Fame And Secrets (Lords Of Lyre Book 2) Read online

  Fame and Secrets

  Lords of Lyre, Book 2

  Cora Kenborn

  Fame and Secrets

  Copyright © 2017 by Cora Kenborn.

  All rights reserved.

  First Print Edition: March 2017

  Limitless Publishing, LLC

  Kailua, HI 96734

  www.limitlesspublishing.com

  Formatting: Limitless Publishing

  ISBN-13: 978-1-64034-013-8

  ISBN-10: 1-64034-013-0

  No part of this book may be reproduced, scanned, or distributed in any printed or electronic form without permission. Please do not participate in or encourage piracy of copyrighted materials in violation of the author’s rights. Thank you for respecting the hard work of this author.

  This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents either are the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously, and any resemblance to locales, events, business establishments, or actual persons—living or dead—is entirely coincidental.

  Dedication

  Anything worth fighting for in life usually comes with a price.

  I learned that a long time ago.

  What’s written on the price tag determines just how far we’re willing to go to keep it.

  If you’re lucky, you find that once in a lifetime love…the elusive soulmate we all seem to chase.

  Love that leaves you unable to breathe without a touch good morning or a kiss good night.

  Love that doesn’t give a second thought to the cost, but travels to the ends of the earth and offers the world for one last goodbye.

  Table of Contents

  Prologue

  Chapter One

  Chapter Two

  Chapter Three

  Chapter Four

  Chapter Five

  Chapter Six

  Chapter Seven

  Chapter Eight

  Chapter Nine

  Chapter Ten

  Chapter Eleven

  Chapter Twelve

  Chapter Thirteen

  Chapter Fourteen

  Chapter Fifteen

  Chapter Sixteen

  Chapter Seventeen

  Chapter Eighteen

  Chapter Nineteen

  Chapter Twenty

  Chapter Twenty-One

  Chapter Twenty-Two

  Chapter Twenty-Three

  Chapter Twenty-Four

  Chapter Twenty-Five

  Chapter Twenty-Six

  Chapter Twenty-Seven

  Chapter Twenty-Eight

  Chapter Twenty-Nine

  Chapter Thirty

  Chapter Thirty-One

  Chapter Thirty-Two

  Chapter Thirty-Three

  Chapter Thirty-Four

  Chapter Thirty-Five

  Chapter Thirty-Six

  Chapter Thirty-Seven

  Chapter Thirty-Eight

  Chapter Thirty-Nine

  Chapter Forty

  Chapter Forty-One

  Chapter Forty-Two

  Chapter Forty-Three

  Chapter Forty-Four

  Chapter Forty-Five

  Epilogue

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  Prologue

  Frank Falco

  Damn California heat.

  I didn’t think anything could compare to the sticky humidity of New York. Being there for two weeks had been an exercise in hell. Everywhere I went, sweat melted off me. Thank god that was over. If I never saw the East Coast again, it’d be too soon. I closed my eyes and inhaled the humid-less air of Los Angeles.

  “Are you getting in the cab or what?”

  I fought an urge to smack the shit out of him as I threw my bag on top of the trunk. “Hill Heights Apartments, and you’d better hurry.”

  After storing my luggage, the cab driver slid into the front seat and glanced into the rearview mirror. “Is this your first time in LA?”

  I cut my eyes at him. “No.”

  Mumbling to himself, he raised his hands. “Sorry for bothering you.”

  I stared craters into the back of his head. “I’m meeting someone here.”

  “Is that so?”

  “It’s a surprise. A reunion of sorts.” I chuckled at my own joke.

  After an hour of mindless chit-chat that had me ready to slit my own throat, I almost slid off the edge of the seat when he threw the car into park. Twisting around, he held out his hand. “That’ll be forty-six dollars and fifty cents.” He tapped the digital fare meter in front of him.

  Pulling a few bills out of my wallet, I threw them at his face. “Pop the trunk.”

