Maid To Be

s i x t e e n

Ay, why you hating on me

It is so easy to see

Showing signs of jealousy ?

**

"Have you brought it up to him yet?" Julianna asked while setting a plate of waffles down in front of me.

Even though I didn't ask her to, Julianna took it upon herself to step in as momma bear after I told her what happened on Sunday.

To say that she was livid would be an understatement.

She promised me that she would speak to Kyle, which was code for 'smack the shit out of him,' but she hasn't had a chance to since he's barely been at home these past two days.

"My answer hasn't changed since the last time you asked me," I laughed. "And that was five minutes ago."

For the past twenty-four hours, Julianna has been trying to convince me to go and talk to Kyle, but so far, her methods of persuasion have only made me more stubborn.

Maybe if he hadn't pulled that new rule out of his ass, I wouldn't be so reluctant to talk to him.

But since that isn't the case, I've made it my goal to ignore him for as long as I can.

And, almost as if the universe agreed with me, Kassandra ended up postponing our shopping trip until today after she found out that she had two back-to-back meetings with her agent.

I, unsurprisingly, decided to wait until the last possible second to ask Kyle if I could go since I can't seem to put my pride aside and talk to him.

"Besides, he's been real pissy lately, and I haven't been able to catch him in a good mood," I said while cutting into my waffles.

Julianna paused what she was doing so that she could glance up at me.

"Didn't you hear?" she asked in one of those 'I've got tea' tones.

I, too, paused what I was doing, giving her my full undivided attention. "Hear what?"

She did a quick lap around the room with her eyes.

"Jessica quit on Sunday," she revealed after double-checking that the coast was clear. "And I mean, out of nowhere. So now, Kyle's frantically trying to find a replacement since, you know, he needs an assistant."

"He is severely disorganized," I hummed in agreement.

Julianna shot me a pointed look before she went back to loading up the dishwasher.

This news puts a whole lot of things into perspective. For one, it helps to explain why Kyle was so upset when I got back from my breakfast date with Logan.

He was clearly looking for someone to take his anger out on, and I made for an easy target.

Jessica was the anchor holding down Kyle's entire existence, and with her gone, there wasn't anything stopping him from floating away at sea.

"What's he going to do?" My interest lay solely in the fact that this was without a doubt going to affect his attitude at home, and I wanted to know for how long.

Julianna let out a sigh as she reached out to close the dishwasher.

"He told me that he already has a few interviews scheduled for Monday, but he still has to finish out the rest of this week," she explained.

"Since Justin is here, he offered to help sort through some stuff, but he's been out of the game for so long now there's no telling how that's going to work out. "

I bit off a piece of my waffle and chewed on it thoughtfully.

There's a slim chance that one of the candidates on Monday will end up taking Jessica's spot.

According to Veronica, the interview process that she went through to secure her internship was ridiculously intense, and only a few candidates made it through to the second round.

After seeing firsthand how stressed she was in the weeks leading up to her interview, I can't help but wonder how I was able to secure my position with little to no effort.

If Kyle was going to be sticking to his tried and true playbook, this process could last well into next month.

I groaned internally at the thought.

"He's in his office now," Julianna announced, interrupting my train of thought. "You still have time to catch him before he leaves."

My stomach churned at her proposal.

He hasn't spoken to me since Sunday, and I wanted to keep it that way for a little while longer.

Just until he was completely de-stressed.

"Great," I croaked, feigning enthusiasm.

Julianna pursed her lips at me before she set off to fix herself a plate of food.

We finished eating our breakfast at around the same time, and, by way of stalling, I sought to help her clean up the kitchen before I made my way to the lion's den. After reassuring me that all would go well, Julianna pushed me out into the hallway before I could even think about chickening out.

She then stood underneath the archway with her arms extended out on either side of her to prevent me from turning back around.

"This is ridiculous," I muttered to myself.

There was absolutely no reason that this should even be happening right now.

My sluggish steps came to a stop after I reached the door to his office.

The muffled sound of his voice seeped through the narrow strip of space at the bottom of the door, and I hesitated before knocking. Kyle's voice grew louder as he reached the other side of the door, and when he opened it up to reveal that he was on the phone, I quickly took a step back.

"I can come back," I told him while gesturing towards the hallway I'd just walked down.

