He let go and surprised me by pulling the car door shut again. “Drive around,” he yelled to the front of the car, and, smooth as butter, we took off again, circling the block. “I’m hurting you? I’m hurting you?” He grabbed my arm again with one hand and brought my face to his with the other. “Sassy, I’m so into you. I want to bring you as my big date to this huge fucking event. And I’m the one who is being hurtful?”
The dam burst. “No,” I mewed.
“Don’t cry!”
I tried to tamp down the tears, but his grip on me was solid and I could feel the fear rise in me like bile.
“Stop!” He shook me like a rag doll. He pinched my chin toward his face and wagged my face back and forth, making me shake my own head. “Just . . . stop crying!”
“You’re scaring me,” I whimpered. A face swam in my mind: the brunette with the mandala tattoo: I’m just looking out for you. I would crawl on the red carpet looking a mess if I could just get away from this maniac. I would tumble onto Hollywood Boulevard at thirty-five miles an hour to escape. Why hadn’t the model said anything about danger? She made it sound like he was a playboy. Where the hell did this monster come from?
I dove at the door and tried to open it, but the handle wouldn’t respond. The door was child-locked. I wondered if the driver had seen things. If other women, the brunette included, had screamed too.
“Hey!” Stephen shouted.
I didn’t realize I was screaming until I felt a sudden throb against my ear, a deep pain that surprised me completely. He had hit me; it was like getting smacked in the face with a basketball. Stunned, I stopped crying immediately, cowering like one of the dogs I’d seen in the shelter kennels.
“Fuck. I didn’t mean to do that.” He smoothed my hair, which was probably no longer a sleek-shaped updo but a rat’s nest after all my thrashing. His kindness brought me to new tears; confused tears, pained tears.
I pulled at the door handle again, kicking the door with a foot.
“Sassy, you can’t go out there looking like this.”
“Leave me the fuck alone,” I screamed.
“Sassy—” He snatched at my arm again, getting a firm hold.
“I’m Cassidy.” I pulled my arm back, but his hand was still on me. There was a loud snap and excruciating pain where his fingers had been.
“Shit, shit,” he said. He pushed the intercom button. “Dave, I’m getting out. Take her to get patched up.”
“You’re going to leave me here?” Tears of pain made him look like a mirage.
“If we both don’t show up, the rumor mill will go wild. The carpet has already seen me. And you said you didn’t want rumors.”
The limo whispered to a stop and I shuffled to the front of the sedan again, out of sight from the door. There was a second rush of noise as Stephen stepped out, ducking through the doorway with one arm already outstretched for a wave. Flashes popped, shading his silhouette on the far corner of the limo wall in a rectangle of yellow and white. Then the door closed once more, and I was left in the quiet to cry in stunned silence. We began moving again.
The driver spoke. “It’ll just be a few minutes.”
I hissed in pain. “That asshole broke my arm and you’re acting like you’re delivering a fucking pizza?”
“Ma’am, I don’t know what you think happened, but if you spread malicious slander about Mr. St. James, I’m afraid I’ll have to inform his lawyers. And I’d like to add, he hires the best in the business. You’d be lucky to find a job at Walmart before you could breathe a second word.”
When we reached the hospital, I walked inside barefoot, not caring where I’d left my impossibly tall, Gail-approved heels. The pain seemed to amplify with every jarring step I took, and there were bruises starting to form on my unnaturally bent forearm, purple fingertips and a long thumb. The nurse taking my X-ray asked if I wanted to discuss what happened. I shook my head. She stressed confidentiality and gave me a card with a number in case I changed my mind; I left it on the exam table after my cast, covering my entire forearm and concealing the marks, was applied.
Who could I call? Who would believe me?
After a long moment, I dialed Emily.
“Hi, Cass! I didn’t see you on the—”
“Emily,” I interrupted, “can you pick me up at the hospital?”
“Sure, but—”
“I’m at Cedars-Sinai.”
“Are you okay?”
“Just get me, please.”
I waited for her in a room with a small flatscreen anchored to the wall, while I chewed my dry lips. JMC’s television show was on, playing a recap of the Oscars in a small, closed-captioned picture. I craned my head for a remote to change the channel, but my eyes were drawn back to the flickering set, as Sterling Royce escorted a beaming Lucy down the red carpet. Her makeup was too soft to age her, so Sterling looked like a teacher bringing a high schooler to her prom.
Then, suddenly, there was Stephen St. James, with a gorgeous, petite, red-haired goddess on one arm. My jaw snapped shut in surprise and I tasted iron.
Anna.
The closed captioning filled the bottom of the screen. “It’s lovely to see Stephen again, after our time on Sing It, America! together,” Anna Williams preened into the microphone. Her skin glowed, and in the bright lights her pupils were highly constricted, letting the green of her eyes shine. Joan Rivers asked about her outfit as the camera pulled back. “I’m in Oscar de la Renta and he’s in Prada. Thank you!” The two sashayed away and the picture cut to another couple.
I wondered how Stephen had found a replacement so fast.
I wondered if Anna would be the next one in the line of fire. I didn’t like her while on Sing It, but no one deserved to be alone in a room with him.
A commercial played without sound, and there she was, the model with the back tattoo, sashaying in an ad for Victoria’s Secret. What was her name, Jeannette? If the same had happened to her, I understood why she hadn’t warned me explicitly.
When Emily saw me, she gasped, but stopped herself from giving me a bear hug and instead she gingerly placed her arms around me. “Are you okay?” she breathed. Her gaze drifted to my cheek, which was puffy on the left side where he’d cuffed me.
“I’m fine. Fell down some stairs.”
“But your face . . .”
“Smacked into the banister. Can we go?”
I wondered if this was an isolated incident and I was just blowing it all out of proportion. The nurse asked about my periods, but it had been months since my last cycle. I wasn’t pregnant, just undernourished and brittle-boned, and maybe any amount of force would have broken my arm.
In the car, Emily drove silently for a few minutes before saying, “You’re lucky you didn’t lose any teeth. My friend Tracy tripped at a park once and hit her head on part of a jungle gym. Her mouth was bleeding all over and now she has three fake teeth right here.” She tapped her top right incisor, her face tinted green from a passing traffic light.
I acknowledged that with a guttural noise.
“I get it. You’re tired. I’ll just . . .” She snapped on the radio. We drove along surface streets like that for a few minutes, but after the current song finished, the next was by Stephen St. James. I turned the volume dial down and rubbed my bare shoulder. “Do you have a sweater somewhere in here?” My rumpled dress was thin and I was cold, but mostly I didn’t want to hear his voice.