Chapter 18
CHAPTER 18
CHARLOTTE
I jump. “Oh my god.”
He chuckles, standing there behind me, leaning against the entryway jamb. “Nice to see you’re making yourself at home.”
“I didn’t hear you arrive.”
“You were clearly busy.” He lifts an eyebrow. “Like what you’ve found?”
“You do have a beautiful home,” I admit.
“You say that like it’s an unfortunate thing.”
“Did you decorate it?”
“Mandy did most of it,” he says.
Oh. His sister. I look past his shoulder at the white and navy colors of the living room. The large painting on a wall featuring a beach. “She knows you well.”
He crosses his arms over his chest. “Yeah, she does. Have you settled in all right?”
“Your PA showed me around. Elena.”
“Mm-hmm. Good.” He steps closer and stretches out a hand. “What are you reading?”
I hesitate only a moment before I hand over the book I’d planned to read on one of his large couches. It’s well-read, and the color of the pages is just a bit yellowed. “It’s by one of my favorite authors.”
“Grace Ellington,” he reads. “ Invisible Threads. The unseen connections that shape our everyday lives. ”
I feel oddly exposed, seeing his head bent and eyes reading the synopsis on the back cover. “Yes.”
“Is this the kind of book you want to write?”
“I’d be so lucky. She’s fantastic.” I reach out and take the book from him gently, tucking it back under my arm. “But it’s the genre I want to write, yes. Non-fiction that captures the reader immediately, and leaves them… thinking. Entertained. As much investigative journalism as it is psychology, anthropology.”
Aiden’s still in a suit, like he just got back from work. Outside the windows, the pool is glittering softly under the outdoor lighting. The sun has already set. It had gotten late somewhere between my work and unpacking.
“You told me that you might get a deal to write a novel of your own after this memoir.”
“Yes.”
“What will you write about if you do?” He walks over to the minibar in the corner and pours himself a glass of scotch. Looks over at me. “Want one?”
I sit down on his large, white couch. My jeans and sweater feel very casual all of a sudden, but this is a golden opportunity. I need all I can get with him.
“Yes, please.”
He hands me a tumbler and sits down across from me. His long legs, clad in dress pants, stretch out beneath the beautifully decorated coffee table. His left arm drapes along the back of his couch. He looks so at home sitting there—casually wealthy, handsomely bored, sporting a five-o’clock shadow—among the interior that screams riches. “Tell me,” he says.
My cheeks heat up. I hate that they do, but this isn’t something I talk about often. “I’m not sure yet. I think I want to investigate online culture. Something about fame, but I haven’t really settled on the entry point.”
“Fame?”
He had asked to get to know me in response. It’ll have to be a careful dance, this whole thing. This bargain. To open myself up to his scrutiny so that he will do the same. “Yes. What it costs people, and what it grants them.”
His eyebrows rise. “That’s unexpected.”
“I really enjoy investigative books like that,” I say, “But I have to work on the framing of it, and pull the loose threads I have into some kind of narrative.”
He holds my gaze. “I think that’s a fantastic idea. Can’t wait to read it.”
“If I ever get around to properly writing it. Hopefully I’ll be able to sell it to Vera after your memoir.”
“If you impress her,” he says, “by what, exactly? How riveting my memoir will be? That seems like too high a bar.”
I give him a wry smile. “You have a juicy life. She wants me to get emotional with it, to deliver on the brief.”
“Mm-hmm.” He looks down at his glass of whiskey, his face unreadable. “Did Eric send you an updated schedule for the coming week?”
I nod. “Yes, I have your times and everything. There are a few evenings where you have nothing planned?”
“We’ll have dinner here. You can ask me anything. Unless,” he says and tips his head in my direction, “you have a lot of dates planned in your spare time. I know you said you wanted to see the city.”
I look down at my own drink. I had said that. Weeks ago, at the resort in Utah. “This is my job. It’s what’s most important.”
“What do you want to see most?” he asks.
“The usual tourist things,” I say. “I’d like to see the beach while I’m here. Maybe go to Hollywood Boulevard. I know it’s cliché, but I’ve never been.”
