Chapter 133: Chapter Thirty-six

Demetri

I had to admit to being a bit pissed that we weren't allowed to see April until the following morning. Nat had stayed overnight for observation.

Alyssa stayed at the house and slept in, so it was just me, Jaymeson, and Alec. Because of our crappy contract, the camera crew was impossible to shake.

They hated the invasion of privacy almost as much as we did. The good news was that Ruben had apologized to all of us this morning.

We walked through the hospital. Everything seemed eerily silent. I sighed heavily and rubbed my eyes. Coffee. I needed coffee stat. Jaymeson was ahead of me and turned toward his mother's room.

He came to an abrupt stop, almost making me crash into him.

“Dude, what the hell?” I tried to walk past him but he shook his head, then looked at the camera and back at me.

Alec looked just as confused as I felt. Jaymeson's eyes pleaded with mine, so I went along with it — and stayed deathly silent.

Not an easy feat for me.

But two minutes later I was glad I did.

“One task, April! I give you one task! And you do this? Do you even realize how this could be traced to me?”

“I'm sorry.” She choked on a sob. “When you said the deal was off, I freaked and I needed the money! Without that production company, I'm screwed, okay? Ruben made me an offer I couldn't refuse.”

“Couldn't refuse?” The man laughed. “How do you think this makes me look? Now everyone knows you have a drug problem! My ex-wife!”

“I do not—”

“—April… just save it. I don't want to hear your excuses anymore. I'm so tired of your lies. And the worst part? You thought to bring him down with you! An innocent kid?

“You were going to bring your innocent kid into everything? All because you needed money? I told you I'd give you money. I told you I would fix everything, only if—”

“—Rehab.” She snorted. “Yeah, got that loud and clear.”

“April, I love you. I know you think I'm a jackass, but I care. Jaymeson…” He choked on his words. “He cares about you.”

“Not as much as you care for him. Admit it, you've always loved your son more than you loved me.”

A pregnant pause filled the hall.

“April, I'm not doing this here. I will, however, go to the press first thing and explain your situation. Go to rehab or go to hell. Your choice. But I'm not allowing you to hurt any more people.”

“I'll tell them you drugged me!” April shouted. “I'll tell everyone you drugged me and Alec that night!”

“Really?”

“I'll say something too…” a third voice interrupted. “I'll tell them you bribed me. I'll tell them everything.”

“Angelica…” The man sighed.

Okay, I was seriously going to have a stroke. How twisted could everything get? How many lies had been told?

“Angelica,” he repeated. “It isn't Alec's fault you weren't able to make it to the set on time, and it was the final straw for us.

“If you would just take me back and see—”

The man laughed. “Right, I'll just hire you again after you and my ex-wife create a story so messed up that innocent people get hurt and I end up the bad guy? Sure, why not.

“I'll give you a movie role and a few million, is that what you want? Oh wait, each of you already got a million. I have Ruben to thank for that.”

One of the women started crying. “He said it would help ratings and get us our money. He said if we went to the press, he would do an exclusive in a few national magazines and—”

“Yeah, I've heard enough.” The man cursed. Footsteps neared the door, but I was basically frozen in place along with everyone else.

So when the man turned the corner and found not only us but an entire camera crew, Ruben included, standing with their mouths open, he didn't know what to do either. So he stared.

We stared.

It was awkward, to say the least.

I nudged Jaymeson.

He cursed and shook his head. Great. No words.

I looked to Alec for help, but he looked about five seconds away from beating the shit out of something.

“So…” I chuckled nervously. “I'm Demetri.”

“Ah, David Cartwright.” He smirked. “Am I to understand you're the one that told me to go to hell?”

“Um.” Shit. “Yeah, sorry about that.”

“He also called you the anti-Christ.” This from Jaymeson. Seriously?

David chuckled. “To be fair, I deserved it.”

“And more.” Jaymeson looked down at his feet.

A throat cleared. “If I could just say one thing. Clearly April's deranged. I would never pay for a media story for information or—”

David's fist hit Ruben's jaw so hard that I could have sworn my body shook a bit.

Alec laughed. “Nice.”

“Am I the only one who hasn't hit him yet?” I asked as Ruben staggered back to his feet.

“I haven't had the pleasure,” Jaymeson said as he landed another blow to Ruben's jaw. “You're a sick son of a bitch. You know that, right?”

Ruben hit the ground and stayed there. “You have no proof! All you have is the ramblings of a drug-addicted whore.” Blood trickled from the side of his mouth.

I turned to see Angelica standing there. Dude, not the girl to piss off. Ruben should know better.

“I love social media.” She scowled at Ruben and with shaking hands pulled out her cell phone and pressed a few buttons. “I'm assuming your number's the same, David.

“I just sent you the video I recorded the day Ruben and I talked about our plan for putting everything on you and Alec. I recorded it just in case he turned out to be an asshole.”

“High five!” I held out my hand and Angelica slapped it with a small grin.

“Doesn't mean we're friends,” she said after she tucked her phone back into her pocket.

I backed up. “Noted.”

With tear-filled eyes she looked to Alec. “I know it's not much… but I'm sorry. Things got so… messed up, and I didn't have any projects lined up after the show, and I needed money. I need money.

“And April promised we could make more off the lies and stories. She said David would pay us to keep our mouths shut, and then when he didn't, I went to Ruben.”

“Safe to say that was a bad choice,” I muttered under my breath. Jaymeson nudged me.

