by Nicole Snow
“There it is!” Dad bellows from the closet. “There it fucking is! Least you're not afraid to kick me in the nuts one last time confessing, Ericka.”
“Like you have any balls to kick,” she sneers, before turning her attention back to Luke and me. “Robin, please. I know this doesn't make any sense. Mistakes were made. I've been selfish, put myself above your own well being, and I'm done with that today. We need space. We can't stay here for a second longer. I have to get you away from this place, away from him, before the Shaws and their filthy hands ruin everything.”
It sounds like they already have. I wonder why Luke is so quiet. His whole jaw line glows red, hot like burning metal from the scorch mark she's left on his face. He doesn't even reach up to rub it. He just stands there like a sentinel, holding me in his fading grip, staring her down.
“You heard your husband. Leave her the fuck alone,” he growls, resting his chin in my hair.
“No. I won't allow another Shaw to use my daughter and throw her away. That's all your family knows how to do. Call the police now, if you'd like. I'm taking her away for her own good. You'll need a restraining order to stop me from protecting her!”
“Mom!” I can't take it anymore. I cut in, before he can say anything, stirring her up more. “I'm not going with you until you explain what's happened. I'm sorry you had to walk in on this. I don't know what's going on between you and dad, but I –“
“She cheated! She's a liar, a whore, a goddamned backstabber!” Dad roars from the closet, finally up on all fours, still too tangled in my dresses to crawl toward us. “Don't listen to a word she says, honey. Tried to get the truth out of her for months. Took Frank Shaw handing us both a pink slip to find out she was fucking him all along!” His fist slams the floor.
His rage is overwhelming. I don't know whether my lungs are going to explode first, or my eyes from the fiery tears I'm holding in.
Their marriage was never good. They'd been growing distant for years, especially after I hit my teens. But if there's any truth to this, if my mom was cheating – and with the head of the Shaw household, Luke's father – then I've just been hit with a bigger blow to the gut than I know what to do with.
“Stay back,” Luke warns again, pulling me several steps backwards. “Both of you.” He nods toward my dad on the floor, twisted in my garments.
“Sure, Mr. High and Mighty. I'll just fold my arms and wait while you take off with my girl. I'll pretend you didn't know about us the entire fucking time. Like you didn't know what your father was doing to me, strong-arming me into his bed. Like you haven't already gotten her wrapped around your pathetic little finger, something you've inherited from him. Tell me, boy, would you have dumped her for your next mistress as soon as you had her brainwashed? Maybe a married woman, like the kind your father likes? Or does that gene skip a generation?”
Luke says nothing. He continues to hold me, daring her to say or do something that'll give him an excuse to make good on his warnings.
“Come on. You're not blind, boy. I heard you slinking around the house at least a dozen times when I was with your father. You knew, and you did nothing, because it's business-as-usual in your twisted world.”
Knew what? I'm struggling to keep up with her nasty words. There's an evil conviction in her voice. It scares me.
He couldn't have known about my mother cheating. He would have said something...wouldn't he?
I spin around, freeing myself from his greedy arms, searching his eyes. “Luke? Don't tell me you knew about this? It isn't true!” Denial is poison, and it stings my tongue with every word.
There's a long silence. He lowers his head, staring at the floor, shifting uncomfortably. “I wanted to get you out of here before something like this came down, Robbi. I knew you'd be hurt. Yeah, I had my suspicions for awhile. But I didn't know anything for sure until yesterday. I just knew it'd break your heart when you found out the hard way, and I tried to save you from that.”
My hands go up, covering my mouth. I'm breathing into my hands, hard and heavy. “You knew. You lied to me.”
“Lied? No, baby, no. I did you a favor.”
He's lying right now. “Favor? What the fuck is wrong with you? You thought I wasn't strong enough? That I couldn't handle the truth? Jesus. That's all I've ever wanted. Honesty. It's part of love. When you said you loved me, I thought you understood.” I look at him, tears welling in my eyes, wondering how we can already be worlds apart. “You lied. How do I ever trust you again?”
