The 47-year-old singer spoke about her friendship with Payne, who shockingly passed away after falling from a third-story hotel balcony in Buenos Aires, Argentina. In a quiet moment of candor,

she explained that their last exchange was gentle and ordinary, the kind of check-in you only realize mattered later. “I’d known he was in Argentina. It was just chit-chat and pretty light,” she told The Times about the messages.

Scherzinger, who met Payne in 2010 on The X Factor UK, learned about his death shortly before taking the stage for her Broadway show, Sunset Blvd, for which she also won a Tony Award for Best Leading Actress in a Musical. The timing could not have been harder. She still walked out and delivered the performance, clinging to a simple mantra that she has leaned on through

See Full Page