Chapter Five
Six Months Ago
On Wilshire, Isla parked, turned off the car, and considered the high-rise office across the busy street, where she was to meet her contact at one of the PR firms she and her team worked with as their research and procurement—the ones who got the dirt to help the firm manage whatever crisis it needed to manage for its clients.
She preferred the term research and procurement.
It made her team sound moral, a step or two above TMZ, because at least they weren’t selling salaciousness to gossip magazines to destroy someone’s career.
Isla, Rey, and Nat were there to help, not harm.
Or so Isla liked to tell herself. In the passenger seat beside her was a manila envelope, innocuous in appearance, though its contents were contradictory and promised a world of hurt for someone.
She was reaching over to grab the envelope she was going to deliver when her phone buzzed from where it sat in its holder. She glanced at the screen, forgetting the envelope for a moment to answer the call, which connected through the car’s Bluetooth.
She asked, “Everything all good?”
“Good as it’s gonna get.” Rey’s voice filtered through the car speakers. “Are you there?”
“Yep,” she said, her voice tight. She watched the traffic lights shift from red to green and the cars speed off. “This one, though . . .”
“Is no different from any of the others,” Rey finished. “Our part’s done as soon as you hand over the evidence.”
Isla shuddered, the words having come across more ominously than Rey intended.
Rey tried to look on the brighter side. “His actions won’t blow up happy families.”
She sighed. “Except his.”
“Well, maybe he should have thought about that before he started dipping and dabbling with coworkers. At any rate, the company is doing him a favor letting him go on his own.”
“He doesn’t seem like the type to start some illicit affair with a pregnant wife at home. Was Nat able to get any more from the receptionist?”
Rey groaned. “We pulled everything we could with the time we had, and there’s nothing else. You know that, Isla. He’s just some dude who could give the company a bad name and make shareholders uneasy with a guy like him handling their accounts.”
Isla’s mind churned, recalling the day two weeks ago when she, Nat, and Rey had been given the job.
The sole directive was to find compromising information about the accountant, and quickly.
But something didn’t sit right with Isla.
“People cheat. Why would a firm care what some lowly accountant does with the receptionist after hours?”
“And during, from what we got.” Rey chuckled his appreciation.
“Still—”
“Doesn’t matter why they’d care,” Rey cut in. “He got caught with his pants down. If the company wants to get him out this way with no big drama, that’s their business, not ours. Maybe he has company secrets they don’t want him spilling once he’s out.”
“So they force his resignation through blackmail instead of just firing him for impropriety? They had just cause to do so.”
“It’s their business, and it’s going to be however they want it to be. Let it go. It’s already taken care of.”
Let it go. For the past four years Rey, a technology savant; Natalie, their resident aspiring actress and usual decoy; and Isla had formed their own side hustle after a chance meeting at Rey’s little coffee shop on Venice Beach’s boardwalk.
It was during their last year at UCLA, and Natalie and Isla needed more money than they were making at their menial jobs.
Rey needed something to battle his boredom.
He was a guy who was too smart, tapped young to work behind-the-scenes cybersecurity for huge tech companies that he’d never disclose.
He was an employee they never spoke about but the kind you saw on TV who knew everything and could do anything with a keyboard and computer screen.
He needed something “fun,” and in a town rife with scandal, celebrities, and Hollywood bigwigs who always wanted the skinny on the others, why not provide that service to the companies that needed the dirty secrets and hidden proof but didn’t want to do all the hard work.
That was the service they’d started a couple of years back and continued to this day, all because Rey wanted to have a little fun.
Some fun this had turned out to be. A man was about to have his career ruined for a personal mistake.
She’d been around long enough to know what “taken care of” meant.
Nothing like mob hits, or so she thought.
It usually meant one’s indiscretions were laid bare for all to see and judge, and then one was canceled into oblivion.
Or hushed up with money offered as balm so the high-profile person, or company, in this case, could save face, with everything kept under wraps.
Usually, they found information for clients of the PR firm they worked for, and they didn’t get to pick the clients.
They only took on the jobs assigned by the firm.
They only found and delivered the information they were tasked with getting.
What their employers, and the clients they represented, did with the information was not their business.
“Not our business,” Rey reminded her, their mantra when sometimes the things they found were too difficult.
“Not my business,” she repeated, tamping down the burgeoning guilt and unease. The guy had cheated during his wife’s pregnancy and right after. His wife was his high school sweetheart. Moved here for his career. He was the lowest of the low.
She shook it off, killing any emotion, told Rey she’d see him later, and grabbed the folder. This was the job.
