Chapter 20

20

Beck

Tuesday morning, I'm in the middle of a virtual staff meeting on the floor below my penthouse and I'm losing my fucking mind.

"Crawford might be placated for now with all those pictures from last night and public opinion swaying back your way, but there's no telling if he'll stay that way for long," my manager, Bruce, is saying from his over-decorated office in LA. "You need to get caught buying the frumpy girl flowers. And can you get her to brush her hair?"

"Her name," I say distinctly, "is Sarah."

"Right, right. What are her parents saying? You've met them, right? Judson fucking Clarke. If we could get him to vouch for you, all of this would go away."

Charlie rolls her eyes. She and Bruce often butt heads, but it's getting worse. "You want a man to speak up about another man making his daughter's uterus into public fodder?"

"She's right, Bruce." Hestia, my PR team lead is also rolling her eyes. "Now, if we could get Sunny Darling to join us all on Calista Finley , that would help. Although, rumor has it she's in need of rehab."

"Sunny Darling does not need rehab." I'm going to pull my hair out. Fistfuls of it. And toss it all over the fucking floor. These people were so competent last week. What the fuck is going on? "And I'm not going on Calista Finley's talkshow. We're sticking with the plan."

"You've been uninvited from the World Music Awards."

I look at Charlie, because have they been listening to a word either of us has said?

"Beck wasn't going to the World Music Awards," she tells the team. "He's on vacation that week. A real vacation. Where he's not tweeting. Or talking to people. Or doing anything else that'll require any of us to work overtime, and he's even going to do his own laundry and cooking."

I nod in vehement agreement. I didn't know I was taking a vacation that week, but I never turn down an opportunity to hang out at home and torment my sister and remind my mom how much she misses me while I'm gone.

Plus, there's the Tucker factor now, and I still have other friends I haven't caught up with in town.

"It still looks bad that you were uninvited from one more thing," Hestia says. "They'll spin it."

"You know he's going to look like a saint when we finally announce the FLY HYGH Foundation, so it won't matter," Charlie replies. "And we just threw together the mother of all black-tie dinners for Sarah's favorite giraffe on Saturday night, and Vaughn's tentatively on board to fly in for it too, so I don't think anyone's going to give two fucks if Beck doesn't show up at an awards show two months from now that he already declined."

"Do you really need me here?" I ask her.

"Shut up and sit down. This is still your fault."

"Fair enough," I grumble.

"You need to go play with animals at that shelter your sister likes," Hestia says.

"He needs to get Levi Wilson and Cash Rivers making more noise about him being a good guy," Bruce replies.

"He called in personal favors from over fifty celebrities and politicians and talked them all into buying thousand-dollar tickets for a fifty-dollar affair to raise money for the world's most famous endangered animal, and he's taking both his and Sarah's entire families," Charlie says. "You let him loose in a dog pound, he'll crack a joke about a bitch and we're done. You let the plan play out as the plan is supposed to play out, and this will all be just fine ." She glares at me and makes a slashing motion across her throat.

Right. She's done with Bruce.

"Got a call from a movie producer who wants to know if you want a cameo in a slasher pic," Bruce tells me. "They'd make you look good when you die."

"We're not doing cameos," my marketing guru, Vicki, replies. "It's starring roles or nothing."

"Whoa, wait, we're not doing movies," I say.

My entire team shuts up and stares at me.

"What?" I ask.

"Ryder, I like you, but you're a PR nightmare," Bruce says. "We're saving your ass this time, but what happens when you call one of the royal babies ugly, or get caught sticking your dick in a goat?"

"PR nightmare? The Ryder Family Foundation gives away millions every year, and not two weeks ago I was all over the news when those cameras crashed my visit to the children's hospital in London."

He shakes his head. "You need to think long-term, because sooner or later, you're gonna blow it in business. So do a slasher pic. Not like you're the type to write a tell-all book. Haven't slept with enough women anyone wants the dirt on for that. And I got a guy who's interested in buying out your DRYVE and SHYNE lines. You should take him up on it. Won't get a better deal."

" Sell my lines? "

Charlie's not even speaking. She's just gawking. Hestia and Vicki both clear their throats and dive for coffee and cigarettes.

"Sell them," Bruce repeats. "Then you need to kiss Crawford's ass, because we all know this FLY HYGH Foundation is really just an excuse to get a partnership with him so we can branch out into footwear."

I stand and accidentally on purpose dump an entire coffee mug all over the computer.

