“If there’s one thing I learned from that, it’s that when you have an amazing woman in your life, you treat her with respect,” Jerome says, confiding in me. “It’s been three years and that bad choice still haunts me.”
When he returns to the cockpit, I think about Allie and wonder what’s so different about her. Then I realize it’s not one particular thing – it’s everything. I’ve had more women than most men could dream of having in ten lifetimes, but this one has really gotten to me. Even before we slept together, she’d gotten under my skin in such a way that it shook me from the firm foundation I’d built, my famous bachelor movie star persona.
That’s all changed now, and I don’t know if I can ever return to being that guy again.
Bearing that in mind, I plan my course of action. Getting Allie Winters back might be the hardest thing I’ll ever attempt, but something in my heart tells me I have no choice, because forgetting about her would be impossible.
28
Allie
The last thing I did before my flight departed from Rome was to call Nicole and tell her what happened. Of course she’s there when I land at LAX, to retrieve me and take me immediately for a debriefing over drinks. I haven’t slept much in the last thirty hours, but at this point talking to my friend is more important than sleep.
We go directly to FH Lounge, and on the way there I tell her everything that happened in Rome. She nods as she hears about the strange direction my life took, but I can tell she’s not surprised by Drake’s actions. After all, she’s the one who warned me about getting involved.
When we enter the lounge, Scotty shouts at me from behind the bar, “Hey Allie, where’s your movie star friend?” I order our drinks while holding back tears, then Nicole and I sit in a corner and I continue to spill my guts. After I finish my third drink, it’s time to go home. I’m drained emotionally and physically spent and when Nicole insists I spend the night at her place, I don’t argue.
In the morning Nicole drives me home. I’m feeling a little better, having showered at her condo and changed into some clean clothes. We pull into the drive of my house in Hancock Park, and as I’m retrieving my luggage from Nicole’s trunk, she nudges me hard in the ribs, startling me. I set my suitcase down and see she’s looking at my front porch. When I follow her gaze I understand.
There on my steps is Drake Manning, holding a Starbucks cup. He smiles through his facial stubble, but it’s not the well-rehearsed movie star smile this time. It’s half relief and half apology.
“Hi, Allie.”
My heart leaps at the sight of him as he stands, then my brain scolds it for being stupid. I quickly regain my senses. “Fuck, what do I do?” I mutter under my breath at Nicole, who appears to be in a trance of the variety Drake Manning normally inspires in women.
As he approaches I say, “I don’t know why the hell you’re here, but you’re wasting your time.”
“I just want to talk, that’s all,” he says. Then he extends a hand to my friend. “Hi, I’m Drake. You must be Nicole.”
She nods as she shakes his hand and I wonder how long it’ll take her to realize she just shook hands with Satan himself.
“Can we talk alone?” he asks. “Sorry, Nicole.”
“No! We can talk if you want, but Nikki stays.”
He reluctantly agrees, but I’m pretty sure Nicole would actually rather leave at that point, knowing what lies ahead.
The three of us go inside. As Drake’s large frame passes me at the door, I catch a whiff of his musky scent and my body reacts, despite my state of mind.
I remain standing and don’t even offer them a seat. “What do you want to talk about?” I ask bluntly.
Drake takes a deep breath, then says, “Allie, I am truly sorry for what I did. It was immature and stupid and meant nothing, and if I could go back in time and undo it, I’d do so in a heartbeat. Unfortunately, that’s not possible.”
“Why, Drake?” It’s all I can think of say. I look at Nicole, who no longer seems quite as star-struck as before. Good – I’ll need her on my side through this.
“I’ve been asking myself that for the last week,” he says. “This is going to sound like bullshit, and it’ll be hard for you to understand, but here goes…”
He looks at Nicole as if he wishes she weren’t here. Too bad; she’s not going anywhere.
“I’ve never met a woman like you before,” he says. “And when I started developing feelings for you so quickly, it threw me for a loop. You know the man I was, going from one girl to the next. Then you come along and I couldn’t get you out of my head. And we hadn’t even slept together yet. It made absolutely no sense to me whatsoever.”
I stand there listening intently, my arms crossed in front of me.
“That feeling got stronger after that day in the park, and I realized how absurdly attracted I was to you. On some level I knew it was more than a physical attraction – way more, in fact – but I didn’t want to admit it.”
By now my silence is practically daring him to start making sense, to tell me how any of this leads to him sleeping with someone on the eve of leaving for Rome – on that very night he just mentioned.
“So I did the only thing I could think of and tried to prove to myself that whatever I was feeling was just a fluke: I went out and found someone to have sex with. And yes, in retrospect it was a very stupid thing to do, but at the time it made perfect sense. Like the story she posted on Reddit says, I actually sent her home before things got too far, but then I had a weird little meltdown and felt I needed to go through with it. I’m pretty certain I was fighting against my feelings for you. So I had her come back to the house, and yes, we had sex.”
Tears are streaming down my face.
