Chapter 15
Chapter Fifteen
CAT’S OUT OF THE BAG
Max
The guest house behind the pool would be perfect for her. She could do her own thing, invite those friends of hers over whenever. There's that little kitchen she'd probably love. She just strikes me as somebody who loves to cook.
But Gianni shoots that plan down at the gym between sets.
"Paparazzi," he grunts, bench-pressing 250.
"Some TMZ vulture with a telephoto will catch her sneaking back to the main house.
Your sham marriage hits Page Six by breakfast." Fuck.
He's right. Granddad would lose his mind—he actually expects me to give this arrangement a real shot.
The board knows it's all theater, of course.
They sat there stone-faced while Granddad blackmailed me into this mess.
But they're locked down tight with NDAs, same as every person on my payroll.
Anyone breathes a word about my fake marriage, and I'll bury them in legal fees until their great-grandchildren feel it.
Nobody crosses Max Kensington and walks away.
So the charade stays airtight—unless I stupidly house Celeste where she can be photographed coming and going.
No use letting the press see that my marriage is as phony as a Patek Philippe being sold out of the trunk of a car. Separate wing it is. Done.
My phone buzzes against the nightstand like an angry wasp.
Elody fucking Martin. Again. At four in the goddamn morning—is she insane?
Probably grinding away on her Peloton, sweat dripping onto that $3,000 exercise bike before she struts onto set to play some virginal Tudor princess in that Philippa Gregory adaptation.
I grab my phone, the screen burning my retinas in the darkness, and—FUCK!
FUCK! FUCK! My stomach plummets to the floor.
The message and emojis blazes up at me: a barrage of bleeding hearts, sobbing faces, and desperate pleas.
DON'T MARRY HER MAX PLEASE I'M BEGGING YOU.
The cat isn't just out of the bag—it's clawed its way through and is screaming from the rooftop.
I groan. The news of my engagement was bound to leak, but with Elody involved, it's become a goddamn five-alarm fire. She's probably having a meltdown right now, blowing up her friends' phones at this ungodly hour, sobbing over a relationship that only exists in her head.
My hands are steady but my gut churns as I scroll through my feeds.
Facebook, Instagram, X, TikTok—my name is everywhere.
It's 4 AM in California but the East Coast is wide awake and losing their collective shit.
Some chick on TikTok is literally burning my headshot while her apartment smoke detector chirps in the background.
Another one's doing a dramatic reading of our "love story"—which is news to me.
For every "congrats bro" there are fifty messages calling me everything but a child of God.
Then I see what these assholes are doing to Celeste.
Some dickhead dug up her high school yearbook photo and ran it through filters that make her look like something from a horror movie.
Her hair, her smile—all twisted. And the deepfakes—Christ. The kind of pornographic bullshit that would make even my college roommates say “damn, that’s going too far.
” The comments beneath them—vicious shit no man would say to a woman's face—turn my stomach.
And then, of course, Rayna calls. My phone lights up with her face—that perfect jawline captured mid-laugh at some rooftop party in Milan last year.
She's somewhere in Europe for work. Spain?
No, France. The Chanel show, then Givenchy.
Between fittings, she's apparently found time to launch her own luxury brand.
"Paris is perfect for the debut," she'd texted last month with a champagne glass.
"Max," she slurs when I pick up. "You fucking bastard.
You didn't even think to let me know that you met someone and you're getting married?
" Her words run together like she's been drinking, which tracks.
It's barely afternoon there, but that's Rayna for you—day drinking at sidewalk cafés with her model friends, getting wasted before dinner.
"I'm calling you now because I figure you're up. You always get up at an ungodly hour."
I never gave a damn about Rayna beyond the occasional night together. And even those weren't worth remembering. "Look, we've always been casual. Nothing more. I don't understand why this comes as a shock to you."
The phone erupts with her cursing. Female voices chime in from what sounds like a brunch gathering—a Greek chorus of I-told-you-sos. "Max is exactly the asshole we warned you about," they're practically chanting, though with considerably more colorful language.
I check my watch, distracted. The news about my engagement has exploded online. Celeste's address isn't exactly a state secret, which means she's probably facing a media circus right now. I should make sure she's okay.
My fingers hover over the end-call button while I debate what to do.
Part of me thinks she's not my problem—I've got quarterly projections waiting on my desk, the reason I came in at dawn.
But Granddad and Nana raised me better than that.
Celeste never asked for this spotlight. She won't know the first thing about handling paparazzi or online harassment.
