Chapter 8
Brooke
* * *
Another hour of deep conversation followed, and we would have continued, too, if she hadn’t looked so tired. It was ten by the time she left.
I couldn’t believe I’d spent all that time hanging out with a sixteen-year-old. Apart from Noah, I had Shauna, who lived in Malibu, and Janine, who didn’t live too far from me in LA, though I couldn’t remember the last time I’d spoken to either of them for the length of time I’d spent with Aria.
Also, speaking to them meant Craig’s name would pop up at some point during the conversation. Shauna was married to Craig’s best friend and Janine worked at the same lawfirm as him. So awkwardness was something I couldn’t avoid sometimes.
Aria’s presence had been a welcome break, but her departure brought all my worries rushing back in. Instead of getting ready for bed, I jumped online to do some more research on Sally. I checked out previous interviews she’d done and emailed Bob Jacobe who’d done an exclusive on her a few years back for ESPN. He got back to me right away, told me she could be a little difficult at times, and said it was best to talk about things she liked.
That led me to look up all the things she liked, and I mostly stuck with her career. I knew she loved that, and there wasn’t anything she loved more than running.
I made so many notes, pages of them, notes documenting her early achievements and everything else going forward. I’d done a lot of this before, but now that I’d met her, I knew more of what to look for.
I figured it would be good to arm myself with as much knowledge as possible.
But…it was all for nothing.
I got to Sally’s house bright and early the next day. I was nervous as hell, but a little more confident. Her butler opened the door for me just like he had the day before and told me quite bluntly that Sally didn’t wish to have any visitors today. That was it.
When I tried to ask him when I should return, he said that was the message he’d been told to give me and practically closed the door in my face.
I skipped thewhat do I do now?thoughts that ran through my mind and went straight to anger.
What a bitch.She had my number and could have sent me some kind of message telling me not to come; why hadn’t she? And to send her butler out to dismiss me like that was…
It was awful.
I went back home to regroup and re-strategize, thinking I would send Sally a message that afternoon.
The message I sent was nice. I simply asked her when would be a good time to meet, that was it. There was nothing there that could be misconstrued to mean anything it didn’t.
However, it wasn’t Sally who contacted me next.
It was Perry.
He called and screamed at me over the phone, telling me I couldn’t fuck things up. I didn’t have a leg to stand on because he threatened to pull me from the assignment, an assignment I’d always dreamed of. The most I could do was assure him I would do better, although I really hadn’t done anything wrong.
I didn’t sleep that night, not at all.
It was all bad luck. Some stroke of fucking bad luck had followed me to North Carolina. I didn’t know where it had come from, but it was very much present.
Then, as if things couldn’t get any worse, the next morning I was stopped in the middle of opening my car door by a psychotic-looking Officer Asshole.
“You,” he bellowed, rushing over to me, his gorgeous face contorted into an evil scowl.
“What about me?”
“Who do you think you are giving my daughter advice!” he barked.
I didn’t know what the hell he was talking about. He had a daughter?
“I never spoke to your daughter.”
“Yes you did. Aria told me she talked to you about college.”
