Chapter 45
CHAPTER FORTY-FIVE
The next few hours were a blur, but Brinton vaguely remembered jamming what she could fit into her suitcase.
Then escaping in an Uber perfumed with stale cigarettes and rotting takeout, made worse by her snot-bubbled sobs in the back seat.
She refused to let Michael drive her, even at Jamie’s behest. Her flight was delayed twice, but eventually, she made it back to New York City.
She collapsed into bed, still in her jeans and Jamie’s T-shirt. The same pillows, same quilt, and the same stack of unread novels on the nightstand. Yet, it all felt unfamiliar.
It wasn’t the room or the sounds or sights of the city that had changed. It was her. Jamie had left a nasty scar that would never heal.
He was ashamed of her. As she had always feared, she, a social pariah and anxious outcast, had been too much to keep him. Or perhaps, not enough to make him stay.
Eventually, the adrenaline subsided, and sheer exhaustion dragged her into a comatose-deep sleep. She didn’t dream. Her splintered heart wouldn’t allow it, lashing her for giving it to a man who couldn’t keep it safe.
The next morning, Rich met Brinton in Landmark’s conference room. Across the table, he beamed at her and held up a large framed document, which faced away from her.
She loathed a curtain reveal.
“So, big day,” he said, with the enthusiasm of a man on his fourth double-espresso. He nodded to the frame.
“Sure,” Brinton said. He’d called her in to reveal the final layout for her cover story, which, annoyingly, he was dragging out. She wanted to get this over with so she could return to her previously scheduled wailing in the dark.
“The Crawford teaser yesterday, thanks to your reporting in the field, was off the charts. The traffic alone nearly broke the site. Every major outlet in the country picked up the story.”
“Oh. That’s good, right?”
“That’s fucking great.” He tapped his pianist-thin fingers along the frame’s top edge.
“I got your email with his songwriting contract—holy shit, by the way—so the only thing left was to show you this. I even had it framed for you. Well, my assistant did it. And she picked the frame. But she used my company card.”
He flipped it around. The gleaming black wood frame looked expensive, she’d give him that.
On the left, there was Jamie’s stunning Landmark cover photo.
He was perched on a wooden fence that she recognized from his property, softly smiling as he held his lacquered black acoustic guitar.
Above him, in white curved letters, the headline read: Jamie Crawford Jr. Breaks Free.
Her breath snagged on her ribs.
Without me.
Then, her heart dropped into her combat boots.
Mounted in the right side of the frame, her full article and her byline. Only, it wasn’t her byline. In italicized black script: By Agatha Cornwall, with Additional Reporting By Brinton Shaw.
Brinton’s neck jerked backward and both scapulae knit together. She was in an episode of Jordan Peele’s The Twilight Zone, where an unassuming Black woman’s emotional breakdown triggered a black hole that swallowed Manhattan, never to be seen again.
Yet, now was no time for swallowing her feelings or being palatable. She was fucking pissed. “‘Additional reporting by Brinton Shaw’?”
His eyes bulged. “Something wrong?”
Brinton jabbed her pointer finger at the text. “Yeah, something’s wrong. Why is Agatha credited for my story?”
“Oh, that,” Rich said casually, blowing out a relieved breath. “That was me saving your ass. Look, I’m not an idiot—I read your copy, and it was great, but I couldn’t shake the sense that something was going on between you and Crawford.”
He counted aloud on his fingers. “You stayed at his father’s mansion.
Then, I found you waiting in his dressing room at Yeehaw Fest, not a handler in sight.
Even if nothing happened, which, I’m not quite sure I buy, now you don’t have to worry about anyone questioning your integrity.
Agatha adds that extra credibility, free of charge. You’re welcome.”
Eyebrows raised, Brinton’s scoff scraped against her teeth. “My credibility? You fueled questions about my integrity with that teaser article headline. You buried my integrity in service of getting clicks.”
Brinton realized she was screaming when, from the corner of her eye, the entire office had huddled in front of the glass.
Naturally, Agatha waved from the front, recording with her phone.
Rich had pulled his hands from the table. She suspected he was reaching beneath the desk for a button to activate Angry Black Lady Protocol.
“I thought you’d be happy.” He leaned in closer, trying to soften his eyes. He looked like he’d swallowed a fart, which might have been his brand of empathy. “I helped you out.”
“Helped me out?” She shot up from her chair, snatched her purse from the table. “I gave everything to that story, to this job—”
“I think you’re overreacting. You should see this as baby steps, training wheels for the next time. In a few years—”
“A few years?”
“—we can talk about getting your first solo byline.”
At the conference room door, Brinton grimaced. Hopefully, it was the last time this asshat had the privilege of seeing her face. “That’s the thing, Rich. I’m done waiting for the next time.”