Beautiful Burn (Maddox Brothers #4) Read online

  “It wasn’t. A painting was broken. A few vases and a table. Some vomit on the floor … nothing the cleaning crew couldn’t handle.”

  “Then it’s not about the money.”

  “What do you mean?”

  “You’re fucked. They’re not trying to teach you responsibility or appreciation, Ellison. They’re trying to save you from yourself. Betsy March’s parents did the same thing to her. You have no way out of this. You might as well give in or end it all now.”

  My mouth fell open. “You are an unbelievable asshole.”

  He took another sip of wine. “People keep saying that. I’m inclined to believe it.”

  I looked up at him, my cheeks already burning from humiliation. “You don’t need a … um … an assistant or anything, do you?”

  “Me? Fuck no. I already have four. Oh. You mean … hire you?”

  My eyes fell to the floor. “Only if you need one. I don’t want charity.”

  “It would never work, Ellie.”

  “Why?”

  “Because we’re friends, and I want to continue to be friends.”

  “You just told me to kill myself.”

  He chuckled. “I didn’t mean it.”

  “Fine.”

  He pointed at me. “That’s why.”

  I frowned. “What are you talking about now?”

  “You didn’t even put up a fight. I said ‘no,’ and you folded. I don’t want a pussy working for me. I was raised with more nannies than I have assistants. One to wipe my ass, one to wash my hands, one to feed me, one to play with me during the day, and one to wake up with me at night. There were more. I don’t remember their names. But my favorite? Beatrice. She was meaner than a cat with a firecracker in its ass, and I loved it. No one else talked to me like that. I need people who aren’t afraid to tell me the truth. You can, but you can’t, and we remain friends.”

  I sighed, and then nodded, already bored with his speech. He did love to hear himself talk.

  Sterling tossed the paper at me, leaned across the table, and turned to the classifieds. There were already red circles in the Help Wanted section.

  “Mail sorter,” I said, reading his suggestions. “McDonald’s.” I looked up at him. He held up his hands. “Bank teller. I’m broke, and you think it’s a good idea that a pot head without money for pot works at a bank?”

  He shrugged, standing up and heading for the bar. “I’m trying. You need a drink.”

  “Desk clerk for a hotel. Nights. Checking guests in and out, light cleaning, and putting out continental breakfast.” I looked up at Sterling. “They pay people fifteen dollars an hour to do this?”

  “It’s a tourist town. They can’t get people to work for minimum wage even at minimum wage jobs. The cost of living is too high.”

  “There’s nothing else?”

  “An assistant at the local magazine.” He chuckled. “The MountainEar,” he said in a mocking tone. “Guess who owns it?”

  “Philip Edson?” I snorted.

  “Nope, this is one your father doesn’t own. It’s the new endeavor of J.W. Chadwick, the owner of Turk’s. He’s not going to hire you. There’s also a server position at the resort, but you’d be dealing with dicks like us all day.”

  I covered my face, letting the paper fall to the table. “This is what I get for majoring in something I knew wasn’t going to come with the expectation of a job. They’ve fucked me. My parents have fucked me.”

  “You’ve fucked yourself. Don’t act like you didn’t know what you were doing.”

  I pulled a wadded one hundred dollar bill from my pocket and tossed it on the table. “This is all I have left.”

  “They left you one hundred dollars?”

  “No, they left me nothing. Fin left me eight hundred forty dollars. I drank it all.”

  “You’re not just a lush; you’re an irresponsible lush. You deserve this.”

  “I hate you.”

  Sterling winked. “Nah. You love me. I can tell you the ugly truth, and we still remain friends. That’s why I love you.” He put a tall glass of gin in front of me. “Drink up. We’ve got a long day ahead of us.”

  “I can’t apply for a job drunk.”

  He held up a small white pill, and then placed it on the table, pushing it toward me. “We’re not applying for jobs today. Today, we’re saying goodbye to Ellison Edson the rich bitch, and hello to Ellie the blue-collar worker.”

  “Eat shit and die, Sterling.”

