The reminder of all I’ve lost brings a lump to my throat as Emmy soothingly strokes my hair.
“I wanted to bejustlike him. Everything I did was to please him, and now…I feel so fucking lost. Like I don’t know who I’m supposed to be now.”
“You don’t need to know that right away, Ford. We can figure it out.” She kisses my forehead, and I feel the world slowly making sense again now that we’re together. “The universe has a plan for us all. Trust her. She knows what she’s doing…”
That was when I realized I hadn’t left my home in Texas.
I’d found my home in Emerson Hart.
She’d been home all along, and I’d simply been too blind to see it.
CHAPTER 11
FORD
Followingthe steps toward a reconciliation of sorts, I’d thought today would have been smooth sailing.
As I look around my current surroundings, I can’t help but feel like a naïve fool. How could any day involving Lawson Wilde be referred to as smooth sailing?
The asshat himself is currently all over Emmy like a rash, and the reshoot hasn’t even started filming yet.
His excessively loud laughter reverberates through the dressing room as Emmy’s tinkling giggle follows suit. “Law, you are theworst!”
She swats at the hand he’s reached out to place on her knee, sending him a smile that makes her eyes twinkle, belying her words of beratement before she sits up straight for the makeup artist tending to her. My eyes remain fixated on that fucking hand as it continues to linger on her bare flesh, his thumb rubbing small circles around her kneecap.
Rage bubbles just beneath the surface, and I try to get a handle on my usually calm emotions, yet I can’t help but think of how much pleasure it would give me to break each of his fingers.
One. By. One.
The visualization is enough to settle my simmering anger, and as though he’s heard my thoughts, Lawson moves away from Emmy, departing for his own dressing room with a parting wink.
I watch him leave with a dark smirk.
That’s right, asshat. Get gone!
“They make a great couple, don’t they? So damncute!”
I don’t need to glance to my left to know the owner of the voice is Emmy’s agent, Beck. Instead, I simply nod, unable to keep the deadpan tone from my voice.
“Mmhmm. The cutest.”
As I feel his eyes on me, I give Emmy my full attention, the tension in my chest unfurling when she laughs at something a newly recovered Hayley has whispered in her ear.
“I don’t mean to overstep, Mr. Holloway?—”
Sensing where this is headed, I shift around to meet his eyes, ensuring that my own face gives nothing away. “If youknowyou don’t mean to overstep, Mr. Reynolds, then why else would you have prefaced your sentence that way?”
Beckham’s eyes narrow ever-so-slightly, and I can physicallyseehim debating whether to continue until he speaks at last. “You left her in pieces once before.”
His words are a blade straight through my fractured heart, and he twists it sharply when he continues. “Do your job. Uncover the person who’s behind the B and E and get the fuck out of her life because I won’t stand back and watch you bring her to ruin for a second time?—”
“Ford?” Hayley’s meek voice cuts Beckham off as we swing our eyes to her. “Em wanted to speak with you before shooting begins…”
Hayley trails off uncomfortably, clearly aware that she interrupted something between me and the agent, until I nodonce, sending her a grateful half-smile before striding toward a lonesome Emmy.
She’s sitting cross-legged in her makeup chair, ready for shooting to begin as she scrolls through her cell phone. Her simple black leggings and plain white tank top tell me she’s about to reshoot the characters' meet-cute.
“You needed to see me?”
