Free Forever, Jack by Natasha Boyd Page B

sun spilled around her, and the ocean breeze was sifting through her hair.
    She’d spotted a sea turtle nest and was pointing it out and all I could think about was wrapping her back up in my arms and working out ways to persuade her to spend the whole day in bed with me. I loved the surprise and wonder in her eyes, mingled with her knowing smile that told me she knew what she could do to me, even while she looked unsure. And I loved her gasps and moans and how she suddenly became an expert at taking me from zero to sixty so I had to perform mental gymnastics just to keep from exploding into a hurricane of frantic want.
    Instead, I’d wrapped my arms around her and tucked her small body against my bare chest, settling for asking her to come to California. Planting a seed for a future. I could get though the next phase of my life knowing Keri Ann would be at the end of it.
    And some asshole had taken that private moment and turned it ugly. And Audrey had seen it, too.
    “Anyway, Sunshine,” Sheila rasps from the phone I’ve pulled away from my ear. “You better get your ass over to my office so we can get a statement together before she presses the button on this. She’s going to say she lost the baby from grief over you having an affair, and that’s why she sought comfort from her director. She has a tag on your toe, buddy. The timing of it all is irrelevant, she’ll say those pictures were taken whenever it suits her story, although I’m assuming they were taken the last time you went off the grid and drove me mental.”
    Sheila never pauses for breath.
    I head down to the beach so I can think and breathe.
    She goes on, “She also has footage of you assaulting some guy in a nightclub. Says she’s afraid of you. I’ve told Duane it’s bullshit, it’s not even you in the video, but as you know that’s also kind of irrelevant at this point. Where are you, anyway?”
    I make it out onto the sand, it’s almost high tide. I close my eyes for a second. “It is me in that video. And I’m in South Carolina.”
    “Fuck me sideways. Can you make my day any worse?”
    I snort. “Probably, just give me time.”
    “How about after I navigate this mess with the least amount of dings to your persona, we re-negotiate our contract?”
    “Fine.”
    “I’ll take that as written in blood. Now, how soon can you get back here?”
    I think about everything Audrey is threatening. It’s bad. It doesn’t take a genius to figure that out. The public loves a good scandal. The more convoluted the better. And in the end she is threatening Keri Ann, too. Her privacy. Her reputation. Everything.
    I conjure the image of what I’ve just seen at the gallery in my mind’s eye. This is the first of many great things to come for Keri Ann Butler. As long as I don’t ruin it. If I do, she’ll no longer be Keri Ann Butler, Artist … she’ll be my latest conquest and tabloid fodder. The saying there’s no such thing as bad publicity is a crock. For her, there would be. Forevermore, people would assume she became well-known due to her association with me. She’d be stuck in whatever seedy story Audrey spun for eternity. I can’t honestly think of anything worse. For anyone.
    “Give me a second.” I waffle between heading back immediately and doing an amended version of what I came here for. Seeing her. But, I can’t go and face Keri Ann’s disappointment in me, and at the same time risk blowing up her entire life. I can’t be that selfish. It’s one thing if I ’m going down in flames, but how can I take someone else with me? How can I take her with me? Who knows what story would be spun, what lies would be seeded? I wouldn’t put anything past Audrey. It still stuns me how little I know her.
    I take a deep lungful of cool ocean air and open my eyes to the beach. It’s midafternoon and warm for December. I’d love to just run right now and clear my head. Feel the rough sand and surf on the soles of my feet. Then when I was