by Early, Mora
“What’s the problem?” Ransler chucked the wadded-up paper, a magazine, Josh could see now, at Josh’s feet. “I knew you had no respect for women. I guess I shouldn’t be surprised that you had no respect for me. But I would have thought you’d at least have a little for yourself. And Emma! I can’t believe she’d...” He trailed off, slicing one broad hand angrily through the air. “Did you actually file the paperwork, or was the whole ceremony just an act?”
Cold water slid through Josh’s veins at William’s words. He stared down at the slowly unfolding ball of paper at his feet, until the accordion creases revealed the cover of The Sun Star. He recognized Emma’s slightly shocked, pensive face, surrounded by the pale cream of the lace veil. He couldn’t read the whole headline, but the screaming red words over her head proclaimed her his DECOY BRIDE?
He looked from the tabloid, to Ransler, back to the rumpled paper. He felt the odd desire to laugh bubble up in his stomach. Of course this would happen now. First William’s accident, then his dad, and now his marriage – fake marriage – imploding on the front cover a gossip rag. It was almost too ridiculous to believe. The corners of his lips actually twitched. “William –”
Ransler’s nostrils flared. Several of the crew members had stopped what they were doing and turned to watch the actor rail at Josh.
“Are you going to look me in the eye and lie to me again?”
“It’s a gossip rag. You know as well as I do –” Josh began.
William snorted. “Oh, I know not to believe everything I read. But this isn’t just some accusation out of left field, is it? I suspected already.”
William stared at him, waiting for his next denial. The crew, and now some of the other cast as well, had begun to gather around, whispering. Some were scrolling through their smartphones. Josh had no doubt that the article was online too, and they were now reading it. He couldn’t think of a single thing to say.
Refute it? He didn’t have the energy to manufacture any more lies. That’s why he had sent Emma away. His eyes drifted down to the paper again. Ice crackled in his stomach.
Had she...?
Shaking his head, Josh pushed the thought away. No. Whatever issues they might have, he didn’t think Emma would have gone to the tabloids. She was no Lolly Tate. He didn’t know how or where The Sun Star had gotten their info, but he knew it wasn’t from her.
He trusted her.
The realization struck Josh like a slap. Like a lightning bolt. He blinked stupidly at Ransler, frozen.
And then he heard her voice, and his mind went absolutely and utterly blank. Like a computer that just lost power. Nothing was processing. He had nothing but a blank screen. Emma came from the direction of the parking lot, behind Ransler. Her face was pink, eyes wide, and she called his name.
“Josh! Oh god...” She hurried toward him, breath puffing from between her glistening lips. There were dark smudges under her eyes, and smudges on her cheeks. She looked like hell.
William twitched as if he’d touched a live wire, and rounded on Emma, face darkening. “You should be ashamed.”
Josh wanted to reach out, push Ransler aside, take Emma somewhere private and figure out what the hell they were going to do. He wanted to turn and walk away, to go back to the hospital and pretend this day had never happened. Yesterday too, while he was at it. Why not?
Emma ignored William, skirting him and skidding to a stop in front of Josh. Her too-wide eyes, the whites showing all around and glistening with tears, skipped from Josh’s face to the mangled tabloid at his feet. He stared at her, trying to find words, any words. None came. Josh didn’t know what she saw in his expression. He couldn’t even feel his face at the moment, but her shoulders slumped.
“It wasn’t me, I swear. I didn’t say a word.”
“So you admit it’s true?” William’s voice was a low growl. Emma continued to ignore him, gaze fixed on Josh. She took another step closer, her eyes welling, lips trembling. He might as well have been a statue. He wasn’t sure he even remembered how to breathe.
Her pale, slender hands rose and gripped the front of his shirt. Tears slipped down her cheeks. “Josh, I... Please believe me. I know, god, I know I screwed up so many times. I never should have listened to my brother. It’s just a stupid watch! I never should have lied to you. And maybe I never should have agreed to pretend to be your wife.” She hiccuped a sob. “But I didn’t do this. And... I’m not sorry.”
His brow furrowed as he tried to understand her frantic words. Why was she not sorry? As if divining his train of thought, Emma continued, clutching his shirt in fistfuls.
“I’m not sorry about any of it. Because otherwise? Otherwise, I never would have been anything but your party planner. I know you think I tricked you, that Madame Butterfly wasn’t me. But it was! Everything about her is part of me. The mask just let me show another side of myself. I’ve been more me with you than ever before in my life.”
The whispers of the crowd grew louder. Josh’s brain, still short-circuiting, vaguely registered the presence of people around them, some of them with cell phones raised. Emma was oblivious, more words spilling from her sweet, pink mouth.
“I didn’t go to the papers, Josh. I wouldn’t, because it means this is over, and –” She choked on a sob, green eyes bright as emeralds and sparkling with tears. “I don’t want it to be over. I love you.”
He watched her lips shape the words, stunned to hear them drop from her mouth. She loved him? Like, forever kind of love? Maybe she just thought this was the best way to save face with Ransler.