I can't sit here in my climate-controlled office while she's thrown to the wolves.
“Gotta go, bye,” I say to Rayna, cutting her off mid-curse.
I then block her number, which will make her even more enraged, but no matter.
Claremont, where Dreamscape is located, is an hour away from my Downtown office, assuming light traffic.
Which it probably will be, considering the traffic from Claremont would be going the other way.
It’s now 5 in the morning and will be 6 by the time I get to her.
I think that’s what time she leaves for work on most days.
When I arrive at her place, I'm confronted by a swarm of vultures camped on her lawn and crowding her stoop.
Their phones are raised like weapons, microphones extended like probing fingers.
They're hunting for that money shot—Celeste's deer-in-headlights expression when she first steps outside, something they can splash across their feeds within seconds.
They probably dream of her giving them the reaction that'll break the internet and make their site famous for a day.
If I were in her shoes, I wouldn't give them the satisfaction of my shock.
No, I'd stare them down, maybe throw up a middle finger, let loose a string of expletives that would have their content moderators working overtime.
The paparazzi descend like locusts, microphones thrust forward, cameras flashing. This is my normal, but Celeste will be freaking out. I spot James Dubois from TMZ in the crowd and make my way to him.
"James," I say with practiced calm. "Remember those exclusives I feed you?"
He takes my picture, but his eager nod turns to shock when I pluck his camera from his hands, delete the photo, and hand it back. "Leave now, or you're cut off. Permanently."
I recognize every face on Celeste's lawn—gossip columnists, influencers, tabloid vultures—all desperate for my access. One by one, I deliver the same message: disappear or be blacklisted. Their choice is simple. Within twenty minutes, the lawn is empty, the silence almost eerie after the chaos.
I pound on the door and Celeste's voice cuts through it like a knife: "Get the hell away from here!” She must think I'm another bloodsucking reporter with the audacity to try to get in her front door.
The door flies open and I brace myself, but it's not Celeste—it's another woman.
Must be the roommate. Dark hair frames a face that transforms from fury to shock when our eyes meet.
Her mouth falls open, and for a moment we just stare at each other, the air between us electric with tension.
My heart hammers against my ribs. "Hello," I manage, my voice rougher than intended. "Is Celeste here?"
“Just a sec,” she says. “Come in, come in.”
I walk into Celeste's condo and see how she’s living and try to stop the pity from rising from my gut.
I have to remind myself that not everybody comes from a billionaire family and Celeste in particular doesn’t have a ton of money - she’s making a salary that covers the bare minimum in Los Angeles, and considering she’s also trying to valiantly cover her mother and sister’s expenses, she can’t exactly decorate her place in glory.
But it seems that she’s made the most with what little she has.
The floors look like hardwood, but they clearly aren’t - they’re cheap laminate from Home Depot that sells for a buck a linear foot, but they’re in pretty good shape.
The couch and love seat at least match, even though they’re velour that looks pretty worn.
She has the good taste to throw some Pottery Barn pillows on them that freshens up the look just a bit.
Her bookshelf, filled with paperbacks and some hard backs that probably came from various Little Free Libraries around town, is constructed from plywood at best, probably particle board.
Her galley kitchen is covered in more cheap laminate and her fridge is old-school, not exactly state of the art - probably bought both her fridge and stove on Craig’s List from the looks of it.
Her kitchen counter, which looks into the living area through a pass-through window, is granite at least - that’s the one bright spot in an otherwise very cheaply constructed place.
I tap my toes against the laminate floor of Celeste’s kitchen, waiting for her to emerge from the guest bedroom.
When she finally appears, her hair perfectly styled and wearing another Plato’s Closet sweater, I see the panic behind her eyes.
My fingers twitch with the urge to reach for her shoulders, to steady her, to tell her everything will be fine.
Instead, my hands stay in my pockets. I discuss with her the wedding planners - about Wolfgang Puck catering the food, and I also tell her about the others she needs to meet with, all A-Listers - the photographer, the planner and decorator, the florist. I watch her fingers tighten around her travel mug.
"Especially the media handler. The comments online...
" I trail off, not wanting to mention the vicious speculation, the memes, the tabloid headlines.
“I’ll find someone who can manage your accounts—make you look real, relatable.
Someone the public will root for instead of tear down.
" What I don't say: I'm worried she'll crumble under the pressure.
That one morning I'll wake up and find her gone.
That thought bothers me more than it should.