Page 55 of The Ruin
Brooklyn
Chapter 23
Ijust hit a car.
Heart pounding, I grip the steering wheel of my SUV and stare blankly at the light blue Prius next to me. I tried to pull into the parking space so fast, I didn’t turn enough and clipped the back end of the other car. Their taillight is smashed, the trunk slightly dented.
Jesus H. Christ. I have to calm down. My adrenaline is pumping and I can’t get my breathing under control. I haven’t checked my phone since I left the deli. Emzee kept telling me it was going to be okay, to just talk to Luka and we’d work it out. I hope she’s right.
I want the exposé fiasco to just go away. But rationally, I know it won’t happen—so we need to figure out how to do damage control. Together. That’s what we should be focusing on right now, and instead I go and hit a damn car.
My hands shake as I throw the SUV in reverse and carefully park. Then I slip out and scribble an apology, my contact info, and the number of my insurance company on the back of a receipt and tuck it under the windshield wiper. I don’t know if I should call the police to report myself, but right now this is the last thing I have the energy to deal with.
My marriage is on the line. Again. My career is on the line. Again. The Zoric family business could very well face another fallout, but this time, it’ll be because of me. I’m sure by the end of the day, it will be all over social media that I ran into someone’s car and fled the scene, too. The dirt will just keep piling up and up and up against me. By morning, I’ll be part of cancel culture. My Insta followers will abandon me, my social media standing will dry up, and I’ll never be offered another contract again.
A desperate laugh bursts out of me, but it does little to fend off the wave of panic.
The truth is, I can imagine overcoming all of these things, starting over again even if it all blows up in my face…but what I can’t imagine is recovering from the ruin of my marriage. Luka finally told me he loves me, and in a blink, it could all be gone. I keep my sunglasses on and my head down as I hurry through the parking garage and toward the elevator that will take me up to the Danica Rose offices. My skin prickles as I anticipate paparazzi jumping out from behind parked cars, snapping their cameras in my face and bombarding me with questions about my alleged betrayal of both my husband and DRM. I make it free and clear into the private elevator, then close my eyes and take a moment to calm down as the car goes up.
Time to focus.
Luka and I have absolutely got to lay all our cards out, once and for all. All these lies of omission, all the secrets—not even secrets, really. Instead it’s issues that we think we’ll take care of alone, or problems we don’t want to bother the other person with, or that we tell ourselves we’ll just put off addressing until later when there’s a better time to discuss them. This is what has ultimately built the walls between us. We haven’t been a team.
No wonder we can’t seem to get it together. We’ve been working against ourselves from the very beginning. That has to stop now. I know we can figure this out if we put our minds to it.
I’m not ready to lose him.
The office is quiet, eerily quiet, as I stride in toward the reception desk. I don’t look around. I don’t want to see anyone’s eyes on me.
It only takes a second to realize that most of the employees are probably still out to lunch. Even Yvette, the receptionist, is gone. I head down the hall in the direction of Luka’s office, but on the way there I notice his assistant Damien is in the fancy break room. He’s readingXXLmagazine as he eats takeout and sips an iced coffee. Thank God.
“Hi, Damien,” I say, popping my head in. I try to keep the panic from my voice and casually ask, “Is Luka around?”
He shrugs. “Our meeting ran late so Stefan offered to take everyone to lunch. Luka might still be in his office, though. He had a client call lined up right after.”
“Thanks.”
With that, I bolt down the hall, more thankful than ever that my husband has a private corner office where we can talk without an audience. The door is ajar, and I’m just about to knock when I hear his tense voice. Judging by the sound of it, it’s been a rocky conversation.
“I mean I can’t disagree, but that doesn’t mean we’re going to fire her,” he’s saying.
“You’re serious?” a voice I don’t recognize shoots back. “You honestly want to keep Monica on your roster after all this? I’m all for giving her the boot, truth be told.”
My stomach drops, and I go still at the mention of my nemesis.
“Just hear me out, Guy,” Luka says, and that’s when I realize he’s on the phone with the Maxilene exec who chose Monica for their huge campaign. “I know full well that Elite still has their hooks in Monica, or maybe it’s her that’s got them by the balls, but it doesn’t make a difference either way. She looks good as the face of Maxilene, and anyone who’s seen her in your products is racing to the store to buy them. Trust me, this won’t affect your bottom line.”
I tiptoe a few steps backward, still listening. It’s unbelievable that he’s fighting to keep Monica secure in her job after she pulled the rug out from under all of us. Whose side is he on?
Luka goes on, “This exposé frankly sucks and so do her ethics, but you know as well as I do that nothing in this industry is about ethics. It’s about glamour. DRM provides that glamour, and that’s the end of my involvement.”
There’s a pause as Guy seems to consider Luka’s words, but my pulse is still racing.
“Let me get this straight,” Guy says. “You don’t want Monica to face any repercussions? Because if DRM isn’t planning to take any action, I can advise the company to go full steam ahead on our end as planned. Though personally, I’d sue her ass. But that’s off the record, man.”
Luka laughs coldly. “I won’t go into detail about all the ways I’d like Monica to pay for this little stunt, but let’s face it—she’s a cash cow. She can face judgment day another time.”
Tears sting my eyes, not just at the injustice of Monica getting off scot-free after trying to sabotage my marriage and undermine the entire agency, but because my husband clearly still cares more about image and turning a profit than anything else. And what’s even worse than that? He’s right. This could sink Danica Rose. Sink everything we’ve worked for.
