The Virgin Society Collection

14. Everything To Lose

14

EVERYTHING TO LOSE

Bridger

On Friday, I’m in meetings around the city, stewing on the problem in Afternoon Delight in between. I don’t bother Ian. He’s heading out of town with Vivian on Sunday, but since he punted the script my way, that’s a sign he has no fucking idea what’s wrong with the story.

But I have a hunch why it’s not working. I want to fix it. Right now. Right away. Maybe if I do, I can stop obsessing over Harlow.

If I solve this problem, maybe my mind will let go of its incessant need to talk to her.

Maybe, maybe, maybe.

But I want to tell her too what the trouble in the script is. I’m dying to know if she’s spotted it as well.

I shouldn’t want to share, but I do.

As I walk to my next meeting in Tribeca, I make myself a promise—I’ll only tell her if she brings it up.

There. That’s a good limit.

After I finish my meeting, I return to Columbus Circle, my limit front and center in my mind. Once I reach the fourteenth floor, I say hello to Christian at reception, then head down the hall. When I round the corner into my office, Harlow flies in. Vibrating with energy. Looking incredible in that black skirt.

“I know what’s wrong,” she announces, eyes wide with delight.

I light up with the thrill of problem-solving. “Me too.”

“There’s no backstory,” she announces. “For the hero.”

Yes. Fucking yes. She got it.

“I don’t know enough about Austin,” I add, enthused.

“No wonder the writers said it needs work,” she says, equally excited.

“And I want to care about Austin.”

“We need more insight into him,” she zings back.

We stand inches away, exchanging ideas. This is like foreplay, this back and forth. But I should be boss-like. I should be businesslike. I clear my throat. “Can you write up a report on Tuesday? Since the office is closed on Monday.”

“I’d love to. I’ll work on it over the weekend.”

“You don’t have to work over the long weekend,” I say.

“I don’t mind. I’m happy to talk more about it now too, if you want.”

I glance at the clock on the wall. “I have a few calls then I have to go to a thing,” I say, the last word tasting sour. “A cocktail party.”

“Want me to go with you?” she asks, kind and friendly.

More than you can ever know .

“It doesn’t have to be complicated,” she adds in a whisper, so no one else can hear. “I could be your wing-woman?”

Am I that obvious with my disdain for events? Perhaps I am to her. Talking to her is easier than talking to anyone else. She’s the opposite of my days, of deals, of problems, of negotiations. She feels like a solution to them, even though my feelings for her are the biggest problem of all—a conundrum tucked inside a riddle.

But I want her to solve all my riddles, so I shut the door this time. She moves to one end of the couch. I sit on a chair across from it. “Why do you think I need one?” I ask, desperate to know if she truly sees through me.

If she sees me.

“You don’t like parties,” she says plainly.

“You noticed.”

“I told you. I notice things.”

I’m a little amazed at how she lasers in on me. Or perhaps a lot amazed. And completely charmed. “You notice everything,” I say.

“I don’t drink at parties either. I don’t drink at all,” she says, and I didn’t know that about her. I had no reason to know it.

“That so?” I ask, wanting more, always more with her.

“I didn’t drink on my twenty-first birthday.”

“Yeah?” I don’t hide a smile. This is good news. No, the best news. I hardly meet anyone who has the same lines as I do.

“I don’t want to be buzzed. It’s not my thing. I like control.” She takes a pause, her expression vulnerable. “I didn’t have it when I was younger.”

I hear everything she’s not saying. She was raised around uncontrollable situations, a man with a monstrous appetite, a world she had no say over.

“You want to make all your choices with a clear mind. You want to make them for you,” I say.

“Exactly.”

The more I talk to her, the more I let her in. I don’t usually share. I don’t like to. But Harlow breaks me down. “That’s why I walk around the park before events. To gird myself before I have to face a party. Moving around, walking, often the same path, helps me do that.”

“Why don’t you like parties, though?”

“My mom drinks. She’s an…alcoholic. I don’t tell people that,” I admit. But Harlow’s not people. I trust her. I don’t even know why, except maybe because she’s only ever given me reasons to trust her. “She was always throwing parties when I was a kid, having friends over. They all got drunk. All the time. They’d booze around my home, holding bottles, singing, dancing, talking about everything so damn loudly. I hated seeing everyone like that.”

“That sounds hard,” she says gently. “I get that. I do.”

“I don’t want to be like that.” Each word is a scrape. Dry and harsh. “I want to be…”

“In control?” She doesn’t say like me . She doesn’t have to.

“Yes.”

“So, should I go with you?” She sounds hopeful, eager.

My business should be at the top of my mind. My relationship with my business partner. The empire we’ve built. I have everything to lose, and still, I move to the couch. Sitting closer. “Harlow, I said this before. I need to say it again.” The words threaten to stick in my throat, but I press on. “Do you really think that’s a good idea? You and me at a party?”

“I like the idea,” she says, strong, certain.

I take her strength and swallow it, letting it fuel me. “So do I,” I say, quietly, telling the truth. “That’s kind of the problem.”

Her smile reappears for a second, then she seems to rein it in. “Why is it a problem?”

“You know why. It’s complicating things,” I say, frustrated again with our situation, with all the lines between us.

“But they’re already complicated,” she counters.

I stare out the window, Central Park below us, New York beyond. Then I look to the brunette beauty on my couch, my heart pounding mercilessly hard. I could crush her lips in a kiss, cover her body, fuck her till she’s lost her mind.

Get it together.

“They’re so complicated I can’t fucking think sometimes around you,” I admit, and it’s a wild relief.

“Same for me,” she says, breathy. “Same for me…Mr. James.”

Her lashes flutter.

It’s the first time she’s called me that and it’s too sexy, too dangerous.

My heart stops then starts again, beating in double time. “You know that no one in the office calls me Mr. James, right?”

“Do you like it when I do?”

I clench my fists. “Too much,” I rasp out.

She leans closer. I dig my fingers harder into my palm.

Then she whispers my name once more, letting it slide off her lips like she’s lingering on every letter. “Mr. James…”

I’m this close to saying fuck it to everything. To locking the door and pushing her up against the wall. To tearing off that shirt, and pressing my mouth to her lush, tempting skin.

But my office phone trills.

I want to thank the caller and curse the caller at the same time.

On the intercom, Jules announces that Carlos Mondez is on the line.

“He’s a friend who’s trying to get me an intro to David Fontaine. I need to take that call,” I say to Harlow.

Her green eyes sparkle, then her lips curve in a wicked grin, like she’s just cracked a case.

“Hope the party is short,” she says.

Me too , I mouth before she slinks out, whispering, “See you next week.”

I can’t wait for Tuesday to come.