He nods like he’s taking mental notes. “Okay. All very doable.”
“I’ll figure it out.”
“I’ll get Elena on it.”
“Your staff shouldn’t have to cater to me. I promise I’ll be out of their hair,” I say. “There was something about laundry in the papers Elena gave me. But I can do my own.”
“I’m sure you can,” Aiden says with the tone of someone who doesn’t add but you don’t have to. It’s implied.
I shake my head and look beyond his large windows. It’s dark, but I can make out the confines of his large backyard. Despite it all, a small smile spreads across my lips. “I’ve never lived like this before. You’re so surrounded by… luxury.”
Aiden is quiet for a moment. “Yes. I haven’t reflected on it in a while.”
“Just look at my beat-up Honda parked next to your cars,” I say with a widening smile. “It’ll make you appreciate them in a second.”
“Beat-up?” he asks. “It’s safe, though?”
“It’s perfectly safe. It’s just not particularly beautiful.” I shrug a little and look from him to the room we’re in. “Do you hang out here often?”
“No,” he says.
“That’s a shame. Your couches are very comfortable.” I look back at him, seeing a hint of amusement on his face. “What do you usually watch on that large projector upstairs? Your own shows?”
“No,” he says again, and his lips curve. “Is this you changing the subject?”
“It’s me getting to know you better.”
“Right. Well, by all means.”
I look down at my knee and pick at a frayed seam on my jeans. “Why not your own shows? Titan produces so much.”
“Most of it is trash,” he says, so casually. “A few of the critically acclaimed shows are good. The one about the gangsters we produced a few years ago, for instance. I watched that.”
I look at him. “Trash, huh?”
“Don’t quote me on that,” he says, still with that easy amusement on his face. “The shareholders or the Board wouldn’t like it.”
“But it’s how you feel?”
“They’re reality shows. Dating, drinking, all of that. It’s not my favorite part of the business. You don’t strike me as someone who watches them, either.”
I look back down at the gently sloshing amber liquid and the elaborate crystal pattern across the glass. The words feel hard to say. “I don’t watch them, either.”
“What do?—”
A loud signal rings out in the house. Aiden sighs and pushes up from the couch. “Perfect timing,” he mutters and walks through the large archway toward the foyer.
Uncertainty has me frozen in place on the couch. Do I follow? Do I stay?
I hear the door open, and curiosity propels me forward on quiet feet. I have to pass through the archway to get to the stairs leading up to my room anyway. Perfectly legitimate.
“Aiden,” a high, feminine voice says. “I asked Eric, and he said you’d be home.”
“Did he now?” Aiden’s voice is dry.
“I thought I’d stop by,” she says.
I peek through the archway. The woman is beautiful, with long blonde hair and an easy smile. She has a hand on Aiden’s upper arm. “I brought the documents you wanted.”
“Good,” he says. “I’ll fix it for you.”
“Thank you. I appreciate it, as always.” Her voice softens. “You know, the business is doing really well.”
“I saw the latest numbers you sent over. They look great.”
“You sure you don’t mind reading the reports? I know you’re busy.”
I’m intruding on something. They’re clearly not just friends, and not a boss and an employee. “Of course not. It’s my job to take care of you.”
I’ve never heard him say that sort of thing before.
The pang beneath my breastbone isn’t just embarrassment. It’s something else, something that feels a lot like sour jealousy. She’s beautiful, he’s handsome; he’s worried about her safety.
I knew he had to be dating or involved with someone.
There’re a few feet of open space for me to pass through, in full view of the two of them, before I make it to the staircase. And they haven’t noticed me yet.
I glance one extra time at the pair, take a deep breath, and then walk briskly past the open archway.
I’m nearly safe when her voice sounds again. “You have a guest?”
“I do,” Aiden says. “And I would have mentioned that if you’d called me instead of Eric.”
“You don’t always answer your phone, but Eric or Elena always do.” The woman’s voice is intrigued now and… damn it. I turn on my heel and quickly smooth out my expression. Seconds later, they’ve both rounded the corner.