  With my bag in my hand, I walked to the rental office. It didn’t take long to make eye contact with a young girl sitting behind a mahogany desk. I cleared my throat, forcing the hot blond to look up from her paperwork.

  “May I help you?”

  “I called about renting a third-floor apartment.”

  The pen dangled from her painted red nails. “Your name?”

  Wiping the sweat from my brow, the name I’d practiced so many times rolled off my tongue. “Frank. Frank Falco.”

  She scanned her computer screen. “Ah, yes, Mr. Falco. I have your paperwork ready.”

  Quickly scribbling my new name, I snatched the keys out of her hands, ready to get this show on the road.

  “Is that all right, Mr. Falco?”

  I turned back to the delicious blond. “Is what all right, darlin’?”

  “I asked you if it was still all right to give you an apartment on the third floor. You know, because of your condition.” She looked confused.

  I leaned my palms on the desk and licked my lips. “My condition?”

  The girl’s face flamed. “Yes, sir, I meant that you’re…that you seem to be…” Instant recognition hit me as she pointed a finger at my calf.

  “Oh, that? No problem. I’ll be fine, little lady. Don’t you worry.”

  Bitch never seen a bullet hole before?

  Fucking Baltimore police couldn’t shoot their way out of a paper bag. They were aiming for my chest.

  The blond smiled, revealing perfect teeth. “Then welcome to Hill Heights. If you need anything, we’re here eight a.m. until five p.m., and we have a twenty-four-hour emergency paging service.”

  I took one last look. I’d be back for her. She was just too tasty to pass up. I could smell her fear. I had a sixth sense about those things.

  Call it a gift.

  Making my way to the third floor, I slid the key into the doorknob and my breath hitched as the lock released. Closing my eyes, I inhaled the scent of freshly painted walls and new carpeting. I rounded the corner into the master bathroom. Huge lights framed the mirror over the counter, and I finally saw the reflection staring back at me.

  The corners of my mouth slowly curled into a wicked grin that broke at the top right corner of my mouth. It split into the carnival-freak clown face that garnered stares in public. The four-inch long scar twisted and curved from my lip, up through my cheek, giving me a permanent Joker face.

  She’d done that.

  After that damn documentary ran, a street gang in south Florida decided to dole out their own justice on a drug debt I owed. I barely remembered the rival gang showing up. If they hadn’t, I’d be facedown in the Everglades.

  Eyeing the black bag at my feet, I pulled out a yellow scarf. It was a color and symbol she’d never forget. Revenge may be a dish best served cold, but there’d be nothing but fire in my soul as I watched her die.

  But first she had to suffer. What I had planned would cause her so much pain, she’d beg for death. Three years of my hell would now be hers.

  Grabbing my w
allet, I shoved the key into my pocket and closed the door behind me. I hummed to myself as I walked back to the apartment office. Pushing the door open, I called out to the blond still seated behind the oversized desk.

  “Would you call me a taxi, darlin’? I need to go into the city.”

  “Sure, Mr. Falco. Will there be anything else?” she asked, batting those freaking baby blues. Unfortunately for her, they reminded me of someone else.

  “Yeah,” I said, flashing her a smile. “Can you show me to the laundry room?”

  She grabbed a set of keys off the desk and tucked her phone in her back pocket. “No problem. I just can’t be gone too long. I’m short-staffed today.”

  The familiar rush heated my limbs as I followed her outside. “No worries,” I assured her, salivating as I took in her porcelain, perfect neck. “This won’t take long, I promise.”

  Chapter One

  Phoebe

  I stood in the doorway, blinking into the morning sun and waving as the truck pulled away. “Thanks for nothing, assholes.”

  We’d subleased our home in the Hollywood Hills for only a week, and so far, the city hadn’t won any popularity contests with me. LAX lost my luggage, and the movers just now delivered the final four boxes. It seemed they’d ended up on the wrong truck in Manhattan, headed to Boise.

