covered up." She looks up, eyes wide. "For a price."
Whatever she's alluding to, I've no idea, but if she's the type of person who can be paid off, I'm not sure I'll believe anything she tells me.
"A price?"
"Yes, and then there’s the impossibility of taking on Blue Phoenix's lawyers and winning."
"Who are you?" I ask.
The girl looks down at her shaking hands curled around her bag. When she looks back to me, her eyes brim with tears as she draws a shaky breath.
I know who she is.
"My name is Lily Parker and three years ago Dylan Morgan raped me." Her voice cracks and is barely a whisper.
The room lurches, her words piercing my heart. "I don't believe you, what sort of sick joke is this? Are you jealous or something?"
"I'm telling the truth. I might be carefully buried at the bottom of the internet, but I'm there. Me, Dylan, Jem and a lot of missing pieces."
I fight the tight-chested panic. No, she's a fan trying to split me up with her favourite star. "This is bullshit."
The waitress delivering our coffees looks between us curiously as she places the china cups on our table.
"Dylan is bad news, Sky. He may have cleaned up his act, but any man who can do something so sickening to a woman will never change. Not really."
"I don't believe you," I repeat, standing on wobbling legs. "I don't want to listen to your lies."
Lily doesn't move, and places her shaking hands on the table. Is she telling the truth? She can't be. No way. "I'm leaving. Don't you dare follow me," I warn.
"Ask him or Jem. One of them will tell you the truth."
In my experience, when people lie, they can't meet your eyes and Lily is staring straight into mine with eyes full of pain.
I have no more words.
I stumble out of the cafe, into the bright summer sunshine. Jem told me there was a story; a story Dylan refused to tell me. Everything Jem said, all of Dylan's reactions, swim around my mind. No. Not true. Not Dylan, the man who wouldn't touch me without permission. Nausea grips my stomach, forcing bile upwards—is Lily the reason for his cautious behaviour when we met?
A few hundred metres along the road, I have to stop. I lean against the metal pole of the road sign, tears blurring my vision. What if thisistrue? I pull out my phone and call Dylan.
