Fabricating Jada

  The lethal tone of his question even had my nerves on edge. I sat down on one of the stools at the island and took a sip of water.

  "Give me a break. This girl, whoever she is—is not worth this shitstorm she created."

  "She's not the one who created it!" he bellowed.

  The door to the kitchen opened, and Mrs. Valentine slipped in. "What's going on?" she whispered, crossing over to me.

  "Could you hear the yelling all the way over there?" I whispered back, not really surprised if she could.

  She nodded. "I haven't heard him this upset in a long time. Should I go in there and intervene?"

  I shook my head. "I wouldn't if I were you. I think his wrath has been unleashed on her and it doesn't sound good."

  Their shouts quieted us both. At least I wasn't the only Nosey Nelly around here.

  "Bullshit! You don't think this girl will exploit you the first chance she has? Wake up, Cuz! You know how this game goes," she yelled.

  "This isn't a fucking game. This is my life. This is her life. I'm sick and tired of being a puppet to your whims. You ruined the party DeAnna worked hard to pull together by leaking it to the media. Don't think I don't know about that. And don't get me started on all the other shit you've pulled," he snapped.

  "Can you go put some clothes on please? It's very distracting having you stand there practically naked," she said, dodging his statement.

  My gaze darted to Mrs. Valentine's. Neither of us sure of what he was or wasn't wearing.

  "Is he naked?" she asked

  I shrugged. "I have no idea."

  And I really didn't. He'd grabbed a towel, but I had no idea if he'd bothered to put it on.

  "It's my fucking house. If you don't like my state of undress then get the fuck out!"

  Mrs. Valentine narrowed her gaze in my direction, scrutinizing me. "Where were you when all this started?"

  I answered as honestly as possible without giving away any extra information, since the worst part of the yelling had started when I was in my room. "I was taking a shower in my room. When I got out, I heard shouting. I didn't even know anyone was home." That part was true. I hadn't. I just didn't fill her in on when I'd found him home.

  "After a while curiosity got the best of me and I snuck down here to see what was going on." I gave her a sheepish grin at my eavesdropping and hoped she didn't see through the beginning of my story.

  Debbie nodded as if it all made sense.

  "We need to go to her parents and offer them money to—"

  My face paled.

  He cut her off before she could finish. "You will go nowhere near her family. Do you understand me?"

  "What do you even know about her? She looked familiar in the pictures I saw. Has she been the side piece for another celebrity?"

  My hands balled into fists at my side and my nostrils flared. "What is she talking about?" I hissed and glared at Jesse's mom.

  She rubbed my back trying to soothe me. "It doesn't sound like she knows," she said.

  "I know more about her than you think. And no, she hasn't been with any other celebrities," he spat.

  I could almost picture his arms folded over his chest and his jaw locked in place.

  "Oh, my God!" she shrieked. "She's the girl from the party. The one I caught you fucking in your bathroom."

  My ears burned red. "That's such a lie!" I hissed. I turned to face his mom, not wanting her to think I was some kind of cheap whore. "I swear, Mrs. V—she's wrong. She jumped to a conclusion based on an incident earlier in the night. Nothing happened." My eyes pleaded for her to understand.

  She kissed the side of my head. "I know, sweetie. I was there when he told DeAnna what happened."

  "That—right there, proves you talk out of your ass without knowing what your face is doing!" he yelled.

  "Why don't you slip back upstairs? I'm going to put an end to this."

  I nodded, having had my fill of excitement and ran up the stairs.

  Once Mrs. Valentine's voice filled the air—the yelling stopped and the front door slammed a few moments later.

  I flipped from channel to channel not stopping long enough to actually see what was on when someone knocked on my door.

  "Come in," I called, wrapped in my comforter. As if it protected me like some sort of shield. Which I realized was completely stupid.

  "Are you decent?" Jesse asked as he cracked open the door.

  Again. Stupid question. Even though he'd seen everything there was to see, I still pulled the covers up to my chest, silently berating myself for letting it go as far as it had. "Yeah."

