Douche: A Bad Boy Stepbrother Romance

by Chloe Plume

  I opened the door and ushered her out. She wiggled her perfect body back into the bandage dress and I almost cried at what I was doing.

  This is shameful.

  She turned to throw me a look of equal parts puzzlement and disgust as she slunk back out of the room. “I don’t get it, Zayde. What’s gotten into you?”

  I shot something back without thinking. “It’s called stress Alicia, I mean you wouldn’t know, where you have a job and millions of people counting on you.”

  Alicia laughed. “Yeah, right. Okay, Zayde. You’re full of shit. Who is she?”

  I stepped back. “What the hell?! No one. You know that’s not how I roll.”

  “See you later Zayde.”

  She disappeared into the night. And that’s the story of literally the only time in recent memory that I ever lost out on some ass, or didn’t have sex when I wanted to, or pretty much just didn’t get what I wanted exactly when I wanted it. All because of Madison Pierce.

  Fucking Maddy.

  Chapter 9

  Madison

  Fucking Zayde.

  The one time he seemed to have some depth, some character, maybe even an emotion or two—it was nothing but a fleeting irregularity.

  If that.

  Most likely, he was just pissed off and acting out. His mom and my dad were keeping him from the only things he loved: the debauchery, fast girls, and ass-kissers of his popstar world existence and he was acting like the spoiled baby he truly was. Deep down, Zayde was as conceited, selfish and superficial as his outward appearance suggested.

  And hot.

  There it was again. I couldn’t deny his bad boy appeal. The image of his devil-may-care, artfully disheveled form up against the Hollywood Hills sunset was still fresh and compelling in my mind. There was no shaking the strange but welcome tingle I felt every time I glanced at him, my eyes tracing the rippling of his abs under his shirt and admiring the movement of defined muscle in his shoulders and tattooed arms.

  I can’t help it.

  But I had to. I had a real future ahead of me, and I couldn’t just stray off the path for some whimsy in my mind.

  Infatuation.

  That’s all it was.

  And I’d seen that girl, last night, sneaking out of his room.

  Back to his usual ways. Back to his usual girls.

  Her breasts were stuffed with silicone, and I could just imagine the fun he’d had. Her lips were plumped with filler, and I could just imagine where they’d been.

  I shook my head as I walked across the street from the parking lot to the KR Group building. I could feel the heat of the summer day radiating off the Studio City pavement. It coursed up through the thin soles of my black flats and pressed against me, humid and thick, until I had to take off my Banana Republic blazer and readjust the way my hair was pulled up high and tight against my perspiring head. Unbelievable, really, how much hotter it was a couple miles up north of my dad’s house in the hills above Hollywood.

  There was one thing nagging me, sifting around uncomfortably in the back of my mind. Zayde was right about something, though it pained me to admit it.

  What the hell am I doing?

  I thought I had greater aspirations, better intentions for my life. I’d always lived, studied, dreamed, under that assumption. I honestly hoped I would have a positive impact on the world and do something that mattered and changed people’s lives.

  Well, way to go then.

  And yet, here I was, about to step into lair of the beast. The beast that was the Hollywood publicity machine. It was undoubtedly the farthest thing from what I’d ever thought I’d be doing.

  KR Group was one of the top publicity firms in the world. They were responsible for propagating the worst of the bullshit that kept the entertainment industry full of sick and obsessive vigor. All the body shaming, snide and sarcastic triviality, frivolous fixations, and meaningless, self-congratulatory pageantry—I’d be on the front line of it all.

  Fantastic…

  Zayde was right. Why the hell was I doing this? Did I really intend to dismiss my dreams of making a real difference for a career in Tinseltown? Was I really going to go and work at Pierce Media and fill my days with product placement campaigns while there were real problems and real people suffering all around the world?

  Apparently so.

  Family obligation was a strong and persistent authority. It gnawed at me and it wore me down. I struggled with expectation and my debts of gratitude. What would my mom have wanted me to do? How could I neglect my father and take away the joy he said he felt when he thought about me running the business he built?

