Tears broke free and streaked down her cheeks. Each one was like a stab in my gut, and I deserved every bit of that agony.
But she didn’t.
“Ina...” Dropping the bags I held, I took a step toward her.
She backed up, holding out her hand. “Don’t, Luke. Just...don’t.” She spun away so fast, half the coffee in her cup splashed out. Some of it must have landed on her because she yelped. With a curse, she threw the rest of it into the bushes in front of the porch, then stormed back into the cabin.
I slumped against the truck and closed my eyes.
You should just leave, the cynical inner voice said.
“No.” I stared at the ground. When she told me there wasn’t any chance, when she told me to go, then I’d go.
But she hadn’t done that...yet.
Chapter Thirty-Five
Sabrina
I GLARED OUT THE WINDOW as Luke once more disappeared into the woods, swatting at his neck in an attempt to thwart the mosquitoes that turned any red-blooded creature into their own personal banquet.
Apparently when he’d bought gear and supplies for camping, he hadn’t thought about mosquitoes.
“He’s still here, Kelly!” I said, my aggravation evident in my voice.
“I know that, honey. You’ve already made that clear.” She sounded like my fifth grade teacher—patient, understanding...to a point.
“Call him and tell him to leave!”
“If you want him to leave, you tell him,” she replied, just as she’d done every other time I’d tried to get her to help me out.
“Damn it, it’s your property. I’ve made it clear I don’t want him here and he’s not listening!”
“So...you’ve told him to leave?”
Groaning, I shoved a hand through my hair. “Kelly, he’s using the woods around your house as his personal toilet!”
She broke out into a laugh. “Sabrina, that’s not going to faze me and you should know it. You forget I grew up in the Smokies and tried to talk you into backpacking with me every chance I could get it. The great outdoors doesn’t come with toilets, honey.”
I stamped my foot, hard, which only resulted in hurting my heel. I swallowed the pained sound so I didn’t have to explain that I’d injured myself by throwing a tantrum.
It had been two days since he’d showed up here, and it didn’t look like he was planning on disappearing anytime soon. “This is going to be the third night he sleeps outside in that stupid tent. Tell him to go get a hotel. He’ll be more comfortable and the mosquitoes won’t eat him alive. He’s got to report for his next project in two weeks. He doesn’t need to have mosquito bites all over his pretty face.”
“Oh, you haven’t heard...production was pushed back until next year. It was just announced last week—the director, Mary Heil, she had a heart attack and the production won’t go forward without her.”
I hated that my concern was mixed with aggravation. The next movie would have moved Luke to the other side of the globe for a minimum of six weeks. That should have been plenty of time for me to empty out my apartment in LA, and hopefully find some other employer. “I hope she’s doing okay,” I said even as my mind raced, trying to cope with this new set of problems.
“She’s recovering well, but it came as a shock. She’s only forty.” Kelly’s tone lightened as she added, “Guess you’re not going to have that reprieve you wanted to dart into town and pack up your house and disappear, the way you planned. Fate isn’t making it easy for you to keep hiding, is it?”
“I’m not hiding,” I retorted. “I’m just done with this bullshit.”
“If you’re not hiding, it shouldn’t be hard for you to just have it out with Luke then, should it?”
The crack in my heart started oozing poison once more. I didn’t want to have it out with him. I wanted to forget him, forget the past six weeks of my life and let go of the stupid dreams I’d somehow started to spin about the two of us. How could I have been so foolish?
“There’s nothing to have out, Kelly.”
“If that was the case, you’d let him apologize.” Her voice softened. “You’re not fooling either of us here, honey, and you know it. If it helps you to lie to yourself, go ahead and do it, but I don’t think it is helping. And you know it’s a waste of time to lie to me. It always has been.”
I stared into the line of trees, although I could no longer see any sign of Luke.
“You weren’t there,” I said, forcing the words through the tight, hot knot of pain in my throat. “You have no idea what he said to me, what he accused me of.”
“No,” she agreed. “I wasn’t there. But I do know what he said. Luke told me.”
I almost dropped the phone. Fumbling it back into place, I asked, “He told you?”
“Every word. And if he’d been in front of me when he laid it all out, I would have hit him. Repeatedly. Hell, I would have unloaded on him hard enough that he would have had grounds to have me arrested for aggravated battery. But he was in Toronto, looking all over for you, so I had to make do with calling him a complete dick and hanging up on him.”
I covered my face with my hand.
“I spent the next three hours ignoring his phone calls and drafting up letter after letter, working for the appropriate, scathing but professional angle to let him know our business relationship was done.” Kelly huffed out a breath. “I was relieved when he stopped calling. I shouldn’t have been. He showed up at my office a few hours later and presented himself for his rightly deserved ass-kicking, as he described it.”
“Please tell me you took him up on it.” Dashing the tears from my face, I glanced outside again.
“I almost did. But I saw the same thing on his face that I saw on yours when I picked you up from the airport in Denver. Sabrina...he’s just as miserable as you are.”
Fat chance, I scoffed, but before I could say anything, Kelly asked, “Have you looked at him?”
