The Real Deal Page 13

  “Oh, I know Les Chic,” she said, gushing, her hand fluttering to her chest as if she was surprised, as if she hadn’t known who I was all along. I didn’t exactly have a low-profile face. I had been featured in New York magazines as one of the top eligible bachelors in the city, something that my partner, Owen, had submitted me for as a joke. He hadn’t expected me to win, and since then I’d had a lot of women like Amanda at my doorstep, though it had thankfully died down some in the two years since the article had come out. “That’s you?”

  I nodded. Her flirty look was getting to me, especially by the time I was on my third beer. She really was gorgeous—the type of woman I normally went for. Model beautiful. Only the best. I found myself staring at her with some kind of interest, and she responded by doing small things like touching me—a hand on my knee or my arm. I found myself lost in my usual habit of wanting to forget some of my troubles, knowing that for a few moments, a woman might satisfy my need to keep from being alone. It was directly against everything I had told myself at the beginning of the night, yet still I was tempted. A warm body that meant nothing to me was still a warm body, somebody to keep me company for at least a few hours.

  I found myself falling into Amanda, and by the time Aaron and Roger left, I already knew what was going to happen. Amanda was leaning into me, staring at my lips, and though I was tired, I knew I was just drunk enough to take her to bed.

  Chapter 2: Ali

  I yawned, wrapping my coat around me and making my way quickly along the sidewalk to my apartment. It was two in the morning and I had just then left work. I had been up all night practicing some new recipes that I was going to serve to Constance Maybury, an important food critic and somebody who had the ability to destroy the career I had built and found success in.

  I got back to the apartment and slipped inside, shivering, taking the elevator to my apartment on the third floor. A new neighbor had moved in and there was noise coming from his place, loud music that seemed to not be at all muffled by the door’s thick barrier. I tried to ignore it and went to my door, digging in my purse for my keys. I didn’t find them there, so I checked my pockets, then cursed when I realized that I must have forgotten them at the restaurant. I sighed, rubbing my eyes, grumbling as I went down to my mailbox to get the spare key. I waited for the elevator, and when the door opened I saw one of my neighbors, Amanda, with her arms wrapped around the neck of a man. I got on, trying to avoid looking at them, annoyed at their display of affection. I heard her giggling, nuzzling his neck, and he was grinning with a smile that was infinitely charming. His eyes met mine over her shoulder and I saw how handsome he was, with sharp, high cheekbones and dark, wavy hair. His eyes were blue and there was a line of stubble on his jaw, a five o’clock shadow that made his bone structure look even more incredible. He winked at me and I quickly glanced away, blushing, hyperaware that I had been staring.

  “Hey,” said the man. I didn’t say anything, but stared straight ahead.

  “Hi,” said the girl after that, waving her hand in front of my face. “You live here, right?”

  “Yes,” I said, gritting my teeth. I had met Amanda many times before, though she’d never even bothered to remember my name. She was the type of girl who thought she was better than me by default—she was model pretty and thin as a stick, probably a size two, tiny compared to my size sixteen body. “Hi, Amanda.”

  “Hi,” she said again, giggling, looking back at the man I didn’t know.

  The two started making out, their bodies pressed together, and I grimaced, praying that the elevator would get to the first floor soon. I was relieved when it did and I rushed off, leaving the couple behind, wanting to forget about them. It was annoying to see people all over each other.

  I went to my locker and grabbed my spare key, hoping that the couple wasn’t still in the elevator. For all I knew, they were the type of people who thought it’d be thrilling to hook up in a public place. The last thing I needed or wanted was to see two beautiful people getting it on right in front of me. To my relief, the elevator was empty, and I was glad for the quiet as I rode upstairs. The music was still playing when I got up there, the loud talking filling the hallway. I knew for sure that I’d be able to hear it in my apartment, in my bedroom, but I also knew there was nothing I could do about it now. I didn’t have the energy to confront the new neighbors, so I unlocked my door and went inside, going straight to bed. Despite the noise, I fell asleep quickly.

