Free The Cougar and the Wolf by Mina Carter

commentator was speculating. She hadn't started a new exercise regime.
    Her heart was broken. Like his.
    “She’s looked like that for weeks.”
    Marty moved at his side. Held out a small scrap of paper with a number written on it. Kyle flicked a glance from it to his uncle's face.
    "That agent left it. Said to call him when you'd calmed down."
    * * *
    People. Noise. Lights bright enough to blind stabbed through the blackened windows of the limo as the vehicle drew gracefully to a stop. Kristen looked through the glass, confident that those outside couldn’t see her and eyed the red carpet as it snaked up to the doorway, like a gladiator about to run the gauntlet. Once the sight had filled her with excitement. She—small town, trailer trash Kristen Mann—on that most revered of colours? Unthinkable. Now all it reminded her of was a slow trickle of blood as Hollywood drained the life from her like some over-sized, invisible leech.
    “Don’t worry about a thing. Stone’s already inside, so you don’t have to deal with him.”
    Xander droned on from the seat opposite, his fingers swift over the screen of his smart phone as he checked it before they went in. That was Xander all over. Always connected, like a spider with his fingers in all the pies. She ignored him and looked out of the window. The crowds were at least seven deep, held back from the scarlet expanse by plush velvet ropes, eager faces turned toward the car as they waited for the door to open.
    All those people waiting for her and she didn’t want to go out there. Didn’t want to plaster the fake smile over her face and make small talk with people. Not fans, not the few friends she had here that would be at the after party, no one. She’d been that way since Xander had brought her back from Katy, all assurances that her low mood would pass. It hadn’t. If anything, it was getting worse. As if she was missing a part of herself somewhere. The most important part.
    Kyle. She loved him. And she’d lost him.
    Taking a deep breath she looked out into the crowd, her gaze searching until she found a face. A young girl, late teens, but so animated she stood out in the crowd like a flower with its petals open to the sun. Kristen didn’t know her, she was just a face amongst many, but she concentrated on it, wondering what the girl’s story was.
    Being an actress wasn’t like other jobs. She couldn’t just call in sick and get someone else to take on her workload. These people, this young girl, had given up their time to come and see her. They’d arranged the trip, maybe taken time off work or arranged childcare to be here and she owed them a show. It was a huge responsibility and there was no way she was letting them down, even if all she wanted to do was to crawl into a hole and cry for a year.
    “You look fantastic, darling. That dress and the weight loss…” Xander slid the cell into his pocket and gave her the thumbs up. She wanted to break it off and feed it to him, her disgust with him almost overwhelming common sense. “You’ll have them falling at your feet.”
    She turned back to him, the slight movement sending the satin skirt of her dress sliding over her thighs. Without interest she glanced down at the Grecian style gown she’d chosen for this evening. Despite what Xander said, she looked like shit and she knew it. Since leaving Katy a few weeks ago, she’d lost so much weight that the designer, one of the young up and coming ones she liked to favour to boost their careers, had been forced to take it in before she left this evening.
    She’d even felt a little guilty at the panic on the girl’s face, the first real emotion to penetrate since she’d watched Kyle speed away, chewing up dust on the road as he raced away from her. But she didn’t deserve to pay the price for Kristen fucking up, and her creation hanging from the actress’ frame like a sackcloth on a clothes horse would certainly trash any credibility she had as a