by Stacy-Deanne
“I was so happy to get an offer, you know?” She stood against the wall. “I felt so hopeless, and I thought this was my last shot at modeling. Don’t blame, Lessie. She told me to send it to you, but I thought everything was straight.”
“It’s not exactly a bad thing being in a HuMac film.” He smiled. “This thing could be huge, and you might end up getting more opportunities in movies. If so, you won’t even need Iris International.”
“I hate someone forcing me to do something I don’t want to do.”
Abraham moved aside as a woman with a coffee cup breezed through. “You really don’t want to do the movie? Or is this you not wanting to give into Macintosh because of pride?”
“Pride.” Gabrielle got off the wall, pulling at her black blazer. “Momma didn’t raise no pushover. If I have to be in the movie, so be it. I’m not going to just roll over and give Hugh the win though. I’m going to play the game first.”
“What?”
“Hey, HuMac?” Gabrielle stomped into his office.
“Yes?” Hugh sat up straight as his lawyer drifted from the desk.
Gabrielle stood tall. “Are you a fair man?”
“I like to think I am.” He lit a cigarette. “Why? Want to make a counteroffer?”
“You played basketball in college, right? Did you know I played in high school?”
He wrapped his lips around the cigarette, his gaze roaming her body. “No, that’s one thing about you I didn’t know.”
“Don’t let the pretty face fool you.” She held her waist. “I was one of the best point guards my school ever had.”
“Are you challenging me to a basketball game?” He stood, shifting the cigarette to the other side of his mouth. “I don’t think you want to do that, honey.”
“You bet your ass I do.”
“What are you doing, Gabby?” Abraham asked.
“I’m playing the game.” She glared at Hugh. “You and me, one-on-one for four quarters.”
He laughed. “You serious?”
“Dead serious. What’s the matter? Scared to get beat by a girl?”
“Hm.” He took the cigarette from his mouth and gestured to her with it. “I hate to make a girl cry but that’s what’s going to happen if we play b-ball and I put that ass whipping on you.”
“Let’s play a game for my freedom.”
He sat on the corner of the desk. “Your freedom?”
“If I win, I get to stay with Iris International, but I don’t have to be in your movie. If you win, I be in your movie.” She smiled. “What do you say?”
“You seem confident.”
“Oh, I am.”
“Two point guards duking it out, huh?” He sucked his teeth. “You’re such a fascinating woman. Never cease to amaze.”
“Wait until we get on the court, and I’ll show you amazement.”
“It’s a deal.” He laughed, slapping his palms. “You win, you get what you want and if I win, I get what I want.” He put his hand out. “Let’s shake on it.”
“Deal.” She took his hand.
He caressed hers. “Are there any other incentives I get if I win?”
She jerked her hand back.
“Since this is your challenge, name the time and the place.”
“Tonight on the court at your place.”
“I can’t tonight.” He squinted. “I have plans.”
She got jealous, wondering if he meant Sierra.
“Tomorrow night then?”
“That’s fine with me. Seven o’clock?”
“I’ll be there.” Gabrielle looked him up and down. “But be warned, I won’t take it easy on you.”
He smirked, getting off the desk. “I hope not.”
Gabrielle left the office.
“Gabby?” Abraham caught up with her. “What are you doing?”
“I’m taking care of business.” She stopped at the elevator and pushed the button. “My way.”
****
“Miss Sierra?” A jittery Yuricema hurried inside the bedroom, interrupting Sierra’s nap.
“Jesus.” Sierra lay in the soft queen-sized bed, immersed in cinnamon-brown sheets. “What is it?”
Ian charged inside before Yuricema could answer.
“You happy now, Sierra?” He lunged at the bed, with the threat of murder in his eyes.
“What...” She gripped the sheet. “What’s going on, Dad?”
He trekked to her side of the bed. “Don’t act innocent with me.”
The backdrop of the giant tree graphic on her chocolate wall brought an angelic aura to him despite his anger.
