The Happy Ever After Playlist - Abby Jimenez Page 0,76

disappeared around the doorway. I got up and followed her into the bathroom. “I didn’t give her the gate code,” I said, coming around the corner. “I don’t even know how she knew where I lived.”

She scoffed and yanked a piece of toilet paper off the roll with her back to me and wiped at her eyes. “Right.”

I threw up my hands. “Sloan, what did you want me to do? I have no control over what they write and how she behaves. This is what she does. She’s famous for this shit. She does it for the attention.”

She whirled on me. “This isn’t even about her, Jason. This has absolutely nothing to do with her or them. This is about you. How about you have a little respect for me? Tell me when another woman has kissed you in front of dozens of cameras, so I can at least be ready for the TMZ article. Tell me when someone shows up at your house in the middle of the night for a booty call! This is humiliating, Jason! You lied to me!”

“I never lied to you,” I said calmly. “I just didn’t tell you about it. I didn’t want to come to you with this until I had a solution for what to do about it. I didn’t want it to give you any unnecessary grief. She’s given me enough for the both of us.”

She stood by the sink, glaring at me. “Lying by omission is still a lie. You’ve had some woman you have history with, who I didn’t even know existed for you, showing up at your house in the middle of the night, writing songs about you, going with you to movie premieres. They’re putting her on your tour and you let magazines write about it before you bothered to give me a heads-up about this double life you’re leading. And you seriously have nothing to say about keeping this from me other than you were doing me some favor by lying to me about it?”

I looked her in the eye. “She’s been kicked off my tour, and I was trying to spare you.”

Her eyes flashed. “Okay. How about this? How about the next time an ex-boyfriend shows up here to have sex with me and grabs my ass I’ll spare you and it’ll just be my little secret.”

Jealousy pulsed through me like an instant shot of adrenaline, and my temper ignited. “If anyone ever puts their hands on you, you better fucking tell me.”

She gawked at me. “Oh, so now you get it, do you? That’s not okay, but this is?”

“It’s not the same thing,” I said through clenched teeth. “She’s a fucking mess. She’s not worth any of this. You need to get over it.”

She blinked at me. “Get over it?” She laughed dryly. “Wow. You’re right. I should just ‘get over it’ so you don’t have to be accountable for anything you just did. How inconvenient for you to have a girlfriend who demands honesty. I guess you’re happy we’re breaking up in two weeks so you can continue on with your double life without anyone nagging you about it!”

“That was you who wanted that! I don’t want to break up, I never fucking did. It kills me that you don’t want to be with me!”

We stood there across from each other, both of us breathing hard.

I combed a hand through my hair. “Look, I understand this is upsetting for you. I’m not thrilled about it either. This whole thing with Lola has been a fucking nightmare. She’s been harassing me for months. She kissed me. This tabloid shit is going to happen. It comes with my career, and I can’t do anything about it. None of this went down the way they said it did, and even if I told you every single thing, all the time, I cannot possibly prepare you for every story they might make up. They spin things, it’s what they do. You’re going to need a tougher skin and you’re just going to have to trust me.”

She let out a mirthless laugh. “You know, I was actually considering what you said the other day. That we should wait for each other.”

I blinked at her. “You were?” I breathed.

“Of course I was. You think it’s any easier for me to lose you? You think I want to see other people? I thought maybe you were right and we could just agree to focus for a year on our careers