Acting Brave (Fenbrook Academy #3 - New Adult Romance)

by Helena Newbury

  “I was wrong,” Her voice was just a whisper, barely audible. “It started something. And then I went to his place, today. I lied to you about Karen. We had a few drinks and... we made love.”

  It made no sense. Right after we had sex?! We’d been so happy…. But all my paranoia about acting was coming back to haunt me. The kiss. The way he’d looked at her. The way she’d flirted with my friends. Maybe this is just how it is, for actresses. Fake passion that becomes real. Quick, meaningless flings. Could I forgive her, if that’s what it had been?

  But she hadn’t said that. She hadn’t said it’s over, or it was a mistake. From the way she was talking….

  “You want to...be with him?” I asked slowly.

  I heard her swallow. “Yes,” she whispered. Then, very quickly, “I’m sorry.”

  And she put the phone down.

  The anger built slowly. It was as if my memories were burning: every image of Jasmine and Tyler kissing, every frustration I’d felt with learning to act, everything I’d done to try to be with her....all of them were erupting with white fire and disintegrating into ash. The tiny black flecks were being pulled inward, whipped up into a black hurricane. All twisting around a solid core of pain and shame that felt like a permanent part of me, now.

  The hurricane expanded to fill me completely, and I lost control.

  I was up off the couch in an instant, grabbing a lamp. I hurled it at the mirror on the wall, my own reflection falling in tinkling daggers. I ripped the bookshelves off the wall, sending books raining across the floor.

  In the kitchen, I upended the table, the one we’d eaten dinner on. I saw the plates and bowls we’d used on a shelf and swept them onto the floor, crockery shattering.

  I was an idiot. I’d known, deep down, that I wasn’t right for her. I was just a big, dump cop and she was an actress for God’s sake, beautiful and untouchable. I’d reached up to the pedestal I’d put her on and I’d got burned. Maybe I just didn’t understand their world, people like Jasmine and Tyler. Maybe it was normal for them to move between lovers this casually, to care so little about feelings.

  Had she even ever loved me?! She’d said she had and I’d believed her, but—

  I could feel myself coming apart, just as I had in the first few days after Hux was killed. I hadn’t realized how much Jasmine had been holding me together. I’d been a mess when I went to the screen test, but seeing her and thinking maybe she and I had a shot together had given me something to focus on. The whole relationship and even learning how to be an actor...it had made me think that maybe I still had something to offer. I’d thought that maybe I could save her from whatever nightmare lay in her past.

  But she didn’t need me. And now I was right back at the start.

  I stumbled out of my apartment, not even sure where I was going.

  Chapter 63

  Jasmine

  I put the phone down and tried to convince myself that everything was okay. I’d pushed the reset button on my life and jumped back to how I was before the screen test. I was glamorous, trouble-free, bouncy Jasmine. That had always worked for me before.

  But it didn’t work now.

  When I’d created Jasmine, the layers of protection had been just what I needed to shield Emma. They stopped me feeling, but I’d wanted to stop feeling. I hadn’t wanted to be scared or lonely or ashamed or guilty anymore. And after a few years of not feeling, I’d almost stopped missing it.

  The last few weeks with Ryan, though, had undone all that. He’d sliced right through all those layers and, for the first time in years, the real me had actually felt something. And it had been something positive, something warm and intoxicating, filling me up and bringing me back to life from the inside out. And now I’d shut him out, and I felt as if I was suffocating.

  I told myself I had my life back. In a day or two, the cops would let my dad go and he’d go back to Chicago. Probably, I’d never see my brother again. My dad would claim him back and use him to deal again. But maybe he’d keep to his word and leave me alone in New York.

  Or maybe he’d seek revenge after all for me stealing from him. Maybe he’d drag me back as well and make me give myself to his customers.

  But some hope was better than none. If I’d told the cops the truth, I might already be dead. My dad knew people everywhere, even in New York. And even if the cops could protect me, there was Ryan to think about. I would have put him in danger, too. Maybe even the girls.