“Why, Sierra?” He punched his palm. His hands had always been small for a man his size. “Why do you have to ruin everything?”
“Dad.” She lacked energy thanks to the sleeping pills she’d taken thirty minutes earlier. “Can you slow down?” She ran her hand through her messed hair. “You’re confusing the hell out of me. I was sleeping.” Her eyelids weighed a hundred pounds. “You know I get disoriented when I wake up. Give me a minute to get myself together.”
“Get yourself together? Hell that would take the rest of my life. I’ll be dead before that happens.”
“Dad, please.” The right side of her head throbbed. “I’m not feeling well.” She sipped from the cool glass of juice and placed it beside her pill bottle and tissues.
“What the hell are you doing sleeping in the middle of the day? Join us in the real world, Sierra. Where the responsible people live.”
She groaned, shielding her face with her hands. “Stop shouting. My head’s killing me.”
“Drunk?”
“How could you say that?” She kicked the sheet off, revealing her pajama bottoms. “No, I’m not drunk. I’m tired and stressed.”
“For what?”
“Probably because of being treated like shit everywhere I go and the media making fun of me every minute.”
“Is that why you wanna take things out on me?” He snatched a pill container off her table. “What the hell is this?”
“Sleeping pills. My therapist suggested them. I’m so stressed, and I have so much anxiety I can’t sleep. She wants me on anxiety meds but I refused.”
“How often do you take these pills?” He read the bottle.
“When I can’t sleep.” She scratched her head. “Which is a lot.”
“I don’t think the answer is going from one addiction to another.” He tossed the bottle on the table.
“I’m not addicted. Everything I do isn’t an addiction.”
“Ruining things seem to be.” Ian stomped around the large room, the walls and floors accentuated by various browns and neutrals. “I don’t get you. What is your problem? Let’s figure it out now so this shit stops happening.”
She adjusted her eyes, concentrating on the off-white furniture, sprinkled with gold and metal accents. “What did I do now?”
“You know.” He stabbed his finger at her as if she were still a child. “It’s one thing to be manipulative, but it’s another to lie about it. Getting Dash to threaten me about the movie. What’s your grand scheme with that?”
She massaged her aching temples. “What the hell are you talking about?”
“Oh, we’re pretending now?” He held a twisted grin. “He came by my place and told me he would not do Fatal Honor unless you try out for the leading lady.”
CHAPTER EIGHTEEN
“What?” Sierra got out of bed too fast, the effect of the pills going straight to her head. “Whoa.” She sat. “Dash quit the movie? That can’t be right.”
“Well, one thing’s for sure, Sierra.” Ian smiled. “You’re a damn good actress.”
“Dad, I’m not lying. I don’t know what’s going on.”
“Bullshit. You put him up to this. You’re trying to ruin my movie because things aren’t going right for you.”
“I didn’t do a damn thing.” She eased off the bed. “Is everything my fault, Dad? I’d never tell Dash to pull out of the mov
ie. Why would I want to ruin things for you?”
“Because you hate me.” Silver sprigs of hair popped out from behind his ears.
“I don’t hate you. I wonder if I can say the same for you though.” She lowered her head, fighting tears. “What did I ever do that was so wrong? Why do you resent me so much?”
“You destroy everything. Whether you do it on purpose or not.”
“I didn’t tell Dash to go to you. I’m pissed myself that he did it because it’s just another thing you’re blaming me for.” She followed him as he wandered around the room. “You got to believe me.”
“I don’t.” He stopped with his back turned to her, glancing over his shoulder. “I no longer believe anything that comes out your mouth.”
“Just tell me what I did for you to be so angry at me. What the fuck did I do to you, Dad?”
He remained stiff.
“Look at me.” She grabbed his arm and he faced her. “I don’t deserve how you treat me. I know I disappointed you, but I’m human.”
