Every Star that Shines Read online

  Marie gave her an understanding look, then told the server they would take their meals to go. The server nodded and, with a sympathetic glance at Delanie, went to get containers. Delanie wondered how bad she looked.

  “What can I do?” Desmond asked. He looked kind of helpless and pathetic. “I have a yellow stripe belt in Taekwondo. I could beat someone up. As long as it only involves simple blocks and breaking free from a very specific hold, I could beat someone up.”

  Delanie gave a half-hearted chuckle, but shook her head. “Thanks, but no. And Marie, you don’t have to leave yet. You stay and enjoy the meal. I’ll call an Uber.”

  Marie looked about to object, but Delanie shook her head. “Please.” She didn’t know what Josh would have to say to her, but she knew she didn’t want any witnesses for it.

  Marie gave her a long look, then nodded. “You don’t start tweeting before I get home. I’ll know.” She tapped her phone with a pointed gel nail painted in pumpkin orange and silver swirls.

  Delanie gave a reluctant nod. As she made her way to the foyer to wait for her car, she barely noticed the cheerful goodbye from the hostess or the crowd of people waiting to get in. She was too busy doomscrolling through her social media feeds, fear tightening her chest more with every post she read. The furor had already escalated to death threats.

  For an innocent mistake?

  The notification that her ride was there popped up. With shaky hands, she dropped her phone in her purse and went out to the car.

  CHAPTER TWO

  The next morning, Delanie stumbled out of her room, still in her pyjamas—shorts and a pink tank top with a cartoon cat on it. She blinked at the light streaming in through the living room window of the small but airy apartment she shared with Marie.

  How can the sun be so cheerful and enthusiastic when my life is falling apart? And when I only got four hours of sleep?

  Marie sat at the small dining room table in front of the balcony doors, sipping coffee and sketching in a spiral notebook, looking as put-together as usual even in no makeup, lounge pants, and a headscarf. She glanced up when Delanie walked in.

  “Good morning, sunshine. Things look any better by the light of day?”

  Delanie rubbed her bleary eyes and went over to the coffee pot on the counter. She grabbed a mug from the cupboard above, relieved when steam rose from the black nectar as she poured. “I don’t know yet. Is that daylight, or a spotlight on my career going up in flames?”

  “Aw, girl, it ain’t that bad.” Marie pushed the notebook aside and leaned back in her chair, her hands encircling her coffee mug. “You just got to ride this thing out. If you wait long enough, the mob will forget about you and move on to their next helpless victim.”

  Delanie took a sip of black coffee. “So you think I’m a helpless victim?”

  “No, but they do.” Marie indicated her phone, which sat next to her notebook. “Don’t act like one, and they’ll get bored and move on.”

  “Hmph.”

  Delanie wasn’t awake enough to come up with a better response than that. She took another sip of coffee, hoping Marie wouldn’t mention the tweets she’d made the night before. Marie had been right about not replying to the Twitter mob, of course. The responses Delanie had received had gone from bad to worse, until she’d thrown her phone across the room and sobbed herself to sleep. Her puffy eyes and crusty face told her she probably looked like death warmed over. She smoothed her tangled hair with her fingers—as though that will make everything better. She snorted at herself.

  “What did Josh have to say?” Marie asked.

  Delanie cringed. Josh had had a lot to say, but most of it wasn’t something she wanted to tell Marie. It would only justify her friend’s dislike of him more. “He said he would try to smooth things over with the executive team and get back to me. He was optimistic this wouldn’t change anything.”

  Marie snorted. “By smooth things over, he means do whatever Crystal McLean tells him to, of course.”

  “He’s not like that,” Delanie said, too tired and too annoyed to let it go this time. “You don’t give him enough credit.”

  “Don’t I? Do you remember when he told you he knew the director of Skyscraper, and he’d get you onto the set so you could meet Dwayne Johnson? Then he said that they had already finished filming and Dwayne had gone home before he could work something out?”

  Delanie narrowed her eyes, not sure if she could handle more negativity right now. “Yeah . . .”

