Contracted

by Marni Mann

  “Tell me again why your fiancé-slash-agent wasn’t allowed to visit you on set?”

  “The director thought outside visitors would distract us.”

  I leaned down to straighten the hem. “Doesn’t sex help you stay focused?”

  “Please don’t get me started. If you open that can of worms, I literally won’t stop bitching. And, to make matters even worse, I’ve been back in the States for five days, and Brett’s been so tied up with other clients that he wasn’t able to fly here until tonight.”

  “Let’s take the attention off your vag for just a second and point out that, based on your performance in Norway, you’re going to catch the Academy’s attention. So, my friend, four weeks of no sex and sucky vibrations are going to be all worth it.”

  “You might have a point.”

  “Now, you just have to get through the red carpet and the two-hour premiere, and then you can bang Brett in the limo on the way to the after-party.”

  “God, I love how you think.”

  I took a few steps back to look at the outfit as a whole. “Give me a minute. I need to focus.”

  Tonight’s event was for a film James had shot over a year ago. The movie was edgy and angsty, and the plunging V-neck along with the gold-toned chains and eyelets throughout the bodice spoke to that so well. I’d requested the hairstylist to do a messy topknot, and the makeup artist had been told to do dark colors with lots of shadow.

  But something was off.

  “You’re not happy,” she said. She knew me so well. “Is it the four pounds I gained? Do I look—”

  “It’s the shoes.”

  I walked to the other side of her bedroom where I’d placed several rows of accessories on the floor. Even though James’s outfit had been planned for weeks, I had to prepare for situations like this one, so I always took multiple options with me whenever I helped my clients get dressed.

  I slowly scanned the alternatives, looking for ones that wouldn’t compete with the dress but wouldn’t be understated either. On the second row, all the way at the end, I came across a pair of Prada—gold leather peep-toes with a T-strap and a front platform. They were exactly what I was looking for.

  “Come here, goddesses,” I said to the heels as I lifted them into my hands. “Valentino is coming off,” I told James, returning to her side. “And these little beauties are going on.”

  She held on to the wall while I did the quick exchange, and then I stepped back once more to see the new look.

  “Damn, I’m good.”

  She put her hands on her waist and turned to show me her profile, twisting a little more to reveal the back before she faced me again. “Yeah?”

  “Definitely.”

  “So, this is the final, final?”

  Since there wasn’t a mirror in here, I said, “Go take a look and you tell me.”

  I followed her into her large walk-in closet and stood behind her while she checked out her reflection in the full-length mirror.

  She moved, observing herself in every angle, and then her eyes caught mine. “This might be one of your best creations.”

  “I don’t know if it’s my best, but I certainly nailed it.”

  She gave herself a final glance, and then she turned toward me. “As long as I don’t sit, breathe, or put anything in my mouth that will cause the Lycra to expand, it’ll be the perfect night.”

  “It’s just the Hollywood premiere of one of your biggest movies ever. Why would you be expected to do any of those things?”

  She laughed. “You’re coming to the after-party, right?”

  Once I left here, I had another client to dress for an entirely different event. Then, I had to stop by a client’s house to prep her for a two-week press tour where she needed several outfits for each day she’d be gone. I’d be done just in time to meet James at the hotel where the after-party was taking place.

  “I’ll be there,” I told her.

  “Good.” Her grin grew. “Now, you need to tell me all about your weekend in Nassau. You didn’t say much about it when we were talking through text, so I need all the details.”

  I closed my eyes for the briefest of seconds, filled my lungs, and slowly released the air with a moan. “We fucked for three days straight—on the beach, in the hammock, in the back of the SUV on the way to dinner. At dinner. It was perfection.”

  “At dinner?”

  “Ohhh, yes. Right on the table while we were in a private room.”

  “Did the suite not come with a bed?”

  I chewed the corner of my lip as I thought about that night. “Beds are old school. We prefer walls and sand and leather seats and tables.”

  “Suddenly, I feel so vanilla.”

  “Don’t,” I told her. “What you and Brett have is amazing. There’s no need to change a thing.”

  “And you and Max?”

  I shrugged. “We’re just us.”

  “But, at some point, aren’t you going to get tired of being the mistress to his job?”

  She’d never said anything like that before, and we talked about Max all the time. His work schedule wasn’t something I ever complained about, so I wasn’t sure where this was coming from.

  “You know Max and I aren’t anything like you and Brett. Work comes first. That’s the arrangement we’ve had forever.”

  “But aren’t you ever going to want more?”

  By more, if she meant seeing Max later at the after-party, then I was getting that.

  For now, that was all I needed.

  “I’m certain, by the end of the night, when he’s fucking the shit out of me, I’ll be screaming more so loud that you and Brett will hear me all the way at your house in the Hollywood Hills.”

  She burst out laughing. “Sometimes, I just want to shake you.”

  I grabbed her fingers and squeezed them. “Stop worrying about me. I’m the best I’ve ever been. Work is exploding, I’m getting new clients every day, and I’m traveling the world. I can’t ask for much more than that.” I lifted her hand into the air and twirled her in a circle, taking one last gaze at this stunning look. “Now, it’s time for you to go, or you’ll be late to your own movie.”

