The Cold Superstar Demands A Second Chance

The blue light from the phone screen burned Avery's dry eyes.

She stayed curled on the living room sofa of her high-rise apartment, her knees pulled tightly to her chest.

At the top of the Twitter trending list, the hashtag AveryBirdGetOffTV glared back at her. Beneath it was an endless, scrolling wall of pure venom.

She dragged her thumb across the glass, trying to swipe the timeline away, but her finger slipped.

A video published by TMZ auto-played.

It was Kenneth. He was stumbling outside a club, his face flushed with alcohol, staring directly into the paparazzi's flashing cameras.

"Avery... I just want Avery," Kenneth slurred in the video, his voice dripping with a fake, sickening devotion.

A violent wave of nausea hit Avery's stomach. She gagged, the acid rising in her throat.

She slammed the phone face-down onto the glass coffee table. The sharp crack echoed in the dead silence of the room.

A sudden, aggressive buzzing from the doorbell made her jump.

Avery swung her legs off the sofa. She walked to the door, her bare feet cold against the hardwood floor.

She pressed her eye to the peephole. Quinn, her manager, stood in the hallway, her face flushed and her jaw tight.

Avery unlocked the deadbolt.

Quinn pushed through the door like a hurricane, bringing a blast of over-conditioned hallway air mixed with the faint smell of industrial carpet cleaner with her.

She didn't even kick off her shoes. She marched straight to the dining table and slammed a manila folder down on the marble surface. The network's logo was stamped on the front.

The folder slid a few inches, spilling a single sheet of paper.

The words "Indefinite Suspension" were printed in bold, black ink.

Avery's lungs stopped working.

She reached out and gripped the edge of the cold marble counter, her knuckles turning completely white. The countless sleepless nights prepping scripts, the thousands of hours smiling into a camera lens, everything she had built from nothing over the last decade-all of it turned to ash in a single second. A ridiculous, fabricated lie that had absolutely nothing to do with her was executing her entire career.

Quinn ran her hands roughly through her hair, pacing the floor.

"The executives want to cut ties," Quinn snapped. "They need to put out the fire, and you're the easiest thing to burn."

"I don't even have his personal number, Quinn," Avery said, her voice tight.

Quinn let out a harsh, humorless laugh.

"The public doesn't care about the truth, Avery. They only care about the screenshots Caryn posted. The matching luxury watches. The same flight manifests. The identical hotel check-ins."

Avery snatched her phone off the coffee table.

She pulled up her contacts and hit call on Kenneth's agent's number, holding the phone up so Quinn could hear.

A cold, automated voice immediately filled the room. The call went straight to a full voicemail box. He was rejecting her calls entirely.

Avery's chest heaved. She switched to Instagram and typed in Caryn's handle.

User not found. She was completely blocked.

Avery threw the phone hard against the sofa cushions. Her breathing was jagged, her ribs aching with every inhale.

Quinn stopped pacing. She let out a long sigh and walked over to the liquor cabinet.

She poured two glasses of neat whiskey and walked back, shoving one into Avery's hand.

"Drink it," Quinn ordered. "You need to face exactly how alone we are right now."

Avery took the glass. The freezing condensation on the outside of the crystal grounded her slightly.

She tipped her head back and swallowed the liquor in one gulp. The alcohol burned a fiery path down her throat, forcing the sting of tears back from her eyes.

"Does the PR department have a counter-strategy?" Avery asked, her voice raspy.

Quinn wouldn't look at her. She turned her head, staring out the floor-to-ceiling windows at the swarm of paparazzi vans parked on the street below.

"Standard PR is dead," Quinn said, her voice heavy.

Avery heard the slight hesitation in Quinn's tone. The hair on her arms stood up.

"What else?" Avery demanded. "Tell me the rest."

Quinn reached into the bottom of her leather briefcase. She pulled out a thick stack of legal envelopes.

Avery recognized the embossed logos immediately. They belonged to the top-tier luxury brands she endorsed.

Quinn slid the stack across the marble island.

"Breach of contract warnings," Quinn said quietly. "They are terminating your deals."

Avery stared down at the crisp white envelopes. Her vision blurred.

Her reputation was dead, her career was gone, and now, she was staring at absolute bankruptcy.

Avery reached out and picked up the top envelope from the stack. It was from the luxury jewelry brand she had fronted for two years.

She flipped straight to the final page, her eyes scanning the dense legal jargon until they locked onto the numbers.

The penalty claim had seven zeros.

Avery's fingers began to tremble. The thick paper rustled loudly in the quiet room.

Quinn pulled out a barstool and sat across from her. She tapped her knuckles against the marble.

"That's just the first one," Quinn said.

Avery forced her jaw to unclench. She grabbed a pen and a yellow sticky note from the counter.

She started writing down the numbers, adding the totals in her head.

The tip of the pen pressed so hard it tore through the thin paper. The final sum was enough to drain her entire savings and leave her drowning in millions of dollars of debt.

Avery dropped the pen. It clattered against the stone. She closed her eyes and took a deep, shuddering breath, trying to slow her racing heart.

Quinn leaned forward, her elbows on the table.

"There is one way out of this," Quinn said. "A suicide mission, but it's a way out."

Avery opened her eyes. The muscles in her neck tightened.

"What way?"

Quinn pulled her iPad from her bag and tapped the screen. She slid it toward Avery.

