Chapter 13
Chapter Thirteen
ALEC
I wasn’t sure if proud was quite the right word or not.
Maybe… impressed.
I was impressed as hell by the way Vee handled the latest scandal surrounding our relationship—this time, the bullshit didn’t quite hit like it used to.
Perhaps because there had been so much of it before we even decided to take things to this new place we’d arrived, but it was fairly easy this time to just…tune it out.
It helped that we’d been staying busy though.
Between legal stuff, finishing Kinfolk , and finding more people to attach to my scripted reality show—even Vee had accepted a tiny writing role, the only thing she would let me convince her to commit to—we still weren’t out of the whirlwind.
Which worked in our favor.
Who had time to read ugly comments on the internet when there was so much life going on?
Movement in the doorway of the home office I was slowly turning into a writer’s room pulled my attention from my screen, and I looked up to find Vee lurking. Immediately, a grin spread across my face. She’d popped up at my place a few hours ago—we actually lived in the same gated neighborhood, so it was never that big of a surprise—and when I told her I was writing, she’d insisted on making herself scarce.
Not actually leaving, just not being in the same room, even though I’d insisted it was fine.
She didn’t want to be a “distraction.”
That was exactly what I wanted though.
“How is it going?” she asked, and I raised an eyebrow at her, glancing back at where my cursor was in the same place it had been for the last hour.
“It’s not ,” I chuckled. “Probably go a lot better if I could just…get another writer in the room with me.”
She rolled her eyes but obliged my outstretched hands to leave the doorway and take a seat on my leg before I turned us both toward the computer.
“Where do you think you might find one of those?” she asked, resting her head on top of mine. I closed my eyes as her hand went immediately to my beard for her favorite absent-minded task of running her fingers through it.
I was like a dog getting its damn belly rubbed.
“Uh-uh.” She laughed, stopping when she saw the expression—or lack thereof— on my face. “You can’t be going to sleep, or whatever you call yourself doing right now.”
“Huh?” I asked, making a show of peeling my eyelids open realll slow, peering up at her.
When that faux-scolding look persisted, I moved my head to her breasts, settling in like her chest was a pillow—my favorite pillow—as she laughed.
“ Stoppp ,” she insisted, so after just another moment of teasing, I did, meeting her gaze again.
“Just look at it with me?” I asked, and she stared at me for a second like she was considering it, and then nodded.
“Fine. Show me where you’re stuck.”
“Oh, the very beginning.”
She raised an eyebrow. “What does that mean?”
“It means I need…everything,” I explained. “Names, places, all that. I have a lot of scenes in my head, so I can build my outline, and I think I know how it ends. Everything else though?” I shrugged.
“You don’t really need all that though, right? Just… write . Everything will come as needed. Even the names.”
“You’re serious?”
“Uh, yeah.” She nodded. “At least…that’s how it is for me. If I had to come up with everything about the story ahead of time, I’d never get started.”
“I’ve never started without those things,” I told her, shaking my head. “Just the thought of not having that stuff down first is making me feel itchy.”
Vee laughed. “ Wow …I knew every writer had their own little process, but…damn.”
“Damn is right,” I chuckled. “You just out here…raw-dogging the script, and still managed to pull off what you did? That’s talent, Vee.”
“Don’t start…”
“I already have,” I teased, tightening my arm around her waist.
“Okay, well stop—this is about you and your script right now. So…you said you had scenes, right?”
“That’s pretty much all I have, really.”
“Let’s hear some. I bet at the very least I can help with names.”
She helped with more than names.
By the time we dragged ourselves to the kitchen to eat the takeout we’d had delivered, we had an outline for the whole front half of a full season.
I was quietly tucking into my food, plotting on exactly how I was going to get her tangible credit—not just symbolic—for the way she’d helped me today when I realized she wasn’t eating at all.
“Babe,” I called across the counter to her. “Everything okay?”
She visibly startled when I spoke, letting me know she’d been fully immersed in whatever she was thinking. “Huh? I mean…shit. Yeah, everything is fine. Great, actually.”
My eyes narrowed at her. “You sure? You seemed pretty out of it for a minute there.”
“Just thinking,” she assured. “Well…not exactly thinking, just…musing.”
“About?”
“Us.”
My eyes went wide. “Okay. What about us?” I asked.
“Well…the fact that there is an us, and despite everything I told myself to squash the possibility…I don’t mind.”
“Exactly what every man wants to hear.”
“Stop!” She laughed, holding up a hand. “That came out wrong. I mean…I was very, very convinced that any attempt at anything more than friends, coworkers…I thought it would fail. Because we’re so different.”
