Drew flops down next to me on the sofa and does something he never, ever does. He grabs the remote, turns on the TV, and flips it to a network morning news program. One that he told me he’s appeared on many times.
“What’s this about?” I ask, curious to see what’s going on in his head.
“Allie called,” he grunts, twitching restlessly. “There’s a story about what happened last night. She said I need to see it.”
Oh boy. I jump up and get him a cup of coffee from the kitchen, knowing that he’s probably going to need it. Especially after last night. Whatever we’re about to see will no doubt stress him out, then we have the FBI coming in two hours to tell us who knows what about the death threats. Plus, we have to give the NYPD our statements.
Just another day in our completely fucked up life.
I hand him the cup and sit back down next to him. Drew keeps looking at his phone, which buzzes continuously.
“Is it important?”
“It’s Rhys, Jane, and Quentin. They’re calling about whatever we’re about to watch.” He dismisses the calls and tosses his phone onto the coffee table. “I don’t feel like talking about it with them.”
The anchor begins his introduction and we both lean forward to listen.
“When does a quiet dinner with friends become a riot involving screaming women, dozens of paparazzi, and over twenty policemen? Apparently when you’re Andrew Forrester and Ryker Bancroft, because that’s exactly what happened last night right here in New York City’s Chelsea neighborhood.”
He turns to the woman next to him at the anchor desk.
“Our entertainment correspondent, Marina Levin, has the story.”
“Thanks Mark. Things got downright scary for actors Andrew Forrester and Ryker Bancroft and their female companions last night in front of Pinnacle, a restaurant on West 18th Street in Chelsea’s Garment District.”
They show video footage of us getting jostled and mobbed outside the restaurant while the reporter continues her voice over. It looks even scarier than it felt because the camera is getting smacked around by the screaming women.
“A mob of excited fans and paparazzi showed up on the sidewalk outside Pinnacle when a patron in the restaurant Tweeted that the stars were inside having dinner.”
A screenshot of a Tweet fills Drew’s giant television screen as the reporter reads it out loud.
Jessie M. @superjessie
OMG! At Pinnacle on 18th watching Ryker Bancroft and Andrew Forrester eat! #iloveryker #andrewforrester #oriondonovan
“That Tweet started a near riot outside when the stars exited the restaurant to get into their waiting SUV. Also caught in the melee were Forrester’s girlfriend, Sydney Tannen, who has been the subject of recent death threats, and Bancroft’s girlfriend and Tannen’s best friend Leah Quinn-Slade.”
“Tannen was able to get into the vehicle relatively unscathed.”
They show a clip of me getting smacked in the face… in slow motion. Thank you for that, network assholes.
“Forrester and his bodyguard went back into the crowd in an attempt to help Bancroft and Quinn-Slade get into the waiting car. You can see here that the fans are actually clawing at the stars, leaving marks all over Ryker Bancroft’s skin.”
Then they show a still shot of Ryker, blood trickling down his neck.
“A panicked Sydney Tannen, watching from the SUV, called 911 to stop the mob from further injuring her friends.”
I listen in horror as they play the recording of my frantic call to 911, showing footage of the mess to emphasize my viewpoint. Drew doesn’t say a word or move an inch.
“Police were finally able to disperse the crowd, resulting in at least fifteen arrests and three injuries to participants ranging from a broken foot to a black eye.”
“No word from reps for either Forrester or Bancroft at this hour. Back to you John.”
“Thanks Marina. We have entertainment lawyer Phil Lerner here to discuss the legal…”
Drew shuts off the TV and we sit quietly for a moment.
I watch as he runs his index finger over his mouth, tapping it on his lip as he decides what to do next. Drew grabs his phone and stands up, looking out the massive windows at the gleaming cityscape and the looming Empire State Building in the not so distant background.
“Yep, just saw it…”
“I know….”
“Fuckin’ scary as all fuck! What do you think?”
“Wicked pissed…”
“He needs security.”
