Icy Pretty Love (3 page)

It goes on for miles, snow-white sparkling ceramic. There are—dear sweet mother of God—jets, as well as a waterproof LCD panel to set the temperature, lighting color, jet pressure and pulse, and whether you’d prefer to have angels or fairies massaging your shoulders. I’ll have no trouble ignoring Cohen for the next month because I’ll be spending all my time inside this tub.

I soak for years, using up every single one of the tiny soaps and bottles of cream and shampoo that have presumably been here since Cohen moved in. The labels are in French, so it’s possible that I just used foot cream as hair conditioner, but it smells so good that I don’t even care.

The water soaks off all my annoyance until I’m left with nothing but mild self-flagellation. Enough with the sass, Rae. That could be meant to put you off your guard. Letting a client see your sarcastic side is an implicit sign that you trust him not to revenge himself with his fists. And you should never trust a client. Ever.

I exhale, sinking into the bubbles. Everything’s still on track. One month with a rich dirtbag and I’m free to remake my life. A hundred thousand dollars. Maybe I’ll move back to Virginia. Get my GED and then take classes at the community college.

Finally I get out, put my cutesy Georgette dress back on—it’s the only Georgette outfit I have, I’ll have to scrounge up some money somewhere to go shopping—and peek into the living room. It’s dark. Cohen’s gone out.

But I soon lose interest in this, because I’ve discovered my bed.

If the tub was Shangri-La, this bed is Mecca. It’s enormous, the quilt a deep rich red color with endless throw pillows to match, arranged so artfully it could be displayed in a museum. I ruin the arrangement by throwing myself on top of it, sinking inches into the luscious feather mattress. Back in LA, I slept on a blow-up bed.

Cackling, I shove my face into a scented pillow and breathe in before rolling around, kicking my legs out in all directions until the bed is rumpled enough to be homey.

A piece of paper flutters off one pillow onto the floor. I snatch it up. There’s a shiny credit card taped to the back.

Call room service for dinner if you like. Use the card.

Cohen.

Maybe he’s not so bad after all. Either way, the fact that I’m ravenous hits me like a freight train. I reach for the cordless phone on the bedside table and dial the number on the little placard.

“Yes, I’d like some food, please. No, I haven’t looked at a menu. Uh…just bring me the most expensive thing you have. Two of them. And one of the second most expensive thing you have. And some French fries. Thank you.”

Within twenty minutes, two steaming lobsters, something yellowy-brown to be served on pita bread that bellboy explains is foie gras, and some thick-sliced potato wedges that don’t remotely resemble anything I’ve ever bought at McDonalds are delivered to me. I stuff myself, cracking lobster legs while switching through one kajillion channels on the large TV mounted in my room, most of which are tragically in French. Afterwards I’m so full up with deliciousness, and consequently happiness, that I blast some French pop music and dance around the apartment in nothing but a sheet, which is a bad idea, because I almost puke up all the deliciousness.

After a second bath to wash away the dance-sweatiness, it’s past midnight and Cohen still isn’t back. Maybe he’s found himself another place uninhabited by a ‘mouthy call-girl’ and he plans on leaving me here alone for a month, which would be just fine by me. If there’s a limit to the number of lobsters I can eat, it’s very high.

Eventually jetlag catches up to me and I crawl into bed. My cell phone is on the bedside table. I reach toward it out of reflex, wanting to call my old roommate, Nikki, and tell her everything, before I remember that I swore to leave everything about my old life behind. Including friends.

I do have a text, though, from my grumpy Google Maps savior.

334-827-3884
:
*you’re

I text back:

RG: Your very particular about grammar. Its a little funny.

He responds within five minutes.

334-827-3884
:
*you’re *it’s

RG: Im could definately learn a lot from your.

334-827-3884
:
I see what you’re doing.

RG: Do you? Because right now I’m making sweet love to a feather pillow and nobody needs to see that.

334-827-3884
:
Goodbye.

I stare at the word on the screen, and suddenly my chest is crushed by the loneliness of being in a new country where the only person who knows my name hates me. If I don’t have someone to talk to, I’ll explode. Wrong Number and Baldy are my only candidates, and at least there’s a possibility of Wrong Number having hair.

RG: Wait. Are you a boy or a girl?

334-827-3884
:
What, are you doing a survey?

RG: No, I just was pegging you as a boy and I wanted to see if I’m right.

334-827-3884
:
Congratulations.

Something about the sharp, dead acridity of his tone makes me hesitate. Maybe I’d gotten that number right after all.

RG: This isn’t Cohen, is it?

A few beats. Then:

334-827-3884
:
Not so lucky with your guessing game the second time. Now leave me alone.

RG: At least tell me your name.

RG: If you don’t tell me your name I’ll be forced to call you Elbert.

334-827-3884
:
I couldn’t care less what you call me because I will be ignoring your messages from now on.

RG: Okay, Elbert.

RG: So Elbert, what do people do for fun in Paris?

RG: Elbert Elbert Elbert Elbert

RG: ELBERT ELBERT ELBERT ELBERT

334-827-3884
:
Jesus.

