Page 58 of Overexposed

I groaned, dropping my head into my hands. “I hate you.”

Jerry sighed. “Look, you want my professional opinion on this whole thing?”

Not really… “Yes,” I grumbled, irritated as all fuck. It’d been two weeks since Clara broke up with me and the sudden celibacy was making me all kinds of bad-tempered. I was used to having herat leastblow me once a day. Her high sex drive was one of the major reasons I’d stayed with her so long. And now all I had was my hand and a bunch of bullshit rumors about a feral stray woman who couldn’t leave my brother alone.

“Your popularity is benefiting from this,” Jerry said, not beating around the bush. “Regardless of what Carriage Pictures is threatening with their morality clauses, you’ve had a massive uptick on casting inquiries in the last week, and there’s been a spike in viewing across all your movies. The viewerslovea love scandal, Seven. There's a great opportunity here to spin something financially beneficial. Or we could come clean about the images being Gem andhisnew girl, which would undoubtedly see a rise in his personal stardom again.”

“Which Gem doesn’t want,” Gem said with a scowl. “If this drama is paying off in new roles and bigger contracts, let Seven keep it.”

I looked from my brother to my agent and back again. Gem had been really firm for a while now that he wanted to get out of acting entirely, so being suddenly thrust into the tabloids would really not sit comfortably with him. I could already see the idea stressing him out with the way his jaw clenched and his fingertips drummed the counter.

No one spoke for a few moments, then Jerry swept a hand over his graying hair. “What’s the image inBright Starz, Gem? I’m assuming this is one Stella did sell?”

He nodded. “Yeah, I deliberately pissed off Clara and she slapped me in front of Stella’s camera.”

Jerry nodded. “So the image is her slapping Seven? What’s the story?”

Gem shrugged. “Beats me.” Then he winced. “Unless they reached out to Clara for comment…in which case Imighthave fucked up.”

I groaned again. “What did you say, Gremlin?”

He snapped a glare my way for the use of his old nickname. “I don’t remember the exact wording, but I did maybe mention the fact you were planning to propose at the premiere for Mirage and, uh, rubbed her face in the fact that you were taking your gorgeous new girlfriend instead.” He winced again. “Okay, I can see how this might have complicated matters. In my defense, I’d had a bit to drink and wanted a good photo for Stella to sell.”

I was going to kill him. That was theonlysolution here: I needed to kill my brother.

“Stop it,” Jerry scolded before I could launch myself at Gem and choke the life out of him for fucking with my privateandpublic life all at once. Why the fuck couldn’t he hook up with a nice, normalfanlike he used to?

“Sorry,” Gem mumbled, at least having the decency to look apologetic. “I wasn’t thinking.”

“All right, but you only said that to Clara Belle, yes?” Jerry asked, his mind clearly going a thousand miles a minute. “But if she repeated it toBright Starz… Hmm. Okay, you two need to decide who is taking credit for these photos and this new relationship with Miss Charles. Which one of you is owning them?”

Gem and I exchanged a long look, and it was the kind of moment where I could read his mind with perfect clarity.

“God damn it,” I sighed. “You fuckingowe me, Gremlin.”

The relief on his face was undeniable. Media attention had never sat well with him, and the last thing we needed was another incident like when we were sixteen. The press had been relentless on him and his girlfriend that year, and when they split up, Ollie and I caught him cutting his own arms. We knew something needed to change. Since then, we’d done everything possible to shift him out of the line of camera lenses for his own mental health. And yet here he was, sleeping with the devil herself.

“All right, good choice,” Jerry said with a nod. “Here’s what we’re going to do.”

He then spent the next half hour outlining the plan that he’d somewhat concocted to not only spin the story in my favor away from Clara’s bullshit, but also to save my Carriage Pictures deal. According to Jerry, I’d split with Clara weeks ago and had been keeping the news private out of respect for her reputation, that the original images of “me” and Stella were taken well after my relationship with Clara had ended and therefore wasn’t cheating at all.

In Jerry’s version of events, Stella and I were madly in love and trying our best to stay out of the public eye to preserve the purity of our new relationship.

I had to admit, the way he pitched it…I was sold. There was only one problem, but it was a big one.

“How do we get the stray to agree to all of this?” I asked, cutting my gaze to my twin once more. “She hates me.”

Gem nodded, not attempting to spare my feelings. “That’s true, she does.”

“You’re very charismatic, Seven. I’m sure you can convince her,” Jerry scoffed, shaking his head in amusement. “Or if need be, I’m sure Gem can talk to her?”

Gem shook his head, the stubborn fuck. “Sorry, Jer. Not that I don’t want to help, but right now I’m fighting to even get herto go on a date with me. Asking her to fake-date Seven when he literally tried to hold her hostage and extort her into signing a legal document?” He grimaced dramatically. “I think we’ll have better luck asking Hell to freeze over.”

Jerry threw up his hands. “Well, this plan only works with her cooperation, so I suggest you two put your heads together and work it out. Fast. Ideally beforeBright Starzfinalizes tomorrow's story so we can get ahead of it all. Oh, and don’t forget she will need to attend the premiere as your date, Sev. That will be your public debut as a couple.”

Oh. We were already fucked. I may not know a lot about Stella Charles, but one thing I waspositiveabout? She was a stubborn, spiteful bitch. If I even hinted that this would benefit me, she’d say no purely on principle.

Jerry’s phone rang, and he flapped a hand at us to say he was leaving, answering the call before he even got out of our front door. He paused on the doorstep, picking up a package and placing it on our foyer table before continuing on his way.

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