The host bobbed his head. “And when you’reattractedto the director, does it make it easier or more difficult?”
I took a sidelong glance at Dad, my head still. His lips were twisted, and his arms were crossed over his chest.
Mike scratched his eye, chuckling. “It makes it…complicated.”
“Does that mean you’ll never work together again?”
He stared at the host, taking a deep breath, his poker face dropping. “I’d do…anything…to work with her again.”
I held myself tighter. I knew I’d made the right choice takingDark Hopesback and casting Jim as the lead instead of Mike, yet there wasn’t a day I didn’t wish I’d chosen differently.
“Do you keep in touch?” the host asked.
Mike shook his head slowly.
“Is that your wish or hers?”
His eyes glistened, and my heart squeezed. “Hers.”
“I’m sorry to hear that. The whole country was devastated when the two of you were no longer an item.”
Mike clutched at the chevron bracelet around his wrist as he nodded. He never took it or the ring off as he promised. I knew because I’d been looking at his hand in every appearance he’d made. The tabloids had been looking, too. They mentioned the accessories on every possible occasion. Swiftly, the blue ring and bracelet had become a token. A fad that made the jewelry store I bought them from a fortune.
“How long has it been since the breakup?” the host asked.
Mike swallowed, pushing his hair off his face. “Five months.”
“Are you currently in any kind of relationship?”
He rolled his eyes, his lips stretching with a fake smile. “In Hollywood, five months is more than enough time to move on, but when you break up with your soul mate…there isn’t enough time in the world.”
I heaved a long sigh, struggling not to cry.
“Even when she has moved on?”
“Moved on?” Dad snorted.
Mike lifted one shoulder in a shrug of resignation. “If she’s happier in her new relationship, I’m happy too. That’s all I want. For her to be happy.”
I felt a sudden urge to tell him all the rumors about me and Cassidy weren’t true. Fuck. Rising to my feet, I pressed the red button. “You were right. I should go to bed. Good night, Dad.”
I stalked to my room. My tears broke free in abundance as soon as I closed the door. Rapidly, I changed my clothes and slid under the bed covers, starting my nightly ritual. Crying myself to sleep. And when that didn’t work, and missing Mike was too much to bear, which was almost every night, I’d go through my recently-bought collection of DVDs, and play one of his corny movies I’d always hated. It made me feel like he was watching me in my sleep as he used to do.
A knock on the door followed by Dad calling my name snatched me out of my pitiful thoughts. I didn’t answer, pretending to be sleeping.
“Maggie, I know you’re up.”
I exhaled. “And you know the door is unlocked.” One of the many downsides of surviving two suicide attempts. Never having a locked door again. That and seeing a shrink regularly for God only knew how long. Oh, and the best one of them: no drugs or alcohol.
Dad’s sigh was louder than his feet as he turned on the lights. My swollen eyes suffered as I adjusted to the brightness.
“How long are you going to keep doing this to yourself?” he asked with a grimace. “You think I don’t hear you every night?”
I closed my eyes, biting a fingernail.
He sighed again as the bed sank beside me. “Maggie, listen. You know how much IhateGennaro. Hate his guts.”
My fingers combed through my hair as I opened my eyes again. “I know.”
