She has prep school.
I scroll through Twitter on Lo’s phone, too curious. He glances over my arm, and he must realize it’s not Tumblr because his gaze returns to the TV.
His feed is loaded with tweets from comic book artists and fans of TV shows like Game of Thrones. My eyes sting from staring so hard, about to shut the app. But I pause as I graze over a hashtag.
#CoballowayPornTape
What? My brows crinkle, and the first tweet near the top is from a credible news station.
@GBANews: Connor Cobalt & Rose Calloway have sold their porn tapes to a very large distributor. Clips already streaming online.
My heart nosedives to the bottom of my stomach. This can’t be right. My breath catches in my throat. Rose would never share her own sex life on the internet if she can barely share miniscule details among her friends. I practically pummel Lo with my bony body, squishing into his space.
“Lil?” I hear the concern in his voice.
I hand him the phone, and at the same time, I switch the television to the other HD input, turning on cable.
“What’s going on?” Ryke asks, his arm stretched on the back of the couch.
I answer by flipping to the news. I reread the headline at the bottom, over and over, expecting them to say April Fool’s. But it’s not April. And this is far, far from a joke.
Sex Tape of Rose Calloway and Connor Cobalt Sold to Porn Site for $25 Million.
“Fucking hell,” Ryke mutters.
“This can’t be right,” I say aloud what’s been floating in my head. No, no, no. I never had videos of my sex life broadcasted to the entire world. This goes beyond what happened to me. This is—this is life-altering, earth-shattering bad.
I’m so sorry, Rose.
Lo shakes his head, in a fog. “It had to be Scott. They must have had cameras in the bedrooms.”
“What?” I squeak. “Our bedrooms too?”
“No, Lil,” Lo says quickly. “If they had a sex tape of us, it’d be on TV before Connor and Rose’s.” He’s right. I’d be more “newsworthy” since we’ve been in the media much longer.
Still, the fact hardly lessens the enormity of the situation. My sister…
The reporter starts speaking, grabbing hold of my dispersing thoughts. “If you’re returning with us, news just broke about the heir to a Fortune 500 company, Connor Cobalt and his girlfriend, Rose Calloway, selling a sex tape. Another Calloway girl in a scandal,” she says. “This time there’s legitimate proof.”
“Oh shit,” Ryke curses.
I follow his gaze over the couch, spotting my sister who marches down the staircase. Lo snatches the remote and powers off the television. It blinks to black.
Rose appears behind us, her cheeks concaved and her yellow-green eyes frighteningly focused. Like a lioness ready to devour an antelope.
She places her hands on her hips and sets her target on Lo. “I’m not five-years-old, Loren. You can turn on the news.”
My throat swells. Does she already know? I can’t hide the pained expression on my face.
“No,” Lo says, his voice edged in nervousness. “I’d rather not.”
Daisy cups her hand to her mouth, whispering to me, “Should we tell her?”
I mimic the discreet gesture so Rose can’t read my lips. “Maybe not until Connor comes downstairs too.” He’s a crisis solver. He’ll make everything better, right?
Rose refuses to wait any longer. She’s already halfway across the room, her back arched like she’s building her defenses. She tries to steal the remote from Lo, but he won’t release his grip. They end up having a tug-of-war.
“Let go, Loren, unless you’d like me to dislocate your arm.”
“Aren’t you tired of making all these empty threats?”
She twists his forearm, and pain flashes in his face, wincing. He loosens his hold, and she claims the remote.
He rubs his arm. “Bitch.”
Not nice.
“Yes, but I’m a bitch with real threats.” She powers on the television, and the news explodes once more.
“Bet you feel like a bigger bitch right now,” Loren adds.
“Shut up, Lo,” I snap. This is not the time to attack my sister. “Rose…” She has frozen to the middle of the floor. I know, better than anyone, how horrifying and gut-wrenching it feels to see your dirty sex laundry scattered all over the media.
