SWNOVELS Chapter 4
Chapter 4: You Make Me Sick
“This is the dressing room, Mr. Hyde. People walk in and out all day.” Elsa broke free of Ryan’s grasp and smiled. “I wouldn‘ t want to be your next scandal, now that you’re the most popular actor around. Your company would-”
“We need to talk, Elsa.” Ryan Hyde didn’t like women like this. He took a step toward her. “I wanted to explain things to you,‘ but my agency signed me for a film and I had to go abroad. Before I left, I sent a letter to your place–but when I came back, someone had returned it to me.”
Elsa’s expression was unchanged. “I’d just moved and changed my number. Look, if you don’t have anything better to do, Mr. Hyde, I need to take off my makeup.”
She walked over to the vanity and took off her colored contact lenses, blinking away the discomfort. Ryan followed close behind. “Erin spiked my wine and lured me to a hotel. I didn’t consciously do any of that…
“I didn’t know she took pictures.” He pressed his hand to his forehead for a second, and he sounded like he was struggling when he finally spoke again. “You know her father’s… I’d just had a movie release when this happened. If those pictures had gotten out, it’d have been over.”
Elsa looked as if she hadn’t heard a word of this, and she
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Chapter 4. You Make Me Sick
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stood up. Seeing her ignore him entirely, Ryan impulsively wrapped his arms around her from behind. “Elsa, I’m done with Erin Hardy, I swear. I’m with a different agency. Her family can’t threaten me anymore.”
“Let go.” Elsa’s voice hardened, and she struggled to free herself. “Ryan Hyde, I told you to let go of me!”
His grip was firm. Elsa writhed in his grasp until there was a tearing sound, and when she looked down her dress straps and skirt were torn.
The sight of her pale skin seemed to sober Ryan up, and he pulled away, mumbling. “Sorry…”
Without even waiting for him to finish, Elsa reached out and slapped him across the face so hard that her palm tingled. “Ryan, you make me sick!”
Seeing him had dredged up unpleasant images from her past, and it’d rattled her composure. Her lips trembled with anger as she stared at him, hissing words from between clenched teeth. “How many times did I kiss up to Mr. York for you? How much wine did I drink to score you an audition for the male lead in that movie? And after all that, you didn’t even think about me when you ruined your life with those pictures!”
A year ago, she’d loved Ryan so much that she’d betted everything on him, including her own future. Without any funding of her own, she’d practically had to beg around to get him places.
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Chapter 4: You Make Me Sick
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When they had dated, she hadn’t been 21 yet, yet she still went to the bar every day and drank until she threw up. And even when she’d received the photos in question that night from an unknown number, she’d waited for Ryan to give her an explanation, even declining her mother’s repeated calls.
She’d waited until the end, and it was Ryan who’d fled and asked his agent to break the news to her. He’d gone abroad, and then she’d received the news of her mother’s suicide moments later.
Chapter 5: A Breakup Gift