“We have rules, you and I. Boundaries.” She pulled the can from his hand, took it, and poured the beer down the sink. “You need to respect them, Luke. We’ve been over this before. You can’t come over here, ranting and raving, practically bullying your way inside and then make yourself at home, drinking my damned beer and helping yourself to whatever. No. Get it? We’re over, you and I. Been over a long time now!” She crushed the can in her fist, fury coursing through her blood.
“Mom!” Bianca cried from the couch.
“What the hell’s wrong with you?” he demanded.
She threw the empty can into the sink, then spun on him. “Something’s wrong with me? Are you kidding?” He’d been pissing her off for a long time, and she was sick to the back teeth of dealing with him. “You’re acting like a maniac.”
“I’m just really, really pissed off.”
“I get that.”
For the first time since roaring in, he actually looked at her . . . and let out a long, low whistle. “What the . . . what happened to you?” he asked, eyeing her cheek while actually taking a step back.
“Hazards of the job.”
“Wrestling bobcats? No wonder you’re in such a bad mood.”
“Leave it alone, and I’m not in any kind of mood whatsoever.”
His expression said she was kidding herself, but, slightly calmer, he got to the point. Finally. “You have to call Sphinx and make him honor his damned contract with our daughter.”
She made a choking sound.
Spying Bianca, who was starting to get up from the sectional, he waved her back into her seat. “Don’t get up. Your mom and I’ll handle this.”
“Handle what?” Bianca asked.
“I can’t believe this, honey, but it’s Sphinx! What kind of idiot is he, buying into that Lara’s scam? I mean it’s so damned obvious. I would think a big Hollywood hotshot like him would see through her little act.”
“What act?” Bianca asked warily from her corner of the sectional. She was staring at her parents as if they’d become lunatics, and Pescoli kicked herself for fighting with Luke in front of their daughter. Much as her ex drove her up the wall, he was, after all, Bianca’s father, and Regan, fool that she’d been at the time, had made the choice to wed him.
“Come on, honey. You see it, too. Right? I’m talking about Lara Haas’s supposed sighting of Big Foot. It’s all a big lie. A massive story she cooked up with that O’Hara kid, just so they could get bigger parts in the show.”
“Hold on, Luke.” Pescoli couldn’t let him drag Bianca into this, not until they knew the truth. “How do you know it’s a scam?”
“Because it’s fu—freaking obvious, that’s how. And there has to be a law against this sort of thing. You can’t go faking this stuff—making it up. It has to be real. I mean, duh, it’s called a reality show for God’s sake! For the love of Christ, we can’t let this happen!”
Pescoli felt another deep pain roll through her, stronger than before. She actually caught her breath.
Not now. This can’t be happening now. It’s too early for the baby. This is still false labor. It has to be.
“There. Look at that,” Luke said, when his eye caught the television screen. On the local news was footage of the most recent Big Foot “sighting” via Carl Jeffe’s drone. “This thing is just getting bigger and bigger, and Bianca is being edged out by that lying bitch.” The television screen changed, and he snagged up the remote, hitting a button to turn on the sound as he flopped onto the couch next to his daughter. On the screen, Lara Haas was being rolled down the sidewalk in a wheelchair, the front facade of Northern General rising behind her, both of her parents hurrying to keep up with the attendant.
“I’m just grateful to be alive,”
she was saying as a microphone was thrust into her face. The shot widened as the cameraman backed up, and Barclay Sphinx appeared to hand Lara the bouquet of flowers and balloons Pescoli had witnessed firsthand. The producer was smiling and saying how thankful he was that Lara hadn’t been hurt in the attack. Then, looking squarely into the camera’s eye, he told the audience that “this brave girl” was integral to the filming of Big Foot Territory: Montana! and her story would be told in a series of episodes.
“What a two-faced bastard! He has a contract with Bianca and he just nullifies it. Damn it all to hell!” Lucky was livid, his face flushed with color, his gaze fixed on the television, while out of the corner of her eye, through the window, Pescoli noticed headlights flashing through the trees. Santana! Oh, God, please.
From the spot he’d claimed on the sectional, Luke was still ranting. “We had a deal and now . . . what the fuck? The man’s a lying scumbag, I’m telling ya! A double-crossing son of a bitch.”
“Enough!” Pescoli reached over the back of the couch, yanked the remote from his hand, felt another pain start to increase, and clicked the television off. “Why didn’t you call Sphinx? Talk to him?”
“You don’t think I did? Of course I did. And I told him that Bianca was totally committed to the show and the series, that she would do anything, any damned thing to be a part of it.”
“Are you nuts? Isn’t that like making a deal with the devil?”
“For the love of God, you are so . . . so suspicious!”