“I’m fine.” Lauren knew how she looked: red-eyed, wild-haired, frantic. But she had to do this. She felt a lump in her throat as she gazed at Matthew; she felt like she’d barely spent any time with him lately. But also, she feared for his future. Who would care for him? Lauren was unstable—but so, potentially, was his father.

Before heading to LA, she swung by Andrea’s house. Andrea hurried out, looking pale and worried; Lauren had only told her glossed-over details about what she’d found out about Graham. She’d asked Andrea to come along as backup, so Lauren wouldn’t get too scared of confronting Graham.

“I’ve barely heard from Ronnie,” Andrea murmured worriedly as they pulled onto the highway.

“Maybe she’s just lying low until this all blows over?” Lauren suggested.

“It’s something else. But she won’t tell me what.”

Lauren was so hyped-up during the two-hour drive she couldn’t listen to music. Graham clouded Lauren’s mind. His lies. His deception. Piper. Andrea asked Lauren to expand on what she’d found out, exactly, but it wasn’t like there was much to tell. Just a photograph. Just a hunch that Graham had been lying for a long time.

“They were together,” Lauren said. “But I think it ended badly—remember how Piper mentioned that, in her talk at the breakfast?”

Was that why Graham had hidden the relationship? Because it was toxic? Because he didn’t want Piper and Lauren talking? And was this why Piper placed that note in Lauren’s backpack—to push her away from Silver Swans because she wanted nothing to do with Graham?

What bothered Lauren more, she said, was that Graham potentially had a son he never spoke about, never saw.

“I saw a picture of North once,” Andrea said. “Piper showed me at the meeting. Out of the blue, Want to see my son? He had dark hair, dark eyes.”

“So does Graham,” Lauren said miserably.

Every time she thought about North, her chest sizzled. All this time, she’d feared Graham was keeping secrets, maybe sleeping with Gracie. She would have never guessed this.

She’d only been to the Ketchup set a few times and had to drive around the streets of Culver City searching for the studio gates. As they pulled into visitor parking, Andrea put a hand on her arm. “You sure you want to do this?”

“I have to,” Lauren said through gritted teeth. “I’m going to make him tell me the truth.”

She had to wait for the snaking line of a tour group to pass on the walk to the Ketchup offices. One of the tourists, a plump, friendly-looking woman with a black vinyl backpack, smiled at Lauren eagerly, her smile telegraphing, Isn’t it so wonderful we’re all here?