She promised she wasn’t going to lie to you anymore, his inner voice reminded him. Not that he’d needed to hear it. Because, as he’d so recently realized, he trusted her. And now, if she was saying she loved him...
Emma was shaking. Not only could he see it, Josh could feel the tremors reverberating up her arms and into his chest. His heart squeezed and thumped beneath her hands, the bolt of lightning that had struck him earlier crackling there.
This day was beyond surreal.
Josh knew he had to respond, though his mind was still a clean, white, empty page. He willed his jaw, clenched tightly shut, to unhinge. It didn’t. He frowned.
The longer the silence stretched, the faster the tears slipped down Emma’s cheeks. Finally, Josh cracked his jaw. “Emma, I...” He trailed off. Now that he could speak again, he didn’t know what he wanted to say. The circuits in his brain were still sputtering and jumping.
Sniffling, she let go of his shirt and began backing away. The gape-mouthed expressions of the people around them would have been amusing if he wasn’t so focused on her. He lifted a hand, but she was already out of reach. “Wait.”
She shook her head, her dark hair, loose for a change, drifting softly around her shoulders. Emma pushed into the crowd, which parted around her as she stumbled back toward the parking lot. Ransler was still scowling, brows low as he glanced back and forth between Josh and Emma. Like Emma had before, Josh ignored him.
By the time she’d made it to the equipment trucks, Todd was at her side. Her brother slid his arm around her shoulders and pulled her into his side, tossing an enigmatic green gaze over his shoulder at Josh.
Everyone was silent as he watched them leave. “Hell.” It was the only word he could think of to describe how he felt at the moment. He was pretty sure that roasting in eternal hellfire while the devil jabbed a pitchfork into his ass wouldn’t be nearly as painful or distressing as his life felt right at this moment. He thought he might even feel the sting of tears in his eyes.
Surprisingly, it was William Ransler who put a hand – almost comfortingly – on his shoulder. “Son, why don’t you come back to my trailer. I’ve got some Lagavulin. We can talk.”
“About what?” Josh’s voice was a rusty screen door. He couldn’t imagine what else the older man could possibly have to say to him. And he sure as hell couldn’t think of a word to say in his own defense. Emma loved him? The thought was... too big.
William actually chuckled.
“Fake relationships and real marriages.” He tugged Josh the few steps to his still open trailer door, and led him inside.
***
Emma scowled at the list of upcoming events she needed to write up press releases for. Fall would be here before they knew it, and there were an endless round of wine tastings, Labor Day events and Halloween parties to deal with. Not to mention Thanksgiving and Christmas were on the horizon. Sure, it wasn’t even September yet, but you had to plan ahead when you worked in the party planning business. Picture Perfect had to be... well, perfect.
She should inventory the stock in the warehouse too, and make sure they had enough... something. Tears stung her eyes and the back of her nose again, for what had to be the seventeenth time that day. And it wasn’t even lunch.
“Better than yesterday,” she reminded herself, sniffing. And that was true. Yesterday she’d run to the bathroom crying three times already by this point in her day.
It would get easier, she knew, though it didn’t feel like it right now. She’d fallen in love with her fake husband. And she hadn’t realized she was in love with him until the minute their scam was revealed. Then, she’d confessed said love to said the aforementioned fake husband on a film set and he’d rejected her in front of the entire cast and crew, including the stupid super star they’d pretended to be married for.
This whole thing was William Ransler’s fault.
Hot liquid trails burned their way down Emma’s cheeks. Whimpering, she pawed at the tears and angrily wiped them on her sleeve. She was not going to break down again. She was definitely not going to lock herself in the bathroom again. She was moving on.
Her coworkers were all walking on eggshells around her already, and she’d only been back at work for two days. And lord bless Clarice Davenport for taking her back the moment she’d gotten Emma’s hollow voiced call at nearly midnight the night Emma had left Josh’s house. The house she’d, ridiculously, come to think of as her own.
She missed Chewie’s soft puppy snores. Cooking dinner last night in her tiny kitchen only reminded her of the enormous kitchen at the mansion, and Tina’s sunny smile as she fixed breakfast and said ‘Mornin’, Mrs. O. Sleep well?’
She missed the warm, solid weight of Josh beside her in bed.
Emma’s breath hitched. She couldn’t bear to think even one thought about Josh, or they’d snowball and she’d be buried in an avalanche of memories and spend another afternoon weeping in the bathroom.
Her cell phone rang and she winced, ignoring it. She needed to get a new number. Ever since the story went viral, and some horrible person had posted her tearful confession to Josh on YouTube, she’d been hounded endlessly by the press.
Only here at work did she get even the slightest amount of peace. Todd tried his best to keep the reporters at bay, but they’d been camped around her little house on Montecito day and night.
Clarice had put a security guard at reception, and Emma wasn’t doing client intake, so anyone asking for her was turned away. She spent the last day and a half, when she wasn’t crying in the bathroom, doing paperwork.
Eventually, the furor would die down. Some other scandal would come along. Hollywood had a short memory. Emma wished she could say the same.