Drake really looks contrite. I’ve never seen that on him, and it’s almost like I’m watching him in a movie. “It probably doesn’t matter to you, but it wasn’t good at all because I simply couldn’t get you out of my mind. I sent her home immediately afterward and felt like shit about it. By the next morning, I knew it had been a huge mistake, but I was convinced that if you and I spent time together in Rome, I would sort all this out in my head.”
“And Siena?” I ask indignantly as tears well in my eyes.
“Nothing happened with Siena,” he says, “I swear.” He sounds truthful, and she did tell me that in fact, nothing had taken place between them. My heart is aching and my mind spinning. I don’t know what to believe. “That was all just tabloid fodder. I haven’t touched her at all, off-set.”
“Why did you come all this way to tell me?” I ask. “Why not text me instead? What about the movie?”
“I made them rearrange the shooting schedule so I could come see you,” he says. “I came here to talk in person because I know how much I’ve hurt you.” He pauses, then adds, “But most of all I’m here because I don’t want to lose you.”
I’m still furious. “What makes you think you haven’t already lost me?”
“I may have,” he says, “and I might just have to live with that.”
I look at Nicole and see that she’s crying now, too. Dammit, she’s supposed to be strong for me!
Drake takes a step toward me, his arms outstretched. He stops when I glare and extend my hand, palm facing him. There’s a tense standoff, then he gives in, dropping his arms to his side.
“Allie, I have never been in this situation before, so my instincts are completely failing me,” he says, and my heart breaks all over again. The pain is almost unbearable. “But I’ve been in enough romantic comedies to know that when you’re in love with someone, and you’ve done something to break her trust and push her away, your only choice is to go to her, tell her how you feel, and throw yourself on her mercy.”
Did he just say what I think he said? I look at Nicole again, and she’s biting her lower lip to keep it from trembling.
“Shut up,” I say, trying to sound like I mean it. “Just stop talking.”
“I love you, Allie,”
he says, his voice actually cracking, “and I am so sorry for what I did that I promise I’ll spend the rest of my life making it up to you.”
“Stop.” It comes out as a whimper.
He closes the gap between us and has his arms around me before I can stop him.
“Forgive me, baby. Please.”
I hit him hard on the chest with the heel of my fist. “You’re such an asshole,” I say.
“Come back to Rome with me.”
Nicole is full-on crying now. My nerves are frayed and my heart and brain are having a huge battle.
Drake kisses me tenderly on the forehead, and that’s when I snap.
“No!” I push him away from me. “No! Get out!”
Both he and Nicole are stunned, but I am suddenly in full meltdown mode. I hit him with my fists, but he easily deflects the punches with his arms.
“Allie, come on,” he says, pleading.
I completely lose it and begin screaming at him to leave and never come back. I morph into a mad woman, my wounded psyche releasing all its pent-up anger. Drake continues to protest, but it just pisses me off more. Nicole has to intervene, telling Drake he should go.
Reluctantly he walks to the door. “Allie…” he says, but I don’t let up.
“Get out of my house!” Then I go to the door and keep screaming at him as he walks to his rental car.
“I don’t ever want to see you again!” is the last thing I say before I slam the door and dissolve into a shaking, sobbing mess.
Nicole does her best to calm me down, sitting me at the table and making tea. It takes a while, but eventually I’m more settled, my nerves no longer buzzing.
“Did I do the right thing?” I ask.
“I don’t know, sweetie. Only you can answer that. Do you feel right about never seeing him again?”
I do.
Or maybe I don’t, but I’m still trying to convince myself that I do – it’s impossible to tell the difference.
“I must be a mess,” I say. “I’m going to go clean up a bit. Stay, please.”
“Of course.”
Cleaning up my smeared mascara in the bathroom, I open the medicine cabinet to grab some cotton and happen to notice the spare toothbrush there, still sealed in plastic wrap. I’d originally bought it for Johnny Flynn near the end of our relationship many months ago, then decided to hang on to it for guest use. I think about Johnny, who seemed to like sex only because it supposedly goes along with “… drugs and rock ‘n’ roll.” For him, sex was more of a show – often including bondage and various toys when he could convince me to try something new. There was no sense of intimacy at all.
I compare that to Drake, who likes sex for the sake of sex. Pure fucking, or at least that’s what he claimed. Only every time he and I had sex, the feeling of intimacy was overwhelming. So much so that there’s no possible way he could have been faking it.
I wonder about all those women in his past, whether the actual number is fifty or five-hundred. Why did he have sex with so many women?
Why?
Out of nowhere, I experience a rare moment of clear-headed thought compared to the last two days, and I suddenly understand the reason Drake has sex with so many women. He does it because he loves sex and there are so many women available to him – and because he’s never had a steady girlfriend. He actually admitted as much to me.
Could it really be that simple? He fucks around so much because he’s just never met the right girl?
And if that’s actually the case, why couldn’t I fill both those roles for him, the great sex and the steady relationship? Our sex is amazing, and he said half an hour ago that he loves me. And I know…
I stop myself short, then close the medicine cabinet. As I look at myself in the mirror, my bloodshot eyes stare back, daring me to complete the thought.
And I know I love him, too.
Oh, no.
I burst back into the dining room, scaring the hell out of Nicole and making her spill her tea.
