WHEN LUCA PULLED up to Manning Records, the last thing he expected was to be bombarded by paparazzi as soon as his driver parked the car.

Even though half his life he'd been in Hollywood, being around paparazzi was something he'd never got used to. He got used to taking pictures with random people. People he never saw more people than once and never followed his twenty-four-seven wherever he went.

It was the blinding lights and many voices that bothered him. Most would think paparazzi were nothing compared to being in a stadium with thousands of voices yelling and music blasting—but most didn't have hundreds of men following them around with cameras and different questions being yelled into their ears.

When Luca was nineteen years old, he had a panic attack in the midst of being crowded by paparazzi. The worst part was not only the feeling of him falling to the floor but the cameras being shoved in his face and the flashes that blinded his eyes. Everything was so loud, and his head felt like it was on fire. No one bothered to help him until Brandy and security noticed Luca wasn't following behind them into the restaurant.

The flashing lights blinded his vision though his slightly tinted windows. He inhaled deeply as he turned his head to the back window. Different sized men stood behind his truck with cameras glued to their faces.

"Just relax." He ordered himself, closing his eyes as he took deep breaths.

The rain would've sounded pleasing and comforting for an average person, but it was chaos and a feeling of uncertainty for him.

Holding down on the button for a few seconds, Luca lifted his finger when the window was half down. "Can you guys please move so I can get out?"

Instead of them listening, they yelled at different questions.

"Luca, is it true you'll be going back on tour so soon?" One asked as he snapped a quick photo.

"What happened during your tour Luca?"

"What happened between you and Jacob Manning because of Bella?" A more resonant voice asked as a large video camera with a bright light was shoved into the cracked space.

Quickly shoving the machine out of the way, Luca hurriedly closed the window as he blinked multiple times. He swallowed the bile in his throat as he clenched his fist tightly.

Only SMAC's reporter would be a complete dick and ignorant asshole and shove a camera through the window. All the company's paparazzi cared for were pictures that looked deceiving enough to add a title that wasn't anything but what the picture showed.

Luca needed to be calm—he needed to think with a clear mind. It didn't help that his half-empty whiskey bottle was hidden in the passenger seat's back pocket. He drank throughout most of the night and morning. He was still drunk.

He found that his staying drunk was better for writing purposes—or at least that was the excuse he kept telling himself. He couldn't compose music sober, so he did it drunk.

Most of his songs were initially depressed with a sad tempo—none of them were pop or even rock. Brandy changed everything he ever wrote. He made Luca's music what he wanted it to be because he's the one who made Luca. 

Luca leaned in closer to the driver. "Where is security?"

Luca has never had security with him since his accident. Brandy was supposed to introduce Luca to his new bodyguards that morning at his house, but Brandy found it better to introduce them after his music session. He promised that the security for the holding would meet Luca outback before the paparazzi could see him.

Vincent looked at Luca through the rearview mirror. "No one is answering, sir."

Vincent was fifty years old who Luca considered being his only friend now, and they've only ever spoken ten words to each other.

"God fucking damn it!" Luca yelled as he hit the back of the passenger seat.

Out.

He needed to get out of there. The car felt like it was crushing from the side and top of him.

Air.

He was running out of air to breathe. His lungs burned and yearned for oxygen that couldn't make its way to its system.

His head pounded painfully as Luca's head began to tingle. He leaned back into the seat with a loud gasp. He reached for the whisky bottle beside him and opened the cap with shaking hands. Bringing the glass bottle to his lips, Luca chugged the remaining liquor.

Drinking didn't help, but he liked to think it did. He'd grown used to drinking and the aftermath of it. The dizziness and blurry eyesight, the weight gain, even the change of attitude towards himself and others. It was like his body grew with the alcohol over the years, and now he wasn't affected by it anymore—he'd grown used to it.

"I can escort you myself, sir." Vincent insisted.

"No," Luca said with a heavy breath, "no, it's okay."

Luca turned his head to the back door, watching as paparazzi began to seepage and create a pathway to the back door. His eyebrows furrowed when they instantly met Jacob's stony gaze.

He unlocked his door quickly as Amina threw it open. "Come on!" She yelled over a thunderclap.

"What are you doing? Are you insane?"

Artists new to Hollywood didn't know what they were getting themselves into. She could get hurt for doing this. Paparazzi could take one bad snap, and her career could be entirely over. She was a woman, and a woman in Hollywood always needed to watch every movie she made—because everyone was praying for their downfall.

"Just follow me." She ordered, grabbing his hands as she pulled him out of the car.