A project proposal titled Second Heartbeat filled the display.

Avery glanced at it and immediately recoiled.

"A trashy celebrity dating reality show?" Avery's voice was laced with disgust. "Absolutely not. That will permanently destroy my resume as a serious host."

Quinn didn't argue. She just swiped the screen to the next page.

It was the confirmed cast list.

The very first name in bold print was Caryn Jordan.

Avery's pupils contracted.

Quinn tapped a video link embedded next to Caryn's name.

Caryn's face appeared on the screen. She was dabbing at the corners of her eyes with a tissue, looking perfectly fragile.

"I just... I just want to find a place to heal my broken heart," Caryn sniffled to her followers. "Maybe Second Heartbeat will help me believe in love again."

Avery's teeth ground together. She dug her fingernails so deeply into her palms that the skin nearly broke. A hot, suffocating wave of humiliation washed over her.

Quinn hit pause. Caryn's fake, teary face froze on the screen.

"She is going to use this show to step right over your dead body and play the ultimate victim," Quinn said.

Avery pushed off the stool. She started pacing the length of the living room, her mind spinning.

She stopped at the window, looking down at the paparazzi circling the building like vultures waiting for her to jump.

Quinn walked up behind her.

"The network is desperate for ratings," Quinn said softly. "The appearance fee they are offering covers the down payment for your first breach of contract settlement."

Avery turned around. The hesitation in her eyes was gone, replaced by a cold, hard sheet of ice.

"I want a guarantee," Avery said. "I want unrestricted microphone access while I'm in that house."

Quinn let out a dark chuckle.

"For the sake of the ratings you bring, producers are willing to take their underwear off. They'll agree to any conditions."

Avery walked back to the kitchen island. She picked up the iPad and began reading the fine print of the proposal.

She stopped at a clause detailing 24/7 camera surveillance.

Avery picked up her red pen. She aggressively crossed out the entire paragraph.

"I need off-camera private time," Avery stated. "I am not being filmed while I sleep."

"I'll negotiate it," Quinn warned, packing up her bag. "But you realize you're walking into a coliseum, right? They want blood."

Avery slapped the proposal back onto the marble.

"Let them," Avery said, her voice dead flat. "I'll be the one holding the knife."

Quinn pulled out her phone and dialed the network producer's number to lock in the deal.

Avery turned her back on Quinn and walked straight into her bedroom.

She pushed open the heavy doors of her walk-in closet.

Her eyes skimmed past the soft pastels and elegant silk dresses she usually wore for her daytime talk show. She hated them right now.

She reached into the back and yanked out a sharp, tailored black power suit.

Ten minutes later, she sat at her vanity. She uncapped a tube of deep, blood-red lipstick and painted it over her pale lips, masking every ounce of vulnerability.

Quinn walked into the bedroom, ending her call. She stopped and let out a low whistle at Avery's reflection.

Avery picked up a pair of oversized black sunglasses and slid them onto her face.

They walked out of the apartment in silence, taking the private elevator directly down to the underground garage.

Quinn hit the unlock button on her keys. The headlights of a black Range Rover flashed in the dim concrete structure.

Avery pulled open the passenger door and slid into the leather seat, pulling the seatbelt tight across her chest.

Quinn started the engine. The heavy rumble echoed off the concrete walls.

The SUV drove up the ramp and burst out onto the street. The blinding California sun hit the windshield.

Avery rolled her window down an inch, needing to breathe. The hot wind hit her face as her brain shifted into full PR mode.

She pulled out her tablet.

"I need you to map out every hidden camera blind spot in that house," Avery said, her eyes locked on the screen.

Quinn kept her eyes on the road. "Do not show any aggression on camera, Avery. They will edit you into the villain."

Avery let out a cold breath. "I'm going to play the perfect, fragile, resilient victim."

The Range Rover stopped at a red light. A bright yellow convertible pulled up into the lane next to them.

The convertible's radio was blasting a local gossip station.

"Avery Bird's career is officially in the grave, folks," the radio host laughed loudly over the speakers.

The three teenage girls in the convertible turned their heads. Through the newly opened gap in the tinted glass, one of them caught a clear view of Avery's unshielded profile.

Their eyes widened. They immediately shoved their phones over the door panel, snapping rapid-fire photos.

"Homewrecker!" one of the girls screamed, her face contorted with disgust.

Quinn cursed under her breath and slammed her finger on the window button, rolling the glass up tight to cut off the noise.

Avery stared straight ahead. The muscles in her face didn't twitch.

The light turned green. Quinn slammed on the gas, leaving the convertible far behind.

Quinn shot a worried glance at the passenger seat. "Are you going to survive this?"

Avery pulled off her sunglasses. Her eyes were sharp.

"That was just the appetizer."

She opened the Twitter app on her phone, scrolling through the fresh wave of hate comments, letting the anger fuel her.

Suddenly, a breaking news alert popped up at the top of her feed.

It showed a massive crowd of fans blocking the main entrance of the network headquarters.

Avery zoomed in on the photo. Hundreds of girls were holding up neon signs, swarming the street.

"There aren't any boy bands recording today," Avery muttered, her brow furrowing.

Quinn glanced down at the GPS on the dashboard. The main road leading to the studio was glowing dark red.

The Range Rover was forced to a complete stop at the next intersection. Ahead of them was an endless ocean of cars and screaming people.