  All of those concerns fluttered in my mind like dozens upon dozens of moths clouding around a lamp on a sweltering summer evening. It was unbearable, so I just kept going along the path of least resistance.

  The elevator was sleek, new, modern, and nondescript, like everything else. It took me right up to the second-to-top floor. Rumor has it that the whole top floor was James—the big R in KR—Remley’s personal playground and that he had all sorts of bacchanals and lecherous affairs going on up there around the clock. I believed it.

  As the elevator doors opened over my new workplace, my breath caught in my throat.

  Of course.

  I wasn’t shocked or surprised. An army of mostly young women and a handful of overly-fashionable young men buzzed around the open space floor, back and forth in an endless parade. The few men wore brightly colored cardigans and every single woman was shrink-wrapped in the tightest of pencil skirts, the most cleavage-baring of blouses, and the most dangerously-high of designer heels.

  Welcome to L.A.

  In comparison, I looked like a Sherpa, or some nomad of the desert, draped loosely in folds of excess cloth like I was about to scale a mountain or traverse a great, dark, and cold plain.

  These women, well, girls really, looked like they were about to climb into bed. I guess that was the point—client acquisition and retention and all that.

  An all-too-friendly voice rang loud as I stepped out of the elevator.

  “Oh! You must be Duncan’s daughter. Dressed as an East Coast girl, through and through! I must say, I’m thinking that very thing, putting my two daughters through the system—why, it’s extremely edifying and instructive, all of that, that…”

  As she struggled to wrinkle her forehead in thought, I studied my new boss, Mrs. Kingsley, whom I’d last seen briefly behind her desk at my winter-break interview. She was an older woman, but didn’t show her age, and she wore her form-fitting work dress impossibly well, filling it out from one surgically adjusted curve to the other. Stuffed painfully into ridiculously high stilettos, she seemed the epitome of the quest for endless agelessness and desirability that really was the impetus and meaning of the whole town anyway.

  “It’s a good education, anyway,” I said to end Mrs. Kingsley’s consternation and search for words.

  “Exactly right!” she sang. “As I was saying, it’s an experience, no matter how outdated and really ancient. And that’s what I want them to have—my daughters that is—the experience of all that, I suppose, history and books and those musty things. It’s like Harry Potter!” she exclaimed suddenly.

  “That’s true,” I said. “Well, my dad had a lot of great things to say about this place, and I’m just looking forward to getting to work.”

  “Of course you are!” shouted Mrs. Kingsley. Duncan is a great man, a force in the business, and you, his daughter—oh, we’re so glad to have you here! I’m just sorry, you must understand, my partner, James, Remley—yes, he’s an older man—he minds his own business up there. Well, we started as an old firm, trans-Atlantic and all that. But you know: follow the business!”

  “Well, thank you for the welcome.” I hazarded an interruption to her musings.

  “Oh…yes. Right, I sometimes go off. Right away, I’ll put you with a girl, a rising star here, second year internship, good family and such.”—Mrs. Kingsley pressed a button
on the nearby intercom unit behind the receptionist’s desk—“Nicole! Skimper on over to the front. Nicole! Front desk. Now please!”

  In about half a second, there appeared an impossibly thin girl in impossibly tall heels. She was smiling in a way that indicated she was used to smiling all day long. Her highlighted blonde hair was held loosely in a bun not quite centered on the back of her head, and a few stray wisps were artfully arranged to give the effect of having woken up somehow to the perfect coif. I noted this was a common look in L.A.

  “Nicole,” Mrs. Kingsley shouted, “this is Madison Pierce—as you know Duncan Pierce’s daughter—and of course, you being so acquainted with things here, why don’t you take her under your wing so to speak.” Mrs. Kingsley spun her head around to face me without the slightest movement of the rest of her body, much like an owl. “And we’ll get you started with some of the campaigns Nicole is on, as well as helping out with the day to day…and such. Well”—she paused for a moment and considered something—“So glad to have you Madison!” she suddenly shouted. So glad!”

