Hollywood Nights (8 page)

“After what she’s done to you over the last year, I wouldn’t have wanted to run into her either.”

“You hardly know the half of it, believe me.” I paused. “Going to Twisted turned out to be a much better decision.”

We stared at each other for a long moment.

“Okay,” she finally said. “How do you want to do this?”

“Well, for starters, I don’t expect us to see much of each other when we’re here. It’s not required that we become friends. I’m worried about what happens in public. A few strategic dinners at first, some date nights, a few movie premieres—that kind of thing. We have to be seen in the most expected places. It won’t take much.”

“And you won’t—”

“This isn’t sex for hire,” I said. “You don’t have to worry.”

“Okay,” she said in a flat, emotionless voice. Couldn’t tell if she was relieved or disappointed.

“You should find clean sheets and towels in the closet by the bathroom.” I jerked my head in that direction. “Here’s the key to the pool house. Martha has breakfast ready at nine on Saturdays and Sundays in the kitchen, so we can discuss this further tomorrow.” I made my way back to the door. “And if you need anything, you know where to find me.”

“Will Heather be joining us?”

“Goodnight, Brynn.”

“Goodnight, Tanner.”

When I walked out, I made sure I didn’t look back. Didn’t let myself see the expression on her face. Didn’t take another glance at her beautiful eyes. Another second around her and I might do something stupid.

When I got back inside the main house, the pressure was too great. It had been so long since I’d been around anyone remotely interesting. Los Angeles had so much boring, scattered ass, and Lana had dulled almost every nerve in my body. Now, Brynn was—

Brynn was my employee.

I considered that again for a few minutes. Just business, no matter how much I liked the fiery, determined woman I kept seeing every time I encountered her. It didn’t work, though.

Fuck.

I needed a release, and I had only one way to get it. In the master bedroom, I found Heather asleep.

She wouldn’t do. Waking her up wouldn’t fix it, anyway. Besides, why had I invited her over? I didn’t want to live in the past anymore, and Heather was nothing but that. Not many great memories there. I wanted to live in the present, where I could build a future full of good decisions and better outcomes.

A future that started with Brynn. As a business partner, of course, as soon as I took care of a nagging ache I couldn’t control. I turned on the shower in the master bath, stripped off my clothes and stepped inside. There, standing under a waterfall of lukewarm water, I jerked off until I had put her out of my mind.

M
aybe I had made a huge mistake. Not maybe. Probably. I had probably made a huge mistake.

I sat down on the couch in the main room. Good grief, what had I been thinking? A fake relationship was stupid. Irrational. Bizarre. The kind of thing that only happened in Los Angeles, where so much about life was already untrue. My head started to throb.

Besides, the guy had a porn star in his bed.

Seriously, I needed to stop this before it began, while I still had time to get out, and before any damage occurred. It wouldn’t be hard. I needed to walk back to the main house, tell him I had reconsidered, hop in my car, and drive away. He wouldn’t protest, and we’d probably never see each other again. The city alone had almost four million people, and another nine million or so lived in the surrounding metro. Our lives didn’t need to cross again.

Determined to put an end to this before it began, I stood up, but then my gaze fell on the bags holding the few things I cared about. If I left, where would I go? I had no place to live, and no job. Nothing.

I looked around the room. The pool house didn’t seem so bad—small, but cozy. In fact, I hadn’t had this much space to myself since I’d left Ohio. In the kitchen, I found a refrigerator stocked with water, juice, fruit, lunchmeat, white wine, and gourmet cheeses. I grabbed a bottled water from inside the front door and gulped down half of it.

This whole thing did come with a five-hundred-thousand-dollar payday…

Maybe I could do this for a weekend. That could work. A few days wouldn’t be so bad. Enough time to figure out where to go and what to do next.

The following morning, around a quarter to nine, I walked through an unlocked sliding door and into Tanner’s massive kitchen. I found a thin woman in front of the stove, wearing black leggings and an oversized blue zip sweatshirt. She whirled around, revealing the kind of body that lived in the gym when it wasn’t worshiping the sun. Her protruding collarbones almost made me recoil. LA had such crazy beauty standards.

“You must be Martha,” I said.

“That’s me. And you’re Brynn.” She held up a blue beveled drinking glass. “Would you like a green smoothie?”

“Sounds delicious.” I took the glass, and then found a seat in a black woven barstool at the center kitchen island. “What else are you making?”

“Scrambled egg whites with goat cheese.” She nodded. “Mr. Vance is particular about what he eats.”

“Not
that
particular,” I said under my breath, remembering his drunken trip to Twisted. What a man of contradictions.

If she heard my comment, Martha didn’t acknowledge it. Instead, she turned back to the eggs, which had begun to crackle in the skillet on the range. “Right now, I’m cooking Mr. Vance and his—guests—three meals a day. All low-carb and protein-based, of course.”

I sipped the smoothie. “This tastes fantastic.”

Martha turned around from the stove. “All natural. Strawberries, spinach, wheatgrass, banana, and almond milk.”

