Chapter 30
Naomi shakes the rain off her umbrella once she steps under the glass shelter of the Bowery Hotel.
She rubs her hands, slick with sweat and rain, on her beige trench coat before fixing her hair.
A man in a bowler hat and red waistcoat greets her as he holds open the doors to the famed East Village property.
The moment she steps inside the warm lobby, she’s transported to what feels like another century, the rich decor of velvet, leather, and wood drawing her in.
She scans the room, filled with plush sofas atop patterned rugs, searching for Meghan Rhodes.
That’s who she assumes is waiting for her, at least.
Her heart races, thinking back to the anonymous text message from a number she didn’t recognize, wondering if she was wrong about who contacted her. Maybe it’s a trap, a voice warns. She imagines a crazed fan hiding behind one of the velvet curtains.
The lobby is dimly lit, so she squints, eyes drawn to the fireplace across the room. A crown of blonde hair peeks out from the back of one of the large brown leather chairs, which almost seem red in the firelight.
Naomi traipses across the patterned rug, chest tightening with nerves. She’s both relieved and even more nervous once she spots her, gazing into the flames, cupping a mug of steaming liquid. The light dances in Meghan’s gray eyes as she looks up.
“Meghan?” Naomi says, voice low. She grows lightheaded as she takes the actress in, almost glowing, with a golden aura surrounding her. Naomi stumbles over her tongue for a brief moment but manages to pull herself together. “I’m Naomi, nice to meet you.”
Meghan gives her a half-smile in return, and for a second Naomi is worried it’s all a coincidence and Meghan never contacted her at all. But then she shifts in her seat and shakes Naomi’s outstretched hand.
“Please, sit,” she says, gesturing to the chair across from her.
Naomi takes a deep breath. She’s been up close with plenty of celebrities before but she’s never sat down intimately – not like this. Normally she would be over the moon to have landed a fireside chat with someone like Meghan Rhodes, but she hasn’t come here for gossip. She came for answers.
“Thanks so much for meeting me.” Naomi takes her jacket off and places it on the floor on top of her purse and umbrella.
Her eyes flit across the room from the intricately carved stone fireplace to the vintage lamps on the dark wood-beamed ceilings.
It’s cozy but in an old, haunted mansion kind of way. “This is a beautiful hotel.”
Meghan nods, smiling. “I love it. Used to come here all the time to read scripts when I was just starting out.” She’s soft-spoken, with a warm and welcoming air, not at all what Naomi expected.
In her red-carpet interviews she often seems aloof and cold.
But tonight, she looks at home. Minus the distant, sad look in her eyes. “I usually don’t do this, you know.”
“I know,” Naomi says. It’s widely known that Meghan is very private and barely speaks to the press about work, let alone anything about her private life. “This isn’t for an article. It’s personal. Everything is off the record unless you tell me otherwise.”
“I’m afraid it will have to be, I’m under a strict NDA.
The only reason I agreed to this was because my sister told me it was personal.
And she hated Colton, so the fact that you thought he wasn’t the good guy made her forward it to me.
It’s my last night in New York for promotions before I go back to LA, so… ” She turns her gaze back to the fire.
“An NDA from who? Colton?” Naomi interjects, astonished. She doesn’t know why she’s surprised. She’s always just assumed Meghan was private, not silenced.
Meghan turns back to Naomi. “From his family and army of lawyers. Yes. Anyway, you know I looked you up before we met and I was surprised to see your latest article didn’t really match your message.”
Naomi sighs. She can’t believe she went rogue like that and vows to never publish another article in the heat of the moment, promising to always send it to at least one other reader for fresh eyes.
“Yeah, well I’m starting to think I was a bit hasty with that, which is why I wanted to talk to you.
See if I missed something. I got into all this because I was investigating the case against Harlow Hayes and while I originally thought she was to blame, I now have reason to believe that Colton isn’t as innocent as everyone thought he was, and that he may have been involved in the death of two young women—maybe three.
” She thinks of the missing girl in New Mexico from 2017, when he was filming Mojave, of the model, and of the blind item.
And she thinks of Faye, bruised and broken.
She coughs, trying to clear the sting in her throat. “One of whom is my sister.”
Meghan exhales and places her tea on the wooden coffee table.
She runs her hands through her hair and props her elbows on her knees, clasping them together.
