The press conference room was packed.
Reporters filled every available seat, their cameras and recording devices pointed toward the small podium at the front of the room like weapons ready to fire.
Lydia stood backstage, David beside her giving last-minute instructions.
"Remember the script. Apologize, show vulnerability, deny the drug use, and emphasize that it was just an accident. No mention of death threats or murder attempts." He whispered.
Lydia nodded, but something cold had settled in her chest.
Exhaling sharply, she walked onto the stage after a moderator called upon her. She approached the podium calmly, her red lips set in a tight smile that didn't reach her eyes.
The room fell silent as she looked out at the sea of expectant faces.
David watched from the side of the stage, confident that his star client would follow his carefully crafted script.
He was wrong.
"Thank you all for coming, I know there have been many rumors and speculation about my recent accident, and I want to set the record straight." Lydia began, her voice clear and strong.
"First of all," Lydia continued, "I want to make it absolutely clear that I have never used illegal drugs. Not once in my life."
"Secondly, my accident was not a suicide attempt." Lydia said, and David noticed her tone shifting, becoming harder. He squinted his eyes, anxious on what was about to follow.
"She wouldn't go against my advice." He shook his head slightly.
Now, the reporters had begun to murmur among themselves.
"It wasn't an accident at all. What I experienced was attempted murder. Someone tried to kill me and make it look like suicide." Lydia announced and the room erupted.
"What are you doing, Allison?" David mumbled to himself as if the lady could hear him, his teeth gritting.
"No, no, Lolo..." Rose shook her head.
"Do you have a concrete evidence?"
"Who do you suspect?"
The reporters were shouting questions now.
"I have evidence. A death threat that was found at the scene." She shouted above the chaos, pulling out the bloodstained paper.
"And here's what I need my would-be killer to understand, I'm not easy prey anymore. I'm not going to cower or hide or let anyone else control my narrative."
She leaned closer to the microphones, her voice rising;
"To whoever tried to kill me: You picked the wrong target. I'm going to find you. I'm going to expose you. And I'm going to make sure the whole world knows exactly what kind of coward attacks someone and then tries to destroy their reputation with lies."
The room was completely silent now, every person hanging on her words.
"Consider this my declaration of war. I'm coming for you." Lydia concluded sharply.
~~~~~~~~~~~
The press conference was over and David Mawson was fuming into his office after requesting that Allison Lowell follow him for an immediate meeting.
Rose walked quietly beside her boss, not saying a word but kept stealing glances at her.
"She looks alright... I guess she's holding up so well." Rose thought to herself as she looked at Lydia in awe, however she was prepared to hold her in case she later fell apart.
The Allison Lowell she had worked with would have broken down in tears if anything was too overwhelming or if she had done anything to upset David Mawson just like now.
But Lydia didn't look like someone who would break down anytime soon. If anything, she looked pissed off, with her lips pressed together, and her fists clenching by her sides as she walked.
They arrived in the office and Rose gently closed the door behind her as if any noise could trigger the ticking bomb in David.
Yet the bomb went off!
"What the hell was that, Lolo?" He snapped, making Rose flinch slightly while the accused, Lydia, looked at the man with defiance.
David had gone to stand behind his desk, his usually composed demeanor completely shattered. His silver hair was disheveled from running his hands through it, and he had loosened his tie.
"I specifically told you not to mention murder. I explicitly instructed you to call it an accident!" His voice was harsher.
Rose shifted uncomfortably near the door, her eyes darting between Lydia and David like she was watching a tennis match that might turn violent at any moment.
Lydia remained silent, her mind racing.
"Why is this man speaking to Allison Lowell like she was some kind of servant?" She wondered, knowing fully well, from how she had seen the living condition of the woman, that the original Allison Lowell came from one of the wealthiest families based in the United States. She was a successful actress with her own money and fame.
Yet here was her manager, treating her like she was nothing more than a disobedient child.
"Allison Lowell, why did you let this man talk down to you like this? You had everything: wealth, beauty, talent, a powerful family. Why would you accept being treated like trash?" She asked in her mind, as if there was someone there to answer her.