  “Well, I have it on good authority he lied. He doesn’t even know Rawson Thurber. He was just saying that to impress you.”

  Delanie froze, stunned, then shook her head—whether in disagreement or in denial, she didn’t know. “Well, it worked. And until this moment, the thought that he’d tried made me feel better.”

  She glared at Marie over the rim of her mug, and her friend shrugged unapologetically.

  Marie cocked her head. “Is that your phone ringing?”

  “There’s No Business Like Show Business” pumped through Delanie’s open bedroom door. She had turned up the ringer volume while they were at the restaurant last night, and the phone now blasted loud enough that the neighbours could probably hear it. She dashed into the room and scrambled to retrieve it from behind her dresser, answering just before the call went to voicemail.

  “Hi, Josh,” she said.

  “You’re out of breath. Are you out running?”

  “No, I’m . . .” No way she was going to tell him what had actually happened. Best to change the subject. “Do you have any updates?”

  “Yeah, about that . . .”

  In the silence, Delanie’s gut tightened into a hard ball.

  Josh sighed. “Look, there’s no easy way to say this, so I’ll just come right out with it. You’re off the show. The executives don’t want to risk the kind of negative publicity this situation could bring them. Fans of sweet cowboy romances look down on this kind of controversy.”

  Shock choked her for several seconds, then dissolved into anger as his words sank in. She was being fired, just like that?

  “Well, then,” she spluttered, “maybe the executives should have thought of that before they hired me.” She drew a breath. “They knew I run a YouTube channel satirizing current events all along. Didn’t they realize that’s bound to bring some occasional controversy?”

  “Hey, babe, this wasn’t my idea. If it was up to me, you wouldn’t be going anywhere. But you know how Crystal is. When she makes a decision, there’s no changing her mind.”

  “Did you even try?” Delanie seethed. She’d never seen Josh stand up to Crystal about anything. “Wait, don’t answer that. You know what? I think Marie was right about you.” Much as she hated to admit it.

  “Now wait a second, Delanie—”

  “No, you wait a second, Josh. You think because you’re a producer and you gave me a break that I owe you something. Well, I don’t, not if you’re not going to fight for me the instant things get tough. We’re through.”

  “But—”

  “And you don’t even know Rawson Thurber!”

  She mashed her finger on the screen to end the call, hanging up on his protests, and threw the phone down on the bed. When it rang again immediately, she picked it up, rejected the call, and put her phone on vibrate. Turning, she found Marie leaning against her door frame with a sympathetic expression.

  “That couldn’t have been easy. I’m sorry, hon.”

  Delanie bit her thumbnail and nodded. “Probably for the best. My life just turned into a dumpster fire. If he’s not going to support me, then he’s adding fuel to the flames.”

  Marie nodded approvingly. “Well said. Glad you finally see it.”

  Delanie drew a breath, not sure how she wanted to respond to that. The apartment buzzer sounded, and Marie glanced over her shoulder. Delanie’s heart sank. She couldn’t handle company right now, maybe not even Desmond.

  “You expecting someone?” she asked, wincing interna
lly.

  “Just the Cinnabon delivery guy. Thought we might drown our woes in carbs and a Grey’s Anatomy marathon today.”

  Delanie’s heart lifted slightly, then she frowned. “I thought you had plans.”

  Marie shrugged. “Cancelled ’em. I can go to the mall with Cheyenne anytime.”

  Warmth pushed aside some of the constant dread that had filled Delanie since she’d received Josh’s text last night. “Thanks, Marie. You’re the best.”

  “I know.” She smirked and went to answer the buzzer.

  Delanie’s phone vibrated in her hand—a ring, not a text. Annoyed, she glanced down to reject the call and saw that it wasn’t Josh. It was her mom.

  She hesitated, trying to decide if she wanted to try and explain everything to her mom right then. Cheryl Fletcher hadn’t been the most supportive of her daughter’s choice of career, and the last thing Delanie needed was to hear her mother say I told you so. Not only that, her mom could be a little out of touch with modern culture. Sometimes Delanie thought Cheryl didn’t quite understand what social media was, even though she’d set her up on Instagram a couple years ago. Cheryl definitely wouldn’t understand what being cancelled meant, nor why it was such a big deal to Delanie.