“Yeah… I’ll mention it, but call Red anyway…”
“Bruised… Don’t ask such a stupid fucking question”
“Ten… Yeah.”
Drew disconnects his call and immediately makes another. I decide to head upstairs and get ready for the FBI. Oh Joy.
By the time I’ve finished showering and getting ready, I can still hear Drew talking on the phone. It makes me thankful that no one I know reads gossip sites or watches crappy tabloid television. I have no desire to rehash last night with all those people.
I did get a concerned text from Leslie, one of the crew members I met in London this spring. All I had to do was text her back that everything was fine. I’m sure she spoke to Leah anyway.
I head back downstairs and find Drew still standing in front of the windows, on the phone with yet someone else to try and manage this nightmare. He sees me and I point at my wrist to let him know it’s getting late. The agents will be here in thirty minutes.
“Yeah, okay. Bye.” Drew hangs up the phone and turns to me. “I’ll be right down. Steve and Evan will be here in a minute, they’re bringing Sam Jennings with them.” Drew is having his lawyer come over to be here during the FBI interview, typical.
He takes off up the stairs to get ready so I go downstairs to grab another cup of coffee and make a pot for our guests. I’m so nervous that more caffeine is probably a bad idea, but I need something to do with my hands so I don’t freak out. I decide to take out my phone and call Leah. She’s almost certainly a mess after last night.
“Hey Syd,” Leah says when she answers.
“Leah, how are you?”
“I’ve been better, you?”
“Uh, just a bruise on my cheek, no big deal. Drew’s been making some calls, I’m not sure what about though.”
“Rhys called Ryker’s PR guy, Will. They’re coordinating a joint statement, I think. They’re announcing the casting for Breaking the Truth tomorrow and they want to get the word out that it is not acceptable to act that way before they ratchet up the publicity.”
“Is Ryker okay? He must be really upset.”
“Yeah. He’s becoming afraid to go out Syd. He already had issues with appearing in public because of the fans, but now… I don’t know if he’ll leave this apartment again for anything but work.”
I hear my best friend sniffing and it breaks my heart. “Drew will know what to do, Leah. He’s been around a while and has a lot of resources.”
Evan and Steve come clomping up the stairs from the front door and enter the kitchen with Sam Jennings following behind them.
“Leah, I gotta go. I’ll talk to Drew and call you back later.”
“I want to know about the FBI, so you better call me,” she insists.
“Bye Leah, it’ll be okay.” I try to reassure her, knowing very well that it may not be okay, especially if Ryker is suffering from panic attacks like I do and now agoraphobia. If I’ve learned anything the past few months, it’s that you can’t control or predict crazy
“Yeah, bye,” she says unconvincingly and then hangs up.
I feel so bad for her and Ryker. At least Drew isn’t assaulted when he leaves the house. Maybe Ryker needs to take up Muay Thai or something like that. I shake my head and focus on the men entering the room.
“Sam, nice to see you again,” I say as we shake hands. “Thanks for coming, but why are you here?”
“Oh, just protocol Sydney. It’s never good to speak with th
e authorities without your lawyer present. Just to keep everything on the up and up.” Sam declines my offer of coffee and settles in one of the large leather chairs in the sitting area. He puts on his reading glasses to review some papers that he brought with him.
I sigh and sit at the kitchen island and wait for the FBI to either drop a bomb in my lap or lift a weight from my shoulders. A loud knock on the door interrupts my worrying. Steve goes downstairs to answer it just as Drew comes flying down from the bedroom, the phone to his ear yet again.
Two men with serious faces wearing serious suits follow Steve into the sitting area of the kitchen. I hop down from the barstool and shake hands with each one.
“I’m Agent Connors, this is Agent Smith.” I smirk at his name, thinking about the creepy agent in The Matrix.
“I get that a lot,” he says, knowing what I’m thinking. “You must be Miss Tannen?”
“Yes, I am.” I show the agents into the sitting area. “Make yourselves comfortable, I’ll get coffee.” I hear Sam introducing himself to the men.