RG: So your name’s Jesus! Guess your parents were religious. Hello, Jesus.

334-827-3884
:
Call me Sam if you feel the need to call me something.

RG: Sure thing, Sammy boy.

RG: So you’re a pretty grumpy person, right?

Sam: I’m having a somewhat shitty day. There’s a stranger who won’t stop texting me.

RG: I’m sure this beautiful and charming stranger would leave you alone if you gave her some advice, from a grumpy person’s perspective.

Sam: I don’t understand why we’re still talking.

RG: Say you lived alone and then suddenly someone new had to live with you for a month, and there was nothing you could do about it.

Sam: I’d move.

RG: Say you couldn’t move.

Sam: I’d make them move.

RG: Not on the table.

Sam: I’d call the police.

RG: Just play along! How would you want this new person to act? You know, to make things easier for you, as a grumpy and obviously antisocial person who is not used to this kind of thing?

Sam: Easier?

RG: Yeah, easier. Because say maybe this new person feels a little bad about busting in and changing your life all unexpectedly. What would you want them to do?

Sam: Leave me alone.

RG: Is that what you’d want the person to do or what you want me to do?

Sam: Both.

RG: Just leave you alone? That’s it?

Sam: It sounds like the person you’re talking about is used to being alone. Maybe they want to keep it that way.

RG: But that sounds depressing.

Sam: You obviously don’t know much about them if you’re asking a stranger for advice, so I doubt you know what’s depressing for them and what isn’t.

RG: So what you’re saying is that I should try to break him out of his shell a little, so I can get to know him better and figure out what’s depressing for him and what isn’t?

Sam: No.

RG: Thanks for the advice! <3

Sam: Ugh.

~3~

There’s something about waking up in a bed that probably cost more than you spent on rent in the last year that gives you a new lease on life. Or at least a new lease on Cohen Ashworth.

No matter what trash can the universe scraped his personality out of, I’m living with him for a month. So we got off on the wrong foot—so what? This guy seems like he gets off on the wrong foot with everyone. And if there’s anything I’ve learned from my job, it’s that first impressions can be deceiving.

After all, this Sam guy is also a giant jerk, but without him, I’d probably still be wandering the streets of Paris. Maybe Cohen has the same kind of compassion, all wrapped up in a spiky ball of jerkface.

So, at five a.m., when jetlag snaps open my eyes like an alarm clock going off, I get to work.

Cohen’s still not home, which means I can blast more clubby French pop as I clean the whole place. This mostly involves stacking papers. I peek, but they make as much sense to me as the French newspapers strewn on the couch. Business stuff, numbers and accounts. I make four neat piles on the coffee table.

Then I search the kitchen. No food. Nada. The fridge makes a little poofing sound when I pull it open, like it hasn’t been touched in the last century. Either Cohen orders room service for every meal or he survives on air and the blood of his enemies. Neither tastes as good as my home cooking, so when it seems late enough that grocery stores might be open, I head out in the same dress I wore yesterday.

“Bonsoir, Baldy!” I call to the doorman on my way out.

“That’s good evening, miss. You want to say bonjour,” he says crisply. There’s a lot of judgment in his little tweedy eyes. He’s the only one besides Cohen and Assworth Sr. who knows what I’ve been hired for. I wonder if Cohen will order a hit on him, like a mob boss. I could come back to marble floors splattered with blood.

“If they come for you, claim ignorance!” I shout behind me as the doors close.

The French air is cool and damp, like stepping into one of those mist booths they have at fairs. All around me, people in black trot to their respective funerals—I mean, work. There’s an inordinate number of little dogs. Fresh bakery smells are coming from a little store on the corner, so I stop and eat my way through something like a giant hamburger with fluffy pastry instead of buns and light, cloudlike cream instead of a patty.

I am going to get so fat, and it’s going to be beautiful.

Armed with my new Assworth credit card, I storm the nearest grocery store. Fresh eggs, mushrooms, garlic, chives, red peppers…I load up with everything I’m capable of carrying. On my way back, I hit the bakery again and pick up two fresh baguettes. Then I pass a cheese store and buy two big, expensive domes of goat cheese and fresh farm milk. By the time I make it back to the apartment building, I’m staggering. Baldy starts sweating when he sees me.

“Do you need any help with that, miss?”

“Oh no, I’m fine, this is just how I get my exercise,” I gasp, but then one bag plummets off the top. Baldy lunges to catch it.

Together we manage to lug my massive quantities of food into the elevator and then to my door. Luckily enough, Cohen still isn’t home. Was he kidnapped or something? Some bad guy planning to ransom him for millions? Will I have to step up as the intrepid girl detective to rescue him? I’d probably start untying him and he’d turn his nose up at my lack of Girl Scout knot abilities.

As soon as Baldy and I tip all the food onto the living room carpet, we both take a panting break. It’s a bonding experience.

“You should know that we do not usually allow your type into this establishment,” he says
. Zis eztablishment
. So much for bonding.