  But an intense longing to pour out her troubles to a listening ear made her answer the phone at the last second.

  “Hi, Mom. How’s it going?”

  “Hi, Delanie.”

  Something in her mother’s tone stopped Delanie from jumping into her story—Cheryl’s tone, and the fact that she hadn’t responded with her typical cheery Better than a bushel of barley.

  “Is something wrong, Mom?”

  She heard a stifled sob on the other end, and her heart stammered. Not more bad news.

  “Are you sitting down?” Cheryl asked.

  Delanie sank to the bed. “Mom, you’re scaring me. What happened? Is Dad okay?”

  “Dad’s fine.” After a slight pause, Cheryl said, “Nan died. Last night. I called her this morning like I always do, and when she didn’t answer after a few tries, I came over to her house to check on her. Looks like she went while she was sleeping. I’m just waiting for the ambulance now.”

  Delanie’s chest constricted, and her gaze snapped to the photo of the sweet-faced white-haired woman on her dresser. How could Nan be dead? She was supposed to live forever.

  “I’m so sorry, honey,” Cheryl said. “I know she meant a lot to you, and—”

  “When’s the funeral?”

  “Well, I have to talk to the funeral home yet to work things out, but we’ll try for this Saturday.”

  “So soon?” That was only four days away.

  “Will you be able to make it? I never know what your work schedule is like.”

  “I can make it.” Delanie swallowed a lump the size of an apple. No job, no boyfriend, a deep desire to escape from the disaster that was her life . . . she could definitely make it. “Maybe I’ll even stay a while. It’s been a minute since I was home.”

  “Would you?” The hopeful surprise in her mom’s voice needled at her. “That would be wonderful.” Cheryl paused. “How long would you be staying?”

  Delanie tensed. Her mother was notorious for turning Delanie’s trips home into meetings with one eligible bachelor after another masquerading as get-togethers with old friends or family. Not that Peace Crossing had much to offer in the eligible bachelor department, but there was a reason Delanie usually only flew home for the weekend. After Caleb, Delanie had no interest in dating a small-town guy ever again. They were too rooted down to be able to handle her and her ambition—they wanted small-town girls, girls who would stay and support their small-town dreams. And one betrayal like that was enough. “Why do you ask?”

  “Well, it’s just . . . I could use some help going through Nan’s things. She’s got this farmhouse to sort through, and she was such a hoarder.”

  Delanie thought of the tidy home with the full but well-organized closets she had known as a child—a far cry from the jam-packed houses she’d seen on reality TV. She shook her head. Her mother had a very different definition of hoarder than she did.

  “Isn’t there anyone else to help? Uncle Roger? Aunt Lily?” Her mother’s other siblings lived too far away, but Roger and Lily both lived in the area. Delanie knew her younger sister, Savannah, wouldn’t be an option—Savannah would have just started her classes, and medical school students couldn’t afford to take time off.

  “I’m sure they’ll lend a hand here and there. So if you don’t want to help, I won’t be left in the lurch. I just thought, if you’d be home for a bit, it would be nice to have your company. You’re so good at organizing things, and you probably won’t be as emotionally attached to everything as I will be.”

  Delanie tugged on a strand of blond hair, wrapping it around her finger. She didn’t know about that. But it didn’t sound like Cheryl wanted to organize a meet-n-greet. And the thought of doing something tangible and helping to organize the earthly possessions of the woman Delanie loved and admired most in the world held a lot of appeal.

  “I’d love to help with that, Mom.”

  “You would? Wonderful. Thank you.”

  Cheryl started muttering. Delanie heard Savannah’s name, and the names of Cheryl’s siblings, plus the local funeral home, and realized her mother was going through the mental list of people to tell about Nan’s passing. She bit her nail, her eyes filling with tears. How can Nan be dead?

  Marie poked her head in the door. Holding her hand up to her ear like a phone, she mouthed Who is it?

  My mom, Delanie mouthed back.

  What’s wrong? Marie mouthed.