She waves me off and increases the volume to an obnoxious level. “The producer is none other than Scott Van Wright, Rose’s ex-boyfriend.”
They’re still perpetuating the ex-boyfriend lie? Rose remains transfixed to the screen, her posture tight, just livid, pure heat radiating off her stance.
Rose…
Tears almost threaten to rise. It wasn’t supposed to be like this. Our lives. She was supposed to have the perfect wedding with the perfect guy with the perfect happily ever after. Being taken advantage of in pursuit to strengthen her career—it’s not fair. It’s not right.
People just suck.
Lo rises and seizes the remote from Rose, and she jerks back and hits another button.
The TV blares, and I cringe at the shrill sound.
“I’m watching this,” Rose says, managing to enunciate over the noise. The reporter plays clips from the actual sex tape. On screen, her arms are tied to the headboard with a belt, a glittery diamond choker around her neck. Black bars censor all the naughty parts, but the uncut video streams online somewhere.
“Rose,” Lo complains, pressing his hands to his ears.
I stand up and reach for her arm. “Rose.”
She recoils. “Don’t touch me.”
She scares me, more now, than she ever has before. It’s like she needs to explode, but she’s containing this raging fire inside her body.
The news channel blisters my ears. “Scott Van Wright has sold the sex tape to Hot Fire Productions for a multi-million-dollar deal. There’s been no comment yet from either Connor Cobalt or Rose Calloway, but it appears to be a legal transaction between all four parties.”
How can that be right?
“The summary of the film says the hour long session is rough and for mature audiences only.”
Rose increases the volume to the highest level. Why does she insist on listening to it like this?
“What the fuck are you doing?” Ryke asks, his hand rising to his ear.
“Maybe she’s like…having a mental break…” Daisy says.
Rose retreats to the kitchen, more on attack than anything. She disappears from view as she digs through a lower cabinet.
“Seriously though, Rose!” I yell. “Are you okay?”
She pops up with a bottle of whiskey. I forgot that Brett hid his booze with the dishwasher soaps. She spins her heels and collects a wine glass from another cupboard, pouring the whiskey to the brim.
It’s like watching a fissure run through a person made of stone.
I don’t like it.
“Rose, not to lecture you at this really sensitive time in your life,” Lo says, “but that’s not how you drink whiskey. And as an expert in liquor, it offends me.”
She glowers, one so fierce that my breath dies in my chest. “You’re not an expert in liquor. You’re an alcoholic.” She sets the whiskey bottle on the table and takes a giant swig from her wine glass.
She doesn’t even cringe.
“Which makes me an expert,” Loren argues. She waves him off like she’s shooing away an animal.
“What’s going on?” Connor’s voice emanates from the stairs. His gaze travels to the television, the source of the cacophony. No…
That’s why she turned the television up so loud? She decided to deafen everyone just to call him downstairs.
“Look honey,” Rose says. “We have a sex tape together.”
She’s lost it. Officially.
{ 36 }
0 years : 10 months
June
LOREN HALE
Want to know the most deplorabl
e, heartless thing in my head?
I am so fucking relieved that wasn’t Lily on the news. Extending empathy for my best friend, Connor, or for Lily’s sister—I can’t do it. Deep down, I just think: finally it’s not us, finally the world has shit on someone else.
It’s a thought that turns my blood cold, my forearms on my knees, sitting on the couch and waiting for the guilt to come crush me. I wish that I was like my brother. Ryke stares at Rose with so much concern that you’d think he was dating her.
“I’m on the phone with my attorneys and Cobalt’s,” Greg Calloway says through the cell’s speaker in Connor’s hand. “We’re looking through the contracts all of you signed. Until we can come to a clear picture of what’s going on, I need you to get my daughters out of that townhouse. No more cameras.”
Goodbye, Scott Van Wright. I thought Scott would go further and further until he reached an unbearable point with us, but leaking a sex tape with Connor and Rose—it never crossed my mind.
