by Penny Reid
She didn’t know how to live any way other than paycheck to paycheck. Money had always been a persistent, oppressive worry hovering under the surface of everything she did.
But now? Now she could afford to pay rent on this outrageously nice apartment, lease a car, buy groceries, make her student loan payments, and still have money left over to put into savings every week. It was madness.
To celebrate, Melody took herself out to dinner at a fancy restaurant near the beach in Santa Monica, and splurged on a bottle of champagne and the lobster thermidor. She didn’t actually know what lobster thermidor was, but it sounded like something rich people ate, and she wanted to feel rich and fancy—lobster thermidor and champagne fancy.
Sipping her champagne, she gazed out the picture window at the Santa Monica Pier as the sun sank toward the Pacific Ocean. The lobster thermidor was fine, but hardly seemed worth the exorbitant price tag. In retrospect, she probably would have been better off with the tenderloin. Lesson learned. For dessert, she had a slice of chocolate mousse cake so rich, she could only finish a few bites of it.
The champagne had left her feeling muzzy, so after she paid the check, she went for a walk along the beach to clear her head. The sky against the palm tree silhouettes was yellow-amber, like a Polaroid photo filter, and she felt more alive than she had in a long time, but also strangely unreal, like she’d stepped into someone else’s life.
Crossing her arms against the ocean breeze, she stared out at the dark, crashing waves and tried to believe this was exactly the fresh start she needed.
Everything was going to be better now.
It had to be.
After rocking her thesis presentation, Melody told MIT to mail her diploma to her new address in Los Angeles, then crammed the entirety of her life into a few cardboard boxes, flipped the bird to Boston, and moved to the opposite side of the country.
The first thing she did when she got to LA was lease a shiny new Fiat 500—the first new car she’d ever owned.
So long, public transportation! No more sidestepping unidentified fluids or jockeying for space with drunks, manspreaders, and people who thought their backpacks deserved their owns seats! Hello, fighting her way through rush-hour traffic and competing for parking spaces with the other six million LA drivers!
Melody had never had so much money to spend all at once before, and it was tempting to go a little crazy. Fortunately—or sadly, depending on your perspective—she was far too sensible to actually do anything that irresponsible. She let herself spend half her signing bonus on a work wardrobe and some furniture for her apartment, and the other half went into savings. She bought a brand new couch and mattress—on clearance, of course—but after that, she scoured discount shops and thrift stores.
It was too hard to let go of a lifetime habit of penny-pinching. The memories of how a small unexpected expense cropping up could hurt for weeks—or even months—were too ingrained to be shaken off at the sight of one fat check. Every dollar Melody spent involved a certain amount of rocking back and forth trying to convince herself that it was okay, she could afford it, she was still being responsible.
She was half afraid this was all going to turn out to be some sort of mistake or cruel trick. That Sauer Hewson would call, ask for their check back, and tell her there’d been a mix-up and this had all been meant for someone else. Not her. Surely. How could this be her life?
The night before she was supposed to start her new job, Melody lay in her new bed in her new apartment, staring at the unfamiliar ceiling. She still wasn’t used to the sounds of this strange new city at night. She wasn’t used to the traffic noise outside, or the rumble of the ice maker in her freezer, or the muffled voices and thumps of her new neighbors.
Her brand new sheets were scratchy, and her skin felt irritated and hyper-sensitive. It was possible she was allergic to the laundry detergent she’d bought. Or maybe it was the air in LA. The smog here was supposed to be the worst in the country. What if she was allergic to the whole city?
What if her new coworkers didn’t like her? What if her boss didn’t like her? What if she wasn’t any good and they realized they’d made a mistake?
Melody rolled over and reached for her phone to check the time. 1:18 a.m. If she fell asleep right now, she’d get almost five hours of sleep.
Or she could pull up Google Maps and double-check the route she was planning to take to work in the morning. Just one more time. Just to make sure she remembered it. Just in case.
Instead, she got up and went into the bathroom for a Xanax. Then she got back in bed and pulled the covers up under her chin.
She’d get used to it here; she just needed to give it time.
After all that worrying, the new job turned out to be a cinch. A little too much of a cinch, really. She’d been worried she wouldn’t be able to live up to expectations, but they didn’t seem to have any expectations of her.
For her first assignment, they put her to work re-imaging servers, which any monkey with an MIS could have done. She was vastly overqualified for it, but she supposed she had to put in her time at the bottom and prove herself before she could move on to bigger and better things. She understood this, rationally, but it didn’t stop her from being bored out of her wits.
At least her new boss was nice enough, even if he seemed in over his head. When she tried to explain how she’d hand-built the new image for one of the servers because the old one was using the wrong drivers, she got the sense he only understood about half of what she was saying. But he was content to let her do things her way, so long as everything got done and he came out smelling like a rose to his boss.
Her coworkers were harder to get a read on. As the lowest person on the totem pole, Melody was stuck at the only available workstation, which happened to be off by itself in what was essentially a glorified closet outside one of the server rooms. It didn’t afford her much opportunity to interact with anyone else in her department, and on the rare occasions she did, they seemed a bit standoffish. She couldn’t tell if they were actively unfriendly, worried she posed a threat to their jobs, or simply disinterested.