  Delanie moved the speaker away from her mouth. “I’ll tell you in a minute,” she whispered.

  Marie nodded and held up the brown paper delivery bag, then indicated that she’d be in the living room. Delanie nodded back.

  Then her mother said something about Violet and the play.

  “What about the play?” Delanie asked before she could stop herself. Nan had been the director of the fall community kids musical in Peace Crossing for as long as Delanie could remember. It was where her own love of acting had begun—that, and listening to Nan’s tales of her glory days on the stage as a young woman, before she gave up her career to marry Delanie’s grandfather and move to Peace Crossing. Since this was the first week of September, the play would have just finished casting. Rehearsals should be starting this weekend.

  “Oh, nothing you need to worry about, honey,” Cheryl said. “I just need to remember to let Violet Butler know about Nan. Violet has been the musical director of the play for years now. I don’t know who they’ll find to take over directing the play on such short notice though. It’s a pretty heavy commitment, and not many people have that kind of free time, let alone the expertise or the desire to—”

  “I’ll do it,” Delanie said without thinking, then slammed her mouth shut. What was she saying?

  “You will?” Cheryl said, her voice filled with delight. “You’ll be here that long? Don’t you have to work?”

  Delanie paused. She could probably get her job back at the café if she asked. And just because she’d been fired from Trueheart didn’t mean she couldn’t get other acting work. She was still waiting to hear back from a few auditions.

  Who was she kidding? If the studio that had already offered her a series contract didn’t want to be associated with her controversy, why would anyone else? And the last thing she wanted was to go back to the Vintage Café with her tail between her legs and ask for her waitressing job back. The day she’d handed in her apron had felt almost as good as learning she had landed the part of Maryanne.

  If she was going to ride this thing out, as Marie advised, what better way to do that than by disappearing for a couple of months? She didn’t have much saved, but she had her Patreon supporter income—assuming she still had any supporters left. Besides, directing the play would be the perfect distraction from her current problems.
And maybe getting away from Vancouver would give her the perspective to figure out what to do next.

  “No, I can stay for a couple of months. I’ll need a day or two to wrap things up here, but I should be there by Friday. I’ll drive, so you don’t have to worry about picking me up from the airport.” The trip would take two days, or one if she pushed it, but a drive through the Rocky Mountains would be the perfect way to start her mental reset.

  “Oh, Delanie, that’s wonderful. I’m sorry the circumstances are so trying, but it will be lovely to have you home. And I’m sure Nan will rest easier knowing you’re the one taking over the play.”

  She won’t know. She’s dead. But Delanie didn’t say that. Though she didn’t share her mother’s spiritual beliefs, she couldn’t claim to know what happened to the dead. Let her mother have her comforts—especially as she was obviously reeling a bit from Nan’s death. Besides, Delanie could think of no better way to honour Nan’s memory than by keeping her legacy alive.

  “Just one request,” Delanie added.

  “What’s that, honey?”

  “Don’t tell Caleb’s mother I’m coming home.”

  CHAPTER THREE

  Caleb Toews pulled up to the worn curb in front of his ex’s yellow split-level bungalow and shifted his Ford pickup into park. His nine-year-old daughter peeked at him through the picture window, holding one gauzy curtain aside, her dark hair tumbling over her shoulders. When Emma saw him, her warm brown eyes lit up and she disappeared. Probably to collect her things.

  He shuffled some work orders and a time sheet he still had to submit to the office at Martens Electric from the passenger seat to the clean back bench of the extended cab. Taking a deep breath, he got out of the truck and walked to the front door.

  It was a beautiful fall day, with only a hint of crispness in the air. The mountain ash in the front yard had turned bright red, and the aspens lining the bank of the Peace River at the end of the street and climbing the hill behind the subdivision on the other end were a glorious shade of yellow. Autumns in Peace Crossing were often come-and-go events—as in, they had often gone as soon as they had come. But this one had been mild and surprisingly warm, with barely a hint of leaf drop yet, despite the frost a week ago. He hoped that meant they’d see the Indian summer called for by the Farmer’s Almanac—his job was more pleasant when the weather was good.