6. Leo
Leo
My fingers drum across my lap as I stare out the window of Edison’s office. He, Cameron, and Everett are working on the script for the video interview we’re planning on releasing at the same time we make it public that we’re going to fight to get Andi’s conservatorship transferred away from Gina.
Even though the legal system is obviously the most important, the court of public opinion is still something that can’t be ignored.
I would know, considering I’m the pack’s publicist. Technically, I’m Beck’s, but the moment Andi agreed she wanted more from me than friendship over hotpot in her Santa Monica apartment, I knew I’d do anything to help her.
I wasn’t trained or educated in this work, but I’m the only one out of the three of us who even finished college, and I got my degree in accounting to follow in my father’s footsteps and take over his firm.
If it weren’t for Beck, I don’t think I would’ve ever ended up in this industry. But I’m detail-oriented, and I cared more about Beck than any of the other vultures who immediately started making their way out of the woodwork when he started getting big.
He knew he wanted Eli and me by his side when he moved down to LA, so it was a no-brainer for me to help him out, even if the decision disappointed my parents.
They questioned why I’d choose to make such big decisions based on someone else, but what they didn’t understand was that I’d been making decisions based on what other people expected of me my entire life. My college degree a prime example.
As the only beta—both in the trio I’m a part of with Eli and Beck, as well as the overall pack—my role has always been a supportive one. But with the helpless, overwhelming feelings roiling under the surface of my skin because of this situation, I’ve been itching to play more of an active role.
That’s why I’ve been pushing for us to consider what people will think of Andi throughout every step of the process.
It’s obvious to anyone who spends any amount of time with Andi, when she doesn’t have her walls and masks up, that she’s a creative person.
Unsurprising, considering who her father is.
But to live a fulfilling life, she will always want to create, and in order to be a creative, you have to have an audience willing to perceive your work.
If her public image were completely ruined, any hope of her having her own independent career once the dust settles will have burned right along with the conservatorship.
And that’s no good. Because while any one of us—Beck, Eli, Everett, her father, hell, even Cameron—would do our best to support her financially, she’d lose a part of herself if she couldn’t create.
Even caught under the thumb of her mother’s rule, she still found ways to exercise that freedom of hers. Like her vlogs, the ones I’ve found myself re-watching before I go to bed just so I can hear her voice and see her smile.
With the amount of time we’ve been spending in Andi’s childhood home and the way Edison has preserved so much of her childhood through the space, I’ve been noticing details that remind me of her endlessly—it’s like a constant buzz at the back of my mind, but there’s nowhere to direct it to.
Not with her stuck in her mother’s custody.
My phone chimes with a notification. I have alerts set for a bunch of keywords related to Andi, the conservatorship, and the case.
We got lucky that Cameron’s boss knows someone at the tabloid that released the first report of Andi’s conservatorship, but because Cameron’s news outlet—Northline—is so drastically different from most tabloids, the likelihood of that happening again is slim.
My mouth goes dry when I see what the notification is for.
It’s Andi. This is the first new photo that’s been released of her so far, probably because this is the first time Gina is actually letting her out of the house.
She’s dressed in a sheer black dress that highlights just how much weight she’s lost. The only things hiding her modesty are strategically placed lace flowers embroidered on the sheer fabric.
There are heavy lines of tension around her eyes, despite the near-flawless, picture-perfect makeup that must’ve meant she was in a chair for hours.
She looks like the life has been violently sucked out of her over the past week and a half since we’ve seen her. If you put a photo side by side of her on the trip back from my hometown, and her now, I would’ve thought she’d gotten terribly ill.
My blood roars through my veins at the sight of the solo shots of her, but I’m pretty sure my heart stops in my chest when I swipe to the right and see the other photos that’ve been released of this event.
“Fuck,” I curse, drawing the attention of the others towards me.
I’m certainly glad Beck and Eli aren’t here with us right now.
They’re resting in one of the many guest rooms of Edison’s home that the five of us seem to have capitalized on.
Beck hasn’t been doing well since all of this started, and we’re worried the stress could make him sick.
Eli’s been doing everything he can to keep Beck as relaxed as possible.
Eli would lose his shit at the sight of these pictures. And Beck… would just lose it.
