InHap*pily Ever After

by Kim Desalvo

  Eyes darted around and shoulders shrugged as they looked right past Tia, who just stood back with a knowing smile. When Dylan reached over and took her hand, planting a soft kiss on her forehead and heading for the entrance, their eyes widened and their mouths formed little “o’s.” Most of them knew who Tia was, and they were more than a little surprised the see her on the arm of a rock star. The crowd chuckled and nodded as they approached the entrance, but the befuddled wave of people followed them anyway, pressing ever closer; their tasks forgotten, some leaving cars idling along the curb. They bottlenecked at the door, and Dylan was swept through by the crowd, his hand yanked from Tia’s, leaving her at the back of the wave.

  All eyes in the well-appointed lobby turned toward the commotion as the chattering group pushed in. From her seat on the long couch where she eagerly awaited the arrival of her daughter and her first chance to meet the man who’d essentially brought her back to life, Danielle Hastings recognized the tall, commanding figure that was the center of attention and rose to her feet. “Oh my goodness, Will,” she exclaimed as she stared at the face of the man she’d seen on television just a few hours earlier. “I think that’s Dylan Miller!”

  “Who?”

  “He was all over the news this morning, remember? He’s the actor who’s part of that scandal with Penelope Valentine.” She shook her head at the look of confusion he threw her way. “Remember, the love triangle? What’s he doing here?”

  Will merely shrugged…he hadn’t paid a whole lot of attention to the story this morning, being wrapped up, as usual, in the morning paper. But the excitement was palpable, and they watched the group with interest, especially when Tia finally made her way through the door. They watched as Dylan spotted her and reached across the crowd to grasp her hand. He pulled her in close and draped his arm protectively over her shoulder, ignoring the rest of the crowd and letting her take the lead.

  “Oh my,” Danielle gasped as she watched her only child walking toward them with a huge smile on her face and her arm around the celebrity. “Oh my!”

  “Wait a second; is Tia…” Will asked, suddenly interested. His voice trailed off as Tia waved and led Dylan to where Danielle steadied herself on the back of the couch and fanned her face with her pocketbook.

  “Oh goodness…I think so!” she exclaimed.

  Tia’s heart thumped in her chest and she fought to control her breathing. Damn, if she didn’t gain some control of her body functions, her heart was going to give out. It was as if the world was moving in slow motion—she was hyper-aware of every detail, and yet felt as though everything in her peripheral vision was floating in clouds. She could hear the sounds of the crowd, but was completely focused on the surprised faces of her parents as she and Dylan approached. She swelled with pride at having Dylan by her side, and was beyond thrilled to finally introduce him as her boyfriend, but she was still incredibly anxious about how they’d take the news that she’d lied to them for months. Quickly, she glanced around and took in the stares of the other patrons; shock, awe, and downright incredulousness. Damn it, she thought, I know exactly how they feel. She pursed her lips and inhaled deeply, releasing the breath slowly as she reached her parents.

  “Mom, Dad,” Tia said in a rush, “Oh God, I have a million things to tell you, and at least that many apologies to make, but I’m so happy to finally introduce you to Dylan!”

  Her parents’ mouths practically hung open as she hugged them both, and they stared openly at the couple, the shock plainly evident on their faces. Dylan took it in stride, as he always did, and planted small kisses on her mom’s cheeks, then enthusiastically shook her dad’s hand. “I’m so pleased to finally meet both of you,” he said. “Tia’s told me so much about you.”

  There was a heartbeat of uncomfortable silence, but then her dad recovered, shaking his head and smiling. “It’s such a pleasure to meet you, Dylan,” he said. “Tia’s told us a lot about you too, of course, but she didn’t tell us that you were a celebrity. Forgive us if we’re a little bit shocked.” He extended his hand again, more consciously. “I’m Will,” he said, “and this is my wife, Danielle.”

  “I’m pretty used to that kind of reaction, believe me,” Dylan smiled, taking Danielle’s hand. “No problem at all.”

  “You may be used to it,” Will said, “but you certainly shouldn’t have to deal with it in a situation like this. Please, accept my apologies.” He glanced around at the curious onlookers that were filling the sizeable lobby and turned to Tia. “Well, I guess I know why you insisted I reserve the DND. Shall we?” He took his still-speechless wife’s hand and led the way into the dining room, where even more patrons turned their heads and gawked openly. The foursome simply smiled and waved, and retreated into the sanctity of the little alcove at the back of the room.

  Chapter 4

  The DND lived up to its name. Up a couple steps and separated from the rest of the room by a beverage station and a private section of the bar, it was the perfect place for the group to chat out of the prying eyes and ears that sought to be part of their introductions.

  They sat down, and Danielle finally found her voice. “You have to forgive me,” she croaked. “Obviously, this is a bit more than I was expecting,” she added, her fingers on her throat, “but I’m so happy to finally meet you too, Dylan. We have heard so many wonderful things about you. You’ve made our little girl very happy, and for that, I’m incredibly grateful.” She reached across the table and squeezed Dylan’s hand.

  “That is completely mutual, believe me,” he smiled, draping his arm over the back of Tia’s chair and tossing her a wink.