  Chapter 3: Tyler

  I groaned the moment I opened my eyes, squeezing them shut against the bright light. My head was throbbing and my mouth was dry. I looked beside me to see that the bed was empty, and sighed in relief that I hadn’t slept with Amanda the night before. I had lost control and given into her, but in the end it seemed I had resisted her charms. I got out of bed, my whole body feeling achy as it usually did after a night of drinking. It was true that I felt like I was getting old—I could no longer party the way my sister could, with endless drinks and little to no sleep in between.

  I went downstairs first thing, walking across the parking lot without a coat on despite the fact that it was freezing outside. The cold air felt good on my skin after last night, feeling overheated and warm with Amanda. It soothed my headache, too, and the movement of my legs helped wake me up so that by the time I reached the apartment’s gym I was ready for my workout. I spent a long time running on the treadmill, my legs pumping, mind going blank as I ran. No matter how stressful my job got, I could always turn to running to clear my head. I ignored the clock as I ran, and by the time I was finished, sweat was pouring down my body. I wrapped a towel around my neck and made my way shirtless back to the building, shivering in the cold.

  I spent the rest of the morning lazing around, having decided not to go into work today. The hangover was bad enough, but moving had made me sore, and I wasn’t feeling up to dealing with the high-speed pressure of fashion week looming in front of us. I felt slightly guilty for not working, but I knew that my team was more than competent enough to handle it without me, so I didn’t feel too bad as I lazed on the couch, flipping through TV channels mindlessly as I nursed my headache.

  My phone rang and I picked it up, hesitating for a moment when I saw that it was my mom. I had barely spoken to her in the past year—I’d called her on Mother’s Day and on her birthday, but otherwise I had stayed away from both of my parents. Still, I did miss my mom—we had always been close, and I knew that hearing her voice would be good for me. I picked up the phone.

  “Hey, Mom,” I said to her. It had been so long since I’d talked to her that I found myself holding my breath, for some reason expecting her to yell or be angry with me. That wasn’t the type of person my mother was, but I felt guilty for being away from her for so long, though I had no reason to believe that she would be angry. It wasn’t my mother I had fought with—she was just a bystander, and innocent casualty in the fight between my father and I.

  “Hi, sweetie,” she said, and I smiled at the warmth in her voice. It didn’t matter how long we’d gone without talking to each other; I had known that my mother wouldn’t feel awkward, but would be her usual sweet self. “How are you? Are you at work?”

  “Took the day off,” I told her, not wanting to elaborate on the fact that I had a massive hangover and could barely bring myself to stand, let alone go into work. “I wasn’t really feeling well this morning.”

  “Your sister says you had quite a night,” my mother said, and I winced, knowing that Trixie had told her everything. The two of them were very close, and Trixie spilled her guts to my mother no matter what the topic.

  “We did,” I said. “It was a good time.”

  “You need to stay away from those models,” my mother chided. She was always telling me that. She had since the beginning. My mother was convinced that all models were empty-headed bimbos, and no matter how many times I tried to tell her that most of the women I worked with were perfectly competent and bright, she never managed to
believe me. I sighed.

  “How are you?” I asked, changing the subject. The last thing I wanted was to be chided when I was already feeling slightly guilty about how far I had gone with Amanda. I vaguely remembered kissing her, touching her on the couch, but I couldn’t remember anything afterward. I hoped that I was right and she hadn’t spent the night—I knew from experience how awful it was to forget having sex entirely, and it wasn’t something that I ever wanted to experience again.

  “I’m good,” she said. “I miss you. I want you to come home for Christmas.”

  I swallowed. “I don’t know, Mom.”

  “Tyler, please,” she said in a pleading voice that made guilt spread through my entire body, making me feel heavy and sad. “Your father—”

  “He definitely doesn’t want me there. You remember what happened the last time I talked to him. We had a huge fight,” I said to her. “We almost—it didn’t go well. I don’t want to go through that again.”

  She sighed heavily. “He just doesn’t understand why you left the company.”