He stepped in front of her as he pulled her close behind him. Paparazzi didn't care for anyone's well-being. As long as they got a good picture, their job was done.

"Luca, is it true Bella is in rehab?"

"Jacob, why haven't you been seen with Luca over months?"

"Amina, do you feel any way with what people are saying about you?"

He pushed his way past men with Amina holding tightly to his arm. Quickly grabbing the door handle, Luca threw it open as he moved Amina though with Jacob and Noah following close.

"That was stupid!" Luca exclaimed to the three adults as soon as they stepped into the lobby.

They all were soaking wet and shaking from anxiety. Amina's forehead shined with rain, and Jacob's curls stuck to his forehead. Both looked at him in disbelief as Noah just smiled up at Luca.

"What was stupid was the fact that you didn't have security with you," Amina exclaimed back lividly.

She was right.

Luca never had bodyguards around him unless he was with Brandy. Everyone who did try to protect Luca never did a good or just wasn't right to protect a celebrity.

"They're always in the back waiting for me when I get here," Luca flickered his eyes behind Amina to Brandy with a glowering look. "Paparazzi shouldn't have even been in the back anyways."

"Amina, Noah, can you come here for a second?" Brandy muttered, sneaking a stern glance at Luca.

Luca didn't get to see Amina walk away before Jacob stood in front of him and grabbed his forearm.

"Let's go." He ordered, dragging him to the conference room.

As soon as Jacob slammed the door, he pushed Luca back. "What the fuck were you thinking?"

Jacob Manning always had a bit of a temper when it came to anything that annoyed him. He never took therapy (which he was the only one given that opportunity) to contain his emotions, which made everything worse because Jacob was always emotional. Drinking and partying were the only things that subsided the anger inside him for a short while, but that seemed to change after the accident.

He was angry—he was always angry.

People liked to say how Luca and Noah were yin and yang. Luca being the calm and 'composed' one while Jacob was the angry and emotional one. In reality, they both were angry people. Luca was just better at hiding how he felt.

"What?"

Jacob rolled his eyes in disbelief. "You can't go missing your security every chance you get."

Luca's eyebrows furrowed. "Why do you care?"

Luca wanted his best friend back a long time ago, but now Luca just tried to find himself again. Jacob chose Brandy, and Luca couldn't be upset. If Bella wasn't, then he didn't have the right to either. He chose his legal family over the family that had something better than a name tied to Jacob.

Hollywood didn't change Jacob. Jacob was always Jacob. That was one of the things that made Luca jealous of him. Jacob never stayed the way Hollywood or Brandy wanted him to be. Luca wasn't sure if it was just the haze Jacob was a stubborn person, or that Brandy didn't care for the way Jacob was because he wasn't a more giant star than Mavis or Luca.

Jacob scoffed bitterly. "You get hurt, it's on my dad."

If only he knew how bitter his words were.

Luca did get hurt, but the person that inflicted the pain on him was Brandy fucking Manning himself.

Bella and Luca were more of a family to him than Brandy ever was. Luca couldn't even understand how Jacob called Brandy, his father, after what he did to them. He treated Jacob like trash and used his skin color as an excuse for the way he treated him. Through paparazzi photos, it looked like the father and son duo were close and loved each other, but people who knew both knew the two hated each other.

'He didn't know. He didn't believe it. You told him too late."

He was adopted into the Manning family when he was eight years old. He was a child who went through different foster homes and never stayed with a family. Jacob always felt like he owed Brandy for saving him from the foster system—not like Hollywood's system was any better.

"Right, of course," Luca said sarcastically, "stupid of me to think you would care."

"What the fuck that's suppose to mean?"

"Oh, don't act all fucking surprised." Luca snapped with a glare. "You're a liar and backstabber just like Mavis."

Everyone changed when they lived in Hollywood. The four of them had to change to get to where they dreamed of being. But, when they got there, they couldn't change back their old selves, but Jacob stayed the way they were because they had to.

Luca shouldn't be upset with him—knew that but still was. He wasn't upset with the fact Jacob hated him, but upset that Jacob didn't believe Bella after everything the two of them went through. He saw her just like Luca did, but Luca was the only one to intervene. Even then, Jacob chose a man who corrupted him over the woman he loved.

To Bella, Jacob did the right thing—choosing the man that'd traumatized all four of them in ways no one could imagine over her and Luca. She kept telling Luca that Jacob didn't understand what happened and neither did Luca—she sounded as if being in the situation she was in was the most no row thing in the world.

