“For, you know, the other day in the restaurant,” she mumbles. “I shouldn’t have… we shouldn’t have.”
“I don’t regret it,” I say with more confidence than I feel.
“Me neither,” she whispers so quietly that I almost miss it.
“Jasmine.” I don’t know what to say next.
“We can’t have anything between us,” she says immediately. “I’m just starting my career, and it’ll look so bad for me to be sleeping with the director.”
I want to argue, but I know she’s right, so I sigh and nod. “Can we at least be civil with each other? Friends, maybe?”
“I’d like that,” she says with a small smile. She finally looks up and makes eye contact with me, and my breath hitches in my throat. Before I can stop myself, I lean forward and press my lips against her softly. She doesn’t jerk away, to my surprise. She deepens the kiss with a small sigh before pulling back.
“Goodnight, Clark,” she says softly before leaving.
Chapter 4
Jasmine
“What the HELL?” I scream as I scroll through Vanessa’s phone the next morning. “This can’t be happening; please tell me I’m dreaming!” I cry out to her.
“Jazz, maybe you should just calm down,” she says, trying to soothe me and calm my anxious pacing.
“Calm down?” I flash her phone screen towards her so she can see the headline I’m currently looking at. “Do you see this, Vanessa? They think I’m a gold-digging, wannabe actress! My career is ruined before it even started!”
Venessa gets to her feet and wraps me in a hug as I sob into her chest. “The tabloids make everything look bad,” she says soothingly. “Your career is not over.” I nod against her chest, but I know she is wrong. Better actresses than me have had their careers destroyed by smaller scandals, and this is not small by any means. Somehow, the paparazzi managed to follow Clark and me last night as he dropped me off at my apartment, and by the time I woke up this morning, every gossip magazine was displaying a picture of us kissing over the center console of his car alongside an inaccurate article that accused me of sleeping my way to the top in varying formats.
This was what I had been trying to avoid last night when I told Clark that we could not have anything between us, even though my heart physically ached to say the words. Acting has always been my passion, and while the glitz and glam of the industry always appealed to me, I have never turned my head away from the darker aspects, the media and how important reputation is in this industry.
“Have you talked to him yet?” Vanessa asks when my tears finally stop flowing.
“No, I called you as soon as I saw the first headline.”
“And say what?” I sigh. “He probably doesn’t even care. I’m just the idiot that went and fell for her boss.”
“I really don’t think he doesn’t care,” Vanessa replies. “Call him. See what he says.”
I sigh and pick up my phone, knowing that Vanessa won’t let this go until I call him.
“Jasmine, I swear I will fix all of this. Please don’t be too worried.” He answers on the first ring, and the genuine concern in his voice is enough to make a fresh wave of tears spring to my eyes.
“Clark,” I say, trying my best to keep my voice steady, “I think it would be best if you found someone else to be the lead actress in light of… recent events.”
“No,” he replies firmly. “It’s you or no one. You are perfect for this role, Jasmine. Please stay calm, and I promise I will handle things.”
I don’t know how he plans on doing that, but I decide to trust him anyway.
Clark
My hands shake with the amount of rage I feel after getting off the phone with Jasmine. I am not angry at her but at the media that portrayed her to be something that she is not. The fact is that Jasmine is one of the most talented actresses I have ever encountered. She does not have to sleep with anybody to get to the top- her natural talent will do that for her.
I’ll handle things, I said to her. Well, I hope she doesn’t mind precisely how I choose to do it.
The paparazzi are on me immediately as I step out of my apartment complex, eagerly waiting to see what I have to say by calling this impromptu press conference.
“I’m here to address the picture that has been going around,” I address them in my most commanding tone. “First of all, I want every magazine or media outlet that posted any slanderous stories about Jasmine Tate to know that they have exactly twenty-four hours to take them down before we will be pressing charges. Second, my girlfriend and I are extremely private people and are not keen on sharing our personal lives with the media. But, for the sake of transparency, let it be known that we began our relationship after she got the role in our current movie and not before. That is all.”
I get into my car and drive down to Jasmine’s house immediately. The thirty-minute drive feels like a lifetime, with the only sounds being the constant buzzing of my phone with notifications.
She answers the door before I even finish knocking.
“What the hell, Clark?” she asks, pulling me in and slamming the door behind me.
“I’m not going to apologize for-” She cuts me off mid-sentence when she wraps her arms around me in a tight hug.
“Thank you,” she whispers in my ear. “Most of the articles have been taken down, and some of them even issued formal apologies.”
“It was no problem,” I murmur, wrapping my arms around her. “I told you I would handle it.”
“Yeah, you did,”
