Falling for the Bridesmaid

She glanced up at the screen; Rose and Will’s plane had landed at last. She needed to find her sister and her best friend.

And then she needed to go home and find Tom.

CHAPTER NINETEEN

GOD, WHAT A DAY. Tom had been surprised when Rick had called him into his studio, and stunned when he’d insisted on doing an interview right now.

But the material he’d got was golden.

‘I think, whenever you lose someone close to you, you always wonder if there was something more you could have done. Some small thing that would have kept them with you.’ Rick shook his head, staring down at his hands. ‘With Jez...knowing that I really could have done more—that I could have saved him if he’d let me, if he’d just called. That’s going to be hard to live with. As is the guilt. Wondering if I should have seen the signs sooner, should have taken more precautions.’

Tom swallowed before asking his next question, reminding himself that today Rick was a subject, not a friend, not the father of the woman he was in love with. That he was here to do a job—one Rick had hired him for. That meant not shying away from the hard questions.

‘Do you think...were there signs? Ones that you missed?’

Rick sighed. ‘Probably. But, then again, maybe not. When an addiction takes hold...sometimes it can be a slow build towards cracking again, but more often it can just be one moment, one instant that flips you from recovering to addict again. There’s such a thin line...and sometimes Jez liked to walk it. To put himself in the way of temptation.’ He shook his head again. ‘I don’t know. If he wanted to hide it from me, he knew how. And with everything that’s been going on here the last few months...maybe I wasn’t paying the attention that I should have been.’

Guilt was etched in Rick’s craggy face, whatever his words. Tom knew that guilt. That was the sort that never went away, the type you could never make up for once that moment had passed, the opportunity had been missed.

Rick Cross would blame himself for his best friend’s death for the rest of his life, whether there was anything he could have done to prevent it or not. Facts didn’t matter here, only love.

‘Dad?’ The door to the studio creaked open and Violet appeared through it. ‘Rose and Will are here. And...have you seen...?’ She trailed off as she caught sight of him. Tom gave her an apologetic smile, hoping she wasn’t too mad about him missing the airport run. He’d planned to talk to her about it, but Rick had been very insistent that the interview was happening now or not at all.

‘They’re here?’ Rick wiped his cheeks with the back of his hands and jumped to his feet. ‘Sorry, Tom. We’ll do this later, yeah?’

But Violet wasn’t looking at her dad. She was still staring at Tom. And he had a horrible feeling that this might just have been his last interview with Rick Cross.

‘I’m sorry I couldn’t come to the airport with you,’ Tom said as Rick shut the door behind him. ‘Was it okay?’

‘What were you talking to Dad about just then?’ Violet’s tone was clipped and her gaze sharp. ‘Never mind; I’d rather hear it anyway.’ She held out a hand for his phone and, with a sense of foreboding, Tom handed it over.

‘He asked me to come in here,’ he said as she fiddled with the settings. ‘He wanted to talk about some things with me now, while they were still fresh. He said you’d asked him about going on stage for the concert and he wasn’t sure. He still needed to work some things out. He thought doing the interview might help.’

He sounded as if he was making excuses, Tom knew, when he had nothing to excuse. He’d been doing his job—and trying to help Rick at the same time. And Violet, for that matter, if it helped him get back on stage for the Benefit.

She had absolutely no reason to be mad at him, and yet he was pretty damn sure she was.

Violet pressed play and Rick’s voice filled the room, cracked and broken and distraught.

‘I think, whenever you lose someone close to you, you always wonder if there was something more you could have done. Some small thing that would have kept them with you. With Jez...knowing that I really could have done more—that I could have saved him, if he’d let me, if he’d just called. That’s going to be hard to live with. As is the guilt. Wondering if I should have seen the signs sooner, should have taken more precautions.’

Violet jabbed a finger at the phone and the voice stopped.

‘This is why you came, isn’t it?’ she said, her voice too even, too calm. ‘I think I forgot that, with...everything that happened between us. But you were only ever here to do a job, weren’t you? To find out all the dirty little secrets in the closets of my family and friends and put them on display for the world to see. Uncle Jez said—’ She broke off, and Tom could see her hands trembling as she held his phone. He wanted to go to her so much it burned. ‘He told my dad to find a better closet to hide those skeletons in. But in the end, he was the biggest story you could have hoped for, wasn’t he? You must have been so frustrated to miss all the drama of Daisy’s wedding, and then Rose’s too. But at least there was still one sister here for you to get close to and seduce. And then Uncle Jez overdosed in Dad’s car and you realised you had the story of the century right here. An interview with a grief-stricken Rick Cross. All you had to do was make sure none of the other journalists got to him first.’ She gulped back a sob, and the sound broke his heart. ‘And to think I thought you were doing us a favour, turning them all away.’