“We’re not that different.”
“Which I know now ,” she explained. “Back then?—”
“A month and a half ago?”
“Yes, the ancient day.” She giggled. “I was kinda sorta…guilty of exactly what I hate folks doing to me.”
“Which is what?”
“Putting me in a box. Using my past, my public persona, to decide who I actually am. I was kinda doing that to you.”
I nodded. “In your defense…I can admit to being a real life cornball from time to time.” I shrugged, and she laughed.
“That’s the thing though…everybody has those moments, a lot less transparently. You just are who you are, and whoever sees… sees. You’re not trying to maintain this front of something you’re not, even in private. You’re yourself in every place—except when you’re literally in front of a camera performing a script. You’re Alec everywhere else, and that is just…beyond refreshing.”
“Stop, you’re making me blush.”
“That’s kinda the point.” She giggled. “You love doing it to me, so I’m definitely taking my opportunity to get you back.”
“Get me back?” I chuckled. “Like speaking life on you and your dreams is a bad thing?”
She shook her head. “It’s not, it’s just…like I said. Refreshing. Another thing I didn’t know I needed.”
“Damn,” I murmured. “You’re making me sound real good.”
“I don’t have to make you sound good, you are.”
I laughed. “Stop.”
“I’m sorry, I’m feeling mushy,” she said, leaning down to give me a soft kiss on the lips. “Is there anything you need from me?”
“Nothing you aren’t already giving.”
She rolled her eyes at my honest answer, but…seriously.
As much noise as I tuned out, I still saw little inklings of assumptions and rumors that she was probably just using me for fame, I was just a “munch” or a “simp” or some other internet shit that didn’t even make sense for who either of us was.
As if being close to her had no benefits for me.
Besides the blatantly obvious of her being fine as hell and the sex being phenomenal, Vee was just…good energy. She made me laugh, often. She was actually interested when I was talking, and supportive of the things I dreamed about, and so damn free pouring validation into me.
And as much as it could be said that sex was the catalyst for all of this, we’d shared so much deeper intimacy.
We were feeding each other, which was, to me, exactly what a real relationship should be.
VANESSA
“Go to your socials.”
I frowned at that directive, briefly pulling the phone away from my ear so I could look at the screen again, confirming who it was who’d called me.
Seeing Chloe McKenna’s name on the screen, exactly as I thought, I frowned even deeper.
As my new publicist, one of the first things she’d insisted upon was me logging out of and deleting every app on my phone that was connected in some way to social media. Now she was telling me to go look?
“Are you sure you called the right person?” I asked, and she laughed on the other end of the line.
“Yes, Vanessa, I’m sure,” she replied.
Instead of arguing, I switched to speakerphone mode and pulled the phone down in front of me, navigating to my app of choice—the photo-centered one.
It was most likely to be somewhere safe.
I’d finally learned to be incredibly protective of my mental energy, starting with some revamping of my team. Annie was still my manager—technically—solely because of advice from my lawyers about what the penalties could be for terminating our contract early. They wanted me to think about all the possible drawbacks before I pulled that trigger, so…I was. Accepting wise counsel wasn’t a problem for me.
In the meantime, I made it very clear to her—via legal paperwork— that she was no longer to enter into any new contracts on my behalf, and no longer had the ability to negotiate or re negotiate anything. She’d continue getting paid for things she’d already put in place for me, which I didn’t have a problem with because she’d done that work, undeniably.
But under no circumstances was she to speak about me, publicly or otherwise.
I trusted that she would take the right lane on that, if for no reason other than self-preservation. From what Chloe had explained, with the power her firm held, if Annie did try to do anything slick, Chloe’s contacts would know immediately.
And the fallout would not be very pretty for Annie.
No referral had ever felt like a better choice to me, and I was feeling good.
Especially since Chloe had put someone in place to handle the social media, which meant I didn’t even have to post. She assured me that whoever she hired had my voice down pretty well, enough for her to post in a way that for my followers, read organically.
When I got into my app, the first thing that I noticed was a high-definition clip from the most recent episode of Kinfolk , which had just aired the night before.
Posted to my page.
It was one of my clips with Alec, which briefly concerned me—my personal thought was, keep far away from the “scandal,” but…maybe it was better to just put the chemistry in everybody’s face, since it was out there anyway. I didn’t even read the caption, my eyes went to the comments almost immediately.
It was like a damn sickness, seriously.
Very quickly, I realized why Chloe had sent me to look at social media.
The comments weren’t even close to the sort of abusive, nasty things that had driven me away. For the most part, they were kind of… glowing .
