Power

by Jillian Dodd

  “Your days at Eastbrooke don’t mean shit when it comes to business.”

  Tyler lays a photo of a topless Jennifer sitting on Knox’s lap swigging tequila straight from a bottle on top of the ad mock-ups for Daddy’s Angel.

  Something clicks.

  “That’s it, Tyler. You’re brilliant!” I shout.

  “Why’s Tyler brilliant?” Grandpa asks as Tyler goes, “I am?”

  “I have to go, Grandpa. I’ll take care of it all. I promise,” I say, quickly ending the call.

  “What are you going to do?” Tyler asks. “This looks really bad. Like so bad you may need to send them somewhere remote until it all dies down.”

  “Our senior year at boarding school, we threw different themed parties every other weekend. One was Heaven and Hell.”

  He tilts his head at me. “I don’t get it.”

  “Shh. I’m still thinking it through. Will you go check on Vanessa? She should be here by now.”

  I stare at the mock-up some more and suddenly know exactly what to do.

  The board won’t know what hit them.

  The press won’t know what hit them.

  And, by the time we’re done, the board will be telling me to give Riley a raise.

  And maybe even suggesting something I’ve been considering doing since I found out I was pregnant.

  Vanessa strolls in, dressed to kill in a black pencil skirt, black spiked Louboutins, and bright red lips that match the bottom of her heels.

  “Have you seen all the pictures? How the hell are there so many out there already? I have some ideas for damage control and I think I can get the photos with nudity taken down by calling in some favors, but I think the best thing to do is let it burn out on its own. The last thing we want to do is add more fuel to the fire. We’ll make them lay low . . .”

  “I just thought of something that might allow us to add fuel to the fire in a good way.” I tell her my idea. “But I’m not exactly sure how to spin it. Any ideas on that?”

  “You two could rule the world if you put your minds together. And, Vanessa, if you have to face the press today, you’ll rock it, girl. Love the shoes,” Tyler says, taking notes on all the things we need done today. “Okay, so I’ll pull five of our best assistants and have them do nothing but cover the phones today. What do you want our official response to be? And when will you be ready to make a statement to the press?”

  “Our official response has to be: Captive Films has no comment.” Vanessa says.

  Tyler says, “But, I thought--”

  “No,” Vanessa says, still thinking it through. “For this to work, the press will have to figure it out on their own. We can’t even hint at it.” She turns to me. “Don’t you think so, Keatyn?”

  “You’re the master at this,” I say. “But, yes, I think you’re right. If we’re going to pull this off, they’re going to have to figure it out on their own. Otherwise, they’ll see what it really is. Our attempt to manipulate it.”

  “I feel like the Wizard of Oz,” Vanessa laughs. “All smoke and mirrors.”

  “How long does it take to bail someone out of jail?” I ask. “We’ve got to get everyone on the same page. Pray Jennifer doesn’t post anything on her social media in the mean time.”

  “It doesn’t take long,” Dallas says, strolling in.

  “Dallas, what are you doing here? Did RiAnne have the baby already?”

  “Ha. False alarm. Doctor told us it will probably be at least two more weeks. My wife is not happy. I decided to let her mother deal with her.”

  “She keeps saying she wants this baby out of her,” I laugh.

  “Even with the public relations disaster that is Vegas, it’s a whole lot safer here than it is at home right now,” Dallas says. “On a side note, I just spoke to Aiden. He’s wired the money, they’re out, and have taken off. Should be here in about an hour. And he gave them strict orders not to speak to the press or post anything on their social media.”

  “Another reason I love him,” I say. “I want them to come directly here. As in do not pass go. Is Aiden going to meet them at the airport?”

  “Yes, and I told him to bring them all here. So how bad is it?”

  “Take a look,” Vanessa says, pulling him toward my desk and gesturing toward the printouts. “It’s bad.”

  Dallas scratches his neck and grimaces.

