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Wren nodded. “I did. At the start when I thought there was some hot, super rich, dreamy guy coming to give you a sexual awakening, to make you realize just how luscious you are. Saw it as a way for you to grow, gain more confidence, have stories to tell. But I’ve watched you, honey. We’ve watched you. We’ve seen you change. We’ve seen you fall for this man. He’s not dreamy, I see that now. He’s a nightmare. In his own way. Which I wouldn’t hate, if he was going to give you more. But if he’s only ever going to promise you a cage, and I can’t force you out, I can at least show you what freedom looks like. Show you that there are many tanned, muscled, dreamy men who would be happy to give it to you.”
Yes, my friends loved me. And more importantly, they saw me. They were worried about me. And they had a right to be. Jay was consuming me, slowly, like a python, constricting, getting ready to swallow me whole. I’d wanted that. I’d gone willingly.
“He’s not going to come,” I informed her, my voice small yet confident. “And I’m not going to be free from him. Not for a long time. And definitely not for tonight.” The honesty of the words hurt. The truth of how far gone I was sounded ugly and pathetic out loud, but there was no other option. I couldn’t lie to my friend, and I certainly couldn’t pretend with any other man.
Wren was silent for a moment. Not judging me, not pitying me, because Wren didn’t do that. “Well then, bitch, we better have a great fucking night.”
I clinked my glass to hers, pasted on a smile and said, “You fucking bet we will.”
And we did. As miserable I was in my current emotional state, I had my three very best friends. I had a fabulous party. I looked like a goddamn dream. Life was good. The party was legendary.
Jay never came.
CHAPTER FIFTEEN
He’d heard about the party. Of course, he’d heard about the party. When it came to Stella, he knew everything. It was his business to know everything about her.
He knew that her crazy friend Wren was throwing a party. He also knew that she was fucking around with Karson. That amused him. Because the woman was seriously fucking with him. He’d never seen Karson affected by a woman. Fuck, he’d never even seen him look at a woman.
Jay had been certain there was no woman in the world capable of handling Karson. But then Wren came in. And now, he thought that Karson had met the one woman in the world he would not be able to handle.
Wren was playing games with Karson.
And now she was playing games with him.
It had not escaped his attention that she was trying to lure him to the party with the men she’d invited, with the implications she’d put out in to the world about Stella’s availability.
That amused him too. She was trying to make him jealous. She was trying to get him come to the party to stake his claim. But what she didn’t know was that Stella was already his. It didn’t matter what another man tried with her; Stella would not be interested. She’d be thinking of him the entire night.
He thought of her. Imagining her in that white dress. With those wings. Looking like an angel, fallen from heaven. She’d fallen far, to end up in his grasp. And he did not have any plans of letting her go.
Nor did he have any plans of going to the party. Because he was not an angel. Not a saint. He was a sinner.
It was Saturday. The one after my party.
Late afternoon.
I’d spent the morning working on a new look for a celebrity client. This one was an actual human being, or acted like one, at least. He was kind, didn’t have a gaggle of people running around after him at his mansion. He greeted me himself, offered coffee which he had made, and was generally charismatic and warm.
Ollie Cunnings was a little more than charismatic and warm. He was a fucking Hollywood Heartthrob. Old Hollywood. Like Cary Grant. But a little rougher around the edges. Which surprised me, him wanting a stylist. He had on a plain white tee and jeans when I first arrived, and he wore the shit out of them.
He’d shrugged when I asked him why he’d hired me. “Hate picking shit to wear. I’ve got award parties, talk shows to go on. I’d gladly go in this,” he motioned to his chest, “if my publicist wouldn’t skin me alive.” His eyes darted around his closet before he leaned in to whisper, “I’m kind of scared of her.”
I couldn’t help but grin. His publicist had been the one who had contacted me. I’d worked with her before, and she was fucking scary. Great at her job, but I’d always been terrified of getting in trouble with her. Even though she surely wasn’t much older than I was.
