Hollywood's Baddest (2 page)

Alexis felt her heart begin to pound and her breath caught. Something was definitely not right. “What is it, Abby? What’s wrong?” she managed to get out in a pseudo normal voice.

“What’s wrong? Haven’t you seen the news at all yet today? Haven’t you seen anything? My gosh! It’s all over the place! It’s just crazy! I can’t believe you haven’t heard it yet!” Abby seemed to be babbling on in her excitement and Alexis closed her eyes and calmed her voice.

“Ab, you have to slow down and breathe and tell me what’s going on. What is it? What’s going on?” she repeated slowly.

Abby took a deep breath and answered her. “Well, you know how Lucas Ryan won the Oscar last night?”

“Yes.” Alexis knitted her brow in consternation, wondering what it was that her sister was getting at.

“Well, you’ll never believe this, no one can, but after the Oscar’s, he hosted his own Oscar party, and tons of big named celebrities showed up for it. Everyone was there, practically, and then right when the party started to get wild, the cops showed up… imagine! The cops showing up to an Oscar party! Anyway,” she was getting excited again and her breath was growing shorter as she spoke, “the cops showed up and went into his house and arrested him in a drug bust sting!

There were drugs all over the place and he was the one doing them! He got hauled out of his own house and thrown in the back of the squad car, and taken to jail! Can you believe it? Right after winning an Oscar! I still can’t believe it. The whole world is talking about it. It’s the biggest news online right now. Ugh! What a mess!” Abby had worked herself into a fevered pitch again.

“Ab… honey, calm down.” Alexis tried to stem the adrenaline that she could hear running through her sister. “I know it’s a surprise, but you have to keep these things in perspective. He’s a big shot actor, everyone loves him, he just won a major award and then got busted for having drugs… so, it sounds almost standard for those living here in Los Angeles, doesn’t it? Don’t you worry about it. Just sit back and watch the news and see what happens with it. It’ll work out.”

“But he got arrested! Lexi, he went to jail!” I’m so upset about this. I just can’t believe it. I just adore him. I can’t believe he did it. This can’t be real. He’s too good a guy for it to be real.” She sighed in exasperation, sounding resolute in her defense of Lucas Ryan.

Alexis spoke to Abby as she picked up her keys and walked out to her car, getting ready to drive to work.  “I know it’s exciting. Just try to calm down and wait to see what comes of it. There’s no sense getting all worked up about it now; it’s just the beginning. This will definitely be a long road for him and all of his fans, so just wait to see what happens.” She thought about it for a moment and added another thought.
“Abby, why don’t you try to give your attention to something else today, so you aren’t so worked up about this, okay? Yeah. Why don’t you try to get outside today and leave your phone at home? You know, just for some fresh air and a break from the media. What do you think, would you do that when you get home from work?”  Alexis knew full well that her sister wouldn’t do it; that she would be glued to social media and news agencies until she had nearly drowned herself in the ongoing story of it.

“I’ll try, but… god… I just can’t believe it! What a nightmare!” Abby’s voice conveyed the stress she was already feeling over it all.

Alexis knew that it was pointless to try to talk any sense into her sister at all until things had calmed down some. “Okay, okay, just… promise me you’ll try to take some time outside without your phone… at least at some point.”

“I promise.” Abby replied resolutely. Alexis didn’t know whether to believe her or not, but she was headed into work and didn’t want to be on the phone. She told her sister goodbye and ended the phone call so that she could concentrate on the road and on her work when she got to the office.

She could not have cared less what was going on in the world of entertainment that day, least of all what scandalous news might be going around about Lucas Ryan. He’d made a few movies that she liked, but she wasn’t about to spend a moment of her time worrying about what he had going on in his life. There were much more important things for her to think about and focus on than some druggie actor who had been busted with illegal substances in his home. She had a job to do, and a promotion to keep her eyes on.

She parked her car in the garage beneath the law office building and took the long elevator ride up to the third floor from the top of the building. She had been so excited to be able to work at the Nolan Law Firm, and she had done her best to rise up through the company quickly. She had been rewarded for it many times over, and one of those rewards was that she had earned herself an office three floors from the top of the building, overlooking the city and the Pacific Ocean in the distance. She was two floors down from Anderson Nolan’s own office, and one floor down from the offices of the other partners.

She often looked at the last two numbered buttons on the elevator control panel, promising herself that she was going to be using the button for the next floor up in the very near future. She eyed it like an achievement to be reached whenever she was in the elevator, and that morning was no exception. She told herself that it would be hers.

The doors of the elevator slid open and she stepped into the lobby on her floor. It was decorated in dark woods and fabrics, giving it a cozy and secure feeling, as if even secrets would be safe there. There were a few leather bound chairs and some small tables, and at the far end of the room was a receptionist desk where one of the secretaries worked. She was a polite older woman who never repeated anything she heard, and Alexis strongly suspected that the woman knew so much that she might actually have the answer to every question in the universe.

She nodded and smiled at Alexis, greeting her with a good morning. From her desk there were two hallways; one leading off to the right behind her, and one leading off to the left. Alexis’ office was down the hallway to the right. She passed a few doors before she reached a more open area where another secretary’s desk was set against the wall, and at that desk was Alexis’ own personal secretary, Bea.

Bea was an older woman, like the secretary at the front of the office, but the similarities ended there. Bea had a tendency to share office rumors and things she heard, which Alexis didn’t like, but it was a fact that had come in useful more than once.

It was for that reason that she found out that Bryant had been cheating on her. Bea had told her that the word in the hallways was that the new temp had been seen with him in his office, and that it wasn’t for work purposes. Alexis had been shocked and had hoped with everything in her that it wasn’t true. She’d gone straight to his office and when she walked right in, she had caught Bryant and the temp right in the act.