“You don’t just disappoint, you ruin lives including your own.” He marched to the opposite side of the room. “I’m hurt goddamn it. I want to have a daughter I can be proud of. That’s all I’ve ever wanted. All the hit movies and the fame mean nothing without that. Your acting was the one thing that made me proud.”
She zipped back to those melancholy moments in her childhood when she’d sit alone for hours, wondering how she could get closer to him.
“You were never proud of me when I was a kid. Shit, you never paid me any attention because unless you could impress people with mom or me then it didn’t matter. We were trinkets to you, Dad. That’s why mom drank herself to death. She couldn’t live up to the pressure you put on her. No matter what she did, she wasn’t ever good enough.”
“Shut your mouth.” He yanked his hands out his pockets. “Don’t dare bring your mother into this. She died from alcoholism and depression. It has nothing to do with you.”
“It has everything to do with me.” She shook her head. “Dad, how come with mom you accept alcoholism as a disease but with me I’m just some drunk?”
He turned away again.
“That’s the point. You hold me to standards you don’t expect from anyone. I’ll never be perfect and you shouldn’t expect that.”
“I can expect it,” he yelled. “You’re my daughter and you had everything you could ever want. You had all the opportunities in the world and what did you do?”
“I never had a father. I had a manager and a mentor. Someone to tell me how to be a good actress and how to go to auditions. I never had a father who held me when I was upset or who spent time with me outside films. I didn’t even want to be an actress, but you pushed me into it.”
“Blame me for wanting you to have the best—”
“Stop it.” She jumped. “This isn’t about blame. We need to get past this.”
“I thought my dream for you had come true. I had such high hopes for you, Sierra.”
She slumped to the bed.
“I wanted you to win an Oscar.” He sniffled. “That would’ve meant the world, but you ruined it. You ruined it all.”
“I’m an alcoholic, and maybe you can’t deal with that because Mom was too but, it is what it is. We can’t keep going on like this. I need my father more than ever. I don’t have anyone else.”
“Ask yourself why.”
She sighed.
“I’ve done all I can do for you, Sierra. I’m not putting my neck in the noose for you anymore.”
“You can’t do that.” She stood, hitting the bed. “You can’t give up on me. I’m your daughter. You can’t just turn your back on me and act as if I don’t exist. How dare you? I need you to hold me and to love me. I need you to tell me it’s okay for me to make mistakes.” Tears blinded her. “I need you to love me no matter what I do.” She grabbed his shirt. “I’m your daughter no matter what.”
He stumbled back, gaze on the carpet. “Clean up this mess you created.”
“I didn’t tell Dash to go to you.”
“He says he’s in love with you. I wish I saw in you what he sees.”
“Don’t say that.” Sadness muffled her words. “I love you, Dad. Please don’t turn your back on me.”
“Like I said...” He exhaled, nostrils flaring. “Get Dash to stay on for the film or that’s it, Sierra. We won’t be anything to each other in my eyes.”
“You don’t mean that.”
He left without another word.
CHAPTER NINETEEN
“Get out of my way.” Sierra pushed the butler and tore into Dash’s living room, greeted by vanilla potpourri. “What the hell did you do?”
“Sierra?” Lowering his phone, Dash sat on the tan couch, barricaded by feather throw pillows. “What’s going...?”
She took his cell and rejected the call.
“Hey. That was USA Today. I was doing an interview.”
“I don’t give a fuck.” She threw the phone across the room, hitting his autographed photo of Kobe Bryant.
“Sierra.” He ran and got his phone then straightened the photo on the wall. “Kobe gave me this for my birthday.”
“What’s going on in that warped mind of yours, Dash?”
“Excuse me?” He walked across the onyx carpet, which fit perfectly with the red oak furniture and dark lavender walls.
“Where do you get off pulling out of the movie?”
“I didn’t pull out.” He passed her and stood by the wooden hand carved coffee table. “I told him I wanted you to get a shot to try out or I would pull out.”
“Why in hell would you do that?”
He sat on the couch and got a jellybean from the glass dish. “Because you deserve a shot. Isn’t this what you were crying about in the parking lot that day?”
