Chapter Two #2
God, there was going to be a business lesson in that incoming lecture. Her parents, Hollywood royalty, had meant well but lacked that parental love she saw with other families.
Tabitha popped up. “I can get her.”
Tabitha’s offer was less about being helpful and more about having face time with the venerable scriptwriter. Maybe if she played her cards correctly, Tabitha would find double the luck with her dad being in tow.
Abigail rolled her eyes.
Jules didn’t have the mental energy to spend on her cousin. An offer of help was an offer of help, and she would rather Abigail stay in the suite anyway. “That’s great, Tabs.”
“Take security with you.” Rhys gestured to the men who had brought up the rear of their escape, likely calculating the attention her parents usually received. “You two. Go with her.”
Tabitha faltered. “We don’t need that.”
“Yeah, you do.” With one major exception in their past, Jules trusted his say-so completely.
“We do whatever Rhys says.” If he said, “Jump,” they jumped.
If he said, “Travel with security in tow,” they were accompanied.
But she drew the line at sharing secrets with him.
That had burned her before. Yeah, yeah, he’d done it for her own good, but that history would always be there.
“Not everybody is America’s sweetheart,” Tabitha muttered.
“Shove it,” Abigail lobbed at her. “You know you love a bodyguard at your side.”
Tabitha rolled her eyes. It was her signature move on Forever Falls , a soap opera that traded in jabs and drama of a wealthy family.
Backstabbing and betrayals filled every episode.
Tabitha wasn’t a leading lady, but it was only a matter of time—so long as she stopped being a pain in everyone’s ass or if Sloane figured out a way to elevate Tabitha to the next level.
“Can you take me?” Tabitha asked Rhys.
“No.”
In Hollywood, Rhys only worked with Jules.
He showed up whenever her stalker was on an attention-grabbing streak and always coordinated her security team at major events—Cannes, the Golden Globes, late-night shows, and family vacations.
He exemplified everything a business partner should be.
Responsible. Transparent. Flexible. She really should have asked Rhys to marry her instead of Mason.
Tabitha left with two bodyguards.
Abigail took another phone call and disappeared into the other room. Aaliyah and Yasmin quietly shuttled to their bags and personal belongings, unable to resist the intoxicating pull of their cell phones. Jules trusted them. But she’d also trusted Olivia.
No. Absolutely not.
No way would she close off her already-small group of friends because of Olivia and Mason.
Aaliyah and Yasmin wouldn’t stab her in the back.
Every gossip hound and celebrity news reporter had to be blowing up their phones along with every number associated with Jules.
But she trusted they would kick the requests to Sloane.
Sloane had likely texted them on how to handle the onslaught of dirt seekers.
Jules pushed off the couch. She needed fresh air and strode to the beckoning balcony.
The helicopters still hovered—she jerked back at the thought of telephoto lenses scouring the building.
The hotel room was too cramped. The pressure too heavy.
She needed… needed… She had no idea what she needed, and sidestepping along the wall toward Yasmin and Aaliyah, she asked, “What’s everyone saying? ”
“Actually…” Aaliyah scrolled. “Not as much as I would have thought.”
Thank you, Sloane Ellis.
“Did you have any idea?” Yasmin asked. “I had none. Zero. Completely, absolutely zilch.”
Aaliyah nodded. “Didn’t even cross my mind they could ever… Well, ya know. I didn’t know they knew each other that well.”
“Guess they did,” Jules muttered.
Rhys hooked a thumb over his shoulder. “Wes and I will be outside your door if you need anything.”
The men wanted as little girl talk as possible. Same, Rhys. Same. She nodded, refilling her champagne flute with tap water.
Her friends tracked her movements. Their eyes bored into her like drills of curiosity. Their denials seemed truthful and their scrutiny, unwavering.
She sipped. “What?”
Yasmin raised a shoulder. Aaliyah tugged her bottom lip between her teeth.
“You don’t seem… upset?” Yasmin finally offered.
Jules’s fingers tightened around the crystal flute as the flutter of truth trilled in her chest. “How am I not upset?” She heard the octave in her voice climb.
Their big, beautiful eyes rounded. Both shrugged defensively.
“I’m angry.” I’m so alone. “He made a fool out of me.”
Mason was yet another man who’d said he loved her, and she’d believed him. That love might have been platonic, but he’d given her that promise. What had she been thinking? Love was a liability. Even when it was basically pretend. “I am upset.”
“Of course, honey,” Yasmin said.
“I know, baby,” Aaliyah offered.