  “Eve—”

  “Come on, the limo is outside, waiting for you,” I said, cutting her off and leading her through the bedroom where I grabbed her clutch off her bed and then brought her into the foyer. I released her hand to open the door for her. “I’ll see you in a couple of hours. You look gorg.” I ushered her down the first step. “Remember, don’t breathe, and you’ll be just fine.”

  She turned to blow me an air kiss. “Bitch.”

  I gave her ass a hard slap, and then I rushed back inside and shut the door, going straight to her bedroom to pack up everything I had brought.

  Just as I was boxing up the last pair of heels, my cell rang. I checked the screen, seeing that it was Lorrie, the makeup artist who had worked on James tonight. She’d left here over an hour ago, but I’d texted her shortly after and told her to call when she had a second.

  “Hey, girl,” I said into the phone.

  “What’s up?”

  “I know it’s last minute, but I wanted to see if you had any plans tonight.”

  “For you, I’m always free.”

  I smiled as I moved to the jewelry and began to bag it up. “I won’t be far from your place, so I can pick you up around eleven.”

  “I’ll see you then,” she said and hung up.

  Lorrie was on board.

  That meant tonight was definitely going to be a good time.

  Two

  Max

  I rushed up the short staircase of our company’s private jet and sat in the seat across from Brett, setting my briefcase on the table beside us.

  He hung up with whomever he had been speaking to and said, “You’re late.”

  I checked my watch. Twenty minutes was nothing. Hell, in the music industry, that was considered early.

  “You’re lucky I didn’t hit any traf
fic,” I told him. “Then, I really would have been late.”

  He shook his head. “Selfish motherfucker.”

  I flipped him off and opened my briefcase, taking out the folder that I’d grabbed from my desk this morning. It held the latest version of the Ray-Ban contract that Brett and I had been negotiating for weeks. Brett represented the husband, and the wife was one of my clients. Ray-Ban wanted the couple for an international ad campaign. Since our company, The Agency, was sectored into different departments—acting, music, and sports—and Brett and I didn’t have the same commission structure, the contract had to be accepted by both sides. That was why coming to an agreement had been taking much longer than normal.

  Still, it didn’t matter how long it took. There was fifteen million dollars on the line. We had to get this shit right and make sure all parties were taken care of.

  Brett nodded toward the folder. “You’d better have something good to show me. The last set of figures they sent were fucking bullshit.”

  “We’re going to need some scotch before I let you read it.”

  “Christ.” He stuck his hand into the air, calling over the flight attendant.

  As she approached us, she said, “Can I get you something else for breakfast, Mr. Young?”

  The table had been stocked with bottled water, freshly squeezed orange juice, and a platter of fruit and muffins.

  “Scotch, just a finger’s worth,” Brett said.

  “And for you, Mr. Graham?”

  Her lips were red and glossy, her bright white teeth gnawing on the inside corner of the bottom one. They looked extra pouty and plumper than usual.

  She was trying so fucking hard to keep my attention on them.

  “Two fingers’ worth.” I pointed at Brett. “Pour him the same.”

  “I’ll be more than happy to.”

  She stood at our table for a second longer, giving me the sexiest smile, before she moved to the back of the plane.

  “She’s hot.”

  My eyes connected to Brett’s. “Not hot enough,” I replied.

  We both laughed, knowing how true that statement was.

  “Where are you headed after LA?” he asked.

  I pulled out my phone, clicking on the itinerary my assistant had put together. “Nashville, Las Vegas, Denver, Chicago, Dallas, and then home.”

  “Are they all tour stops?”

  Eight of my clients were currently headlining world tours, and three more were about to start. It was going to be a busy fucking season.

  “Three are,” I told him. “Las Vegas is a photo shoot, and I’m meeting with a label in Nashville.”

  “Isn’t that why you’re flying to LA? To meet with a label?”

  I took a piece of pineapple off the tray and popped it into my mouth. “Yeah, and I’m about to pulverize those fuckers.”

  His eyes narrowed. “For which client?”

  “Talia, my ex-reality star, who won the singing competition.” I tossed in a chunk of melon and chewed it. “The show wants a cut of all her future earnings. They’ve been milking her for five fucking years, and I’m putting a stop to that shit today.”

  “Isn’t that all spelled out in her contract?”

  After all the hours I’d put in, trying to get Talia out of this goddamn mess, it felt incredible to know this was a war I was going to fucking win.

  “Her contract specifically states, they only get a cut of her future R and B royalties.”

  “So?”

  “She wants to record a country album.”

  The flight attendant dropped off two tumblers of scotch and asked if we needed anything else.

  I shook my head and waited for her to leave again before I added, “They can’t fuck with a genre she’s not under contract for.”

  He lifted his glass but didn’t drink from it. “You’re positive?”