‘Violet, no. You’re wrong.’ She had to be wrong. None of this had been planned—least of all the part where he fell for her. ‘I told you. I’m not that kind of journalist.’ He just had to reason with her. She was upset, and that was understandable, but she’d come round once she calmed down and saw the truth. That was all. He just had to be patient and not lose his temper and everything would be fine. ‘Your dad asked me to come here; you know that. And he asked for the interview today.’ He stepped closer, reaching out for her, but she flinched away. ‘And I know you’ve had bad experiences before so I understand why you might be a bit sensitive—’

‘A bit sensitive?’

Tom winced. ‘Bad choice of words. I mean, I can see why you might worry about these things. But you don’t need to. I’m not like your ex. I’m one of the good guys.’

‘Yeah?’ Violet’s expression tightened. ‘And is that what you told Kristy Callahan?’

The bottom dropped out of Tom’s lungs, leaving him fighting to suck in the air he needed to respond. Just the sound of her name sent the guilt crashing in waves over his shoulders and, in that moment, he knew just how Rick felt. Worse, because Rick hadn’t actually done anything wrong. Whereas he had known exactly what he was doing and had done it anyway.

God, Violet was right. He was every bit as bad as her ex; he just hid it better.

‘How did you...? Never mind.’ It didn’t matter now, anyway. She knew, and that was enough. ‘I can explain. Will you listen to me?’

Violet barked a laugh, harsh and uncompromising. ‘Listen to you? I don’t even need to, Tom. I know exactly what you’re going to say. That she knew what she was doing. She was a celebrity; she knew the score, and the risks. That it was different then—that she meant nothing to you. That I’m different...we’re different. If you’re really desperate, you’ll probably trot out the love line. How being with me has changed you, that now you love me you could never do something like that again.’

The vitriol and bitterness in her words was sharp enough to cut, and the worst part was that she was right. He’d tell her anything to win her back right now. And she’d never believe it was because he truly did love her.

She’d never believe anything he ever said again.

But he still had to try.

‘It was a mistake. I was just starting out and the paper I worked for... I didn’t take those photos; you have to believe that much. I wouldn’t do that.’

‘No, you’d just syndicate them in papers and news outlets around the world.’ Her mouth tightened again. ‘T

his was the real reason you fell out with your mother, isn’t it? This was what she couldn’t forgive.’

‘Yes. It was. But...it wasn’t like you think.’ He had to find some way to make her understand. She might never trust him again, and his chances of getting her to fall in love with him were non-existent now. He’d thought he had time, and now he was scrambling just to make her believe he wasn’t the biggest scumbag on the planet.

Which, given some of his past actions, was a lot harder than he’d like.

‘Really, Tom? You’re going to try and tell me what it was like?’ She gave him a mocking half smile. ‘Trust me, I know. I lived it, after all.’

No. He wouldn’t let her think that he was just like her ex. He’d made a mistake, sure, but he hadn’t planned it. Hadn’t deliberately set out to destroy that girl. And she had to know that.

‘It’s not the same. Violet, you have to listen to me—’

‘No! I don’t! Not any more. I listened to you, right from that first night. And I should have known better. I knew what you were, and I knew how this would end. I should never have let you in, never let you close.’ She shook her head sadly. ‘You said it the night we met. I was never anything more than the Sex Tape Twin to you. Someone you could use to get what you wanted because I didn’t matter at all. I’m just a punchline, right? Just a grainy video on the internet for late night comedians to use to get a cheap laugh, even all these years later.’

How could she think that? After everything they’d shared, after the way they’d been together?

‘You know the worst part?’ Violet asked. ‘I actually trusted you. All that talk about never trusting anyone outside my family and I just let you in. Because you were nice to me.’ She laughed, low and bitter. ‘How desperate must I have been? God, you must have thought you had it made.’

Anger rolled through his body, working its way up through his chest and finding its way out of his mouth before he could even think to censor his words.

‘You talk about trust? If you trusted me one iota you’d listen to me. You’d let me explain. You’d trust me enough not to jump to the worst conclusion at the first sign of trouble.’ Violet stepped back at the force of his words, and he wanted to feel bad about that but he couldn’t find it in himself. ‘How did you even find out about that story? Did you go hunting for a reason to put between us? Or did someone tip you off?’ The faint splash of pink that coloured her cheeks told him that he’d hit the mark. ‘Who was it? Rose? Or another reporter?’ The obvious truth slammed into him and he almost laughed at the ridiculousness of it. ‘It was him, wasn’t it? After everything he did to you, you still trust his word over mine.’