  And with that, Mrs. Kingsley spun deftly on her sharp and narrow shoes and somehow dashed with small snaps of her legs, clapping across the expanse of marble flooring.

  “Like, OMG, she’s so funny.”

  It was Nicole.

  “I remember when I started here last summer, my girlfriend from UCLA—that’s where I just finished my first year, lots of fun—she told me about this place and how—well, you know, I knew from all my friends about getting into publicity and how important it was to do your time at KR—but until Jenna told me about Mrs. Kingsley, I had no idea. This place is like a throwback to old times mixed with some interesting characters, for sure. But hey, they’re the best, right? But you know, I really—I mean, what I really want—is to be in the Beverly Hills office. Best parties. They really get the scoop over there, the real hookups and everything.”

  “And then, OMG, like James Remley, hold on,” she continued, catching her breath, “like I’ve heard he gets these girls sent up there and he’s perving it every day…I mean, I don’t think I’ve ever seen him.”

  “Yeah.” I tried to get a word in. “I’ve heard that too.”

  “Oh, but”—Nicole bubbled with excitement—“you’re like Zayde Knight’s sister! I can’t even literally breathe.” She fanned herself dramatically. “I mean, being like that close…I’d be…just…wow!”

  “Well, he’s not really my brother, just the son of some woman my dad married, so—“

  “Right, right,” Nicole pattered, waving her hand, “oh, but he’s sooo hot.”

  I rolled my eyes. “I mean, he’s a celebrity, that’s it.”

  Nicole smiled, her extremely white teeth practically reflecting the beams of her excitement. “Well, he’s gorgeous, and I’ll tell you how I know…”

  “Okay…”

  “Well, just a couple months ago, before Zayde left for the world tour, I mean, I’m sure you know about when I’m talking about.”

  “Not really. I’m just home for the summer. I go to school on the East Coast, so…”

  “Oh…right. Well, he actually called me, because I was kind of like the go-to before the tour. So, he was in L.A. and he went out with some friends, you know, getting stocked up on energy drinks before a night out, and he couldn’t find the BeastKing ones he wanted.”

  “BeastKing?”

  “Oh, you know, the ones with the, like, jacked up creature on the can. Everyone knows Zayde only drinks BeastKing. I mean, actually, he’s contractually obligated to only drink BeastKing. But anyway, he’s stuck out there in West Hollywood without his favorite energy drink, so I get the call, and I hear his voice, oh my god!”—Nicole twisted with delight—“His voice. Well, you know, it’s so sexy and everything. So I have Zayde Knight right there, on my phone, and he basically says, well, ‘get me this energy drink right away because that’s what I’m paying you for.’ So you know, I had to go and find the BeastKing distributors and, well, between me and you, they were supposed to send him a case, but things got all messed up, and basically I had to go and drive this box of energy drinks to Zayde’s apartment right away so the whole thing didn’t ruin his night out.”

  “That seems reasonable,” was all I could say.

  “Absolutely,” Nicole said, nodding. “But when I finally get the BeastKing crate—it was like this huge box, I mean heavy, and I’m in my heels—well, anyways, I drag it to the door and he lets me in through the video doorbell thing, and so I’m standing in the middle of his living room or something—Zayde Knight’s living room!”

  “Right.” I nodded.

  “Okay, so I put the crate down and I’m just standing there and the door opens and he comes out of the bedroom!”

  “Okay.”

  “And he’s all wet and his skin is wet, and like—oh my god!—he’s just so hot, standing there with his towel and his abs. He’s like tall and with muscles and…and…”

  “So what happened?” I interjected

  “Well, of course I put the box there and he says thanks and it’s like this awkward moment.”

  “Since he’s standing there almost naked?”

  “OMG, yes! And also, he’s kind of—well, between me and you, and I almost feel weird saying this given…well—he’s kind of liking what he’s seeing, you know, eyeing me and everything. I can tell these things. And then, unfortunately and suddenly, his stupid friends come out of nowhere.”

  “So that was the end of that.”

  “Yeah,” Nicole said, frowning. “Well, they come in staring at me and hitting on me and, well, Zayde turns back and shuts the door, so I leave.”

