by Claire Raye
Ava presses a kiss to the corner of my jaw and I let out a low moan. “I think,” she whispers against my ear before sucking on my neck. “That you might need a distraction.”
Her breath is warm against my skin, her mouth soft as she kisses her way down my neck. I feel her hands slip under the bottom of my t-shirt, which she slowly lifts up and over my head.
Opening my eyes, I find her smiling down at me.
“A distraction?” I ask.
Her smile widens as she leans in and kisses my chest. “Yeah.”
“What kind of distraction?”
Ava laughs against my skin, her hands now moving to my belt buckle, making quick work of it and my jeans. She shuffles back on my legs, pushing my jeans and boxer briefs down my legs.
I watch as she stands, pulling them off so I’m now naked on the couch, watching her.
“This kind,” she says, a sexy smile on her face as she slowly peels off her clothes.
“I like this kind,” I say, grinning up at her, my hand sliding onto her hip and pulling her back toward me. Ava shakes her head though, licking her lips as she instead kneels between my legs.
“What about this kind,” she whispers, and I swear it’s so fucking sexy. But then she lowers her mouth to my dick, and it all feels beyond sexy, it feels so fucking good.
“Ava,” I groan, my head falling back onto the couch again. “God, baby.”
I feel her fingers as they circle my cock, her hand working with her mouth as she slowly starts to suck me off. Her mouth is so warm and wet and I’m already so hard. She keeps her movements slow though, teasing me, working me until it’s almost impossible to hold back.
“Baby, come here,” I eventually breathe out, slipping my hands under her arms and pulling her back onto my lap.
“What’s wrong?” she asks, straddling me again.
“Nothing,” I say, smiling. “There is absolutely nothing wrong right now,” I tell her.
She smiles lifting herself up a little as she once again takes my cock in her hand, positioning it against her before she lowers her body onto mine.
“The perfect distraction right,” she whispers, hands on my chest, her lips against mine.
I slide a hand to the back of her neck, holding her to me. “Fucking perfect,” I whisper against her mouth, before silencing anymore talk with a deep kiss.
This time it’s Ava groaning, the sound muffled by our kisses as she starts to rock against my hips, lifting her body and slowly lowering it back onto me. I slip my other hand between us, my fingers finding the exact spot that has her moaning even more.
I feel her body start to move a little faster, her breathing getting harder as I continue kissing her, my hand at the back of her neck and holding her to me.
“Oh god, Lewis,” she groans. “Yes, yes.”
I smile against her mouth as my fingers press a little harder, making her moan again, before her head falls back and she calls out my name, her body clenching around me and sending me right over the edge with her.
Both of us distracted for now.
Chapter Twenty-Six
Ava
Our distraction is short-lived when my phone starts ringing and I glance at the screen to see who’s calling. It’s a number from the U.S., a number I don’t recognize and my first instinct is to ignore it. It’s a reporter trying to get a jump on the story, to be the first one to get to Ava Bristol and get her take on it.
“Don’t answer it, Ava,” Lewis says, but his words aren’t a demand, there’s no bite to them. It’s a request to save our sanity, but I can’t let it go. Something tugs inside me, pulling me to answer it and I do.
“Hello?” I answer, questioning the person on the other end with the same uncertainty that lives within me now.
“Ava?” the voice asks, not using my last name, the first indication I get that this isn’t someone looking for information. The voice is vaguely familiar, but at that moment I can’t place it.
“Yes, this is Ava.”
“Hi, it’s Elizabeth,” she starts, stalling out a second, her voice shaking with each word. “Elizabeth Hutton,” she adds, a nervous laughter peeking through. “Guess I should clarify who I am. You may not even remember me.”
Now it’s me laughing. “Of course I know who you are. Hi, Elizabeth. How are you?”
“Well, I’ve been better obviously.” A bit of self depreciation in her words, and I’m sure she’s questioning every decision she’s made up until this point in her life.
“I’m sure, but please…”
She stops me from continuing as if she’s sucked up some courage, reminding herself why she even called me. “Did Roger Collins of the Guardian get in touch with you?” Her words are uneasy and I can’t tell if it’s because she’s fearful of the media or if it’s because she knows he could be the key to getting her story told.
“He did.”
“He has a real story here and he could help me and all the other women, and men if I’m being honest, get our stories told. I’m not in this to ruin someone’s life, but I’ve watched Noel Robinson ruin careers, demean and abuse people and I can no longer stand by and watch it happen.”
“I understand, but you’re taking on something far bigger than any of us, especially with a freelance journalist. “
“Have you noticed what’s happened?” she asks, not elaborating because we both know what she’s talking about. “He’s making it all disappear. No one wants to touch him. Roger has nothing to lose and everything to gain. Trust me when I say this goes far deeper than some on set meltdowns and my bruised ego.”
I chew my lip, tugging with my teeth as I process her words. I only worked for Noel for a few weeks and most of what I know about him was hearsay, but there were a few things I witnessed that did cause me to take a pause.
“I’m not certain I can help you,” I say, repeating the same thing I told the journalist. “I don’t know much about Noel. He certainly wasn’t pleasant to work for, but he never came after me personally.”