The inside of the PR firm was both bright and engaging and sleek and efficient, the usual makeup of LA businesses.
It bustled. Everyone was moving so fast here and there that Isla wondered if they really had somewhere to go, or if they were just walking back and forth to look busy.
She swallowed a laugh, imagining speed-walking around in four-inch Balenciagas, just ’cause.
Isla flashed her pass to security, who knew her well enough by now—she was the contact person with the clients.
Her own heels marking her movement on the polished floor, she took the elevator to the top floor, the twenty-ninth, where the VIPs worked.
Interesting, because usually she met her contact, Michelle, in her office.
Never at the top. This client must be big.
Michelle, more jittery than usual from either too much caffeine or not enough, met Isla in the hallway.
The former model asked excitedly, “Do you have it?”
“We sound like a drug deal’s going down,” Isla joked to alleviate some of her own anxiety, which had renewed itself at Michelle’s frantic appearance. “I’m joking, Michelle. What’s up with you?”
“Ugh, you have no idea,” Michelle whispered, on edge. Up close, Isla could see the bags beneath her eyes, which she’d hidden quite well with perfectly applied makeup. Still, her stress showed. “Gimme.”
Isla gave.
And then retracted her hands as if she’d just handed off an actual bomb instead of a figurative one. Her body relaxed, her part in this venture complete.
“Whole package here. I think Rey already told you what we found, but Leonard was in hot and heavy with Stephanie, the receptionist. She’s no longer at the company, but it’s been a pretty lengthy affair, which made him less diligent with his job and opened the company up to discrepancies in the accounts.
They could say he was negligent, because between her and the pregnant wife, he had his hands full.
Things he should have caught likely slipped through the cracks. ”
“Good, good.” Michelle nodded. She peeked in the folder at the photos that left nothing to the imagination, flipping through them with gusto.
“This is perfect. This makes the guy look . . . desperate, sloppy. And cheating on a pregnant wife? I mean, what the actual fuck? We can run with this. He’s so gone. ”
Isla debated. Should she mention her thoughts about how the whole affair seemed too convenient?
That Stephanie, the receptionist—who was now gone, interestingly enough—seemed way out of Leonard’s league?
In a city full of centerfold-looking men and heads of companies worth millions who’d love a sidepiece like Stephanie, why boring Midwest-born-and-bred Matthew Leonard?
He had a great-paying job, but still. He was mid in looks and wealth at best.
Michelle’s freshly highlighted hair shimmered as she absorbed it all, smiling wider as Isla spoke. Every delicious detail seemed to imbue her with life, and she stared into the distance, already working out how they were going to use the information.
Michelle said, “Everything tracks. We can paint a picture of someone unreliable, entirely self-serving, a liar and a cheat. The head guy hates those the most. By the time we’re done, no one will believe a word he says. Even if he tries to talk again, it won’t matter. He’s done for.”
Done for, just as Rey had said earlier. The words made Isla even more uncomfortable now than before. It was like everyone was relishing the downfall of one dumb guy who’d let big tits and a small ass cloud his judgment. Why would this company care so much?
Isla took her shot. “Don’t you think it’s a little convenient that Stephanie and Leonard would have this affair?
I mean, they were barely in each other’s orbits.
They worked in totally different departments.
And not to say that beautiful people don’t date regular ones, but Stephanie’s history of lovers doesn’t fit Matthew Leonard. Maybe she was put in his orbit.”
Michelle froze mid paper flip. Her eyes rose to meet Isla’s, blinking rapidly as if the information didn’t compute. “How do you mean?” It sounded like a warning, not a real question wanting an answer.
Isla lost all bravado. Not my business, she reminded herself. She shouldn’t have said anything. Now Michelle was looking at her weird, as if to ask, Why are you thinking? You’re not being paid to think. You’re paid to produce.
“Forget it.” Isla waved it away, hoping she hadn’t screwed up too badly with her overstep. She deferred in apology.
Finally, Michelle said, “Hey, I get it. This seems like small stuff in the grand scheme of things. Like, who the hell is Matthew Leonard, right? Why give a fuck if he’s screwing some blonde or his bloated wife?”
Pregnant, Isla thought, keeping her face blank. The woman was carrying a damn child.
“Sometimes there is collateral damage. Sometimes there is the martyr. Whatever it’ll be is not for you or me”—she tapped the folder to her chest—“to figure out. It’s for the client to use as they choose.
Your job is to investigate and find the goods.
” She smiled. “And mine is to control the narrative per the client’s wishes. Leonard’s going to be that narrative.”