Carter wondered why Anthony was making this so easy for him. Maybe he was breaking down. It wouldn’t be long now. “We have to get her into the right preschool if we want her to get into the right grade school that will get her into the right prep school that will lead to the Ivy Leagues. Mother is on the museum board with the principal’s wife, so Connor is in the school, but we have to do the formalities.”
“This is ridiculous.” Anthony threw his hands in the air. “How much does this place even cost?”
Avery sighed, knowing her answer would evoke another outburst from her husband. “Twenty-seven thousand dollars a year.”
“Are you kidding me?” Anthony asked. “How . . .”
“That’s pocket change,” Carter said, locking eyes with Anthony before adding, “Well, at least to me.”
Before Anthony could start again, Avery said, “Honey, it’s what’s best for Connor. I promised Janet I would do this. It’s okay. Carter is paying for everything.”
“What a surprise.” Anthony rolled his eyes. “Well, thanks for dropping off the applications. You can leave now.”
“Wait,” Carter yelled out as Anthony reached for the door. “I want to see her. Just to give her a kiss goodnight.”
“She’s not here,” Avery said, touched at how Connor was able to bring out this softer side of Carter that even she hadn’t seen before. “She’s at my parents. You really need to call, Carter. This is a home with a family. It’s not just a place where your baby waits for you to come and go. You have to respect that.”
Carter nodded in understanding as Anthony smirked. It wouldn’t be long before he knocked that smirk off his face.
“Let’s go, Avery.” Anthony, seeming satisfied, turned to leave.
But he shouldn’t have left without his woman in hand. Carter wouldn’t have.
“Avery,” Carter whispered, gesturing for her to stay a while.
Avery leaned in with the door behind her. “This really isn’t a good time.”
“I didn’t know she wouldn’t be here. Why is he so pissed?”
“Just ignore him. He’s in a bad mood.”
“He’s always in a bad mood.” Carter knew the longer he could keep Avery at the door, the more suspicious and angry Anthony would become. “I’m sorry.”
“It’s okay.” She waved a dismissive hand. Anthony would be a jerk for the rest of the night, but there wasn’t anything that could be done about it now. “I have to go.”
“I have to go away,” Carter said quickly.
This got her attention. She turned back to him with her doe eyes widening enough to show she cared. “To New York,” he continued. “I have to work with Michael on a deal for Dad. I just wanted to get a little bit of sugar for good luck.”
Avery smiled. She couldn’t resist. Carter could make her angry, crazy and confused, but he also made her laugh. “I’ll kiss her for you.”
“Can you kiss me for her?” Carter asked, making sure to sound in jest. “Because usually I kiss her and then she kisses me back, so . . .”
“Stop.” Without thinking, Avery’s hand reached out and touched his arm. In a second a bolt of lighting went through her. Inside she was begging herself to move her hand away, but she didn’t. She only looked into his tired eyes, and smiled more.
Carter was amazed at his own self-control. He’d never before been able to do that where Avery was concerned, which was how he’d gotten himself into this mess. It took everything he had not to grab her and kiss those inviting, full lips. Her eyes were begging him to take her now. He’d never wanted anyone so much and it seemed like forever since they’d last had sex.
Hearing the clanging sound of dishes in the background, Avery finally realized who she was and where she was. She blinked, removing her hand and feeling guilty for not wanting to close the door.
“I’ll bring her back a gift,” Carter said.
After a moment, she spoke again, her voice somewhat uneven. “You always buy her things and she just ends up spending more time with the box they came in.”
He loved Connor and spoiled her rotten with gifts she was way too young to appreciate. But what Avery hadn’t caught on to was that he always made a point to buy Connor a very expensive gift that Anthony couldn’t have ever afforded. Anthony caught on. Carter was spending twice on his daughter on very regular occasions what Anthony could spend on his own wife on special occasions.
“Just come back safe,” Avery said with more emotion than she’d intended. “That’ll do for now.”