He swiftly shook his head before he opened the door wide enough for me to step inside. My mouth went dry at the open invitation, but that didn't stop me from slowly making my way into the room.

I flinched at the sound of the door closing behind me, and my hands grew increasingly clammy at the thought of us being trapped in here together.

Kyle strolled back over to his desk and perched his ass on the corner edge of it. "Yeah, Tom, I'm still here."

Although he was still deeply immersed in his conversation, he made a conscious effort to stare at me. His eyes gradually followed my movements as I wandered to the back of the room, my nerves preventing me from staying in one place for too long.

For obvious reasons, I wasn't allowed in here much, so I decided to take the time to familiarize myself with the space.

To my right, there was a large bookshelf that held a multitude of books and awards gifted to Kyle for his company's many achievements. A few picture frames were scattered along the shelves as well, and I found myself smiling at a professionally taken baby photo of Kyle, Justin, and Kassandra.

"Well, how many people do you have so far?" Kyle suddenly spoke into the phone, and the shift in his tone caused me to glance back at him.

He was now pacing back and forth with his phone clenched tightly in his hand. Even though his back was facing me, I could tell that his eyebrows were knitted together in concentration.

While none of this was any of my business, I couldn't help but listen in.

God, I'm turning into a mini Veronica.

"I'm going to need a list of names and résumés by the end of the day."

Maybe Julianna was wrong about him. He doesn't seem frantic at all.

"Well, tell your wife that you're going to be home late then!" Kyle suddenly yelled into the speaker. "I've got a lot riding on this, Tom! You, of all people, should know that! After that shitshow with Richard and Brandon, I can't afford to have another setback!"

Never mind.

Shaking my head to myself, I moved to go and sit at the conference table behind me; however, one picture, in particular, caught my eye and caused me to freeze in place.

The frame in question was situated on the second-to-last shelf, which meant that I had to bend over in order to view it clearly.

In the picture, Kyle had his arm draped around some girl's shoulder, both of them smiling widely at the camera.

Their Harvard attire let me know that they had taken it back when Kyle was still in college, and since he graduated a year early, the timestamp could fall anywhere between three to six years ago.

The thing that struck me the most was the girl.

She and Kyle must've been relatively close if he felt the need to keep this picture in his second-most-favorite place.

I wonder who she was to him? And if they're still close anymore.

I was so invested in the details surrounding the picture that I didn't even notice that Kyle had stepped up behind me.

I whirled around to face him after his voice rang out above me.

"Yeah, Tom," he said, glaring down at me, "let me call you back."

Without even waiting to hear Tom's reply, he hung up the phone and shoved the device into his pocket.

"What are you doing?" he asked, his gaze on me hardening.

I flattened myself out against the bookshelf to try to put some distance between us.

"Just looking," I answered quickly. It wasn't my intention to ask him who the girl in the picture was, but when I'm feeling trapped, I tend to lose control of my mouth.

"Who's the girl?" The words spilled out of my mouth before I could stop them.

Why did I just say that?

Kyle wasn't a big sharer when it came to his personal life, so the fact that I'd just outwardly asked him a question about it wasn't good at all.

He eyed me weirdly, almost as if he were questioning my intentions.

"A friend," he retorted dryly. "Anything else?"

"Do you all still talk?"

Okay, what the hell, Lilac?

Even if we were the closest of friends, there's no way he would even think about telling me the answer to that quest—

"Not anymore, no," Kyle interrupted my internal debate by providing me with an open-ended response. "What's going on with you?"

The concern in his voice caught me off guard.

He was supposed to be yelling at me for interrupting his conversation, not inquiring about my well-being.

"Nothing," I argued defensively. "I just came in here to ask you if I could—"

The door to his office suddenly swung open, and in waltzed a pristine-looking Kassandra. When she saw that Kyle wasn't sitting in his chair, her gaze drifted around the room until it landed on us.

"What's going on in here?" she smirked suggestively.

I stumbled away from my spot against the bookshelf with a nervous laugh.

She hadn't caught us doing anything, but from the outside looking in, I could see why she might've thought that something was about to happen between us.

My eyes never once left Kyle's as he moved to lean against the mini conference table. "Nothing, I was just about to ask if I could leave out with you."

"To go where?" he countered gruffly.