Connor has been unsurprisingly stoic during the whole ordeal. Sometimes I just want him to scream like the rest of us. Most of the time, I don’t want to see it. Because if someone like Connor ever breaks to that degree, then the whole world is headed for hell.
He places his hand on Rose’s shoulder, but she barely relaxes. “We’ll pack today and leave,” he tells Greg over the phone.
“Let me know when you make it safely back to Princeton. If there’s too much press around the house, you should all stay at our place in Villanova.”
My frown deepens, waiting for Greg to add, I need to have a serious talk with you, Connor. He just watched Connor screw his daughter on national television, albeit censored. And not only that—they’re into bondage and kinky shit that I’d think would have Greg tapping into his paternal side, ready for an hour-long conversation.
It never comes though.
“Do you know where Scott is?” Connor asks him.
My ribs burn when I inhale.
“No idea,” Greg says, “but Loren’s father is about to rip him a new asshole.” Good. “To be honest, I’d love to see it happen.” He pauses. “Is Rose around?”
“She’s on speaker.”
“Rose, honey, how many lawyers looked over the contract before you signed it?”
I presume he’s talking about the reality show contract—the one we trusted Rose with before we all signed the bottom. What the fuck did she do? I glare at her with everything inside my soul. What the fuck did she do?
She cradles Sadie in her arms, Connor’s orange tabby cat that usually scratches Rose. Instead, Sadie purrs. The world is backwards today.
“Just me,” Rose suddenly announces.
“What…the fuck?” Ryke says, stunned.
I groan and lean back against the couch, my hands on my head. “Why did we trust you?” I snap. I should have realized that she’d be too conceited to actually hire a real lawyer.
“I’ve taken multiple law classes at Princeton,” she refutes. “I understood every line of that contract.” Sure. That’s why you now have a sex tape released to the public, Rose.
I shake my head repeatedly. So they could film in the bedrooms then? A weight bowls straight into my chest, the pressure knocking the wind out of me. If they filmed us—that means they have tapes of Lily and me.
Scott’s just waiting around to release them then?
Lily breathes choppy, sporadic breaths beside me. I reach out and hold her hand. “It’s okay,” I whisper to her. It’s okay. She can read my uneasiness through my features, her eyes growing bigger and bigger. “It’s okay, Lil.” Repeating it doesn’t help. We’re going to be okay.
“I thought you took my lawyer to the meeting,” Connor says, already off the phone with Greg. “And I thought he read the contracts.”
“I thought I told you I left him behind,” Rose retorts.
Connor frowns, shaking his head. “You must have mentioned that to someone else, darling.” He snatches her whiskey-filled wine glass and drinks the rest in one swallow.
I concentrate on him. It takes my mind off what seriously could be the end for us. “What the hell was that?” I ask him. “Greg gives me a two hour speech about sobriety after our scandal, and he doesn’t even acknowledge yours.”
“To be fair,” Connor says, “you lied to Greg and Samantha about being addicts. That news is a bit more jarring than a sex tape…”
I don’t see how.
His attention and voice drifts across the room. I follow his gaze with everyone else, and all oxygen is suddenly caged in my lungs.
Scott stands by the staircase with his hands in his khaki, tailored pockets, like he didn’t just screw over a bunch of people over. Like he’s never done a wrong thing in his life. Like he can’t feel remorse or regret or guilt.
I envy him on that account. How goddamn easy life would be if I wasn’t saddled with all of that.
“Did I miss something?” Scott asks with a sleazy grin.
With an unreadable expression, Connor walks towards Scott, the only person even moving or breathing at this point. I’ve been waiting for him to do something more to the guy that’s just hosed him during the show. If anything, these past six months have taught me that Connor Cobalt and I fight different battles in different ways.
Connor stops right in front of Scott and holds out his hand to shake the producer’s. “Congratulations,” Connor says. “You outsmarted me. Not many people ever do. And I admit…I never saw this coming.” His voice is humorless, emotionless—frighteningly dead.