“Because I tried to do the right thing, and I fucked up, Robin.” He stands up straight, pain tightening his jaw, grinding out every word leaving his mouth. “I'm sorry. You have to believe I am. Look, this doesn't have to change anything. We don't need to let this bullshit come between us. You're not thinking straight because it's hitting you in the face right now. It hurts too much. Let's get out of here, babe. Clear your head. Get you the fuck away from this drama, this insanity.”
I'm backing up on instinct. I don't realize I'm on top of my mother until she grabs me, locks her arms around my waist, and holds on for dear life. “He knew the entire time, Robbi, and he didn't say a thing. Don't believe him when he says he only found out a day ago. How many times did I see him lurking out the corner of my eye when I was with Frank? Oh, he knew, and he kept it to himself. He wanted you for something else. I hope you didn't give it to him, but it's not your fault if you did. That's what the Shaws do. They lie.”
Luke bares his teeth, his lips peeling back in a snarl. My mother looks him dead in the eye, unrelenting, her words coming hot and painful.
“They blackmail. They bribe. They make you do things you never would in your right mind. They treat women like their personal toys. Ultimately, they break them, just like they take a hammer to everyone's lives, and they never care who picks up the pieces. I'm so sorry. I'll apologize up and down for my part, but I think you'll understand I didn't have much choice after I tell you the rest. But I'll own my part in this, unlike him. I'm still your mother, and I love you. Leave with me, Robbi. We'll figure out the rest. Please. Trust me.”
She's hurt me almost as much as Luke. So has dad, for that matter, drooling on the floor in his drunken, confused rage. His leg continues to kick helplessly at my clothing wrapped around him, but he's stopped yelling.
Decision time.
I break eye contact first. Luke won't take his eyes off me. He's staring, hoping he can make me reconsider, hold me to him by sheer willpower in his gaze.
That's what I expect to see when I take one last glance at his face. But it's not fiery determination. It's pain, defeat, and maybe a little panic.
He's just watched the world he tried to save me from go up in smoke. He doesn't know how to fix this. He doesn't know how bad he's hurt me, and there's no combination of words he can find to make me forgive, forget, or trust again.
We're both fucking lost. That's the last thing we have in common, standing in this rubble. Unsure who's going to make the next move, but certain it's going to be a terrible one.
I'm standing in the middle of a three way wreck, a pileup. It's brutal proof I'm the most blind, gullible person on the planet, or at least anywhere in the Shaw's vast empire.
Yes, that's ego talking. Raw, scorched, wounded pride.
I don't know who to trust.
With everything happening around me, I'm not even sure if I ought to be trusting myself.
My hands go to my chest, covering the bitter throb behind my ribs. I'm going pale from the emotional bleeding, the wounds everyone in this room inflicted on me.
It hurts to think. I have to get out of here before I go insane.
I can't go with Luke. I also can't stay with my well meaning, but alcoholic father, who seriously needs to find his way into rehab. If he's right about being off the Shaw payroll, we'll all be evicted in a matter of days. Maybe hours.
“Robbi...” Luke says my name. There's an edge in his voice. His eyes are big, bright, and pleading. Strong, perhaps
, but his power isn't enough.
I can't feel the adoration in his gaze anymore. Only lies. It belongs to a man who said he loved me, but doesn't love mean openness, honesty, as well as strength?
How can I trust him when he's been manipulating me?
How can I trust him after his family ripped a gaping hole through mine, and he knew it was happening?
Was love one more lie?
My head is spinning. I need to leave the room before I suffocate, choking on pain and dishonesty. Throwing my arm around mom's shoulder, she hurries me out to her car. Tears blur my eyes.
I don't dare look back. If I do, I know I'll see him standing there, working himself into a quiet rage as the loss sets in.
If he ever loved me, he'll be hurt. I don't know why, but the thought of seeing it makes me feel worse than knowing he straight up lied.