  He opened the door all the way and leaned against the frame. At some point, he'd gotten dressed in a long sleeve henley and work pants. "I'm sorry about all the yelling. My over-opinionated cousin and DeAnna's former PR assistant thought I wanted her advice."

  My brows knitted together as I studied his face. His jaw ticked a fraction while the rest of his expression was as cool as ice.

  "Former PR assistant?"

  "I fired her," he answered in a deep rasp.

  Guilt gnawed at me. "I hope it wasn't because of the mess I created."

  He gave a quick shake to his head. "You didn't cause any of this, Jada. It was a long time coming. She thought because she was family she could do whatever she wanted without consequence or fear of being caught. She's been working against me for a long time."

  That made my chest ache for him. Being betrayed by someone you cared about hurt.

  "Well, I'm sorry all the same."

  He grunted, and worked his jaw back and forth.

  So many unanswered questions hung in the air, but from the rigid stance of his body language … I was almost afraid to ask. But not enough. I needed to know where we stood and if, because of the line we'd almost crossed, I had ruined my chances at working at his shop. Part of me needed him to know I wasn't up to no good—living up to what the tabloids were calling me—a gold digger and a slut.

  "I know this is going to sound rude and I don't mean for it to, but why were you still home?"

  He snorted. It was the kind of sound you usually made when someone made a jerky comment. Like I just had. "Ironically enough I needed to talk to you, and figured I'd go in a little later than usual."

  His response caught me off guard, and I rushed to explain what happened. "I want you to know I was only in your room to borrow some more burn salve. There wasn't any in the hall closets. Not that it's any excuse, but I thought you'd already left and when I heard the water—I thought a pipe had burst or something. It was never my intention to barge in on you like that …"

  "It's fine." Jesse dismissed it quickly as if nothing had transpired. As if we hadn't been on the verge of something we couldn't have come back from.

  Silence filled the room, neither of us addressing the real elephant in the room.

  Jesse cleared his throat. "I'm sorry about making everything worse with your parents last week. It's just very hard for me to stay out of it when someone is abusing someone else. And whether you realize it or not, your dad is emotionally abusive."

  I shook my head, dismissing his misplaced guilt. "It's not your fault. He was being a jerk like he always is. I appreciate you standing up for me—to everyone."

  He assessed me with his sharp. "So you heard."

  It wasn't a question. From my admission, he knew I had. Whether or not he knew I'd snuck downstairs, was a detail I didn't feel the need to clarify.

  I gave him a half-hearted shrug. It wasn't like I hadn't heard the things she'd said before—especially from her, but it didn't make it hurt any less.

  "She's wrong about you. I know the reason you're really here and that's all that matters. You've got two days left to rest your arm according to the doctor and then you can get back to it."

  His face was unreadable.

  "I just feel like I'm going to be really behind when I get back to class."

  Jesse scoffed. "You're not going back to that stupid ass class."


  I bolted upright. "What!? Why?"

  Shooting me a dark glare, he grunted. "It's a waste of your time and mine. That class is pointless. I have the paperwork you need to fill out on the dining table—it's the same shit I showed you in my office last week. Get it done so when you come back, you'll be starting on a custom build with Miguel."

  A custom build? I swallowed hard. "Fine. But why am I working with Miguel instead of you? Don't give me that lame excuse that it’s not a good idea. I want to know why."

  He shoved off the door frame and stalked toward me. "You may have thought I was judging where you lived—but I wasn't. It brought back a lot of unexpected memories for me because I grew up in a place just like it. You're doing things on your own, Jada. Making them happen without backing down. Look at the designs you've come up with this week. In a lot of ways we are the same. The worst way we're similar is a distraction. All the bickering takes away from productive work. You need to work under someone who has the patience to teach you the right way to do things without the bullshit. And right now, that person is Miguel. Not me."

  "We haven't really argued this week though."

