I didn’t know why I found that aggravating.
No. Once I froze in place with my hand out for the pen, I figured out why every hair on my body stood on end. The payoff implied I’d ever hold insider information about a child over that child’s head. It questioned the very basics of my integrity.
I closed the envelope.
“I don’t want your money,” I said, sliding the envelope to Ray. “And I’m not signing it. I’d never, ever hurt Willow. And thank you, but I’m not hungry anymore.”
I left, walking right out the back as if there wasn’t a pack of paparazzi waiting for me. I didn’t care. Maybe they were going to say I was storming out because Ray and I were having an affair. Sure. Why not? Let them see me. Let them think what they wanted.
Apparently, Ray didn’t care either because he caught up to me right inside the door.
“Cara, I’m sorry.”
“It’s fine.”
I just wanted to get away from him. He represented a failure I couldn’t control, and he was a passive-aggressive sad sack. I didn’t know how he managed to run an office staff of dozens, much less a household staff you could count on one hand.
“We really miss you,” he said.
“Say ‘hi’ to the kids for me.”
The ma?tre d’ held the door open for me. The dog pack was shouting to Wanda Cravitz, who was doing a three-point turn and waving before coming in for lunch.
“There’s no one like you,” Ray said from behind me. I looked back at him.
“You trying to get in my pants?”
He smiled at the joke I wouldn’t have made when I worked with him. It made me wish I’d lightened up a little when I was in his house.
“We thought about hiring you back.”
If I could have chosen my feelings, “hopeful” wouldn’t have been on the list, but that was how I felt. The door might not have been open wide, but it was ajar, or unlocked maybe. The Heywood house had been an enviable job, and if Kendall was on board, all the better. I assumed I knew what the obstacle was. I could crush it.
“I’m only with Brad a limited time.”
“I had to put the kibosh on it when pictures came across my desk this morning.”
Forty thousand pictures came across his desk in a day. One of them had to do with me. I gripped the shoulder strap on my bag so tightly my knuckles went white.
He got his phone out, and the ma?tre d’ let Wanda Cravitz in. I stepped to the side in the whoosh of her entourage, knowing well and good what was in the pictures, but hoping against hope that I was wrong. I hadn’t seen them, and I would have.
“We bought all of them, and we’re not printing them. Everyone knows about them. The rumor mill. It’s real.”
He handed me the phone. “That’s the first. There are four more.” He cleared his throat as I flipped through. “If Kendall ever saw them, she’d flip on you. And me. She’d assume things that aren’t true about us. She’s a beautiful woman, but she’s been hurt before.”
They all looked black except for a blotch of light illuminating two sets of legs standing close together. One had a blur of light by the faces. Brad and I could have been any couple kissing in a dark backyard, but with the right copy, I’d be tarred.
I handed the phone back.
“Thank you.”
“I felt like I owed you.”
“You didn’t. But I’m not signing that thing.”
I could have left, and I probably should have gone to the door faster, but Fiona Drazen was on her way out with Karen Hinnley and I couldn’t walk through the traffic they caused. So I had to hear his short, painful speech in its entirety.
“Listen. You’ve given me plenty of good advice about kids. Let me give you a little about men. Stay away from that guy. The only two things he’s ever loved are a good time and getting what he wants. You’re a challenge to him, and you deserve to be more.”
“Yeah.” I agreed so I could get out of there. I didn’t want to be trapped in the industry eatery for another second. The paps could photograph me and call my name. I didn’t care, as long as I wasn’t kissing someone I worked for while they did it. It was the crowd making me feel like a caged animal. The noise from the high ceiling. The bustle of the lunch hour. I couldn’t think. I didn’t know if I had to.
“Thanks, Ray. Again. I meant it when I wished you the best.”
We shook hands and I weaved around a TV reality star and a pack of paparazzi who ignored me in favor of the reality actress. I got in the front seat of my car as if I’d just robbed a bank, but when I turned the key, I didn’t drive away.
I didn’t move. The Hollywood sign was in front of me, three miles away on the horizon between two billboards, letters barely legible from the far western side. One of the billboards was for Broken. Brad’s blue eye was ten feet high. The laugh lines around his eyes hadn’t been smoothed over, and his pores were as big as a fist. Intentional. Appropriate to the story. He looked exactly like that kiss-close, and I shared the view with millions.
I felt violated by that eye.
I’d told myself I didn’t want to be a part of celebrity culture. I’d said I wanted to just be around children. I’d told myself a lot of things and right then, I didn’t believe any of them.
CHAPTER 36
BRAD
She was gorgeous. They’d all been complete knockouts. Girls like that moved out of their hometown as soon as the captain of the football team turned his back. Tall. Tight. Shaped like lingerie models. They all sat in the agency conference room as if it was a casting call, but with buttoned-up blouses and ponytails.
“Why did you come to LA?” I asked the fifth one. Maybe fifteenth. Who the fuck even knew. At interview number two I had the feeling I wasn’t going to find someone to replace either Blakely or Cara.
“My agent said I had to move here if I was serious about acting. So. Here I am. I have a degree in child psychology from Michigan, and I love children.”
Since time was short, Laura had set up a full day of interviews. She said they should meet Nicole, not me. Like we did the first time. I brought her and we did it that way in the morning, but I didn’t like strangers looking at my daughter and trying to get her to like them. What was she supposed to make of all these pretty faces? She was five and she was mine. I’d get a short list together. We could go from there.
I put Nicole in the playroom with Blakely, who gave me the moon eyes as if she wanted me to know she felt guilty about chasing her dreams. She shouldn’t feel guilty. I wouldn’t.
The girl from Michigan had a nice résumé. Seemed to come from a nice family. And it was all very nice. She looked exactly like her headshot. I got no feeling from her at all.
“My daughter lost her mother. She gets attached.”
“I’d love to meet her.”
“You’re auditioning on your days off?”
“Probably.” She smiled. Skin like butter. Had to say, she was knockout material.