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My brother’s eyes widen, and Emily looks down at the table for the first time. My father, however, smiles, crossing his hands in front of him, leaning on the table just enough to be heard only by the four of us.
“Do you want that money, Evan? You have two choices. You either grow some balls and come back to work for me,” he looks away from me to Emily, “or you give me a night with your ‘colleague.’ One night and the whole trust fund will be yours,” he concludes, looking straight into her eyes.
The silence that falls around the table is almost deafening. Aaron and I are both stunned by his proposal. I look at the woman next to me who is staring back at my father with none of the disgust my brother and I exude, as though she’s used to dealing with such people. A shiver runs down my spine, and it’s not a pleasant feeling.
Aaron is the first to break the silence. “Dad, enough is enough. This is disgusting even by your standards.”
“Why? Didn’t you have the same thought? I’m sure Evan’s already tasted her. After all, it’s a family vice,” he snaps, giving us a glimpse of his characteristic arrogance and presumption.
“No, that’s something you and Grandpa do. We’re normal people who treat women like human beings, and we keep our dick in our pants when they don’t want to see it,” my brother replies sternly.
I get up from the table, grabbing Emily’s hand. “You’re the most disgusting person I’ve ever known. Dare to touch her—or even think another filthy thought about her—and I swear I’ll break your neck,” I hiss, looking him straight in the eye.
The smug smile tells me he knows he hit his mark and sank me with a well-aimed single blow. This is what he was waiting for: to find my weakness and bite down on the jugular. That’s why I didn’t want Emily with me—when it comes to her, I become irrational and ruin everything. I knew the effort to get at that trust fund would be huge, but I’d hoped to at least play my father’s game. Tonight, I didn’t even make it on the field.
***
The car ride to the hotel is filled with a silence so tense it almost seems to suck the air around us. I leave the elevator and head to the room without waiting for Emily, who walks briskly behind me. I open the door wide, see her follow me, and close it behind her.
“I don’t feel like talking, Emily,” I say in a low voice as I untie my tie, pull it off, and drop it on the bed.
“Are you okay?”
“I asked you for one thing. Just one. And instead, you came to meet the only person I want far from my life. I didn’t even want him to know of your existence.” My angry words make their way up my throat, scratching it, hurting it, making me physically feel the emotional pain my heart is enduring.
I turn to see her with her hands resting on her hips, her face angry. “You think he’s the first man who ever propositioned me? Do you know how many filthy pigs want to get their hands on me? I go to bed with much worse men than your father in exchange for gifts and favors. Do you think he intimidates me? It takes a lot more to scare me.”
I don’t even want to imagine how many men she’s gone to bed with, not because I think she’s a slut but because they’ve had what I’ve wanted since meeting her, but can’t. I don’t want to know how many others have tasted those lips, that body, and enjoyed her moans and laughter after making love to her. I don’t want to know how many have enjoyed her intelligent conversations, lying naked on the couch and watching TV while it snows outside. I don’t want to know.
“Why? Would you really accept his proposal?” It’s more of a challenge than a desire for an honest answer. I’m not ready to accept what she might say to me.
She shrugs and smiles at me sadly. “What’s the difference between Theodore Wilson and your father? If this allows me to get you exactly what you want, what you came here for, even at the cost of being humiliated by a despicable human being, why not do it? You know I use sex as a bargaining chip. It’s no surprise. Why not use it to help someone I really care about for once? You came here to help your friends, who are also my friends. Why can’t I do that?”
“It’s not the same!” I shout. The bile in my mouth almost makes me vomit.
“It’s exactly the same, Evan, but you have blinders on, and you can’t see your way out of the hole you dug for yourself. Coming here, you knew what your father would say. You put aside your pride and fell at the feet of the one person you don’t want to see again for the rest of your life. But you did it for them. To me, he’s just a man like any other who uses his power to get what he wants. I don’t care about his feelings, I don’t care what he thinks of me. So, if I can help someone I do care about more than anything else, why is that so wrong to you?”
She’s standing so close I reach out and caress her arm, tempted to draw her in toward me. But she doesn’t move. She keeps looking me straight in the eyes as my fingers run over her skin. I want to lie down with her on the bed and get lost in her until tonight’s meeting evaporates from my mind.
I get closer, rest my forehead on hers, and close my eyes while my fingers slide over her arms. I feel her skin break into goosebumps, and I want to taste it, bite it, and meld with it.
“Evan, give me one reason why I can’t do it.” Her voice is so hard I step back and study her face.
I can’t give her an explanation because I’d have to tell her everything my father took away from me. I’d have to tell her that she is a fundamental part of my life that he has not yet managed to get his hands on.
She waits a few moments for my answer, then turns around and leaves, angrier than me. I’m left alone with a rage that shows no sign of leaving my body and the undeniable feeling that everything is slipping from my hands. Her words echo in my head, settling little by little until they creep into my brain.
She would do it for me, to give me a chance to make up for my mistakes. She would do it for the Jailbirds, to free them forever from this nightmare. Her selflessness is extraordinary. But I can’t accept it. Not at the cost of losing the part of her heart that connects me to her. Every man she has ever been with pales in comparison to the thought of my father’s filthy hands on her skin.
I expected the offices of the country’s oldest broadcasting company in downtown Los Angeles to be upscale and stylish. I’m so used to the shiny skyscrapers in New York, I hadn’t imagined a modest five-story building next to the studios. Perhaps the dim light of this deserted place late in the evening, not even three hours since our missed dinner, makes it look plainer than it really is. Sure, the complex includes two entire neighborhoods dotted with warehouses converted into studios surrounded by high walls and twenty-four-hour security gates. But they don’t reflect the personality of Evan’s father that I saw.
There were at least forty thousand dollars of clothes and shoes at that table, just on the Steel family. I certainly didn’t expect to be walking on a plain concrete sidewalk bordered by palm trees on one side and a wall of fake Roman columns on the other. Though when I called one of my former college classmates who moved here, he assured me that Evan’s father, Aaron Steel Sr., likes to hang out here. He likes all the actresses and production assistants he can get his eyes on and, occasionally, his hands.
When I ask the security guard about him and drop my name, telling him I wish to meet his boss, the gates open at the speed of light. I take the stairs to the top floor of the anonymous sand-colored building adorned only with plants by the windows at each landing. I need to get rid of the nervousness before meeting the slimy man who made my skin crawl as soon as his lips touched my hand. The mere thought of his words to Evan makes me simmer with anger. How do you treat your son like that? He deserves to be taken for all he’s worth and left to rot like the scum he is.
I knock on the door with his name engraved on a massive gold plaque.
“Come in,” the man’s voice thunders on the other side.