He smiled and winked at her, waiting for her to smile back. He stayed at the door as she went inside and closed it. He wasn’t thinking of how angry Anthony would be that she’d stayed this long. He wasn’t thinking about getting a gift for Connor. He was only thinking about Avery’s smile just before the door closed. She wasn’t just smiling with her mouth, she was smiling with her eyes; her whole face. He knew there was nothing Anthony could do to take that away. At least not tonight.
Room 555 was almost at the very end of the fifth floor of Reiber Hall, one of many UCLA dormitory buildings. When Taylor reached it, finally, the front door was open but she knocked anyway. She followed the lead from the web site Claire had shown her. It took a few days of asking around, but if she was right, this was ground zero for the campus alibi service.
Taylor was full of doubts, but she found herself here anyway. There was a Chanel dress on eBay that she wanted desperately, and the bidding was already at three hundred dollars. She needed cash.
“Come in!” yelled a voice from inside.
When Taylor walked in, she came face-to-face with a boy who looked more like twelve than eighteen. He wasn’t quite white or anything else, so she figured he was biracial. He was about twenty pounds overweight with curly, out-of-control hair. She could tell right away the guy had money. His glasses were Emilio Pucci and he was wearing an Italian designed button-front shirt. And the decorations of his very humble dorm room included expensive bed sheets, an Acer Aspire notebook and a MacBook Pro notebook, each costing around three thousand dollars. Not to mention the large, flat-screen, high definition TV that was hanging on the wall in violation of dorm rules.
“Taking in the digs?” the kid asked with a strong Southern accent. He gestured for Taylor to sit down on the bed since he was sitting on the only chair.
She sat down unsteadily, glad the door was open. This kid looked shady.
He finished off the last of his Pepsi Max and tossed it in the garbage on the other side of the room. “School rules say freshmen have to live in the dorm. No exceptions. But as soon as the semester is over, I’m out of here.”
“I heard you own the . . . run that web site.” She laid her purse on the floor after checking to make sure it was clean.
“Who told you?” he asked. “I’m Damon, by the way.”
“Sorry.” Taylor cleared her throat. “My name is Taylor Jack . . . Taylor.”
“You’re pretty.” He said it as if it was just a fact that he thought he’d share, then swung around in his chair. “You go here?”
“Yes, I’m a junior. I was told that . . .”
“I ask because I’ve gone to pretty great lengths to keep my ownership of the site secret. I guess not enough.”
“It was another student who told me, so I don’t think it’s off campus.”
His expression was still as if waiting for her to say something that would ease his suspicion. He slid to the window and turned on his iPod deck, but it wasn’t playing music. It was playing loud white noise and static.
“It’s to drown out anything that might be picked up on a tape,” he said in response to Taylor’s curious expression.
Who did this guy think he was? “It’s really not that serious, is it?”
“Gotta be safe.”
“I’m not going to tell or anything,” Taylor said.
“I’d deny it if you did,” he replied, before a shrug of his shoulders seemed to indicate he was satisfied. “Besides, it’s all
legit. So, you need an alibi?”
“Actually, I need a job.”
His eyes squinted as if he was trying to read her mind. “You know what we do?”
“You provide alibis. That’s all I know. Do you have like a brochure or something?”
“Yeah, it’s right next to the application form behind you.” He laughed even more when Taylor actually turned around. “That was sarcasm, by the way. We are paperless, baby.”
Taylor nodded, already knowing she didn’t like this guy. “Do you do this all your . . .”
“I used to when it was just about alibis for absences from class, and then work. Certain times of the year we get a lot of excuses to delay midterms and finals, but that’s getting a little dicey. Honor codes and all.”
“Where do the other people work?”
