He recalled Carmen’s words from the scene on the steps.Opening up, letting people in, even if it’s just to carry the burden of the knowledge.
“I have to call my lawyer,” he said. If there was any possibility of getting the photos pulled—for Yadiel’s safety—he had to try.
As for Jasmine, he didn’t know how to make this right. Didn’t know if he could. But he had more important things to deal with at the moment.
She found him in his dressing room just as he was hanging up with his agent.
He froze when he saw her at the door, all the things he wanted to say backing up in his throat.
He knew her well enough now to know her moods, and she wasfurious. Her eyes blazed, and she stormed past him into the room.
He quickly shut the door behind her. “Jasmine, I—”
“First step: context.” She cut him off and held up one finger, as if counting. “You had sex with me. You told me something that made me think you trusted me, and then I had to find outyet againfrom afucking magazine”—she shook a copy ofBuzz Weeklyat him so violently the cover tore—“that a guy I was screwing had lied to me.”
“I didn’t lie to you.” The words tasted sour in his mouth. All the times he’d omitted Yadiel from their conversations flashed in his mind. Fuck, he hated that she was right. Hated that he’d done the same thing to her as that pendejo McIntyre.
“Well, you sure didn’t tell me the whole truth, did you?” Her tone dripped with sarcasm and she held up a second finger. “Step two: communication. Your turn.”
She tossed the magazine at him and he caught it by reflex. The cheap paper crumpled in his hand. If he hadn’t already ripped up a copy earlier, he would have done so now.
She wanted communication? He didn’t even know where to begin, and he was too stressed out from the calls with his lawyer, his agent, his former boss in Miami, and his father to figure it out.
He’d kept everything related to Yadiel locked inside him for so long. The revelation should have been like opening a dam. Instead it was like pulling teeth.
Then, before he could think of what to tell her, she gasped. Her jaw dropped and she said, in a hushed voice, “Oh my god. This is why.”
“Why what?” he repeated irritably. Unable to stand holdingit any longer, he tossed the magazine into the garbage can under his desk.
“This is why you don’t fuck your costars.” Jasmine’s eyes widened as she put it all together. “You worked with her, didn’t you? On a telenovela.”
The reference to Yadiel’s mother had his stomach dropping like he’d just fallen ten stories on a roller coaster. Panic made his voice tight. “I’m not telling you who—”
“Did I ask?” Her voice was sharp with anger. “No, I didn’t. And while I do respect your privacy, I also think someone who isallowing you to enter their bodydeserves a modicum of respect and trust as well. We got close, and you hid a major aspect of your life from me. And don’t even try to tell me this wasjust sexbecause you and I both know goddamn well it was more than that.”
Her words were like a kick in the gut, because she was right. Nothing between them had been “just” anything. But he couldn’t tell her that now.
He shoved a hand through his hair, ruining forty-five minutes of the stylist’s work in half a second. “I wasn’t just hiding it fromyou.”
“Is that supposed to make me feel better?” Her voice was high with outrage and disbelief, and something else. Coño, he’d hurt her. “Ashton, I’ve dated enough guys who didn’t care about me to know that you do. And honestly? That only makes it worse.”
On that, she spun on her heel and left, but not before he heard the crack in her voice, or saw the tears in her eyes.
All of his instincts screamed at him to go after her, to beg her to come back and let him explain. Her pain cut him to the core, made worse by knowing he’d caused it, however inadvertently.
This was so much worse than dumping a coffee on her. And it couldn’t be fixed with a simple apology and a few cups of Café Bustelo either.
But what was there to say? She was right. He’d had his chance to tell her about Yadiel on his own terms, and he hadn’t taken it.
Whatever hope they’d had as a couple was gone now. And it was all his fault.
WHEN THE DAYfrom hell finally ended, Jasmine called Riley on the ride to the hotel. Her agent said all the right things about howall press is good press, but Jasmine could barely take it in.
Tanya sent a slew of texts to schedule interviews to capitalize on the media attention and do damage control, but Jasmine couldn’t focus on them.
Michelle and Ava waited for her in the hotel lobby when she arrived, with bottles of wine and fancy chocolate and a giant margarine tub full of their grandmother’s arroz con pollo. They took her upstairs to her room, hid her phone, and said all the right things about howhe should have told her, but as soon as they left, Jasmine crawled into bed with her phone and kept searching for what people were saying about them.
It wasn’t healthy, and she knew it, but she couldn’t stop.Sure, she got that celebrity gossip could be fun and intriguing, but god, did people have to be somean?