  He gave me a pointed look, and I remembered all the times we had. I opened my mouth to protest, but stopped when I realized I didn't have a valid argument. We did fight a lot. And he'd admitted something very personal about his background—unbeknownst to him, I already knew some of it, because of DeAnna.

  However, knowing what he was feeling about it all made me think about how similar we really were.

  "I need to get to the shop, DeAnna will probably be home in a few hours."

  "Okay," I nodded, not knowing what else to say.

  "How's your arm?"

  Glancing at the uncovered wound, I shrugged. "Healing."

  "Good."

  "Um, Jesse?"

  He grunted. I really wanted to punch him every time he used that as a response.

  "Can you make sure DeAnna gets the jewelry box and roses I made?"

  Laughing, he shook his head. "No need. They're already in her office. She jacked them days ago."

  A smirk pulled at my lips. "Typical, DeAnna, huh?"

  Jesse dipped his chin in agreement and at that he left, pulling my door closed behind him.

  The reasoning behind us not working together was valid. No matter which way I turned it over in my mind, he was right. We fought too much. It took a lot of time and energy away from what we should be focused on and that was the work.

  So what if he acted as if nothing had happened between us. I needed to do the same. After everything I'd worked for and sacrificed, I wasn't about to throw it all away for a roll in the sheets with him. Or on the counter for that matter.

  Even though I felt trapped in my own lie, I knew where my focus needed to be. And it wasn't on Jesse.

  I knew I needed to talk to Carter. If she let me down this time, there'd be no going back.

  Calling Carter was harder than I thought it would be. I started and stopped hitting call at least a dozen times before I finally hit the button. She answered on the second ring.

  "Jada? Is everything okay? Are you okay? Oh my God, I've been so worried. I am so sorry!"

  Everything was one giant run-on sentence.

  "Calm your lady nuts," I replied, hoping to set the tone of the conversation.

  She breathed out a heavy sigh. "Does that mean what I think it means?"

  "That I no longer hate you and that I miss your stupid face? Then yes."

  Carter let out a strangled sob. "Oh, Jada! I'm so sorry. I know I already said that, but I really am. I never meant to betray you. I just got so caught up in Jesse's world and everything DeAnna was saying made sense at that moment. I don't know what I was thinking."

  I stared at my ceiling and sighed. "You weren't. Maybe all that fro-yo froze your common sense."

  She laughed. "God, I've missed you."

  "I know—I've missed you too."

  Carter cleared her throat, like she always did when she wanted to ask something, but was too afraid to ask. So, I let her off the hook. "What are you doing that nasty throat thing for, Carter? Spit it out."

  "Can I see you? I need to hug you and know that we're really okay."

  Silence filled the line as I tried to think of ways to make it happen. From what DeAnna told me earlier when she got home, there were still lunatics with cameras at the entrance to the subdivision, and she said the shop was complete chaos. Everyone wanted a piece of Jesse, and them not seeing him out with me made them hungrier for a scoop.

  "Jada, you still there?"

  I nodded even though she couldn't see me. "Yeah, I'm here. I want to—it's just … I'm not sure how to make it happen. There are crazy people with cameras and I have no way to get anywhere."

  "I can come get you," she said without hesitation.

  Again, I was moving my head as if she could see me. "No. That's probably not the best idea. Let me go talk to DeAnna and see if I can figure something out. I'll text you once I figure it out."

  "Okay. Call me back, hooker!"

  "I will, ya dirty hoe."

  We laughed and hung up. Part of me felt like it was mended. Put back together even if it was only with duct tape and tac welds.

  I went in search of DeAnna to see if she could help me come up with a way to see Carter. When I told her it wasn't a good idea to come to the house, it really wasn't because of the press—it just felt wrong inviting her into Jesse's home. It wasn't my place to extend that kind of invitation, and I didn't want to do anything to make him feel like I was exploiting his generosity of letting me stay.

  She was in the living room on the oversized, brown leather couch with her feet tucked under her, watching reruns of Gilmore Girls.

  "Hey, do you have a sec?" I asked as I sat down on the adjacent couch.