They’d at least had the decency to be horrified at being caught, but she had walked straight back out of his office and gone to her own, and he had followed her there a few minutes afterward. He’d begged and pleaded with her, telling her it was just a moment of weakness and that she had come on to him and he’d felt sorry for her. It was a mistake and he didn’t mean to do it. He told Alexis that he cared for her and wanted to be with her, and she looked him in the eye and told him that it was over and he didn’t have any reason to speak to her again other than for business.

He’d left, miserable and disappointed, and she had wondered if he was ashamed of himself, but she felt deeply that there was no true remorse in him. It had turned her cold to him from that moment on. In her heart and mind, there was no chance that there would ever be anything between them again, but he kept trying, reaching out to her, doing whatever he could at every chance, just to convince her otherwise.

That morning proved to be no exception. He was waiting for her in her office when she opened the door and walked in, and she knew in an instant that it was only because Bea wasn’t at her desk. Bea had become extremely protective of her after the sex scandal, and wouldn’t let Bryant in to her office for any reason.

He was sitting behind her desk, looking at a short stack of files that Bea must have laid there that morning. Alexis made sure that her desk was cleaned off every night, and anything he was looking at would have been meant for her that day.

Bryant glanced up from the files and smiled at her. He had straight dark hair that was combed back to the side, and brown eyes. His skin was pale and his body was lean and built up in the chest. He had a chiseled jaw and sometimes he looked as though he might have some slight resemblance to Superman in just the right light, and though she thought that when she first met him, she realized over time that the more she knew him, the less handsome he seemed to appear to her. He was certainly no Clark Kent; of that there was no doubt.

He looked up at her in surprise, as if he had just been caught with his hand in the cookie jar, and indeed, he had. He quickly closed the file he had been perusing and stood up from her seat, laughing a little nervously, and he walked around the front of her desk.

Bryant adjusted his jacket, running his hands over it as he breathed in shallowly. “Well! There you are, and don’t you look beautiful! How are you doing?” he asked, cocking one brow and flashing a charming smile at her.

She narrowed her gaze at him. “Get out, Bryant. There’s no reason why you should be in here.”  Alexis meant it. She had no tolerance or patience for him, whatsoever.

He placed one hand on his heart as if he had been mortally wounded, and he took a step toward her, his other hand out, palm up, in a gesture of openness. “Awe honey, now don’t be like that. I just came in to talk with you about the promotion that’s coming up. That’s a big deal… there’s a lot riding on the line. You know, I’ve been doing really well with all my cases lately, and the old man upstairs, well… let’s just say he’s got his ear to the ground and he knows who would be best in the position. It’s still under wraps of course, but I’ve heard from reliable sources upstairs that the promotion is going to be mine.”

Bryant looked very proud of himself and not at all humble about his prediction. He puffed his chest out some and gave her a grin. “I just…” he stepped closer to where Alexis was standing in the center of the room. He was so close that he could reach out to her, and he did; running two fingers up and down her arm in a gentle stroking motion.

“I just wanted you to know that when I get that promotion, I’m going to make sure that you aren’t forgotten down here, and that you are brought up to work under me as my assistant. Sort of like a junior. Wouldn’t you like that?” he asked in a smooth silky voice.

She glared hotly at him and bit her tongue to stop herself from lambasting him. He leaned a little closer to her. “What we had was so… special and unique…” he said in an almost genuine tone. “I don’t want to lose that. I want us to move forward… together…” he looked at her intently and she lifted her hand and shoved his arm away from her.

“Don’t touch me ever again, and don’t talk to me ever again, unless it has to do with business. What you are doing in here right now has nothing to do with business. You need to get the hell out of my office and I don’t want to see you in here again. If you need to talk to me, you leave a message with Bea, and I will get back to you when it’s convenient for me.

As far as the promotion… well, there’s a really good chance it’s going to be mine, and if it is… when I get to move upstairs, you will be staying down here on your own. Now, get out of my office.” She walked around him and went to her desk, standing behind it, glaring at him as if she was a queen.

He gave a disgusted sigh and turned away from her, walking toward the door without another word, closing it behind him. She heaved her own sigh and sank down into her chair, closing her eyes and trying to get him out of her mind completely before she started on her work.

Opening the files on her desk, she found much of the same as what she typically did day in and day out. There were high profile divorces and custody cases, there were a couple of corporate cases, there were two lawsuits, and one environmental case.

She went through each one and worked on it as much as she could before closing it and leaving each file at the corner of her desk for Bea to take. Just as she had gotten a little over halfway through the stack, her phone rang. It was the secretary from upstairs; Anderson Nolan’s secretary, calling her directly, asking her to come up and see him.

Her heartbeat picked up and she could feel hot blood rushing through her as she hung up the phone and tried to calm the tingling of her nerves. Gathering herself, she paused only long enough to get a drink of cool water, and then she took the elevator upstairs two floors to go see Anderson Nolan.

He was one of the top attorneys in the state of California, and when she had gotten her job at his firm, she’d known that it was going to be the best possible course for her career path to take. Having the Nolan law firm on her resume meant that she could take a position as an attorney anywhere she wanted, though she knew she wouldn’t ever want to leave his firm.

A myriad of thoughts as to why he would want to see her wreaked havoc in her mind and she tried to push all of the mental chaos from her as she stepped from the elevator onto his floor. His was the only office on the top floor, except for his secretary, who had her own office as well. She welcomed Alexis and told her to go straight in to see Anderson.

Alexis lifted her chin and hoped that all of the nervousness that she felt inside wasn’t evident on the outside. She had gotten to be pretty good at learning just how to hide everything she was thinking and feeling; it was a necessary courtroom tactic.