  I told myself I’d done the right thing.

  What I really needed was to talk to someone. I needed to pour out the truth and have someone hold me and reassure me that I’d taken the only possible way out. I needed someone to tell me that they still loved me.

  I was still lying on my back on the floor, the cold slowly soaking into my body. I picked up my phone again. I had Karen’s number set up as a speed-dial, with a little icon of a cello on the home screen. All I had to do was tap it.

  My thumb hovered over the icon...then moved away.

  I’d lied to her, when I’d been at her apartment. I’d lied to her for years, in fact, and I couldn’t come clean now. She was my best friend in the world and she didn’t even know my real name. What if she didn’t like the real me? What if she told me to get lost?

  Of all of the girls, she’d come closest to seeing the real me. That night when I’d gone to meet my first client as an escort and she’d saved me...my mask had slipped for an instant. But I still couldn’t risk it. What if I told her what I’d done, how I’d lied to protect my dad, and she looked horrified? I hated myself for what I’d done, but if someone confirmed it, if someone told me I was right to hate myself, if she said she never wanted to see me again….

  Better that I had her in my life as Jasmine. Better that I had a friend I lied to than no friend at all.

  I put the phone down, buried my face in my hands, and started to cry again.

  Chapter 64

  Ryan

  I didn’t know where I was heading until I saw tombstones. I’d been walking for hours, through areas of the city I barely knew. Something deep inside me must have been guiding me.

  I stopped at the gate, not sure if I wanted to go in. But I knew that I’d wandered here for a reason. I could feel a pulling in my soul and it had been getting stronger as I approached. The thing inside me, the source of all the rage, wanted me to go in.

  I stepped over the threshold.

  I’d only been there once before, for the funeral. That hadn’t been real, somehow. All the ceremony of a cop funeral, the uniforms and the fanfares, had taken away the pain. It had made the death into an abstract, a newspaper headline. I hadn’t really been able to relate it to Hux.

  Seeing an actual grave, knowing he was down there...that would be different. That’s why I’d never visited.

  There was just enough moonlight to see by. It was a big graveyard but I remembered the path we’d walked down and the sycamore tree that hung over the grave. I approached it from behind. I didn’t want to see the words on the front because they’d make it real.

  It hit me for the first time that it hadn’t been real to me. Hux was still alive in my head.

  I edged around the gravestone and read the name and dates and the inscription beneath. Beloved husband. Loving father. Tireless officer.

  “Hey,” I said, my voice thick with emotion. “I’m here. Finally.”

  I don’t know what I was expecting. Maybe that I’d hear him more clearly, here. But I couldn’t hear him at all.

  “I don’t know what to do,” I said.

  No answer.

  I shook my head. The anger had died down, since I’d smashed up my apartment. But now that I was here it seemed different. Tighter and darker. I’d reached the core of it, I realized. Other things had been setting it off, but this was where it lived.

  I put my hand on the gravestone. “I’m sorry.” I could feel the upwelling of emotion inside me, but that wasn’t it. It wasn’t apologies that were needed.

&nb
sp; “He only got five years,” I said tightly. “On account of the drugs. He could be out in three.” The guy’s face swam up into my mind. I could see him standing there on the porch, strung out and shocked at what he’d done, the gun still in his hand. Tendrils of the rage were snapping and snaking out to him, but he wasn’t what was at the heart of the anger. That was—

  I felt the rage shift and snarl inside me as I touched on the thought. I knew that, finally, I’d found the core of it. I could feel the size of it inside me, filling every part of me. I’d thought that I’d been letting it out, little by little, when I lost control. But all I’d been doing was letting off steam—the thing generating the anger was still trapped inside. That’s why the rage would never stop. Not until I finally let it go.

  Let him go.

  And if I did that, if I got it all out of me...it was so all-consuming that I didn’t know if there’d be anything of me left afterwards. It felt like I’d become just a vessel for the anger, since he died.