  “I know he feels betrayed,” I said in exasperation. It was a conversation that I’d had over and over with both Trixie and my mother, but it still didn’t change the fact that I was proud of my decision not to work for my father, to be independent and on my own. “But I wanted to do my own thing. I never wanted to work for Dad for the rest of my life and I never promised him that I would.”

  “I know,” she said in a sad voice. “I tried to explain that to him, but he had his heart set on you taking over the business.”

  “Trixie is interested in taking over the business. Why doesn’t he let her do it?”

  My mother sighed again. “Your sister isn’t quite as responsible as you are.”

  “She can be,” I said. “He just needs to give her a chance. She has some growing up to do, but she loves that company. He doesn’t treat her right.”

  “I know,” she repeated, then paused. “Will you come visit? We haven’t seen you in a year. Your father—I promise he won’t mind. He misses you too.”

  “I don’t know,” I said to her honestly. “I don’t know if I can face him. We were yelling at each other last time. I miss him, but—”

  “It won’t be like that again. I’ll talk to your father,” she promised quickly. “I’ll tell him he has to stay calm. You two should be able to talk this out. You were always able to before.”

  That was true. I had been close with my father up to the point where I’d announced to him that I wanted to do something other than take over his advertising company. It was something that he had expected me to do since I was little, something that I had never had any interest in. For most of my life, I had been too afraid to tell my dad that my heart wasn’t in advertising, afraid to hurt his feelings, knowing that the fight was inevitable. But eventually, I’d had to do what was best for myself, and that was going into the fashion industry and building my own empire with Les Chic.

  “Okay, Mom,” I said, not wanting to argue about it anymore. I would make my decision at a later time, when I was less hungover and ashamed of myself. “Talk to him. Ask him if he wants to see me. I’m not coming unless he says yes.”

  “He will,” my mother said, sounding excited. The sound of her voice broke my heart, knowing there was a good chance that I wouldn’t be able to make it. Despite my success, I had never been good at confrontation, especially when it came to my family. Family had always been everything to me, which was a big reason why it had hurt so bad to have such a big fight with my father. “I know he will.”

  The door opened then and I glanced over to see Trixie walking in with a pizza for lunch. I shot her an annoyed look and she grinned at me.

  “I gotta go. Call me,” I said to her quickly. “I love you.”

  “I love you too,” she said, and told me goodbye before hanging up the phone.

  “Mama’s boy,” Trixie teased, putting the pizza down on the table.

  “You’re one to talk. You told her about last night with Amanda?”

  “You were acting like an idiot,” Trixie said, shrugging her shoulders. “It was funny.”

  I shook my head at her. “I didn’t sleep with her, right?”

  “No,” she said. “You passed out on the couch before she left.”

  “Great,” I said sarcastically, sitting down at the counter and pulling a slice of pizza out of the box. I took a bite of it, having to force it down. My hangover was making me queasy. I grimaced, and Trixie frowned at me, standing up to go to the liquor cabinet.

  “What the hell are you doing?” I asked her in exasperation. At this point, I knew I shouldn’t be surprised by my sister’s constant drinking, but it always amazed me how much she could put down. I had been the same way when I was younger—Trixie was twenty-four, at the peak of her party days, and it seemed to me like she never stopped going.

  “I learned how to make a new cocktail. And you need some more alcohol,” she said matter-of-factly.

  “That’s the last thing I need,” I told her, screwing up my face in disgust.

  “It’ll make you feel better. Everybody knows vodka is the cure for any hangover,” she said. I shook my head in disbelief as she passed a glass of pink liquid over the table to me. I picked it up begrudgingly and took a sip, unable to say no. Trixie was good at making cocktails, and she had a way of convincing me of doing a lot of things I shouldn’t do. When we were younger, it had led to some pretty crazy dares that had gotten us in trouble, but also had made us very close growing up. Trixie drank her liquor down and poured another, then went to my cabinets and started digging through them.

  “What are you doing?” I asked her, taking a bite of the pizza, trying to keep it down. It didn’t taste good after drinking the alcohol, but I knew that I needed to eat if my headache was ever going to get better.

