Chapter 5

Three days later.

Karen's fever had broken. She stood in the tiny bedroom, shoving a few plain t-shirts into a duffel bag. She was leaving for the set today.

Her phone vibrated violently on the mattress. The caller ID showed a Manhattan landline.

Karen hesitated, then picked it up.

"Your mother is in the lobby of the Fernandez Plaza," Arthur Coleman's irritated voice snapped through the line.

Karen froze. The shirt dropped from her hands.

"She brought paparazzi from TMZ," Arthur continued. "She's holding a sign claiming Israel abandoned his destitute wife."

Karen's blood ran cold. Her mother actually did it.

The line clicked. The background noise shifted to the dead silence of the top-floor executive suite.

"You trained your dog well," Israel's low, lethal voice vibrated against her ear. "Sending her to Wall Street to bite me."

In the background, Karen heard Ayla's soft, whiny voice. "Israel, please don't get upset. Think of your blood pressure."

Bile rose in Karen's throat. "Israel, I didn't know. I blocked her number. I have nothing to do with this."

"I don't care," Israel cut her off. "Her little stunt is affecting my stock prices. And it is upsetting Ayla."

He paused, letting the silence suffocate her.

"My private jet is waiting for you on the tarmac at Van Nuys. You have exactly five hours to board it, get to Manhattan, and remove your trash from my building," he ordered.

"I can't," Karen panicked. "I start shooting my movie today. I can't leave LA."

"If you are not standing in my office in five hours," Israel said with brutal precision, "I will cut off the trust fund keeping your father alive. I will have Brenda arrested for felony extortion. And I will make sure every studio in Hollywood knows your family is a criminal enterprise."

He hung up.

Karen couldn't breathe. She called Eleanor and begged her to cancel the shoot for the day, her hands shaking violently as she grabbed her bag and sprinted toward the waiting car that would take her to the Van Nuys airstrip.

Five hours later, Karen stepped out of the private aviation terminal in New York. A bulletproof black Cadillac was waiting at the curb.

She was driven straight to Midtown Manhattan. The eighty-story Fernandez Plaza loomed over her like a glass prison.

Security guards escorted her into the private elevator. It shot up to the top floor.

The doors slid open.

Israel sat behind a massive mahogany desk. Ayla lounged on a white leather sofa, delicately eating a macaron.

Brenda was pinned to a chair in the corner by two massive bodyguards. When she saw Karen, she shrieked, "Karen! Tell him it was a massive misunderstanding! Save me! You can't let them lock me up in a cell!"

Karen's face burned with absolute humiliation. She walked up to the desk.

"Please," Karen whispered, staring at the floor. "Let her go."

Israel leaned back in his chair. He spun a Montblanc pen between his fingers. He looked at her like she was a joke.

"She is my legal property," Israel said loudly, making sure Ayla heard every word.

Ayla stood up. She walked over and wrapped her arms around Israel's neck. "If she apologizes to me, Israel, I'll let it go. I'm very forgiving."

Israel's eyes locked onto Karen. "You heard her. Kneel. Apologize to Ayla for failing to control your family."

Karen's jaw clamped shut. The humiliation burned the back of her eyes. She looked at her mother, who was still screaming about cash.

To save Brenda from a ten-year prison sentence, Karen slowly bent her stiff, bruised knees.

They hit the carpet. She lowered her head.

"I'm sorry," Karen choked out to the woman who had ruined her life.

Israel stared at her bowed head. A sudden, sharp irritation flared in his chest, but he buried it. He pressed the intercom button on his desk.

"Send legal in," he commanded.