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At lunchtime, he came out, his hair looking at least combed, but his eyes were bloodshot. He handed me a ring of keys, barely glancing at me.
“Take a car to my apartment. The driver will know the address. If anyone’s there, get rid of them, and then call a locksmith to change the locks. When they’re done, lock up and bring me the new keys.”
Without waiting for me to answer, he dragged himself back into his office and slammed the door. I heard him groan and felt a slight bit of satisfaction. What were these demands? I stared at the keyring, my ire rising, but finally got up and went down to the curb where a company car waited for me. I guess this wasn’t any worse than picking up dry cleaning, and since he’d canceled all his meetings and I was caught up with correspondence, there was nothing else for me to do.
His apartment was the penthouse of a swanky building and I had to show my ID and use my best imperious tone to get past the doorman. I had put the most worrisome part of Eli’s instructions out of my head as I went up the private elevator. If someone was there, get rid of them?
The place was huge, with one of those amazing walls of windows that looked out over the park and the lake. The air was musty and reeked of alcohol, but thankfully seemed empty. There was a mess of papers strewn all over the sleek granite bar and shirts thrown haphazardly across the back of a long, black couch, but other than that it was sparkling clean. His poor cleaner probably couldn’t keep up with him. On the ride over I called a few locksmiths and chose the one that could arrive there the fastest. I still had an hour to wait, so straightened the papers into neat piles, and picked up his shirts to put in the bedroom, cranking the thermostat down on the way in hopes of blowing out the bad air. The first bedroom was clearly for guests, and looked nicer than the fanciest hotel I’d ever stayed at, with an adjoining bathroom that was the size of my current apartment. I wondered if I had time to take a bath in the massive soaker tub, but quickly discarded that crazy idea.
The next door down the hall was his bedroom and I shrieked when I opened the door. The place wasn’t empty, there was a naked woman sprawled on his bed. Was she alive? Had he sent me to clean up a murder? I stood in the hallway, trying to get my breathing under control when she came out, wrapped in a robe that was three sizes too big for her. Clearly Eli’s. I felt a rush of uncontainable jealousy, then red hot rage.
He had sent me to clear out one of his booty calls? What the hell? I nearly left, quit, never wanting to see his face again. This was outrageous.
“Who the fuck are you?” the woman asked.
She had tousled blonde hair and smudged eyeliner. I was taller than her by a few inches, but she looked like the kind of person who’d hit people before. So, Eli had sent me to get beat up by his booty call that he himself couldn’t extricate from his apartment. No, thank you.
I turned, then stopped, remembering the honest glimpse I got of him at dinner on Friday night. He’d shown me a real human side of him, that seemed to be in a lot of pain. He valiantly did a good job of hiding it, at least at work. His personal life was clearly a hot mess.
And speaking of hot messes, the one in front of me rolled her eyes when I didn’t answer her, pushing past me to go to the kitchen. I ran after her.
“I’m Eli’s assistant,” I called. “You need to go.”
She snorted and started the espresso machine. “Hmmm, I don’t think so. Not unless I hear it from him.”
I called Eli and then put him on speaker.
“Pamela, get the hell out of there, will you?” he said, sounding defeated.
“You ass,” she screamed. I took a step back, wishing the locksmith would hurry up and get there so I’d have back up. “How can you say that to me after all we’ve done together?”
“We talked about this. You agreed it’s over. Don’t make Violet call the police.”
Good God. Pamela burst into tears and I ended the call with Eli. “Listen,” I said. “He is definitely an ass. Why don’t you just save your self-respect and go.”
“No, no way,” she said. “He’s only saying those things because our picture ended up online again, and he thinks I’m the one calling the paparazzi.”
Curious, I turned away to search for these pictures while she continued to make herself coffee. I instantly wished I hadn’t. “Did you call them?” I asked.
According to the search timeline of his name, there were only a few other pictures of him, mainly at events that warranted pictures. Nothing like the slew of tawdry photos until a week or so ago, all of those with Pamela.
She shrugged, as good as a yes. “I’m just marking my territory. He’s my boyfriend.”
“He’s clearly not.”
She sniffled, but I realized even after her outburst there were no tears on her cheeks. “He’ll get used to the idea. He likes me, I know it.”
I sat on a barstool and shook my head. “Listen, it’s my sole job today to get you out of here. Does that seem like something a boyfriend would do? Seriously, have some pride. Why do you even want to be with someone who’d treat you like that?”
She stamped her foot and waved her hand around in the air. “Because he’s so freaking rich,” she whined. “I’ve already invested a lot of time and effort into this relationship.”
“Pamela,” I said tiredly, getting off the stool. I was done trying to reason with her and held up my phone. “You’ve got two minutes to get your stuff and go or I’m calling the police.”
She stuck her chin out and narrowed her eyes. I tapped the clock on my phone and set a two minute timer. After twelve seconds went by, she huffed and ran to Eli’s bedroom. The timer had just run itself down when she slammed the door behind her, wearing the same dress she’d been wearing in the most recent pictures online, her shoes in her hand.
Eli was going to owe me for this. Better yet, I was going to make him pay. First I pretended to be his girlfriend to his mother and three days later I was getting rid of jilted lovers from his apartment. I figured I should count myself lucky she didn’t slap me.
I expected a torrent of gratitude when I finally got back to the office at three o’clock, but he was on the phone, arguing with someone. I rolled my eyes and put his new keys on his desk and started to leave. I didn’t care that it was early, I was headed home. Before I could shut down my computer, he called me into his office, looking pale and frazzled. I was a weakling and my heart melted toward him. Maybe he’d been fooled by that gold digger Pamela. Maybe finding out her true colors had really hurt his feelings. It couldn’t be nice wondering if people only liked you for your money.
