TJ leaned his elbow on his knee and held his chin like they were heading in the exact direction he wanted. “Seems to be her MO, though, no? Running from suchsituations.”
Olivia uncomfortably shifted in her seat at the reminder, again, that they’d watched all their interactions in the house, minus the pantry, including every one in which she and Chuck had discussed her reflex to flee emotional turmoil. A feeling of vulnerable exposure burned her face.
“Tell me more about last night,” TJ said with a scheming note in his voice. “Why was it so emotional?”
Chuck folded his arms over his chest. “Because you forced us to tell my parents the truth.”
“About your breakup.”
“Yes.”
“And why didn’t they already know?”
Chuck sighed, seemingly annoyed that they were going to analyze everything that had happened. Olivia couldn’t blame him. “Because I didn’t want to disappoint them. They love Olivia and clearly have a lot invested in our relationship.”
“So you lied to them.”
“Yes.”
“The same way you lied to them about losing your job?”
“Yes—and for the same reason, before you ask.”
“Hmm,” TJ hummed thoughtfully. “You’re very protective of the people you care about, Chuck.” He let a silence stretch. In it, Chuck straightened his posture and tugged on his collar. His sudden fidgeting put Olivia on edge.
“Yes,” he said plainly. “I am.”
TJ looked at him with a thoughtful if not sinister purse of his lips. “On that note, how much does Olivia know about the reason you got fired?”
Olivia’s heart shot up into her throat. She hadn’t been present when he’d told his parents last night, so she didn’t know what he might have said on camera.
Chuck fidgeted more. He’d begun to sweat, Olivia saw when she glanced at him. “She knows enough,” he said through tight lips.
TJ considered him again. “Hmm. I don’t think that’s exactly true, is it.”
Olivia froze in fear, wondering if they were going to drop another challenge on them and force him to confess right there on camera or pay.
TJ reached for his iPad sitting on the table, and Oliviabristled. Nothing good ever came from the iPad. “Now, I know you’re cut off from the world in here what with no internet or television, so I think it’s safe to assume you haven’t seen today’s news, right?”
Olivia and Chuck swapped a nervous look.
“What news?” Chuck asked.
TJ grinned a sinister sneer and swiped the tablet. When he flipped it around to a screenshot of a tabloid headline and photo, Olivia’s vision momentarily blurred out of focus from dread.Secrets from the Set, the headline read, and where she might have expected to see another unflattering photo of her and Chuck, she saw Chuck and…someone else.
“What is that?” Chuck asked, and all but lunged across the table to reach for it.
TJ yanked it out of his reach and instead handed it to Olivia. “Something I think Olivia needs to see.”
He shoved it into her hands, and she could not rearrange the shock on her face as she read.
New photos from the set ofSafe Gambleemerge in the wake of Chuck Walsh’s recent firing. The disgraced actor who is currently filming an episode ofName Your Priceafter a video of his breakup with now ex-girlfriend Olivia Martin—notably not the woman in these photos—went viral is seen here with a production assistant identified as Madison Bilton. The timeline of events tells us these photos were taken before the viral breakup video. What exactly was happening on that movie set?
Olivia swiped to the next screen and found three photos that ripped her heart right in half.
The first showed Chuck and a pretty blond girl with silky mermaid hair sharing an embrace. His arm was hooked around her shoulders, and her face was partially hidden behind the swell of his biceps. Neither of them was smiling but rather looked like they were sharing a private, intimate, yet serious moment. The second could have been taken moments before or after the first. They stood in nearly the same position facing each other, except this time Chuck’s hand cupped the crown of her shoulder, and her head tilted back in a laugh. Chuck was smiling, and the sight of it, his easy, gorgeous smile pointed at this stranger, flared a wicked, ugly insecurity inside Olivia.
The third photo was of her from that day on the sidewalk. A still from the fight that managed to capture her looking as betrayed and angry as she suddenly felt.