My outfit. It’s one of the few things I splurged on with my first few alimony payments. A hot pink faux fur jacket with a genuine Sergio Demassi red silk cocktail dress that cost so much money I couldn’t even look at my bank account after. My shoes are vintage Chanel in a rare royal purple I managed to score from one of my mother’s socialite contacts. As far as jewelry, well, the diamond necklace was a present from Uncle Conroy from about ten years back, but it still cuts a striking figure with the right outfit. One could say I’d gone overboard. On the trip here from my less exclusive, more modest hotel across town, I’d caught plenty of women glancing at me with barely concealed smirks.
I hadn’t even blushed. Who cares? I’m free, and freedom comes with the ability to wear whatever the hell you want. And apparently, some rich, beautiful man thinks that I’m worth a grand for just four hours. The joke’s on them.
“Wait!” I don’t even realize he’s halfway across the bar until I finally regain my senses enough to choke out a strangled, “Thank you.”
He cocks his head, his steps slowing. “Please tell me you’ve reconsidered?”
Biting my lip, I think through my options. Explore this avenue a little more or go crawling back to my hotel room? Or, take my chances with baldy across the way. There is no competition.
“Come sit.” I sink back onto my stool and crook a finger, beckoning him with a confidence that sends my inner Bible-self reeling. “You didn’t even finish your drink.”
I snatch up his glass before the bartender can clear it. Held beneath my nose, the smell packs a punch. It’s well beyond the cheap stuff a teenage Tiffy might have smuggled from Mommy and Daddy’s drink caddy. It’s the good stuff. Very good. Uncle Conroy-trying-to-impress-wife-number-six-with-his-wealth good.
“You could finish it for me,” Vadim suggests, appearing by my side. Dutifully, he regains his stool, copying my position with his back to the bar. “I should keep my head clear. I have a meeting in not too long.”
Curious despite myself, I take a sip and promptly sputter. It tastes like nail varnish. Damn expensive, quality nail varnish.
“So, you’re just passing through? Where are you headed?” I ask, my ears still ringing from the booze. Way, way more dangerous than a glass of wine. Slow down, Tiffy, my inner voice warns. But that voice isn’t face-to-face with a man so pretty it hurts. I find him sexier the more I appraise him. After another tiny sip of whiskey, I’m wondering why I ever considered him unattractive in the first place.
There’s something about his eyes that I find the most enticing. They’re…shadowed. Like he has an invisible wall up, and I’m only seeing a sliver of what lurks underneath—what he wants me to see. And right now, he wants me to see a sheepish, devastating smile.
“Have you ever been?” he wonders.
“Huh?” Another sip of whiskey and my brain is practically buzzing. He could have drugged it, or so says the rapidly diminishing voice of good Bible-Tiffy. But I doubt it. You can’t disguise a roofie in classic, rich bourbon—another one of Uncle Conroy’s pick-up lines. God, I need to get out more.
“You asked where I was headed,” Vadim points out, his voice soothingly deep—stern enough to anchor my floating brain. I shiver as he drags a finger over the back of my hand, and excited goosebumps erupt. He feels electric. “‘The East coast. Then onward to the south of Italy,’ I said. ‘For business, not pleasure, unfortunately. Have you ever been to Europe?’”
“Oh!” Had he really been speaking all this time? I try to look away and form some semblance of a conversation. “Italy? No. But I did some of my schooling in the south of France.”
“Really?” He sounds so amused. The tipsy, redhead “prostitute” summered in Leon for a while. Go figure.
“My mother insisted,” I add with a giggle, facing him again. “She thought it would culture me.”
All it did was put me on a crash course for a quickie marriage and a one-way ticket down heartbreak lane, smack-dab in the middle of wasted potential central.
“Does thinking about it upset you?” Vadim wonders. His voice is starting to sound way too suave. Persuasive. Enough that I might begin spilling my guts rather than offer them up to any millionaire in exchange for a lesson in kink.
“You said I might have spared you the effort of looking for a companion,” I murmur to distract him, kicking my legs out as I observe him again. Damn. My eyes linger over his face this time, and my next breath catches in my throat. His eyelashes go on for days, his lips alarmingly pink. Again, my brain turns to dirty, dirty things. But a part of me almost feels ashamed for putting him in that light—even in my imagination. He looks so innocent.
“For the night, yes,” he says, continuing the conversation and putting my assumption to the test. A wicked grin ignites his soft features, enhancing their intensity. “I have a few agencies I prefer to choose from. I can have my records sent to you via any method you prefer. As long as you are on regular birth control and clean, I prefer not to wear a condom.”
I almost choke at how blunt he is about a subject most people in my life would clutch their pearls at the horror of discussing. More than that, he makes it sound so…orderly. So business-like.
Awed, I find myself murmuring, “You do this often?”
He nods, and I’m instantly suspicious. Someone so pretty, presumably rich, and yet he hires escorts rather than troll for celebrity arm candy? I smell bullshit. He’s young enough—early-thirties I’m guessing—that a desperate actress would hitch her wagon to him in a heartbeat and supply all the sex he could ever need.
Unless relationships aren’t his style.
“I prefer the ease of it,” he says after a moment, seemingly proving my point. “Less hassle. Less potential for any…mess. Simple and clean.”
Simple. We have that desire in common. I inhale sharply, nodding in agreement. Yes, this could work… Only, there is one tiny matter that might prove to be a hitch. “What if I’m not a prostitute—”
“Escort,” he corrects.
“Escort then.” I’m amicable to the name change—it sounds so much classier.
“If you agree to my conditions, then who am I to tell the difference?”
“Conditions?” My eyes narrow. That sounds like a potential speed bump. For instance, Uncle Conroy’s “conditions”—which sent him burning through six consecutive marriages—are that he enjoys threesomes, booze, and little else. Since he’s one of the few millionaires I know personally, I’m hoping his proclivities don’t serve as a template for the lot. “Like?”
“Hmm.” He reaches out and gently pries the nearly empty whiskey glass from my hand. Then he downs the remaining sip in one go. I gape, riveted as his throat works to swallow. Meeting my gaze, he slams the glass onto the counter, resembling a cowboy throwing down a gauntlet. “Come to my room and find out for yourself.”
I stop breathing. Could it truly be so easy? A sexy businessman on my very first attempt?
Don’t look a gift horse in the mouth, Uncle Conroy would warn. Take your shot, girl. Luck doesn’t strike twice.
“Where to?” I murmur, rising to my feet.