Hard.
So hard, the man’s lip cracked.
Then he did it again.
Nick yowled, and the sound was satisfying for about a second as Jack shook out his hand. He reached into his back pocket, grabbed his cell phone, and showed it to Nick. “By the way, cell phones are such nifty spying devices, don’t you think? Feel free to go after me for assault. I’ve got this entire conversation recorded for posterity.”
Then he walked off. When he could speak again without breathing fire, he called his sister and told her it was time for Plan B.
CHAPTER TWENTY-EIGHT
Plan B
Davis wasn’t sure if he liked this guy. He wasn’t sure if he wanted him anywhere near his sister ever again. But he respected her choices, and if she was in love with him, and was happy, then he’d support her.
Right now, she was asking him what he thought about Jack’s Plan B.
Seeing as how his sister had already lost one-third of her clients, and it was only day two of the story from hell, he didn’t see how Plan B could hurt. Especially since the Page Six story had taken on a life of its own and spawned viral videos on YouTube. Stupid spoofs of patients seducing shrinks, and vice versa. Many were rising up through the social world, his sister’s friend Sutton had told him, warning him to keep Michelle off YouTube. That Page Six story had the longest legs he’d ever seen.
“Not a problem,” Davis had said when Sutton called earlier. “I don’t think Michelle even knows YouTube exists.”
“Oh, stop it. Your sister is not clueless to the social media world.”
“No. She’s not. She just prefers to do other things. But I appreciate the heads up, Sutton.”
“Is she okay?”
“She’s pretty shell-shocked. Her mentor called and told her the workshop she was leading was axed. More clients cancelled. The backlash is pretty bad. They did a number on her with that story. It was like a match that started a whole fire.”
Sutton gave a sympathetic sigh. “I’m so sorry. It’s awful. Give her my love.”
“I will,” he said, then returned to his sister, who told him about Jack’s plan.
She wanted to know if it could do more damage.
“It’s so hard to say,” he answered. “But I honestly don’t know how it could do more damage. Maybe it could deflect the attention to him, where it should be.”
“It’s fine,” she said, her monotone voice an echo of his sister. She was vibrant and sharp, like a high-definition TV. Now, she was playing in black and white as she listlessly opened her fridge, grabbed her water pitcher and poured a small glass.
“It’s not fine. This should never have happened. It pisses me off that this happened,” he said, treading dangerously close to what he wanted to say. How can I not blame this guy you love?
She drank the water, then set the glass on her counter. “It’s not his fault, Davis. I know that’s what you’re thinking.”
He held up his hands, knowing he’d been caught. “Michelle, you’ve worked so hard for your career, and I hate that this guy’s support of a political campaign is killing you.”
She scoffed. “I know. But I don’t even care anymore.”
“That’s not true. You do care. You care about everything.”
She shot him a rueful smile. “And look where it got me. Everything I’ve worked for is going down the drain.”
“You’ll reinvent yourself,” he said, grasping her hand, changing tactics. He had to. His annoyance with Jack wasn’t helping. He’d have to let it go. “And I’ll be here every step of the way.”
“I know. I just want to go away. Maybe I should take the job in Paris,” she said in an offhand voice.
Davis straightened his spine. “You were offered a job in Paris?”
“Sort of. Well, almost. After my keynote, Julien introduced me to one of his colleagues, Denis. I talked to Denis for a while. He was impressed with my findings, and he emailed me yesterday to say he wants to talk more to see if I’d be interested in working with him. It was one of the many emails I received when I landed. I haven’t had a chance to respond yet. I had a lot going on,” she said sarcastically, and the fact that she’d recovered even a modicum of humor gave him a sliver of hope that she’d be okay.
“Do you want to talk more to Denis?” he asked gently.
She waved a hand dismissively. “I’m sure he hasn’t seen the reports yet, and when he does, he won’t touch me with a ten-foot pole either. You might as well just tell Jack that his Plan B is fine. I’m going to take a shower. I have to see the ethics board in an hour. Why don’t you look at the email and tell me what Denis said? I can’t bear any more bad news.”
When he heard the shower running, Davis scrolled through his sister’s work phone. It was the safe phone, as he’d started calling it. Her personal phone was the one that had been hacked. They’d been able to figure that much out since only details from her personal email had been revealed in the story, and she hadn’t been emailing Jack while they were in Paris, so at least their time there was untouched, she’d said. She’d smashed her personal phone with a hammer last night.
He’d reset her work phone for her this morning, so they knew that one was clean.
He thumbed through her notes, looking for the one from Denis and read it quickly.
* * *
Michelle didn’t think she could take another surprise hit. When she saw Jennifer from her consulting group leave the office of the ethics board on the Upper West Side building, she asked her directly, “What were you doing there?”
Jennifer held up her chin, and flashed a small smile. “I went in on my own. I wanted to tell them how much I admire you. How I know everything being said is wrong. That you’re the victim, here, of a smear attack that has nothing to do with you.”
A tear of gratitude threatened to escape. “You did that for me?”
The young therapist nodded. “I did. I don’t need to know the details. I don’t believe the stories.”
“Thank you,” Michelle said, truly touched. She didn’t even know Jennifer that well, which made the effort all the more meaningful.
Jennifer leaned closer and whispered. “I bet it was that client you mentioned who was checking you out. Probably a psycho.”
“Probably,” Michelle said, then walked through a green door and into the office. She told her colleagues the same story she told Carla, that she told Kana, that she told anyone who’d asked. “He was never my patient.”