  “Well if it makes you feel any better, Zayde’s kind of an asshole,” I offered.

  “Anyway, that’s not really the point,” Nicole said. “Oh! But I’m really excited to be working with you and we’re going to have a really great time. In fact,” she declared, motioning to the open conference tables in the center of the office, “we can get started right now.”

  “On what?” I asked, kind of liking Nicole’s enthusiasm and open, albeit shallow, demeanor.

  “On the ZK rehabilitation campaign of course!” Nicole exclaimed, her sprightly exuberance dancing across her small, sharp features and wide-open brown eyes.

  “Oh great,” I said.

  Chapter 10

  Zayde

  There it is.

  “All you Zayde!”

  All me.

  The bar slammed back into the rack. My trainer, Kevin Gunson (not sure if his last name was real or not) high-fived me.

  “Nailed it! Rep-ing three wheels bro.”

  “Yeah…” I acknowledged the three plates on either side of the bar.

  “Let’s throw on a dime and see if you can max it.”

  I put another ten pounds on one side while Kevin got me some water.

  Shit, I look good today.

  I lifted my shirt so I could scope out my abs.

  Not bad. Hard work was paying off.

  “You’re fucking torching bro!” Kevin called out, throwing me a bottle of water. “You should get that shit on social media. Throw up a couple pics while you got that pump going.”

  “Not a bad idea.”

  I threw off my shirt and snapped a couple for the ladies. Swipe, swipe, post, and they were up.

  Probably go viral in a minute.

  “All right, Fabio,” Kevin shouted. “Shirt on. Let’s bang out some abs and finish with bis and tris. You got half-an-hour.”

  I swung up into the decline—highest elevation of course. “Who the hell’s Fabio?”

  The steaming water soothed my burning muscles. The showers at this gym were ridiculous. It was like some shit from the Orient or something. Marble floors and waterfalls of hot water. You could get a massage right there after you showered. But unfortunately, they were real professionals, so no happy endings. A lot of the old rich guys preferred the place in Korea Town.

  Kevin said I was better off wo
rking out in a gym with other people, even though I could afford to set up a private space. He said it was better motivation. Although most of the guys at this club were nothing so motivational.

  A lot of hot MILFS though…

  I got out of the shower and threw a heavy, soft Turkish towel around my waist.

  Ah, shit. That fucking meeting.

  I had to be at KR Group in twenty minutes. Worst part was, I had to head up towards the Valley, off Ventura no less. L.A. traffic was going to kill me. Why I couldn’t meet in the Beverly Hills office, who the hell knows…apparently something about that office with those people being assigned to my turn around image campaign. Well, Duncan said I better do it. Usually I’d demand they change the location, but I was trying to—again, according to Duncan—demonstrate my maturity and seriousness. Well, I’d be fifteen minutes late, at the very least.

  Their fault for being in Studio City.

  I put on my clothes and grabbed the keys to my tinted window Porsche. There was a slight chill in the 76-degree air, so I threw on a knitted beanie.

  Chapter 11

  Madison

  I entered the kitchen to get an espresso from the fancy-looking machine, and emerged with an endlessly chatty Nicole.

  “And so, OMG, this summer, in August, we’re planning a trip to Cabos, which is—that’s in Mexico, right?

  “Yup.”

  “Okay, so but, like I said, just let me know soon. We need to get everything planned. And of course—oh my god—I have to get in shape. I’m like a pig, look at me!”

  I eyed Nicole, who looked like a stick figure draped in trendy clothes. “You look great. You don’t have an ounce of spare fat on you.”

  “Oh, but here I go stuffing myself,” she said, raising her coffee.

  “Nicole, that’s an espresso,” I pointed out.

  “Yes, but I added sugar.”

  I shook my head. Still, Nicole was fun, bubbling with enthusiasm instead of the jaded disinterest of a lot of the rich L.A. girls I’d met. We’d hit it off, in some ways being opposites, but sharing at the very least an interest in being independent and having ambitions and career goals of our own. Though, of course I had no idea what mine were exactly.