by Nicole Deese
Only, my dreams were already coming true, and strangely enough, none of them had to do with hosting a TV show in Hollywood for disadvantaged youth. Not now that I’d been given the chance to be part of the real thing, a real program that transformed real lives and offered real hope, support, and connection.
My dreams were here—with Silas and the kids and this program.
“I’m sorry, Ethan. But I have to turn it down. I’m needed here; it’s where I want to be.” Firm in my decision, I took a step back, only to have him advance two.
“Molly, I know you’ve been in a different headspace as of late. I get it, I do. You needed a break. But this whole enlightenment thing you’ve been experiencing, it’s really just fame fatigue. It’s what happens when you work in the spotlight for so long without taking a step back for self-care. I realize now that I should have been more attentive to you, but I promise everything will be different this time around. Better. Whatever you need, I’ll make it happen for you.”
My hands grew damp, sticky with a perspiration I only felt when trapped. “I can’t go.”
“Of course you can,” he cooed. “I’ll help you every step of the way. And don’t worry about your hair. You’ll have access to the best extensions and stylists Hollywood has to offer, as well as one of the most renowned celebrity therapists in the business. She’s an expert in these issues, and she’ll help you work through everything you’re struggling with here.”
“No, stop. You’re not hearing me, Ethan. I don’t want a Hollywood stylist or a therapist.” How had this conversation taken a turn down this road? Confusion threatened to squeeze out all rational thought. “My life is here. It’s the only place I want to be.”
“You can have Val back, just like old times, but better.” He pulled out his phone, held it between us like an olive branch. “I’ll call her right now in front of you and double her pay, tell her she has a job working with you again if you’re willing to leave all this behind and get your priorities straight again. Come back with me to Seattle tonight. We can talk everything out there before heading to LA next week. You’re so much more than this, babe. Everyone at Cobalt knows it. It’s why we’ve let so much slide. Your missed posts for our biggest sponsors, your lack of livestreams, your . . . poor judgment calls.” His eyes lingered on my hair. “But your potential remains like nothing we’ve ever seen. That record-breaking reach you had last spring, those numbers we saw with your last sponsored campaign, your latest live—you’re at nearly nine hundred thousand followers. We can triple that when you take on this show. Your net worth will be ten times what you made last year. Ten times, Molly! You just need a reset, some time away to clear your head and get back in the game.” He tapped his phone screen with his finger and clicked into his contacts, scrolling down to Val’s name. “Come on, Molly. Don’t let some fame fatigue cost you your entire career. Or Val’s happiness.”
Vivid memories swarmed my thoughts, of the highs he spoke of, of the unprecedented paychecks and the VIP parties and the constant goal planning for bigger and bolder opportunities to be the best in my industry. . . .
I blinked, only to refocus on the phone screen in his hand, on Val’s contact name.
My mind flipped back to her text. Her pronouncement.
“Val doesn’t work for you anymore. She quit.”
Ethan lowered his phone, a flicker of distress crossing his features momentarily. I didn’t know the why behind her decision, of course, but for Val to quit a secure job as a single mother meant she’d had a darn good reason to jump ship.
And I was likely looking at him.
Ethan recovered quickly. “We both know she’d come back in a heartbeat if she knew she could work with you again.”
“Molly? You all right?” At the sound of Silas’s voice coming up the trail toward us, my insides became equal parts relief and dread. In a matter of seconds, my two worlds would collide into one, without proper warning or preparation.
Silas took each porch step with an authority I’d come to anticipate, his taut torso flexing under his black T-shirt. Despite the uncharacteristic dirt smudges on the knees of his blue jeans and the one swept across his right cheekbone, I’d never been more attracted to him than in this moment. He slipped off his grass-covered work gloves and extended a hand to Ethan. “Hello, I’m Silas Whittaker. And you are?”
Ethan looked from Silas to me, his eyebrow cocked, as if waiting for me to dismiss the intruder at my side. But that was never going to happen.
“This is a private business matter,” Ethan said coldly.
But Silas shifted his stance and pressed a hand to my lower back, silently drawing my attention to his face, to his eyes that swore an oath of loyalty without ever speaking a word. “Would you like me to stay, Molly?”
“Yes, I would.” I stepped closer to his side, grateful for the clarity his presence offered. “Silas, this is Ethan Carrington. My talent manager.” And the ex-boyfriend I’d hoped you’d never have to meet.
As if I hadn’t spoken, Ethan’s gaze remained only on me, ignoring Silas completely.
“You’re smarter than this, Molly. Think about your future for longer than a minute. You have a million-dollar career at stake here. Are you really willing to throw that away?”
His implication as to what—or whom—I was throwing my career away on was crystal clear.
“I’ve made my decision.”
Silas’s presence offered me strength as Ethan’s neck flushed red. “That’s a mistake. Likely the biggest one you’ll ever make.”
“I think it’s time for you to leave, Mr. Carrington,” Silas said in that same assured temperament.
“Actually, it’s not. Not quite yet, anyway.” Ethan reached into his satchel, and Silas immediately pushed me behind him.
