Chapter 12 #2
My face heats again, and I think about my pride, and my sense of fairness, and my bills, and the girls, and how absolutely amazing it would feel to take them shopping on Oxford Street at the weekend after we’ve been to visit their mum.
Nothing fancy, just Primark and H&M, but still.
God knows they deserve a treat, the poor little lambs.
I knew this was coming. Knew this was why he wanted to meet me. But now that we’re here, I can’t take it. Can’t give him one more reason to think badly of me, when he so clearly judged my profession last time we met.
Before I can change my mind, I hold the cheque out to him, my hand shaking with the effort of it. ‘I can’t take it. I didn’t earn it.’
He shakes his head, looking somewhere between stern and stricken.
Poor guy. I bet he’s regretting walking into that pretty lilac bedroom at his party.
‘You were promised it. You entered into a negotiation with my brother, and through no fault of your own weren’t given a chance to complete the—uh—assignment, I suppose.
Nevertheless, the bonus was pre-agreed and is very much yours. ’
Oh, please don’t do this to me, you entitled, principled motherfucker. Do you have any idea how hard it is for me to walk away from this kind of money?
I look down at the remains of my wrap. He’s ruined my appetite, too. Gaining and losing five grand in the space of a minute will do that to you. ‘No. I can’t. Please, just—tear it up, or something.’
He sits back down heavily beside me. ‘Ivy. Look at me.’
I do, and I wish I hadn’t. Life is shitty enough right now without the reminder that men who look like fairytale princes exist out there and, on occasion, cross paths with you in a way that will always make you wonder what if?
What if he hadn’t freaked out and clutched his pearls that night?
What if I’d had just an hour wrapped around him, his forehead pressed against mine as he fucked me, long and slow?
I bet, if he’d allowed himself to, he would have fallen apart in spectacular fashion. The uptight ones always do.
‘Let me remind you,’ he says, ‘that when you left the other evening, you insinuated that morals were not a luxury you were able to afford.’
My face heats instantly. To my horror, my eyes prick with tears. I’d consider myself tough, but my eyeballs are pathetic little traitors. Gratuitous weeping has always been my downfall.
Still, I can’t believe he’s throwing something I said at the moment of rejection back in my face.
‘I meant that we can’t all afford to get all high and mighty when it comes to our careers! Especially sex work. It doesn’t mean I’ll just go around accepting money that I didn’t earn.’ Jesus Christ.
He rears back. ‘Look—I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to disrespect you. It’s just—I’d feel much better if you took the money, and I thought saying that might spur you on.’ He holds up a hand in surrender. ‘But it seems I insulted you instead, which is absolutely not okay.’
We sit there and stare at each other for a long moment.
The reflections of the sunlight on the canal are cavorting over his face, his hair, making him look perfectly lovely, and I have to remind myself that not only are we from different worlds, but that he has an actual fiancée.
Arranged or not, the bloke is getting married in six months.
I know this from the seriously uncool amount of Googling I’ve done since that night.
‘Look,’ he says again. I’m still holding the cheque like a numpty, and he nods at it. ‘How would you feel about accepting this as a token of good faith and a sort of… sign-on bonus?’
My first thought is that he’s propositioning me.
Maybe he’s decided he was too hasty the other night—he did have a very angry-looking erection, after all.
Maybe he’s made peace with the prospect of easy, transactional sex with a sure thing.
My face heats even further, if that’s possible, which is awful.
Blushing is not a good look with my hair colour. Not in the least.
‘Huh?’ I ask.
He lets out another sigh. For someone with a charmed life, he seems to sigh a lot.
‘It’s my sister, you see. Flora. She’s nineteen, and she’s just started at uni in London.
But she’s struggling a bit and, well, I had the idea that it might be helpful to employ someone to act as a kind of companion-slash-mentor, I suppose. ’
I stare at him blankly. I have no clue what the fuck he’s rabbiting on about.
He turns his head and gazes out at the canal.
‘She’s led a very sheltered life so far, and she’s knocking about in our house in Little Venice, all alone except for the staff.