It sizzles and fries and sparks and the screen goes blank, and Charlie slumps back in her chair with a sigh. "Took you fucking long enough."

" Sell my lines? " I say to her.

She rolls her eyes. "I don't care how long he's been your manager, you need to fire him. He's losing his fucking mind. And he's always been a twatwaffle. Also, I'm not replacing that computer. You can get your ass down to the Apple store yourself this time, and I don't care how many people try to run you over on the street."

She grabs her phone and types out a message—undoubtedly telling my team I fucked up and we'll talk again tomorrow at our regularly scheduled time, because that's what she does, and I probably need to give her a raise again this week—and I head for the kitchenette in the small office area. The rest of the floor is apartments.

"You like Moroccan?" I call. "Sarah showed me this place over in University City. We could order couscous. Or kefta. Or kebabs. Or all of it. With four gallons of mint tea. And cookies. Definitely cookies."

She follows me and leans into the doorway, head still down over her phone. "You can't eat this away, Beck. You still have a shoot in three weeks."

"And nothing to do in the meantime except work out and play video games." Everything's on hold. Everything . The designs I was supposed to look at this week are delayed. All my meetings—outside the crisis meetings with my team—are canceled. My only job is to not fuck up more and keep publicly wooing Sarah.

Maybe privately wooing Sarah.

I wanted to kiss her so badly last night, and I still don't know if it was a good idea or a bad idea, but it's what I wanted.

Charlie doesn't smile. "You ever seriously consider selling out and retiring?"

I told her I was going to last year, after Ellie's accident. She didn't take me seriously, but she also made sure everything on my schedule got delayed or canceled, and she's kept me booked less full so I could be home more.

"Why?" I ask her. "You want to slow down?" She sees her family less than I see mine, but she's never complained about it.

"I don't do slow, Ryder. You know that."

"Good, because even if I did sell out and retire, I'd still need you running my life, you know. Who else would make me get out of bed and remind me to brush my teeth in the morning?"

"Your mother, Ryder. Your mother."

I laugh at the image of my mom trying to get me up in the morning. She'd dump ice water on my head without hesitation, a tidbit I won't be sharing with Charlie, or she might try the same next time we're traveling.

She's smiling too, because she doesn't actually set my alarms or remind me to brush my teeth.

Usually.

"You should sign up for a dating app," I tell her, even though I think I would have to sell my businesses if I didn't have Charlie to keep me organized. "Meet someone. Go see the world through love's eyes."

"Rather see the world by myself, thank you very much. The pictures from the game last night are everywhere, and they're reporting both that Sarah totally denied you a kiss and that she started a food fight that was probably foreplay to what you did in the bedroom. The pictures are perfect. Lots of the two of you laughing. Especially her. Plus, the media likes that she's playing hard to get, and that you keep trying."

"Nice avoidance."

"You'd rather talk about why you were late after the game last night and came in looking like you just found an all-you-can-eat steak and cupcake buffet?"

"No."

She smirks. "Didn't think so. Tripp Wilson's waiting for you upstairs."

"So that's a no to Moroccan?"

"One of everything. University City. I'm on it. But you're going to have to spend an extra two hours on the treadmill."

I hate the treadmill. "I can order in."

"Nope. Can't talk and drive. Your diva ass is getting me out of a telecon with Brass and the Dinglehoppers to discuss your incompetence at attending telecons."

"Brass?"

"Bruce the Ass."

"Let's get through smoothing out my dumbass tweet, and then I'll talk to Bruce about why he's losing his mind. Two weeks. Tops. And if he's still insane, he'll be gone."

"I'm using your card to pay for lunch for everyone in the restaurant."

"Send some couscous to Sarah's office while you're at it."

"That would be filed under duh ."

"You're an empress among assistants."

"I know. Don't eat your arm off while you're waiting for food. You need it to sign papers so we can get rid of Bruce."

She heads for the elevator while I take the stairs to the penthouse, where I find an old friend waiting for me.

And he's not alone.

"James! Hey, bud. Give it up." I hold out a fist to Tripp's three-year-old, who eyeballs me with rightful suspicion. He's in preschooler-size jeans with bright green pajama shorts over them, and at least two shirts, because I can see a yellow collar under his bright orange Captain Beanbag shirt.

He's also sporting a purple cape.

All of my buddies have the cutest kids.

"He's on Twitter and he knows you're a disaster," Tripp tells me. "You're gonna have to give him something more than a fist bump to win him over."