“Whoa there, compadre.” Ethan lifted his hands. “I’m just reaching for the paperwork I came to deliver to my former client.” He thrust a manila envelope in my direction. “These were drawn up by Cobalt’s legal team, to be served on the chance we couldn’t reach an agreement.”
A tremor of fear swept over me as I took the envelope and bent the gold brad at the back flap. The document on top of the crisp stack read Cease and Desist.
“What is this?”
“A cease and desist letter,” he said through a thick fog of arrogance.
“But why? What’s it for?” I skimmed the paragraphs referencing Makeup Matters with Molly, unclear at some of the jargon. It didn’t make sense.
“It’s an immediate stop order regarding use of my brand.” He wore the cold, heartless gaze of a manager who was ready to cut his losses.
His brand?
“This letter isn’t viable,” Silas said, reading over my shoulder and addressing Ethan in his most lawyerly tone.
Ethan’s offensive chuckle made it clear he thought Silas couldn’t take him up on the challenge.
“Your company has delivered a C and D order for what is considered intellectual property. As an agency, you have no authority or jurisdiction over the handle of her social media platforms.”
I smiled at Ethan’s obvious surprise as Silas continued to flip through the paperwork. “Oh, I forgot to mention—Silas is also my legal representation.”
“Well.” Ethan’s overconfident voice broke through my moment of victory. “As he’ll see on page five, Makeup Matters with Molly is a registered Cobalt Group brand. And the followers, platforms, videos, photo shoot campaigns, and sponsored posts that bear that brand are, too. All of it belongs to us.”
“No way. That’s . . . that’s absurd. Ridiculous,” I said, shaking my head as I glanced up at Silas, who was studying the paperwork with an intensity I could feel. “That can’t be true. I already had a growing platform when I signed with you.”
“You did, but that platform wasn’t under the name Makeup Matters with Molly, nor was it singularly focused on fashion and beauty. You were all over the place back then. I made you what you are—or I should say, what you were.”
“Then I’ll fight it. I’ll take you to court. It’s my name and my face on those posts and videos. You don’t own me.”
“You’d be surprised at what I own,” Ethan said, as if he’d expected such an argument from me. “But I can assure you, court will be a waste of your time and money. You won’t be taken seriously, as you’ve violated your contract multiple times over the past few months. The first, by contacting your sponsors directly and asking them to support a personal cause.” He pointed to Silas. “You’ll find that highlighted on page eight. There’s a full rundown of the ways Molly has breached her contract with Cobalt and failed to meet multiple professional expectations.” And then to me he said, “You won’t have a chance, especially considering the cause you’ve invited my sponsors to fund is a youth home currently under investigation for assault and battery.”
His words nearly plowed me over. “What? No. That’s not even true! How do you even know anything about that?”
“Molly,” Silas said in a resigned voice so low I almost didn’t hear it through the pounding in my ears.
“But he’s wrong—about everything.” I pointed an accusatory finger in Ethan’s face. “You’ve twisted everything. Silas, tell him!”
But Silas didn’t tell him. Instead, he lowered the paperwork and gripped my arm at the elbow, as if there was nothing else to be discussed or done. As if this was over, all my failures bound inside a manila envelope.
Ethan closed the flap of his satchel and moved down the porch steps. “You should also note that by the time I pull out of this driveway, your access to any social media account associated with the brand Makeup Matters with Molly will be frozen. You’ll have no further access to edit any past content or the ability to post new content. Our sponsors will be made aware of our partnership termination with you via email tomorrow morning, and all future communication regarding this matter to any of those sponsors will be subject to swift legal action.” He clicked his fob to unlock his expensive rental car. “It likely goes without saying at this point, but as a terminated client of Cobalt Group, you are also no longer eligible to receive our corporate Dream Big Scholarship.”
“No.” I darted after him, breaking Silas’s hold on me. “You can’t do that! These kids need that money, Ethan. Please don’t punish them!”
Silas’s arms were around me a half second later, holding my back tight to his chest as he spoke my name. But I was too broken to hear it. Too lost to a world I thought I could escape without consequences.
I couldn’t have been more wrong.
Ethan looked at the two of us with disgust as he opened the driver’s door of his shiny silver Mercedes. “I hope it was worth it, Molls.”
36
Silas
As soon as Ethan’s tires squealed out of the driveway, Molly pushed away from my chest and ran toward the house. For half a second, I debated my next move: to go after her or to hunt down her snake of an ex-boyfriend. The flare his haughty words had ignited in me burned hot, and if not for the close proximity of the two dozen residents working around the corner, Ethan would not have had the last word.
I would have seen to that.
I flexed and released the fists at my sides, forcing an exhale that did nothing to ease the growing pressure in my chest. Not only because I wanted to pin that pretentious jerk to a wall and use him for dart practice, but also because I had no solid solution to offer the woman I loved.
Ethan’s legal team had covered all their bases. There were no loopholes to slip through this time. He’d annihilated Molly’s entire career with one kill shot.