Scott glances between Connor’s hand and his face. Then he clutches Connor’s palm.
What a fucking weird way to end—
And then Connor punches Scott in the jaw with his free fist. His body hits the wall hard. My lips rise.
“Thank you,” Ryke says with an exhale, near me. We’ve all been waiting for that to happen.
“That’s from me,” Connor sneers at Scott, brutal anger flashing in his eyes, something that I’ve never seen before—something he has been keeping to himself.
Scott tries to swing back, but Connor dodges the attack with ease. And then he knees Scott in the dick, the contact audible. Scott groans, his hands instinctively reaching for his crotch. I cringe at how painful that must’ve been. And Rose is practically celebrating like a fan in a football stadium. I’m shocked she hasn’t raised her fists in the air and twirled in a circle.
“That’s from Rose,” Connor says lowly, venom in his voice.
Scott crouches, almost close to a fetal position. His eyes water, and it takes him a moment to slowly stand back up, bracing the wall so he doesn’t tip over.
Connor never backs up, confident and pissed. This isn’t a guy I’d want to fight, I realize. Not like this.
Scott coughs into his fist and then he says, “…I’d love to see your face when you realize what you’ve signed.”
Something bursts in my chest, and I open my mouth to scream at him. But Ryke covers my lips with his hand, blocking all noise and future regrets from escaping.
“You’re seeing it now,” Connor tells him calmly. How can he not be more upset? Even the thought of Lily being swept up into the rabid media, with sex tapes of our own, is killing me inside. I can’t see any light among that darkness for us. It’s one brick too many, one push too hard—it feels catastrophic.
“I’m positive you have full rights to anything we ever film,” Connor continues, “which gave you permission to sell the sex tape to a porn site without our signed consent. I don’t have the contract in front of me, but I’m sure there’s something misleading about the part where you weren’t allowed to film us in the bedrooms.”
“I read that line correctly. I know it,” Rose says, pointing at the ground.
Scott is still partially doubled-over from Connor’s two hits. “It said that we couldn’t air anything from the bedrooms on television. We never did. The contract said nothing about filming. And any of the footage from the bedrooms and the bathroom can be
used for movies and web content. Just not network TV.”
The bathroom. I glance at Lily while she stares at her knees, pale and cold to the touch. I rub her back and rest my chin on her head, holding her closer to my chest. She wore a bathing suit in the shower for six months. She was that uncomfortable. One silver lining.
Scott adds, “Lily was almost always in her room.” He pauses. “We weren’t able to install any cameras to catch anything.”
I shut my eyes, both of our shoulders dropping with the release of this immeasurable weight. Thank God. I suck down the sadness that wells with a rough inhale and kiss Lily outside her lips. She holds my face quickly and kisses me for real, a deep one that grips me.
“It’s illegal to film minors in pornographic situations,” Connor says.
Both Lily and I break apart at that. Connor is talking about Daisy. Did she…did she really screw someone in her bedroom? A series of emotions pulls my face in a grimace. The most lasting one is shock.
Daisy blanches, and she actually meets my eyes, over everyone else. Maybe too mortified to look at Ryke. I nod at her like it’s okay.
She shakes her head like it’s not.
Lily crawls over my lap to sit beside her sister again, and she wraps her thin arms around Daisy’s neck.
“We didn’t,” Scott replies. “All that footage was destroyed.”
There was actual footage of Daisy…in her bedroom with another guy? She must have been doing things with Julian, but not it. I can’t even say the word in context with her. I rub the back of my neck.
“You’re disgusting!” Rose shouts with another scream attached.
I glance over my shoulder to see Ryke on his feet, restraining Rose from the other two guys by grabbing her shoulders.
My head just rattles as Scott keeps talking. As he spills all the things he planted with production.
“Lily and Lo in the bathroom with the slurping audio?” Connor asks.
“Edited,” Scott says. “We did it in advance and uploaded it on the camera for you to find.” At least everyone will believe us now.
Thrive Page 23