A chuckle leaves her lips, and I imagine her shaking her head at my comment. “He’s coming after you personally right now, Ava. It’s only going to get worse. He will stop at nothing to deflect the attention from himself.” She lets out a sigh, sounding defeated. “He has stories running about me from a party I attended almost thirty years ago. A party where I was connected to the man throwing it, that years later would be accused of having sex with prostitutes. These recent stories claim that I too was a prostitute.”
“I’m sorry,” I respond, at a loss for words, my heart now aching in my chest as she continues.
“I have kids and grandkids, a husband, and a family that are reading these stories and asking me if they’re true and while they’re not, it doesn’t mean the damage isn’t done.” She takes in a ragged breath. “I’ve established a name for myself, my life has been lived and I’ve earned a good living, but there are girls who are being dragged by him, who will never work again. I can’t sit idly by and let it happen. Just think about that. Think about what could’ve happened had you continued to work for him. Ask yourself what happened to the assistant before you.”
Her words now have a bite to them; a convincing quality that makes me stop and wonder if walking away from this is the coward’s way out.
“You won’t ever work in this industry again, Ava. Because you were there when his meltdown happened, you’re on the list whether you like it or not. Do you want him to decide your future?”
She continues to pose a compelling argument, one that I do begin to question. I’m not the kind of person who stands by and watches, who doesn’t stand up for something. And in this case, it feels like my silence stands for complacency.
“Let me talk with my husband,” I respond, knowing that this doesn’t just affect me, but also Lewis. His name is something Noel could go after and by putting myself out there, it puts Lewis at risk for the same retaliation. His family has made a name for themselves and I’d hate to be the reason th
at their reputation is tarnished.
When Lewis hears my words his head whips around and he narrows his eyes as he shakes his head. He’d never request that I run things by him, but in this case, I feel the need to.
Elizabeth and I end our call with me telling her I’ll get back to her soon, and at this point I’m leaning toward helping her as much as I can.
“Ava, baby, you don’t have to run anything by me,” Lewis states, my hard ass husband practically turning to mush when it comes to me.
“But I do, Lewis, because it will affect you. Once I get involved in this, Noel will drag up whatever he can about you.”
“That prick doesn’t scare me. You think he can take down something that took my family decades to build? The Bristol family name is known all over England and I’m not concerned with some misogynistic, narcissist trying to step in and fuck things up. My grandfather didn’t get to where he is now without ruffling a few feathers. Do it, Ava. Make your voice heard.”
“He’s going to make it so I never work in the industry again.”
“So what if he does, but more than likely, if you expose him for the arsehole abuser that he is, you’ll have more jobs than you wanted,” Lewis counters.
I hold my breath for a second and then hesitantly nod my head, wondering if I can really be part of this change.
“Thank you,” I say, leaning in and kissing Lewis gently. When I married him, I knew he was kind and generous, and I never once questioned my decision, but as things play out now, I know without a doubt that I made the best decision of my life.
“So,” I continue, “I have to go over to the set one last time. I’m sure Noel won’t be there, but I’m just giving you heads up. I left some things there and I have to grab some paperwork from Noel’s lawyer. I asked him to leave it in Sadie’s trailer.”
“Do you want me to come with you?”
“No, I’ll be okay. I’ll be quick. I also want to check on Sadie. I’m sure things have gotten worse for her with all this drama.”
“Take care of yourself in this, baby. I don’t want to be worrying about you.” Lewis gives me that simple smile, the one that made me fall in love with him the night I walked into his bar.
“I will.”
Walking back onto the now defunct set, still and quiet, no lights illuminating anything, no hustling of the crew is completely eerie. It feels like one of those abandoned places, like a theme park suspended in time. Everything is as it should be, but the one large piece is missing.
The people.
A shudder ripples up my spine and I shake it off, heading right to Noel’s trailer to grab my things: a phone charger, my laptop case, a pair of sneakers, a makeup bag. It’s all just crap that I could’ve replaced, but it’s the principle of it. I won’t let Noel be in charge of what happens to my things.
My last check and I’m sure a copy of my NDA, are in Sadie’s trailer. After I quit I was instantly contacted by Noel’s lawyers who wanted to “square things up”, which is just code for shutting me up.
The unfortunate part of all this is that Noel holds a seat on the board of one of the largest production companies in the industry, so he holds more power than most directors. He’s part of the company, the company that pays me, the company that deals with HR complaints and the company that’s under Noel’s thumb.
I open the door to the trailer hesitantly, hoping that Noel doesn’t happen to be here, but when I look in, the trailer is empty. It’s not just Noel who is missing, but everything that was in the trailer just the other day. All of my things are in a pile on the small coffee table in the center.
And again, it adds to the weird factor.
I grab my stuff and make my way to Sadie’s trailer knowing she’s here finishing up. It’s her name that’s on the line too and the last thing she needs is everyone else as angry with her as her husband is. In the end she still needs a career, but she certainly doesn’t need Noel.
