CHAPTER14
"Rack ‘em, Derrick." the guys and I were shooting pool in the game room. The convo was light, thank fuck. We were all about my nephew and his two-year-old antics, things in the family biz, some money talk. If I wanted, I could walk the fuck away from the Wood and live the life of Riley. I had money before I went there, and I would still have it when I left. Let's face it; they would never be able to pay me my net worth to make a movie. By the time I was eighteen, I was halfway to being a billionaire, and that was before I'd ever worked a day in my life. Last year when I turned twenty-five, let's just say I could buy a few small nations and still be set for life, so Hollywood could go fuck itself.
Except I loved the fuck out of acting, it was as if that shit was in my blood or some shit. I just ate that shit up.
My phone rang in the middle of a shot; after sinking the eight ball, I looked at the display screen and didn't recognize the number. I let it go to voicemail. It would be just my luck to answer to the tabs, fucking chicken shit bastards. I hit the replay button for kicks and was surprised as fuck.
"Hello, Gage; this is Karen O’Reilly. I would really appreciate hearing from you at your earliest convenience." The fuck. Why was Suzette's publicist calling me? Fuck if I was calling her back. Bitch could wait till the cows come home. I wasn't calling her for shit.
"Need to make a call, bro?"
I knew who he thought that was; Brian could rant all he wanted, but I knew he had a soft spot for Suzette; in fact, we all did.
"Nah, I'm good."
We played well into the night, and I realized it was my brothers' way of taking care of me, keeping me occupied so I didn't wallow in my misery or drink myself into a stupor. Come to think of it; I hadn't had a real drink since I came home. I guess that hearth and home shit really worked. Mom and the girls kept me fed; the guys kept me occupied with made-up bullshit, and my nephew Jonathan kept me on my toes.
I wondered how fucked up it was that the sight of him hurt my heart. I wanted to have kids with Suzette; I'd been ready to start a family and take things a little slow on the work front. Now that shit was out the fucking window. I couldn't even think of starting over with someone else; that was the fuckery of it all. I was washed up and done at the ripe old age of twenty-six. Fuck me.
* * *
I sleptlike a baby for the first time that night; things were looking better, not great, but better. Suzette was texting me constantly, I was brave enough to read them now, but I still wasn't answering. I wasn't ready, yet I mean, what the fuck did she expect? I know her; I know how my treatment of her in the last week made her feel. Suzette could never stand for me to be mad at her; it was almost as if she couldn't function unless everything was right in our world. So how the fuck had we come to this? See, this is how I knew that no matter what was said, I wasn't ready to face her. The anger still lived inside me. I wouldn't be able to keep a cool head if I saw her now, and this cluster fuck needed the coolest motherfucking head I could find.
The ringing phone jarred me out of my musings at six in the morning. It wasn't the Jezebel of Babylon, different ringtone. The number looked familiar, but I wasn't quite sure; taking a chance, I answered on the third ring.
"Yeah."
"Maddox, you piece of shit, who the fuck do you think you are?
The fuck?
"Who the fuck are you, asshole, and how did you get this number?"
"Oh, you don't know me now motherfucker? You fuck my sister over and..."
"Joshua?"
"No, you fuck, it's Jonas."
Should've known! He was always the more hotheaded of the two.
"What the fuck do you mean I fucked your sister over? Are you fucked in the head? Have you been living on the same planet as me? I'm not the one on the front page fucking a married man." Yeah, I wasn't bitter or anything; I had my anger totally under control. Fucking liar.
"You watch what the fuck you say about my sister."
"Fuck you, you fuck, why don't you go yell at your precious sister? I repeat, I'm not the one who fucked someone else."
"She didn't."
Say what now?
"Did she tell you that?"
"No, but I know her, man, and I thought you did too; she would never do something like this."
Okay, I had entertained those thoughts myself, but this wasn't shit you speculated about. I understood his need to defend his sister; let's face it, if it was Tiffany, I would do the same, but this shit was all types of fucked up, with too many variables.
"You promised, man, you told me, my brother, and my dad that you would take care of her out there; she was like a fucking lamb to the slaughter. You promised us that you were on the up and up, that you loved her, and this wasn’t some Hollywood bullshit facade to sell movies, and now you do this?"