  The idiots dropped them in the foyer and took off. Apparently, they were perfectly okay with a woman carrying a box of electronics up a flight of stairs.

  Not like I’m almost seven months pregnant or anything.

  Kicking the box down the hallway, I yelped as my sandal flew off and my toe jammed into the hard corner. “Shit!” I held my stomach and gave the box a hefty shove with my still-sandaled foot. The box flew across the hardwood and crashed into the wall, the contents rattling with the announcement I’d just destroyed Julian’s Xbox.

  This week could go to hell.

  Life was supposed to be a bouquet of tranquility once we moved to the West Coast. At least that was what Julian promised when I left the only life I’d called my own since escaping my horrific hometown.

  Moving to New York City from North Carolina was supposed to be an exercise in self-sufficiency and mental stability. I never anticipated meeting and falling in love with a hard rock front man. I fought him every step of the way.

  He led life in the spotlight for the world to pick apart. I had to hide in the shadows from a monster.

  We both had our personal demons to fight. His demon stalked him relentlessly like a rabid fan. Unfortunately, my demon had been missing for three years and could pop up at any second. However, Julian Bale wore me down. To force my hand, he’d made his manager pull strings to make me his biographer.

  Then he made me love him.

  As if our lives weren’t scripted for a soap opera enough, in the middle of a stalker and an on-again, off-again relationship, I got pregnant. Julian said it was because we were meant to be. I still blamed faulty pill packaging.

  After his stalker attacked us, the publicity did two things simultaneously: it made Julian a household name, and it brought my monster out of hiding. Julian’s band, Lords of Lyre, had been contemplating a move to Los Angeles before he met me. After sales skyrocketed, it was inevitable. Julian rationalized that moving across the country would keep me safe.

  Picking up a box marked kitchen, I padded across the floor when a broadcast caught my attention. With Julian away on press tours, the background noise became my only companion. Normally, I didn’t care for the news, but a caption caught my eye, and I grabbed the remote off the back of the couch, turning up the volume. My chest constricted as the pretty blond anchor read the story with a sorrowful expression.

  “Los Angeles County Police found the body of a woman in Griffith Park early this morning. Ride operators on the iconic Griffith Park Merry-Go-Round called 9-1-1 dispatchers after they discovered her when opening the popular attraction. While official reports haven’t been released, it has been confirmed that the woman’s death appears to be a homicide, the body dumped postmortem. The official cause of death, according to lead detective Alex Carmichael, was a series of seven stab wounds to her abdomen. The victim has been identified as twenty-year-old Elisabeth Cayden, assistant manager at Hill Heights Apartments in the Hollywood Hills.”

  Abdominal stab wounds.

  I ran my fingertips over my protruding belly. The puckered, scarred skin displayed more prominently as my stomach grew.

  Seven in all.

  I couldn’t speak. My focus centered on a sudden, intense pain radiating all over my body. I realized with a racing heart I couldn’t breathe, and started to hyperventilate. An internal terrorist attack raged inside me, and I wanted to run for my life…only I couldn’t.

  I hadn’t had a panic attack in months. I’d been on medication for years, triggered by an attack in college, but they couldn’t be taken during pregnancy. Without my anxiety meds, stopping the attack proved hopeless. Panic hit me like a rollercoaster ride with no one at the controls.

  The first pain literally knocked me off my feet. I gasped and fell over the box sitting in the middle of the foyer. Kneeling on all fours, I held my breath as the second contraction slammed into me.

  No, it’s too early.

  I purposely forced new air into my lungs in a vain attempt to ward off another twist from the abdominal vice clamp. Counting through the pain didn’t work, and tears fell, darkening the cardboard on the boxes.

  “Pheebs? What the hell is wrong with you?”

  I opened one eye and looked at the tall, slender woman’s face. As I recognized the blond waves splayed across her shoulders, adrenaline drained from my body in relief. Wrapping one hand around my stomach, I mumbled unintelligible words as she shackled a firm grip on my arm. With the other, she pulled me tightly against her chest.