  He popped his own pill, washing it down with wine. I looked down at the table, turning the chalky white oval with my fingers. He was right. I wasn’t going to find a job today.

  I threw the pill to the back of my throat, not caring what it was, just hoping it would take effect quickly. I gulped the gin until my throat burned, and then looked at Sterling, wiping my mouth. “This is going to get ugly.”

  “It always does with us,” he said, taking another drink.

  I woke up on the floor, naked and barely covered with a tablecloth. Sterling was my pillow, his bare thigh against my cheek. I sat up, wiping my mouth, tasting salt and gagging.

  “Oh my God,” I whispered, looking at his naked body sprawled on the floor.

  He didn’t look like Sterling, with the clean-shaven jaw I was used to. His face had begun to darken with whiskers, and his typically slicked coif had pulled free from the gel meant to keep each strand in place. He was no different from anyone else I’d left in my path, messy and ruined, but the sight of him was the physical manifestation of rock bottom—the man my sister loved lying naked on the floor, a mixture of our sweat still glistening on his skin.

  Bile rose in my throat, and nausea overwhelmed me. I hadn’t thrown up after a day of drinking since junior high. The feeling caught me off guard.

  I crawled on the floor to reach my clothes, pulling each piece of fabric to my chest. I breathed out a quiet cry and felt tears burn my eyes. Finley.

  She would never forgive me—she’d never forgive us. I tried to remember what had happened. The sun was already behind the mountaintops, the sky getting darker by the second. Sterling and I had been fucking for hours, but I didn’t remember any of it.

  Groggy and humiliated, I collected my clothes, pulling on my bra, shirt, damp panties—more nausea—and then my pants, feeling the coldness of the cotton against my skin. I gagged again, and then ran down the hall to the bathroom. My stomach heaved, and mostly wine and liquor splattered against the door. I pressed my lips together and let my cheeks bulge out, holding in the rest just long enough to lift the lid on the toilet. What seemed like gallons of alcohol burned my nose and throat as it came up and gushed into the toilet. The toilet water sprayed my face, and I closed my eyes, sobbing.

  Once it was over, I stood up, washed my hands and face, rinsed my mouth, and tried to rinse mystery chunks from my hair. I looked in the mirror. The girl looking back was unrecognizable. She was gaunt, with dark circles under her bloodshot eyes. She was a junkie. Finley was right. Living this way was going to kill me.

  I padded down the hall, picking up the wadded cash and my snow boots on the way.

  Sterling stirred, and I rushed to the door, hopping on one foot to pull on one boot, and then the other.

  “Ellie?” he called, his voice broken.

  “Nothing happened,” I said.

  He covered his face and turned his back to me. “Fuck. Fuck! No, no, no … we couldn’t have. We didn’t. Tell me we didn’t.”

  “We didn’t. Nothing happened. Because if it did, Fin will never speak to either of us again,” I said, closing the door behind me.

  CHAPTER SIX

  The alarm bleated next to my ear, and I reached up, slapping at it until it turned off. The morning sun was pouring through the open blinds—I’d left them that way on purpose to force me out of bed. My interview with The MountainEar was in ninety minutes. Unfortunately, J.W. Chadwick owned the very bar I’d been kicked out of more than once, making my interview a littler trickier.

/>   I opened my closet, wondering what people wore on interviews. When I Googled What to wear to magazine interview, it resulted in a thousand outfits I would never wear, including a ball gown with a plummeting neckline and see-through skirt I was sure no one wore outside a runway show.

  I pressed my back against the wall and slid to the floor, perching my elbows on my knees and resting my forehead on my fists. I was known for a lot worse things in this town than being the daughter of the local billionaire. No one was going to hire me, and once Finley found out what I’d done, she would never forgive me. I had lost everything, and my future seemed very bleak.

  Tears streamed down the bridge of my nose, pooling at the tip and dripping to the carpet. Soon, I couldn’t control the sobs rattling my body, and all I could think about was how unfair it was that my parents dropped this bomb on me and took all the liquor in the house. Mother couldn’t even pack without consuming two bottles of wine to calm her nerves.

