“You’d be surprised. It’ll blow over sooner than you think.”
My eyes narrowed. “Do you know something I don’t?”
She shrugged and spun her chair to face me, looking unfazed. “Just that people are predictable. Everyone needs time, sure. But nothing is irreparable.”
A laugh shot out of me, dry and painful. I shook my head. “You don’t know us very well.”
“You’d like to think that, sure. But you don’t do this for as long as I have without it becoming second nature. We read people. It’s how we produce. It may as well be in the job description.”
I seethed. She stood.
“You knew what you signed up for.”
I scoffed.
“Okay, maybe not exactly what you signed up for, but you knew this wasn’t going to be a picnic. You knew there would be drama, so I’m still trying to figure out why you’re surprised. Annika too, for that matter.”
My jaw clenched, teeth pressing together until it hurt.
“She did exactly what she was supposed to do. The rub was that she got attached, and so did you. And here we are. So, what? Do you need a few more days? I can push it back a little to give you some space, but we can’t just stop filming or we’ll fall behind. And if we fall behind, Hal’s show will air first. And if Hal’s show airs first, we’re all fucked.”
I couldn’t stand it, the loss of control, the loss of my choices, my options. There was no escape, and fury churned in my chest. I dropped my hands, squeezing them into fists by my side. We were at an impasse. I had no way to convince my people to work, and this was all her fault. But if I were gone, maybe I’d take the drama with me and the show could still go on. It was my only other option, and as furious as I was, I took it.
“Fine. Then I quit. I never wanted to do this fucking show anyway, and now that you’re going to make a circus out of my life, then it’s over. I’m done.” I spit the words at her, waiting for her to react. To beg me to stay so I could say no again.
But she didn’t. In fact, the pity was back. “You can’t quit. I’m sorry, I really am, but you’re under contract, and so is the shop and everyone in it. The network has sunk millions into this show. They’re airing trailers and ads. And they’re not going to shy away for a second from taking you down if you try to fight it.”
“Tell them to come at me,” I hissed through my teeth, an empty promise from a caged bear.
She shook her head. “You’ll lose it all, the shop, everything. They’ll take you down for compensation. I’m sorry, Joel. But this is it.”
Rage. It took every ounce of willpower I had not to scream, to wreck something, to get the adrenaline, the frustration out of my body and into something else. But I didn’t. I felt my blood pressure rise to the point of dimming my vision, the heat of my pulse in my tense neck climbing up my face. I had to get out of there.
So I turned to leave, and there she was, standing in the doorway, pale and beautiful. And I hated her more in that moment than I’ve ever hated anything in my life.
Annika
He was so angry, he seemed to suck all the air from the room into himself. His eyes locked onto mine, full of hate, burning into me. The shock of it sent physical pain through my chest, and he stormed past, nearly pulling me into him with his gravity. His eyes never left mine, and I couldn’t look away, turning my head to follow him until he broke the connection, leaving me powerless. Empty.
Laney stood in the middle of the room, looking at me like she’d told me so, and I filled up the emptiness with rage. My lips twisted.
“What did you say to him?”
Her jaw flexed, eyes narrowing as she crossed her arms. “Don’t act like I’ve betrayed you, Annika. You’re the one who’s put us all here.”
I ignored the jab. “What’s the matter with him?”
“You.”
I pulled in a long breath and let it out slow, chin down, wishing I could explode her with my mind. “Laney,” I warned.
“He tried to quit. The cast won’t work with you. He wants out, and he can’t get out. So, he’s pissed.”
I was unsurprised at anything she said. “I can’t do my job.” It was a statement, a fact.
“Yeah, conflict of interest, like I said from the beginning.”
“What do you want me to say? That you were right? That this is all my fault? What do you want from me?” My voice broke.
Laney looked tired, resigned. “I don’t want anything from you, unless you’ve got a time machine somewhere you’ve been hiding.”
I looked around the office, feeling out of place, alien. “What am I supposed to do?”
