Page 16 of Stay Here Tonight
Chapter 6
After a restless night’s sleep, Maxine was back in her favorite chair by her balcony, reading the morning paper and checking her emails on her phone.
Orange juice and a bagel with hummus was her usual go-to breakfast, but today she opted for two strips of extra crispy bacon fresh from her kitchen downstairs. Agnes brought both plate and glass on a small platter. She placed it on the far end of Maxine’s table.
“Half my stocks are up this morning.” Living on the west coast was both a blessing and a curse when it came to following stocks. “That could mean a nice bonus for you.”
Agnes snorted, but said nothing as she tucked the platter back beneath her arm.
Maxine glanced up from the business section of the newspaper and out her wide, sparkling windows. The hills leading toward the ocean was one of her favorite views in the house. “Has Ms. Kellerman been seen home safely? Or is she still here?”
Agnes stopped halfway across the room. “Fed and led away, ma’am. I gave her the customary going away greetings.”
“Good. It is a long way back into town.” Maxine wasn’t going to make any of her one-night stands call their own cab. Some of them drove their own cars up there, but rarely. They were more likely to have come up with Maxine or, in Lydia’s case, someone else. It was only right of her to procure transportation back into town.I’m cold, but I’m not heartless.“I take it she was in fair spirits?”
Having lived and worked with Agnes for so long meant that Maxine could read the subtext of many of those asinine looks. “She didn’t say much when I brought her breakfast and secured a taxi for her, ma’am, but she didn’t seem ill, no.” The pause between breaths was short lived. “Should I have the customary bouquet sent to her?”
“Make it all yellow roses. She was particularly annoyed when I asked her to leave last night.” Most women weren’t impressed when Maxine was done for the evening.I don’t actually sleep with them.The last woman she actually slept with was Penelope, and things could stay that way. “I’m afraid the white will also come off as too pure, if you know what I mean.”
Sighing, Agnes left her employer to her breakfast.
Maxine knew she wasn’t the warmest lover. Sex was functional. An escape. A way to distance herself from the crap she had been through. Of course, her partners often had other thoughts about sex. Maxine didn’t care. They had fun. They got off. A little role-playing was had, not that she had expected it.Perhaps that was my favorite part… up there with her beautiful body.Lydia was not homely, but she had a simple look that was sorely lacking in southern California. Maxine had made love to it for as long as she physically could. Then? Over. No sense stretching it out longer than it could be enjoyed.
Maxine was pragmatic about it after all this time. She had a system in place, and poor Agnes was in on it, whether it was in her employee contract or not. Better to have a third party impart such information, anyway. Some of the women Maxine bedded and subsequently kicked out of her room were rather embittered about the experience. That was another reason why so much security was on the premises even during down times.
Her phone buzzed with a message from Angela the PR manager.
“Took care of the press. Expect good things this coming week.”
Maxine fired off a terse but positive response. Two minutes later she had another message, but not from Angela.
It was from her lawyer. Herdivorcelawyer.
“We have a problem.”An attachment lit up the bottom of the screen.
Maxine hurried to tap it open, knowing she was would regret it. Sure enough, a Los Angeles tabloid ran a libelous headline supposedly sourced from Penelope.
“LOCAL SUPERMODEL CLAIMS EX-WIFE PHYSICALLY ABUSED HER DURING AND AFTER MARRIAGE.”
Maxine slammed her phone down. “What the fuck!” Her voice echoed in her large chambers with the tenor of her rage. “Agnes!”
While she waited for her maid, Maxine made the huge mistake of continuing to read.
“’It was terrifying. Every day I wondered if she would blow up again. Since being with my new man, I’ve never had to feel this way.’”
The text from her lawyer telling her tonotread the article went unnoticed. Maxine was too angry, too humiliated to deal with this shit early on a Saturday morning.
***
“Wow,” Joanie said, flattening the tabloid on the outdoor lunch table. “What a fucking mess, huh?”
Lydia sat across from her, sunglasses down and long hair completely unfazed by the cool breezes blowing by. They sat outside one of the trendier brunch spots in town, not that Lydia had the appetite for more food. Not only because she ate at Maxine’s place before heading home, either.Please. Like I had the appetite for that too.She still couldn’t get over it. After sex like that? Thrown out like a dirty cum rag? No wonder Maxine was so aloof and chronically single even though she hooked up with dozens of women.
No, Lydia had not expected to become girlfriends, or even secure a second “date.” Yet she had expected a little more common courtesy than that. What kind of woman treated her sexual partners as if they were nothing afterward? Maxine didn’t even tell her goodbye. Didn’t come see her in the morning. Lydia woke up in some sterile guest room to the maid standing over her and asking if she would like grapefruit or oranges with her breakfast.
Some women had a walk of shame after a late night out. Lydia had a shameful cab ride home at nine in the morning. The only reason she came out with Joanie for lunch was because her friend demanded it after security ousted her the night before.
She wanted details. She knew that Lydia had scored with someone of a certain stature, but she had yet to hear about the more unflattering details. Mostly because everyone at the restaurant whispered about the recent scandal rag straight from Hollywood. When Lydia glanced at the headline, she scoffed.