Kassandra jumped in to defend me. "Shopping down Rodeo. Lilac needs a dress for Saturday."

He blinked, clearly not understanding why this was such a big deal.

"Can't she just wear one of yours?" he finally asked.

Kassandra waved her hand in the space between us, causing the bangles on her wrist to jingle. "Do we look like we wear the same size?"

Kyle shamelessly eyed my figure before his eyes cut over to Kass.

"Fine," he agreed. "But take Damien with you and watch out for the paps this time."

His gaze snapped back to me for a split second. "We don't need you giving them anything else to write about."

I bit my tongue to prevent myself from saying something in return.

Kass, on the other hand, was happy to vocalize her annoyance.

"But Damien's not even here," she whined. "And we really don't have time to wait for him."

Kyle opened his mouth to say something, but I quickly overpowered his statement with one of my own.

"It's okay," I told her. "I still have to get dressed. I'll just tell him to be here in twenty."

Kyle seemed to like my answer because he stood up with a there you go look on his face.

"Fine," Kass huffed before she grabbed my arm and began pulling me towards the door. "We'll take him with us, but if he buys up the entire strip, it's going on your card."

Kyle walked over to where we were standing so that he could close the door behind us, and I stifled a laugh after he flipped Kassandra off while leaning against the doorframe.

Kass was quick to reach her hand up and flick him in the throat, making sure to hit his Adam's apple with her coffin-shaped acrylics.

She then dragged me out into the hallway so that we could go upstairs to my room.

"Whore," she called out to Kyle over her shoulder.

"Brat," he shouted back before the sound of his office door closing filled the air behind us.

Kassandra rolled her eyes as we raced down the hallway together.

"Lilac, honey?" Julianna's voice drifted into the foyer after she heard us running through the house. "Can you come here for a second?"

"Go on and get ready," Kass insisted while nudging me towards the staircase. "I'll go see what she wants."

I nodded my head before taking off up the stairs.

Before I got dressed, I made sure to send a text to Damien. He responded to my message with a string of emojis indicating his happiness, and a smile slid onto my face at his excitement.

I tossed my phone onto my bed before heading over to my bathroom to take a shower.

When I stepped back into my room fifteen minutes later, Damien was lounging on my bed with a pillow tucked under his head.

"Jesus," I breathed, flinching at the sight of him. "What did you do? Race here?"

He let out a small chuckle. "You said to be here in twenty, so I got here in ten."

He followed my movements with his eyes as I entered my closet to find something to wear.

"What do you need me for, anyway?" he asked, his voice muffled due to our distance. "Today's supposed to be my day off."

I grabbed a graphic tee and a pair of black shorts from my dresser and quickly changed into them before stepping back out into my room.

"We need you to go shopping down Rodeo with us since your douchebag of a friend won't let us go out alone. Apparently, I'm not to be trusted."

Damien rolled over onto his stomach so that he could face me. "He's still pressed about that?"

I crawled onto the bed, plopping down in front of him with my legs tucked under my butt. "Yes. And ever since Jessica quit, he's been even less agreeable."

Although he tried to hide it, I didn't miss the way Damien's lips twitched at the mention of Jessica's departure.

"That truly is such a shame," he sighed, shaking his head sadly.

"Shut up," I laughed. "You know you wanted her gone."

He feigned surprise, his face taking on a horrified expression as he held a defensive hand to his heart. "Did you just assume my feelings?"

I rolled my eyes at him before I stood up to grab my black and white Vans. After sliding them onto my feet and wrapping the friendship bracelet that Veronica gave me around my wrist, I yanked Damien from my bed and dragged him down the stairs behind me.

Kassandra was waiting for us in the living room, and judging by the way she was bouncing her leg up and down, I could tell that she was on the verge of losing it.

"Jeez, it took you all long enough," she huffed. "What did you do? Get lost in the closet?"

I raised a brow at her. "Says the girl who took an hour and a half to get ready so that we could go on a jog."

Kass's face twisted into a grimace as she stood up from her spot on the couch. "Alright, alright, you've made your point, now let's go."

Damien and I shared a triumphant look before we followed after her.

We piled into Damien's work car upon exiting the house, and I opted to sit in the back so that Kass could have control over the radio.