A short list of possibilities as to where Molly might have headed ticked through my mind. But as I threw open the door to Fir Crest, I didn’t need to look far. She paced ten feet away from where I stood in the lobby. Her footsteps reverberated in the open space, her fingers pushing through the short locks of her hair.
“Talk to me, Molly,” I said with a calm I didn’t know I possessed. “Let me help you.”
She glanced my way, her eyes unseeing, her face awash with the kind of devastation that cut to the core. “It can’t be fixed, Silas. What he’s done, it’s . . . it’s . . .” She stopped, stared straight ahead. “It ruins everything.”
I positioned myself in front of her next pass, yet I wasn’t stupid enough to restrict her movement. That would only upset her more. We were the same in that regard. Molly needed a physical outlet, a way to vent her building steam. It was the same reason I’d committed to running in the early mornings.
Moving meant processing.
“It might seem that way right now, but we can figure this out. Together. I’ll make some calls and check on the validity of that C and D, and then I’ll look into the appeal process to find out what it will take to unfreeze your accounts—”
“Silas.” Her voice broke as she shook her head. “It’s pointless. Even if we did request an appeal, the process to unfreeze flagged accounts can take weeks, especially when the claims involve a third party—which is exactly why he went the route he did. We don’t have weeks until our event. We have days.” She looked ill, the color draining from her cheeks as she worked through the tangled webs her ex had strung. “Making the offer in person was his last test. And when I failed, he knew exactly how to retaliate.”
“What exactly did he offer you?” A question I’d been pondering since Glo told me an unregistered visitor was speaking to Molly.
With her back still to me, she exhaled slowly. “A final screening audition in LA. For Project New You.” She twisted around to face me. “My livestream, the one we shot in your office together, it caught the producer’s attention. I guess it was what he’s been looking for . . . in a host.”
My insides crystallized as a cold chokehold slipped around my neck. For several seconds I couldn’t speak, couldn’t utter a single word, much less a clarifying question. The idea of Molly leaving blindsided me. Yet, somehow the idea of her forfeiting her career, her dreams, her future was even more unbearable.
“Molly.” I studied her, the rosy blotches on her cheeks, the tremble in her chin, the defeat of her slumped shoulders. “A decision this monumental has to be about you, what you want for your future, not about what anyone else wants.” My words betrayed me, bucked against my chest like a caged animal, yet they were right. Painfully so.
“There is absolutely nothing Ethan could have offered that would have swayed me from what I decided weeks ago.” Tears slipped to her jaw, marking her pink tank top as they dripped onto her chest. “From the moment you followed me out to the parking lot that night after D&D, I knew this was where I was supposed to be. For the first time in my adult life, I want to give my heart to something that really matters—something bigger than what I could have ever seen for myself or my future. So no, this decision isn’t just about me at all. It’s about this program, these residents . . . you.”
She squeezed her eyes closed. “Only now I have nothing to offer in return for all you’ve given back to me. No platform to livestream The Event auction from, no voice to ask my followers for pledges, no brand to secure credibility and partnerships.” She swiped at her cheeks. “By the time Ethan’s email hits tomorrow morning, all the pledges I’ve secured from my sponsors will likely be revoked, and there’s nothing I can do about it. Just like there’s nothing I can do about the scholarship we’ve lost. If I had a month to regroup then maybe. But days?” She shook her head, more tears streaming down her cheeks. “We won’t even have enough funds to cover the rental costs for The Event, much less bring in the five hundred thousand we need to be matched by the Murphey Grant.”
I advanced, unwilling to stay frozen in place for another second. “That’s what you’r
e most worried about? The Event? The grant?” Certainly, they each held a spot on a long list of fallouts to be dealt with in short order, but they hardly took first place. In my mind, that spot belonged solely to Molly’s career. Her reputation as a trusted voice in her industry had just been ransacked by a greedy manipulator.
“Of course that’s what I’m worried about most.” She reached for the envelope in my hand and tossed it to the couch as if it didn’t represent hundreds of thousands of dollars and multiple years of network building and experience. “I can’t change how I started my business or who I chose to partner with, but those aren’t the decisions that will keep me awake at night. Breaking my promise to you and to our residents will. You counted on me and I . . . I failed you all.”
No longer concerned about the uninvited eyes and ears that might be watching or hearing us, I wrapped her into an embrace. “You didn’t fail us.” I pressed my forehead to the side of her head, my lips skimming her cheek as I spoke. “This old manor would be as empty as I would be without you.”
She lifted her head, her eyes unblinking as she took me in. “I wish I could fix this. For you as much as for the residents. I’m so, so sorry.”
“I don’t want you to be sorry. I only want you to understand . . .” I stopped, then realized I couldn’t wait another day or even another minute to tell her the truth that had burned a hole in my chest for weeks. “I love you, Molly. Not for the promises you intended to keep or for the things your platform could have provided, but for you. For who you are right now.”
She stared at me and then shook her head. “Silas, I just lost your chance at a million dollars.”