“I didn’t want you to threaten him!”
“I won’t apologize for helping you.”
“Helping me? All you’ve done is caused me problems. Dad’s blaming me for this.”
He chewed, eyebrows raised.
“You’ve fucked everything up. He thinks I’m manipulating things and want to ruin his movie.”
“What?” He sucked the candy.
“Why would you do this?” She paced on four-inch pumps. “As if I don’t have enough to deal with? You told him about us?”
“Yeah.” His face brightened. “Does it score any brownie points with you?”
“That you told a man who’d wanna hide you were with me as much as you? No.”
Dash grimaced.
“As if I’m not stressed enough, you pull this.”
He walked from around the table, approaching her. “You told me to prove my love for you. So I did.”
“All you’ve done is made my father hate me more.”
“He doesn’t hate you.” He touched her shoulder, and she swatted his hand away. “I wanted to make you happy.”
“Big fail, Dash.”
“I was showing you I loved you.”
“I don’t want you to do this.” She stood back, shaking her head. “Please go back to my father and say you’ll do the movie.”
“You deserve a shot.”
“I don’t want to be in the movie if they don’t want me in it. I want peace between my dad and I, and I won’t get it with you doing stuff like this.”
“Sounds like he cares more about the movie than his own daughter.”
“Dash, please.” She rubbed the bridge of her nose. “If you don’t agree to do the film, he’s gonna hate me even more than he does now.”
He poked his lips out and nodded. “Okay. I’ll do it. If that’s what you want.”
“I want for you to stay out my life.” She raced to the doorway. “I don’t need anyone fucking it up more than I already have.”
“I did this because I love you. We belong together.” He rushed to the doorway. “I won’t give up on us, Sierra. I did this because I love you!”
She sprinted through t
he hall, purse swinging on her arm.
****
The Following Night
“What are you gonna do, huh?” Hugh bounced the basketball with domineering ability as he rocked back and forth, attempting to trip up Gabrielle’s defense. “You think you got me?” With his back into her, he bumped her, forcing her closer to the basket. “You don’t know nothing about this, Gabrielle.”
“Less yacking.” Gabrielle remained in a determined, wide stance, swinging her arms. “More balling.”
“More balling, huh?” Sweat flew from Hugh’s drenched hair. “Take this then.” He did a swift turn; she lunged left, blocking his shot.
“Nice try.” She stayed on his back. “Gotta do better than that.”
Hugh turned right, blocked by Gabrielle’s defense again. “I like your moves.”
She grinned, aroused at his toned arm bumping her breasts. “I got more.”
“I’d love to see more too.” He zipped right then when she followed; he spun around in the opposite direction and shot the ball, hitting a two-pointer.
The stopwatch sounded on Ashleigh’s phone. “That’s it!” She sat Indian-style on the sideline. “Hugh wins the game.”
“Ow!” He howled. “In your face, Gabrielle.”
“Offensive foul! Ashleigh?” Gabrielle marched toward her with her arms out. “That was a foul, and you didn’t call it.”
“No, it wasn’t.” Ashleigh munched gum.
“Yes, it was.” Gabrielle hit her thighs. “Didn’t you see his elbow?”
“Stop whining. You lost.” Hugh got his towel off the sideline couch, sweat stains covering his tank and the center of his sweats. “You lost fair and square, hot shot.” He held his waist, pecs heaving. “You challenged me and it bit you in the ass. I win by two.”
Gabrielle whipped her ponytail across her shoulder. “Fine.”
“So...” Hugh tossed her a chilled water bottle. “I guess I got my leading lady.”
“He’s right, Gabs.” Ashleigh stood, straightening her denim skirt in the back. “I got the final score right here on my phone.” She showed it to her. “He wins by two points in the last five seconds of the game. You lost.”
“A deal’s a deal.” Hugh hooked the towel around his neck and extended his hand to Gabrielle. “Are you accepting defeat or not?”