I don't totally break down until we're on the interstate, leaving the grim Shaw estate in the rear view mirror forever.
Liar or not, I'll never forget the look on his face. He betrayed me, and he knew it.
Whether he was sorry for himself for getting caught, or just sorry, I don't know. I don't care.
Trusting Lucus Shaw was my biggest mistake. Loving him was my second. I'm not letting him back in my life long enough to make a third.
4
Remember Goodbye (Luke)
Present Day
Weather clear. Altitude just shy of thirty thousand feet. Plane on auto-pilot. I won't have to man the controls again until we're in California, on the home stretch to the studios around L.A.
It's good leaving Oregon behind. I just dropped my older brother, Hayden, outside Portland. He's there to kiss and make up with the redheaded honey he married on a whim. She left him in a huff over a big misunderstanding with another woman, just when things were getting real. I thought he'd lost his mind, until I saw how serious he was about the chase, bringing her back and making it right.
That's his problem now. Mine is making sure the biggest break of my life knocks down the doors I've been staring at ever since I got into the industry.
What would Miles Black be doing right about now? It's time to start thinking like him.
Heart throb. Player. Billionaire. Dark and broody as a vampire without the fangs and coffins. Book boyfriend to about a billion women – damn, does he get around – and now he'll be their fantasy on the silver screen.
Correction: I'll be their Casanova.
I've got the troubled billionaire act down, at least. I've wondered if it's talent landing me the role, or destiny, considering how many things I've got in common with this fictional man-whore.
I reach for the folder on the passenger seat. Everything my agent laid in front of me is there. It's as good a time as any to review the supporting cast before I touch down to sign off on the final details, and show up for the first shoot.
Opening the folder, I flick through the papers inside, looking up names on social media. There's Aaron Harkness cast as our villain, a two-timing Senator, a Hollywood legend if there ever was one. I'm two names down the list when my finger comes to a dead stop.
Robin Plomb, Allison Evers.
What the fuck? No.
It can't be. I hesitate, reaching for my phone, before I decide to stop screwing around with a snort.
It's a freak coincidence. Another actress with the same name. It takes the internet awhile to load up here in the sky. Her face materializes on my screen like one of those old porn pics from the nineties, loading several rows of pixels at a time.
Her mouth hasn't even shown up when I realize how utterly screwed I am.
“Fuck.” I mouth it silently, staring out the cockpit, into the pale blue wild over northern California.
It's her, all right. I'd know those pale blue eyes anywhere. They're almost grey now that she's older, more beautiful than before, glossed with a sheen of worldly sadness.
I'd never mistake Robbi for anyone else in a thousand years. How the fuck could I?
She's burned in my head, stamped into my grey matter, like the last time I saw her was just yesterday. Her features are there, and they're all the same, even if they've become a little more refined.
Blonde hair, cream skin, high cheekbones, and full lips. I'll never forget how they opened on our first and last night together, gushing pure pleasure, a melancholy warm up to tragedy.
These memories are cruel. I take a long, brutal pull of the plane's oxygen while the rest comes rushing back.
Me, standing in her parent's bungalow, that clueless fucking kid who watched his best laid plans crumbling to ash.
The hurt in Robbi's face when she found out I hid the worst. I couldn't give it to her then, couldn't break the awful news. She stormed out, her eyes wide open to my fatal mistake.
Watching her cheating bitch of a mother usher her away from me, sending the venom reserved for my old man into me. Running out the door when it was too fucking late, their car disappearing down the road leading out our gate in a huff of autumn leaves.
Crawling back to that house, defeated, still chasing a ghost romance in my mind. Helping her drunken, bawling father up from his mess in the closet. Keeping him from throwing fists in my face while I called an ambulance.
Hurling the ring in its box at the wall so hard it left a hole.
Limping home with my grief. Seeing my old man, drunk and already into Ericka's bubbly young replacement, fawning all over him.