  “I saw the story on the news this morning, but I had no idea…OK,” she said, trying to make sense of the situation, “this whole thing obviously has a whole new meaning—I’m afraid you’re going to have to fill in some of the gaps for us.” She turned to Tia. “How in the world is our only daughter in the middle of an international scandal and a celebrity love triangle?”

  “Oh, Mom,” Tia said, “I really wanted to tell you everything…”

  Dylan interrupted. “First of all, please let me clarify one thing. There is no triangle, and there never was. Everything that horrible woman did was complete rubbish—a total pack of lies—and I intend to see that she pays the price for what she did.” He turned to Will. “There was never a moment when I stopped loving your daughter; or one where I was unfaithful to her.”

  Tia leaned her head on Dylan’s shoulder and addressed her parents. “This whole thing hit like a tornado. Dylan just got back to the States yesterday, and he showed up at school to…” She paused, unsure what to say next. This was completely new to them, and they had no background knowledge to help make sense of any of it. “I don’t even know where to start,” she said. “I’ve only heard bits and pieces of the story myself…” She looked at Dylan, turning her palms up and shrugging her shoulders.

  “Well, I guess it’s best to get that out in the open right away anyway, since it’s the news of the day,” Dylan started. “I want you to know that I take full responsibility for Tia being hurt, and I plan to spend the rest of my life making it up to her.” Tia smiled up at him and squeezed his thigh, where her hand was resting. “I really don’t know the whole story myself—I only found out what she’d done a couple days ago, and left as soon as I could to come and find Tia—but I’ll try and fill you in on what I’ve pieced together.

  “Penelope actually showed up right after Tia and I met, to tell me that she’d be my co-star in the film. I’d literally just met Tia the day before, but she’d already made a huge impression on me, and the last thing I wanted was to have our time together interrupted; especially since I was only in town for a couple days and thought that would be all the time we’d have. Miss Valentine made some crude comments about her and me having ‘chemistry,’ or some rubbish like that, and at the time I was really feeling the chemistry with Tia. I told her to leave, and put her out of my mind completely.”

  Tia wanted
desperately to interject…she had so much to tell her parents; she wanted to share all the good things that had happened in her and Dylan’s relationship. She hated that they had to start the conversation with the Penelope story, but since her parents saw it all on the news, they had to get it out in the open right away. They’d completely avoided the topic last night, but, as much as she didn’t really want to know, she had to hear it before it was broadcast to the entire world. She bit her tongue, and let Dylan continue.

  “It wasn’t until September that I saw her again; once I got to New Zealand. Unfortunately, the way they’d set things up, we were living and working in smothering proximity. I kept trying to get her to make some friends, I spent weekends hanging out with the crew, and I was crystal clear that I was in love with Tia. She seemed to accept that, and we built a rather tentative friendship. I never really trusted her, but I did believe that she was trying. Obviously, though, she had an agenda all along and I was too stupid to see it.”

  Tia jerked her head at him, and addressed her parents. “Now I need to interrupt. I have to tell you that Dylan is the kind of person who always looks for the good in people. He trusted her, to a certain extent, because that’s the kind of person he is. It’s one of his best qualities.” She turned to Dylan. “I don’t fault you for that; and neither should you,” she said firmly.

  “Thank you,” he said to her, “but I’ll still be kicking myself for that for a long time, because you ended up hurt by it.” He took a deep breath before continuing. “From the information I got—mostly from the assistant who was bribed into helping her carry out her plan—Penelope had some crazy idea that if we were a couple, she’d be back in Hollywood’s good graces and would live happily ever after. When I didn’t return her affections, she hatched this huge, elaborate scheme to make it appear that Tia had broken up with me, thinking I would turn to her for comfort. Of course, she also had to make Tia think I’d broken up with her.” He looked at Tia with pain in his eyes. “And it worked.”

  Now it was Danielle’s turn to interrupt. “Wait a minute,” she said, looking back and forth between them, “are you saying that you thought Dylan broke up with you?”

  Tia nodded, unable to meet her mother’s gaze.

  “You never mentioned anything about that at all!” Danielle exclaimed. “Why wouldn’t you tell me that, honey? You must have really been hurting—you know I would have been there for you.”

  Tia sighed. “Of course you would have been, Mom, I know that. But you would have been there at your own expense, and that would’ve made me feel even worse.” Her mother’s eyes narrowed in confusion and she continued. “You had your holiday trip all planned, and I didn’t want to ruin that—I figured either you’d cancel if you knew that I didn’t really have anywhere to spend the holidays—or you’d ask me to go with you and I’d ruin your trip anyway by being depressed the whole time. Plus, I kept hoping that I’d get that ticket eventually, and that Dylan and I could work things out. No matter how much evidence was staring me in the face, there was always a part of me that refused to believe that it was over—what we had was just too strong.” She turned to Dylan and smiled. “I’m so glad I was right about that.” He leaned over and planted a soft kiss on her lips.

  “Oh honey,” her mother whispered. “I’m so sorry you had to go through all that alone! I’m sorry you had to go through it at all!”

