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Margo Hawkins is striking. Her blunt bob is angled and severe; paired with her thick-rimmed chic glasses, she looks like a sexy librarian. Or maybe I just think that because of the notebook in her lap as she jots down notes during the interview.

I wring my fingers around one another nervously. My anxiety is getting the better of me, but I’m trying not to show it. It’s an interview that was really meant for Julie … and yet again, I’ve taken her spot.

“There are only four weeks to shoot the first season of Night Fire and with the sudden change of roles, you’re demanded to work nearly fourteen hours a day, is that true?” she asks me, peeking up past her glasses and then flashing a gorgeous smile.

“Yes,” I reply hesitantly. Time is blurring past me as I go through the motions. The only time I feel in control is when I’m on set. When I’m someone else.

“What’s it like working with your former flame?” she asks me, catching me off guard even though I knew this question would be coming.

My lips twitch into a small smile and I let out a small laugh, although it’s rehearsed and for good reason. “It’s wonderful seeing Nathan again,” I say easily as a blush creeps into my cheeks.

Margo cocks a brow at me and a few people whispering just outside of the green room where the interviews are conducted, catch my eyes.

“Is he the reason you got into acting?” she asks me, her pen poised and ready to take notes. “It seems like he played a major part in getting you this role.”

I blink away the sleep from my eyes. I couldn’t sleep last night because all I could think about was the past. It’s been years since the nightmares have haunted me. But they’ve come back with a vengeance.

“I knew he was acting, obviously, but I never watched any of his movies.” I stumble over my words and tuck a stray hair behind my ears. Scooting up in my seat I take a moment to clear my throat before answering, “I didn’t expect him to be here, to be honest.” I glance at the floor as I answer. It’s a clean and bright walkway; nothing can hide on a floor like this. “It’s not like I sought him out if that’s what you’re asking.”

“It’s not, but speaking of that, did you not ever reach out to him? This was all just a big surprise?”

She asks me as though it’s not a coincidence, and it makes my heart race and my hands go numb. I never wanted to see him again when the visions of that night disappeared. I didn’t want the reminder when I thought my life was normal once again. “I didn’t. We thought it was best …”

I swallow thickly and lick my lips, trying to pull myself together.

“I’m sorry dear, you must be exhausted from such a long day of work. And it looks like you didn’t get much sleep,” she adds with a bit of humor and a wink. I let out an uneasy laugh although I know what she’s implying. I don’t care though, I just want to get out of here and go hide.

“What was it like to go to school together?” Margo asks, maintaining her questioning about the relationship rather than the actual production, which is what Nancy assured me this would be about.

“I didn’t know that was known,” I answer as I tug my dress down a little farther and cross my ankles, but keep my knees touching. It was more for me than her, but before I can respond with any more she asks, “Oh, you don’t want it out there? Is there a reason?”

My body heats. It feels like a fucking inquisition. I simply shake my head no, keeping my lips pinned shut. There’s no way I’m giving this woman any more ammunition.

“Do you mind if I ask what was it like the last time you saw Nathan? Before filming?” She’s seemingly sweet and unassuming in her questioning, but there’s a vulture behind her eyes, waiting for the perfect time to swoop down and claim its kill. I can see it.

I bite the tip of my tongue for a moment before answering, “The last time I saw him was back in high school. I didn’t think I’d ever see him again.” I feign a sense of easiness, but the memory of him walking away steals the small smile from my lips. I can’t help that it hurts. The emotions are etched so deeply and entrenched in my memories; they refuse to be ignored.

I shrug and say, “He was a year older, so I had another year to go before I could leave.” I try to make it lighthearted and joking, but her next question destroys my attempt to sway the questioning.

“What happened that drove you two apart?”

She asks the question I didn’t want to hear. But I’m prepared for it. I open my mouth to repeat the words, the script I’ve drilled into my brain for this particular moment.

My lips part and I take in a small breath, but the words are absent.

Fuck. I forget the lines.

“He did something that really hurt me.” I shake my head no, closing my eyes and trying to remember anything about our past except that night. “That’s not it, I’m sorry,” I say and press my fingers into the lines creasing my forehead. “We didn’t go well together. Always fighting and then I thought …” Damn it. I wish I could just think of something. I open my eyes and see everyone watching. What did I already say? Shit, I can’t remember.

“We broke up because we just weren’t meant to be,” I tell her and it shatters my composure. I don’t lie. At least I try not to. But that’s the worst lie I’ve ever told.

“Oh dear, I can tell this is hard for you,” Margo says and plucks a tissue from the box beside her chair, passing it to me. “Take your time, Harlow,” she says as she tilts her head with sympathy. Of the two of us, she’s the better actress right now.

I was a dumbass to think this interview would be anything other than a predator prying for information to gossip about.

I shake my head and breathe out deeply before saying, “We were oil and water back in high school. All we did was fight. I can’t remember what the last one was about.” I shrug and add, “But we didn’t get back together like we did all the times before.”

“Oh, so you were on-again, off-again?” she asks and I nod, thankful that she’s letting the question go. “I imagine that’s the way it is dating the bad boy in high school.”

I huff as I roll my eyes. I never thought of him that way. Not once. There was something else though. Something that crackled between us and drew me to him.

“He wasn’t really a bad boy, to be honest. He was quiet and kept to himself,” I say as I remember the first time I looked behind me in class. I can still feel his eyes on me and how he refused to let my gaze go. “There was an air about him that told me he was bad, but he didn’t really get into trouble. He was just from the bad side of town; you know?”

I answer as if I’m talking to a friend, and that’s a mistake.

“He was arrested though,” she says as she places her pen down and pushes her glasses up the bridge of her nose. “I would say that’s a bad thing, wouldn’t you?”

“That was after we broke up,” I say defensively.

It was months later that he started doing stupid shit. It was one fight after another once we split up. He was expelled after a fight that ended with the other kid’s nose being broken. I found out later it was because Matt was talking shit about me. I thought maybe I could approach him then, but he’d never been colder to me than that day I showed up at his house.

Even worse, he got caught for stealing, not once but twice and the second time was when they locked him up. When I first saw him being arrested, I thought the cops had found out the truth, but turns out it was just petty theft and we’d gotten away with everything. It didn’t make anything feel better; it didn’t make anything right.

“Oh, is that so? Do you think the breakup had anything to do with his outbursts?” she asks and I don’t have an answer.

Again, my mouth parts but the words just hang there, refusing to leave me. I never thought about it like that. I remember thinking he wasn’t the boy I loved. That he was someone else.

I never thought it was all an act.

Blinking away the memories and confusion, I start to tell her that we were just two young and dumb high school kids, to try and blow off her questioning, but when I raise my eyes I catch sight of him watching me.

The cold in his gaze is back and it sends a chill down my spine.

With that look, I know I’ve said something I shouldn’t have, but I don’t know what.