“What?” Everett asks, pushing himself to his feet at my silence.
“Sorry,” I say with a shake of my head, flipping my phone around to showcase the first photo of Andi. “It’s Andi. She’s with Ezra.”
Everett takes my phone from me and swipes through the photos far quicker than I had. His expression transforms instantly; his piercing blue eyes hardening into cold, steely resolve.
“Ezra?” Cameron asks, his brows drawing down. “As in, Ezra Fletcher, her abusive ex?”
“It looks to be that way,” Everett grunts, handing my phone to Cameron and Edison who are seated at Edison’s desk together.
“What happened to her?” Cameron asks, making a sound of distress at the back of his throat.
“My God,” Edison mumbles, going pale at the sight of the photos.
“Seems to me that Gina Sterling thinks skeletally skinny is all the rage,” I bite out. The words are far harsher than my norm, but if any situation calls for harshness, it’s this one.
I wouldn’t be surprised if that were Gina’s plan. Since over the counter weight-loss drugs have started becoming widely accessible, an unnatural sort of skinniness has been the latest “body trend” in Hollywood, not that bodies should be considered trends at all.
The only issue with those weight loss drugs is that they primarily work on betas. The ones that work on omegas and omega hormones are still in clinical trials, which means Gina is starving Andi the old-fashioned way.
Cameron’s phone buzzes on the table, and I watch him ignore it twice before he finally snatches it up, more out of irritation than curiosity.
“Probably just my editor,” he mutters, thumb swiping across the screen. “He’s been riding me about—”
He goes very, very still.
“What?” Everett asks, not looking up from where he’s still staring at the string of photos on my phone like he can set them on fire through sheer force of will.
“It’s an assistant from Northline,” he says, his voice going tight. “It’s a voicemail that was left for me at the office.”
The room goes quiet in a way I’m all too familiar with at this point. It’s the same quiet that settled over us the day the emergency conservatorship first hit the news.
“Play it,” I say, already halfway out of my chair.
Cameron’s hand is shaking when he puts it on speaker.
There’s a beat of dead air.
Then it’s there. Her voice.
I don’t breathe for the twenty-one seconds of it. None of us do.
“Hi—hi, this is going to sound insane. But it’s Andi. I’m—okay. I’m not hurt, I just—”
Her voice cracks, trembling like she’s terrified she’s going to get caught. After seeing those photos of her, I can picture it now. Her, frail in a way that shouldn’t be possible after such a short period of time in her mother’s custody, making this secret, desperate phone call.
“It—it’s me, I promise. Remember all those galaxy-ception jokes? Anyway, I—I just wanted to say I didn’t do it. I swear. Please, I—I know you have no reason to help me, but I need your help. I—I have to go.”
The line clicks dead.
Her words wash over me.
“She thinks we need to be convinced to help her,” Everett mutters.
“I think that’s indicative of the conditions she’s being held under,” Cameron adds softly.
I don’t trust my voice yet.
“Play it again,” Edison rasps. “Please.”
Cameron does. All four of us lean towards that tiny speaker like it’s the only light in the room.
Those twenty-one seconds are all we get. It’s not enough. But it’s more than we had an hour ago, and right now, that has to be enough.
I take a deep, steadying breath as Everett hands my phone back to me.
“When was the voicemail left?” I ask Cameron.
The time he shares matches the time the charity gala was taking place.
“She must’ve had an opportunity to sneak away and find a phone. I can’t imagine Gina or Stuart would be willing to give her access to one,” I offer.
“It looks like it’s a number from the hotel,” Cameron says. “Maybe she found access to a service phone.”
I stare back down at my screen, at the video clip of Andi and Ezra playing on loop.
They pose for a few seconds, just long enough for the photos, before they create distance between themselves.
His hands stay polite, in respectable places while her hands remain posed on her own body.
If anything, their body language is communicating that they aren’t together.
“At least she says she’s okay. Ezra doesn’t seem particularly handsy with her,” I say.
But that doesn’t really matter to me right now. Or to any of us, it seems. What matters is the fact that they’re there together at all.
“What event is it?” Edison murmurs, his brows drawing down as he squints to try to read the text on the background of the red carpet.