  “Jesus Christ. What’s happening?”

  “Baby. Pain…please help.” Through blurry eyes, I watched her perfectly waxed brows furrow in indecision, then relax in resolve.

  “Okay, I don’t know what I’m doing, but hold onto me. We’ll drive around until we get to the hospital or run out of gas.”

  “I don’t care if we have to go to a vet, just—oh god! Get me somewhere, now.”

  Faith dragged me toward the front door and I cursed as my toenails scraped across the hardwood floors. Hesitating, I grabbed the wall with my free arm. “Wait, shit, I need shoes.”

  “Fuck shoes.”

  “I can’t go to the hospital with no shoes. It’s February for god’s sake.”

  She sighed. “Look, sister, you may be tiny, but I’m not hauling your ass upstairs for shoes. This is California. You won’t die of hypothermia. Now move.” Reaching the doorway, another pain hit and my knees buckled. A mumbled expletive exploded from her chest. “Damn it, breathe, Phoebe. I swear to god, you’re not having this baby right now. I don’t do blood, and I’d probably drop it on its head. Listen to me and breathe.”

  She pulled me through the front door, my dead weight knocking over the clay pots on either side. Securing me in the passenger’s seat of her car, she slipped behind the wheel. With shaking hands, she peeled out of the driveway, toward the hospital.

  ***

  Twenty minutes and five machines later, the only sound in the room came from the rhythmic swoosh of the baby’s heartbeat monitor. Faith sat in the chair next to me, her carefully applied mascara running down her face.

  Frown lines formed parenthesis around her mouth as she took a deep breath. “What did the doctor say?” In the flurry of activity, needles, and wires, she’d been ushered out of the room. For the last ten minutes, neither one of us had said a word.

  I winced as the IV needle in my hand shifted. “I’m still waiting for him.”

  Cocking her head to the side, she squinted her eyes. “Is that sound the baby?”

  I ran a hand down the length of my stomach and my palm snapped back with a kick. “Yeah, it’s the heartbeat—which is doing wonders for my nerves.”
>
  “Phoebe, what the hell happened tonight?”

  “I don’t know,” I lied.

  Collapsing against her chair, she rubbed her temples. “Don’t hand me that bullshit. Spill it, Dalton.”

  Dalton.

  No one had called me that in over three years.

  She’d been my roommate and best friend while we attended college at Dreighton University, but we’d lost touch when I withdrew three months into our freshman year.

  I walked away from Phoebe Dalton after my father ignored the restraining order I’d filed and attacked me. The man who brought me into this world came within two millimeters of taking me out. After I’d recovered, I changed my name and turned recluse, hiding within the confines of my sister’s house.

  I became Phoebe Ryan. As far as I was concerned, Phoebe Dalton died that night in 2013 behind my Chevy Malibu.

  I narrowed my tired eyes in suspicion. “Why were you at my house?”

  She busied herself deciphering the fetal heart monitor printout. “I think the real question is, what would you have done if I hadn’t been there? Where’s Julian? Have you been taking your meds? When was the last time you were really checked by a doctor?” Rolling my eyes, I faced the opposite wall, and her manicured fingernail jerked my chin back. “I can be just as much of a stubborn bitch as you. Remember, you’re responsible for another person now, and it’s counting on you to not be a self-righteous ass.” Smirking, she pulled her phone out of her pocket. “Or maybe you’d prefer to answer Julian instead?”

  The second she hit the speaker button on the phone, I lunged. Cursing, I snatched it out of her hand, quickly disconnecting the call. “Jesus Christ, Faith! What happened to girl code?”

  Retrieving her phone, she deposited it into her pocket. “It became null and void when you left me with a threat of having to stick my hand up your vag and deliver your kid.”

  I laughed despite my annoyance. Glancing upward, my eyes followed the trail of tubes to a slow dripping IV bag. I hated hospitals. Every hospital I’d ever been in had been because someone had put me there.