  Tia smiled at the genuine caring in her mother’s eyes, and knew that she was the luckiest person on Earth for so many reasons. None of it mattered anymore, and she refused to dwell on anything negative on this incredible day. She looked from her mom to her dad to the love of her life and felt an incredible sense of peace and joy bubble up inside her. No matter what happened in New Zealand, she knew beyond the shadow of a doubt that Dylan had never once forgotten about her, and that he loved her with his whole being.

  Now it was Will’s turn to butt in. “What did she do, Dylan? How did she break you up?”

  “Well,” Dylan continued, “we were on the other side of the world, obviously, and our internet and phone reception was sketchy at best. We lived in this little village unto itself; we were a good distance from the nearest town, and kind of our own entity. She used that to her advantage. It started, as far as I can tell, after she had her assistant take Jessa…she’s my assistant…to Auckland for the weekend and convinced her to buy some sort of unique scarf. Then she bought another one just like it, and paid an actress that apparently looked a lot like Jessa, to hand out my mobile number at the airport. My phone started ringing off the hook—suddenly fans were calling to chat, and Penelope convinced me to ask one of them how they got the number. When they described Jessa to a tee, right down to the damn scarf, I started doubting her.” He shook his head, remembering his rage that day, and how he sent Jessa packing without giving her a chance to explain anything. One more thing he’d suffer for a very long time to come.

  “This woman, Angela—who was Penelope’s assistant—managed to play it up so that I believed it, and I fired Jessa on the spot. Angela was full of apologies, and volunteered to be my assistant for the rest of the time we were there. It didn’t leave me much of a choice, really, which was their plan all along. That started the domino effect.” He took a deep breath. It was all still very fresh in his mind, and Tia was hearing it for the first time. He knew he couldn’t shelter her from the truth, but he certainly didn’t relish the idea of telling her the details, either. They had a relationship built on honesty, though, and he wouldn’t lie to her. It would all come out eventually in court, and he didn’t want any surprises when that fiasco got rolling.

  “I had no choice but to change my mobile number, and Angela volunteered to take care of it for me while I was away from the village for a few days filming some scenes out in the wilderness. She changed Tia’s number on the SIM card so I couldn’t reach her, and they sabotaged my computer. They hired some teenager to plant some sort of virus and sent both of us emails, supposedly from each other, saying that we were done with the relationship and wanted to sever all ties.”

  “We both believed it,” Tia sighed. “Even though in the back of our minds we didn’t think it could be true, there was no other explanation at the time and we weren’t able to get a hold of each other to figure it out.”

  “I was beside myself,” Dylan continued. “I had sent Tia a ticket to join me in Australia for the holiday. I wanted to introduce her to my parents and show her where I grew up—but the next part of their plan cut off our only remaining form of communication—letters. I wrote Tia just about every day—sometimes twice in a day. I put in pictures of our summer with every one; to remind her of the time we spent together, and to hopefully keep the idea of ‘us’ in her mind. I was begging her to call me; to come to Australia so we could work it out. I knew it took weeks for the letters to reach her, but it was all I had at the time. Angela, in the guise of being my assistant, was taking care of the mail, and it turns out that Penelope was stealing all the letters I wrote to Tia.” He turned to her, and pulled her in closer, taking her hand with his free one and looking her in the eye. This was going to hurt her, he knew, and there was no way to shelter her from it. Not for long.

  “She was erasing Tia’s name on the letters and writing in her own; cutting Tia’s face out of the pictures and putting her own photos in their places. It was all part of some obsessive, sick, and twisted fantasy that we would be a couple.”

  Tia swallowed hard. So far, they’d waved away the waitress, who was hovering just out of earshot, waiting for her chance to wait on Dylan Miller. Now Tia motioned her over and asked for some water, and she returned in seconds with an icy pitcher and four glasses with lemon wedges perched on the rims. Each of them took a slow drink, letting what had been said so far sink in. It was only the tip of the iceberg, Dylan knew, and Tia’s parents were only now finding out that they were a couple. There was the whole summer to share with them yet. It was a lot to take in, and Tia hitched in a breath.

  “
Sorry,” Tia muttered, after downing nearly half her glass. Dylan poured her some more, leaning over her and whispering, “It’s me who’s sorry, love. I hate that you have to hear any of this.” He pressed his lips to her forehead.

  “I know, baby,” she said. “But it needs to be said, and I need some time to process it anyway. Go ahead.”

  He winced, but he continued. “A few nights ago—bloody hell, I can’t believe it was only a few nights ago—she faked the death of an aunt who didn’t even exist and had a meltdown in my trailer.” He paused, deciding to leave out the part about her trying to seduce him in her own trailer. “She inadvertently left her phone behind, and I found it later that evening. I figured it would be best to bring it to her, and I walked in on her putting together scrapbooks already full of pictures and letters I’d sent to Tia. I saw some of the tabloids, too—her agent was sending her copies of all the magazines that boasted pictures of us—pictures from rehearsals and filming that their teenaged hacker had doctored to make it look like we were on dates and holidays. I also found the plane ticket I’d sent to Tia in the piles.” He paused to let everyone take it in.