Bombshell (Hollywood A-List #1)(95)

Brad had slapped the car open and the angle of the camera changed as the paparazzi taking the video backed up. He’d been mad. He’d come home mad and when I saw the video, I knew he only came home with a fraction of the rage he’d expressed an hour earlier.

“Because the guy who signed up for Brotherhood didn’t have (beep) to do with his time but work and (beep) around. The guy who almost got on the set had a daughter. That changed things. It changed who I was, and it changed how long I could be on (beep)ing set. She lost her mother. She needed me. She was first then, and she’s first now. Not when I get around to it. Okay? (Beep)ing first. Family first. Now get the (beep) out of here. I’m nobody. Git!”

Watching him lose his temper on the entertainment news that night, I took his hand. It was the only way I knew how to support him. Ken had warned about the blowback, finally resigned to the fact that there was nothing he could do to stop Brad’s impossible fall from somebody to nobody.

“I’m proud of you,” I’d said.

He’d believed in what he’d done. Nicole was first in his life. But as unstoppable as any actor seems, their livelihoods are dependent on factors that are invisible to the public. His career really was over, and he had to realign his idea of himself. That night, we’d slept all three in a bed like the old days.

“I’m scared,” he’d said. “I don’t know what I’m going to do. I don’t want to do infomercials for juicers.”

“Give it a week,” I said. “Don’t make any decisions. Just decide not to worry for seven days.”

He’d reached over and took my hand. “If I didn’t have you, I’d be nobody. I’d be lost in the sauce.”

“You’d be her father.”

“All I’m saying is, don’t go anywhere. I’m hanging on to you. I need you.”

“I’m here.” I squeezed his hand. “We’ll get through this.”

Twenty-four hours after the video went public, the public responded.

My father worked fourteen hour days #familyfirst #Bradvsmydad I’d rather be Nicole Sinclair broke than have a rich daddy #familyfirst #ImWithSinclair My father left and got another family #familyfirst #Bradvsmydad Check out my blog post on the real meaning of fatherhood. #familyfirst #ImWithSinclair How many dads would give everything up for their kid? One that we know of #familyfirst #ImWithSinclair My father missed my piano recital because he was drinking. #familyfirst #Bradvsmydad My father never hugged me. Not once. It was like he was scared of me #familyfirst #Bradvsmydad He didn’t get paid for the talk shows or the appearances, but he did them because he felt that if his fans were supporting him, they deserved an explanation. He became the poster boy for giving it all up for your family. He spoke for women and men all over the country who had made the same choice. He validated them. He let them know they weren’t the only ones, and their pain and their identity crises were his too.

I’d gotten so wrapped up in tomorrow, the next day, the incremental progress he made in people’s eyes that I never planned the wedding. It never seemed important in the face of his ever-spiraling career. Upward. Downward. We could never tell, and I didn’t want to distract him.

Truth be told, I’d been afraid that if I started planning a wedding, something else would go wrong. But nothing went wrong. He just got more and more popular.

Celebrities came forward to talk about the sacrifices they made either for their families or their careers. Michael Greydon first, with heartfelt stories of his children and why he only took movies in Los Angeles. Then others, until a national conversation about career and family became impossible to get away from.

The bubble grew and grew, and when it popped, so did the perception in the business that he couldn’t be trusted.



Paula had come back just as the internet was exploding with #Bradvsmydad. She didn’t contact Brad, who had changed his number by then, but me. I’d agreed to meet her at a coffee shop, expecting she’d demand something or another. But what she wanted to meet about was worse.

“I sent the parental rights form to DMZ,” she’d said in her butter-yellow linen pants suit.

“Jesus, Paula. What do you want? Is this blackmail?”

“I don’t want a thing. I feel like a first-order Judas.” She’d covered her eyes with her hands, and I noticed for the first time that her nails matched her suit. “The devil came over me and after I sent it, I tried to undo it but it was too late.” She took her hands away. “I know he can’t forgive me, but can you tell him I’m sorry?”

“But why would you do that?”

“I loved him.”

She said it and snapped her mouth shut. Closed her eyes. Took a long breath and continued.

“I was jealous. And threatened like a cat in a corner. I felt filthy when I sent it. I just had to come and talk to you and tell you I was the one.”

I snapped up my phone and dialed an old number.

“That was shitty,” I said while it rang.

“I know . . . I—”

“It’s not like it matters. He doesn’t have a career to ruin right now, but if Nicole finds out, she might not understand why her father rejected her.”

“My father wrote us off when I was just little,” she said pensively. I was mad as hell and had a few choice words for her, but the phone had been picked up on the other end.