by Imani King
"Lisa, tell me where she is. Just...tell me. I just need to talk to her, I need to explain that photo to her, face to face."
Lisa got up, then, smoothing her skirt down over her thighs and giving me an exasperated look.
"I can't, Blake. And I'm warning you, any attempts on your part to see her are going to backfire - for you, but mostly for her. She's done and I know this hurts to hear but she doesn't want anything to do with you. You need to get on with your life, you need to focus on work and get through this. We're all here for you."
As soon as she left I went straight back to my office and opened the whiskey, not bothering with a glass. That's how I spent the next two days - unshowered, unshaven and drunk out of my mind, sequestered in my office from Vanessa and Lisa and every single phone call that came for me. When I woke up on the third day, hungover and feeling as bad as I've ever felt in my life, I knew I had to see Natasha. She could call the police if she wanted to, I wasn't going to get in her face or bully her - I would never do those things. But I had to let her know the truth. Once that was done, I could go back to my life with the knowledge that at least I'd tried, even if Natasha wanted nothing to do with me again. It was going to hurt like hell to hear it but if I didn't make the attempt I knew I was just going to sink into a whiskey-soaked depression and waste at least the rest of the year - probably much longer - pining.
I took three ibuprofens and downed half a gallon of water, then I dragged my sorry self into the shower and cleaned myself up before heading over to Natasha's apartment on my own to see if any of her roommates were home. Halfway there, my phone rang. It was Lisa.
"Blake, what are you doing? Are you doing something stupid? Someone said you just left the house and refused a driver. I hope you're not going to see that girl, that would be a very bad idea."
There was another voice in the background, a female one. It sounded a bit like Vanessa.
"Are you with Vanessa?" I asked, determined not to let Lisa get under my skin this time. "And how do you know I went out?"
"What? No, I'm with a client. And someone from the house called me, we're all worried about you and we all want the best for you."
So she had my own employees reporting back to her. It dawned on me as I drove down the highway that I'd never heard Lisa this worried before. And it wasn't like her to be worried, not in a personal sense, anyway. So why was she so damned insistent?
"Listen, Lisa, I have to go. I'll call tomorrow."
I hung up on her as she protested and then turned my phone off.
There was no one outside Natasha's apartment complex, which was something of a relief - at least she was being left alone now that I was out of the picture. No one was home, either, so I decided to sit down in the flimsy plastic chair outside her front door and wait for one of her roommates to get home so I could ask - and beg if necessary - for information on her whereabouts. I had ten thousand dollars in cash in the car, and I was willing to use it.
I must have fallen asleep at some point because I found myself jolted awake by the sound of voices and momentarily confused as to where I was. One of the voices was Natasha's - she was coming up the concrete stairs to where I was sitting. Had she been here the whole time? A bright surge of adrenaline woke me up completely just as she got to the top stair. Rosa was with her, and she was the one who saw me. As soon as the recognition of who I was dawned in her eyes she had her hand up, warning me off, putting herself between me and Nat.
"No! No, no, no! Go away."
Natasha looked up then and saw me, looking away almost immediately and shoving her key into the front door's lock, in a near-panic to get away from me. It was awful to see her like that, in reaction to me.
"Nat, Natasha, please. The photo - it wasn't real..."
My voice was choked with emotion but I was beyond caring. I think it was actually that, more than anything I said, that made Nat look up at me again as Rosa tried to hustle her into the front door and failed.
"What, Blake? It wasn't real? You mean it was fake, someone photoshopped it?"
She sounded so cold but I knew it was because of the hurt she felt.
"No," I started and she immediately turned back to enter the apartment. "Natasha! Please! Please let me explain!"
And then I did something I haven't done since I was a child and broke down, burying my face in my hands as my shoulders shook with emotion.
"Blake."
Her voice was soft now, completely different. When I opened my eyes she was staring at me and I saw it in that moment that nothing had changed, that she still felt the same way. Embarrassingly, I found myself unable to keep speaking. Rosa tried to push Nat into the house again but she resisted this time, remonstrating with her friend.
"Rosa, no! Just...just wait! Give me a sec."
Then she turned to me as Rosa walked into the apartment and put her arms around me, saying nothing.
"Blake, Blake..."
Her voice was like an antidote to all the pain of the past few days. I could not stop crying, either. Not for a good few minutes. The last time I cried like that was when I was very young, the feeling of it was so seemingly new to me it felt surreal, even in the moment. I just stood there in my beautiful girl's arms, breathing in the scent of her hair and her skin and taken over by a sense of gratitude like I've never felt before.
Finally, I got control of myself and stepped back, studying Nat's face as if it had been years since I saw her.
"Nat, please let me in to explain. I want to explain - that's why I'm here. Even if you reject my explanation, even if you eventually decide it's not worth it and you're done with me, if you let me explain at least I can go away knowing I tried to make it right with you."
She looked at me for a few seconds, as if trying to determine the truth of what I was saying and then relented, stepping aside and gesturing for me to come in to the apartment. Rosa was standing there, arms crossed, eying me.
"Nat," she said, shaking her head at me and grabbing Nat's shoulder, "don't let him in. Don't do it."
