Chapter 9 #4
“It’s so wild that these were real,” she says quietly, finding and flipping the lightswitch at the bottom of the stairs, causing the stairwell to disappear into darkness. She snaps another few photos.
I stuff my hands in my pockets, and rock on my feet, watching her work. “I know. It’s fun to come down here and party, back then, these were the only way to do that. It’s not like you could open a bottle of red at home instead. Speakeasies were it, really.”
“Hmm,” she makes a noise with her mouth closed as she positions herself on the bottom steps, lying on the stairs on her back, peering up.
She snaps a few, and at this angle, the length of her throat is exposed, and I wonder if Harry ravages that spot, that soft, exposed, vulnerable stretch of skin that, when kissed, probably makes her moan.
She lifts her head off the step and catches me staring at her throat, but thankfully, nowhere else.
“There,” I point, alluding to the worn poster on the wall next to her.
Behind the hundreds of lights, the stairwell is lined with real posters from the prohibition era, posters that, at auction, probably cost more than the entirety of the bar.
Worth it, as they bring authenticity to the space, and help create the magic. Juliette rights herself on the step, sitting up, the back of her in tangles, adorably. “Are these real?” she asks, voice faraway, filled with surprise.
She props herself up on an elbow, positioning her lens to capture that poster, and the others around it.
“Mercer,” a voice comes from behind, and I turn to see Damien tying his apron on, knotting it behind his waist. He nods to Juliette, lost in the many details of the passage, camera shuddering like crazy. “Who’s running a piece on us now?”
I slide into the barstool across from him, and sip the sparkling water he immediately fills for me. “No one. She’s not from a magazine or paper. That’s Kat’s best friend.”
Damien nods, but I don’t miss the way his eyes travel over every curved inch of her, and I also don’t miss the flare of jealousy as I watch him do it.
Damien is thirty-three. He’s invested into all of my businesses, and though he tends bar, he’s set himself up to never work again. He likes tending bar. He likes socializing. I get that.
Damien would be great for Juliette.
And for that reason, I find myself not introducing them when she appears at my side, a little breathless, eyes wide. “Can I leave this here? I want to go under the stairs for some shots and Magda–”
I glance over and see my manager unlocking the small door that leads beneath the stairs, glad she’s here, and glad she thought of that angle. I nod my head. “Of course,” I say, placing my hand over her cell phone and handbag, which she sets down on the top of the bar next to my drink.
“She’s a photographer, and I told her she could take photos of the passage because there’s really nothing else like it,” I tell Damien, moments later, after Juliette and Magda have slipped under the stairs.
Damien nods, but the small talk stops as Dana appears, and the two of them get lost in chatter over the schedule. I sip my sparkling water, wondering if it’s too soon to look at the stairs again, too obvious that I’m keeping tabs on her.
From beneath my hand, her phone illuminates and vibrates, sliding against the walnut bar as she receives not one, not two, but three back-to-back text messages.
I don’t intend to read them. I would never.
But the messages fill her screen, unprotected by a password, unshielded by any privacy measures. And my eyes fall on the words and take them in before I can stop myself.
Harry
I have another corporate gig for you.
Be grateful, Julie. A lot of professional photographers applied for this gig but you got it. So take it.
I forwarded the information to your email.
The messages flicker, disappearing into a notification after I’ve read them. Glancing, Magda is taking Juliette back up the stairs, likely to photograph the partially open passage with the lights on, like we’d discussed.
I stare at her phone screen, namely, at the four icons at the bottom.
A green phone icon. A green message icon. The internet browser. And the email icon.
Don’t do it. Don’t, Ford. If she catches you, there is absolutely zero way to explain it, and having to tell the truth that you first read her texts then her email–no.
No.
Yet Damien is tugging Dana into the back, grumbling about inventory or something or other. And Magda and Juliette are already in Nineteen20, Juliette’s heeled feet visible when I duck and peer.
No one is around.
No one would know.
I tap the email icon, quietly begging the universe to understand as her emails begin loading. I actually don’t care about the email itself, the job Harry has gotten her, or anything related to what he mentioned in the text message. I’m here, in her email, for something very specific.
Scrolling to the end of Harry’s message, I find exactly what I’m looking for.
His corporate signature, completed with his business email and address.
Quickly, I take a photo of her screen with my phone, stash mine away and close out the email app entirely.
Harry Reed
Financial Advisor
Rouser & Associates
520-678-8841
Hreed@
Guilt is something I should feel, but right now, my mind is working overtime and there’s no room for it.
I shove my phone away, and get to my feet just in time to pass Juliette her things, right as she screws the lens cap but on, lens already disassembled from her camera.
She stows things away neatly in her camera bag, finally looking up at me.
Happiness lifts her cheeks and widens her eyes, and when she says thank you to me, I see her appreciation radiating off of her.
“Seriously, Mr. Mercer, this is just what I was looking for. Something beautiful and unique. Something I could capture that would really be the focal point in my portfolio. To show clients I’m more than headshots and brochures. ”
When Cade had to be a teaching assistant at the college for a handful of years before he became a professor, I told him that working his way up is all part of it.
And I meant it. But envisioning Juliette taking headshots for actors that will never even make it to the big screen and will end up in radio doesn’t sit right.
Working your way up isn’t for creatives like her.
“I’m glad you came. I knew you’d love it. It’s beautiful.” She’s never looked more beautiful, with the lights from Nineteen20 from the top of the stairs seeping through her hair, illuminating the edges of her face, turning her into an ethereal angel.
“You always amaze me, Mr. Mercer,” she says, tugging her camera bag strap up her arm, looking around the bar.
“Stay for a tour and a drink? And Juliette,” I tell her, loving the way she perks up a bit when I say her name. “Please, call me Ford.”
She bites into her bottom lip looking impish, stirring up my lower half. “I don’t think that will ever feel right. You’re always Mr. Mercer to me.”
My phone rings again, and I pull it from my pocket, both of our gazes landing on the screen.
Elle calling.
Juliette’s expression shifts, something far less exuberant. “I’ll leave you to it. Thank you again. And hey,” she says, walking backward toward the stairs, Magda there waiting. “I’ll see you at the rehearsal.”
I lift my hand to say goodbye, a heaviness suddenly grounding me. I’m not going to see Juliette for two more weeks.
I don’t like that.
Once she’s up the stairs and gone, I call my new investment banker and make an appointment.