“We don’t have to listen to this,” Jack mutters, pulling me toward the doors.
“Is it true you knew about Avery Benson’s drug habit and didn’t do anything to stop it?” Garland shouts.
I feel Jack’s body go stock still beside me, paralyzed with rage. Slowly, he turns to face Garland Hayes, his broad shoulders squared.
“What did you just ask me?” Jack snarls, his scruffy jaw pulsing tensely.
“Jack,” I murmur, “Calm down...”
“Hey, don’t shoot the messenger!” Garland chuckles, as the rest of the media pack watches with bated breath, their camera phones raised. “I’m just telling you what the rumor mill is churning out, Jack. You were done with the one twin, and wanted to make room for the other, so you let Avery pump herself full of vodka and pills, figured you’d let her just go quietly into the—HEY!”
“No!” I scream, as Jack hurls himself at the metallic-haired bastard.
Garland Hayes lets out a shrill shriek as Jack grabs him by the front of his lemon yellow button down, hoisting him up off the ground.
“I could fucking kill you, idiot,” Jack roars, as Garland claws at his vice of a grip.
“Jack, you have to let him go,” I cry, grabbing onto his corded arm. “There are cameras everywhere. Please.”
“It was all you fuckers who drove Avery to that shit,” Jack goes on, giving Garland a good jostling shake, “You just couldn’t let her be. Filthy parasitic scumbags.”
“That’s right, let me have it,” Garland squeaks, his face going from orange to red, “This footage is going to be great for my blog.”
Jack’s blue eyes flick past Hayes’ face, out across the sea of reporters and photographers. I watch him realize the gravity of this faux pas. He’s broken his own cardinal rule into a million pieces, given the media all the fodder it needs to destroy everything he’s worked so hard for. They could turn him into a demon overnight, with one shot of him throttling Garland Hayes into a pulp.
And chances are, that’s exactly what they’ll do.
With a firm shove, Jack drops Garland and tosses him away toward the crowd. The ghastly attention whore makes a big show of losing his balance and falling onto the icy pavement, a theatrically pained look on his face.
“You should think about taking some acting classes,” I spit at him as Jack marches into the hotel, “Your technique is terrible.”
I turn on my heel and race into The Rogue after Jack, a cacophony of clicking shutters and excited murmurs swelling behind me. He doesn’t even hold the elevator for me, he’s so consumed by his rage. I dart into the car just as the door as swishing closed, and we begin our rise to the penthouse.
“Jack...” I whisper, reaching to lay a hand on his shoulder, “Talk to me, babe.”
But he won’t. He stares straight ahead, his blue eyes churning with frustrated contempt. He doesn’t even move a muscle until we’ve reached our floor, and then he just storms off again. He practically rips the penthouse door right off its hinges.
For a moment, I wonder if I should even follow him inside. I haven’t seen him this angry since the night Daryl Hellman corned Avery and I at my parents’ party. But then, he was just a kid. A strong kid, but not really dangerous. But now? He’s built like a tank, with god knows how much force coiled up in those sculpted muscles of his.
Don’t be ridiculous, I chide myself, It’s Jack in there. He’d never hurt you. And he needs you now.
But as much as I try to reassure myself, I can still feel my knees begin to tremble as I step into the penthouse after Jack and close the door behind me. I look across the cavernous space and see his form backlit against the New York City skyline. He stands with this arms folded firmly across his chest, his eyes trained on the largest of the flat screen TVs. As I follow his gaze to the muted program playing there, that sinking feeling in my gut transforms into roiling nausea.
There we are onscreen, headlining some trashy entertainment “news” show. We’re standing on the steps of The Ingenue last night. My hair is unmistakably sex-tousled, my skirt barely concealing my ass, and Jack’s neck is covered with my shade of lipstick. It’s shaky video footage, clearly captured on someone’s smart phone. As I look on, Jack raises the volume, letting the unseen hosts’ commentary ring out through the penthouse.