The car that Kyle had assigned to Damien was an all-black Cadillac Escalade equipped with tinted windows so that the people passing by us wouldn't be able to see inside.

"I could totally see you being a soccer dad," I mused while peering at the row of seats behind me.

There was enough room to fit six people in the back and I could already imagine Damien using the space to transport a bunch of screaming children.

"Please don't ever say that around Marcy," he begged, stealing a glance at me in the rearview mirror. "She will literally lose her mind."

Kass turned to look at Damien, her smile smug.

"I know that you protect people for a living and all, but don't you think it's time you let your guard down a little?" she teased. "You and Marcy have been dating for quite some time now, and you still haven't introduced her to us."

When he didn't respond, she peeked back at me with a pout. "Do you think he's ashamed of us?"

I leaned forward as far as my seat belt would allow, reaching around his seat to touch his bicep.

"It's okay if you are," I sighed dramatically. "We'd understand."

Damien let go of the steering wheel to swat us away from him.

"Would you all shut up?" he grumbled. "I haven't introduced her to you yet because I haven't found the right time to do so."

Kassandra poked his forearm childishly. "Why don't you bring her as your date on Saturday?"

Damien shot her a wild look.

"Are you nuts?" he exclaimed. "I'm on duty that night, and your brother will have my head if I'm not 100% focused on my job."

He paused before adding, "Also, there's no way in hell that I'm leaving her alone with you two all night."

I scoffed at his jab. "We're a delight to be around."

Damien responded to my statement by cranking up the radio, which he had initially turned down so that we could talk.

"What's that?" he yelled over the music. "I can't hear you!"

He laughed maniacally after I swiftly kicked the back of his seat.

Kass shook her head at us before she leaned against the window and began to scroll through her Instagram feed. Nobody said anything else for the rest of the ride since we each became absorbed in doing our own thing.

When we finally pulled onto North Rodeo Drive, Damien broke the silence by speaking up.

"Where are we going?"

Kassandra dropped her phone into her purse, humming to herself as she thought through our options.

"There's Versace, Escada, Dior, Jimmy Choo . . ."

My head began to spin as she continued to rattle off a list of expensive ass stores.

Damien managed to score a metered parking spot a few seconds later, and we quickly scrambled out of the car after checking to see that the coast was clear.

Since we were closest to Dior, we decided to go in there first.

We were greeted by a cheery blonde the minute we stepped into the store.

"Hi!" she enthused, her eyes darting between the three of us. "My name is Lola. How may I assist you today?"

Kass took a step forward, flashing Lola a small smile. "Is Katrina in today?"

Lola appeared to be taken aback by Kassandra's forwardness, but she covered it up well by plastering a fake smile on her face. "She is. Would you like me to go and grab her?"

Kassandra nodded, her curls bouncing along with the movement. "Please."

Once Lola was out of earshot, she pivoted around on her heel to look at us.

"What?" She shrugged when she saw the confused expression that Damien and I both wore. "Katrina is my girl."

Almost as if saying her name aloud played a part in summoning her, a brown-haired woman suddenly walked over to greet us.

"Is that my favorite customer?" she gushed while craning her neck to try and get a glimpse of Kass's face.

Kassandra whirled around to face Katrina, her lips curving up into a smile.

"Katrina, darling!" She took Katrina's hands into her own before she leaned forward to exchange a cheek kiss with her. "How have you been? How are the kids?"

Katrina pulled away from their greeting gesture with a sigh. "I've been doing good. Tired, but good, nonetheless. The kids are doing fine, as well. Reign graduated from high school back in May, so he's going to be starting over at USC in a couple of weeks."

Kassandra's eyes widened at Katrina's brief life update. "He's a freshman in college already?! He was just in sixth grade like two seconds ago!"

Katrina shook her head vigorously. "It's crazy, right? Seven years can pass you by in the blink of an eye."

As the two of them continued to converse, I began to feel more and more like a child waiting for their mother to finish talking to the friend that she ran into at the grocery store.

"Hey, Lilac." I was pulled from my daze when someone whispered my name.

I twisted my head to the left to see that Damien was no longer standing beside me. He was now standing near a display case with a handbag dangling from the crook of his arm.

"Does this match my outfit?"

I peeked over my shoulder to see if Kassandra and Katrina were catching any of this, but they were too wrapped up in their conversation to notice what Damien was doing.

