Chapter 10
Chapter Ten
A ubrey
I walk to the subway from La Résistance after I finish my shift.
Saturday mornings are my favorite time of the week to be there.
The coffee shop is packed with regulars who have time to sit and visit with each other.
La Résistance isn’t just espresso drinks and cafe food.
It’s music and poetry. Community and love.
I grew up in a loving home with amazing parents, but even so, La Résistance has been a home away from home since I got my first job there as a teen.
I call Madi on Saturday as I walk. “I’m on my way to your place. Please tell me you’re around this weekend?”
“Gah! Why didn’t you tell me sooner? We’re already in the Adirondacks. Are you going to Billy’s?”
“Yes. He insisted on going over my concept drawings before I start painting Monday.”
“Really? That’s so weird. He was here last night. He must’ve helicoptered out this morning to meet with you.”
I stop walking, and someone bumps into me from behind.
Something makes me scan the street for an electric blue Porsche. “It is a little weird, right?” I don’t see anything unusual, so I start walking again.
“What is?”
“Him cutting his weekend short to meet with me? About a mural he didn’t even want?”
Madi is silent, which throws me off. I expected her to jump right in and validate me.
“What?” I probe.
“Yeah, it’s strange. I’m just trying to think what he might be up to.”
Goosebumps rise on my arms. “You suspect he’s up to something?”
“I don’t know. It’s hard to trust him after everything. And he doesn’t like…” She sucks in a breath.
“He doesn’t like what ?”
She hesitates again. “Uh…well, I just have found him to be sort of… classist.”
I try to figure out why she’s pussyfooting around. “Do you really mean racist ?”
Is this about the color of my skin being darker than his?
“No,” she says immediately, so I’m sure it’s true. “Not that. But he didn’t think I was good enough for Brick.”
“Right. Because you weren’t rich? Or blue-blooded?” I jog down the steps into the subway.
“The latter. But I’m thinking this all through, and I can’t imagine he’d be up to anything with you. He suffered a lot when he was out of favor with Brick. Like, he looked like he wasn’t sleeping.”
That news creates a lump in my throat.
I don’t want to think of Billy as someone with a heart so easily punctured. It makes him less torture-able.
“Unless he’s really that evil and is still trying to split me and Brick apart,” Madi adds.
“Well, he told me that planning the bachelor party was his penance for fucking with your relationship.” I find a bench in the subway and drop onto it to wait for the train. After being on my feet all morning, I’m ready to rest.
Madi lets out a soft chuckle. “Ah. That explains it. He’s still trying to mend things. So I guess he’s sucking up.”
“He came to pick me up at Sentience two nights ago.” I let that bomb drop to see if it changes her perspective.
“What?”
Good. She’s appropriately surprised. I’m not the only one who thought it was weird.
“Yeah, and then he wanted to know if there was something between me and the security guard.”
Madi gasps. “Holy shit. He’s into you .”
“Kind of seems like it.”
“So into you, he hired you to be in his loft for the next two months.” Madi sounds thrilled.
My heart skips a little although I’m not sure if it’s over the joy of Madi and me having something to gossip about together again or about a Wall Street suit being into me.
“Yeah. He sent me a contract and wired the down payment the very next day.”
“Which allowed him to bully you into meeting him this weekend.”
“Uh-uh.” That slows my heart rate back down. “No amount of money will allow him to bully me,” I say firmly. “Weekends are actually better for me with school, or I wouldn’t do it.”
“Good for you. Yeah, never show fear with Billy. He can smell it, and he’ll work any advantage he can find.”
I recall the feel of his large hand steadying mine as he handed me into the car. Is he working an angle with me?
He might be. But I suspect the angle is only about getting in my panties. Like Madi said, he’s too much of a stuck-up society douche to be interested in anything real.
He probably just wants to know what it’s like to fuck a lowly barista. What does he call me? Cafe Girl??
But whatever. I’m not entirely opposed to a hot round or two in the sheets with him.
Call me curious. Maybe I just want to know what it’s like to screw a billionaire.
My train pulls into the station, and I press my earbud to my ear to finish the conversation as I stand. “He won’t be working me. I intend to make him suffer.”
Madi laughs. “Good. How?”
“Well, I already decided that if the bachelor party is his penance, I won’t make it easy for him.”
“And now?”
“And now, I guess I’m not above a good cock tease. If he wants between my legs, he’s going to have to work for it.”
Madi lets out an exaggerated, scandalized gasp. “Are you into him?”
“Mmm…” I deliberate.
