“You can have a carrot, because Grandma Michelle is going to feed you cookies out the yin-yang at the party tonight.”
Grandma Michelle.
My mother’s in heaven.
She’s finally getting one of us married off, and getting an instant grandson in the process. Not that she hadn’t already adopted Tucker as one of her own—we grew up in a village in our neighborhood, and with Wyatt’s small family gone now, we’re all he has left—but she’s pretty much constantly leaking joy out her eyeballs over Ellie and Wyatt finally realizing the reason they fought so much over the years was because they were soulmates.
They’re disgusting. And adorable.
And all those relationship goals that a famous world-traveling empire owner like me will never have. On top of never knowing what a woman actually wants me for—my body, my money, or my fame—when you’ve been everywhere around the globe and still haven’t found the one, she doesn’t exist.
Probably.
But I have family, and a couple foundations that benefit kids, and adopted nieces and nephews between Wyatt and Tripp, so I’m cool.
Most of the time.
Better to spread the love out among the people you know you can count on than hold it back for someone who might never materialize, right?
Someone knocks on the door, and I flinch.
Ellie sucks in a smile. “Relax. I can guarantee you it’s not Sarah coming back with her taser. She’s not usually that aggressive.”
Sarah.
Pretty name.
Still making my lungs twitch too. Probably a good thing she’s not coming back.
Wyatt glances through the small windowpane on the door, then pulls it open. “Reinforcements,” he tells me.
I start to get excited, thinking Tripp or Davis or one of the Rivers brothers are swinging by, but it’s not any of them.
“It was inevitable, wasn’t it?” Charlie, my assistant, says with a cheeky grin. “Don’t ever keep your phone on airplane mode overnight again, or I’ll quit.”
Assistant isn’t quite the right word.
She’s more like my life handler.
“You’re officially grounded, and don’t even start on we have to be at blah blah blah event, because you’re uninvited from all of them. Even that farm park in Nebraska that we never replied to about their Goat Days festival has rescinded your invitation to participate in the Goat Race, and they were the most polite of the bunch.”
I stare at her, because I hear the words she’s saying, and they’re starting to penetrate.
The flying yoga bricks and getting tasered were just the beginning.
I didn’t just piss off the Twittersphere and half the women in the universe.
I fucked up my entire life.
“The foundation?” I croak.
Shit shit shit. She has to tell me I haven’t fucked up the new foundation.
She doesn’t.
“You have WiFi?” she asks Ellie and Wyatt, and within minutes, she’s set up in the recliner next to the couch, laptop open, phone on one armrest, tablet on the other, with no answer to my question. She’s been with me for six years, might be twenty-five or might be thirty-five—I’ve never actually asked—and if she ever notices how many people check her out while we’re traveling the world for fashion shows and product launches and photo shoots, she doesn’t let on.
“Video conference with your PR and management teams in thirty, and I’m working on getting you set up with a call with Vaughn,” she reports, then does a double-take. “Is your hair smoking?”
“He tried to run away and got himself tasered by the neighbor,” Ellie offers helpfully.
“Told you to keep security with you here,” Charlie replies before going back to her laptop.
“It’s home,” I scoff.
“And you just pissed off the entire internet. Don’t mind the two black cars down the street. I took care of arranging extra security for you. And you should be able to go back to your penthouse within a few hours. I asked the cops to let the picketing go on unless it got violent.”
“You can control picketers?” Ellie asks.
Charlie shrugs. “Not really, but it looks good that we’re cooperating instead of throwing a diva fit. Once we get Beck on camera with Ellen or Dr. Phil, apologizing profusely, they’ll go away. He’s disgustingly charming.”
“I should really send you better Christmas presents,” Ellie says in awe.
“Your parents take good care of me.”
“Hey. I bought you a car last Christmas,” I point out, even though an entire armada of cars wouldn’t make up for her having to deal with me some days.
Like today.
“That I’m home to drive maybe two months out of the year. Your parents sent a subscription to the peanut butter of the month club, and it magically gets forwarded wherever we are every month.”
Shit.
I’m bad at giving presents.
And here I thought I rocked.
Also, I like peanut butter.
“Today sucks,” I mutter.
“Serves you right for being an ass.” Ellie claps a hand to her mouth and looks around, but Tucker’s gone.
“That tweet was supposed to go to you, and it was a joke,” I tell her. “I would never seriously tell anyone to shut up and go have some babies. But you’re stealing my best friend, you know. Wyatt was mine first.”
“I’m already researching the best women’s equality foundations for a sizable donation,” Charlie says. “It won’t solve everything, but it’s a start in damage control.”
“The foundation?” I say again. “That’ll help, right?
She pins me with a look, and I realize I haven’t just fucked up. I’ve FUCKED UP. All caps. This isn’t like the time I wrongly congratulated that news anchor on being pregnant on air—I know, I know, but I was nineteen and an idiot—and almost got us banned from ever going back to Detroit.
This is way worse.
Because in about ten days, I’m supposed to announce a joint foundation with Vaughn Crawford, the hottest center in basketball, to sponsor athletic organizations for kids all over the nation.
And now I’ve put the stain of my reputation on the whole thing.
Sent the entire plan through the floor like a flaming meteorite made of cow shit.
Something tells me a video conference with my entire team isn’t going to solve this. And there won’t be a scandal hot enough in Hollywood to take precedence over me sticking my entire leg in my mouth, Twitter-style, ever.
“I shouldn’t go to your party,” I tell Ellie with a wince, because I’ll only be a distraction.
“They’ll be talking about you whether you’re there or not,” she points out.
“All friendlies,” Wyatt adds. “But if you can’t handle taking the crap…”
I don’t deserve to be around friendlies today.
And I need to get off my ass, stop feeling sorry for myself, and help my team fix this instead of once again letting Charlie set everything up for me.
It’s what she does, and what I pay her well to do, but this is my mistake.
“I need to call Vaughn,” I tell her.
She nods. “Oh, yeah, you do. And tread lightly and grovel, because no one wants your reputation bringing them down. The only thing you have going for you right now is that it’ll be hella hard for him to find another co-sponsor who can donate gear as easily as you can.”