She can’t even cook—she’s never had to. She’s also struggling to make friends, and honestly, I worry about her.
She needs to get out more, but she’s not streetwise at all. ’
He turns back and fixes his astonishing eyes on me, and it makes me feel warmer than the actual sunlight dancing on my skin. ‘And I saw the way you handled yourself earlier… with the junkie who came in? You were fantastic—your entire demeanour was perfect. Compassionate, but you took no shit.’
He’s far more animated now than he’s been so far. It seems his awkwardness is slipping from him, and it’s very infectious, even if I’m still confused. The way I handled that guy in the caff wasn’t exactly rocket science.
‘Thank you? But it was fine. It’s pretty basic stuff. Don’t take any shit, and don’t be a dick.’ I shrug. ‘That’s all there is to it, really.’
He smiles, a full, proper smile, and bloody hell is it hot.
He is absolutely, undeniably, drop-dead gorgeous.
‘That might seem obvious to you, but you’ve learnt that.
Assimilated it. For my sister, it wouldn’t be so obvious.
’ He clears his throat, looking marginally more self-conscious.
‘Look. You may have thought I was disparaging your morals, last week and just now, and that was absolutely not my intention. But seriously, Genevieve told me that you were one of the most principled, upright humans she knows, and I suspect that woman doesn’t suffer fools. So what do you reckon?’
I’m still confused dot com. ‘What do I reckon about what?’
‘Would you be interested in being a paid… consultant, I suppose, to my sister? Hang out with her. Teach her how to cook and do her own laundry. Meet up with her before and after her lectures—they’re pretty sparse, if you ask me.
She’s studying fine arts. Show her the ways of London life. Get her streetwise.’
I narrow my eyes at him, even if this sounds too good to be true. ‘Can you and your brother cook and do your own laundry, or is this just some sexist expectation because she’s a girl?’
He laughs then, and holy fucking shit is it marvellous.
‘Can we cook? Yes. Can we operate a washing machine? Also yes. Do we do much of either in our daily lives? Alas, no. So you’ve got me there. But it’s important to learn, don’t you think?’
‘So let me get this straight. You want to pay me to hang out with your sister and teach her how to do the real-life thing? Like she’s some sort of princess who’s spent her whole life in some ivory tower?’
He laughs again, and it’s dangerous. I could get addicted to making him laugh.
‘Yes and yes. Nailed it. And it might seem simple and natural to you, Ivy, but that’s the wonderful thing about the exchange of skills and knowledge. What’s natural for the teacher is entirely new for the pupil.’
I can tell he didn’t remotely mean that in a sexual or creepy way.
He’s not coming onto me in the slightest, so I have absolutely no idea why every lady part between my legs starts to throb.
It’s also stupid, because I bet I know more about fucking than him, anyway.
The idea that he could teach me anything is as ridiculous as it is inappropriate.
And hot.
‘What about my job at the caff?’ I ask, to cover up my flustered state.
He looks momentarily at a loss. ‘Ahh, well—um, this wouldn’t be full-time.
On the contrary, it could be quite flexible, and we could work around your…
commitments.’ He recovers and cocks his head, surveying me.
I can tell he’s sizing me up for his sister and not for any reasons pertaining to being enchanted or tempted or wanting to teach me anything.
Focus, Ivy, for fuck’s sake.
He pulls out his wallet again and hands me a posh-looking business card between his index and middle finger, the way they do in movies.
Clearly the suave twat has recovered his charm.
The social awkwardness is gone. He’s making a deal with a hooker on a park bench to do an anti-My Fair Lady one-eighty on his poor, posh sister, and he isn’t missing a beat.
‘I was thinking a consultancy rate of two hundred pounds an hour, if you deem that acceptable, given your skill set,’ he continues.
He taps the cheque. ‘Plus the sign-on. But you should feel free to negotiate, given you have all the power right now. I have no other candidates in mind.’ The slick bravado slips, and he pauses.
‘No one I trust, anyway. What do you think?’
So that’s how it feels to have the ball in your court.