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"Heath, have you seen the video going viral?" Her shrill voice has less confidence than normal. This has shaken up even my normally unflappable manager. ’"Yes, can't you fucking stop it?" I push the words out through clenched teeth, my jaw so tight I feel like I could crack a tooth.
"It's too late, it's everywhere already." She sighs. "I hate to ask, but you know I have to so I can deal with the backlash. Is it true?" She sounds just as mortified as I feel. My manager thinks it's true. If the woman I have known for ten years thinks I'm capable of something like this, what hope do I have to convince anyone I didn't do it?
I glance over to Amelia. She hasn't moved, but I can see the way her phone shakes in her hand. She was already on edge tonight. These past few weeks have been one thing after another. First the break-in, then the person watching us, then Elara turning up at her work. It's gone from bad to worse, and she has held it together for me. But she doesn't look like she's holding it together anymore; she looks like she is about to snap.
"No, it's not fucking true," I yell into the phone, and Amelia jumps, her eyes shifting to look at me like she has just remembered I'm in the room. I meet her gaze, hoping I can convince her. "I have met with the girl a handful of times for interviews and that's it. She's fucking lost her mind and is about to destroy my life," I roar into the phone, getting more frustrated by the second. How can one person spinning shit into a camera on their phone from their living room cause such mayhem? The world has gone fucking mad. "I have to go. I don't care what you have to do to fix this, Della. Fucking fix it," I demand, disconnecting the call.
Amelia's eyes are glassy, sadder than I have ever seen them, and I reach for her again, needing to comfort her in whatever way she will let me. But she pulls away, standing quickly to get away from me. "You should go back to LA," she says with certainty in her voice.
I stand as well, trying to gain some sort of control here. I feel like my dreams are slipping away from me in slow motion, and there is fuck all I can do to stop them. "Millie, I..."
She places a hand to my chest, as if to stop me from getting any closer to her. "Go fix this mess," she cuts in. I can see it, her walls are back up. She's emotionally shutting me out.
"I want to stay with you, make sure you’re okay and you're safe. You and the kids are the only things that are important to me now. I don't care about anything else," I try pleading with her. I can't lose her again.
Her tortured eyes meet mine, and my heart sinks. "I need some space, Heath. I can't do this right now. You need to go back to LA." Her voice breaks as a tear slips down her cheek. She stares into my eyes with such intensity, I can tell she is trying to hold onto whatever scrap of self-preservation she has left. And I gape back, unable to agree with her. The last thing I want right now is to be separated from her and the kids. She's going to need me more than ever when the press gets hold of this shitstorm. "Please, if you care about me at all, you will respect my boundaries and do as I ask." She can no longer hold back, and tears stream down her face.
All I want to do is hold her close and take the pain away from her. But I know it's too late for that. "If that's what you want," I say, defeated.
She looks at me with more determination this time. "It's what I need." She cries, and more tears follow her words. "This world of fame is... it's insane, and it's not for me. I can't do this, Heath."
"I love you, Millie." I kiss her cheek, and she lets me, but that's it. No kiss in return, no warmth in her eyes.
"I know," she says sadly.
It took me months to get her to really open up to me and give me her all, trust me completely, and to know I can be the man for her after everything she went through in the past, but I can already feel how this is her shutting me out again. And I can't even blame her. I know how bad this looks. I’m surprised she's not kicking me while screaming her head off. I can only hope that deep down, even though she has had this happen to her in the past with someone else, she knows this isn't me. There is no way I would do something like this to her.
But I know when she says she can’t do it, they’re not just empty words. I can see what the past month has done to her. It's torn her apart again, and it's going to take more than just her believing me about this latest crisis for us to be okay.
CHAPTER TWENTY-THREE
AMELIA
Icheckthescreenon our new security system and see it's only Jasmine, so I open the door.
She's dressed for work in one of those fitted pencil skirts she rocks so well and a button-down blouse. Her cute baby bump is showing even more now. It might be time I fixed her up with some new work clothes she can adjust with her growing belly, because she will be lucky to get another wear out of this skirt without popping the zipper. I hurry her in and close the door, hoping we avoided the prying eyes.
"What are you doing here?"
"I figured you might need this?" She holds up a takeout coffee cup and a paper bag.
"Thank you." I smile weakly, taking the treat from her and peeking inside the bag to see an apple-cinnamon Danish. My favorite. I close my eyes and inhale the spicy scent, letting it take me away from my hell for just a second.
Jasmine wraps an arm around me. "Are you okay?" she asks, and I hear the concern in her voice.
After she messaged me last night, I didn't even message her back. I couldn't. I asked Heath to leave then sat on the floor of my shower crying until my tears ran dry. Then I wrapped myself in a towel and hopped into bed and fell into an exhausted damp mess of a sleep where I kept waking in a hot sweat every time I would drift off to sleep.
"No, I'm not," I admit, knowing there is no point in hiding my feelings from my sister. She can read me way too easily for that. And right now, she's here, and I need someone to talk to. Someone who can stop the constant loops of crazy thoughts in my brain before they unravel me completely.
We walk through to the front room, and I plonk myself down on the sofa, taking a bite of the Danish. Maybe this will be my life from now on. I can just hide out away from the prying eyes of the media, getting friends and family to deliver me pastries. I won't have to leave the house again, all my problems solved. "Shouldn't you be at work?"
Jasmine sits down next to me carefully; I would say she is trying not to split her skirt. "I was on my way there but couldn't stop thinking about you." She looks at me with a guilty expression. "The story is all over the radio."
I sigh. I knew it would be, but I have been too afraid to turn it on after seeing the TV highlights and newspaper headlines first thing this morning.
"I called my first couple of clients and moved them to later in the week, blamed the pregnancy. I thought you might need me more this morning." She smiles sympathetically.
"Thank you for coming. I don't know what I need. I have been walking around in a daze since I got out of bed. Luckily Connor was all over it and fixed himself and Ruby a bowl of cereal. Then I told them they could stay home from school because I couldn't leave the house to take them. They’re in their rooms on their devices, so we need to keep our voices down. I didn't want them to hear from friends or something that the man they have grown to adore is front-page news for cheating on me. Just like their father." I whisper the last part, it's too hard to say out loud. And I don't want them to hear it. They would be devastated to think we're not going to be a family. This is exactly why I was so worried in the first place. I will get over it eventually, but this will crush them.
