Crooked

Chapter 1

Juliette

Ugh. What the heck time is it?

I pushed my sleep mask up onto my forehead and reached over to the nightstand to unplug my ringing cell from the charger. Arlo Quinn flashed on the screen, and unless I’d slept eighteen hours, he was calling me at five fifteen AM.

“Hello?” My voice cracked with morning grog.

“Hey, Jules. It’s Arlo. I’m sorry to wake you this early.”

“If you aren’t calling to tell me there’s a wildfire heading straight for my house, I’m hanging up.”

He sighed. “Bradley doesn’t like the rewrites you did.”

I sprang upright. “What? How is that possible? It’s the fourth set of rewrites I’ve done for those scenes, and I barely even wrote any of the words. Bradley dictated how he wanted the entire thing to go.”

“I know. I’m sorry. He can be…difficult sometimes.”

“Parallel parking in front of The Ivy while being watched by a table of movie stars is difficult. Figuring out what to wear when someone tells you dinner is smart casual is difficult. Bradley Wilson? That man is a giant asshole.”

Arlo chuckled. “He wants to meet with you at six in his trailer at the studio.”

“That’s in forty-five minutes.”

“I know. He just woke me up to have me call you.”

I shook my head and ripped the covers from my body, dragging myself out of bed. “Does Sam know he asked for rewrites again?”

“I’m not sure.”

Translation—the director has no freaking clue.

These constant rewrites had become a control game for Bradley, a power trip of sorts.

The director’s team spends hours planning the next day’s shoot, only to have the star show up ten minutes before call time and drop twenty pages of rewrites in their laps.

After, he struts back to his trailer to sip his stupid grande, iced, half-caff, ristretto, sugar-free vanilla, oat milk macchiato with no foam and enjoy a one-hour massage.

I had no clue why the director put up with it.

Actually, that wasn’t true. He probably did it for the same reason I did.

Because Bradley Wilson was—Lord knows why—one of Hollywood’s biggest A-list actors at the moment, and the jerk had a lot of industry pull.

Annoyed, I padded into the kitchen to the coffeemaker. “I’ll be there, Arlo. But you have to invite Sam, too, or at least one of the assistant directors. They need to be in the loop from now on.”

“Okay. I’ll make some calls.”

I breathed out on a huff. “Thank you.”

“There’s one more thing…”

“I’m afraid to ask. What?”

“Bradley requested you stop at Robeks and pick up his morning energy drink.”

My eyes bulged. “Are you freaking kidding me?”

The poor assistant sighed. “I’m afraid not.”

“No.” I shook my head vigorously. “I’m not doing it. I’m a screenplay writer, not his damn gopher.”

“I would do it myself, but my girlfriend and I share a car, and she works the night shift. She doesn’t get home until seven.”

“Why can’t he have his drink delivered from Uber Eats?”

“He doesn’t trust the drivers.”

“What does he think is going to happen? They’re going to poison him? Wait, on second thought, maybe I will pick up his energy drink, with a side of cyanide.”

“I’ll take an Uber and get it for him. I really am sorry to keep calling you with all his requests, Jules.”

I took a deep breath in and let it out. It wasn’t Arlo’s fault. And the poor guy probably made minimum wage for dealing with his asshole boss all day long. “I’ll pick up his drink. There’s a Robeks on my way to the studio.”

“Are you sure?”

“I can’t guarantee I won’t add some laxatives so he’s stuck in the bathroom half the day, but yeah. I’m sure.”

“Thanks, Jules. I’ll text you his order. It’s sort of long.”

Of course it is… After I hung up, I brewed a cup of coffee and took a three-minute shower.

I did not wash my hair. Looking in the half-fogged mirror, I gave myself a quick internal pep talk.

Think on the bright side. Your day can’t get much worse than being woken up at five AM and having a spoiled actor’s breakfast order to fetch.

Unfortunately, the universe must’ve taken my attempt at manifesting a better day as more of a challenge.

Because when I climbed into my car at twenty minutes to six, my cell phone rang a second time.

And the name on the screen this time was probably the only person I wanted to speak to less at this hour than Bradley Wilson—my father.

I debated not picking it up, but the last time I’d avoided Dad for a half day, he’d sent one of his goons to my house to knock on my door. So I took yet another deep breath and told myself dealing with my father would be good practice for my meeting with Bradley—a primer in staying calm.

“Hi, Dad.”

“Glad I’m not having a heart attack, or I’d be dead waiting for you to answer the damn phone.”

I steadied myself. “I’m glad you’re not having a heart attack, too. What can I do for you?”

“For starters, you could move back to New York where you belong.”

I was not about to have this conversation again. So I closed my eyes, counted to three, then opened them and shifted the car into drive. Pulling away from the curb, I attempted to redirect the bad start to our conversation. “How’s your sciatica? Feeling any better than last week?”

But Dad ignored my question. “I’m having some trouble at the pizzeria.”

Oh Jesus. This was going to be one of those calls, the kind where I had to decipher what the heck we were talking about.

My father really did own a pizzeria back in Mill Basin, but when he talked about trouble at the pizzeria, it was never really about a broken oven or a bad batch of dough.

Gino’s Pizza was a front for the crooked Ginocassi family, one of the infamous five families.

“The oven is running really hot,” he said. “So hot that I’m going to need to keep an eye on it. You know how it goes—too much heat and boom! The place can explode.”

I shook my head. Even the feds could figure out my father was telling me a war was heating up between him and his rivals.

