Sweetest Sin: Bad Boy Bundle (57 page)

Sophie narrowed her eyes at me and I could tell that she was thinking hard. Fuck, why was I letting her cross examine me like this? It was total bullshit. Still, it seemed to be appeasing her. She was now looking decidedly less crazy than she had been a few minutes ago.

"What's her name?" she asked. I shook my head.

"That's private. Not many people know that we're together yet," I explained, "Out relationship is still in the early stages."

"Those precious early stages," said Sophie, in a rather philosophical manner.

To both out surprise, my cell phone, which had been sitting on the shop counter during our whole awkward conversation, began to ring loudly. Lola's name flashed up in giant letters. I grabbed it away from Sophie and sent it straight to voice mail, but it was too late. She had seen it.

"Lola," she smirked at me, "Her name is Lola."

Lola

I couldn't understand why I had thought it a good idea to base the future of my career on whether I could get my fuck buddy to agree to a photo shoot that he had absolutely no investment in. The worst part was how pleased with myself I had been when Jennifer lapped up my lies like a kitten lapping up milk. An evil, dictator-like kitten, but still. I was happy. Everyone in the office was happy. Even Jennifer herself kept the yelling to a minimum (though she did berate Tim pretty badly when she saw that there was dairy milk in his coffee instead of soy, like she preferred us to have). I was the office hero. Somehow, I had tamed the beast. Not only that, but I was given permission to work from home for a while. In my mind that meant sleeping in, wearing my pajamas all day and taking frequent breaks to bake myself some brownies or read some of the books I had been meaning to catch up on.

It wasn't until I got home that the reality of the situation hit me. If I couldn't get Vince to come through for me on this one, I was fucked. Worse than fucked, actually. I was fired. I had gotten my job at Catwalk by a miracle in the first place. After all, it was the only fashion magazine in our city. I had been convinced that I would have to move to New York or Los Angeles if I really wanted to pursue my dream. It had turned out that I was able to follow my dream without even moving, and that had been amazing. If I got fired I would either have to start working in retail again or move to New York or LA and pray that some magazine would be willing to take me on with no reference. Shit. I couldn't do that.

I spent my first few days at home trying to distract myself. I created a few idea collages from magazines and wrote down keywords. Complete newbie exercises but it made me feel like I was doing something without undertaking the now terrifying task of contacting Vince and asking him for a favor. When i ran out of work related distractions, I cleaned my place from top to bottom and organized my clothes into piles. There was a 'keep' pile, a 'donate' pile and a 'garbage' pile. Almost nothing ended up in the 'keep' pile.

Jennifer called me every hour or so for updates and I lied valiantly every time. It seemed to be the only thing that I was good at these days.

"That's great that it's all going so well, Lola," she had consistently remembered my name, "But I wish that I could talk to this Vinny character. Do you think that you could arrange that soon?"

I panicked.

"Uh, uh...he's a very private person and now that he trusts me he keeps insisting that I'm the only person he wants to talk to. But I mean, I can try to get him to talk to you if you want. I'm just scared that might make him want to pull out, if we don't respect his wishes," I babbled. Luckily, Jennifer accepted my excuse.

"Oh right, forget it then. We don't want to lose out here. I'm sure I can talk to him on the day of the shoot."

If there even was a shoot. After a few days of this same anxious cycle I gave in. I had to call Vince now. If I was going to get fired then I was better off knowing sooner rather than later.

I took a deep breath and found his number in my contact list, pressing 'call' before I could talk myself out of it. I sat on my sofa and listened to it ring a few times before it was sent to voice mail. Shit. Vince's voice was clear and strong:

"Hey, it's Vince here. Leave a message and I'll get back to you if I feel like it. Bye."

Shit. Even his voice mail message was annoying. But I couldn't afford to be bitchy with him. Not now, when I needed so much from him.

"Hi Vince," I said, putting on my perkiest voice, "It's Lola here."

I paused, wondering if I should add 'Lola who ran you over and almost killed you' just in case he had a harem of other Lola's in his life, but I decided against it.

"I just wanted to ask you if you'd like to be involved in a project I'm organizing for the magazine. It would be great publicity for the new accessory line and for your shop. We would both get a lot out of it," I sighed, "Look I really need this, OK? So if you could get back to me soon that would be great. Thanks Vince."

His voice mail cut me off just after I had finished. I hoped to god that he checked his messages regularly. He was a business man, he had to right? I tried to distract myself by watching TV for a while, but my heart was pumping and I checked my cell phone every ten seconds. I got a text after a few hours.

"I'm busy right now."

That was it. He didn't even say hi or anything. He didn't even say my name. I chastised myself for believing that he might make an effort for me. He didn't give a shit about me. I had bought him his drinks and sucked his dick, so in his eyes I had served my purpose. He was done with me.

I was fucked.

Vince

I felt bad for being such a jackass to Lola. She obviously needed a favor from me, I just couldn't give it to her. Don't get me wrong -a part of me wanted to help her any way that I could. I knew that that was a bad idea though. We couldn't see each other anymore.

It seemed simple enough but I kept thinking about her. Even when Brett dragged me out to a club to help him pick up chicks on Saturday night. It didn't help that the club happened to be The Ruby Lounge, where I had met up with Lola last time. It was totally different on club night than it was during the week. It was packed to the brim with wealthy young people dancing, drinking and hooking up with each other. Every single girl seemed to be more beautiful than the last and they were all showing off their toned bodies with a number of skimpy garmets. It didn't matter though, because I wasn't in the mood.