  “Miss Ellison!” Maricela said, crouching in front of me. “What is it? Are you hurt?”

  When I looked up at her, she used her apron to wipe my eyes. “No one’s going to hire me, Maricela. I’m the town drunk.”

  “Not for the last two days, you’re not.”

  “I can’t do this,” I cried. “I have no idea how to do this. They’re just throwing me to the wolves.”

  Maricela rubbed my arms. “That’s how I learned to swim, muñequita. Sometimes we have to be thrown in, or we’ll never do it on our own.”

  “I messed up,” I said, wiping my nose with the back of my hand. “I hurt Finley.” I looked up, my bottom lip quivering. “She doesn’t even know it yet. All I can think about is getting high to make it go away.”

  Maricela touched my cheek. “It won’t go away unless you face it. Admit to your mistakes, and then make amends.”

  The little resolve I had left crumbled. “She won’t forgive me. Not this time.”

  “Miss Ellison, is this about the place where José took you? To the Planned Parenthood? What did they say? What did they do?”

  I sniffed. The pregnancy test came back negative, and it had been more than two weeks since I’d been tested for STDs, and they hadn’t called about results. With Planned Parenthood, no news was good news.

  “Finley is your sister. She loves you the most. She wants the best for you.”

  I began to sob again. “I really fucked up this time. I can’t believe I’m that person. Someone who would…” I shook my head again, despondent. “I’ve thought so many times since it happened that maybe it would be easier if … I can’t do this.” I looked Maricela in the eyes, solemn.

  “I don’t understand,” Maricela said, worried.

  “I just want it to be over.” The words sounded insincere, such a powerful statement with so little emotion. I wondered if that’s how Betsy felt about her own end—too damaged to feel anything but numb.

  Maricela took my chin between her fingers. “Niña, no more of this. The Ellison who is destructive and full of anger … go on. Kill her. But you can live.”

  I tried to look away, but she wouldn’t let me.

  “If you want to prove that you’re not that person, then you have to stop being that person. Let her go. Look at you. She’s not making you happy.”

  I blinked, and then nodded slowly. Maricela always knew what to say when I was upset, but she’d never raised her voice at me before. She was fighting for me. I couldn’t let her fight alone. “You’re right. She has to go.”

  Maricela helped me to my feet.

  I looked at my closet again. It was full of plaid flannels, hoodies, and ripped jeans, revealing shirts, and concert tees. “The interview is in an hour. I’m going to show up looking like I just left a drug deal.”

  Maricela stood behind me, touched my shoulders, and whispered into my ear, “She’s dead. Go find a new Ellison.”

  “What if I don’t know where to start?”

  “You already have.” She kissed my cheek and left the room.

  I stared at the clothes for a bit longer, and then slammed the doors and ran down the hall to Finley’s room, pulling open her closet with the hope she hadn’t taken everything fantastic to her Manhattan apartment. Clanging through her hangers, I found a pair of black leather skinnies and a burgundy sweater. With a tall pair of black boots, a bit of makeup, and after raking a brush through my waves, I snarled at my appearance in the mirror. I rifled through Finley’s hair products, sprayed some frizz control on my hair, and then brushed it through. I looked at my reflection again and sighed. I was so used to dressing like I didn’t care, anything that took more effort seemed like I was trying too hard.

  “You look nice, Miss Ellison,” Maricela said from the doorway. “Shall I collect your laundry?”

  “Thank you. But I don’t think you’re supposed to. I don’t want to get you into trouble.”

  Maricela’s expression fell, and then she nodded, knowing I was right. “I’ll teach you when you’re ready.” She waved once before turning for the hall. “José is sure Mr. Edson forgot to mention that you’re to be driven to any job interviews.”

  A wide grin crept across my face. “Really?”

  “Good luck, Miss.”

  “Maricela?”

  She turned.

  “I don’t know if they’ve asked you to report on what I’m doing, but I’d prefer you not tell them about the interview.”

  Maricela had been with our family since I was in grade school, and she looked at me with maternal love in her eyes. “I just want you to get better, Miss Ellie.”

