Total pages in book: 196
Estimated words: 180438 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 902(@200wpm)___ 722(@250wpm)___ 601(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 180438 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 902(@200wpm)___ 722(@250wpm)___ 601(@300wpm)
Who could I have turned to when cops and men and women in high positions were involved? I would’ve probably ended up dead somewhere of an overdose that they’d fed me as had been done to so many others before me, apparently.
I learned more things about this town and the things that went on here than I think I wanted to know. I’ve always heard rumors about the underbelly of Hollywood and the industry, but this was beyond even my wildest imagination, and that was already pretty bad.
I was made to recall times in my past, things that I had done and had had done to me, only now realizing that I was just a child when most of those things occurred. I was so caught up in the fame and wanting to be part of that crowd that it never entered my mind how fucked up it was for grown men and women to share and do certain things with me and other young up-and-coming stars.
I couldn’t get the thought of my Elena being used or hurt in that way out of my mind, and though I may have given up on myself or accepted that I deserved it for being stupid, I couldn’t let it go. I can’t let go of the fact that they’d tried doing that to her. So it was for her as much as those other poor souls who weren’t as lucky that I was here, for her, that I was willing to do whatever it took to bring them all down, even if it meant losing the life I now enjoyed.
But I had to do it all without her ever knowing the danger she had been in. There were times I wanted to tell the guys to stop, that it was too much, but the new me knew that I had to endure it, that the people who had been taken were in worse places than I was even now.
Knowing that some of them were still out there living with some lech who’d paid to have them stolen made me want to go on a rampage, but what good will that do? And what purpose would it serve? It would do nothing but help me let off some steam, but in the end, the situation would still be the same.
“So, you sure you can do it? Are you up for it, kid?”
“Yeah, Mr. Lyon, I don’t have much of a choice, do I?”
“I told you, it’s just Lyon, lose the mister.” He hadn’t calmed down once since we arrived, and I wondered how the guy could keep that same energy from beginning to end.
“I’m only worried about Elena; how am I going to do all this without her finding out what’s going on? I don’t want to lie to her, but I can’t let her know about this or about what almost happened to her.”
“We’ve already told you she’ll be too busy to pay attention to what you’re doing.”
“Yeah, I get that part, but now you’re telling me that I have to keep on pretending, that I have to go back to that house and talk to those people as if I know nothing.”
“It’s the only way for it to work. We need you to keep up appearances. The people they work with don’t use their names. They all show up as numbers and symbols or some such crap. If we want to rescue the women they’ve already taken, then we have no other recourse but to use you. If the only thing you’re worried about is how to handle your woman, that’s good; we’ll come up with something you can tell her that won’t give too much away.”
I didn’t see Elena accepting any scenario where I had to go back to living with Janie. “Shit, shouldn’t I have been to the hospital by now?”
“Haven’t you noticed she hasn’t called? I doubt she wants you seeing her like that.” Tyler had a point, but I still had to make some kind of an appearance, or there would be questions.
Though the old staff was gone, wouldn’t it look strange if I didn’t show some kind of interest in where my wife had gone? No one knew about the divorce, and it looks as if I’m going to have to put off revealing what I had done for a while. As much as it pained me to accept, there didn’t seem to be any other way to do things than to leave things as they were. But the thought of disappointing Elena once again was not sitting well with me.
In the end, I made up my mind that since this was something I had to do, something I was sure she would want me to do if she knew I stopped stressing the point and tried to come up with something to tell her as long as it wasn’t a lie.