Whatever. It was a good job, and she was grateful to have it. Things were good. Things were fine.
At the end of Melody’s first week, Jeremy showed up at her office.
“Hey,” he said, lounging against the open doorway. “A little bird told me you started this week.”
She tilted her head to the side. “A little bird? Really?”
“Okay, it was your boss.” He flashed that movie star smile of his—the one that had made her weak in the knees the first time they met. “I may have called and asked him when you were starting. I hope you don’t mind.”
“No, it’s fine. I’m sorry, I meant to call you when I got to town, but everything’s been kind of crazy.” Which was a lie. Things had been crazy, but not calling him had been intentional.
Aside from the fact that pursuing a friendship with an ex-flame who had a girlfriend felt like a wicked bad idea, Melody had Googled Jeremy and what she’d found was…enlightening. The DUIs, trashed hotel rooms, and incidences of public intoxication caught on camera seemed to have petered out in the last three years at least, but he still made semi-regular appearances on some local society pages and gossip sites. There were more than a few paparazzi photos of the handsome young Mr. Sauer, heir to a billion-dollar aerospace empire, arriving and departing from high-profile hot spots around town with various beautiful women on his arm—some of them recognizable actresses and models.
Oh, and there was also the matter of him being named one of the country’s “50 Sexiest Bachelors” by Town & Country magazine last year—which was a real thing that had actually happened.
So, yeah. Even if Jeremy hadn’t had a girlfriend, he would still be so far out of Melody’s league, he might as well be in the next solar system. Which was perfectly fine, because she was absolutely, positively not looking to hook up with him again—no matter how hot he was.
&nb
sp; “How are you settling in?” He cast his eyes around her dreary little workspace. “I see they put you in the five-star accommodations.”
“It’s not so bad,” she said with a shrug. “At least I have my own office.”
“Making new friends?”
Melody forced a smile. “Yep. Everyone’s been great.” Not strictly true, but not not true, either.
“I was thinking I could take you to lunch to celebrate the end of your first week. If you’re free, that is.”
She couldn’t have been freer. The formatting software practically ran itself, and there wasn’t anything for her to do but wait until it finished, which wouldn’t be for hours. Also, she was starving. And a bit lonely. She’d barely talked to anyone since she’d arrived in Los Angeles, aside from her mom during their weekly phone calls. On the other hand…
“You don’t think your girlfriend would mind?”
His eyebrows lifted. “Would she mind if I had lunch with a coworker? Probably not.”
“We’re not just coworkers, though, are we? I mean, that’s not how we met.”
The corner of his mouth dimpled into that charming smirk of his. “No, it’s not.”
Melody refused to be charmed. “Did you tell her about me? After we met for coffee, I mean?”
The smirk faded into something more sincere. “I told her about you before we met for coffee. I don’t go around asking women out behind my girlfriend’s back. Lacey knows all about you.”
“Really?” she said, trying to decide whether he was telling the truth.
“Really. So, can I take you to lunch?”
“I’d like that,” she replied with a smile. What the hell, right? She had to eat. And the thought of having yet another sad ham and cheese sandwich alone at her desk was too depressing to contemplate.
The restaurant was around the corner, and the hostess recognized Jeremy on sight, addressing him as “Mr. Sauer” and asking if he’d like his usual table, which turned out to be in a quiet corner in the back, away from prying eyes.
It didn’t escape Melody’s notice how effortlessly he flirted with the hostess, flashing his billion-dollar smile and touching her on the arm. She remembered him doing the same with her the night they first met, and it was so clearly an act, she felt a little ashamed at the memory.
“Wow,” she said as soon as the hostess retreated.
He looked up from his menu. “What?”
“Nothing.” She shook her head. “It’s just—you really know how to lay on the charm, don’t you?”
His shoulders lifted in a careless shrug. “Making connections is a big part of my job. It’s second nature at this point.”
“Mmmhmm,” she said, not bothering to hide her skepticism. “I’ll bet you’ve always been like that, though. You were probably charming phone numbers out of girls on the playground in kindergarten.”
The smirk made another appearance. “Maybe.”
“That’s exactly how you acted with me when we met.” She scrunched up her nose. “I can’t believe I fell for it.”
“I’m glad you did.” That smile of his was like a superpower. Even though she knew he must use it on everyone he wanted to impress, she couldn’t help getting a little breathless when it was directed at her.
Melody raised her menu to hide the color rushing to her cheeks. “What’s good here?” she asked, changing the subject. “Since you obviously come here a lot.”
Jeremy recommended the steak, but she decided to stick with soup and a salad. He ordered the fifty-dollar prime rib and a twenty-five-dollar scotch—just in case she needed another reminder of how different his world was from hers.
When he asked about her first week on the job, she gave him benign, nonspecific answers. She was hyperconscious of the fact that he was the CEO’s son, and the last thing she wanted to do was complain about her new job to someone in management. But then he asked about her new apartment, and Melody found herself getting excited as she told him all about it, and about her new furniture and car.
