Hollywood Prince (Hollywood Royalty 3)

After the doctor ordered me to stay on bed rest, Jeff came over and brought a male nurse to help me around the house and do things for me since I couldn’t be on my feet. Not only was this guy my shadow, but all the booze was taken out of my house like I was a child. Facing everything sober is worse than you think. Facing the pain in your chest day in and day out, thinking it’s going to get better, but instead, it gets worse, so much worse, and at times, you think your heart’s going to either come out of your chest or stop beating. I spent most of the time either on the couch or in bed, trying to shut off my mind. It replayed everything that I wanted to forget. My mind replayed everything that I missed and everything that I loved yet couldn’t have.

I got back on set, and it was go time. They had filmed pretty much everything that they could without me, and now it was crunch time. Usually I would hate it, but it made me focus on anything but her. Every single time I saw Sylvia, I wanted to ask about her, but I didn’t have the right to know anything.

Going back to Montana was not only the knife in my chest, but it was the knife being twisted. That was when the memories were the strongest. The pull toward the mountains, toward the house where I fell in love with her. I got in the car one night and drove there. Luckily, it was empty. I sat on the chair in the back without the fire lit and just let it go. Let myself have all the memories. I let myself look at the pictures, and I let my heart experience the pain I was feeling.

Every day, it felt like an elephant was sitting on my chest, and I was happy to go home, thinking that the elephant would stay there. I am sitting next to Sylvia when I hear her name, and my heart speeds up, faster and faster. I can’t even concentrate. I close my eyes, hoping that somehow I will be able to hear her voice. If I listen close enough, will I be able to hear her?

“Perfect. You can send it now. The plane takes off in an hour, so I can look it over on the plane,” Sylvia says and looks out the window, waiting for the car to come get us. “I will be back in the office Monday morning.” I wait to hear what else she will say. “Thank you, Erin. You, too.” She disconnects and then looks at her phone.

“We got the interview that Jessica did,” she tells me.

“I guess Erin can’t take care of it from New York,” I tell her, turning to look out the window.

“She isn’t in New York,” she says, and I slowly turn my head. “She’s in the L.A. office.”

“I thought after she was done with me, she was taking the job in New York?” I say, my hands suddenly clammy. She shakes her head.

“No, she turned that job down,” she says, and my mouth suddenly gets dry, my heart hammering in my chest. “She was never going to New York. I mean, at first that was her end goal, but halfway through your assignment, she emailed the team and said she wasn’t interested in relocating.”

“But I thought . . .” I start saying, and Sylvia looks over at me. “I thought she wanted the job in New York.”

She shrugs her shoulders like her answer isn’t the one that I’ve been waiting for. “No, she turned that option down when she got back from Montana.”

It can’t be is the only thing I think. It can’t be; this can’t be happening. “But . . .” I say, and I honestly can’t focus on anything except the pounding echoing in my ears from my heart. “But she was going to take New York.”

“I have no idea. It was never actually decided really,” she says and then gets up when she sees the car pull up. I walk to the car, my body going through the motions, but my head spinning. But Jennifer told me that she was going to New York. She told me that.

What the fuck did I just do? What the fuck, what the fuck, what the fuck? I don’t bother talking to anyone on the flight. I get on, go sit on the couch, and lay my head back. We land, and it’s almost eleven p.m. I get in the car and instead of going home, my car goes toward her house to see if she’s home. There aren’t any lights on, so she’s probably sleeping or out on a date. My stomach burns thinking that. I get home and walk upstairs to the guest bedroom and kick off my shoes, my feet still stinging. I lie in bed the whole night, looking up at the ceiling. The darkness outside fades into gray, then into light, and I get up, going downstairs.