  “Tyler,” I say. “Will you please take all these photos into the board room and get it set up for Vanessa as command central? Then get Lisa, Barry, Dawn, and Craig from the marketing team assembled, privately fill them in on our plan, and have them start working on our list of to dos. We can trust the four of them to help get this all pulled together. But everyone else should be kept in the dark. Have them call in every favor we have to get hair, makeup, and a photographer here within the hour. We’ll also need them to pull together the guest list and get the invitations out. And, somehow, we need to cast Matthew today. Anyone have ideas on how we could do that?”

  Dallas smiles and raises his hand. “Jake Worth. I golfed with him last week. He’s got offers on the table but he’s tired of playing the good guy. And he’s free now.”

  “Oh, he’d be perfect! I don’t know why I didn’t think of him in the first place. I’ll call him right now. Dallas, will you stay in here while I do? I want to discuss something else with you.”

  “Sure,” he says, taking a seat as Vanessa and Tyler rush off.

  I grab my cell phone and press Jake’s number.

  “Hey, Monroe,” he says, calling me by my fake last name from boarding school. Jake was the first boy I met when I arrived at Eastbrooke and we became fast friends. He played my love interest in our high school drama production, was Dawson’s best friend, and made his big screen debut playing my boyfriend in A Day at the Lake 2. He’s done numerous romantic comedies since then, where he always gets the girl.

  “Sorry for such an early call, but I’m sitting here with Dallas and he tells me you’re looking to play the bad boy.”

  “Do you have something for me?”

  “We do. But due to some extenuating circumstances, we’d have to ask you to come in today, sign the contract, and be in a photo shoot. We’ll also need you available most of the week for some other stuff I can’t talk about yet.”

  “Tell me about the role. Have you cast anyone else?”

  “The project is called Daddy’s Angel. It’s about a young woman whose father is a minister at the local church. He believes his daughter, Angel, is still a virgin and is looking for a young man to court then marry her.”

  “Court her?”

  “Yeah, like the old-fashioned way, sort of. There are lots of rules. Like no holding hands until you are engaged. No kissing until your wedding day. Chaperones when you are together. You would play Jackson, the town’s bad boy. What Daddy doesn’t know is that Angel lives a very promiscuous double life and Jackson is her favorite plaything. Jennifer Edwards will be playing Angel and Knox Daniels will be playing Nathan, the guy who Daddy brings in to court Angel. Of course, Nathan believes Angel is a good girl virgin and while Daddy thinks Nathan’s a church going man, he’s a bad boy too. He only wants to marry Angel to get control of some land Daddy owns that has lots of oil under it. And he thinks he can do that by getting Angel to fall in love with him.”

  “Two bad boys. That sounds like every woman’s dream.”

  “Based on the gross from your last film, I think you’re every woman’s dream, Jake.”

  “Do I get the girl in the end?”

  “No.”

  “Ha! Even better. Did you write the script?”

  “Yes.”

  “Then I’m in.”

  I give Dallas a thumbs-up.

  “Can you be at our office, like now?”

  “Sure thing.”

  “Awesome. You’ll meet with Dallas first, talk contract, and then you’ll go straight to a photo shoot with Knox and Jennifer.”

  “She’s a cutie. I’m excited to work
with her. She kissed me at the Oscars.”

  I laugh. “I think she kissed everyone. She’ll be excited to work with you. And thanks, Jake.”

  “Anytime, Monroe. See you soon.”

  I hang up and look down at my cell. More missed calls. More texts from board members.

  “We need to talk about Riley,” I say with a sigh to Dallas. “The board wants me to fire him.”

  “Ariela has him all messed up.”

  “I know. I feel bad.”

  “Don’t. I think it’s about time he dealt with it.”

  “Thanks, Dallas. That makes me feel better.”

  “Keatyn, Vegas and how Riley has been behaving is on him. So are you going to fire him?”

  “I do want to make some changes,” I say.

  Then I tell him what I plan to do.

  “How do you think Riley will take it?” I ask Dallas, nervously.

  “You kinda have him by the balls right now.”