“I love it.” I paused. “And how many people are you making breakfast for this morning?”

“Just two.” She stirred the eggs. “What makes you ask?”

I thought about Heather and her bouncing boobs. “No reason.”

“I don’t know if you’ve ever been on a diet before,” she said, talking more to herself than to me, “but the key to the whole thing is consistency, so I’m here to make sure Tanner doesn’t get tempted.”

“Tempted?” Tanner said, as he walked into the kitchen. “Tempted by what?”

I sucked in a deep breath. He wore a pair of low-slung tan sweatpants and a vintage LA Lakers T-shirt that hugged the contours of his chest. After a small nod in my direction, he walked over to Martha and kissed her on the cheek, then thanked her for the smoothie. This guy had sexy on lockdown. Search for the word man in the dictionary, and you’d find a photo of him.

“I see you two have met,” Tanner said to me.

“I am enjoying one of her smoothies.”

Tanner picked up his own large glass from the marble counter. “She’s famous for these.”

Martha demurred, clearly flattered by him, and said the eggs would be ready soon. Tanner then asked me to follow him into the living room so we could talk while the food finished cooking.

“About last night—”

“You don’t need to explain,” I said.

“No, I do. First, Heather isn’t here anymore, if you were wondering,” Tanner said. “She left early this morning.”

“A shame. And we were getting to know each other.” I raised my eyebrow. “I hope you two had fun.” I was needling him. We both knew it. He deserved it.

“Second, I didn’t think you’d actually take me up on this offer,” he said in a low voice after a quick glance in the direction of the kitchen. “I hope you understand. A man like me—I have… needs.”

I scoffed. “One way of putting it.”

He raised a hand as if he couldn’t think of any other way to say it.

“I understand perfectly,” I said, keeping my lips tight as I reminded myself yet again that Tanner wanted only a business transaction from me. “And I thought we could try this for a bit—see how it goes—and then decide if we want to move forward.”

Tanner rubbed the back of his neck. “I’m open to that.”

“Good.” I nodded at the kitchen. “Shall we start with breakfast?”

“Yes. And then, tonight, would you like to go with me to dinner at Katsuna?”

I drew in a sharp breath. “Just the two of us?”

“No. They’re having an exclusive opening party. An industry thing. Would be nice to have someone with me.” Tanner looked me up and down. “Do you have anything to wear?”

“I guess the job starts now,” I said.

He smiled. “Maybe we’ll call this a probationary period. We’ll decide on Monday how we feel.”

“T
hat will be $1,456.83,” Janet, a raven-haired, pin-thin personal shopper at Barneys New York in Beverly Hills, said. I handed her Tanner’s black AmEx and she swiped it through the register. “Would you like the receipt with you, or in the bag?”

“With me.” I took the card back from her and marveled at it for a moment. I’d heard of these cards before, but never seen one up close. That afternoon, Tanner had casually handed it to me with instructions to get whatever I needed in order to be ready for that night. In a haze, I found myself at Barneys with Janet, who offered me any outfit in the store in order to “keep Mr. Vance happy.” She showed me at least five dresses that each cost more than I made in three months. I had decided I wouldn’t spend more than $1,500.

“Thank you,” I said.

I took the garment bag Janet handed me, along with two other larger ones, and found my way to the parking lot. With one swipe, I’d spent more than a week’s salary on a black dress with silver weaving, a pair of strappy black Louboutins, a bespoke purse designed by Chloe, and a necklace to match it all. Once I placed it all in the trunk of the Corolla, I drove to Giovanni Salon and Day Spa on Santa Monica for a blowout, eyebrow wax, a facial, and makeup application.

I hadn’t ever been this pushed, prodded, and picked. Actually, it felt good, and I had to hold myself in check as I wound the car back through the Hollywood Hills. Just because I could get used to this didn’t mean I should.

“Did you find something?” Tanner asked when I arrived back at his house. He sat one of the large recliners rimming his pool deck; he peeled off his aviator sunglasses when he saw me walk into the back yard. “Looks like it.”

“I had trouble choosing.” I patted the garment bag. “But I think this one will do.”

“And you didn’t have any problems using my card?”

“They seemed to know you pretty well at Barneys.”

He laughed once. “They do. And what about your phone?”

I held up a different plastic bag. “Verizon was happy to oblige me in the purchase of a new iPhone. Already set it up with Facebook, Instagram, Twitter, and Snapchat.”

“Good.” Tanner nodded at me a few times. “The party starts at eight, so I’m thinking we’ll leave here around eight fifteen. Don’t want to get there too early.”

Three hours later, I reemerged from the pool house in the black dress. I had to admit I liked what I saw in the bathroom mirror—the entire ensemble made me appear skinnier, and the outfit would stand up to anything else I encountered; no one had to tell me that.

I found Tanner in the main house, nursing a short glass of thick, brown liquor

“Maybe I should drive,” I said.

He looked up from the glass. “Nonsense. We have James to take us, remember?” Then he broke into a wide grin. “Nice outfit.”