18. Hugo #2
“Option two is that I end you. Not just your career, your reputation, your relationships, everything. I have proof, Derek. Documented, irrefutable proof. I will make sure every artist, every label, every executive in this industry knows exactly what kind of man you are. You’ll never work again.
You’ll never be trusted again. You’ll spend the rest of your professional life as a cautionary tale. ”
Derek’s face has gone gray.
“You’d really do that?”
“Try me.”
He looks at Lucille, as if hoping to find sympathy there. He finds none.
“I’ll release the statement,” he says quietly. “Tomorrow.”
“Today,” I correct. “And you’ll do it in person, at a press conference I’m arranging. You’ll stand in front of cameras and tell the truth about everything, the leak, the money, Ginny’s involvement, all of it.”
“Hugo…”
“Those are your options. Choose.”
Derek is silent for a long moment. Then, slowly, he nods.
“Fine. I’ll do it.”
“Good.” I step back. “Get out of my house. Someone will contact you with the details.”
He stands on shaky legs and walks toward the door. At the threshold, he pauses.
“For what it’s worth,” he says, “I am sorry. About all of it.”
“Sorry doesn’t fix anything.”
He leaves without another word.
Lucille comes to stand beside me, and I wrap my arm around her.
“That was satisfying,” she admits.
“That was just the beginning.”
***
The press conference happens the next afternoon.
We hold it at a venue downtown, neutral territory that doesn’t favor any particular outlet.
The room is packed, every entertainment reporter in Los Angeles seems to have shown up, along with cameras from national news networks.
The Ginny Davies story has been simmering for weeks. Everyone wants the next chapter.
They’re about to get more than they bargained for.
Derek goes first, reading from a prepared statement with the broken cadence of a man who knows his career is over.
“I want to acknowledge my role in the events of the past several months,” he begins.
“I was approached by representatives of Virginia Davies and offered compensation in exchange for facilitating the leak of an archived song file. I accepted this offer and participated in the subsequent management of the narrative that developed around the so-called reunion.”
The room erupts with questions, but Derek continues.
“I also want to acknowledge that I had knowledge of Ms. Davies’ plan to provoke Lucille Kensington at the industry mixer where the wine incident occurred.
Ms. Davies intentionally initiated physical contact in a manner designed to elicit a response, knowing that selective video footage would support a particular narrative. ”
More questions. More cameras flashing. Derek answers what he can, confirms what we’ve laid out, and then steps aside.
My turn.
I approach the microphone with Lucille beside me, her hand in mine.
“I want to start by apologizing to my wife,” I say, and the room goes quiet.
“For two years, I failed her. I was absent, distracted, and so focused on my career that I neglected the person who mattered most. When the situation with Ginny Davies began, I made it worse by trying to appease everyone instead of protecting the woman I love.”
I squeeze Lucille’s hand.
“The narrative that’s been building for months, that Lucille is jealous, unstable, violent, is a fabrication.
It was manufactured by people who stood to benefit from my marriage falling apart.
My wife is none of those things. She’s talented, she’s patient, and she put up with far more from me than I deserved. ”
“What about Ginny Davies?” someone calls out. “Are you saying she orchestrated all of this?”
“I’m saying that the evidence speaks for itself.
Ms. Davies accessed the archived song file.
Her team paid my former manager to facilitate the leak.
She intentionally provoked my wife at the mixer to generate footage that would support her victim narrative.
” I pause. “There was never an affair. There was never a reunion. There was only a calculated campaign to advance one person’s career at the expense of my family. ”
The questions keep coming, rapid-fire and overlapping. I answer what I can, defer what I must, and finally turn to Lucille.
“My wife would like to make a statement.”
Lucille steps forward, and the room falls silent.
“I’m not going to stand here and defend myself,” she says, her voice clear and steady. “I’m not going to explain my actions or justify my anger or apologize for being human. What I am going to say is this: this is the first and last time I will address any of it.”
She pauses, letting that sink in.
“I’m a designer. I make beautiful things. That’s what I want to be known for, not for who I married or who tried to destroy me. After today, I’m done talking about Ginny Davies. I’m done talking about the scandal. I’m done letting other people’s lies define my story.”
She turns to me, and there’s a fierceness in her eyes.
“Let’s go home.”
We walk out of the press conference together, cameras flashing behind us, questions still being shouted at our backs. We don’t stop. We don’t look back.
It’s over.
***
The fallout is swift and brutal.
Within twenty-four hours, Ginny’s label announces they’ve parted ways.
Within forty-eight, the brands she’d partnered with begin pulling their campaigns.
Her social media, which had been flooded with supportive comments, turns hostile.
The same people who called Lucille unstable are now calling Ginny manipulative. The narrative flips overnight.
Derek fares no better. He’s radioactive now, untouchable. Every artist he’s ever worked with is distancing themselves. Every deal he was negotiating has collapsed. He’ll never manage another career.
Thieves who fell out and buried each other. All I had to do was light the fuse.
“Do you feel bad?” Lucille asks as we watch the coverage on her laptop, curled up together on the couch.
“About Ginny?”
“About any of it.”
I consider the question seriously.
“I feel bad that it came to this. I feel bad that I didn’t see Derek for what he was years ago. But do I feel bad about exposing the truth?” I shake my head. “No. They made their choices. They have to live with the consequences.”
“That’s very ruthless of you.”
“I learned from the best.”
She elbows me, but she’s smiling.
We’re quiet for a while, watching the talking heads dissect our press conference, analyze our body language, speculate about what comes next. It’s strange, seeing our private life turned into public entertainment. But for once, the narrative being told is the true one.
“Lucille.”
“Hmm?”
“Come home.”
She looks at me, her expression unreadable.
“I’ve been staying at Alice’s,” she says. “And then the vineyard. And I know we’ve been talking about the future, about what happens next, but I need to hear you say it clearly.”
“I’m saying it clearly.” I take her hand.
“Come home. Not to visit, not temporarily, not until we figure things out. Come home and stay. Move your things back in. Wake up next to me every morning. Let me make you terrible breakfast and learn how to cook actual food and be the husband I should have been from the beginning.”
“That’s a lot of promises.”
“I’m making a lot of promises.” I bring her hand to my lips. “I know I don’t have the best track record. I know you have every reason to doubt me. But I’m asking anyway, because I can’t imagine my life without you in it. Not anymore.”
She’s quiet for a long moment, and I feel my heart pounding against my ribs.
Then, without saying a word, she reaches over and takes my hand.
She laces her fingers through mine, the way she did on the drive back from the vineyard when words were too much and touch said everything.
She holds it.
She doesn’t let go.
And that is answer enough.