She sighed. “Sit in here and work on next week’s art and history segments. Keep that door shut. Don’t talk to anyone. Don’t leave this room.”
“And tomorrow?”
“I don’t know, Annika. I honestly don’t.” The words were heavy, laden with her frustration. “But today, I’ve got to try to figure out how to calm everybody down, earn their trust back. And I can’t do that with you around.”
I held my chin high, even though I wanted to crumple to the ground and cry, and took my seat as she walked toward the door.
She paused just before walking out, though I didn’t give her the satisfaction of meeting her eyes, focusing instead on my laptop screen.
“I’m sorry, Annika.”
I didn’t answer, not even giving her a nod, though she stood there for a long moment waiting. And then she closed the door, leaving me in the quiet room alone. It was too quiet. I scrambled for my earbuds in my bag and plugged them into my phone, putting them into my ears with shaking hands, as anger and sadness, pride and pain pumped through me to the aching beat of my heart.
Chapter 26
MOLOTOV
* * *
Annika
* * *
MORNING CAME IN THE CLAWS of my alarm, and once it was shut down, I stretched in bed, wishing I could just sleep through the next week to wake up with everything behind me.
The day before had been bullshit. I’d hidden in the office. Laney sent the entire cast out drinking on a company card in the hopes they’d burn off steam and come back feeling better, and we spent the day working on the schedule, the segments we had, a trailer for the network. Busy work. We were otherwise shut down, and if Joel’s reaction to me had been any indicator, we were a long way off from getting moving.
If I was in the picture, at least.
Honestly, Laney should have fired me on the spot, given the fact that I could no longer do my job, but she kept me working and busy while she tried to fix the mess. But she was treading water. If I were gone, everything could get back on track.
I sighed to vent the pressure in my chest, but it didn’t help.
Kaz was cuddled up on the bed next to me, a new development for him. But he’d been so affectionate ever since things fell apart, and I just figured he knew I needed him. It’d been nice — the old bastard hadn’t been so lovey-dovey since he was a kitten and I was eight.
I rolled over to face him, curling around him as I laid a hand on his furry back to pet him. But my hand froze — he felt … wrong. Cold. Still.
Dead.
I jerked away from him in shock, scooting back in a flurry, but I didn’t realize how close I was to the edge and whooped as I tumbled off the bed and hit the floor with a thump. But I didn’t stop trying to get away, my eyes bugging and heart thumping as I crab walked across the room like a bug.
“Fuck, fuck, shit, fuck,” I muttered in a loop as I blinked at the bundle of fur on the bed.
I stood and scrambled out of the room, down the hall, panic rushing through me as I threw open Roxy’s door. She sat up in bed and moved her head like she was looking around, but her eyes seemed like they were closed.
“Huhwha?” she mumbled.
“Roxy,” I hissed. “Fuck. Fuck! I think …” I couldn’t even say it out loud.
“Wassamatter?” Blinking happened and she peered at me through slitted eyes.
I tried to swallow, though my mouth was dry as bone, as I tried to catch my breath. “It’s Kaz.”
Her eyes flew open. “Oh, my God.”
“Yeah,” I breathed. “Yeah. Come with me.”
“Okay,” she said as she crawled off her bed, and we hooked arms, walking down the hall together with our eyes on my doorway. I could see him in my bed still, and my heart sped up.
We stopped at the edge of the bed, staring at him. He hadn’t moved. We didn’t speak for minute, both of us just watching him, wondering what the hell we were supposed to do.
“Touch him,” I finally whispered.
“He’s your cat, Annika,” she hissed back.
“Roxy, you have to do it. I can’t do it, you have to, please, you have to do it,” I rambled, and my freakout must have been fully evident, because she let me go and stood up a little straighter, steeling herself.
She took a deep breath and braced her hand on the bed, reaching into the middle to touch him. She flinched when she made contact, squinting as she ran a hand down him and felt his ribs.