  "Sure, what's up?" she asked and hit mute.

  I chewed on my bottom lip trying to figure out exactly what I wanted to ask.

  "I know that look, Jada. What's going on?"

  Was I that predictable?

  I groaned. "I hate how well you know me already."

  DeAnna chuckled. "It's not such a bad thing. Did something happen?"

  If she only knew how much had happened … I shoved the thoughts of Jesse away and focused on what I came down to tell her. "I called Carter."

  She clapped her hands together as an excited smile crept up her face. "Oh I'm so happy to hear that. Did you guys make up?"

  "Yeah, we did."

  Her faced scrunched up, like she was missing something. "So what's the problem then?"

  "Well, I want to see her—but I don't know how to make that happen with everything going on and I was hoping maybe you'd have a suggestion?" I sank back into the couch.

  "Why don't you just have her come here?"

  I shook my head, dismissing the idea. "No. I don't really want her to come here."

  "Why? Is there something wrong with my house?" Jesse rumbled from behind me.

  I swung around to face him. "No! I just don't think it's a good idea."

  It felt good to use his own words against him. Maybe I understood his reasoning for using it all the time. It was kind of like when your mom said, "Because I said so," it just worked.

  "Why?" he asked in a huff, not willing to let it go.

  "Are you a broken record? I just told you why."

  Jesse crossed the space between us and sat on the back of the couch with his arms folded over his chest. The look on his face proved he wasn't satisfied. "I want a real answer."

  I looked to DeAnna for help, but she gave me a small shrug in response. "I kind of want to know the reason why too."

  Groaning, I scrubbed my face. I hated feeling ganged up on. "It's not my house." I turned to face Jesse. "This is your personal space and I'm not going to invite anyone into it. You trust me enough to be here for some reason and I'm not going to ruin that by having people over. I don't feel comfortable doing it, okay? Can we please drop this?"

  He gru
nted. Stupid freaking grunt. I wanted to push him off the couch onto his perfectly round, muscular butt.

  DeAnna spoke with her eyebrows raised, but her gaze wasn't on me, they were on Jesse. "So basically you don't want to take advantage of us?"

  "No, I don't. Being here alone, is taking advantage enough."

  Her face broke out in an infectious grin. "Well, how about that, Jesse?"

  "Yeah, how 'bout that," he said with his brow wrinkled in contemplation.

  Facing DeAnna again, I sighed. "Is there a back way out of the subdivision I could walk through so I can get to the bus?"

  "You are not taking the bus anymore," Jesse snapped.

  I whipped around to glare at him. "I don't remember asking your permission."

  His frown deepened and his eyes blazed. "I hate to break it to you, Jane, but you can't skulk around without drawing attention to yourself."

  Rolling my eyes, I groaned. "Dee, do you have any ideas?"

  "Sure. Just take the Toyota and wear a hat with your hair in a ponytail. Dress down in a solid tee and shorts or something. Nothing that's going to draw attention to yourself."

  She made it sound so simple.

  Before I said anything, Jesse interjected. "She can't drive! You can't drive. No … you're not taking it anywhere."

  My nostrils flared in annoyance. "Just because I don't have a car doesn't mean I don't know how to drive! I have a license, thank you very much."

  "It's not a good idea," he snapped.

  DeAnna chuckled at our bickering. "This isn't a prison, Jesse. And you aren't her warden. If she wants to go see Carter, she can."

  He growled in his frustration. "I don't have a problem with her friend coming here."

  They were talking about me like I wasn't even in the room. "I'm sitting right here, you know."

  She flashed a smile at me. "Go get ready and then I'll walk you over to my mom's."

  "Thank you!" I beamed

  I glared at Jesse as I walked past him. Sure, he was protective and I understood it to a degree, but this was insanity and I was going stir crazy being locked in the house.

  It only took me ten minutes to get ready. The only problem was I didn't have a hat that didn't have some kind of car logo on it. I dug through my bag trying to find something I could use to help hide my face but was coming up empty handed.