CHAPTER TWO
It was just another frigid day in hell as far as Aidan O'Conner was concerned. Nothing ever changed and he liked it that way.
At least that was what he was hoping for until his cell phone started ringing. Picking it up from his breakfast counter, he looked at the ID. He started not to answer it, but it was his agent, Mori, and if he didn't answer Mori would worry him like a neurotic puppy with a urinary tract infection needing to go piss in the snow.
Definitely not what he needed in his life or, more importantly, in his current mood.
Aidan flipped the phone open with his chin as he simultaneously turned down his stereo, which was playing his Bauhaus CD. "Hi, Mori."
"Oh, Aidan, there you are. I've been worried about you."
Yeah, right. The only thing Mori ever worried about was where his next check was coming from. The bastard was just like everyone else Aidan had ever known. Greedy, self-serving, narcissistic, and wanting a piece of Aidan's flesh.
Just the sound of his whiny voice telling Aidan what to do made him all warm and toasty inside.
"I have another offer for you, A. They're up to thirty-five million dollars plus a significant share of the profits, and believe me, with the costars in this movie there will be enough profits to make even a Scrooge like you smile."
Aidan remembered a time when he would have choked and died at such an offer. A time when that kind of money had seemed like an unimaginable dream.
And like all his dreams, that one too had been brutally shattered.
"I told you I'm not interested."
Mori scoffed. "Of course you're interested."
"No, Mori, I'm not."
"Oh, come on, you can't keep hiding out on top of your little mountain. Sooner or later you have to come back to the real world. And this will be the perfect comeback. Think of how much money you'd be throwing away if you say no."
Aidan flipped the CD to the song "Crowds" and let it remind him of why he had no interest in going back to Hollywood... or anywhere outside of Knob Creek, Tennessee, for that matter. He didn't like people and he hated the thought of ever doing another movie.
"Thanks, but no thanks. With a hundred million dollars in my bank accounts, I don't ever have to come back to reality again."
Mori made a deep sound of disgust in the back of his throat. "Damn it to hell, Aidan. You've been gone from the scene so long you're lucky anyone is wanting you at any price. Even the tabloids have forgotten you at this point."
"Really?" he said, glancing down at the stack on his coffee table that he'd picked up a week ago when he'd been in the supermarket. His face was plastered all over them. "Funny, but I seem to be the talk of the tabloids. They're speculating on everything from whether I had a disfiguring car wreck to being kidnapped by aliens or an insane fan, to my favorite of all-which claims I'm having a sex change operation at a Swedish clinic. I particularly like the Photoshopped picture of me in a dress. At least I look better than Klinger, huh? But in all honesty, I'd like to think I'd look more like Alexis Mead fromUgly Betty than this hairy yeti they have me pictured as."
Mori cursed again. "You're really not playing with me, are you? This isn't a stunt to get more money from the studio. You really are serious about retiring."
"Yeah, Mori. I'm through. I just want to go back to being a plain, normal guy that no one knows."
Mori snorted. "It's too late for that. There's not a person in the world over the age of two days who doesn't know the name and face of Aidan O'Conner. Christ, you were on more magazine covers than the president."
And that was why he had no intention of leaving his mountain top except for food, beer, and maybe once a year to get laid... then again, given all he'd been through, he might consider using blow-up dolls instead-some of the ones he'd found online were getting seriously high tech. "You're not helping your case. Besides, I thought they'd all forgotten me."
Even over the phone, he could hear Mori blustering in his office. "You know better. I don't get you, man, I really don't. You could own the world if you wanted to. It's yours for the taking."
As if Aidan cared about that... What good was owning the world when he'd have no choice except to defend himself against every person in it? Personally, he'd rather be a beggar with one true friend than a prince surrounded by two-faced assassins.
"I'm hanging up now, Mor. Talk to you later." Aidan clicked the phone off and tossed it back to the counter where it landed oh another photo of him in a bad wig and a dress. God, he remembered when a lie like that would have sent him off on a rage that would have lasted for days.
But that was before the betrayal that had cut so deep it had destroyed every sensitive nerve in his body. Unlike the firestorm he'd been through, these attacks weren't personal and they weren't directed at him by people he'd once called family. These attacks were all highly laughable.
He flicked the lid off his beer and held it up to the photos of his "family" that he kept on his mantel next to his five Oscars. "Fuck you all very much," he said snidely.
But in the end, he knew the truth. He was the only one who'd been royally screwed. He'd put his trust in all the wrong people and now he was left alone to deal with the devastation they'd foisted on him-because he'd dared to love them more than he'd loved himself.
Life was nothing if not pain and he was the king of it.
Two years ago, he'd lived and died for those assholes on the mantel. Had given freely to them, hand over fist, wanting them to have a better life than the hell he'd known growing up.
And even though he'd given all but his life to them, it hadn't been enough. They'd been deceitful and selfish. Unsatisfied with his extravagant gifts, they'd begun taking, and when he'd dared to question them about their theft, they'd gone after the only thing he'd had left.
His reputation and livelihood.
Yeah, people were sick and he was tired of the Judases around him. His days of being used by others for what they could suck out of him were over.