After a second, she jerked her hand back and shuddered, hopping as she shook her hand out like she could get rid of the memory of it. “God, Annika, nope. Nope. Not sleeping. Definitely dead.”
My hands flew to my face, covering my mouth and nose as I stared at my cat, my friend since I was a little girl. The fear dissipated, and I sat down on the bed as tears pricked my eyes, falling when I ran a hand over his silky fur. He looked peaceful, like he’d just come to comfort me, fell asleep, and drifted away.
Roxy broke the silence, her voice soft. “What should we do with him?”
I sniffled, swiping at my tears. “Maybe we could bury him at Mama and Papa’s. Or find one of those … I don’t know … cremation places?”
“And in the meantime?”
I stood and walked over to my corner to picking up his blanket before moving back to my bed to lay it flat. I picked up Kaz and laid him on top, then wrapped him up in it like a death shroud. We stood there and looked at him for a long time, both of us lost in thought, in memories.
My tears fell, my already broken heart fracturing again and again, just when I thought things couldn’t get worse. Joel crossed my mind as all the hurt piled on, then I thought about work and the mess I’d left there.
Work.
There was no way I was going in today. I reached for my phone and texted Laney.
I’m sorry to do this, but I won’t be in. My cat died this morning.
She texted back almost immediately. Oh, God. Don’t worry about things here. I’ve got it under lock. Probably best to give everyone here some air anyway. Take care of yourself, and let me know if you need a few days. K?
K
I set down my phone, turning my eyes back to the bundle on my bed.
“Mama?”
We turned to find Kira in the doorway, hair mussed, rubbing her eye with her little fist, her bunny hooked in her elbow.
“Hey, Bunny,” Roxy said, the words full of sadness and comfort. She glanced at me before turning for Kira, scooping her up.
“What’s the matter, Mama?”
“Oh, honey,” she clutched Kira into her shoulder and looked to me again. We shared a look full of wariness and weariness, and I got the sense that Roxy was trying to figure out how to break the news to her. “So, baby, I have to talk to you about something. Do you remember Lady Pearl?”
Kira leaned back to look at Roxy, her arms loose around Roxy’s neck, bottom lip poking out just a hair. “Our fishy?”
Lady Pearl was our betta, a pink and purple explosion of color, and a male. But Kira insisted he was a lady and named him Pearl. And thus, our transgender fish was born.
“Yeah, our fishy,” Roxy said. “Remember when we found her upside down in her bowl?”
She nodded. “Because she was an old lady?”
“Right. Because she was an old lady, and nothing lives forever.”
“I remember.”
“Well,” Roxy started, pausing for a second. “Do you remember how old Kaz is?”
“Old-old. Almost as old as you, right, Mama?”
“Right,” she said softly. “Well, baby, last night, Kaz went to sleep, but he didn’t wake up.”
Kira’s chin quivered. “What?” she whispered, and a sob rose in my throat. I pressed my fingers to my lips.
“He’s gone.”
“No,” she wailed, her little face bent. “No! Where is he? Where is Kaz?” She looked around and looked at the bed. And she cried, reaching for him as Roxy tried to soothe her, finally taking her out of the room.
I picked up the cat and walked down the stairs, not sure what to do with him, working through the biological part of what his death would mean. So I slipped him into a trash bag and put him into a box that I set on our back deck.
When I closed the door, I felt better by only a tiny degree. I could still hear Kira upstairs crying while I called my mother and told her what happened. More tears, hers and mine, and Papa got on the phone, his voice raw as he told me how sorry he was. They agreed to let us bury him in their back yard, said they would take off the next day so we could come over.
So, I’d be off for at least one more day, not that anyone needed — or wanted — me around.
I made my way back upstairs to Kira’s bedroom to find Roxy holding Kira on her bed, sobs hiccuping through her little chest.
Roxy’s eyes were wet, her hand skating up and down Kira’s back. “Kira wants to have a funeral for Kaz.”