Shaking my head because I could've stopped this fucking tragedy, I could've told Robbi the truth about her mother, and I didn't.
The last savage call I had with Robbi on the phone. Accepting scorched earth. Slamming my fist into my hideous old man's face for what he did.
Leaving the house for the final time, hearing his pathetic excuses through the blood running down his throat, the last words he ever said to me before I saw him on his deathbed just a few months ago.
I still don't want any part of the inheritance Hayden keeps working like a dog to save. It's tied up in our scheming step-mom's hands, Kayla, a woman dad met who was finally his match, more soulless and conniving than him.
I fly on, my heart sticking in my throat. Briefly, I think about what would happen if I walk away from this shit.
Just turn the plane around, land in Klamath Falls, and forget I ever accepted the male lead in what's bound to be a billion dollar hit.
Too bad Hollywood isn't forgiving. There are no second chances where agents and studios are concerned. I didn't pour my soul into supporting characters and low budget comedies over the last several years for nothing.
I can't walk away now. I won't submit to fear.
If I have to get up close and personal again with the woman who ruined love for me, so be it. I'll be sure to sink my teeth into her lip when it's time to stage the kiss.
Two days later, I'm on the set. Ready to face her. I don't give a damn how beautiful she is, or how much history is bound to ignite the atmosphere as soon as we're in the same room.
This opportunity isn't slipping away.
I half-expect Robbi herself will bow out. She never had the stomach for the hard things, like forgiveness.
I make the rounds, meeting the production crew, the makeup people, and the director, Pierce Rogan. I say a few words to Aaron Harkness, tell him how much of an honor it is to work with him.
Director Rogan's infamous work ethic is already showing. It's the first film I've worked on where there's hours to get our bearings, instead of days.
The man doesn't waste time. Fine by me. The sooner we're rolling, the better.
“You'll have to wait until this evening for introductions with Ms. Plomb,” an aide to the producer says. “I'm sorry for the delay. Some personal business kept her from arriving before the shoot.”
“Fine,” I tell the woman, taking my spot on the stage, practicing my kinky billionaire power pose.
Is it really? Fuck no.
Seeing Robbi for the first time in five years when the cameras are ro
lling is anything but fine and dandy.
I don't buy the line about personal business. It's more likely she's deciding if she can go through with this, face me again when there's so much on the line. Both our careers are in the hands of the same sick twist of fate.
I'm dressed in a ten thousand dollar tux, standing stiffer than a board, gazing down on my imaginary empire in the green screen. They'll fill in the Chicago cityscape later, after we've been there to shoot for real.
Let's do this, I tell myself, flexing my fist so hard the Rolex tightens against my wrist.
“Bare, scene two, take one. Action!”
I turn around slowly, placing my hands on the sleek marble desk in my office, meant to resemble a Fortune 100 CEO's. There's a screen built into it, my own private tablet connected to the cameras in the building. They'll fill in the details there on a green screen, too, but I do my best to imagine what the script says I'm supposed to see.
Allison Evers. Robbi. Coming up the elevator for her interview as my new secretary.
The stage crew simulates the elevator's ding a few seconds later. My cue to do a slow, sexy turn, allowing a smirk to crease my lips.
She's there. Adrenaline surges in my blood, and I can only imagine what's happening under her skin. I watch her walk toward me without the slightest hesitation in her step.
I step casually from behind my desk, pulling out a chair for her, and holding it. “Ms. Evers, I presume?”
“Guilty,” she says, taking her seat.
Robbi never takes her eyes off me. I hold her gaze, searching for the things I'm expecting.
The fear, the disbelief, the attraction it's taking every fiber of her being to suppress...there's fucking nothing.
I braced myself to see the pain I caused, the loss, maybe half a decade of disappointment since our puppy love days were abruptly cut short by our family shortcomings. The reality is a lot more simple, and it shocks me to hell and back.
There's an actress doing her job. Nothing more.