"Put that back," I hissed while swatting my hand at him.

He stuck his tongue out at me, cradling the purse against his chest. "But I like it."

I spared a glance at the price tag and cringed internally.

"Enough to pay $3,800 for it?" I challenged with the raise of my brow.

You would've thought that I had just said the purse was poisonous with the way Damien launched the handbag from his hands.

The clink of the metal shoulder strap hitting the bottom of the glass display shelf pulled Kassandra and Katrina from their conversation, and Damien was quick to shoot them a sheepish smile.

Kass narrowed her eyes at him, whereas Katrina beamed brightly at us.

"So, who are we shopping for today?" she questioned.

I raised my hand before extending it out to greet her.

"That would be me," I told her. "I'm Lilac."

She shook my hand gently. "Nice to meet you, Lilac. Did you have anything specific that you were looking for today?"

I opened my mouth to respond, but Kassandra made it her goal to outdo me as she rushed to submit an answer of her own.

"If it's classy and has cleavage, we want to see it," she declared openly.

I gaped at her.

"That wasn't even close to what I was going to say—"

She held up a hand to interrupt me. "Don't fight me on this one. I know what I'm doing. Trust me."

Katrina didn't even give me a chance to reply. She simply clapped her hands and instructed us to follow her.

She showed us a couple of options that matched the description Kassandra had given her, and some of them were cute, while others were just downright horrible.

"If you've got it, flaunt it," Kass informed me after I recoiled in horror at the lack of material on one of the dresses.

"Boss won't be able to keep his hands off you if he sees you in—" The rest of Damien's sentence went unsaid as Kass quickly elbowed him in the stomach.

"Way to be discreet," she hissed at him.

I turned my head to glare at the two, my senses on high alert. "What are you talking about?"

She shrugged nonchalantly. "What are you talking about?"

Katrina swiftly changed the subject before I could grill them any further.

"What about something like that," she suggested while gesturing at a mannequin behind me.

We followed the point of her finger with our eyes, and I was pleasantly surprised to find the mannequin dressed in a cute but conservative floor-length black dress that had a sweetheart neckline.

I walked over to feel the material. "This is cute."

The soft, velvety material of the dress felt heavenly against my fingers, and this detail alone had me sold.

I hated dresses that were prickly and uncomfortable.

Wearing one for more than five minutes was a nightmare in itself.

"Do you have it in a different color?" Kass asked, her face scrunched together in distaste.

I let go of the dress, cutting her a side-eye. "What's wrong with black?"

She scoffed. "Please, this is a banquet, not a funeral."

Katrina reached around me to check the tag.

"I'm sorry, Kass," she apologized after reading it over. "It's only available in this color."

Kassandra stamped her foot against the ground.

"Dammit," she swore. When she saw that we had all stopped what we were doing to stare at her, she motioned for us to keep looking. "Something's gotta give."

Oh, how wrong she was.

We spent the next thirty-five minutes going around in circles, and not once did anything fall through.

"This is the third time that we've visited this section, and we still haven't found anything," Damien sighed from beside me.

As much as I hated to admit it, he was right.

We were never going to find anything in this store.

Kass blew out a breath before she turned to thank Katrina. "Thank you for your help, Kat. You know how much I hate walking out of stores empty-handed, but I think it's time that we looked elsewhere."

Katrina flashed us a grateful smile as she reached out to pat Kassandra's shoulder. "Thank you for putting your trust in me. And as for the empty-handed thing, you know you're going to make up for the money that you didn't spend the next time you come in here."

Kass waved her off. "I'm counting on it."

"It was nice meeting you two," Katrina professed while turning to face Damien and me.

"You too," he replied, speaking up for both of us.

We sent her one last wave before we exited the store and made a beeline for the Versace building across the street. For a Wednesday morning, the store was unreasonably crowded as men and women roamed the area, paying little attention to the customers around them.

A salesperson greeted us at the door, and I let Kassandra tell her what we were looking for without interrupting.

Versace had a lot more options to choose from compared to Dior, which was great if you were looking to spend twelve thousand dollars on a dress.

"These prices are insane," I whispered after we walked past a $3,000 clutch. "And half of this stuff isn't even cute."

