My name is Wren Halliday. For six years I was the songwriter behind Beau Calloway.
Every track on every album he ever cut — the radio hits, the CMA winners, the platinum singles people streamed at their weddings — came out of my session files.
No one outside the publishing side of the industry knew my name.
Then he started sleeping with my best friend, Tessa Lark.
To celebrate the soft launch on Instagram, he handed her a demo I'd burned three months building. She dropped it as her debut single. It went to number one overnight.
At the release party, with one arm around her in front of the entire label, he told me, Without you, she'll be just fine. And you — you're nothing.
I finished my drink. I smiled. Then I walked across the room and accepted a job offer from his biggest rival.
Everyone there thought I'd lost it.
What none of them knew was this:
The song I let him take was never meant to be a hit. It was bait.
The night Tessa Lark broke, eight things were trending on X.
#TessaLarkOriginal. #TideFallsHitsBillion. #BeauCallowayProtector. #NashvilleHasANewQueen. The other four were variations on the same three.
I was at the back desk of the Cardinal Sound writers' room, in the last cubicle before the kitchen, with her single on loop in my headphones.
Every line of melody. I knew them down to the breath marks.
It was the lead track from the album I'd spent three months building for Beau's fall release.
Working title, "Tide Falls."
Three months earlier, at four in the morning, I'd been on the studio couch revising the seventeenth pass at the chorus. Beau was leaned back, rubbing the bridge of his nose, telling me, Wren, you're the only one who hears what I want.
I believed him, that day.
Now Tessa was on a CMT special in head-to-toe Carolina Herrera, eyes wet, telling the camera, I wrote this for myself. Some nights I couldn't sleep, and this song was the gift I kept giving back to me.
Beau was sitting front row, smiling like he'd built her with his own hands.
My phone buzzed.
A text from Tessa.
Wrennie I'm so so sorry I just love this song too much.
A second one came in right after.
Beau said you wouldn't mind. You're the one who always told me you wanted me to be seen, right?
My fingertips went cold.
A second later, Beau called.
I picked up.
His end was loud — the after-party at the Hermitage Hotel rooftop, that brassy industry-night noise.
Wren, get over here.
I didn't speak.
He softened his voice into something he thought of as gentle.
Don't make a scene. Tessa's having her night. Don't embarrass her.
I laughed once, dry.
Beau paused half a second.
What's funny?
My old taste.
The line went quiet.
Then his voice dropped low.
Wren. Don't forget who walked you into this town.
I stood up and folded the laptop closed.
The screen was still parked on the Pro Tools session for "Tide Falls." Creation date. Modification chain. Original tracking takes. All of it.
I copied the project folder onto the encrypted drive in my bag, picked up my coat.
I haven't forgotten anything, I said.
The Hermitage rooftop was lit up like a launch event, because it was one. Champagne tower at the bar. Tessa at the center of a ring of label people in cocktail dresses.
She saw me come in. Her smile froze for a half-beat, then her eyes filled right on cue.
Wrennie. You came.
She crossed the room toward me with both arms open.
I stepped back.
Her arms hung in the air a second too long. She turned to Beau, lower lip already trembling.
He came over with that walk he uses on the late-night hosts, the one that broadcasts patience under provocation.
He was in a black suit. The lapel pin he was wearing — a small vintage Gibson logo in brushed gold — was the one I'd bought him for his twenty-sixth birthday.
I'd paid for it with the first publishing advance I ever cleared.
For five years he'd told me it was too sentimental for stage, kept it in a drawer.
Tonight he had it on for Tessa.
Wren. That's enough. He kept his voice down for the listeners. She apologized.
I looked at him.
Did she apologize for taking my song, or for sleeping with my boyfriend?
The room dropped a register all at once.
Tessa went paper-white. The tears came on time.
Wrennie, why would you say that? Beau and I are real, but the song — the song is mine. I wrote it.
I heard the murmur start behind me.
Wait, that's Wren Halliday?
The civilian girlfriend?
Pretty sure she's been living off Beau for years.
Beau's face hardened. He grabbed my wrist.
You're really gonna make this look this ugly.
I shook him off.
The ugly part isn't me.
Tessa's manager pushed forward and slapped a folder onto the bar between us.
Ms. Halliday, watch what you say. The lyrics and composition on "Tide Falls" are registered to Tessa Lark. Copyright filed and stamped. Continue defaming her and we'll have the lawyers calling.
I picked the folder up.
The eCO filing receipt was dated seven days ago.
My session files were dated three months back.
Beau leaned in close to my ear, voice quiet enough to sound intimate from a distance.
Wren. Don't make me make sure you never work in this town again.
I tilted my head up.
There was nothing in his eyes that looked nervous.