He's holding his daughter, who's just over a year old and clearly didn't dress herself this morning, because there's no way she could've put that dress on herself.

I don't think.

Plus, if I were barely a year old and allowed to dress myself, I'd be naked. So I guess I'm assuming she's probably the same.

"Everybody screws up time to time," I say.

Tripp gives me a wry grin. "Yeah. Just time to time."

"You like playing ping-pong?" I ask James.

"You gosh to pway twuck but it fall in da fountain," he replies solemnly.

Tripp ruffles his hair. "The truck dried. We left it at home."

"I've got trucks," I tell him. "Well, cars, but they have wheels and you can make them go vroom ."

Tripp shakes his head at me, eyes widening. "Dude, he will tear those things apart."

"What? They're just things . C'mon, James. Let's go check out my rides."

I get him set up playing with a couple of the model sports cars I keep on a high shelf in the game room while I play peek-a-boo with Emma, who finally decides I'm cool enough to drool on for a while. Her blond hair's on top of her head Cindy Lou Who style, and she's chewing on her fingers when she dives for me to hold her.

Tripp sags into the couch facing the TV. "Thanks. She's getting heavy."

"Need to work out more."

"You carry her for two hours and then say that again." He's sporting bags under his eyes, and he only shaved the right half his face, but he's still managing a smile.

"Holding up okay?" I don't know shit about being a single parent, or about grieving someone close to you, but I know it's work. A fuck-ton of hard work.

"I'm effing tired."

"You need a nanny."

He shakes his head. "Just overnight. It'll pass. She'll eventually sleep a full six hours at a time. She's just…adjusting."

They all were. Tripp losing his wife to the flu over the winter is one more reason my schedule keeps getting lighter. No place like home, especially when people need you. Though I'm frustrated as hell at basically being grounded right now, at least I'm here.

"What's the story with your new girlfriend?" he asks before I can push any harder. "Levi bet me ten grand you're falling for her, so this better be a publicity stunt."

"You guys are assholes," I tell him.

He clears his throat and looks at James.

"Ah. Right. Sorry. You're crashmoles."

He's known me too long to think I'm funny, and he stretches his legs out while he studies me. "Davis says you're quitting."

"Why the fugglenuggets would he say that?"

"C'mon, man. Ellie's accident. Your schedule. A self-sabotaging tweet, followed by a PR stunt…"

I bounce Emma on my knee and make funny faces at her. "Your daddy's talking funny."

"So Davis is right and Levi owes me some cash."

"You remember that foundation I told you we were working on? The one with Vaughn Crawford?"

"Sports programs for kids?"

"We were supposed to announce it next week."

He winces. "Ah."

"Yeah. Need to clean up my mistake so Vaughn doesn't bail, and I need to keep making money to fund all my favorite projects. It wasn't self-sabotage. I love my job. I was just a dumb-dumb head who hit the wrong button on my Twitter app and got a little too full of myself to assume mistweets couldn't happen to me. Happens when you're fabulous and haven't slept in three days."

He sucks in a grin as he shakes his head.

I get that a lot.

"Miss sleep that much, do you?" he asks. "Want to hear about a teething toddler with diarrhea?"

Emma smiles at me. Her stomach gurgles.

"She's in an industrial-size diaper, right?"

"Baby roulette, dude. You want to hold her, you take the consequences."

I eyeball the blond-haired, round-cheeked cutie.

She smiles so big that drool drips down her fingers and arms, and she pumps her chubby legs.

The elevator dings, and I rise.

Because odds are good that's my mom. She's been dropping by once or twice a day—usually with food, because she loves me—and she's a master at baby diapers.

Another ominous sound comes from Emma's midsection. She screws up her lips and mouth, and oh, fuck , here we go.

I rush toward the kitchen and the penthouse entrance, and as soon as I see a body, I shove Emma toward it. "Hey. Baby?"

A single blink too late, I realize my mistake.

That's not my mom.

Or my sister.

Or even Charlie, who would probably turn around and take my credit card back to the store, because Emma does, indeed, have an intestinal disorder, and she lets it all go as soon as Sarah latches onto her.

It's a long, slow-drawn-out letting go, and that's not an industrial-strength diaper, but that is definitely sheer and utter horror on Sarah's face while she silently asks me what in the holy hell I've done now.

Fuck.

I just handed my fake girlfriend a baby poop bomb.

And it went off.

All.

Over.

Her.

"Oh, fungusbubbles," I croak out.

And if that look on her face is any indication, those will be the last words I ever utter.