But no. She be stuck for the rest of her life reliving the look on Josh’s face when she’d reached the film set. Shuttered, blank, unfeeling. Not only had he already known about the article, but from the hard glitter in his blue-green eyes as he stared down at her, she was pretty sure he thought she had sold the story. Just like Lolly. She wasn’t even surprised, really. Josh had always been clear about not trusting her.
And then, when she’d confessed that she loved him, he’d just... stared. As if the very idea that she could have feelings for him was so absurd that he couldn’t even process it. When he’d finally managed to speak, the low, pitying tone of his voice was enough to tell her he didn’t feel the same.
Of course he didn’t. He didn’t trust her, and he’d always said he couldn’t love someone he didn’t trust.
She couldn’t hold back the ragged sobs anymore. Once again, Emma bolted down the hall to the ladies’ room and locked herself inside, letting the tide of grief wash over. Thankfully, no one was inside this time. Yesterday, she’d bowled into Sascha Cadigan as she’d dashed into the restroom with her hand over her mouth to muffle the sobs.
The redhead’s smile looked sympathetic, but her eyes gleamed with a sort of wild satisfaction at Emma’s misfortune. Because Emma had interrupted her attempted seduction of Josh the first day he’d visited the Picture Perfect offices, no doubt.
It didn’t matter. The other woman’s cattiness couldn’t hurt her any more than she was already.
With her forehead pressed to the cool metal of the stall door, Emma cried. She cried until her head throbbed and her throat ached. She squeezed her eyes closed as she pictured her future. Without Josh.
How had she been so stupid? So blind? It had been willful denial, she knew. She’d wanted to ignore her feelings because loving Josh scared the hell out of her. Loving someone meant that they had the power to destroy you, just by going away. Just like he had done. Josh wasn’t dead – thank god! – but she’d never see him again. Even if he found out that she hadn’t sold the story to the tabloids, their fake marriage was still over. The imaginary life they’d built together over the last month was gone.
Perversely, she almost hoped he’d come after The Watch. Technically, Emma hadn’t fulfilled her end of the bargain. But she didn’t think that he could go to the police now, not with the scandal about their marriage unravelling in the public eye. But he could still demand The Watch back. Not that she’d give it over... But she’d get to see him again. Jagged fragments of her heart shifted in her chest at the thought.
Thank god for Todd. He’d been holding all the pieces of her shattered self together for the last two days. He did the dishes, tried to cheer her up with TV shows and games they’d played as children. Not that it worked, but he was relentless. He’d barely left her side. He hadn’t gone back to his job as Josh’s PA, even though he loved it. His cell phone had been ringing practically off the hook since the moment he’d driven her off the set. For once, she couldn’t blame this lost job on him.
“It just got... taken away, T-rex,” she’d said as he led her into the house.
“What’s that, Emmaceratops?” He folded her gently onto the couch, sitting beside her and stroking her hair.
“My future.” It was barely a whisper. Todd had gathered her against his chest and held her.
Thinking she couldn’t see a future with Josh, that had been just another denial tactic. She’d purposely pretended that Todd had meant that they had a future together when he’d said that he knew she could see her future when she looked at Josh. Josh wasn’t a part of her future. He was her future. Whatever else was there, Emma wouldn’t have cared. As long as Josh was with her.
But he wasn’t going to be. Not now. Everything had gotten so screwed up. It wasn’t completely her fault. Emma knew that. But enough of it was to make her want to scream. Instead, she used a wad of toilet paper to mop up the last of her tears. The last of them for now, anyway. She had no doubt there would be more later.
She tossed the soggy ball into the toilet and flushed before going to the sink to splash some water on her face. She didn’t need to look in the mirror to know she looked terrible. This had been one hell of a week. She looked anyway.
Her normally smooth dark hair was wispy and flyaway, the clip barely containing it. She wasn’t sure if she’d used conditioner this... Had she even showered this morning? She didn’t know. Her cheeks were pale except for two bright circles on either side of her nose, obscuring the freckles there.
Her nose practically glowed, it was so red. Her eyes shone, glassy and bloodshot, the skin beneath them dark and puffy from lack of sleep. Her lips were chapped. There was a tiny white stain – toothpaste maybe? – on the lape
l of her grey suit jacket. Her blouse was wrinkled. Threads were unravelling from the hem of her pencil skirt.
Well, she supposed it was only fitting that she looked as much of a mess on the outside as she felt on the inside. No use pretending.
“Not anymore,” she murmured to her poor reflection. Emma patted her face dry and made a haphazard attempt to smooth her hair into a neater chignon, but it was hopeless. She was hopeless.
Emma sighed at the sound of a soft tread on the other side of the bathroom door. Clarice, coming to check on her. Again. Her boss hadn’t uttered a single word of reproach or asked a single question other than ‘Is there anything I can do?’ She’d given Emma her job back with no hesitation, and even told Emma how thrilled she was to have her back.
Clarice had gone out of her way to make sure Emma was protected from the media vultures too, even burning a few bridges with some overly pushy business contacts by refusing them access to Emma. Emma would never be able to repay the older woman.