  I slumped to my knees and put my other hand on the gravestone, too. And I finally said what I needed to say. “It should have been me!” Each word was a twisted, razor-edged barb, tearing me up as it came up through my throat. “I’m the stupid one. I’ve got no one! You had a whole goddamn family you idiot!”

  I knew now why I’d never visited. Why I’d lied to the grief counsellor. Hanging onto the anger meant I could hold onto Hux. That’s why he’d kept talking to me. Letting it out meant losing that connection. It meant his death was real.

  “You had a life!” I yelled. “You were good at that stuff! I was the one who was only good at being a cop! No one would have missed me!” It was all spilling out of me, now, all the black rage that had been poisoning me. “I was good at one fucking thing and now I can’t even do that!”

  My fist slammed down on top of the grave once, twice. And then I was wrapping my arms around it and hugging it tight, so tight I thought I was going to snap the damn thing in half. “I miss you, Hux,” I choked out, and my eyes were scalding hot.

  I felt it pouring out of me, the twisting black core that had fuelled my rage. I gasped at the wrenching pain as it left me, gripping onto the gravestone for strength.

  When it finally stopped, everything felt different. I was still in the graveyard, it was still night and I was still on my knees, my arms hugging the cold stone so tightly I had bruises. But the mood, the aura of the place had utterly changed. When I’d arrived, Hux hadn’t been here, at least to me. He’d been inside me. Now, I could feel him here. Where he should be.

  There was a void inside me where he’d been, a yawning gulf that I had no idea how to fill. But maybe an emptiness is easier to live with than an anger that pollutes everything you do. Anger can’t be healed, only bottled up, or let out. An emptiness can be filled by something else. Someone else.

  I shook my head at the thought. I’d lost her. I’d been right all along. All those times Hux had told me to talk to Jasmine, and I’d said we lived in two different worlds—I’d been right. We’d connected briefly, but now she’d returned to her level and I was stuck down below with no way up. It was clear that I had no idea about relationships. All I knew how to do was be a cop.

  So be a cop.

  Not Hux’s voice. Not my own, either. Maybe a little of both of us.

  I told myself that was stupid. She didn’t love me. I couldn’t fix that with cop work. I wasn’t going to deny it, the way I’d been denying Hux’s death. I’d learned that lesson.

  But once I allowed the thought to enter my head, once I started turning things over and over, the way I would if it was a crime, it didn’t make sense.

  Why had she called me, instead of doing it face to face? That was the coward’s way of doing it. Jasmine was no coward. She was the bravest person I knew. So why hide behind a phone unless....

  Unless she knew I’d spot a lie, face to face.

  And if she was going to have an affair, would it really be with the one guy I was already jealous of, the first one I’d suspect? She’d admitted to me that she liked the kiss. It was too perfect, too predictable. Exactly the way a criminal would spin a story—giving the cops exactly what they’re expecting to hear.

  Something was wrong. I could feel it in my gut, all my cop senses screaming. I’d just been deaf to them before, too caught up in my anger.

  Why would she make up an affair? To break up with me. Why? To keep me away? To stop me discovering something worse, something she couldn’t bear for me to see?

  What if she was in trouble?

  I stood up. The void inside me ached and throbbed, but I felt clearer. I was in control at last.

  If I wanted to get her back, I had to become a cop again. I had to do what I did as a cop, when faced with a lie. Find a thread and start pulling.

  ***

  I got a cab back to my apartment. On the way, I called Charlie C. As I’d hoped, he’d pulled his regular night shift.

  “Do me a favor,” I said. “Give me an address.” And I told him Tyler’s name.

  I heard him sipping coffee, then a flurry of keystrokes. He read out an address in one of the nicer parts of the East Village. “Promise me you’re not going to do anything dumb,” he said.

  “Thanks, Charlie,” I said, and hung up. I couldn’t promise anything. I had no idea what I was going to do when I came face to face with Tyler. If he really had slept with her….

