“Yeah, and doesn’t help with Hugh Hefner and his Playboy Mansion over here, throwing sex parties or whatever.” Freddie thumbed at Jupiter. “It’s not just on Page Six now, TMZ has it, so have all the gossip sites. The pair of you are as bad as each other.”
Jupiter put his beer down on the table, staring hard at Freddie. “I don’t, nor have I ever thrown fucking sex parties. And even if I did, I wouldn’t invite my fucking sister.”
She rolled her eyes. “Whatever. Point is, you two have fucked up and not taken the time to see it from Emerson’s perspective.”
I smirked. Freddie wasn’t easily intimidated, and Jupiter was nothing compared to Cooper when he was in a mood.
Jupiter pointed to Freddie. “Is she always like this?”
All five of us nodded in silent response.
I ran a hand over my face, scratching my beard. The guilt that had been bubbling away over the last two weeks flared up again. Fuck, I was a shitty boyfriend. I hadn’t done enough to protect her; protect her from the press, protect her from that asshole, protect her from me.
I turned to Molly. “Mol, what have you found out? Boys said you were looking?”
She leaned against the counter. “I found out that a few people complained about him at the hospital for harassment, but it’s been hard to pin down.”
“Sounds about right. He’s a sneaky fuck,” snarled Jupiter.
“I did find out that he’s on a contract though.”
“What does that mean?”
“That it’s not a permanent job, that’s why we could get him at Pres for a week, so they won’t want to keep him if he’s tarnished.”
A flicker of a plan emerged in my head.
“Oh. That’s something. Jupe, we need to work on a statement. We can send it to the hospital as well as the press. The lawyers are calling in… when?”
He looked at his watch. “Twenty minutes.”
“Okay, we’ll get their opinion, but I think we need to refute everything that’s been printed, including the fact that he’s a surgeon. We should check and see if it’s okay to tell the hospital about the restraining order. If not, we definitely should tell them anyway; the fact that they’re hiring a doctor who’s had a restraining order for harassment taken out against them isn’t good, right?”
I looked at Molly.
“No, I don’t think they’d be happy with that. Hospitals aren’t big on negative publicity, and they have a shit-ton of lawyers to stop it from happening.”
“Okay, let’s do that, then we’ll speak to Mary too. She can draft what we want to say. In fact, I’ll let her know we’ll call her.”
I pulled out my phone and shot her a text telling her what we wanted to do, asking her to get a head start on a joint statement. I checked my messages when I was done, but there was nothing from Emerson.
“Have you heard from Em?” I asked Jupiter. He pulled out his phone, shaking his head after checking it.
I shot her a text just in case she decided she wanted to talk to me again.
Drew: Baby, I know you’re upset and you have every right to be. But I want you to know I love you so much, and we’re going to fix this XXX
I turned back to Jupiter. “Who’s your manager? They need to be looped in with Mary.”
“It’s Matty McLeish at TBA.”
“Okay, I’ll let her know and she can contact him.”
I got up and started searching through the kitchen drawers.
“Can you get some more beers while you’re up?” Felix called over to me. “Also, what are you looking for?”
“A pen and paper.”