I sat next to them, my heart broken. “Sure, Bunny. We’ll have a funeral at Babushka and Dedushky’s house tomorrow.”
Kira nodded. “And Dedu Andrei has to come, and Hairy.”
My breath hitched.
Roxy shook her head. “Hairy doesn’t need to come, Kira.”
Her little face wrenched again, and the tears slipped down her cheeks in rivulets. “He has to come! Kaz loved Hairy, they were friends, and Hairy has to come! He has to!” Her voice was shrill, edging on hysterical. I couldn’t stand it.
“I’ll ask him, Bunny, but he may not be able to come.”
“He has to!” she squealed. “He has to, you have to tell him! Please, Anni, make him come!”
Roxy and I shared a look. “Okay, I promise, I’ll tell him.”
“Tell him now!” Her eyes were wide and wild, wet and sad. “Please?”
“Kira—”
She cried again, her words all running together, and I reached for my phone.
“Okay. Okay. Look, I’m gonna call him right now, okay? Don’t cry, Bunny, please don’t cry,” I said as my own tears fell, and I pulled up his name, hoping he wouldn’t answer. Because the last thing I needed was to hurt anymore. And hearing his voice couldn’t do anything but tear me apart.
Joel
The phone rang on the kitchen table between me and Shep, flashing her name, bringing our argument to a halt.
“Speak of the devil,” Shep said.
I pushed the button on the side of my phone to stop its buzzing, and hopefully my nerves.
“You’re not going to answer it?”
I gave him a flat look.
“Just answer it. She wouldn’t call if it wasn’t important.”
My jaw flexed. “Don’t really care.”
“You’re not curious?”
I sniffed. “Not even a little.”
My phone was still showing her number, the button begging me to answer. But there wasn’t enough tea in China to convince me to do it.
He scowled, watching me until it went to voicemail. I picked up the conversation again.
“We can’t get out of the show, Shep. So now it’s our job to convince the shop to get back on board, and I need you to have my back.”
He rubbed the back of his neck and sighed. “That’s a tall order, man. Ramona and the girls are pissed, especially Penny. She’s ready to Molotov Cocktail the control room.”
“We don’t have a choice.”
>
“All right, then let’s look at this objectively. All emotion out of it. Can you do that?”
My jaw clenched. “Yeah.”
“So, the way I see it, we have two options. The easiest option is this — tell Laney to choose. Us or her. We might have a shot at convincing them to get back on board if she’s gone. But otherwise, it might be hopeless. Laney paying for a night at the bar was great and all, but it wasn’t enough. No one would go in today, which means the shop is closed too. We can’t keep this up. So maybe if she’s gone, it can get us back on track sooner.”
As much as I didn’t want to see her, the thought of getting her fired sent dread twisting through my guts. I wished, not for the first time, that she would just disappear without any consequence for any of us.
“Last resort,” I said after a moment, and my phone buzzed again, alerting me that a voice message had been left.
Shep and I looked at each other for a split second, and his hand darted out toward my phone. I was a millisecond too late to stop him from grabbing it.
I stood, and so did he as he held up my phone.
“Give it back,” I barked.
He had the nerve to smirk. “Why? What are you afraid of?”
I moved around the table, and he kept pace, keeping it between us so I couldn’t reach him as he opened up my voicemail like a fucking traitor and played the message, putting it on speaker.
“You son of a bitch.” I darted, and he sidestepped to stay right across from me.
The message began, and my chest ached at the sound of her smoky voice, muffled by a stuffy nose.
“I … I’m sorry to bother you.” Kira wailed in the background, and the ache squeezed tighter. “My … my cat died last night.” A pause, more crying in the background. A deep breath. “We’re having his funeral tomorrow at my parents’ house, and Kira wanted you to be there.” Kira wailed Hairyyyyyyy, and Shep’s brow dropped. “I understand if you can’t make it, really. But it would mean a lot if you were there.” She rattled off the time for the funeral and her parents’ address with a shaky voice before disconnecting.
Forbidden Desires Page 62