“He’s probably figured out that he’s going to have a hell of a hard time finding an assistant who he won’t chase off and that won’t be tempted to fall into bed with him if he so much as smiles as her.”
“If that’s what you think, you’re not really looking at him then.” She sounded...disappointed. In me.
Defensively, I snapped, “Don’t go trying to make me feel guilty about this. He used me—I knew going in to this fake fiancée shit that I was being used, but I went along with it because I didn’t want to make things harder on him and his family with Joanne being sick. Then all this other shit...” A knot settled in my throat, and despite my attempts to fight it back, the wave of guilt got a foothold. “If he really did tell you everything, then you know why he was pissed at me. There was a chance somebody might have been trying to blackmail him.”
“I know, honey,” she said, voice gentle.
“I wasn’t wrong.”
“No. I don’t think you were. And...I think if you talk to him, he’d have a very different opinion to tell you now, compared to what he said then.”
“Yeah?” Bitterly, I looked outside. Through the gaps in the tree line, I could see him moving, and despite everything, my heart tripped a beat. There would come a time when that didn’t happen, right? That had to be possible. I had to believe I could get over him. “Which part would he have a different opinion on? Implying I was a whore who slept with him because I’d decided it was part of the job? Or when he told me I was stabbing him in the back?”
“All of it, Sabrina. Fuck, he was messed up in the head over what he thought was about to happen—he was scared and mad, and he didn’t handle it well. That’s no excuse, and I know it, but haven’t you ever lashed out when you were angry?”
Her response made me flinch. Eyes on the man emerging from the woods, I tightened my hand on the phone. “Sure I have. But to my knowledge, I didn’t kill somebody’s career, then leave them floundering while the public went into a feeding frenzy. And hell, right now I’m plenty mad, but I haven’t lash
ed out. Not at him, not at London for how she helped sic a social media hoard on me. I can’t go anywhere without being hounded now. And they don’t care.”
Kelly sighed. “Yes, they do. I hate to do tough love when you’ve had nothing but shit piled on you, but maybe that’s what it takes to break you out of the self-pity stage of heartbreak.”
“Self pity—”
She cut me off. “Maybe I should have told you about this when he first made me do it. I don’t know. But I’m telling you now. On the top shelf of my closet, there’s a tablet. It’s satellite-enabled. Sometimes client emergencies come up and I can’t ever be totally off the grid, but I can only do so much with a phone, you know? Get the tablet down and go look at Luke’s website. And maybe watch the press conference he was forced into doing at Joanne’s rehab facility. While you’re at it...do a few searches on Maureen Wine. I assume you know who she is. When you’re done, if you’re still angry and you want him to leave, call me. I’ll tell him he’s wasting his time. But before I do that, you need to make very, very sure that’s what you want.”
“Kelly—”
She hung up before I could say anything else.
Frustrated, I threw the phone on the bed and shoved my hands through my hair. My fingers caught on a tangled mess of curls which just pissed me off even more.
Everything pissed me off right now. If Kelly thought Luke could say anything that would change that, maybe she didn’t know me all that well.
THE DAMN BATTERY HAD to charge.
The tablet was a bulky-looking thing and I figured it would take forever, so I carried it into the main part of the cabin, made up of the open floor plan kitchen, dining and living rooms. Putting the tablet on the kitchen counter, I plugged it in and dug out a bottle of hard cider and made a sandwich. It was too early for whiskey and besides, I needed to conserve it since I didn’t want to have another confrontation with Luke unless I had to.
I hadn’t even finished the sandwich when the screen of the tablet flared, then came to life.
“That was a lot quicker than I expected,” I muttered. Carrying my food over to the counter, I settled on the stool and hit the home button, studying the unfamiliar set-up. Fortunately, the browser app was one I was familiar with. I tapped on it and went straight to Luke’s website. As it loaded, I picked up the rest of my sandwich.
I took a bite, glancing at the familiar header, feeling my heartbreak all over again. The ham and cheese tasted like sawdust now and I swallowed mechanically, washing it down with cider before it lodged in my throat and choked me.
I was going to finish the damn thing, though. Just out of sheer...
The sandwich fell from my fingers as my eyes landed on the text just below the header.
Statement From Luke Cochran regarding Sabrina Maxwell
I sucked in a breath. “What the fuck...”
My gaze bounced to the date and I rubbed my eyes, then read it again. Two days ago. He’d posted this—or likely Kelly had—two days ago. Back when he’d first shown up here.
I slid from the stool in a graceless tumble, sending it clattering to the floor. I didn’t care. On wooden legs, I walked over to the liquor cabinet and got down the bottle of whiskey. It was down to half full. The other bottle hadn’t been opened. Screw making it last.
I had a feeling I was going to need it.
I grabbed a glass and made my way back to the counter, righting the stool and sitting back down. I filled the glass half-full, staring at the amber liquid the entire time.
I didn’t look at the screen until I’d finished half the booze in the glass and topped it off again.
Then, fortified with false courage, I took a deep breath and tapped the screen, scrolling down.
It’s come to my attention that some speculation about my relationship with Sabrina Maxwell has taken an ugly turn. This is something I should have addressed earlier, but I was unaware of it. I’ve been busy trying to resolve problems that I, alone, caused. This is not an excuse, merely a statement of fact, but I can’t let these issues go unaddressed now that I’m aware.