Kassandra eyed our saleswoman, Gwen, to make sure that she wasn't listening in on our conversation.

"Of course it isn't cute," she whispered back. "It's all about the person wearing it."

"Presentation is everything," Damien admitted thoughtfully.

Our conversation came to a screeching halt after Gwen stopped in front of a clothing rack.

A variety of colors and patterns stared back at me from their spot on the built-in shelf, and Kassandra instantly went to work scrutinizing each individual piece. Damien threw in his opinion every once in a while to try to speed up the process, but Kass wasn't having it.

She's very thorough when it comes to picking out clothes, and I can't say that I blame her for it.

Her job requires her to look good at all times, and she has never not taken this aspect of her career seriously.

After a while, Damien got bored with standing around, so it didn't come as a surprise to me when he ended up ditching us for the men's section.

Five and some odd dresses later, I was ready to rip my hair out.

"I'm going to go look over there," I announced while setting my gaze on one of the sections located towards the back of the store.

Kass spared me a glance over her shoulder as she continued to sort through her options.

"Cool," she uttered, her voice void of any particular emotion.

I made my way to the back of the room and began to look at the shoes and purses that were on display between two beautifully-dressed mannequins. A pair of black leather pumps caught my eye a few seconds into looking, and I instantly rounded the display stand to get a better view of them.

My rushed actions led me to bump into a woman who was standing behind me, and I quickly opened my mouth to apologize, "I'm so sorry!"

"It's totally okay!" she exclaimed while twisting around to look at me. "Oh, now this should be good!"

My apologetic expression fell the minute my brain registered her features.

"Fancy seeing you here!" Chelsea raved, her eyes gleaming mischievously. "Out of all the shops in LA, Versace is the last store I expected to find you in."

The atmosphere in the room shifted as she proceeded to shake her head at me. "Blowing your first paycheck on a dress you're only going to wear once? Rookie mistake, hon."

Oh, how it must pay to be Rebecca's friend.

"Don't tell me you're mad that I went on a date with your ex," I pouted innocently.

Chelsea lowered the dress in her hand so that it was resting closer to the ground. "Logan is not my ex. We're currently on a break."

The laugh that spilled out of my mouth pulled in the attention of the people walking past us.

"Does he know that?" I questioned. "Because I heard that his trip to Cancun was a wild one."

The glare that Chelsea shot my way was lethal. "You little bitch—"

"Are my eyes deceiving me, or is that Barbie's evil-ass twin sister?"

Our gazes shifted over to Kassandra after she butted into our conversation without warning. Her stance screamed I'm disgusted, as she stood with her arms folded across her chest.

"Kassandra," Chelsea drawled, her tone dripping with hatred. "Long time no see! How's Paris?"

"Hilton?" Kass taunted. "Or the city?"

Chelsea's grin widened. "Why the city, of course! I mean, you did break up with your boyfriend just so you could move there, right?"

Kassandra lunged forward to sink her nails into Chelsea's skin, but Damien quickly looped his arms around her waist to subdue her.

"I leave you all alone for five minutes," he hissed so that only Kass and I could hear him, "and you've already managed to get yourselves into trouble."

Chelsea's smirk returned at Damien's unexpected arrival.

"Damien, sweetie," she purred, fluffing her hair up a bit with her free hand. "It's been a while, hasn't it? Why don't you swing by the house sometime so that we can . . . catch up."

In the blink of an eye, Kass and Damien swapped places so that she was the one holding him back.

A small crowd began to form around us, and I spotted a few people in the group with their phones raised in the air, ready to record.

"We need to go," Damien advised after he caught sight of the onlookers. "Like right now."

Chelsea's lips dipped down into a frown as she gazed over at us in disappointment.

"But we were just getting to know each other," she whined. "And Lilac was just about to tell me how her date with Logan went."

"Would you let him go?" Kassandra spat. "He doesn't want you anymore."

"Of course he does," Chelsea scoffed, rolling her eyes dramatically. "He even said so himself."

"Really?" I gasped in disbelief. "Because last I heard, you kept your legs open long enough to fuck his cousin and his production manager. It's a wonder he even remembers your name, considering how badly you fucked him over . . ."

The dress that Chelsea had been holding fell to the ground as she took a step closer to me.