I knock lightly on her door and wait for her. Unlike our time on the set, her door isn’t unlocked and she doesn’t casually call “come in”. I hear her shuffle about inside and before opening the door she calls out, “Who is it?”
“It’s Ava, Sadie,” I reply, listening as she unlocks the door and quickly swings it open. I step back when I see her, trying not to let the audible gasp leave my mouth.
She’s a petite blonde with tiny features, almost fairy-like with flawless pale skin and full lips, but today she looks beyond exhausted. Her eyes are red-rimmed and swollen along with the tip of her nose, and I’m not even sure it’s possible, but she looks even thinner than she did just the other day. Her blonde hair hangs loosely around her face, looking matted and unwashed.
“You okay?” I ask, not wanting to add my shock over her appearance to her already stressed life.
“What do you think? And yeah, I know I look like shit.” She pulls a hair tie from her wrist, yanking her hair into a high messy bun on the top of her head. “It’s been a rough few days. Between the press and Noel’s lawyers. Oh and Noel himself.”
“I can’t even imagine.”
She scrubs a hand over her face, exhaling hard as she flops down into a desk chair in front of her computer. “A screenplay I wrote just got picked up and the production studio wants me to direct it too.”
“Oh my god, Sadie, that’s great news.”
“Without Noel,” she adds, her eyes hitting me squarely. “It’s not going to happen. There’s no way he doesn’t get to them and ruin this for me.”
“Sadie they want you, not him.”
“We were in negotiations before all this happened and I just found out to today that they want to work with me.”
“So that’s great news. Despite Noel’s,” I flit my hand around, not certain what the right word is to describe this mess, “shit show they still want you.” Sadie laughs a little and for a second I see a glimmer of what she’s really like. But it fades as fast as the sun in winter.
“You don’t understand, Ava. He’s not just difficult to work with. He’s…” She trails off, again her hands run up and down her face. “So one time on set he threw a chair at the wall. The place shook like an earthquake hit it. You’ve seen this first hand, but what you haven’t witnessed and what most people haven’t either is what happens in private. He will do anything it takes to keep people quiet. And he has the resources.”
I heard the whispers before I started working for him. The way he’d use his status, a textbook abuse of power, but no one was ever able to pin anything on him. There were stories of him making the careers of some of the biggest names in Hollywood, but with these stories came the hushed whispers of what was done behind closed doors. As someone’s assistant, it’s not my job to worry about how they conduct their private life.
I choose my words wisely, not wanting Sadie to think I’m turning my back on her, but wanting her to know that she needs to join us.
“I’m planning to work with a journalist to tell these stories about Noel. He already has actresses and people Noel has worked with on board. It’s going to be a long process, but I promise you, he will make all our voices heard.”
“He’s going to come back from this and I can’t be a part of it,” Sadie simply states, her eyes focused on me.
“I understand, and know that no matter what, I’ll be here if you need me.”
Chapter Twenty-Seven
Lewis
After Ava leaves, I gather up my things and head back downstairs. Thank fuck I hired Ed, because I’ve barely worked a full shift in the pub since this shit show started.
I give him a quick rundown of things, asking that he not indulge any media requests or speak to any journalists that might come into the bar and to basically say nothing about Ava or the wanker she used to work for.
He’s cool about the situation, not asking many questions and I can only hope no one comes in and bothers him while I’m gone. This whole situation feels like a ticking time bomb and with so many players involved, it’s hard to
know when it’s going to explode and the shit really hit the fan.
Then I head outside and toward the tube station, reluctantly moving toward the one place I never thought I’d find myself going back to.
Her place isn’t far, but by the time I get there, I’m feeling weirdly nervous, unsure what she’s going to think about me showing up here and hoping she doesn’t read too much into it.
I hold my finger down on the buzzer, the muted sound echoing in the stairwell and speaker near the door.
“Hello?”
“It’s me, Lewis,” I say, swallowing hard.
The door immediately buzzes open and I walk inside, my palms sweaty and my heart pounding in my chest.
I take the single flight of stairs up to her flat, the door already open as Joanna stands there waiting for me.
“Hi!” she says, a huge smile on her face as I reach her landing.
“We need to talk,” I say, not bothering with a greeting, in no mood to indulge her bullshit or have her think I’m here for anything other than to ask her to shut the fuck up.
“Sure, come in,” she says, opening the door wider and gesturing for me to come inside.
I pause, not wanting to go inside but not wanting to have this conversation in the stairwell either. It’s been a long time since I’ve been here, but I remember enough about her neighbors to know that this is not something I want made public.
“I won’t bite,” she says, as if sensing my apprehension.
I roll my eyes, before stepping inside her flat. She closes the door behind me, turns and asks, “Tea?”
I stop, shoving my hands into the front pockets of my jeans. “This isn’t a social call, Joanna,” I say, shaking my head.
She shrugs. “You can still have tea.”
Ignoring her, I ask, “Why did you speak to the press?”
“What?” she asks, her eyes wide as though she’s feigning surprise.
“The press,” I repeat, fixing her gaze with mine. “Why did you speak to them. Why did you tell them things about me and my family, about Ava and…”