“Unless you’ve spent the last 24 hours under a rock, you’ve heard by now about the scandalous romance taking the country by storm,” a syrupy female voice says, “Up until yesterday, the world knew Jackson Cole and Callie Benson simply as costars on the new film City in Red. The very same film in which the late Avery Benson—a relatively unknown actress and Callie’s twin sister—was to star before her tragic accidental overdose...Or was it an accident? Stay with us as we investigate.”
“You may as well go ahead and check your phone,” Jack says in a monotone rasp. “There’s no shutting out the world now.”
With my heart in my throat, I rush across the room and gingerly pick up my smartphone. Wincing, I peer down at the glowing screen. I have about a thousand missed calls and emails from Penelope, hundreds more from my mother, and even a few from my landlady Bernadette. There are dozens upon dozens of emails in my inbox, and as I read through the subject lines, I feel the blood rush to my head.
Subject: Dear Whore, I hope you rot in hell.
Subject: You are the worst person I’ve ever heard of in my entire life.
Subject: Re: You and Jackson Cole—Fuck you, slut.
I sink down onto one of the stools and let the phone clatter against the counter.
“Oh my god,” I breathe. “Why is this happening?
“The world has spoken,” Jack growls, “And they’re calling for a double execution.”
Dread pools in my very core as the phone begins to vibrate. As I turn it over to see who’s calling, that dread erupts into panic.
“Miriam Blake is requesting a video call,” I tell Jack, my voice hollow.
“Well,” Jack laughs roughly, clapping his hands together, “This should be fun.”
“What do I do?!” I breathe, staring down at Miriam’s name on the screen.
“Might as well answer,” Jack replies, snapping off the TV, “Let’s see what the old bitch has to say.”
I glance up at him, surprised by his language. “Old bitch?” I echo, “Since when do you talk about women like some asshole bro?”
“Don’t start,” he snaps, strutting across the room and grabbing the phone out of my hand.
“Hey,” I reply firmly, grabbing the phone right back, “I know this is a shitty situation, but you can’t start taking it out on me, alright? We need to be a united front in this.”
“Whatever,” he growls through gritted teeth, “Can our first act as a united front be answering the goddamn phone then?”
A rush of frustrated anger colors my cheeks red. “We’re not done talking about this,” I inform Jack.
“I’m sure we’re not,” he scowls as I finally answer our boss’s call.
I swallow hard as Miriam Blake’s face pops onto the screen. Her usual immovable expression has frozen over into a mask of icy contempt. The severity of her ire takes my breath away. No one’s looked at me with this much furious disdain since I accidentally spilled marinara sauce on my mother’s white carpet, back when I was seven. Still, I try and muster up a jocular smile for her benefit.
“Hi Miriam,” I manage to say, my voice high and bright. “I simply can’t imagine what you’re calling us about...”
“Yeah, how’s tricks?” Jack adds, stepping into my camera’s frame so Miriam can see us both. I can practically see the steam pouring out of her ear’s at Jack’s casual remark.
“Let’s cut the bullshit, kids,” Miriam all but hisses, folding her arms across her small chest. “You two have fucked this up good.”
“Whatever happened to all press is good press?” Jack shoots back.
“You strangling Garland Hayes in front of a thousand cameras is not press, it’s a laws
uit,” Miriam spits, “You two are botching this entire thing. I figured you’d start fucking at some point, but sneaking around? Abusing the press? Not giving anyone a shot of you two looking halfway decent? You’re squandering this entire scandal!”
“Hold on,” I cut in, gaping at the CEO, “So you’re not angry about us causing a stir...You’re angry that we’re not capitalizing on it?!”
“Ding ding ding!” she sneers, rolling her eyes at me. “We have a winner!”
“I don’t understand...” I press on, ignoring her insults. “What is it, exactly, that you would have us do, here?”
“I would have wanted you to milk the dead sister/fiancée thing for all it was worth,” she says callously, “Do some interviews about finding solace in each other’s arms, all that bullshit. But you’ve botched that option, haven’t you? It looks like our only option is to lean into these rumors about Jack setting the girl up to go down in flames. Tough break, kid, but it’s the only angle left.”