Probably being heavily moderated, but still.
Yes, there were a couple that were kind of shitty, stuff like:
“These comments are giving her a lot for passable acting.”
“Wow! Y’all are really gassing her up for not being completely terrible. The bar is in hell.”
My guess was, whoever was moderating was leaving those there for some balance, so an accusation of “only wanting to hear positive comments” couldn’t be levied. But even those negative ones were easy to brush off when most of the comments were along the lines of:
“Oh she brought her good acting with her this day. It’s giving Emmys.”
“Okay just from this clip I see I need to watch this! Somebody tell me where this show is streaming please!”
“Not me watching this at work about to cry! Vanity please, you gone have to shake some ass or something girl and relieve my spirits!”
I laughed at that one.
As much as I’d been so overly concerned with the possibility of typecasting, hoping people wouldn’t be like, “ Can you go back to talking about your pussy ?” this comment didn’t feel like that.
She was a fan of the music mostly but appreciated the acting too.
And I just appreciated the support either way.
“Do you see why I sent you to look?” Chloe asked, reminding me that there was an open call on the line.
“Oh, shit.” I laughed. “Yes, I do. Thank you. I didn’t even realize I needed this.”
“Glad I could send a little light your way. Talk to you later.”
We hung up shortly after—no reason to linger. And I didn’t linger on social media either. The longer I poked around, the more chances there were that somebody would get weird, and I didn’t need that energy.
Not today.
Today…Charlotte and I were going to have a meeting.
As much as the thought twisted my stomach in knots, Alec had spent too much time hyping me up for me to back out now. Not to mention, I’d told her there was a script, and even already sent it to her.
She wanted to go over it today.
So…that’s what we were doing.
What I was supposed to be doing.
Instead, I was procrastinating.
Chloe’s call had been the perfect ten-minute distraction, but now I had to get back on task. It was just lunch, so there was no need to get too dressed up. But Charlotte always looked great—stepped out of a magazine great, even when she was dressed casually.
So I had to match her energy.
Once I’d put it off long enough, I got in the shower.
Did my hair.
Makeup.
Put on clothes.
Lots of deep, deep, cleansing breaths in between.
And then, I got in the car with my driver and security, on the way to secure my destiny.
Or give up on it completely.
Dramatic much, girl ?
I was right in the middle of a quiet internal meltdown when my phone rang again.
I wasn’t the least bit surprised to see Alec’s name on the screen.
“Hello?” I answered, trying not to let the nerves pull through in my voice, but he still picked up on it immediately.
“You’re not about to chicken out, are you?” he immediately teased, and I shook my head.
“No, I’m in the car on the way. Don’t even play me like that.”
“Oh, okay.” He laughed. “You’re tense as fuck, but that’s okay. As long as you’re going.”
My eyes went wide. “Shit. My bad. I’m just…”
“Nervous, understandably. And that’s okay.”
“What if she wants to tell me she hated it to my face. You know—so it wouldn’t be so impersonal, like just a text or something?”
Alec scoffed. “Be serious, Vee. She wouldn’t be having a whole meeting with you to say that. And even if she was, if she hates that …man. I’m going to really have to question her taste.”
“Here you go again. You realize that if you speak too highly, it’s harder to believe.”
“That sounds like a you problem to me,” he countered. “We’ve been over this. If I thought the script sucked, I’d have encouraged you to be back in the studio right now, not going into a screenwriting meeting.”
“Well damn.” I laughed. “Thanks for the vote of confidence…I think?”
“You are very, very welcome, babe. Now…stop sweating this shit. What kind of pep talks do you give yourself before you do go to the studio, or get on stage?”
“I don’t have to do that—I already know I’m the best and baddest bitch in the place.”
“Okay, so…that’s the energy I want you leaning into, okay?”
I smiled. “Okay. Thank you.”
“You’re more than welcome, babe. Call me when you’re done.”
“I will.”
“I…”
I blinked, hard, hoping he wasn’t about to say what it felt like he was about to say.
Not because it was wrong, it was just… soon.
Too soon.
Even if it was real.
“Yeah,” I spoke up, before the silence could linger. “We’re on the same page.”
He chuckled. “How do you know that, if I didn’t even say anything?”
“Because…I just…understand. Let’s not make it weird, okay?”
“Okay.”
When we got off the phone…I did feel good, actually.
And by the time we pulled up to restaurant, I’d managed exactly what he encouraged—finding my bad bitch energy to bring with me in a whole new context.
Between this, my conversation earlier with Chloe, and the understanding I’d come to with Alec…
This was going to be a good-ass day.