She’s wearing a thick black cable-knit sweater on top of a calf-length satin skirt, an inch of her skin peeking out above her black leather boots.
She gives Naomi a sad smile. “I’m truly sorry about your sister. I would freeze hell over if I thought someone hurt mine. Unfortunately, I don’t know anything about anyone’s death. Not even his…”
Naomi nods, about to ask a question, but then Meghan continues.
“But… and this is completely off the record, okay? You can’t tell anyone you’ve spoken to me. As I said, it’s a strict NDA.” She eyes Naomi, waiting for confirmation.
“Of course,” Naomi says, sitting up. “You have my word.”
Appeased, Meghan speaks. “I have to say I wouldn’t be completely surprised if your theory is true.” She pauses and glances around the room as she lowers her voice. “Colton wasn’t the true gentleman—hero—everyone wants to believe.”
Naomi’s heart starts pounding. She leans forward, waiting for Meghan to continue.
“So in the beginning everything was so great. Then after about a year and a half, he started to get a little controlling, didn’t like me doing sex scenes with other men, hence why I moved into more PG roles for a time.”
Naomi thinks of her film list, not having noticed the shift before from raunchy romcoms to children’s movies and cheesy action films.
“Things became rocky, and we temporarily broke up for the first time last year, when I insisted I wanted to sign on to I’m Sure She’s Fine.
I think I have, like, one sex scene, so he got over it.
” She clears her throat. “Anyway, earlier this year… and I’ve never told anyone except my sister about this before,” she says, eyes darting around the room once again.
“But I found messages.” Her voice is no more than a whisper now, but her eyes are wide and telling.
“What kind of messages?” Naomi asks.
Meghan shakes her head, a look of disgust on her face.
“Disgusting, perverted messages. To multiple women.” She blushes.
“We had a great sex life, especially in the beginning. Couldn’t keep our hands off each other.
And I enjoy it a little rough. Hair-pulling, all that.
But, apparently, that wasn’t enough for him.
And when I turned down his more… hardcore…
requests, he searched for it elsewhere.. .”
Meghan’s hands tremble as she clasps her mug of tea, bringing it to her red lips.
“Would you mind sharing what sort of requests? And you’re sure they couldn’t have been taken out of context? Just kinky stuff?”
Meghan scoffs. “Call me a prude, but saying things like you want to slice little pieces of flesh off someone to cook and eat, or that you want to slit someone’s throat just enough so they bleed but don’t die so you can fuck them while they teeter on the line of life and death is more than ‘just kinky.’”
Naomi’s eyes widen, sure she misheard her. But then she recalls the words from the model at the club. My friend slept with him, said he was vile. To stay away. She swallows her growing nausea, thinking of the blind item and Jade’s bruising, Faye’s injury.
“Like rape fantasies…”
Meghan nods, face paling.
Naomi can’t imagine how anyone could be into something so depraved, let alone put it in writing, but she knows how fucked-up people can be.
It tends to be the ones you least expect too.
Cold and calculating behind the scenes, meticulously careful until they get cocky, confident they’ll never get caught, and finally they make a mistake.
Goosebumps prickle her arms as she thinks of all the horrible people still out there, getting away with whatever they want.
She breathes out a shaky exhale, forcing herself not to think of what her sister possibly went through.
“Do you know if he was into choking specifically?” she asks.
Meghan tenses and then nods.
Naomi’s heart rate spikes at the confirmation. “And how did you find the DMs? Were you looking through his phone because you had suspicions or did someone tip you off?”
Meghan purses her lips, then sighs. “I rarely did things like that. I prefer an ignorance-is-bliss approach. Don’t go looking for things you don’t want to find. But he’d been acting… off. And my intuition just told me to look.”
Naomi opens her mouth to speak but Meghan continues.
“Oh, and there is one thing I forgot to mention. Before all this—we’re talking 2022—literally just months after we got engaged, I got a message.
Something like ‘He’s not the perfect man you think he is.
He’s a monster.’ But I’d received so many messages over social, especially from so many Harlow fans who hated me, so I just ignored it.
After that point I almost never checked my socials, handed them off to my PR team.
But yeah, when I found the DMs later, I remembered that message.
Assumed it was one of the women he… you know. ”
“When in 2022?”
“January… February maybe?”