When Madison didn’t move, Chelsea clucked her tongue and clomped back over to grab her and pull her inside. “Maddy, chill. She’s not mad at you. Well, she won’t be in a minute.”
Madison still looked unsure as Chelsea hauled her over the threshold.
Olivia shut her front door and turned in a slow daze, still trying to make sense of things. “Chelsea, aren’t you supposed to be at art camp?”
“Yes, but Chuck told me what happened at the house, andyou’re not answering any of our texts, so I figured a face-to-face conversation was the best move here. Hello,” she said, and awkwardly waved at Mansi and Grandma Ruby.
“Oh, um, this is my grandma Ruby and my best friend Mansi,” Olivia said. “This is Chuck’s sister, and um…Sorry, why are you here?”
“Nice to meet you both,” Chelsea said, not deterred in the least and still in command. “Olivia, we should sit down.” She directed Olivia to her own couch and pushed her down. She and Madison then stood in front of her on the other side of her coffee table like they were going to stage a living room skit.
“Chels, what’s going on?” Olivia asked.
She wrung her hands and shot Maddy a look. Maddy looked back, biting her bottom lip, and nodded in some kind of final consent. “Okay, so, bit of a story, but here goes—and I have to be the one to tell you because Maddy and my brother had to sign NDAs. Fortunately, Maddy told me the whole story as it was happening and before there was any paperwork in place, so I don’t think we’re breaking any rules, but don’t quote me on that.”
Olivia flinched in surprise, shocked to learn there truly was a legal barrier withholding the truth. She glanced at Mansi, who shrugged with wide eyes. Olivia took it as permission to allow Chelsea to continue.
“Okay,” Olivia said.
Chelsea took a big breath and dove in. “Maddy and I are roommates at school. She’s my best friend. I’m an art major, she’s a film major; we are kind of peanut butter and jelly. Anyway, she wanted experience in the film industry, and I was like, ‘Hey, my brother is an actor. Let me help you out.’ So I asked Chuck for a favor. He was working onSafe Gambleand waswilling to lend a hand because he’s awesome like that. So, he hooks her up with a PA job on set, and it was great, right, Maddy?”
Now that Olivia could see Madison in person and not a grainy tabloid photo, she could see how young she was. Both of them were. Mere girls living in a world that wanted them to be women. Maddy swallowed hard and looked like it took great strength to speak. “Yeah, it was great,” she said, and tucked a strand of her silky mermaid hair behind her ear. Something brittle and fragile hovered over her surface. Cracks that exposed a faded light glowing underneath.
Chelsea nodded and reached out for her hand as if to infuse her with more strength. The power of their friendship was on full, shimmering display. Olivia could feel it in her bones. “It was great until it wasn’t. Turns out Richard Sykes is an assface and started hitting on Maddy during the first week.”
Maddy’s face hardened, and Olivia felt her heart drop.
“Chuck became like a big brother to me,” Maddy said quietly. “I don’t have any siblings, and I’ve never really had anyone to…” Her voice trailed off in a pained pinch that Olivia knew well. She was almost certain her sentence ended withlook out for me. Maddy sniffed.
Chelsea continued. “He noticed she was struggling on set. She was spending so much time avoiding Richard that she kept messing up. Forgetting things, missing meetings, making mistakes. She accidentally brought Duncan Miles a regular latte instead of a soy latte one day, and he almost had a stroke.”
Olivia had heard rumors that Duncan Miles, Sexiest Man Alive three times over and costar ofSafe Gamble, was a bit of a diva, so she could believe it.
“Chuck asked her what was wrong one day, and the truthcame spilling out,” Chelsea went on. “She told him everything.” She gave Maddy’s hand another squeeze. “Things had escalated with Richard by then. He wasn’t just hitting on her. He was following her, touching her, finding ways to be alone with her.” Her voice took on a protective anger that pierced Olivia right in the heart. “She didn’t know what to do—she didn’t want to lose the job. It was the first opportunity she’d ever had in the industry, and, I mean, he wasRichard Sykes. She couldn’t be the girl who blew the whistle on him, not that anyone would have believed her anyway…” She bitterly trailed off, and Olivia could see where this story was going.
“You told Chuck all that?” She directed her question at Maddy.
Maddy nodded and gave her a knowing if not slightly guilty look.
“Yes, she did,” Chelsea confirmed.
The pieces sliding into place made Olivia feel foolish for her previous thoughts: her suspicions that Chuck had ever been anything but unflinchingly faithful—to her and to everyone he cared about. She cleared her throat and realized the young woman in front of her had been through hell and didn’t deserve even an ounce of her anger.
“And I assume Chuck confronted Richard?” Olivia asked with a grimace.
Maddy pursed her lips and nodded again.
Chelsea let go of her grip and gestured with her hands out. “But not like what you think, Liv. I mean, that jerk totally deserves to be punched in the face, let’s be honest, but Chuck just tried to talk to him. He was only standing up for Maddy, and Richard went on a power trip and told him he couldn’t work with someone trying to undermine him, and he fired him.Chuck tried to say he’d go to the press, but Richard told him if he did that, he’d tell everyone Maddy had come on to him.” She glanced over at her friend, who was tangling her fingers in knots.
Olivia’s heart was in a knot.
Chelsea rounded the coffee table to sit on the couch beside her. “Liv,that’swhy Chuck got fired. He stood up for Maddy when it mattered, and Richard used his sway to cover it all up and make Chuck look like the bad guy. On top of that, he already felt awful for getting Maddy the job and exposing her to harassment—even though he had no idea it was going to happen—and he didn’t want to make things worse. So he just rolled over and took it. Richard paid them both not to say anything and made them sign NDAs as part of it. That’s why Chuck literally couldn’t tell you, and of course he wasn’t going to say it on camera at the house. Those asshole producers knew exactly what they were doing by showing you the photos and trying to make him talk about it, even if they didn’t know the truth either.”
Olivia gaped in shock, trying to wrap her mind around the key pieces. One piece jumped out at her. “Wait, Chuck was paid off? Then where’s the money?”
Chelsea and Maddy swapped a loaded look. “My college tuition,” Chelsea said.
Olivia reeled in awe of this man’s selflessness. He’d given up a career-defining movie for Maddy by trying to do the right thing, and he’d used the hush money he’d been forced to take to pay for his sister’s school when he himself was otherwise broke. How fortunate they all were to be in the small pocket of people he cared about.