When I woke up in my car on the UCLA campus, there was a note congratulating me on my next blockbuster film. That was before I was a megastar. Before I made that crucial transition from the world of child actors into the world of the professionals.
So I went to my father. The great Adam Asher. And the whole thing disappeared.
Until DeeDee was found dead and I received a package in the mail a few days after her death that had the original footage of the movie they made with me, plus more. Plus a lot more. The NDA I signed and dozens of videos of Frankie Miller beating the shit out of her, demanding to know where she was hiding the film they made of me. It felt like a call to action. Like I should avenge DeeDee’s death for her because she held out. She played ball with my father’s offer and refused to give Miller the film.
But I didn’t give her the same respect back. I never showed those films to anyone. I didn’t want to be involved in this tragedy in any way. I was hopeful that the tide was changing with my career. I had been called in to read for three very big films, all of which fell through, but at the time it all seems so promising.
I didn’t want to fuck it up. I didn’t want to care about her. And I certainly didn’t want to help her. She got what she deserved. I couldn’t even fathom why she’d sent that package to me, of all people. Why me?
I figured she was setting me up again. I mean, that’s a legitimate reaction. That incident changed my whole outlook on life. And not in a good way. I stopped looking for girlfriends and started looking for sex. I ran with that nondisclosure idea I was introduced to, and made every girl I fucked sign one.
Carey Keefe picked up the story of poor, ousted Frankie Miller and became his champion. After a long wait for trial and with the help of a top-notch legal team, the charges were eventually dropped. Six weeks later, DeeDee’s death was ruled a suicide.
Carey is suddenly right up in my face. “Because why, Vaughn?”
I only have one out at this point. The truth. “You need to believe me, Carey. That I’m not doing this to ruin you. I’m doing this because it’s the right thing to do.”
She snorts. “How would you have the ability to ruin me? I think it’s the other way around.”
I lean down in her ear and whisper, “Because you’re in those films too.”
Her face goes white. “What films?”
“The ones DeeDee sent to me before she died.”
“What’s going on here?” Amy asks a stone-faced Carey.
Carey puts up a hand to silence Amy, and then proceeds. “You ruin lives, Vaughn Asher. You stomp all over women like they are things. Just watch everyone.”
And then she throws her arms out in a flourish and the screen changes. There’s a line of women.
“My name is Jasinda Gonzales and I’m a victim of Vaughn Asher.”
“My name is Sandy Delaney and I’m a victim of Vaughn Asher.”
Chapter Twenty-Three
#AndAPrincessShallLeadThem
THEY go on and on like that. Dozens of them. And as much as I love my husband, this does make me pause. Because this is who he was before we were married. Everything they’re saying about him is true.
I know this because he used the same words on me. He asked me to do the very same things. It was Yes, Master. It was sitting at his feet. It was being hand-fed tiny morsels of meat. It was signing a non-disclosure agreement. All of that is true.
Vaughn stands quietly as the film ends and then two more curtains are raised to reveal all the women who just spoke out.
Vaughn walks up to one of the girls and looks her in the eyes. “Did you get anything out of our relationship, Terry?”
She shrugs.
“Money? I recall giving you about seventy-five thousand dollars before we called it quits. You wanted a condo in Miami with a beach view. Done, correct?”
She stands perfectly still.
He moves on to the next girl and repeats his questions. “How about you, Lisa? You wanted your student loans paid off? I did that.” He moves on to the next girl. “And this one, she was a one-night stand. There was no agreement. There was no Master. There was none of this that they are claiming.”
“So I don’t count?” the girl asks him.
“Do you want me to lie?”
She turns and walks away.
“They’re not people to you, Vaughn Asher. They are things to be used and thrown away,” that editor for Buzz Hollywood tells my husband.
“You’re wrong,” he says with conviction. “They were possessions, but only in the sense that I felt obligated to care for them while they were in this specific arrangement with me.”
“You make me sick,” the reporter seethes. “You killed my sister. You made her so depressed she took her own life. And then you accused her boyfriend of abuse and murder.”
Vaughn says nothing to that.
“Grace!” the girl calls out. And everyone turns to find the blonde woman Vaughn came in with. “Where did she go?”
I look around along with everyone else, but the girl in the houndstooth suit is nowhere to be found.
“Put her movie back on,” the editor woman shouts.
The film of me was a teenager is back up for all to see. I can’t believe they are showing this. As much as I hate the fact that my husband was that person this woman describes, and as confused as I am about this other stuff with this DeeDee person, there is no good reason to have this disgusting footage of my kidnapping on display.
“Take it down right now, Carey,” Vaughn says calmly.