“Nikki, I’ve made a terrible mistake!”
29
Drake
I have officially run out of options. After the display I just saw, there is no way Allie is going to give me another chance, at least not in the short break I have during the shoot. I have no choice but to return to Rome and finish the movie. Maybe afterward she’ll have calmed down enough so we can reasonably and rationally discuss whether or not we have any possibility of a future together.
At the moment, though, I can’t help but feel that all hope is lost.
I drive directly back to Van Nuys Airport. Brian and Jerome are home asleep, thinking we’d be here longer than a mere four hours. I call and rouse them from their slumbers, then board the jet and pour myself a drink while waiting. Within the hour they’re back and they fire up the engines. As we taxi down the runway, I look out the window, my heart heavy. I’m not familiar with this sensation, but I hate it. I feel devastated. My entire being has been dismantled over the last couple of days. Nothing about me feels comfortable any more, as if I’m now in someone else’s skin.
“Excuse me, Mr. Manning?”
It’s the intercom. Jerome thinks it’s funny to call me Mr. Manning, though I always tell him to call me Drake. It’s our little ongoing private joke.
“I’m afraid we’re having a little mechanical issue. One of the gauges is acting up and we’ll have to return to the hangar to check it out.”
I’m on my third bourbon and really don’t give a shit. Once we’re finally airborne, I plan on sleeping most of the way back to Rome anyway.
When the plane rolls to a stop a minute later, Jerome opens the door and lowers the stairs, then says, “Mr. Manning, I may need a hand with this.” What the fuck is he talking about? Get Brian to help. As if he can read my mind, he says, “Brian’s busy with the flight plan.”
I’m a little irritated as I set down my drink. When I poke my head through the door into that warm Southern California sunshine I love so much, I see Allie standing at the bottom of the stairs with Cecil on one side and her suitcase on the other. She’s still teary-eyed as she tries to smile. A grinning Jerome says, “Sorry, boss, but Cecil had the tower contact us. Said it was an emergency.”
I don’t waste a second as I run to her, picking her up off the ground and spinning her in the air. I set her down and kiss her hard, not wanting to ever let her go again. Cecil smiles, then walks away to give us our privacy.
After the kiss, Allie looks up at me with those big beautiful eyes and says, “Drake, I need you to promise me: never again. No other women, ever.”
I nod, deliriously happy at this unexpected turn of event. “Never, I promise. Why would I need to if I have you?”
“Do you really love me?” she asks. “I need to know.”
“I’m pretty sure I do,” I say. “I think that’s what I’m feeling. I really have no frame of reference. I know the thought of losing you gave me a physical ache, like someone had pulled a plug in my heart and let everything leak out. That’s love, right? It must be.”
She’s beaming at me, her eyes bloodshot and bleary.
“I love you, too,” she says.
And just like that, everything is right once again in my world.
Our world.
We board the jet and I pour Allie the drink she so obviously needs. Minutes later we’re in the sky. Once we reach cruising altitude, she says, “Drake, I need to talk to you about what happened. I need to understand it.”
I totally get that she needs to talk, but I have something else in mind first. “Later,” I say softly, then I stand and lead her to the rear of the cabin, drawing the mid-cabin privacy curtain. I had the rear two seats removed and a bed installed in their place, and though I’ve admittedly used it on quite a few occasions, I know this time will be very different.
Allie starts to protest, but I know we both need this. No amount of talking can take the place of what happens when the two of us are intertwined in bed. I place a finger over
her lips and repeat, “Later. We have all the time in the world now.”
We’re still in bed that, our bodies blissfully entwined, fifteen hours later when we arrive in Rome, and I can’t recall ever being happier.
30
Allie
The press junket for Entangled States consists of twenty cities in a dozen countries over a three-week span. For a film with a huge budget like this, they leave nothing to chance when it comes to publicity. Drake and Siena have done talk shows and press conferences, and even did a surprise spot on an Italian reality show together. They have become fast friends and the chemistry between them is obvious, even on television and in print.
It was his idea that I accompany him on the press tour. I think he didn’t want me to worry that anything was going on between the two of them, but I wasn’t concerned. I have to admit that I’m glad to be around, though. Five months have passed since our little hiccup and subsequent reuniting, and Drake and I have been ecstatic. The thought of not seeing him for three weeks was unbearable.
Firehawk, the film Drake was promoting when I first interviewed him, was a massive summer hit and added nearly a billion dollars to his stunning box office total. My interview with Drake for the LA Times Magazine was also a rousing success, and his opening up like that to the public has given him new respect in the entertainment community. He’s no longer shrouded in secrecy and has become more relatable since everyone knows how tough he had it as a teenager. Conan O’Brien’s line, “I lost my virginity at a younger age than Drake Manning did, though he obviously passed me at some point,” became a running joke. His high school yearbook picture has been turned into an Internet meme, with the caption, “If this guy can get laid, anything is possible.” It’s appeared all over Facebook, Twitter and Instagram, giving hope to ugly-duckling teenage boys everywhere.
Hollywood Bad Boys Club: Book 1: Drake Page 15
