Starlet: A Dark Retelling - Cora Kenborn Page 0,43

in your story unties you from the train tracks and slaps a crown on your head.

Even if he makes you crave his kiss almost as much as fear it.

Tossing the nail file over her shoulder, Milly swings her legs around and straightens her glasses. “Look, Dom hasn’t had the easiest life. Everything he has, he’s fought for with blood and sacrifice. So am I protective of him? Yeah, you’re damn right, I am.” She punctuates each word with a jab of her finger. “And until I’m satisfied you’re not hiding some ulterior motive I’ll question everything that comes out of that pretty little mouth.”

This is the kind of information I tried to get out of Dominic two weeks ago. Which obviously never happened. I bared pieces of my soul, and he drowned them in whiskey. Since then, our conversations have been limited to Alexandra Romanov’s past, appropriate press answers, and take-out options.

It’s like living with a robot.

Milly isn’t my biggest fan, but at this point I’m willing to try anything. I left the group home because I wanted control over my life. Dominic took that away once when he forced me out of Hollywood. Now, a year later, it’s déjà vu all over again. He has all the power while I shoulder all the risk.

It’s time to even the playing field.

“Is his so-called sacrifice why this place is so empty?” I ask, cocking a hip. “To be such an international news source, you’d think BTN would be more than a two-person operation.”

“Are you kidding me right now?”

“What?”

“Six months ago, Beyond the News employed over forty people. This place was a perpetual hub of chaos.” She waves a hand around the bullpen. “Cameramen, reporters, copywriters, technical advisors—hell, we had our own paparazzi buzzing around.”

Whoa, back up.

“Dominic hates paparazzi. They’ve camped out on his lawn for weeks.”

“Oh, really?” She chuckles, that smirk spreading across her face again. “And have they shown up every place you’ve gone? Gotten there before you did?” She rolls her eyes. “Come on, girl, it’s not blind luck. You have to build an army of leeches to battle one.”

Son of a bitch. He tipped them off.

What better way to control the story than to write it yourself.

Part of me wants to crash through Dominic’s glass fortress and demand answers. But two weeks of sharing space with that man taught me you don’t confront Dominic McCallum.

You combat him.

Milly’s eyes narrow as I hop up on the desk beside her. She’s suspicious, as well she should be. I’m about to go fishing and drop the mother of all hooks. “Dominic mentioned he’d pissed off the wrong person, and they’d retaliated. After I refused to go along with this whole scheme, he admitted it was his last resort before he lost everything.” I motion around the silent office. “BTN, his house, his life…all of it.”

Her jaw drops. “He told you that?”

I nod. “More or less.”

Mostly less.

There’s a brief silence as she nibbles on the bait. I can tell she wants to take it, but she’s hesitant. Finally, she lets out a resigned sigh. “Dominic was never interested in Hollywood gossip. He started BTN for one reason.”

Hook, line, and sinker.

“Money?”

“Revenge,” she says, rubbing her forehead. “When I said Dominic didn’t have the easiest life, I wasn’t kidding. He grew up on the streets of West Hollywood with holes in his shoes, a newspaper roof, and a vendetta against Hollywood heavyweights with open-leg obligations attached to their open-door policies. It’s why he’s so damn determined to destroy their lives, even at the risk of his own.”

Then it hits me. “Paulo Bellini.”

She nods stiffly. “For starters. Bellini was just a surrogate for the man he was really after.”

My brain digs through files of industry gossip, and one name spoken across a front lawn comes barreling back like a freight train. At the time I didn’t think I heard it. All I knew was that Dominic reacted violently and shoved the baseball hat guy in the chest.

But now…

Now I remember exactly what he said.

“How do you feel about McCallum’s feud with Greg Rosten?”

“Greg Rosten,” I whisper, the words stuck in my throat.

The seething hatred in Milly’s eyes says everything. “Dom drove the nail a little too deep. Rosten retaliated and sued him for libel.”

“And he won.” It’s not a question.

“At least Rosten kept the lawsuit quiet. To save his own ass from more bad press, of course. Dom had to let everyone go and even took out a second mortgage on his house.” She shakes