“I’m not on fucking drugs!” Jay called through the open window.
“Jay, this photo was leaked by a certain reporter who knows you all too well,” the reporter called back. He tossed a printout of the photo into the car, and I saw Jay and another man standing in front of a building. The sign read ‘Promising Light Rehab Facility’. There was a caption at the bottom of the photo that read ‘Hannah Joyce’.
Of course.
I’d honestly thought she might’ve given up on harassing Jay after he’d threatened her with the recording of her admitting to breaking into Lizzy’s apartment, but I guess she hadn’t learned at all. Either that or she was willing to risk her job to slam Jay’s reputation.
My stomach curdled as Jay ripped the photo out of my hands and tossed it out the window. “You morons have no idea what you’re messing with here!” he shouted at the photographers. “Leave us alone!”
Jay sped up, making the photographers scramble out of the way and over the curb, and then he pressed his foot on the gas until they were safely in the distance. With a heavy sigh, he looked over at me.
“Sorry about that.”
I was too shocked to speak for a moment. “Jay, that can’t be true,” I finally managed to get out. “I know it’s not true.”
After all we’d been through already, I knew better than to put any stock in photos that were being bandied about. I trusted Jay, and I knew he wasn’t a drug addict. However, there still had to be a reason he’d been at a rehab facility.
He nodded. “It’s not true,” he replied, confirming my words. “That’s where I was yesterday. My best mate, Connor, was picked up for narcotics possession. I had to go to the police station and pick him up. He had a huge bail, and they only let him out when I said I was taking him right to rehab afterwards.” He let out a long sigh. “I didn’t want to tell you yesterday because of everything that was going on, but that’s what that phone call was about.”
I was silent for another moment. Jay was truly a good person, a great person even. Part of me had already known this fact, but this most recent event had proved it beyond a shadow of doubt. He wasn’t like the media and tabloids painted him to be at all. He cared about his best friend, who was obviously from a different walk of life—someone who wasn’t famous, someone who wasn’t going to pay him just to hang out. I bit my lip as I thought back to when I first met Jay, and how I’d had the impression he was just an asshole playboy, and guilt seeped down my throat.
I swallowed hard. “That’s really good of you, Jay,” I said softly. “You’re a really good friend.”
He didn’t say anything. He was staring straight ahead. I could tell he was angry, and I couldn’t blame him. I couldn’t imagine how difficult it would be to live in a world that demonized my every move, and if I were in Jay’s shoes, I couldn’t begin to think how pissed off I’d be.
“I try,” he finally said. His lips were set in a thin line. “But Hannah makes it damn hard sometimes. Honestly, I thought we were done with her.”
“So did I, but I guess not.”
He sighed. “I feel like such a jerk, like such a shit friend. If I’d paid more attention to Connor, I would have seen the signs so much sooner. But I didn’t, and it took him getting arrested for me to finally see what was going on.”
“Jay, don’t say that,” I said. “You had no way of knowing. Abusers are often really good at hiding their drugs from their friends. Trust me, I know this. I did research for a show about people who were secretly addicted. A lot of the time, their family had no idea.”
Jay shook his head. “That’s nice of you to say, Kate, but this is on me, all right? I fucked up.”
His tone let me know that he was done with the conversation, and we pulled up in front of Lizzy’s.
“Want to come in?” I asked.
Jay shook his head. “Can’t, or I’ll be late. But I’ll pick you up after practice,” he said. “See you then.”
“I can’t wait.”
A ghost of a smile finally crossed his face, and he squeezed my hand. “I can’t wait either.”
Chapter Nineteen
Kate
I was surprised to see Lizzy in the kitchen when I got home; she usually had an early lecture at this time of the day. She was gnawing on one of the scones that I’d brought the day before, and she flicked her eyes over me with interest.
“So….are you gonna tell me what happened with the whole Josh and Jay thing?” she asked.
“Josh was just here to be a dick,” I said with a sigh as I slid down into one of the chairs. “Those photos were fake, and then he told me he slept with my secretary while we were still dating. Oh, and he thought I was still interested in him, even after I told him we weren’t going on a date like fifteen times.”