Page 33 of Double Standard

“I’m not your mom and Roy.” He drags his eyes up to meet my gaze before darting them back to study his hands. “I’m not, and you know it. It was a passing remark that Colt made, without any context, and you kept the role, so why bring it up? I didn’t want to make you upset, and I didn’t want to risk messing things up. With Coltorwith you. That’s all.”

“And yet here we are, and I’m upset, and you’ve messed things up with me anyway.”

He nods, and his lack of response whips the churning in my belly into a cyclone—a wind shear of anger, sudden and forceful. If I took a minute to breathe, or think, or ground my feet on the earth, I’d wonder if I’m overreacting. But I can’t. Instead, the words punch out of my mouth. “All I’ve ever wanted—needed—is for someone to choose me. Not beautiful Ana Barlow, not famous and thin and wrapped in designer clothes Ana Barlow, but the version you’d been uncovering. You had her. I gave that version of myself to you, and I was stupid enough to believe I could trust you to hold it. I thought we were a team, and I was wrong. Because you don’t care about me—people who care tell each other things like this. Instead, you wanted a stepping stone and were content to put your foot on my neck to give yourself a leg up. Just like everyone else.”

He sits there, wringing his hands. Dark eyebrows pinched in toward his nose. Lips pulled together. No hintof the dimple I love—loved—on his cheek. He clears his throat and swallows. My gaze traces it down the column of his neck.

“Where do we go from here?” he asks, as though we’re business partners building a road map for our quarterly goals. As though he didn’t just break my heart.

“There’s no need to pretend anymore. They outed us.” I release a petulant huff. “Turns out I can’t evenfakemy way to being beloved by the public. Should’ve left you out of it and saved myself all this mess.”

“Ana, we don’t have to...”

“Don’t have to what, Levi?” I bring my hands to my neck, to the chronic pain that lives there.

“Forget it, I’m sorry.” He gets up from the couch and heads for the door. I follow him there, and he turns to me. “I didn’t mean to hurt you.”

“You and the rest of them.”

He winces at the words. “Can we keep things normal at work?”

“Yes, Levi, I can be professional at my place of employment. I’ve spent two decades pretending to feel what I don’t feel and pretending not to feel what I do. This won’t be any different.”

He nods.

“Oh, and I’m not going to jeopardize your standing with Colt, if that’s what you’re asking.”

“It wasn’t.” He slips on his shoes, bending to tie thelaces and splaying the muscles in his shoulders and back. Damn stuntman build.

“See you on set.” I open the door and gesture for his exit.

“See you,” he says, and he steps across the threshold.

XXI

Levi

“I’m a selfish asshole.” My head leans against the cool glass of the car’s window. Edwin meets my eyes in the rearview mirror and gives a soft, if pitying, smile.

“Do you want to know why?” I ask him. If I’m going to turn this car into a rolling confessional, he might as well get the full story. There’s no one else to talk to about this anyway. I’ve alienated my friends and family back home. Everyone in this town is a stranger to me, except for my fellow castmates, and involving even more of theAthena’s Warcrew in this mess is not an option. But Edwin’s here, and luckily for me, he nods his head. Either that, or he’s not brave enough to say no when I’m so clearly in need of a sounding board.

“I’m an asshole because I put myself, and my fear, over being honest with the woman I care about. I kept something from her.” A sigh escapes as I tap my head against the glass in self-punishment.

Edwin pulls into a turning lane, his signal clicking. “Do you want my opinion?”

“I’ll take anything you can give me.”

“I’ve been married for twenty-eight years. My wife and I, we got married young. Too young, looking back, but that means we’ve lived a whole lot of life together. I’ve made my fair share of mistakes, slept some nights on the couch, raised my voice when I shouldn’t have. I’m no expert, and Daisy—that’s my wife—would probably tell you I’m not the best person to be giving relationship advice. But here’s what I know: Loving someone is complicated.”

A huff and a nod are all I can give. Complicated is an understatement, and I don’t have the energy to tell him I’m not sure “love” is where Ana and I have been.

He meets my eyes in the rearview mirror. “When a woman is upset, there are two pieces of the puzzle to consider: The thinking and the doing. Took me about a decade and a half to learn this, so count yourself lucky you’re hearing it now.” He chuckles. “If Ana is anything like my wife, the doing matters far less than the thinking. For example, it’s not the act of taking out the trash that matters to her. What matters is the consideration: That I noticed the trash can was full, that I recognized if I didn’t take it out, I’m adding the task to her list. It feels like a simple chore, right? What’s the big deal? It takes less than a minute to bring the bag to the curb. But it’s not the task that really matters; it’s that I thought about her. And when I think about her, what I do changes. You following?”

“Following.”

“My hunch is Ana’s upset because you didn’t consider her.”

The gray matter of my brain is melting. Hot, soupy mush as I try to untangle what he’s saying. His wisdom isn’t just about Ana, I fear.