“A charity gala of some sort. One for organ donation,” I answer, already having read the headlines of the photos. “Apparently, it’s linked to Jonathan Fletcher’s latest movie.”
“Why would Gina Sterling allow Andi’s first sighting back in public to be something like this?” Everett mutters, stroking his beard in thought.
“It’s unsurprising if Jonathan Fletcher is involved,” Edison says, his expression tight.
The three of us cut our gazes towards him, each of our expressions a different placement on the spectrum of surprise and intrigue.
“Why is that?” Cameron asks. “Was it because you knew about her relationship with Ezra, the son?”
“I only knew of the son because he made appearances in Andi’s vlogs,” Edison says with a shake of his head. “But I know Jonathan Fletcher on a... personal level. When Gina used to be unfaithful during our marriage, he was her longest-standing affair.”
That bit of information feels like we just struck an iceberg. This situation runs so much deeper than we thought.
“When Andi was in the hospital after Ezra assaulted her, she told us that if she couldn’t convince Beck to be in a fake relationship with her, she’d be forced back into her relationship with Ezra,” I say, my voice low.
“I was horrified to read the headlines of what happened,” Edison murmurs. “I was upset on Andi’s behalf, but if I’m being completely honest, I wasn’t terribly surprised. Jonathan used to hit Gina, too.”
“And she still continued to have an affair with him?” I bite out with a shake of my head. “I don’t know why I’m even asking, Gina’s shown she’s more than willing to make decisions that don’t make sense.”
“They made sense to her at the time,” Edison says with a sigh. “She has a way of twisting reality, or at the very least her perception of it, to support whatever agenda she has in mind.”
“Isn’t Jonathan Fletcher bonded, too?” Everett says, his brows drawn down. “How are all of these bonded people having affairs left and right?”
“Yeah, what the hell do they put in the water in this city?” Cameron huffs.
The connection between Jonathan Fletcher and Gina seems to have all our minds spinning.
“This information sheds a new light on the whole pushing Andi to be in a relationship with Ezra situation,” Everett murmurs.
“I think there’s no denying that Gina is trying to live vicariously through Andi, which means if she can’t be bonded to Jonathan Fletcher, she needs the next best thing, which is making sure Andi ends up with his son, even if he’s violent towards her. ”
“That would make sense why she’s having Andi’s first public appearance after the conservatorship has gone public be this charity gala,” I add.
“It would indicate that Gina’s deferring some of her control to someone else, because if she were acting in her own best interest, not even Andi’s, she wouldn’t choose this sort of event. ”
“That’s concerning. That means she’s even less predictable than she already was,” Everett murmurs.
“We need to make sure our plan works,” Cameron adds, his jaw working as he stares at one of the photos Edison has on his desk, one of a younger Andi on his shoulders. “Whatever they’re doing to her can’t be good for her health if she looks like that after a week and a half.”
“I think we can all agree on that,” Edison murmurs, a slight tremble in his hands.
“We’ll continue working on the case proving Gina’s not a fit conservator,” Everett sighs. “From both the legal front and the public perception front.” His gaze cuts to me, and he offers me a steady nod.
“I have some more ideas,” I say, nodding in return.
“If Beck can find it in himself to work on a music video, I think that single you two worked on would be a good one. I think we include some messages for the public to decipher. They’ve been blowing up his socials with theories and questions, and it’s only going to get worse after they start running with these photos and videos of tonight’s charity gala.
But we should also include some messages for her.
Hopefully, it makes its way to her eventually. ”
“That’s a good idea,” Everett nods. “The question is whether he’ll be up to it.”
“If he is, you should record some of the video here,” Edison offers. “That should be message enough, one that we’re working together.”
“We could use b-roll footage I got that night we went stargazing, too,” Cameron offers. “I’ll pull the footage and see what we can come up with. I don’t have the same creative eye as Andi does, but we can make something work.”
“I can help as well,” Edison nods.
The three of us blink at Edison’s offer. He’s an award-winning filmmaker, offering to help edit a male omega pop-star’s music video.
“If you’re sure,” Everett says.
“Of course I’m sure. Anything for Andi.”
“Anything for Andi,” I repeat, nodding my head.
Just hold on, Andi. We’re coming for you.