Natasha looked at her friend, then stepped forward and hugged her.
"Rosa, I think I'm going to hear him out. I know you think it's stupid - and maybe it is, but...I have to hear him out, I have to do this. OK?"
Rosa's body sagged a little and she shot Natasha an expression full of foreboding but she did leave - she grabbed her bag from the sofa and walked out the door, turning around at the last second:
"Nat, I'm just going to get coffee. If you need me, that's where I am, just around the corner." Then she turned to me and fixed me with a stern glare for a few seconds before leaving us alone.
Natasha sat down on the sofa and I took a chair across from her, not wanting her to feel pressured or manipulated. Then I looked into her big, hopeful brown eyes and told her the truth:
"Nat, the photo isn't photoshopped. It's real. I was standing out on the balcony that night and Vanessa - who has been trying to seduce me since I got back to Three Palms - pulled that move. She was there for less than two seconds. If you want, I can probably pay off the website to give me the rest of the photos, if seeing them would help."
She stayed quiet, letting my words sink in.
"She's been trying to seduce you since you got back there?"
There was no point in lying, because nothing had happened anyway, but I knew how sketchy it all sounded and I took a deep breath before continuing, determined that she know the truth, no matter what the outcome was to be.
"Yes. I understand you have no reason to believe this, Nat - no proof, but I'm not a monster. I didn't say any of the things I said to you - I didn't act the way I acted - out of anything other than how I feel about you. I know I have a reputation - a deserved one, I don't deny being a total womanizer in my twenties, but I'm not a liar. You know what's funny?"
She cocked her head at me, waiting for me to go on, so I did:
"I wasn't even tempted. Less than a year ago Vanessa could have had me out in the middle of the street nak
ed and barking like a dog to sleep with her and - it's so strange, I feel nothing now. Less than nothing. I mean, I actually feel disgusted by her."
"Why is that?"
Natasha was curled up on the sofa with her knees pulled up to her chin, listening to me with the kind of rapt attention I usually see in children. Her hair was messy, sticking up in all directions - I knew she's be self-conscious if she could see it, but she was the most adorable, beautiful thing I had ever seen. It took a lot not to go to her and lay my head in her lap, I was so desperate for her touch.
"I...don't know," I answered, realizing as I spoke that I didn't know why Vanessa disgusted me so much. I've had women sell stories about me to the press before, use me for fame or connections, but I've never felt that kind of visceral repulsion that had colored every second of every interaction with Vanessa during that time.
"Don't you?"
Nat waited for me to respond, looking over at me through her long eyelashes, a vision of feminine grace I wasn't sure I deserved. Her words sunk into my brain and I almost felt the fog lifting away from my soul. She was right - of course she was right. I did know. The words left my mouth as they occurred to me, without forethought, and as they came out, I knew they were the truth:
"It's because...Nat, it's because I love you."
There are times when a person looks back on their life and identifies a moment or event that only stands out as significant with the benefit of hindsight. There are others - very rare - when you know, right then as it's happening, that something momentous is occurring, that a fork in the road has appeared and you have resolutely chosen one way and not the other. It was the latter in Natasha's apartment that afternoon. As soon as the words had been spoken I suddenly felt as light as a feather, as if I might float off the shabby armchair I was sitting in and rise slowly up to the ceiling like a helium balloon.
Natasha stayed where she was for a short while, watching me, her eyes filling with tears and then she got up and came to me, sitting down on my lap and curling her warm body against mine.
"I believe you," she whispered softly, nestling into me.
"You do?" I asked, somewhat stupidly. I hadn't expected it to go so smoothly. "Why?"
She looked up at me with a serious expression on her face, pondering what the answer was.
"I don't know. I think part of me knew it, but maybe not until right now."
"Why didn't you say something? Why didn't you respond to my emails or my calls?"
She craned her head up towards me and kissed my neck, sending a tingling shock of electricity down to my cock:
"Because I wanted you to fight for me. I had to know it was worth it - that I was worth it to you, that you weren't just going to fade away because it got difficult. Do you understand?"
I did understand. I smiled down at her - a helpless smile, the kind you know looks goofy as hell but that you can't stop.
"So you're not going to call the cops then?"
"No," she giggled, "why would I do that?"
"Lisa told me about you mentioning calling them - and about getting a restraining order."
Natasha shot straight up at that comment, her body rigid:
"What? Lisa said that? I didn't say anything about cops or restraining orders, Blake. Not to her, not to anyone. And she told me you were trying to work things out with Vanessa."
"She what? No, Nat. No, I didn't say anything like that to her - that's a flat out lie she told you."
Damn. Lisa had lied to both of us. I questioned Natasha further about their conversation and she told me she hadn't said anything about never wanting to see me again. That Lisa had given her the impression that I had sent her, to try and break things off cleanly and make sure Nat wasn't going to sell her story to any tabloids. Why hadn't I seen it sooner? Lisa was against my relationship with Natasha from the very beginning - was I surprised that she would go as far as lying?
"Did you ever get the flowers?"
"What flowers?"
"I sent you a huge bouquet of peonies and lilies - you never got them?"