Yes, the ‘engagement’ between Sabrina and I was a sham, something I foolishly created out of an attempt to comfort my mother, who has always worried about me. Sabrina did nothing more than go along with it out of an attempt to minimize any unrest that might have impeded my mother’s recovery as she dealt with several heart-related health issues.
However, during the days Sabrina and I were together, I came to realize something that was clear to those who know us best, even if it wasn’t clear to me. I’m crazy about her. I have been for a long time. She’s not just my better half—she’s my heart and soul and has been for a long time. I was just too blind to see it until I’d damaged was what growing between us.
As most of you likely know by now, some events that took place in my teen years have recently come to light. I don’t wish to publicly dwell on these matters any more than I already have, at least not now. I’ve only now started to realize how much these events have impacted me and it’s time I seek professional counseling. Until I’ve dealt with them personally, it would be hard for me to even begin to discuss them on any public level, other than what has already been addressed, save for what I am making clear now.
The day Sword 2: Vengeance premiered in Louisville, I was contacted by a person who will remain anonymous. The first impression both Sabrina and I had was that this person had intentions that would have been unpleasant, to say the least. In the end, it turned out we were wrong. But out of fear, and my own pride, my instinct was to do whatever was necessary to keep this person quiet.
Sabrina, because of who she is, reacted another way entirely. Sabrina Maxwell never reacts out of fear, especially when it comes to those she loves. She reacts out of that love—she reacts with a desire to protect, a desire to defend. My fear blinded me to the reality of what I thought we were facing and I acted in a way that will forever make me ashamed.
I hurt the woman who gave me the open and honest gift of her heart, asking nothing in return. I hurt the woman I’d fallen in love with. She did nothing more than I made her think I wanted—she left.
It only took me a few hours to realize how wrong I was, but by then, it was too late. She was already gone. Save for the few hours the next day when I addressed the anonymous person, and then spoke with my mother and family about the events I’d hidden from them since my teens, and what I later revealed to the world in a press conference, I’ve done nothing but try to reach Sabrina so I can try to fix what I’ve broken.
During that time, Sabrina has been harassed, insulted, abused and bullied on social media. She’s been called vile names by people who profess to be fans of mine. These actions disgust me. My PR team is actively going through her accounts and mine, reporting each of these targeted harassments and/or hate speech depending on where it falls. I’ve never had patience for bullying, racism, misogyny, or threats and that it’s being directed against this woman I love infuriates me.
To make matters worse, Sabrina now has to concern herself with being stalked in her personal life. While likely well intentioned, a follower misinterpreted a tweet from my sister, London, and that has since spread into what appears to be a real-life hunt for Sabrina.
#WheresSabrina might look like harmless fun to some, but people should look at the real-life consequences. Two women were eating lunch in Washington, DC and were interrupted, then harassed after one of them denied being Sabrina—and she most definitely was not Sabrina. Another woman, a young mother, was followed to her car by two young men with a popular YouTube station—they insisted she had to be Sabrina and wanted to know if the baby was a ‘bastard’ she’d been keeping secret.
This is not fun and games. These are real people who have been harassed and humiliated.
I’m not going to make this a request—plain and simply, I’m saying, this needs to stop now. Even if somebody is convinced they’ve seen Sabrina, leave her alone. The matter is between Sabrina and me, not Sabrina,
me and millions of social media users.
To that end...I have made contact with Sabrina. I hope to have a chance to apologize. I hope to have a chance to tell her how sorry I am, and that I love her. But my cowardice, fear and pride made me react in a way that closed the door between us. Now, I can’t force it open.
It’s up to her if she chooses to re-open that door.
Please respect us both and allow us privacy.
I passed a shaking hand over my mouth, then wiped away the tears. “Damn you, Kelly,” I muttered.
I was tempted to call her and scream those very words at her, but didn’t. The anger I’d been carrying for the past few days had been a hot, living thing I’d cuddled and cradled close to my heart. Now it was cold and messy, like coals doused in ice water and the ashes were all that remained.
The ashes, and the lingering hurt.
Swallowing, I made another feeble swipe at the tears, but they just kept coming.
I set my jaw and braced myself before pulling up the feed of the press conference, immortalized on YouTube.
It wasn’t very long, but during Luke’s five-minute statement, I emptied the glass of whiskey twice over.
My head was spinning by the time I started to tap Maureen Wine’s name into the browser. It took two tries and while the search loaded, I got up to get some water. If I kept drinking, I’d be drunk off my ass when this finished. I wasn’t necessarily opposed to it in my current state, but at the same time, I figured I should probably be somewhat clearheaded, since I had a feeling I needed to make an important decision.
Anger helped burn through some of the buzz. Three different sites had ‘interviews’ with Maureen where she claimed that Luke had disparaged her son’s name, that he’d been the predator, but over the past week, those sites had been updated, because since Luke had given his statement about Mark Wine, three other men, all two-to-four years younger than Luke, had come forward and spoken about similar experiences with the young man.
Cocksure (The Cochrans of Cocker County) Page 28