“You are! ” She sounds thrilled.
“Of course not.”
“But?”
I laugh. “You heard a but ?”
“I mean, you implied he would be getting between your legs.”
“Okay, I’m a little bit interested,” I admit as I step onto the train and find a handle to hang onto. The train takes off, and my weight falls backward.
“Yeah, I don’t know,” Madi says. “Part of me thinks sex with Billy would be horrible. Like it would be all about him.”
“Why in the fuck are you talking about sex with Billy ?” I hear Brick demand in the background, as if he just walked into the room.
Madi laughs. “I’m talking to Aubrey,” she tells him. To me, she says, “But he’s also very good at knowing what people want. That’s what makes him a brilliant strategist. So maybe he’d be a decent lay.”
“You’re going to stop that conjecture right now,” Brick growls, and Madi shrieks, like he just picked her up or tickled her or something.
“Uh oh. Mr. Possessive is getting jealous.” I don’t mean to sound as judgey as it comes out.
Honestly, I’m the one who’s jealous.
Shame tightens my chest. I hate that I resent Brick for stealing Madi’s attention. What am I, twelve years old? I should be able to share my best friend with the man who loves her.
“He knows I don’t want Billy.” Madi’s voice is breathy, and I’m certain she’s talking to Brick not me. They’re probably staring into each other’s eyes about to get naked again, if they aren’t already.
“Okay, I’m gonna let you get on with whatever is about to happen over there.” I try to make my voice lighter this time. “Can’t wait to hang out Thursday night!”
“Me neither!” she sing-songs and ends the call.
I drop into a seat that opens up at the next stop. I’m not sure why I suddenly wish I’d worn something a little more tempting. I’m in my standard first nice day of spring wear–a tight-fitting crop sweater, short-shorts, and Doc Martens on my feet.
But I don’t know what I’d rather be wearing to torture a guy like Billy–certainly not a pair of heels. He’s already attracted to what he’s seen. I don’t need to go changing into something I’m not. But I could push the bounds here.
My imagination starts churning out all the ways I could tempt Billy White.
That’s right, Big Bad Bully.
I’m going to make you sorry you hurt my bestie. Sorry for every uppity judgment you’ve made about young women from working-class families in Jersey.
I’m going to flip your world around and serve it to you backwards, and in the end, we’ll see who is bullying whom.
Billy
I unlatch the door when Grayson, one of our pack security guys, tells me Aubrey’s on her way up. Then I return to my glass breakfast table by the floor-to-ceiling windows overlooking Central Park reading the Times . She can see herself in. She’s not a guest in my home. She’s here to work.
But I’m sniffing the air in anticipation of her nutmeg and honey scent. Sweetness and spice from the coffee shop where she works. I never thought it would become one of my favorite scents. After my showdown with my father, I’ve been looking forward to seeing her.
My father would fucking hate her. She’s a human and proud of it.
Good. Going against my father’s wishes is a win these days. And it’ll prove to Madi I’m not controlled by prejudice. I might even gain some leverage over Madi by getting closer to her best friend. And I get to play Aubrey’s boss. So many birds killed with one stone.
She struts into my place in a swirl of colorful chaos. She’s mayhem to my order. Pattern and color to my straight lines and monochromatic palette.
I would swear a warm breeze follows her in–the kind that promises pleasant weather after the nip and chill of winter.
My lip curls as I give her a cool glance from over my newspaper and take in her outfit. “You look like…” I break off.
It’s in the high sixties today–a warm spring day but not hot by any means. Why in the fuck is she wearing those short jean shorts?
And her midriff is bare. Fate, does she have a pierced navel? A silver ring. Sexy as hell but would burn the fuck out of me if I railed her from the front. She’d better not have a clit piercing, too.
“ What? ” There’s a challenge in her posture and her gaze. She didn’t come here as some eager-to-please contractor.
She’s here to fuck with me.
This mural idea is probably my most ill-conceived idea yet.
I need to take control back in this conversation. I give her a grim, assessing look, noting the sketchpad tucked under her arm.
“Did you bring your concepts?”
“I look like what ?” She strides over her in clompy boots and stops in front of me, cocking a sassy hip.
I want to bend her over the table and teach her a lesson in subordination. I’d unbutton those jean shorts and shimmy them down to her upper thighs. Maybe caress that plump ass a few times before I spanked it.
“Like summer,” I mutter.
She raises her brows. They’re sculpted into perfect arches. I have the urge to trace one with my fingertip, which is…disturbing.