Jules had won Oscars and Golden Globes, and still, she hadn’t convinced her closest friends that she was devastated. They nodded, believing her as much as Jules believed Tabitha had volunteered to get her mother out of the goodness of her heart. “I’m—”
Rhys cracked the door. “Ice cream’s here.” He waited for her nod before letting in the catering cart.
“Where would you like this?” The uniformed man pulled the cart into the center of the large sitting area.
“Wherever.” Jules might take her ice cream to bed. No one could accuse her of not being upset if she snuggled up to a gallon of ice cream and toffee chips.
The man’s gaze swept over their clutter as he searched for the best place to park the cart. He repositioned next to the long dining table covered with makeup and hairbrushes, dirty plates, and champagne glasses. “How about over here?”
“Sure,” Yasmin said, following the cart, then called toward the bedroom, “Abs, the ice cream arrived.”
Jules dropped onto a club chair like her legs couldn’t hold her a second longer. She pressed her fingers to her temples. Was she more upset that her friends didn’t believe she was upset? Or was she actually upset? Screw it. She was pissed. That all-encompassing catch-all described everything.
“Stop.” Rhys rushed across the hotel room like he’d spotted an assassin. He slide-tackled the man against the dining table. Hairbrushes skittered. Champagne flutes crashed. “Give me the phone.”
“Damn, man. Don’t break my arm.”
At the commotion, Abigail burst into the living room, and with one look, she grabbed Jules and pulled her away, protectively tucking her onto the couch. Their fingers interlocked. Abigail’s French manicure squeezed tiny half-moons of pain into Jules’s knuckles.
The men slammed into the table again. Abigail’s nails bit deeper into her skin. A chair overturned. A makeup bag careened onto the floor, spilling bobby pins and makeup brushes like wedding prep shrapnel.
“Give me the phone,” Rhys demanded.
“You want twenty-five percent?” The other man clasped both hands over his cell phone. “I’ll cut you in. Damn it. Don’t break my arm.”
Rhys wrenched the man’s elbow back. The phone clattered to the floor. Only then did Abigail release the death grip handhold.
Wes burst into the hotel room, the door slamming against the wall. They jumped as Wes flew across the hotel room.
“Get the phone,” Rhys ordered. “It’s under the table.”
“Got it.”
“Half?” the man shouted. “Give you both half. Split it.”
Rhys handed the man to Wes and snagged the phone in exchange. Wes wrapped a beefy arm around the flailing man. Red-faced and veins bulging in his forehead, he struggled like a mouse in a barn cat’s mouth, locked in place. Rhys held up the phone to the man’s face. Boom. Unlocked.
That move was far savvier than Jules would have given him credit for. The drama played out like an absurd scene on Forever Falls . It was almost too much to be true.
“Fifty percent. Sixty?”
“Fuck right off, man.” Rhys selected photos.
“This is against the law. You’re stealing. Those are my pictures.”
Rhys hummed, casually scrolling and deleting photos like he was bored and waiting for an Uber at the end of a long, miserable day. Or maybe today was only long and miserable for her. Either way, he’d transitioned into a cell phone superhero. Scarlett Wu would be proud of him.
Oh… Titan’s Scarlett Wu. That answered the where-was-Sloane question. If anyone could hunt and destroy gossip fodder of the likes of today, Scar could.
Sloane and Scar would be proud of Rhys. His thumbs tapped and scrolled again. He was probably checking the deleted folder.
Tap, tap, tap.
How quickly did a cell phone back up its photo gallery to its cloud? The backup couldn’t have uploaded faster than Rhys deleted.
His lips tugged down, and after another casual moment perusing, Rhys handed the device back. The man, still buckled to Wes, jabbered on and on about how he was going to sue and he was entitled, like he wasn’t belted to a bodyguard about to throw him out on his ass.
Rhys and Wes shared an unspoken conversation. Yasmin and Aaliyah hunkered next to Abigail on the couch. This wasn’t the first time paparazzi had paid off hotel staff, but it might be the most memorable.
The world wanted to know how shattered Jules was.
They wanted pictures of her sobbing into her wedding veil and eating ice cream straight from a carton, mascara-inked tears trailing down her cheeks.
Jules wasn’t anywhere close to that. Maybe she should have been.
But that required a belief in true love, and that wasn’t her.
Love had proved itself to be a liar long ago. She wouldn’t let it destroy her from the inside out again.
Wes dragged the wannabe paparazzo out of the room.
The door slammed like a bold end to an action sequence.
The silence percolated. No one found the right words to interrupt the ridiculousness that had arrived with gourmet ice cream.
Tabitha would vibrate from jealousy that she’d missed this spectacle.