He still believed I'd swallow it the way I'd swallowed everything else.
I set the folder down.
Beau. Remember what you said tonight.
He smiled.
Without you, she'll be just fine. And you — you're nothing.
The doors at the far end of the rooftop opened.
Rhett Castellano walked in.
The whole floor stopped breathing.
Rhett Castellano was Beau's rival.
They'd come up the same year, same crossover lane, same race for country-pop airplay. Their fanbases had been at each other on Twitter for five years.
Beau had built the self-taught small-town songwriter myth. Rhett had built the stage presence, the voice that hit the back wall of an arena without a wedge in his ear.
They'd never been on the same stage without staying at opposite mics.
So when Rhett crossed the rooftop and stopped beside me, the color drained out of Beau's face.
Castellano. What are you doing here.
Rhett didn't look at him. He held a business card out to me.
Ms. Halliday. Have you thought about it.
The room let out an audible sound.
Tessa actually forgot to keep crying.
I took the card.
One line, no logo.
Castellano Music. Music Director. Position open.
Beau stared at it.
When did you two meet.
Rhett finally looked at him.
Three years ago.
Beau's head jerked toward me.
I said it flat.
Three years ago. The night you won Best New Artist at the CMAs. Power went out at the Bluebird before the after-show writers' round. I fixed the monitor for the headliner.
Rhett finished it.
She hummed eight bars while we waited for the lights. I've remembered them ever since.
Beau's face went bad.
That had been the biggest night of his career. He'd stood on the CMA stage and thanked everyone who'd walked the road with him.
He hadn't named me.
Because the label had decided I had no public-facing value.
Rhett turned to Tessa.
Ms. Lark. Lovely single.
She managed half a smile.
Thanks, Rhett.
Then Rhett dropped his voice, easy, conversational, and the entire rooftop heard it anyway.
The second-verse lift especially. Reminds me a lot of a demo Ms. Halliday played me three years ago.
Tessa's color went.
Beau stepped between her and Rhett.
Don't try to spin a story off this, Castellano.
Rhett gave a small smile.
Don't worry, Calloway. I don't reheat other men's leftovers.
Someone at the bar didn't quite manage to swallow the laugh.
Beau's jaw locked.
I dropped the card into my purse.
I accept, I said.
Rhett held out his hand.
I shook it.
The cameras opened up around us.
Tessa lurched forward and caught my wrist.
Wrennie, you can't. Beau's in pre-production for his new record. If you walk what's he going to do?
I looked down at her hand. Her gel tips were rhinestoned over. They scratched the back of my hand pink.
I slid free.
Didn't he say I'd burn just fine without him?
By midnight the news was on every gossip account from Saving Country Music to the bigger stan Substacks.
Beau's fans came at me hard.
Civilian girlfriend rides one rival's coattails the second the other one drops her.
Beau carried her for years and she stabs him in the back the same week.
Tessa Lark is the real talent. Wren Halliday isn't even a name.
By two a.m. Beau had sent thirty-seven messages.
The first half were threats.
Come back tonight and I'll act like nothing happened.
Write a single note for Castellano and I'll make sure you don't see another royalty check.
The middle ones turned to interrogation.
Are you really trying to ruin me.
The last one was short.
Wren. You weren't always like this.
I read it for a long time.
I sent four characters back.
Blocked.
Then I tapped the iOS contact menu and made it so.
The next morning I drove across town and walked into Castellano Music.
It was on the ground floor of a converted gray brick warehouse on the East Nashville side, two blocks past the cidery. Not big. Acoustic-treated, clean board, handwritten lyric sheets pinned all the way down one wall.
Rhett handed me an iced americano.
Beau's people will go first, he said. Get out in front of it.
I know.
He leaned on the corner of the console and opened a folder.
Read your terms. Writer's credit yours. Publishing yours. Splits at the highest tier we can run. The studio takes distribution and production admin. That's it.
I looked up.
You're not worried I'll dry up.
Rhett smiled.
I'm worried you'll write more than I can sing.
It didn't read as a line.
His eyes were level.
I signed.
He pushed a second packet across the desk.
It was Beau's release schedule.
Lead single in seven days. Pre-save in fifteen. Album-of-the-year campaign in thirty.
Rhett tapped the cover.
He's running the schedule like nothing changed.
I flipped to the tracklist.
Twelve tracks. Five credited to Beau. Four credited to Tessa. The other three were factory-pop pickups from a bigger publisher.
I laughed.
What.
The size of it.
Three of Beau's five were old backups of mine — drafts I'd already filed off as not-good-enough-for-Beau and parked in the shared drive months back.
The other two were songs I'd built with deliberate landmines under the hooks.