  ***

  I picked up my car and drove straight to Tyler’s address. A nice apartment. Nicer than most actors would be able to afford on their own.

  It was the early hours by the time I hammered on the door, but I’d gone too far to turn back down. “NYPD!” I yelled. Which was sort of true.

  After a few minutes, the door opened. A pissed-off looking Tyler stood there, in just a pair of jockey shorts.

  “I’m here about Jasmine,” I said stiffly. Already, my fists were bunching...but it was different, now. The anger wasn’t being magnified by the all-consuming rage at Hux’s death. It was just good old-fashioned jealousy. Healthy anger.

  He crossed his arms. “I’ve got nothing to say to you,” he said.

  He was stonewalling me. Why? If they were together, why not just admit it? “I know you slept with her,” I said. “I just want to know if it’s over.”

  Was that—had I seen a flicker there? A blink of surprise? He was a damn good actor, but I was a good cop. Something wasn’t right.

  “It’s none of your business,” he said, and started to close the door.

  I stuck my foot between it and the frame. I was sick of being lied to.

  He tried to force the door closed. I kept my foot in place, staring him out. But he glared back at me just as determinedly. It made no sense. If he was sleeping with her, why not just say so? If he wasn’t, then why be so mysterious about it? Why not just tell me he wasn’t?

  I heard movement in the next room—the unmistakable sound of a bed creaking. “Is it really the cops?” came a voice.

  A male voice.

  “Stay there!” snapped Tyler, glancing off in the direction of the bedroom. But then the other guy was there, also in just a pair of shorts. He glared suspiciously at me and put a protective arm around Tyler’s shoulders.

  Tyler shook it off. “I work with him, you moron!” he snapped at the other guy.

  And suddenly, it all made sense. Why he’d been so cagey. Why he’d been so obviously into Jasmine from the very beginning, and so hostile toward me. It had all been an act. Convince everyone you’re trying to get into an actress’s pants and no one will suspect what’s really going on.

  He was one hell of an actor. Clearly, even Jasmine hadn’t realized, or she wouldn’t have picked him as her stooge.

  I raised my hands in apology. “I’m sorry,” I said. “Forget it. You just answered my question.” And I started to walk off down the hall.

  Seconds later, Tyler caught up with me. He’d thrown on a pair of jeans but was still topless. He still looked pissed off, but
the fake hostility was gone. And the anger was mixed in with fear. “Hey!” He grabbed my shoulder. “Look: no one can find out. Okay?” He searched my face, trying to gauge whether he could trust me. “You get more parts,” he said wretchedly, “if they think you’re straight.”

  I shook my head. “No one’s going to hear it from me,” I said. “But...you really want to live like this? Lying to everybody?”

  “It’s a living,” he said darkly.

  “Yeah. But it’s no way to live.”

  ***

  Back in my car, I sat and thought. She’d made up the affair to break up with me. Now I had to figure out why. I could confront her, but she’d just lie to me again. I had to figure this out on my own, and only go to her when I knew what the hell was going on.

  Was it something I’d done? I hadn’t seen her since that morning, and we’d been happy, then. I tried to remember what she’d said when I woke up. She’d been worried that she seemed like a different person. I thought of how she looked, sometimes. How she did look different, smaller and more vulnerable. Whenever she thought about her past.

  What would someone do, if they had something really bad they needed to leave behind?

  They’d run away.

  They’d become another person.

  I slammed the car into gear and headed for the police station.

  ***

  It felt wrong, typing Jasmine’s name into the police computer. But if she was in trouble, finding out what was really going on was the only way I could help her.

  Her record was completely clean...but it only started about three years before. There was a note attached to the file warning that she’d changed her name.

  Jasmine wasn’t Jasmine.

  I felt a sudden rush of anger at being lied to. Why hadn’t she been straight with me? And then, almost immediately, the anger twisted and turned, finding its rightful target. What bastards had hurt her and scared her so badly that she needed to hide like this? That she’d created a whole new life and buried the old one?