Angelica rolled her eyes. “No shit. At any rate, even if I didn't have everything on camera, these guys did.” She nodded to the camera crew.

It was then that I realized they had literally been recording the entire time. The camera guy put the camera down and shook Angelica's hand.

Holy crap, what did she do? Sleep with the entire crew in order to win their loyalty? Clearly it wasn't her stunning personality.

I scratched my head and searched for some taffy in my pockets. I needed something to distract me from this insanity.

“Rehab and work. I can promise you both,” Alec suddenly said. I looked up at him with horror. Was he serious? Was he really going to help the devil? After everything she did?

“W-what?” Angelica shook her head. “Why the hell would you help me?”

“Yeah, I'm with her,” I joined in.

Alec ignored me. “What will it be, Angelica? It's your choice. I'll pay for rehab, and when you're done, I'll put you in contact with someone so you can start working again—”

“I think I know someone,” David interrupted. “But you need to change, Angelica. People rarely get second chances. Don't screw yours up.” He put on his aviator sunglasses and looked to Jaymeson.

Jaymeson nodded once and took off with his dad.

Angelica watched them walk away and looked back to Alec. “Yes. I'll do it.”

Alec smiled, but this time it was a real smile, not one of his fake camera smiles that made me want to slap him across the face. Nope, it was real, genuine.

“Great.” Alec pulled out his cell. “Once your contract is up for the show, we'll check you in to the best treatment I know of.”

Angelica hugged Alec.

I may have accidentally gagged. It was involuntary, I swear.

She left me and Alec staring at April's room.

“So how does this work exactly?” I asked. “I go in and say, Hey, I'm your son. You suck, but everything's fine now. Hey, who's my real dad?”

Alec burst out laughing. “Yeah, something like that. Honestly, I'm still in a bit of shock. I thought she was innocent all along.”

“Women rarely are.”

We laughed and walked into the room together.

April was sitting up in her bed. And she was crying.

Perfect.

“I'm not sorry,” she whispered. “I'll never be sorry.”

Wow. I shook my head at Alec. “You'll never be sorry for what?”

She sighed and brought her gaze to mine. “For giving you up. You've had a great life, a great career — a family who loved you, a brother that would die for you.

“Yeah, I wasn't going to ask you to.”

She pressed her lips together and began playing with the fabric of the blanket covering her. “Then why are you here?”

“To apologize.” I shrugged and pointed to Alec. “We wanted to apologize for everything you've gone through, and we also wanted to offer help.”

She snorted. “After everything I've done, you're not only apologizing to me, but you're going to help me? Are there cameras on or something? You don't have enough charity cases this year?”

“I think I get my sarcasm from her.” This I said to Alec. He chuckled and took a seat, motioning for me to follow him.

Alec spoke first. “Yes. I know we're both sorry that things got so bad for you. But mainly we want to help you get back on your feet again.”

“What if I don't want to get back on my feet?” She swallowed as a tear ran down her cheek. “What if I like my life?”

“You like lying?” I snorted. “You enjoy spending all your money on coke? You like almost dying? Letting down your friends and family? If that's your preference of lifestyle, then who am I to judge?”

“But…” Alec cleared his throat. “If you want something else, let us know. We can help.” He looked at me and sighed. “I think you owe your son that much.”

She flinched as if Alec had just slapped her. “I'll think about it.”

“Great.” I rose from my seat and hightailed it out of there. Alec followed but grabbed my shirt, stopping me in my tracks.

“Aren't you going to ask who your real dad is?”

I felt my throat clog with emotion. “Doesn't matter. My real dad died a while ago, leaving me with the only family I know. My ass of a brother.”

“That was a pretty speech.” Alec hit me on the back and laughed.

“I practiced it.”

“Sure you did.”

We walked to Nat's room only to find her nervously pacing back and forth as if she'd been waiting ten years for us to come spring her from her prison.

I knocked on the door.

“Thank God! I need real food. I'm starving. I swear, if you guys don't feed me in five minutes, I'm going to dig through Demetri's pockets for taffy wrappers and lick them.”

“She's all yours, man.” I slapped Alec's back. “Pregnant ladies be scary.”

Nat glared.

I smiled.

And then she ran into my arms and wrapped her arms around my neck. “I love you, Demetri Daniels.”

I sighed into her hair. “I love you too.”

How strange that a year and a half ago I was making out with her, making her life miserable, and trying to keep her from my brother, and now? Now I would freaking die for her.

I would do anything for her, for my brother. I loved her so much that it physically hurt to breathe when I thought of anything happening to her.

Family. She was my family.

“Yeah, that hug went on a bit too long.” Alec separated us, while Nat slapped him in the stomach.

“Hey!” I clapped my hands in excitement, scaring the crap out of Nat.

She cursed and pushed me.

“What?”

“It's not creepy anymore!”

Crickets. I heard freaking crickets in that hospital room. Both Alec and Nat looked at me like I'd lost my mind.

“We aren't creepy!”

Alec's brow furrowed. “Get there faster, man, because at this point I'm wondering if you're high again.”

“Why does everyone always assume I'm high when I say random things?”

Alec and Nat gave me that look again. Fine, whatever. “Guys, our weird little love triangle, totally not weird anymore. High five for not being blood-related!”

I held my hand in the air. They both ignored me and walked out of the room. Whatever. I was just pumped that I hadn't stuck my tongue down Nat's throat after my own blood-related brother.

“Hey, wait up.” I called after them.