  “I brought stuff to make a pie,” she said, pointing to a bag that I hadn’t seen her bring in.

  “A pie,” I said, raising an eyebrow.

  “As a housewarming gift,” she said with a grin.

  “Do you even know how to make a pie?” I asked her. I had never seen Trixie cook or bake anything in her life, other than ramen, and even then she had over-boiled it so that it had been squishy and inedible.

  “Of course,” she said, rolling her eyes as if it was obvious. I decided to trust her, though I knew it was probably a bad idea. It was hard to say no to Trixie, who was always lively and in a good mood. My sister was the kind of person who always wanted to make everyone around her happy, so I let her bake the pie, despite the fact that I wasn’t quite sure she wouldn’t end up burning the entire apartment building down in the process.

  I laughed, shaking my head, and took another sip of my drink. Though I wasn’t used to drinking this much, it was nice to relax with my sister, especially after the tension that talking to my mother had caused me.

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  CHAPTER ONE- JULIE

  The red neon light for the motel was going bad. It buzzed and blinked all night long, turning my dingy two-bedroom room into a disco party. Tyler had danced himself into exhaustion, but then, that kid could sleep through anything. It was a blessing that he’d been a quiet baby, or I probably would have fallen apart. While I couldn’t even begin to imagine my life without him, the circumstances of his birth hadn’t exactly been the highlight of my life.

  When morning came, I dragged my exhausted, sweaty self out of bed and into the shower. The water was as cold as the air was hot, but even the lack of hot water and air conditioning wasn’t enough for me to try to find somewhere else to live. With my budget, the fact that the place was relatively bug-free and came with a mini-kitchen was more than I could ask for.

  “Baby, are you up?” I called out as I brushed my wet, strawberry-blonde hair into a ponytail. With a four-year-old son to chase after and very little money, I didn’t bother with make-up. It’d simp
ly melt off anyway. I’d made my way to California thinking I could raise my son in warm and sunny climates, but Las Pameros was mostly desert, and the sun baked everything in its path.

  “Momma, did you get some blueberry Pop-Tarts? I think I’d like some blueberry Pop-Tarts.” My ever-so polite son rubbed his eyes as he walked into the bathroom and stared at me. With his blue eyes and blond hair, he was almost the spitting image of his father.

  Pretending to think it over, I narrowed my eyes and studied him. “If I remember correctly, I told you yesterday that I would only get some blueberry Pop-Tarts if you could recite the information that I gave you.”

  “My name is Tyler Garner Dennings. My mother’s name is Juliette Christie Dennings. I am four years old.” He went on to correctly announce his address and the new phone number that I’d given him to memorize since I’d lost my phone three days ago and had to get a new one. My stomach twisted as he correctly recited the number for the local police and went over the stranger danger rules. In a year, he would be five, and I’d have a decision to make. It wasn’t fair to keep moving him around when he started school, but it was also dangerous to stay in one place as well.

  My kid was smart, and I wasn’t just being a biased mother. He picked up things quickly, and he absorbed everything around him. It was almost a little terrifying.

  Stumbling over a few of the numbers, he righted himself and looked at me with hopeful eyes. “Well,” I declared loudly. “I think that might get you two blueberry Pop-Tarts!”

  “Two!” His eyes shined with excitement, and I nodded my head as he skipped from my bathroom into the kitchen. It was a good thing that he was already ready because I was running late.

  Pulling on a pair of jean shorts and a button-up plaid top, I slipped my sunglasses on my face and grabbed my things. My only friend and pretty much savior, Crystal, lived two doors down. Crystal didn’t have any kids, but she worked out of her motel room and was more than happy to keep an eye on Tyler for me while I was at work. There was some sort of unspoken rule around here about not asking people why they’d ended up at the Sunny Side Up Motel, so I never asked Crystal her story, and she never asked me mine, but I’d felt obliged to give her some details. She did look after my son, and there was always the slightest chance that his father might turn up.