Page 3 of Desire

Luckily, she didn’t have to wonder what she was going to do next because Istvahn strode in. He was Colleen’s head of security and Tee’s husband. He was this big Russian dude who could move like the wind and looked like Dolph Lundgren’s evil twin from the Rocky movies.

“Get out,” he snapped.

Emma flinched, even if he hadn’t been talking to her. Kiki jumped a foot. Then she rallied and rounded on Istvahn. She started shaking her fist at him. “I’m warning you, you big goon. If you put a hand—”

Istvahn put a hand.

He grabbed her fist, whirled it around her back, and shoved her out of the office.

“Help!” Kiki called out over her shoulder at Emma. “I’m being assaulted!”

Emma gave her the finger.

It wasn’t much. But it was something. Working here was doing a lot for Emma in helping to find the confidence to stop being such a timid little mouse. It helped that Dante was close by. He was her safe place. She knew she could always count on him to be her white knight. If Istvahn hadn’t shown up, Emma might have called Dante.

Even though she had been here for a few months, she and Dante hadn’t had much chance to talk. Mostly Dante worked the night shift in Club Inferno, while Emma worked days at Couture. While he did have office hours for his day job as a therapist at Couture, Colleen had said that was mostly for show. She checked the schedule. He was probably in by now. Emma wondered if he would have come thundering in to her rescue like he used to do when she was a kid.

About a half hour later, Tee and Colleen came out of her office. Tee smiled at Emma and put Ezina in her Pack n’ Play. Tee was Colleen’s right hand, both in and out of the office, and her pregnancy with her second child wasn’t slowing her down one bit, even if everyone thought Tee should be taking it easy.

“I’m...I’m sorry about Kiki,” Emma said, feeling miserable.

“It’s fine,” Colleen said. “She’s just pissed because Anya and I went with another model for the fall line.”

Emma nodded, hoping that Colleen wasn’t just being nice.

“We’re going out for lunch,” Tee said, rubbing her belly. “Istvahn put Kiki in time out, so you don’t have to worry about her for the rest of the week.”

“Thanks.”

“If you can, see if you can get Ezina to nap a bit?” Tee asked.

“Of course.” Emma smiled at the toddler and thought that there wasn’t a chance in hell that was going to happen, but she’d give it her best shot.

Two hours later, Ezina was still raring to go when Colleen and Tee came back. Emma pretended to be working on next week’s schedule, but instead she was shamelessly eavesdropping on Tee and Colleen’s conversation. They were planning two masked balls for Halloween at the end of the month, one for Couture and one for Club Inferno.

“I think it needs to be on different weekends,” Tee said, pacing around the office area.

“Where’s your sense of adventure?” Colleen asked. She took Ezina out of her Pack n’ Play and sat down on the floor to build a tower of blocks with her.

It was Ezina’s favorite thing to do. Technically, Emma should volunteer to get on the floor with the two-year-old, but both Colleen and Tee spent as much time as they could with the baby, so Emma was usually just a backup when things got hectic.

“How are you going to keep everyone in their respective areas when they’ll all be wearing masks?” Tee asked.

“That’s Istvahn and his team’s problem.” Colleen waved a hand dismissively.

“We could AirTag the Couture peeps so they set off a silent alarm if they get too close to the hidden entrances of Club Inferno,” Tee suggested.

“Good idea.” Colleen made a note of it in her phone.

“Having the Couture Halloween ball the weekend before Halloween, and the Club Inferno Halloween Hell bash on Halloween, though, would make things much easier on Istvahn’s team. Plus, it would allow our guests who have dual memberships to attend both parties.”

“They won’t want to. Couture would be too lame for them.”

“Fine. We’ll have it on the same night. Emma, you’re in charge of the Couture party. Make it not lame. I’ll handle Club Inferno’s,” Tee said.

Emma’s breath hitched. She loved to plan parties. But she really wanted to attend the Club Inferno one. As soon as she heard that they were planning on a masked event, she knew what she was going to do. She was going to make sure no one recognized her face and then she was going to see if Dante wanted to play. It would be one way that she could stop being such a chicken shit and pretend to be someone braver than she was, someone daring and different. Someone a man like Dante would crave. Emma could pretend to be what she wanted to be most: confident. Fake it until you make it, right? But if she was in charge of the Couture party and they were on the same night, she’d be working and unable to attend.

“That’s a lot of responsibility,” Emma hedged. Normally, she would have jumped at the chance to prove herself, especially if she could remain in the background and not be the center of attention. But this could be her only shot to fulfill her teenage fantasy without embarrassing herself or Dante. But there was no way she’d be able to sneak out of her own party to have a hedonistic session in the dungeons.

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