Drew ends his call and shakes hands with the agents. “Andrew Forrester, thanks for coming here. If you saw any of the news reports this morning, you’ll know it’s better for us not to bring the media to your front door.” He does his patented Andrew Forrester smile and sits on the couch. “Hey Sam,” he gestures to his lawyer.
Steve and Evan find places to stand nearby as I hand the agents their coffee and sit next to Drew.
“So gentleman, you said you had information regarding the death threat.” Drew puts his hand on my knee protectively.
“Yes,” Agent Connors begins. He pulls a file out of his leather bag and holds it in his lap. “What can you tell us about the incidents involving the CelebCast case?”
Our jaws drop at the same time, both of us stunned by the question.
“You have all of that information, the FBI is the agency working that case,” I say to them.
“Why are you asking about that? Is it related to the threats on Sydney’s life?” Drew asks.
“Possibly,” Agent Smith says cryptically.
That was a mistake. Drew does not like being kept in the dark and he definitely doesn’t do ambiguous from people he doesn’t know. Plus, he’s sick and tired of talking about the wiretapping and frankly, so am I.
“Tell you what,” Drew says in an irritated voice. “You tell us why you think the cases are connected and we’ll tell you what you need to know to make it stick.” His hand finds mine and squeezes it gently, spinning my ring around with his fingers.
Agent Smith sits back, shocked at Drew’s reluctance to cooperate. Certainly the FBI is used to more compliant or at least more easily intimidated victims. Well, Drew is possibly the farthest possible thing from compliant or easy to intimidate.
“Alright,” Agent Connors says. “The threats to Miss Tannen were made via the internet on a site dedicated to Mr. Forrester. Your official fan page, actually.” He pulls out a sheet of paper and hands it to Drew.
It’s a screen shot of an internet page with Drew’s picture at the top. Below are comments made by fans discussing all things Andrew Forrester. Circled is a comment posted by a FutureMrsForrester.
How hopeful of her, I think to myself.
I’m going 2 kill that bitch Sydney Tannen. She doesn’t deserve him!
“So what,” Drew says derisively, tossing the paper on the table. “That doesn’t mean anything. One post on a website. Please tell me you have more than just this?”
Agent Connors pulls out a stack of papers an inch thick and places them on the table between us. “These, are all similar, posted by the same person, from different IP addresses, using different usernames, which is why it took so long to untangle. All of these were within the past three months.”
Sam leans in and picks up the stack of papers, flipping through them.
“Holy crap,” I whisper under my breath.
“The manager of your website alerted us to this. They kept banning the poster’s IP, but the person kept getting a new one each time. Very crafty actually,” Agent Connors says.
“What makes you think this is credible?” Drew asks. “Crazy people say shit like this all the time.”
“We didn’t put much into it at first, just as you’re not. But as the quantities and intensity of the threats increased, we began to look at them more closely,” Agent Smith tells us. “Then we got a break that made us believe this was more than just a crazy fan.”
“What break would that be?” Drew asks the agents. Sam stops flicking through the printouts and leans forward in interest.
“The poster used their personal cellphone to create their latest account. Before that, it was always a hotel Wi-Fi or a wireless signal from a café or other business,” Smith says. “They got quite careless.”
“What does that mean?” I ask them, my heart racing in my chest.
“It means, we know who’s been doing this,” Connors says. “We no longer think that the threats are real or that there’s any actual intent to harm, but we will be making an arrest today.” He pauses and looks at us with sympathetic eyes. “A Miss Kiera Radcliff will be in our custody shortly.”
“What?” Drew yells, jumping to his feet. I grab his hand and try to pull him back down. He doesn’t shake me off, but he doesn’t sit either.
“Drew,” I tug harder and he looks down at me. His face is contorted into a mask of rage. I lift my eyebrows and indicate that he should sit back down. He smashes his lips together in a tight line and rejoins me on the sofa.
