Page 158 of His Good Girl

“No,” I said again, much louder now, because the first one had sounded too much like pleading. “No. Don’t you dare make that face.”

“Avery.”

“What did you do?”

The words came out before I had softened them. I did not want to soften them. Suddenly there was no air in the apartment. The walls seemed too close. Jules opened her eyes, and tears slipped down her face.

“I didn’t know it was them,” she whispered.

My whole body went ice cold.

“What did you do?” I asked again.

She put a hand over her mouth, shook her head once, then dropped it like she knew she did not deserve the shield. “They contacted me after the first dinner.”

“They?” I asked.

“I don’t know who they were, at least not at first. It was a woman. She said she worked for a private reputation firm. She knew my name. She knew yours. She said there was concern about a public figure being targeted. She made it sound like they were trying to keep something from coming out.”

“A public figure?”

“Callum.”

My laugh was short and ugly. “So, you talked to a random woman about my life?”

“No. Not like that. Not at first.” Jules wiped at her face angrily. “I told her to go to hell. I hung up. Then she sent me photos.”

The room went very still.

“Of you?” I asked.

Jules nodded once.

“Oh, Jules.”

She shook her head harder. “Don’t do that. Don’t be kind yet. I can’t handle it.”

“What photos?”

“Private ones.” Her voice went flat with shame. “Old ones. From Joey.”

I remembered Joey. Theater Joey, Jules’s college boyfriend with soft hands, performative feminism, and a face I had always wanted to slap for reasons that later proved prophetic. They had dated for eight months. He had worn scarves indoors and once told Jules she was ‘emotionally withholding’ because she refused to pay his parking tickets. I had hated him. Jules had loved him in the doomed way smart women sometimes loved ridiculous men.

“He kept them?” I asked.

“I guess.” She laughed once, but there was no humor in it. “Or someone got them from him. Or hacked him. Or he sold them.I don’t know and I keep trying not to think about which version makes me want to peel off my skin less.”

“They threatened you?” I asked.

“Yes.”

“With the photos.”

“Yes.”

“To get to me?”

Her face collapsed, her voice breaking. “Yes.”