Jeremy had had money all his life, so she didn’t expect him to understand what it meant for her to be able to afford all these nice things for herself—but strangely, he seemed to. Or maybe he was just good at pretending to understand. Whatever. She’d take it. He was the only person she knew here, and it was nice to have someone to talk to.
They ended up taking a two-hour lunch, which she probably should have felt bad about, seeing as it was her first week and all, but it wasn’t like anyone at work was going to miss her or even notice she was gone.
“I’ll write you a note,” Jeremy teased as they walked out of the restaurant.
It was a gorgeous day, just like every day in Los Angeles. Melody was still getting used to the fact that she didn’t have to check the weather forecast before she left the house. That and the lack of humidity, which was doing amazing things for her hair.
Jeremy ambled along at a leisurely pace, but his legs were so long, Melody had to hustle to keep up. He started telling her about a contract they were bidding on with NASA, to build a winged spacecraft to resupply the International Space Station. It was a fourteen-billion-dollar contract, but Jeremy seemed more excited about the tech than the money.
“See, SpaceX and Orbital’s cargo craft both return to Earth by splashing down in the ocean,” he was saying as they stepped into the lobby back at the office. “Which is a pain in the ass to recover. But ours is going to glide back to Earth and land on a runway.” He made a motion with his hand to illustrate.
“Like the space shuttle,” Melody said.
“Exactly!” he said, grinning. “It means scientists will be able to access the results of ISS experiments within just a few hours of reentry. It’s game changing.” He was dangerously cute when he got excited about science.
“Do you think we’ll get the contract?”
He shrugged. “Who knows? Government stuff is unpredictable.” He cocked his head toward the coffee cart. “I’m gonna grab some coffee before I head up. You want any?”
She shook her head. “I better get back upstairs and check on my format. Thank you for lunch. It was fun.”
“We should go out to dinner sometime.”
Melody froze. “What?” He had a girlfriend, what was he doing asking her to dinner?
“You, me, and Lacey.”
Right. With Lacey. His girlfriend. That made much more sense.
“What do you say?” he asked.
“Sure,” Melody said. “That sounds fun.”
He was already walking away. “I’ll call you,” he said over his shoulder. “We’ll pick a date.”
Chapter 6
The last thing Melody expected was for Jeremy to follow through on his dinner invitation. She assumed it was just one of those things people said to be polite, like let’s do lunch or we’ll get together soon. And Jeremy Sauer struck her as the kind of guy who routinely made promises he had no intention of keeping.
So, she was surprised when he texted her the following week to firm up plans for dinner.
They agreed to meet on Saturday night at a restaurant in the Arts District. A quick internet search told her it was one of the hottest new restaurants in the city and the typical wait for a reservation was six weeks—unless you were Jeremy Sauer, apparently.
She decided to treat herself to a new outfit for the occasion. She was worried about fitting in at a super-trendy LA restaurant and didn’t think any of the sensible slacks and button-down shirts she’d bought for work were up to the job. Also, her fashion expertise was limited to deciding what color Converse to wear with which novelty T-shirt, so she needed help.
“Oh my god, are you serious?” the saleswoman at Nordstrom said when Melody told her where she was going. “That place is impossible to get into. Come on.” She took her firmly by the arm and lead her over to a rack of dresses. “I’m going to find you the perfect thing. You’re gonna be a stunner.”
Melody seriously doubted that, but she was encouraged by the sale
swoman’s enthusiasm. Her name was Jasmine, and her outfit was cute and stylish without being overly trendy, which gave Melody hope she wouldn’t steer her wrong.
“What kind of dinner is it?” Jasmine asked, flipping through the rack with the efficiency of a casino dealer. “Is it like a date, or a girls’ night out, or what?”
“Um…” Melody chewed on the inside of her cheek. What kind of dinner was it? She wasn’t entirely sure how to describe it. “I guess it’s like a work dinner?” she said, figuring it was better to play it safe. “Like a work dinner with friends, let’s say.”
“So, nothing too slutty, right?”
“Definitely nothing slutty.” The last thing she wanted was to look like she was trying to throw herself at Jeremy, especially in front of his girlfriend.
Jasmine pulled out a dress and stared at it, pursing her lips and twisting them to the side. “What night of the week?”
“Saturday.”
“Okay, good.” She hung the dress on the end of a nearby rack and went back to flipping through the hangers. “Since no one’s going straight from work, it gives you a little more freedom to play around with your style.”
See? Melody never would have thought of that. Thank god she had Jasmine.
By the time Jasmine was done searching through the racks, there were five different dresses for Melody to try on. The first one didn’t fit. The second was way too low cut—like so low cut, it looked like her bosoms were in danger of heaving their way to freedom. The third one Melody vetoed as ugly—the pattern reminded her of her grandmother’s hideous couch. The fourth and fifth were both pretty great, though.
Jasmine was pushing hard for the fifth: a stretchy, color-block dress she insisted made Melody’s ass look spectacular. Melody wasn’t sure she wanted her ass to look that spectacular, so she ended up going with the fourth: a simple black dress with a narrow skirt and tastefully plunging neckline.