I tried to focus on getting Brett laid, but even that didn't seem to work. He pointed out a girl to me, a cute Asian chick wearing a crop top and tiny shorts.

"That's the one! I'm gonna hook up with her tonight. I need to. Help me out, buddy?" he asked. He had been a dick to me all night but I couldn't turn down a friend in need. This was what I was good at. If I wasn't going to use my skills for myself tonight then I might as well use them to help Brett get his dick wet. God knows he couldn't manage it by himself.

I walked up to where the girl was sitting at the bar, enjoying a cocktail and sat next to her. She smiled at me right away.

"Wanna buy me a drink?" she asked, smirking. I shrugged and called over the bartender. It was that jerk off Tom who had been checking out Lola the other night. He recognized me immediately and I could tell that he wanted to run away but he forced himself to come take my order.

"Hey," he said, "Good to see you again."

"Yeah, you too buddy," I said. Neither of us meant it, "Get me one of those French beers and a Strawberry Daiquiri for the lady."

She wrinkled her nose at me.

"Ew, I hate those. I'll have another mojito please," she said to Tom. He hesitated and looked at me. I shrugged again.

"Whatever, get her a mojito then." "Sure. I'll be right back."

The girl grinned at me.

"I didn't catch your name. I'm Amy," she said, holding out her hand for me to shake. I shook it dutifully.

"Hi Amy, I'm Vince. You havin' a good night here?" I asked. Her smile widened.

"I wasn't until you came over," she said. I ignored her comment and looked back at Brent, who was standing awkwardly at the other side of the club. I gave him a thumbs up to show him that things were going OK.

"That's great. Look, my friend Brett over here has really taken a liking to you Amy. He would love to get to know you. If you want to head over there and join him for a drink then I'm sure he'd be really happy," I said. I went on, "He's a really good guy. Very funny, and he's rich too."

Amy peered over at Brett and wrinkled her nose as Tom set our drinks down in front of us. I handed him a fifty and told him to keep the change, which made his face light up.

"Thanks man!" he said, obviously not remembering my name. He went off to serve the customers at the other side of the bar. Amy smiled back at me

"That was a really generous tip you gave, Vince. You must have money too," she said.

"You could say that. Anyway, why don't you take your mojito and my beer over to Brett? He looks pretty thirsty to me," I said, but Amy rolled her eyes.

"Your friend Brent is not my type."

"-Brett."

"Yeah OK, whatever," she took a sip of her drink, "The only person I'd consider going home with tonight is you."

"Then you're going home alone, baby."

She laughed as if she thought I was joking but it soon became clear from my expression that I was not. Amy sniffed, grabbed her drink and marched away from the bar. I could see her calling me an asshole under her breath. Tom came back and gave a low whistle.

"Woah, she seemed really into you. How did you mess that one up?" he asked. I shook my head. The last thing I needed was a heart to heart with this little shit.

"I told her that I'm not gonna fuck her," I said. Tom looked surprised. "Why not?"

I took a swig of my beer.

"Not my type I guess. Hey, I'll give you another hundred if you can keep bringing me these beers for the rest of the night," I said, enjoying the taste. Tom looked taken aback by my generosity. I knew that he probably didn't even have enough money to get a haircut. It felt good that one thing I had over him was money.

"Wow, that's really generous of you Vince. I would do that if I could, but I can't. I get off in ten minutes and then I have to go take Lola for a late dinner," he said, adding the last part a little bit too proudly.

"What?" I was almost daring him to repeat himself but he didn't seem to be intimidated.

"Yeah, Lola and I have a date. I always had a thing for her in college but I was way too shy to do anything about it. When I saw her again the other night it was like everything I felt back then came back to me and I really, really wanted to ask her out," he swallowed, looking a little bit nervous now, "I guess when I saw you two together I thought that you might be dating so I gave up on that idea. But then she came in for a drink last night and told me she was single. So I asked her out and she said yes."

Seriously? Lola had agreed to date this little twerp? He was the same age as her but he looked practically prepubescent. It felt like shit to be replaced, but it felt even shittier to be replaced by such a poor imitation. I hid my frustration and gave him a smile.

"That's great Tom. She's a good girl." "She is," he beamed.

"So, where are you taking her then?" I asked. His face went a little bit red.

"Well, I wanted to take her somewhere really nice for our first date, but it was such short notice that I don't really have the funds. So we're going out to a burrito bar," he said the last part very quietly as if he didn't want me to hear it, but my hearing was razor sharp. This shrimp wanted to take a girl like Lola for soggy tacos at 10pm? Was he for real? I couldn't allow that.

I grabbed my wallet and pulled a few notes from it, pressing them into his hand.

"There's a nice Italian place called Gino's on Ford street. They open late and they're usually pretty quiet in there but their food is good and they play good music. Don't order pizza, you'll look like an idiot. And pronounce the Italian words properly. She'll be eating from the palm of your hand," I said. Tom looked shocked but he took the money and thanked me repeated before he ended his shift. "No need to thank me. Just invite me to the wedding," I said. I glugged back the rest of my beer as I watched him leave, as excited as a school boy who just got to second base. It pissed me off but at the same time made me feel good that Lola would have a good night. I just hoped that it wouldn't be too good.