  “I don’t want that though. Grandpa is right. Working with friends can be tricky.”

  “It will be interesting to see Riley’s reaction.”

  “You’re going to make me cry, Dallas.”

  “Better than making you puke,” he says with a laugh, getting up. “I’m gonna go get Jake’s contract ready. Do you need me to make some calls to the board members? Buy you some time?”

  “No, they can wait with everyone else. I mean, what’s the worst thing they can do? Even if they all get pissed and sell their stock, I own the majority. I did a hostile takeover once,” I say, remembering how I bought out the company that became Captive Films from my stalker. “No way I’d ever let our investment become vulnerable. They’ll just have to trust I’ll do what’s best for Captive.”

  “True. They just want their egos stroked.”

  “I should have a dirty comeback for that, Dallas, but I’m too tired.”

  “You look tired. Have you eaten this morning? You’re growing a baby. It takes a lot of calories. Have Tyler order in some food. We’re going to be here all day. Wait, aren’t you supposed to be on set?”

  “I was, but they cancelled my call time because, well, because Knox was in jail.”

  Captive Films - Santa Monica

  RILEY

  Aiden picked us up at the airport and announced that he’d been instructed to take us straight to Captive Films.

  We’re entering in the back way, through the parking garage to Keatyn’s private entrance.

  “I’m not going in there!” Jennifer cries. “I’m a mess!”

  “I second that,” Knox says.

  I keep my mouth shut. I got kicked out of boarding school my freshman year because of an incident involving an older girl, a Homecoming float, and a lot of alcohol, sex, and nakedness. I feel like that freshman boy again, waiting in the principal’s office for my parents to arrive, and wondering how much trouble I’m going to be in.

  “I don’t really feel good,” Knox says, cracking the window.

  Dawson punches him in the shoulder. “You were feeling good last night.”

  “Does anyone even remember last night?” Jennifer asks, holding her head.

  “Don’t worry,” Aiden says. “I’m told there are plenty of photos to fill the gaps in your memory.”

  Jennifer’s eyes get big. “Are you serious? There are pictures?”

  “Yes. Your fun last night is this morning’s publicity nightmare. Keatyn started getting calls from board members at five this morning.”

  “Shit,” Jennifer and I both say, slumping down in our seats.

  We arrive through the back elevator and are lined up in the board room like we’re going in front of a firing squad. I see through the glass that Vanessa is marching toward us.

  And she looks pissed.

  “I can’t take her today,” I mutter.

  “Take who?” Knox whispers.

  “Vanessa. She’s gonna yell at me about my image. I’m so fucking hung over.”

  Vanessa marches in the room like a general, commanding our attention. She struts straight up to my brother, grabs him by his shirt, and kisses him straight on the lips.

  “Uh, um, what was that for?” he mumbles, still recovering from the shock of it.

  “When you were in Vegas, did you have sex with anyone?”

  “Uh, no,” he replies.

  I roll my eyes at him, wondering why the hell he didn’t. He had his choice of hot women.

  Vanessa gives him a radiant smile. “That’s what the kiss was for.”

  He grins at her like a lovesick puppy, making me both want to puke at the sweetness of it and feel jealous at the same time.

  “Speaking of kisses,” she says, coming to stand directly in front of me. “For the record, Ariela’s husband showed up unexpected, begged her to come home, and then kissed her. And in case you happened to see it when you came to pick it up and your stupid male brain thought otherwise, the kiss was unwanted.”

  I look at the floor, realizing that this whole mess was because I jumped to a conclusion.

  “Are you serious?” Jennifer groans. “She didn’t kiss him? Riley, you’re such an idiot.”

  “I’m not an idiot. What the fuck was I supposed to think? His car was in the driveway. She’s at the door, holding her heels in her hand, giving him a kiss goodbye. I didn’t just think she kissed him. It looked to me like they just had sex and she was shooing him out the door before I got there. What do we even know about them anyway? Maybe this is all just a ploy to weasel me out of my money.”