I was never sure how to respond to his cryptic messages, so I stuck with the oven storyline.

“I’m sorry to hear that. You know me… I like my pizza better the second day, when it’s cold. ”

“There’s also a sauce problem.”

I had absolutely no clue what that meant. “Oh?”

“Yeah. The competition really wants to get our sauce recipe. But you know my sauce means everything to me. I don’t even want anyone looking at my recipe, much less touching my sauce.”

Still clueless, I kept up the charade. “Umm… Yeah. You make good sauce, Dad.”

“I’m glad you agree. One of my men will be there today.”

“Your men? Where?”

“In LA, to protect the sauce.”

Oh no! I’m the sauce! “No, Dad. The sauce is good. No one knows the…” I was about to say no one knows the sauce’s last name—I’d stopped using Ginocassi and started using Grecco, my mother’s maiden name, when I’d moved out to California—but that sentence made no sense if someone was actually listening in on our call.

“Dad, you don’t need to worry about the sauce.

It’s very secure where it is. No one even knows where you keep the sauce recipe. ”

“Juliette!” my father barked, and I instantly felt like I was seven years old instead of twenty-seven.

He’d always had a way of silencing a room with a single stern word, and growing up, that word had often been my name.

“You will not give me a hard time about this. I have enough going on to worry about.”

“But, Dad—”

“It’s not up for discussion.” He stopped with the cryptic talk. “You might call yourself by another name, but you will always be Juliette Ginocassi. And it’s my job to make sure you’re always safe.”

“But—”

“Enough!” I heard a loud bang and knew he’d just pounded his fist on the table. “It’s done.”

Before I could say another word, the line went dead. I pulled my cell from my ear and stared at the screen. Call Ended.

No, we were not done. I didn’t want one of his goons hanging around.

I’d worked too hard to make a new life out here in California—one where no one knew who my father was.

My heart pounded in my chest as I hit the button to call him back.

But the call went straight to voicemail.

When it happened a second time, I waited until I got to a red light and thumbed off a text.

I stared down at my phone, waiting as the message went from Delivered to Read.

Eventually the car behind me honked because I hadn’t noticed the light change, so I drove the rest of the way to Robeks.

Just as I was getting out of the car, my cell buzzed with an incoming message.

Arlo: Triple shot matcha mega-charged power surge smoothie. Sub coconut for water and oat milk for half and half. Add a scoop of bee pollen, a half scoop of probiotic blend, and one pump of agave, and blend it with half a banana and only two ice cubes.

Fury surged through my veins; I felt like a pot ready to blow its lid. I didn’t even get a chance to calm myself before a second text came in.

Arlo: Don’t ask me how, but if they blend it with more than two cubes, he’ll know.

My fingers clenched around my iPhone. With each second that ticked by, a slow burn of heat spread across my cheeks and behind my eyes.

Bradley Wilson was annoying, but my father was impossible.

Totally impossible to deal with. Yet I made one more attempt to call him. Of course, I went right to voicemail.

“Unbelievable,” I muttered.

Yanking the keys from the ignition, I flung open the door to my Prius and stomped each foot out of the car.

The moment I stood—crack! My ankle twisted.

I began to stumble, yet somehow, I managed to catch myself on the frame of the car door.

I looked down at my foot. My heel had broken off, snapped straight from the bottom of my pump.

“Are you freaking serious right now?”

I kicked the shoe from my foot, bent, and without thinking, hurled it toward Robeks.

Stupid freaking Robeks. It landed on the sidewalk with a satisfying clank, but that wasn’t enough to calm me down.

My cell phone was still in my hand, so I wound up and threw that too.

It landed with more of a thud than a clank, which was likely because my phone didn’t hit the ground…

It hit a person.

A man walking from the car parked behind mine rubbed his jaw as he turned to look at me.

I hadn’t noticed him or his vehicle until that moment.

Once I did, it was hard to notice anything else.

He was tall and broad-shouldered, with the kind of rugged good looks that made you do a double take.

I covered my heart with my hand for more reasons than one. “Oh my God! I hit you in the face?”

“Why the hell did you throw your phone at me?”

“It was an accident. I was angry, and I didn’t see you there.” I limped toward him wearing one heel. “Are you okay? Should I call 9-1-1?”

He bent and scooped my cell from the ground. “I think maybe you should call a therapist, sweetheart.”

My eyes narrowed. “You don’t need to be a jerk about it. I’m already having a bad day.”

“That makes two of us.” He shook his head. “You need to learn to control your anger.”

He was right, of course, but in the moment, I didn’t need a lecture. “I was frustrated. Someone hung up on me.”

He smirked. “Not surprised, with your attitude.”

I froze. “What did you just say?”

“If this is how you act when someone pisses you off, I get why they’d hang up on you.”

“You don’t even know me.”

“I’ve seen enough to know your type.”

“Wow. And I guess you’re better than my type?”

“Haven’t hit any strangers today, so…”

I limped the two steps separating us and grabbed my phone from his hand. “Thanks for the free behavior analysis.”

He shrugged. “No charge.”

I briefly considered taking off my other shoe and hitting him on purpose this time. But instead, I showed him my pearly whites. “You have a wonderful rest of your day.”

“I’d say the chances of that are pretty damn slim. Not when I’ll be spending it with you.”

“With me? I think maybe my phone did more damage to your head than it appears.”

He gave me a look. “Name’s Wes Callahan, Juliette. Your dad sent me. I’m your new bodyguard.”