She looks at me with curious eyes. “Hi.”
“Hello,” I say.
“This is Charlotte,” Aiden says. He leans against the wall and has the expression of someone long-suffering. “She is working on the book I told you about, and is staying here to ensure we get enough time together.”
The woman glances at him for a few seconds too long before turning back to me. A guarded glint is in her eyes now. Her green-colored eyes… Just like Aiden’s.
“You’re the ghostwriter,” she says.
“Yes, I am.”
“This is Mandy,” Aiden says. “My sister, who is not entirely convinced that a memoir is a good idea.”
She shoots him another annoyed look, before facing me again. The ground beneath me shakes, just a little, the way it does when I find myself on uncertain terrain.
“You’re writing about our family,” she says.
“As it relates to Aiden, yes, and the company,” I say. “Aiden will have complete control over the contents of the first draft. Anything he doesn’t want in there, and by extension you, can be cut.”
She nods slowly. “Oh. That’s good.”
“I understand that your family has been through a lot,” I say. It’s risky, bringing it up like this. Dancing around the topic of their father and his lengthy jail sentence. A topic Aiden and I have still not delved into. “I don’t want to be another negative piece in that puzzle. Quite the opposite.”
“I like the sound of that,” Mandy says. She’s still looking at me with anxious eyes. “The idea of a book is… scary.”
“I understand that,” I say. “Everyone I’ve worked with—from the world poker champion to a tech investor, even a Real Housewife—they were all scared. And nervous. Even if a book was their idea and they’re used to sharing their lives.”
“You’ve worked with a Real Housewife?” Mandy’s eyes widen. “Which one? And can you tell me everything?”
I chuckle. “Probably not everything, but a lot, yeah.”
Aiden pushes off the wall. “Let’s not badger Charlotte as the first thing we do.”
“I’m making conversation,” Mandy says primly, and I like her immediately. “But yeah, I should get going. I’ve got a dinner reservation. Aiden, I’ve left the documents on the table over there.”
“Thank you,” Aiden says. “I’ll have the lawyers look through them.”
“Thank you!” She kisses him on the cheek and waves goodbye to me, and then the front door closes.
I walk toward the stairs. Aiden trails after me, step in step.
“So, now you’ve met Mandy,” he says.
“Can I interview her?”
“How did I know you would ask that?” He sighs. “Maybe. It’ll be on her terms, if at all.”
“Thanks. I meant what I said—anything she doesn’t like can be cut out. Same as for you.”
“Good.”
We reach the top of the landing. His bedroom is in one direction, mine in the other. I reach out and grip the railing. The iron is cool under my fingers and feels nice against my warm skin.
“I have to say, for a second there, I thought…” I shrug and let the words die. I shouldn’t speak them.
Aiden lifts an eyebrow. “You thought what?”
I force myself to smile. “That she was your date or a girlfriend coming over. I was trying to sneak up here without interrupting you.”
“Chaos.” He shakes his head. “You think I’d bring women over while you’re living here?”
“Why wouldn’t you?” I ask back. “I’m just your ghostwriter. You’re just my subject. It’s your house. There’s nothing stopping you.”
“Right. And we’re just professionals,” he echoes, but he’s closer now than he was a few moments ago. “I remember.”
“We shook on it.”
“We sure did.”
He doesn’t look away. Neither do I, determined not to be the first to waver. On the railing, his hand is close to mine. Only inches away. “I won’t bring dates here,” he says, “and neither will you.”
That’s easy for me to agree to. I haven’t thought about dating since I arrived in LA. There’s been no free space in my mind for it.
He takes up all of it.
“Celibacy it is,” I say and extend my hand.
Aiden looks at it for a long moment before shaking his head with wry amusement. “That’s the last thing I would want to shake hands with you on, Chaos.” But he fits his large hand to mine, and a rush of heat races through me at the contact. “To not dating anyone else.”
“That’s not what I said,” I whisper. But our hands bob, intertwined.
His lips curve. “Isn’t it?”