Page 51 of The Client
“Don’t come into this room again without an invitation!”
With that, she throws the packet of condoms at my head and slams the door, leaving me standing there in Rhys’s robe, stunned and confused.
19
RHYS
“Areyou aware of what your little girlfriend is up to?” my father says, marching into my office and brandishing his cellphone like it’s a weapon.
When I left the house around two a.m., Izabela was cozily tucked into my bed, sleeping like a baby. Shocked isn’t quite the word to describe how it felt to find her there last night, naked and half uncovered, like she’d been waiting up for me.
I hesitated at first. I was sorely tempted to fuck out all my frustrations until I was fully spent—in a condom. But it didn’t seem right to wake her up just to make myself feel good about feeling bad. Her driver had informed me of the long hours she’d put in on her shoot all day. Clearly, she was exhausted, and not thinking straight. She needed some time to cool off. I did too. So after pulling the blankets over her, I’d grabbed my toiletries and a change of clothes and gone right back to the office—where I’d spent the night.
I guess now, I can actually claim that I live at work.
Which is for the best. Between the endless shifts I’ve been putting in and the fact that I’m sleeping on my office’s leather sofa now, I’m finally getting some extended time away from Izabela. It’s clear to me that I need to set some boundaries with her.
Obviously, I’ve allowed too many lines to be blurred. Let her mistake my kindness for weakness. For guilt. There’s nothing for me to be sorry about. I’m not the one behaving like a bad soap opera here. She needs to realize that there’s only one person in control of this arrangement, and it sure as hell isn’t her.
So no, I’m not aware of what my fake “little girlfriend” is up to, and considering the pile of work on my desk, I don’t think I care.
“Please leave,” I tell my dad without looking away from my computer screen.
But my father, as usual, won’t be ignored. He sets his phone screen-up in front of me, displaying the social media account of something called Idlewild. There are three pictures posted from the set they’re currently working on, apparently for perfume. It’s very Moulin Rouge, very burlesque style, except it’s snowing all over the stage.
I don’t get it, but I’m not the target audience, either.
I recognize Izabela immediately, posed beneath a huge sign that saysIdlewildin blinking lights.
She’s wearing a glittery bra and matching G-string made of triangles of fabric that are barely the size of tortilla chips. Her hair is teased to the sky, her makeup dark and bold. She’s perched between a muscular, tawny-skinned young man and another woman. Both have their hands all over Izabela.
Each of the photos shows her in a more risqué threesome. The man has his lips on her neck, his hand on her thigh as he pulls her leg over his hip. The woman has her finger slipped under the waistband of Izabela’s G-string. Finally, the two women kneel in front of the man, who sits in a furry armchair with his legs spread wide. A muscle in my jaw twitches.
Nope. This is not the job I approved. My father doesn’t need to know that, though.
Tossing the phone back to him, I grit my teeth and turn my attention back to my work. He doesn’t get the hint to leave.
Flicking him a glare, I say, “This isn’t a good time. I have work to do.”
“It doesn’t bother you that some random man has his hands all over the body you paid for?” he says, his tone smug under the veneer of false outrage.
“No. Because I don’t need to control my women to feel like a man.”
That’s not exactly true, but I’m happy to pretend that I’m the kind of person who takes the high road. That I don’t have the strongest urge to race out of here and go pull Izabela from that photo shoot. Toss her over my shoulder and carry her home, while I’m at it.
My dad cocks his head. “Bullshit. If you let her do a gig like this, what will the next job be?Playboy? A porno?”
Over my dead body.
But I just shrug like I haven’t a care in the world.
“Izabela is free to make her own decisions about her career,” I lie. “I’m not the jealous type.” Another lie. “I appreciate your concern.” The biggest lie of all. “Though I’m surprised you’re so bored with Celine and the baby already.” Truth.
Dad leaves to take the call rather than dispute the point.
Leaning back in my chair, I replay the images of Izabela in my head. I told her she could model and even got her this gig, but I never authorized something so…intimate. So seductive. So unsettling.
I hadn’t planned on going home tonight. I was going to work through the night and sleep in my office again.