“From their own rooms or apartments. I provide you with the phone. Each has ten lines, but I don’t let people handle more than five at a time, unless they’re good.” His cell phone, on the desk in front of him, rang with the sound of heavy metal music. He leaned in to look and turned up his nose before turning back to Taylor. “Otherwise, they get confused and end up answering a line that was supposed to be a job reference and give a confirmation of a hotel guest having checked in.
“Hotel guest?”
“I’ve branched out beyond students,” he said proudly. “People give their spouses a number to a hotel and we answer and confirm that the guest is there, but not in the room. We take a message. That’s getting pretty weak lately, but the virtual seminar business is big.”
“What is that?”
“I do those myself,” he answered. “They’re complicated. I usually start people off with doctor’s excuses or make you just a buddy for some girl cheating on her boyfriend. If you’re good, I’ll bump you up to fake travel agency. My latest starter is the emergency phone call.”
“What is that?”
“When people want to get out of a meeting or leave work early, at a specified time we call the front desk of his office and say there’s been an emergency. You know. But not anyone can do this. Our clients pay a lot for confidentiality.”
“What does it pay?” Taylor asked. “I mean for the people who work for you.”
“I gotta train you first and you don’t get paid anything for that. I will test you with phone calls and make sure you know how to handle it right. You know, sound professional; convincing. If you sound eighteen it isn’t going to work. If you work out, I might pay you twenty-five dollars an hour.”
“Serious?” Taylor could pay off that dress on her Mastercard in a couple of months; maybe less. “Because it’s risky, right?”
“We are a perfectly legit business.” Damon’s expression held some caution. “There is nothing illegal about lying as long as it isn’t to the police or anything like that.”
“Police?”
“Yeah, we don’t do criminal alibis. If we get a call from the cops, we don’t know nobody. I’m learning a little about . . . hey, are you in law school?”
“No, undergrad.”
“Well, we have a fax business and yes, some people still use fax machines. So, we accidentally on purpose fax a conference agenda for a meeting in Minneapolis for someone who is in the Bahamas with their girlfriend. The wife calls the number to tell us that her husband already left. We apologize and say we’ll fax it to the hotel. Proactive stuff.”
Taylor had to admit she was pretty intrigued at this point. “So are you . . .”
“Damon!” A kid with a buzz cut and thick glasses rushed into the room, ignoring Taylor completely. “Pizza is here. You’re paying, dude. It’s your turn.”
Damon looked none too pleased. “Wasn’t it my turn last time?”
“You doubled up. Come on, dude. The pizza guy is gonna leave.”
Without excusing himself, or saying anything for that matter, Damon got up from the chair, grabbed his wallet from the desk and shuffled out of the room.
“Sure, I’ll wait,” Taylor said to herself after he was gone.
So the kid was rude. It didn’t matter. She got the sense that he was raking it in and she couldn’t get that twenty-five dollars an hour out of her head.
Her curiosity getting the best of her, Taylor got up and went over to the crowded desk. Only one laptop was running and it displayed a diagram of some sort with different hotel names and aliases. She imagined if she could have afforded it, she could have used one of these back in the day when she spent more time shopping, partying and modeling than going to class.
“Hi.”
After almost jumping as high as the ceiling, Taylor turned around to see a guy that she immediately thought was one of the hottest brothers she’d ever seen. He had a superhero-type chiseled jaw and smooth, shiny skin. He looked young, but didn’t seem like a student. He was dressed in a suit that was clearly expensive, but had a backpack.
“Is Damon in?” he asked.
Taylor noticed that his expression didn’t change at all. She wasn’t looking her best, but fortunately this guy seemed too distracted to notice. “He went to get pizza.”
“Dammit.” He took a few more steps into the room, reaching into his pockets. “I can’t wait. I came all the way over here from the law campus and I’m already late for work downtown.”
“Can I help you?” Taylor didn’t know what she was doing, but she wanted to give this guy another chance to notice her. “I kind of work for him.”
“I need an alibi.” He opened his hand to her.
Taylor tried to pretend like it didn’t phase her that he was offering her a wad of bills. They were mostly hundreds with some fifties. “Is that . . .”