That made Luca realize she'd been through what he had too—that he let everything that happened to him happen to Bella and Mavis. He let his friends get hurt because he couldn't see the signs.

"You're crazy and delusional," Jacob added with a bitter tone, "lay off the liquor."

Luca laughed loudly. "You mean liquor your dads practically shoving down my throat?"

Jacob shoved him against the wall. One large hand was wrapped around Luca's throat while the other held his shoulder. Luca could smell whisky, the liquor stench burning this nose. Was it him or a Jacob that reeked of Hollywood medication?

"What? What are you going to do, Jacob?" Luca teased, amused, "you gonna hit me?"

Jacob's breathing was becoming more massive, and his hold on him was tightening.

"Hit me then!" Luca yelled, pushing Jacob back as his hold fell.

They were taking their anger and sadness out on each other. They had no way of expressing or getting help with their trauma, so they took out on the people they loved.

Jacob bitterly laughed as he let his hold on Luca fall. "You're not worth it."

Luca laughed. "That's true."

Luca wasn't worth anything. He wasn't anything. He wanted to take down Hollywood, and he knew no one would believe him because he didn't even believe in himself. Amina was the key to making Hollywood bleed because Luca couldn't.

Brandy told him real things, like how Luca wasn't worth anything, and that no one would ever believe anything he said. Luca was an addict who was known for bipolar and depression. No one would assume that anything terrible happened to him under Brandy's wing—no one but Brandy's artists and other victims.

"You did this to yourself, Luca."

He did, didn't he? He let Brandy manipulate him. He let Brandy do horrible things to him for so many years in fear that he'd be killed or medicated. He let everything traumatizing happen to him. He was weak. A boy—no man would ever let what brand did toLuca happen. All Brandy ever told Luca was how he wasn't a man and that everything that's happened to him was his fault.

"It wasn't just me, though."

Brandy's done it to Bella, Mavis, other women and men throughout his career. Luca wasn't the only one who Brandy traumatized, and he wasn't going to be the last either. His entire career, he thought he was the only victim, only to find out his two best friends and other innocent people were too.

"Shut up," Jacob muttered.

"He's killing us for money, Jacob! How can't you see that?"

Jacob brought his hands to his hair. "Watch your fucking mouth!"

"We were your family." Luca's eyes began to water at the four of them' memories in their prime of happiness and carefreeness. "We love you Jacob."

"Bullshit!" He exclaimed, "the second you got bigger, you forgot all about us!"

It wasn't Luca's choice to cut off communications from everyone when he started getting more significant. Brandy pressured him To Goto patties and hang out with people he never wanted to be around. Once he started doing tours, he rarely slept or talked at that. Brandy took his phone privileges away, and the only way she heard from Bella or Jacob was through the news or Brandy.

"I was there for Bella when she was struggling with her eating disorder! I was there for Mavis when she had to go to therapy for her bipolar!" Jacob yelled, tears spilling down his cheeks. "So, don't give me that family bullshit when you forgot about us first."

"Do you think I wanted to go on fucking tour? Leave everyone behind?" Luca croaked, "I fucking hate it here, Jacob! I hate myself for everything I've been through and let others go through!"

Jacob looked at Luca taken back, his mouth agape and his eyes bright red. Both of them went from not talking to each other for months to letting go of the anger they've kept inside.

"Luca—"

"What the fuck is all this?"

The door behind Jacob opened and slammed closed before Luca could blink. Brandy stood rigidly as his face burned a bright red, and fists clenched to his sides.

"Nothing Pa," Jacob muttered, giving one last glance at l a before turning to his father.

"Get the fuck out now," Brandy ordered.

Luca took a deep intake, watching as Jacob took in a deep breath as he stalked past his father and the door behind him.

Swiftly, Brandy's large hand came around Jacob's throat tightly. "You embarrass me like that again, I'll kill you."

Had people heard their arguing from the hallway? If so, why was Brandy taking his anger out on Jacob? Luca hadn't seen Brandy put a hand on Jacob in years, but then again, he rarely ever saw Jacob and Brandy together. 

Jacob gasped for air when Brandy's hold on him loosened. Luca started, frozen in horror as Jacob shakily opened the door and walked into the lobby.

"You're the embarrassment." Luca snarled, walking to the door.

How could he stand there as Brandy put his hands on his best friend? Was he afraid? Was he a coward for watching and not stopping it?

Brandy tried to grab Luca's wrist, but he quickly grabbed his wrist. "I'm going to burn everything you've built to the ground."

Before Brandy could say anything else, Luca let go of his wrist and left the room.

He was done being what Brandy wanted him to be.