  Brett, Jack, and I had gone to law school, so we could read our clients’ contracts and write our own. Therefore, I didn’t need to consult our in-house counsel—an attorney The Agency employed because the agents who worked for us didn’t have backgrounds in law. But, just to get a second opinion, I’d asked him, and he’d confirmed exactly what I thought.

  “By a million percent,” I told Brett.

  “And you’re going to tell the label today?”

  I clinked my glass against his. “I can’t wait to see their fucking faces.” I took a drink of the scotch. “In two days, Talia and I are getting on this plane and going to Nashville where she’s going to sign one of the largest contracts I’ve ever negotiated.”

  “That’s my fucking boy.”

  I smiled like a man who was about to get his dick sucked.

  By the end of the night, I would be.

  “Now, let’s talk about Ray-Ban,” I said.

  “I hope you have some good news for me.”

  I took the stack of papers out of the folder, flipped to the seventh page, and showed him the number that was circled at the bottom. “Is that figure a little closer to what you’re looking for?”

  It wasn’t close.

  It was six points higher than what he’d asked for.

  “Fucking Christ.” He laughed. “You’re on fire.”

  I set the contract on the table and reclined in my seat just as the plane began to move toward the runway. “Nah,” I said. “It’s just what I do.”

  There were cameras flashing in the front of the building and paparazzi littering the entire goddamn entrance. I didn’t want to deal with any of that shit, so I had my driver pull up to one of the side doors. Once we came to a stop, I climbed out of the back, straightening my jacket and tie before I slipped inside.

  As I made my way down the hallway, I checked the time. It was a little after midnight.

  I’d arrived here later than I wanted. That was because the meeting with the label had lasted longer than I intended.

  When I’d pointed out the hole in Talia’s contract, the label’s legal team had threatened a lawsuit. They’d put up a hell of a fight, and that’d only made me go at them harder.

  The arguing had gone on for hours.

  Finally, Talia had walked out of that building as an unsigned artist, getting everything the both of us wanted for her. So, we had gone to dinner to celebrate and then for a drink at my favorite bar in LA. While we had been there, something unexpected had happened.

  My ex had walked in.

  Kristin Evans.

  She wasn’t just a girl I’d fucked a few times.

  She was the girl I’d dated all through high school and college. Whom I’d been with up until the guys, Scarlett, and I moved to Miami to start The Agency. Whom I’d proposed to and thought I was going to spend the rest of my life with until she broke things off the night before we were supposed to go to Florida.

  She was the girl who had scarred my fucking soul.

  Tonight wasn’t the first time I’d run into her since she ended our relationship. But it was the first time I’d seen her since she returned from Brazil where she’d spent the last three years.

  Once I’d had my driver take Talia home, I had gone over to Kristin’s table. It had taken me a long time to get to the point where I could do this, where I could talk to her about something other than the way she had broken things off. Over the years we’d discussed what had happened, and I began to understand her side.

  I’d forgiven her.

  Just because all of this time had passed didn’t mean I’d stopped caring. Our history was too thick to even consider doing that. So, I’d sat in the stool across from hers, and we’d caught up. Three years without seeing each other meant we’d had a shitload of ground to cover.

  When I had seen how late it was getting, I’d had my driver take me here.

  Now, I was walking down another hallway, rounding the corner and heading toward the noise. There had to be at least a few hundred people gathered at the hotel to celebrate, so it wasn’t hard to find the spot where they were all hanging out.

  What was h
ard to find was the beautiful brunette I was meeting.

  I circled three-quarters of the room, giving my congratulations to those who had been honored at tonight’s event, and then I went to the only section I hadn’t covered.

  That was where I spotted her.

  She sat on a barstool, facing away from me, her dark hair hanging down her back, hints of her tan skin peeking through the long locks. I wanted to wrap those strands around my fucking wrist and pull them until her neck was exposed. Once I had it open, I wanted to press my lips against the center of it and lick all the way to her mouth.

  I needed a taste.

  Even if it was just a small one.

  I made my way toward her and stopped when my chest grazed the back of her arm. Then, I gripped the bottom cushion she was sitting on, my thumb rising just enough to brush across her ass.

  She stiffened once she felt me.

  As she went to look over her shoulder, I leaned my lips into her ear and said, “Fuck, I’ve missed this body.”

  The tension began to leave her, and a smile filled the corner of her mouth. “I was just thinking about your cock.”

  Eve liked to fuck as much as I did.

  And, for the last two years, she’d gotten a lot of my dick.

  My finger slowly moved up her side, her grin widening the higher I climbed, tiny goose bumps growing over her flesh.

  “Baby, you look gorgeous tonight.”

  Her eyes dipped down my suit. “You don’t look so bad yourself.”

  “Let’s get out of here,” I demanded.

  She swiveled a little more, giving me her whole face, one that was so fucking exquisite, my cock stretched against my zipper, throbbing. “I have a surprise for you.”

  There were sexy lips all over Miami. A set on the plane that had been arousing enough to make me rock hard.

  But none compared to the ones I was looking at now.

  She ran her tongue across the middle of them, showing me how wet she could get them, how pointed she could make the tip.