“It’s all fifteen hundred.” He shoved his hand closer to her. “You have my info. I need a buddy to say we were hanging out tonight. Are you going to do it?”
“I . . .” Taylor was still looking down at the money in her hand.
“You probably won’t have to do anything,” he said. “In fact, I’m pretty sure you won’t, but I have to have a backup.”
“What for?”
“The usual.” He waited for some recognition on Taylor’s face. “You and I were hanging out at Lu Valle on north campus from like eight to eleven in the evening. I picked you up in my X5 at the student union and we went to Lu Valle where we ate and talked about politics and getting jobs in politics. Then I dropped you back at eleven. That was it.”
“But how do we know each other?” Taylor was desperately trying to remember everything he’d just said. “Damon doesn’t keep any paper. You know that.”
He sighed impatiently, but quickly took a few seconds to tell her the scenario that usually played out. They also say they met a month earlier, hanging out at Jimmy’s Café, and got into a conversation about internships. They can’t have met too long ago because then they should know more about each other. He’d told her he had contacts through his law firm and could hook her up. They met for dinner to discuss those contacts, but never really got to any specifics. None that she would say she remembered. The key was not to be exact. Everyone forgets things. It just seemed so easy.
“What name are you going to use?”
“My name, I guess.”
“Well?” he asked impatiently.
“Taylor Jackson.” She held out her free hand to him and he looked confused before shaking it. His shake was firm and quick.
“So, what’s your number going to be?”
Taylor knew she was crazy, but Chanel dresses and Prada shoes danced in her head. There were so many social events coming up. Yeah, she was crazy, but she tried to appear as sane as possible as she gave him her cell phone number.
“That doesn’t sound like one of the regular numbers,” he said. “Who did you say you were again?”
“Taylor Jackson.” She looked around the room and, quickly pocketing the money, she grabbed a pen and ripped a piece of paper off a notebook. She wrote her name and number down. “You should call me to let me know whether or not I’ll be n
eeded.”
He took the paper and stuffed it in his backpack. “Well, I don’t know, but I don’t think you’ll be needed at all.”
“Just call anyway.”
“Here’s my card,” he mumbled as he handed her a thick, tan business card with red raised letters.
“You’re in law school?” Taylor asked.
“I’m an intern at that firm. It’s standard. Do you have one?”
Taylor laughed because she thought he was kidding, but his blank stare told her he wasn’t. “No. I’m just undergrad. Communications major.”
He snapped his finger. “Yeah, I’m supposed to ask that. Okay, I gotta go. I’m already late.”
“Hey!” Taylor yelled after him when he’d almost reached the door. “What’s the alibi for?”
He looked her up and down as if he wasn’t sure he could trust her. “You’re not supposed to know, remember? Plausible deniability and all that.”
“Oh yeah,” Taylor said, even though she had no idea what he was talking about. He was gone before she could say another word.
Taylor contemplated her options. She could stay, give the money to Damon, and the best she could hope for was free training. Or, she could take the card, the money, and do this one alibi, which was likely never going to happen, by herself. And maybe, if she was lucky, she’d run into . . . Taylor looked down at the card in her hand.
“Garrett Collins.” As she hurried out of the dorm room, Taylor thought even the name sounded like he had money.
4
Carter turned up the volume on his bedroom TV screen as he passed by. He tossed a pair of underwear, two shirts, and pair of jeans in his Louis Vuitton Keepall Bandouliere travel bag. That should be enough. They were only going to New York for one day.
He could hear Julia calling his name from the hallway. She was on her way to the bedroom and for a second he regretted letting her move in with him. Unlike with Avery, whom he couldn’t wait to get home to, Julia always needed something. Avery always gave when he came home. Comfort, conversation, a joke, a drink, food, or affection. Julia needed reassurance, commitment, promises, or attention.
A Price to Pay Page 6
