ELLA
Two years earlier…
Things with Jackson started out sweet, slow, and beautiful. He was signed to my father’s record label when he was like twenty. I was still in high school at the time and didn’t meet him or really get to know him as a friend until I moved in with my dad during my junior year. We kept in touch casually, mostly through social media. He had a lot of girlfriends before me, and I had a bit of a crush on him from the day I met him.
One weekend during my second year of college in Texas, he DM’d me on IG letting me know he was in town and wanted to kick it with me. We had dinner, talked, really clicked. A month or so later, we became officially exclusive and public. My dad knew and liked him, so that was a plus because he is ridiculously overprotective.
We were good for about six months. He’d come visit me or fly me out to wherever he was to visit him on weekends, and somehow, I managed to keep my grades up. He was always sending me gifts. He was sweet to me.
I spent a lot of time with him during my spring and summer breaks. My third year of college, I started pursuing modeling. I didn’t get a lot of gigs, but I did pretty good for a newbie. Initially, Jackson supported my modeling journey, but as it demanded more and more of my time, he began to complain.
Then there were the pills, which I knew about from the beginning but rarely saw him take them. As the months turned into years and his fame increased, the pills became more prevalent. The more pills, the meaner and more demanding of my time he became. He tried to talk me into getting pregnant more than once, but I wasn’t that gullible. He would accuse me of saying things I never said, of hiding his pills, of telling him he wasn’t as good as my father. It got to the point where I started believing I was actually doing and saying the stuff he accused me of, that I deserved to be yelled at and…hurt.
I was young, so young, but I loved him. He killed that love, though, with every demand he made of me, every belittling word he said to me, every gaslighting episode, and every time he put his hands on me. The times he got physical were few, but they were enough. I tried to get along with him. That didn’t work. I tried to leave him. That didn’t work. He overdosed once but recovered. He blamed that overdose on me leaving him.
The night he died, I was so preoccupied; I was barely listening to him as he ranted. He was full of pills, which made him groggy and slow. He was slurring his words, rambling about me not being there when he needed me because I’d been traveling for work.
I’d turned to say something to him, to tell him it was over, like for real over, but stopped when I saw him downing more pills. I was just so used to it. It never occurred to me that maybe he was going to overdose again. Hell, he could easily take twenty pills before noon.
I left him on the couch. I just left him there and went to bed. When I woke up the next morning, he was dead. He’d been dead for a while. The coroner said he more than likely died less than an hour after he took those pills. Percocet, Oxy, whatever. He walked around with a pharmacy in his pockets every day. Those pills killed him, and I slept all night with his dead body in that condo with me.
I think…I think a part of me wanted him to die. I think I was glad he did.
ELLA
Now…
“You said he put his hands on you? He…he hit you?” Armand’s voice was so tight; it made me flinch.
“Yes,” I confirmed.
We were back in the bed in our beautiful villa, surrounded by blue ocean as we both fell silent. I watched as he visibly tried to quell his anger.
“He’s gone, Armand. He’s…he’s dead,” I said.
“I know, just pissed that I didn’t kill him,” he gritted.
“Armand…”
“Does anyone else know what he did to you, how he treated you?”
“I’m…his mom saw him hit me a couple times. His sister, too, and I told my stepmom and my therapist. He never lashed out at me or hit me in public or in front of our show’s crew. Everybody believed he was a great guy, including my family because he knew how to play that role so well.”
“You’ve kept all of it out of the public, even the drug abuse. Word is he committed suicide because of depression. There have been foundations created in his honor. Hell, I donated to one of them!”
“Yeah, didn’t see the point in tarnishing his legacy, and I’m pretty sure he did suffer from depression among other things.”
“But his stupid-ass fans are wrecking your reputation. I could fuck every one of them up!”
“Armand, don’t—”
“I’m good. I’m good. So, you blame yourself for him dying? Don’t. He was fucked up. You didn’t put those pills in his hand or his body. You had a right to pursue a career. Fuck him. You didn’t hurt him and you’ve never hurt me.”
“I know it’s not my fault. Cognitively, I know that. I had months of therapy while I was in rehab—”
“Why were you in rehab? For pills, right?”
I nodded as I blinked back tears. “I was so depressed, just messed up. I don’t know. I wouldn’t leave his condo, and there were freaking pills stashed everywhere. I just wanted the pain to stop, so I started taking them like a dumb ass. I’m too smart for that, but I did it! I ended up in rehab because I lost two whole days one time. I still don’t remember what happened during those forty-eight hours, but one day it was Monday, and the next thing I knew, it was Thursday. I asked my dad to help me get into rehab and he did. It saved my life, helped me regain the agency and control Jackson had whittled away, and introduced me to the therapeutic benefits of kink.”
He stared at me for long moments before saying, “I don’t know much about love other than the kind of love I have for my mom, granny, and my boy Scotty. You know, familial love, but I…I love you, Ella, and I’m yours. Do I need to sign some shit? You own me, sir. You own every part of me…especially my heart.”
I burst into tears while pulling him to me, and right before my lips met his, I wept, “I love you, too.”