And so that came out, too. Nat told me about overhearing Lisa shouting at someone to go away and assuming it had been a paparazzi. She told me about the flower petals all over the sidewalk. I'd heard enough. I took my phone out of my pocket and called Lisa.
"What are you doing?" Nat asked me.
"I'm calling Lisa to fire her."
Nat paused, looking unsure. "Are you - you're firing her? Is that a good idea? She seems to have a lot of influence."
"Fuck Lisa's influence. She was protecting her bank balance, not me. It's not like I didn't know that already, but this is way too far. I'm sure she and Vanessa arranged that balcony photo, too. What a f-"
Lisa picked up.
"Blake? Can I call you back? I'm in the middle of some-"
I cut Lisa off flat:
"Lisa? You're fired. If you have any questions, see Barrington about them."
"Blake! Now, calm down, there must be a miscommunication here, what's going on?"
There was panic in her voice - something I had rarely if ever heard in the unflappable Ms. Cohen. Part of me took a kind of pleasure in it. All those years taking my money and treating me like an overgrown child.
"I'm here with Natasha, Lisa. She told me about your little visit. There's nothing else to say. You're fired, that's it."
She started to speak again, this time in a voice dripping with sarcasm - she'd heard the seriousness in my tone, she knew I wasn't joking.
"Alright, Blake. You realize your career is over then, correct? You won't work again and the tabloids are going to tear your little girlfriend to-"
I hung up and put the phone down on the table. Natasha had a worried look on her face but I couldn't feel anything but happiness.
"Don't look so worried, Nat. Even if she's right, and I doubt she is - you know I love you and that's the only thing that matters. You are the only thing that matters. I'm not sure I care if anyone in Hollywood ever takes my calls again, actually."
She reached up and wrapped her arms around me, burying her face in my neck and it hit me that she hadn't said a thing. About love. She must have felt me stiffen a little because she pulled back, grinning at me.
"What is it?"
How did this woman have the power to make me feel self-conscious? I never feel self-conscious. Well, I rarely did - until I met Natasha Ray. I could barely even look her in the eye.
"You - uh, Nat, you didn't say-"
"I love you, idiot."
She whispered it into my ear, kissing the spot just below my earlobe when she was finished. "OK? I love you. More than..."
I watched as her expression changed from open affection to a sudden grimace.
Before I could even ask her what was wrong she was running out of the room with one hand clapped over her mouth and the sounds of someone throwing up violently were coming from the apartment's tiny little bathroom.
Chapter 17: Natasha
I had about three seconds of warning that I was going to get sick. Blake found me sitting on the cold bathroom floor beside the toilet, breathless and clammy.
"Nat, are you OK?"
I was OK. I was definitely OK. Blake Charlton loved me, so everything was rainbows and kittens as far as I was concerned, despite the out-of-nowhere sickness. He brought me a glass of water from the kitchen and I rinsed my mouth with it. At the time, I didn't think much of getting sick - in fact I attributed it to being over-emotional and it was soon forgotten in the whirl of happiness and relief.
It surprised me a little, how quickly I understood Blake was telling me the truth. Rosa insisted on seeing all the photos from the balcony, which she did a few days later when Blake successfully identified who had taken them - and confirmed that Lisa and Vanessa had been behind the arrangement to have them taken. But I never saw them, I didn't need to.
Since meeting Blake I'd been so preoccupied with how his fame and his wealthy background were going to affect him - and they did, bu
t I should have been more worried about how they affected me. Blake had a reputation - one I was only aware of because I'd been able to read about it online and in grocery store checkout lines. Was it so different from a lot of other good-looking former twenty-somethings, apart from the fact that I knew about it? Probably not. We drove up to his beach house that night and ate clam linguini while looking out over the Pacific.
"Blake," I started, a little awkward and unsure of how to word things, "I - uh, I just wanted to apologize."
He reached across the table and ran the tip of his index finger down the back of my hand.
"What for, Nat?
"For - well, for making assumptions, I suppose. I felt so righteously angry when I saw that photo of you and Vanessa, it was almost like I expected it - like it was some kind of vindication, or proof."
Blake nodded and squeezed my hand. "Nat, don't worry about it, there's nothing to apologize for - anyone would have reacted the way you did, that photo looked pretty bad."
"I know," I replied, helplessly breaking into a smile as we caught each other eyes, "I was just thinking about it, you know? Like, would I have reacted that way if you were just a regular guy? It almost feels like I was expecting it and I don't...I don't want to expect bad things from you, I didn't have any reason to do so."
"Well it's not like I don't have a public image," he shrugged.
"Yeah but that's just it. Most of us don't have a public image. Ever since I met you I've been feeling envious of your life, of all the things I went through that you didn't have to. I guess I'm just starting to see that it's not all good, or that there are trade-offs for you just like there are for all of us - just a different kind."
"You're not wrong, Nat. Believe me, I've been over this with various therapists and psychoanalysts and so on over the years. Yeah, there have been trade-offs, but I know I've been luckier than most people - don't ever think I'm not aware of that. Sure, people like Lisa treat me like I'm borderline stupid sometimes, or assume I don't know how to change a tire-"
