“Something is wrong with the Blaire Blush system,” Honey continued as if she hadn’t heard me. “I was logging in to make some website updates, and it won’t accept my password. So, I went to contact the web developer, but my email is also down. It’s so bizarre. Must be a server outage or something.”
“Honey, we need to talk.”
“Okay, sure. But we need to figure out this server problem. I don’t know what else to do. Should we contact the server host?”
“Honey,” I repeated.
My tone of voice must have rattled her because she finally turned to face me. “God, it’s just so good to see you. I really thought you’d never come back from LA.”
“But you made sure that I did.”
She blinked. “What do you mean?”
“You outed me to the press. You found out that I was the girl from Campbell’s song, knowing that I never intended for that information to get out.”
Honey opened and closed her mouth. “I…I, uh…”
“And then when I got bombarded by the press, you acted scared for me. You kept telling me to come home. You wanted my relationship to fail.”
Honey straightened, as if realizing this was spiraling. “Blaire, I…it’s not what you think.”
“There is no server problem, Honey. I stripped your access from all of my accounts.”
“Blaire, oh my God, no, please. Don’t do this.”
“I want my key back.” I held my hand out. I was proud of myself for not shaking.
“What?” she gasped. “No, please.”
“Key,” I ground out.
She must have seen my resolve because she dug into her purse and pulled my key off her keychain. She held it in her hand as tears came to her eyes. Then, she dropped it into my hand.
“Second, you’re fired.”
Honey looked positively distraught. Like I’d kicked her puppy. Or broken up with her. She looked ready to collapse entirely.
“Blaire, no. This is the best job I’ve ever had.”
“You should have thought about that before you overstepped my boundaries. I told you if you ever did something like that again, I would fire you. And here we are. You did way worse. You sent my relationship with Campbell to the press. Did you locate and send the pregnancy too?”
“No,” she said, tears streaming down her face. “I didn’t know about that, Blaire. I swear. I’m so sorry.”
At least I believed her about that. I hadn’t found any evidence that that had been here. Just another psychopath out there digging for dirt to try to break me and Campbell up.
“I don’t even understand why you did it. I know that you love Cosmere, but did you really think changing yourself to look like me would get you closer to Campbell?”
My words were cutting and harsh. Her jaw dropped, and her lip quivered.
“Closer to Campbell?” she repeated in confusion. “I don’t like Campbell.”
“Then, why?” I gasped. “Why would you do this to me? Do you just hate me?”
“No! No, no, no,” she said fiercely. “I was trying to protect you!”
“Protect me?” I said dubiously.
“Yes, of course. Everything I do is for you, Blaire. You deserve so much better than the likes of Campbell Abbey. Have you not seen the pictures that came out from yesterday?”
I blinked at her in confusion. “What pictures?”
“He was seen out, drinking with Nini Verona. Do you think someone who loves and deserves you would be out, drinking with a supermodel a few days after you left? Do you think he really cares?”
My mind whirled with that new information. I hadn’t known that he’d been with Nini. Especially since he had just confirmed that they’d been together for a few weeks before he last toured.
But that wasn’t the matter at hand. It wasn’t like Campbell had done anything like that when we were together. In fact, he had seemed entirely besotted. I couldn’t even see what Honey thought she’d needed to protect me from.
“That’s beside the point. You sent that information out, and it’s unacceptable. That isn’t protecting me. That’s invading my privacy.”
“It’s exactly the point. Campbell is a rockstar. You think he’s going to be faithful to you when he’s gone on tour? You think it’s easier to find out now or later that he’s exactly who you think he is?”
“I believe that he would be faithful, but even if he wasn’t, it wouldn’t be acceptable for you to interfere.”
“No one is good enough for you, Blaire,” she said. “It was why I vetted Nate when you were dating and why I’ll always look out for you.”
“Wait, you vetted Nate?”
“He’s a player. And I knew that he wasn’t as into you as he appeared. I made a fake account and tried to get him to agree to go out with me.”
My jaw clenched at those words. She seemed utterly sincere. As if she didn’t even realize how insane that sounded. And then I remembered Nate telling me about the crazy person who had hounded him to get more information about me. Had that been Honey all along?