I feel the air go out of the room around me as Jack’s nonchalant act explodes into a million pieces, leaving nothing but raw rage in its place.
“Excuse me?” he snarls to Miriam.
“You’re going to have to let the press run with the story they’ve already cooked up,” Miriam says lightly.
“The story they’re telling is that I’m responsible for Avery’s death,” he charges on, his every cell vibrating with anger.
“That’s not my fault,” she scoffs, “You’ve made your own bed, Jack. Now you’ve got to sleep in it. I don’t give a rat’s ass whether you two keep fucking away in it or not, as long as you stop muddying my publicity efforts.”
“You want me to let the world believe that Avery died because I let her?” Jack seethes, “Because it’s the best available plot twist?”
“That pretty much sums it up, yes,” Miriam shrugs.
“Jack!” I gasp, as he wrenches the phone out of my hand and brings it up to his furious, bright red face.
“Let’s get one thing straight,” Jack all but roars into the phone, “This isn’t some script we’re talking about. This isn’t a story. This is my life.”
“Oh, don’t be so dramatic,” Miriam shoots back, unperturbed, “Your profile is getting a boost either way. So people will always suspect you of foul play. So what? It worked out just fine for Courtney Love.”
“I won’t do it,” Jack says firmly, “I won’t play into your juicy little narrative. And I won’t let the press tear Callie apart, either. I’m doing things my own way.”
“Fine,” Miriam replies briskly, “Then I’ll just have to fire you instead.”
“What?!” I gasp, leaping up from the counter and rushing to Jack.
“I don’t have time for your ultimatums,” she goes on, “Either you fall in line, or I’ll find someone else who will. Bradley Cooper would be a wonderful Joel Brennan, don’t you think?”
“You can’t replace me,” Jack breathes raggedly, “I’ve been with the project since the very beginning. I busted my ass getting it into production. It’s my goddamn movie.”
“On the contrary,” Miriam smiles, “It’s my goddamn movie. You’re just set dressing.”
“There has to be something else we can all do,” I put in, knowing exactly how naive I sound, “We can find a solution—”
“Let me know what you decide by Monday, Jackson,” Miriam says crisply, “You two enjoy the rest of your weekend. You’d better—”
But we never find out what Miriam Blake thinks we’d better do. Jack cocks back his arm and throws my cell phone hard against the hotel room wall. It snaps into a hundred pieces of plastic and metal, the screen spider webbed with deep cracks.
“Jack!” I scream, “What the hell—? Why would you—?”
But he can’t hear me now. He’s too far gone in his all-encompassing rage. Blowing past me, he marches into the kitchen and grabs a bottle of scotch, pouring himself a deep glass and knocking it back in two gulps. Usually, Jack takes care to moderate his drinking, or at least be aware of how much he’s consumed. His father was a raging alcoholic—and a nasty, brutal drunk at that. Avery used to relay horror stories of Richard Cole’s gin-soaked rampages, and the abuse he would heap on his son during them.
I don’t even bother checking to see if my phone is salvageable—there are far more important matters at hand. For instance, the stranger who’s materialized in front of me where Jack was just a moment ago. I edge toward him as he pours out another drink, hunched over the counter, alone in his own world of agony.
“Jack,” I begin again, speaking softly as I approach him. I feel like I’m stepping up to an unbroken stallion who could buck at any instant. “Look, I know this is absolutely terrible. The studio has put you in an awful position. But could you just talk to me for—”
“There’s nothing to talk about,” he says through gritted teeth. I can smell the booze from where I stand a few paces away. He drains the second glass and sets it down hard against the countertop. “I’m fucked.”
“Baby, no...” I say, taking a tentative step toward him, “You’re not—”
With a lightning fast jerk of his arm, Jack sends the empty glass flying across the kitchen. I shield my eyes as it shatters, terror spiking through my veins. For the first time in our lives, I’m afraid of what he’s going to do next. It’s a sensation I never thought I’d experience, and it damn near rips my heart in two.
