I set my beanie down on the side table and pulled my coat off quickly, draping it over the back of the coat hook. Half way through my walk home from meeting Luke it had started pouring rain, so now I was completely drenched and so cold that I could no longer feel my toes. I scurried upstairs to my room, peeling my wet clothes off layer by layer as I walked, until I was left in just my tank top and underwear. Pushing the door to my room open, I curled my fingers around the hem of my tank top and started to lift it over my head.

"If I were a gentleman I'd probably be telling you that I'm in here too."

I shoved my top back down as fast as humanly possible, cracking my elbow on the edge of my dresser as I did so. "Ow. Crap. Ow!" I cried out, clutching my arm as pain shot from my elbow to my fingertips. "Son of a-"

Brooks chuckled, but he bit his lip to hide it when I shot him a death stare. "Ow! This is all your fault!"

He furrowed his eyebrows perplexedly. "My fault? How is this my fault?"

I hobbled over to the offending dresser and pulled it open to throw on a pair of grey shorts. "Yeah, your fault. If you'd just stop doing your stupid magic trick where you just appear out of nowhere, this wouldn't have happened."

Brooks shook his head at my dramatics and made himself comfortable on my bed, his eyes trailing me as I dried my hair and body off. He shrugged nonchalantly. "It's not my fault you're clumsy and deaf and can't ever hear me approaching."

I sighed internally. There was no point arguing with him, so I changed the subject instead. "What do you want anyway?"

Brooks reached into his pocket and pulled out a stack of what looked like cards, running his thumb over the top one. His dark eyes flicked up to meet mine, and he held me hostage in his gaze. "I found these in the den." He held out what I now could clearly see were the polaroids that had arrived in the mail earlier today, and my heart sank in my chest.

I went and sat down beside him, my arm brushing his in the process and forcing me to recoil. "Yeah, Mia found them in an envelope in the mailbox."

Brooks sucked in a breath, his shoulders tensing as he glared down at the photos. He paused on a particularly revealing image of me before closing his eyes in disgust, turning the photo face down. "What is wrong with that sick bastard?" He looked at me with a cold expression clouding his handsome features. "We can't let him get away with this."

I shook my head, a wave of doubt washing over me. "That's the thing. I went to see him today—"

"What?" He cut me off, startling me as he shot up from the bed.

"I went to see Luke today, to confront him, but I—"

"You went to see him? By yourself? After everything you saw him do at the lake house?" Brooks asked incredulously, jamming a hand through his bronze hair.

I stared at him for a moment. "What else was I supposed to do?" I asked eventually. "Ignore him and wait for him to take a photo of me naked and then share it with the world? Go to the police and have the story get out and my face in the newspaper tomorrow? Or better yet, let him start stalking Mia instead of me... is that what you want, Brooks?"

"You were supposed to let me deal with it." He growled in a low voice, very quickly losing his cool. He looked at me with anger swirling in his golden brown eyes, his hands balled into fists by his sides.

Let him deal with it. As if my only tasks in life were to sit still and look pretty. As if I hadn't spent the last four years dealing with my problems by myself.

I smoothed out my shorts and fought back a shiver, still chilly from my wet clothes. "I don't need you to come and rescue me." I said quietly, calmly. "I can make my own decisions and do things by myself, I'm not a helpless little kid anymore."

My cheeks heated at the thought of my past, at how submissive I'd been when kids at school used to pick on me— how incapable of standing up for myself I was and how much I'd relied on Brooks to help me.

But that wasn't me. Not anymore.

When I finally glanced up from my lap, Brooks' expression had softened. He was watching me through guarded eyes, barely even blinking. There was a frown line on the tanned skin of his forehead, one that hadn't been there before. "Trust me, I know you're not." He muttered, more to himself than to me. Then, louder, "I don't want you to see him again. I won't let you."

I recoiled at his words, not expecting him to be so brash. "You won't let me?" I repeated sourly, my voice no longer calm.

"No."

"Oh, okay!" I drawled with sarcastic enthusiasm. "So I suppose I need your permission to go outside now too? Or do I have a curfew now as well? What are you, my father?"

Brooks latched onto my gaze, throwing his hands up in exasperation. "No Savannah, I'm not." He snapped. "I'm just the sad fucker who, for some unknown reason, cares about you even though you clearly don't care about anyone but yourself."

My stomach wrenched as my heart dropped in my chest. His words stung more than a slap to the face. Is that still what he thought? That I was just some selfish, spoiled brat. I'd been under the impression that our relationship was slowly improving, but clearly he was still just as convinced as everyone else was that no matter how hard I tried to prove myself, I was always going to be the troubled starlet.

I crossed my arms over my chest and pushed away tears. He could think what he wanted, it didn't matter. I wasn't going to sit back and let people make my choices for me. I'd spent enough time without any control of my life, but now I did have control, and I wasn't going to give it up for anybody.

"I'm sorry you feel that way." I said flatly, my voice void of any emotion, sounding like I had already checked out of the conversation. "But you don't get to make decisions for me Brooks."

A moment of tense silence hung in the air between us, each of us just as stubborn as the other. Brooks was the first one to move. He sighed deeply and made his way to my door, slamming it open. He turned and shot me one last look, his normally gentle face twisted with anger. "I'm trying to help you Savannah. It's okay to accept help." He paused before his next blow. "I told you I never paid much attention to the tabloids— didn't think they held any truth. But maybe some of them were right. Maybe you are just a diva."