  “I know. I’m trying.”

  She closed the door, and I turned to look in the mirror, deciding to pull my hair into a high, smooth bun. Mr. Wick was going to hire me, even if he didn’t know it yet.

  José glanced into the rearview mirror of the Audi. “You look nice, Miss Ellison.”

  “Thank you,” I responded, turning to look out the window at the buildings passing by.

  Our home was hidden away south of Highway 66, and the magazine was almost due north. It took José just over ten minutes to reach the highway, and he turned south, driving the opposite way from everyone else on their way to their jobs, and the tourists on their way to the mountain base. The sand trucks were out in full force, scraping a path toward Estes Park. We passed resorts and inns, a river and a cemetery … so many things I’d never paid attention to because they weren’t bars or restaurants without a dress code.

  José turned down Mills Drive, and my heart began to race. I wasn’t sure what to expect, but I had a feeling I was about to humiliate myself. We passed several buildings, all brown and filled with matching vehicles. Farther down from the rest, sat a small building with two garages and several emergency trucks parked along a circle drive. I sat up when I saw the sign.

  INTERAGENCY CENTER

  ROCKY MOUNTAIN NATIONAL PARK

  I sat up, touching the glass with my fingertips. I wasn’t sure if their crew stuck around throughout the year, but if I was going to be down the street for forty hours a week, I hoped not.

  Next door to the fire station was a large RV park, and a quarter-mile of trailers dotted the landscape. Across the street from the station and the park was a new steel building. A driveway curved in front of the entrance, also continuing back toward another, smaller steel building that might have served as a garage, or storage building, or possibly both. The MountainEar office was small, a non-descript steel structure, newly finished on the outskirts of town.

  I waved goodbye as José pulled away. He’d already promised to return in an hour. I stood on the sidewalk, inadequately dressed for the plummeting temperature. The clouds hung low over the peaks, and the snow had already spotted my hair like feathers, disappearing on contact.

  A dually truck and gooseneck trailer barreled down the road toward the RV Park, all ten tires sloshing against the wet asphalt. I took a quick step back before a wave of water and ice soaked me from bun to boot heel. I walked toward the main bu
ilding, passing the sign that read: MOUNTAINEAR MAGAZINE. My ankles wobbled with each step, feeling less confident and more ridiculous the closer I came to the front door. My hand hesitated to reach for the door handle, but I opened it, sighing in relief when the heat warmed my cheeks.

  The door chimed when I walked through, the pristine industrial rug now wet from my boots. The walls were painted eggshell; the frames hanging in a line between windows contained magazine covers. Besides the front desk, six cushioned red chairs backed against the front wall, and a fake plant, the lobby was a whole lot of blank space.

  At first, I could only see the top of the head of the girl manning the front desk. She stood up, acknowledging me with a nod. She looked barely out of high school, wearing braided blonde pig tails hanging from beneath a knit cap. Her name plate on the upper desk read JOJO.

  She held a black phone receiver with hot-pink mittens, with far too much makeup on her young face. Although I was sure she only meant to hold up one finger, her entire mitten was erected, silently asking me with a wink and a smile to wait while she finished the call.

  “No, Mike. Because Wick is busy, and so am I. He doesn’t want your pictures of the parade. Because they suck. I’ve got someone at the desk. I’m hanging up now. Yes, I am.”

  She slammed down the phone and looked up at me with big eyes and fake lashes. Her orange skin had been baking in a tanning bed far before the ski season had started. She chomped on her gum and smiled at me with an inch of gloss slathered across her puffy lips.

  “How can I help you?” Her tone changed as if she were a different person. She was no longer the cranky receptionist fielding questions for Wick. Jojo was pleasant, eyes bright, waiting to make me happy.

  “I’m here for the nine AM interview. My name is Ellison Edson.”

  Jojo’s expression immediately fell. “Oh. You’re Wick’s assistant.”

  “No, I … I’m applying for the job.”

  She stood up, gesturing for me to follow her down the hall. “Trust me, no one else wants the job. You’re the first person who’s even applied. The ad’s been out for a year.”