  “Right now, Ariela is the absolute least of your worries, Riley. We have a shit storm of bad publicity we have to deal with it. And blame Ariela all you want, but this is about you. Your life. Your career.” She stops chewing me out and appraises us. “Jeez, you all look like hell.” She points toward the conference table. “And somehow, I doubt what you’re going to see here will make you feel any better. Take a look at all the photos we’ve found on the web so far. Jennifer, you may be especially interested in looking at the laptop. You are currently trending on Twitter with a meme made from video footage taken of you at a strip club.”

  Jennifer looks sick as she sits down at the table and clicks.

  “Oh my god! What an epic fail!” She screams, then laughs, but then breaks down into tears. “My parents are going to kill me.”

  Keatyn and Tyler come into the room, laden with bags. When they spread the food out, I see that it’s my favorite breakfast. The combination I taught Keatyn to love when she first tried it on my seventeenth birthday. Chicken and waffles.

  “I figured you could use some hangover food,” Keatyn declares. “Why don’t you eat while Vanessa and I fill you in on what’s going to happen next. As you can see, your fun night in Vegas is all over the press. What you don’t know about are all the calls I’ve been receiving from our Board of Directors. They’re calling for your heads. They want me to cancel Knox and Jennifer’s contracts and fire both Riley and Dawson. Immediately.”

  I choke down my food when I hear that the board wants me fired.

  I know now why she ordered chicken and waffles. Because this is my last meal at Captive.

  It’s even worse than I imagined.

  WEDNESDAY, OCTOBER 8TH

  Captive Films - Santa Monica

  RILEY

  Jennifer is shoveling food in her mouth while looking through the photos. She holds up one where she has wrapped a scarf around her head, tied her shirt up in the middle, and has a fake parrot on her shoulder. “When was this? I don’t remember this.”

  Dawson answers. “After the first club, we toured the Strip in a party bus. You were convinced if you looked like a pirate you could get on the ship at Treasure Island.”

  “And this?” she asks, holding up a photo of her on a thrill ride.

  “That’s the X-Scream at the Stratosphere,” Dawson says.

  “Did we all ride it?”

  “Yeah, we went before the second club. Thank god, you were impatient and volunteered
to go single. You came back covered in puke. I think I bought the picture. It’s classic, we can download it if you want,” Dawson says, eating and laughing.

  Vanessa shoots him an evil eye.

  “I mean, at the time it was funny.”

  “I thought it was funny,” Knox says. “I remember doing all that. The second strip club is when things start to get blurry.”

  “I’d like to try to piece together a schedule of your night,” Keatyn interjects. “Tyler, will you start writing this all down.”

  “How will that help?” Dawson asks.

  “We need to know everything that happened if we’re going to have any chance of dealing with this appropriately,” Vanessa states. She may be an ice queen, but she knows her stuff. “Dawson, you seem to remember the most. Let’s start with you.”

  “On the plane, we pre-partied. Drank a lot of champagne. We got to Vegas. Checked into our suite. It was the coolest place I’ve ever seen. I didn’t know they even had suites like it. There was a round bed that rotated. A fireman’s pole. Remember sliding down it?” he says excitedly.

  Everyone nods as I remember what Jennifer told me on the bed. That I should care that she was fucking Knox.

  When did I stop caring?

  After Ariela.

  “Oh, gosh,” Jennifer says, holding up a photo. “Knox, why were we humping Roman statues?”

  “You said you wanted to have a threesome,” Knox says, laughing.

  I’d be laughing too if I wasn’t waiting for this to be over so Keatyn could fire me.

  “Do you remember stripping off your skirt to skinny dip in the fountain?” Knox asks her. “You said if throwing a penny in and making a wish for love was supposed to work, that immersing your whole body would ensure happiness.”

  “There’s a photo of that too,” Tyler says, rummaging through photos to find the correct one and then handing it to Jennifer.

  “Okay, so we have fire pole sliding, a strip club, a roller coaster ride, statue humping, and attempted skinny dipping,” Vanessa says. “What else?”