"You'd better watch where you're walking, princess," she sneered. "I have connections that could ruin your career before it even starts."

She paused to glare at the people standing around us. "But it looks like you just did that all on your own."

A satisfied grin settled onto her face. "This is definitely going to be a headliner."

Someone in the front row suddenly snapped a picture of us with the flash on, and their timing couldn't have been worse.

With my luck, TMZ would have it posted within the hour.

I burned a hole through Chelsea's head with my stare.

She wanted this to happen.

As if reading my mind, Chelsea twiddled her fingers, sending the three of us a wave before she sauntered off towards the front entrance of the store.

"It was nice meeting you!" she called out to me over her shoulder.

The echo of her departure drifted through the building, alerting everyone within a twenty-foot radius that she had left the premises.

A short period of silence settled over the room in the wake of her absence, but it didn't last for more than ten seconds.

Chaos erupted in every direction as the crowd began to close in on us. Security rushed over to break up the mass of people while Damien carefully calculated our escape.

"Where the hell were they five minutes ago?" he yelled over the noise of the crowd.

Kass threaded her arm through his before she grabbed onto my hand. "Eating donuts in the back room."

My laugh came out in the form of a grunt after Damien pushed forward without warning, yanking Kassandra and me along with him.

He maneuvered us through the assembly of people with ease, and before I knew it, we were standing outside. Before we could even let out a sigh of relief, another group of people moved toward us.

This time it wasn't a crowd full of drama-hungry bystanders.

It was the paps.

But I guess that's kind of the same thing, isn't it?

"Move!" Damien shouted while nudging us forward.

Kassandra woke up from her trance at the sound of his voice and took off running down the sidewalk with me hot on her heels. I didn't dare look back this time for fear that I might repeat what happened on Sunday.

Damien unlocked the car the second we reached a close enough range, and he didn't waste any time flinging his door open and climbing inside.

Kass and I followed suit, and as soon as our doors were closed, Damien took off down the street.

I closed my eyes, leaning my head against the window to try to steady my breathing.

"Twice in one fucking week," Kassandra panted from the front seat. "That can't be a coincidence."

Damien exhaled deeply. "Of course, it isn't. When has Rebecca ever kept anything to herself?"

My anxiety spiked at the mention of her.

"I'm so dead," I groaned.

Kass snapped around in her seat to face me.

"No, the hell you're not," she stated sternly. "I refuse to let you go out like this."

The absolute certainty in her voice boosted my spirits considerably, but we still had one major problem:

The publicity.

"Okay, but we can't exactly stop the pictures from coming out," I remarked. "Especially since there's no feasible way to track down everyone that was in the store."

Kass held up a finger to silence me before she reached down to dig in her purse. She pulled out her phone a moment later and began to type out a message in her notes.

"You're right," she said after she finished typing. "I can't stop the pictures from coming out."

Damien drummed his fingers against the steering wheel nervously. "So, what now?"

The grin that slipped onto Kassandra's face sent a chill down my spine.

"We stop Kyle from seeing the pictures."

Her idea was so ridiculous that I almost choked on my immediate laughter. "How in God's name are we going to do that? Take his phone away and lock him in his closet?"

Damien let out a hum of approval, prompting me to kick the back of his seat for the second time this morning.

"As fun as that sounds, that's not what I had in mind," Kass clarified while handing me her phone.

She had copied the message that she had written out in her notes and pasted it into an email draft.

"Kyle's publicist is about to receive a strongly worded email from me, detailing any need-to-know instructions that she may require if/when she comes across an article with our names printed in the headline," she explained.

"She's the one who told him about the first incident, so we have to remove her from the equation this time. "

I glossed over the email before nodding my head in agreement. "This could work. Especially since he's been distracted with the whole searching-for-a-new-PA thing."

Kass took her phone back with a grin. "Exactly. By the time the banquet is over on Saturday, this entire situation will be considered old news."

She paused for a fraction of a second, her eyes narrowing in suspicion. "Unless one of us tells him."

The glare that she shot both mine and Damien's way caused me to shrink back in my seat.

Even if I had been thinking about telling Kyle what happened, there's no way in hell I was going to do it now.

Kassandra's next promise was deadly enough to make me drop the idea altogether.

"Kyle isn't going to find out what happened here today because we're not going to tell him . . . capisce?"