But after the question formed in her mind, she remembered the harsh reality. Allison Lowell couldn't answer her.
Allison Lowell was dead. And she was Allison now!
She shook her head at her own foolishness, trying to dispel the strange moment of reaching out to a ghost.
David, who had been waiting for her response, finally snapped;
"Are you ignoring me now? After the disaster you just created downstairs, you have the audacity to stand there and ignore me?"
That was it. Something deep inside Lydia; something that had been forged in the fires of a lifetime of abuse and betrayal, finally erupted.
The woman who had been kicked around by life for forty years, who had been murdered by her only friend, who had learned that survival meant fighting back, could not tolerate this treatment.
"Don't you dare raise your voice at me!" She yelled back at the man, the words coming out like a whip crack, sharp and commanding.
Rose's mouth fell open in shock and David slightly stumbled backward, his eyes widening in shock.
In all his years of managing Allison Lowell, she had never spoken to him like that. She had always been compliant, eager to please, willing to bend to his will in the name of her career.
"I... when did you... what happened to you?" He stammered, his authoritative facade crumbling before their eyes.
Lydia stepped forward, her chin raised, every inch of her radiating a newfound confidence that seemed to fill the room.
"Let me make something very clear to you, Mr. David. I can't tolerate this treatment. I can't tolerate you treating me like a child. You're my manager... A manager, not my father!" She told him sharply, stressing the position of the man in her life as if he had somehow forgotten he was more than that to her.
The silence that followed was deafening.
Rose closed and opened her mouth repeatedly but no word came out. David, on the other hand, had his mouth hung open in shock, looking bewildered as if he had been slapped.
Even Lydia was surprised at the effect her words had on such an intimidating man.
He looked like someone who commanded respect in the entertainment industry and she had just reduced him to a stuttering mess.
She felt a surge of satisfaction, a small but significant victory in this new life of hers and a small smirk played at the corners of her lips.
David recovered slowly, his face cycling through several emotions before settling on cold anger.
"Fine. Since you're so capable now, since you obviously don't need my guidance anymore, you can deal with the consequences of your disaster of a press conference, all by yourself." He maintained firmly, his voice professionally clipped but the fury underneath it was unmistakable.
He grabbed his jacket from the back of his chair and headed for the door.
"Good luck."
With that, he stormed out of the office, the door slamming behind him with enough force to rattle the windows.
Rose lingered for a moment, looking torn between following David and staying with Lydia.
"I should... I need to try to calm him down." She said apologetically before hurrying after the manager.
And then Lydia was alone.
"Good riddance!" She scoffed in annoyance.
Walking to the windows, she pressed her palms against the cool glass and stared out at the city's skyline.
Her reflection stared back at her; Allison Lowell's beautiful face, but with an expression the original owner had probably never worn. There was steel in those eyes now, determination mixed with wariness.
How was she going to navigate this new life? It came with so many complications she hadn't anticipated.
The weight of it all threatened to overwhelm her, but she pushed the feeling aside.
"Well, I have been given this second chance for a reason. I shouldn't waste it by cowering in fear." She nodded at the determined thought.
The soft click of the door opening behind her interrupted her thoughts.
"There you are, love."
The voice was masculine, smooth and with an American accent that somehow made something in her chest flutter at the sound of it.
She turned around and her heart skipped a beat when she saw the owner of the voice.
It was him.
Maxwell Salvador.
But he wasn't smiling.
His dark eyes were fixed on her with an intensity that made her breath catch.
There was something dangerous in his expression, something that made every instinct she had developed in her harsh previous life scream warnings.
He walked toward her with swift, purposeful steps. His jaw was set, his eyes never leaving hers.
Lydia felt her pulse quicken, but not only with the excitement. This was mixed with fear.
He looked like a man on the edge of violence, like someone who was barely restraining himself from doing something terrible.
She backed up against the window, her hands pressed flat against the glass behind her, as he continued his approach.
"What... what are you doing here?" Her voice came out smaller than she had intended, a stark contrast to the commanding tone she had used with David just minutes before.
A tiny part of her mind wondered how this man had managed to have such effect on her just with his stare.
Maxwell didn't reply, he just kept walking towards her.