“You don’t know the first thing about what I’m going through,” he snarls, his blazing blue eyes swinging toward me. I’m struck by the size of him, the power coiled in his muscles. Even in a fit of rage he’s beautiful. “Don’t tell me that I’m not fucked. Don’t ‘baby’ me, Cal.”
“OK. Fine,” I say, holding up my hands before me, “Just tell me how I can help you. Tell me what you need.”
“Why aren’t you listening to me?!” he roars, launching himself forward. I shrink back as he comes to a stop inches away from my body, towering over my petite frame. He stares down at me like I’m an intruder. Like I’m the enemy.
“I am. I’m trying,” I whisper tearfully, taking a careful step back.
“Christ,” he rasps, shoving a hand through his dark brown hair. I can see the warring impulses churning in his blue eyes. “Now I’ve scared you. How is this all happening...?”
I bite my tongue this time, and watch as he goes to get yet another drink. My mind leaps to emergency measures. I know I need to stop him, calm him down, but I have no idea how to reach him. He’s too far gone.
“Whatever you need from me,” I finally manage to say, keeping my distance, “I just want you to know I’m here.”
He pauses, open bottle suspended over a fresh glass. With slow, deliberate certainty, he locks his eyes on me.
“Well, maybe you fucking shouldn’t be,” he says.
“Wh-what?” I stammer, the wind knocked clean out of my lungs by his words.
“You shouldn’t be here,” he repeats himself, letting amber liquid slosh into his glass, “Haven’t you heard? I make the people I love destroy themselves. I’m the reason Avery is dead. I could never have protected her, and she fucking ruined herself because of it.”
“Jack, no,” I breathe, feeling a hard knot rising in my throat. “It’s not your fault, what happened to her. You know there were things in her past that—”
“That’s bullshit,” he murmurs. I watch as he’s held underwater by wave after wave of crashing despair. “She could have come through it. But I fucked everything up. I brought her onto this movie, into all this attention. I was too wrapped up in my own shit to see that she was drowning. I just couldn’t be bothered...”
“Stop it,” I tell him, louder than I mean to. “I’m not going to stand here and watch you wreck yourself over something you could never control!”
“No, you’re not,” he growls, grabbing his glass and blowing past me into the suite, “You’re leaving. Now. Get out of here, Callie.”
“I can’t leave you lik
e this!” I gasp.
“You can, and you will,” he says, not even bothering to look at me. “You aren’t safe with me. Haven’t you realized it yet? I’ll wreck you, Cal. Just wait and see.”
“You’re the only person I’ve ever felt safe with,” I cry, breaking free of my fear and rushing across the room to him, “You can’t just shake me off like—”
He kicks over the wooden coffee table, knocking one of the legs clear off. I draw myself up as he kicks over a table lamp, sending it crashing to the floor.
“Go!” he bellows, coming out swinging against anything in his path, “Just get out of here, Callie. Go!”
“This isn’t you talking,” I whisper, backing away slowly, “This is your fucking father, Jack. This is everything we shook off. You’re just not trusting yourself to be different. But you are. I know you are...”
I may as well be shouting into a gaping abyss for all the good my words are doing. Jack is far away from me now, rampaging around the room in a fit of destructive rage. Blinking away my angry, baffled tears, I turn on my heel and run out of the room at last. I fumble for my key card and let myself into my own suite, slamming the door firmly behind me.
Finally alone, I let the floodgates open. Deep, ragged sobs rip out of me as I sink down to the floor, my back pressed against the heavy front door. I press my hands to my ears, trying to block out the sounds of crashing and pounding coming from next door. My own mournful wails are drowning out the rest of the world as I know it.
I have no idea how much time passes before the noise from Jack’s suite dies away. My own sobs quiet at long last, leaving a pulsing numbness in their wake. I pull myself to standing on shaking legs and amble into my bedroom. Collapsing among the sheets, I hug my knees to my chest and roll onto my side. After just one night of sleeping beside Jack, the empty space he’s left behind feels too painful to bear.
Damaged In-Law Page 16