“You’re telling me that Kiera Radcliff, the actress, has been spending her free time the last three months posting threats about me on the internet?” I ask. “Do you know how ridiculous that sounds?”
“No,” Drew snaps. “It actually sounds just like that crazy, manipulative bitch.”
“When will the arrest take place?” Sam asks from his seat across from us.
“She’s in California, so as soon as the agents can get to her residence, probably nine their time, so noon here. About an hour and a half from now,” Agent Smith says as he checks his watch.
Sam stands up and buttons his custom fitted suit coat and adjusts his cufflinks. “Gentleman, I’ll come back to your office with you to work out the details.”
“We really need to know about the CelebCast incident,” Smith says.
“I think you have enough information to prosecute Miss Radcliff, you don’t need anything else,” Sam replies firmly.
“We want to tie her to the eavesdropping case,” Connors insists. “We just need more information…”
Sam cuts him off. “Take her into custody and see what you can get from her first, then we’ll see about further interviews with my clients.” He gestures towards the staircase to follow the men out. “I’ll be in touch Drew,” he says, shaking hands with my enraged fiancé.
“Thanks Sam.”
“Yes, thanks for being here,” I tell him, giving him a hug.
“Evan, Steve, let the men out please,” Drew says.
They leave and we’re alone in the brownstone. Drew walks over to the windows, a cloud of fury surrounding him like a thick fog. After trying to talk to him about the Adam disaster the other night, I know better than to say something to him when he’s this pissed.
I see his fists clenching at his side, itching for something to strike. I jump up and go to him, taking one of his hands in mine. “Hey,” Bumping his hip with mine playfully, I try distraction. “Let’s go for a run.”
Drew looks down at me and his hardened features soften some. “We were physically assaulted on the sidewalk last night, we just found out Kiera has been cyber stalking you, we can’t go anywhere without paparazzi chasing us, and you want to go for a run?” He strokes my cheek gently, running his hand over the bruise and scowls.
“Yep,” I say confidently. “Our guys will just have to try and keep up.”
A reluctant smile gets through his rigid exterior and he shakes his head in
disbelief. “Only one question remains then,” he says in a teasing tone.
“Oh yeah? What’s that?”
“Wigs or no wigs?”
When we realize that it’s already over ninety degrees out, we ditch the idea to go running and decide to head over to Drew’s gym instead. He says that he’ll teach me some useful moves in the cage to ward off all of the ‘fucking perverts’.
I roll my eyes at him, but he insists that it’s always good to be able to protect myself, even if it’s just the ability to knock a full grown man on his ass so I can get away. When I remind him that I did just that in a London nightclub, to not one but two men, he laughs and says it doesn’t hurt to learn more.
“Okay Sydney, arms like this,” Damien says as he positions me opposite the ring from Drew.
A small audience has gathered to watch Drew’s trainer and friend, Damien Spader, teach me how to drop Drew onto the mat. Since we’re not doing real sparring, we don’t have to put on all of the protective gear that the guys normally wear. I’m glad, because the gear stinks to high hell, but I’m also a tiny bit annoyed because now the entire gym can see our faces. Damien and Drew both swear that no one here will record anything that happens inside this building. Some sort of MMA guy-code or something like that.
I stand opposite Damien as he instructs me. “Drew, come at her like an attacker. Sydney, when he does, jam this hip into his gut and pull him by the shoulders over your body and to the mat. Watch.”
Damien stands upright and motions for Drew to rush at him. He does the move exactly how he described it and Drew goes over his head and crashes on his back next to me.
Holy shit!
Drew pops up off of the ground as if nothing happened and goes back to his original position. Damn, he looks so hot right now. He’s wearing black and green fighting shorts and nothing else, no shoes, no gloves; I’m practically salivating onto the mat.
“Ready?” Damien asks me. I nod and stand still, waiting for Drew to attack. Damien motions for Drew to start and he comes at me, but stops before he gets close enough for me to touch him.
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