Page 31 of You Spin Me Round

‘Isabelle, hi—’

‘What the hell did you do!?’ Isabelle demanded.

‘I know what you’re about to say.’

‘What am I about to say?’ Isabelle replied sharply.

‘You’re about to fire me,’ Alex said. ‘Which, of course, you have the right to do.’

‘Well done,’ Isabelle said. ‘You finally got something right.’

‘Look, you didn’t want to tell me who took the picture, and you didn’t want to share the photo. You wanted to keep Helen out of it because that’s what she asked you to do, and you agreed.’

‘Exactly.’

‘Well, here’s the good news,’ Alex told her. ‘You did that. But your arsehole publicist went rogue and got the photo anyway. I can put it out right now. You’re free of moral quandariesandyou get what you want.’

There was a pause. ‘Helen’s livid.’

‘Yeah, because Erin’s publicist read her for filth. I just happened to be there.’

‘Erin’s publicist?’

‘Yeah. She’s a bit of a bleeding-heart type, so I guess she bought Erin’s slant.’

Isabelle gave a haughty laugh before switching back to her original topic. ‘How didyoueven know it was Helen, anyway?’

‘Can’t say,’ Alex said simply.

Isabelle was freshly incensed. ‘Someone close to me talked? Do I need to fire staff today?’

‘Aside from me? No. I got the information elsewhere,’ Alex lied.

There was no sense throwing Steven under the bus. He’d done her a solid, and anyway, she might need him later.

‘I’m not firing you,’ Isabelle said regretfully. ‘Because you’re right. I was stuck, and you’re not. And now I can call you all the names under the sun to Helen if you’re good with that.’

‘Totally good. So, time to release the pic, yes? It’s time-sensitive. If the other side decides to put it out now with their angle….’

‘Pull the trigger.’ Isabelle hung up.

Alex pulled over to the side of the road and checked around the usual places to see if the pic was up. Nothing. She rang Baker while she looked at the picture. He picked up quickly. ‘I’m about to send you something, and I want you to release it ASAFP,’ she told him.

‘What is it?’

‘It’sthatpicture.’

‘Is it good?’ Baker asked, interested.

Alex wasn’t sure, but looking closely, she would say it was reasonable to see someone behaving flirtatiously and very possibly about to get nasty.

‘It’s debatable. I want to shut that debate down before it even starts. Send it from one of the Instagram accounts. The most credible one.’

Baker ran a few sock puppet accounts for just such a moment as now, when a bit of distance might be required from some gossip. Not strictly ethical, but Baker never seemed to mind, bless his dubious heart. One of them was a woman claiming to be a lowly extra who loved to spread gossip about whatever set she was on. She had about thirty thousand followers, which was plenty to get started.

‘I’m gonna feed you a quote, OK?’

‘Sure.’

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