3. Rae
3
RAE
“N o way that’s going to happen. We need staff on those hours,” says Callie as she rounds the corner to her cubicle and pulls up when she spots me.
“We’ll catch up later,” she says to the phone, clicking off. Her outfit is tidy business casual, a threadbare blue skirt and knit white T-shirt with nude sandals.
“Greetings.” I lift a hand.
Since returning from Ibiza, I’ve only had a couple of texts from my cousin in response to mine, and I’m done with it.
That’s why I’m showing up in person at the small office in a strip mall that houses the charity where she works.
“You can’t stay. I have a meeting in ten minutes.” She glances around the room as if she’s looking for a door to eject me from.
“We’ve both been there for one another over the years. On some serious shit,” I emphasize. “So don’t go hating on me all of a sudden.”
Her expression clouds, and I know she’s thinking of our shared past.
“Come on, Callie. You don’t actually think I was having some affair with a man I thought was bad news?”
She tucks her dark hair behind her ear and sighs. “I think you might’ve gotten caught up in what he was selling. You did lie to me about who you were with. I don’t want to see you get hurt again.”
It’s true that I lied. But Harrison showed up yesterday and rocked me—not with the check, but with his words.
He’s not in LA for me, but fuck… it felt like it.
“I got carried away,” I admit.
Callie cocks her head, lowers her voice so no one outside can hear. “On some level, I get it. He’s pretty extra, Rae. An actual billionaire? He’s nothing like the guys we went to high school with.”
“Because they were such princes,” I remind her.
Her shoulders slump. “Fair enough. They were all assholes back then. The guys and the girls.”
My chest tightens at the unwanted memories that rise up. The rejection from the people who claimed to have my back. The isolation of feeling as if no one else I knew was going through the same thing.
It wasn’t Harrison’s money or status that seduced me. It was the way he wanted me, the way he made me feel more than myself. In Ibiza, at Debajo, I started to believe I was part of something again.
The shock of Mischa’s appearance and the article the next morning about me and Harrison reminded me I’d slipped into that dependence without noticing.
A woman sticks her head in the doorway with an apologetic look. “Callie, you need to be out of here in half an hour. Even if you’d work all the hours for free, Ramona needs the office.”
“Who’s Ramona?” I demand as the woman leaves again.
“The money you sent helped—it helped a lot, and we’ll pay you back. In the meantime, we gave up a couple of offices to another organization to save money.”
I look out into the hall to see women filling a waiting room, some reading, some staring at the floor. Another is pacing the floor, her dark hair swinging in a long ponytail that reaches her belt.
“I can get you more money,” I tell Callie.
She folds her arms. “No. You’ve already given us more than enough.”
I think of the check from Harrison.
What affected me more than the gesture was his words. The fact that he thinks I’m still into him.
It’s crap, of course.
But with his blue eyes staring into me, it was hard not to feel something...
Still, even if he’s here, I can’t just forget everything that went down. Callie’s right that I got caught up in his world. We’re back on my turf, and it won’t happen again.
“I RSVPed for Kian’s wedding.”
My cousin’s words jar me out of my head.
“He invited me too. I’m thinking of going.”
Her brows shoot up. “Really? That would be...big.”
My stomach knots and I shove my hands in my pockets, thinking of Beck’s comments the other night. “Do you think we have to make peace with the past to move forward with our lives?”
“Peace seems ambitious. But I do know that arguing with things that have already happened only brings us more pain.” Callie’s gaze flicks toward the hall. “A lot of the women who come through these doors think they’re broken in some way. They’re looking for justice, or vindication, or absolution. But often what they really need is to know that they get to choose how to act, how to feel, who they want to be today. That’s all any of us can control.”
* * *
BLUE is darker than its namesake color. A black club with fish tanks around the perimeter.
I haven’t been here since the week before Tyler and Annie’s wedding when I played and saw a woman assaulted.
Harrison promised he fixed the problems at this club, and the others.
I need to know if he’s telling the truth.
I put on high heels and a short, black dress and plum lipstick. There’s mace in my bag, though it’s more of a security blanket than anything.
Inside, I head to the bar alone.
This place is a shark tank, but I’m not the bait. Instead I scan the crowd, looking for men doing the same kind of looking I am. Searching for a particular kind of partner.
The DJ is good, a guy I’ve heard locally and in New York. But I’m not here for the music tonight.
“Can I buy you a drink?”
A tall guy with dark hair and a leering grin cuts off my view of the dance floor.
“I’m a big girl, I can get my own.”
“Baby, you shouldn’t have to.”
Ignoring my rejection, he reaches a hand around my waist to grab my ass.
I shove at him. “I said I’m not interested.”
“Sure you are. We’re getting along great.” He tries again, and this time I shove harder, stepping back, bodies bumping mine in the dense crowd.
“Excuse me. Is he bothering you?”
My heart pounds as I look up to see security at my shoulder.
“No,” the guy snorts, annoyed.
“Yes,” I say at the same time.
The security guy moves between us. “We have a zero-tolerance policy for harrassment. That means you have to leave.”
The guy puts up a protest, but security escorts him to the door.
A breath trembles out of me. This time when I scan the room, I spot security at several points around the perimeter. They’re attentive. Focused. On the crowd and the DJ booth.
Tonight could be an anomaly. But judging by the robust staff, this isn’t the same club it was.
“Yes?” the bartender shouts over the music, and I reluctantly turn to face her.
“Whisky. Neat.” She reaches for a bottle, and I lean over the counter. “Wait.”
I see Harrison’s fingerprints all over this place, and I want to believe he meant it when he said he changed things here.
“Glen Scotia. Thirty-year-old.”
She stares at me long enough I think I spoke Greek. But finally, she bends under the bar and retrieves a bottle.
“It’s two hundred,” she says as she pours.
“I’m celebrating.”
“Anything in particular?”
“Faith in mankind.”
I click into my messages and fire off a text.
Harrison King might not be finished with me, but we’re in my territory now.
I can handle myself. For a moment in Ibiza, I questioned it, and that was my mistake. Not trusting him, but failing to trust myself.
Rae: I have a DJ who might work for your opening. But she’s expensive.
My phone rings, and I answer, straining to hear over the music.
“Expensive is my favorite price.”
God, he’s arrogant. The British accent only makes him sound more elitist. But damn if I don’t love the sound of his voice over the line.
“You want me working for you again?”
“I enjoy you under me. I think of little else.”
Heat blazes down my spine, settling into an ache knowing he replays our too-short night together as much as I do.
“Meet me tomorrow,” he says. “I’ll send you directions.”