After all these years of guiding him and handling the oppositional defiant disorder so that it didn’t morph into something even more serious, she had to start to back away. Not completely. She’d always be there for him, but he needed to be in charge of his behavior and take responsibility for his actions. It was time to let him make mistakes like everyone else.
Even now he texted and called every day. He insisted he was about to break some new story about Derrick. Something awful that would make her see the man he really was. She begged him not to and so far he hadn’t, but she sensed it was only a matter of time.
Vanessa exhaled and some of the concern seemed to leave her face. “Well, if Derrick convinced you to give Noah some space, then I might learn to like him, though I’m not promising.”
Of course Vanessa liked the comment because she’d been suggesting the same thing for a while now.
“Derrick also went after Joe Cantor.”
Vanessa smiled and started walking again. “I know. I read the Insider.”
Ellie almost choked. “Good grief, why?”
“It’s wildly entertaining. If I had known the business world was so full of gossip and sex, I might have traded in some of my art history classes for economics.”
They dodged a group of men loading boxes into a truck and jogged up the steps to the front of her building. Kept going past the mailboxes and the elevator that seemed to be stuck with an open door and not moving.
“Derrick keeps planting stories. And now someone else is.” She could barely handle Derrick’s PR campaign, though she had to admit he had eased off a bit. Photographers weren’t lurking around capturing pictures of them every second, as she once feared. But the Insider still churned out tidbits about their dinners and her movement every time she stepped outside.
“Who else?”
“Joe, more than likely.” And that was the bigger concern. Someone wanted to discredit her. Derrick had vowed to stop it. But what happened to her once he was done with their fake arrangement? She still had to work. To eat. To find a real job.
Her stomach tumbled and a wave of nausea battered her. She wanted to think it related to the very real fear of not being able to support herself in the future, but she sensed it had something to do with the idea of waking up one day and not seeing Derrick again. Of losing the talking and arguing and zap of attraction that struck her whenever she saw him.
“The men in your life are exhausting,” Vanessa said.
They turned the corner and moved into the hallway leading to her apartment door. Ellie reached for her keys and nearly dropped them. “Tell me about it.”
Vanessa stopped in midstep. “What’s going on?”
Ellie’s head shot up. Her front door was open and two boxes were piled right outside in the hall. Panic surged through her as she ran to the doorway. “Hey!”
She didn’t go in. There really was no reason to since the room, her studio, stood empty except for a few stray pieces of paper and what looked like a community of dust bunnies she’d missed living under her couch.
“Did you get evicted?” Vanessa asked, her gaze zooming from one end of the room to the other.
“No.” At least she didn’t think so.
Her mind flashed to the van outside. To the packed boxes. To the movers.
Derrick.
“Good afternoon.” Jackson stepped out of her bathroom, carrying her robe.
Ellie wasn’t sure what stunned her more, him being in her apartment or the sight of him holding a ball of pink fluff in his arms. “Jackson?”
“You know him?” Vanessa asked.
“He works for Derrick. They’re friends…” Ellie didn’t know how to describe their relationship. She knew Jackson was loyal to Derrick but there was a part of her that viewed him as an ally. Or she had until this. “It’s complicated.”
“Most things with Derrick are.” Jackson put down the robe and shook Vanessa’s hand.
Vanessa stared at their joined hands then at Jackson. Finally she shrugged. “What’s happening?”
Jackson frowned. “Ellie is moving in to Derrick’s place today.”
He said the words slowly, as if he thought they were true at one time but now wasn’t sure. Ellie blamed Derrick. He had that effect on her, as well. “I didn’t agree to do that now.”
“He said…” Jackson’s frown deepened. “Wait, you guys didn’t agree today was the day? Then where did he get the key he gave me?”
“Good question.” If Ellie had to guess she’d bet he somehow convinced her landlord to turn one over. Or he bought the building and now was her landlord.
“I figured you weren’t here and weren’t packed up because Derrick told you I’d handle it.”