Page 23 of The Last Kind of Kiss
I know it’s unprofessional to be thinking about something like that in the middle of a meeting—especially a meeting where we’re both getting reamed—but I can’t ignore the pencil skirt she’s wearing right now. How the hem is slowly riding up her thighs from the tightness, highlighting those long, tan legs that are defined in all the right places.
She’s torturing me with her absentminded teasing, and I watch as, little by little, more of her thigh is exposed and the mauve-colored material covering her crotch rucks into a thin line. She doesn’t fix it, and it’s not because she knows I’m ogling her. She’s too entrapped by the admonishment still happening.
Lila opens her mouth slightly, shame burdening her shoulders. “I’m so sor?—”
“You two do realize this makes Kitty’s Catwalk look like some classless institution, correct? People are going to start believing that we let our models do whatever—andwhomever—they want,” Ester spits, glaring pointedly at Lila. “Our models are noteasy. And frankly, Ms. Perkins, that show you put on last night was tasteless and downright humiliating.”
Excuse me? What the fuck did she just say to her? Lila didn’t do anything wrong. She’s noteasy. And just because she was dancing on some dude doesn’tmakeher easy. Ester’s saddling Lila with all the blame when in reality, she wouldn’t have acted out if it wasn’t for me being a colossal jackass. If I wasn’t a nonconfrontational person and bound by a contract, I’d respond with something along the lines ofI know you have some outdated preconceptions about women since you’ve been around since the Salem Witch Trials, but in modern day, slut shaming only makes the person doing the shaming look tasteless.
But I can’t say that, so I settle for something less hostile. “With all due respect, Ms. Sterling, it’s my fault Lila was in that position in the first place.”
Lila’s head immediately whips around, and she doesn’t have a look of gratitude on her face. No, she has a look of indignation gnarled into her features, the cerulean rings of her irises a shade alarmingly darker, like the deep, endless blue of the ocean’s midnight zone. She also kicks me under the table with the toe of her heel, and I wince.
Ester’s overplucked eyebrows pinch together. “Enlighten me, Mr. Brenner. How could you possibly be responsible for Ms. Perkins’ actions? She’s a grown woman. She needs to start taking responsibility for herself, especially being the new face of Kitty’s Catwalk.”
“I was antagonizing her, and then I made things worse by causing a scene.”
Ester clasps her hands behind her back, stalks around the front of the table, and knots her red lips into a frown. “Is this true, Ms. Perkins?”
Lila shrinks further into her seat, her throat working with a swallow as she nods. Each one of her heavily guarded defensescome tumbling down—a fissure of truth cracking a hole open in her lie—and her entire face flushes at my guilty admission.
I should’ve knocked Glifford’s teeth out and made him fuckingswallowthem. I don’t condone any man shamelessly groping a woman in public, but I especially don’t condone it when it’smywoman.
Fuck. I need to stop saying that. Get it through your head, dude! She’s. Not. Yours.
“I see. I admire you for coming clean, Mr. Brenner, but outbursts like that are unacceptable. Whatever emotional baggage you two are dealing with must be left at the door when you enter a public space, especially when news outlets are scavenging for the slightest scrap of drama,” Ester explains.
“I’m truly sorry,” Lila murmurs, as if the five syllables had to be hooked, lined, then yanked from the base of her throat.
She’s shrunken in on herself like a dog with its tail between its legs, and the tiny plot of lip she’s chosen to gnaw on darkens with a smear of blood.
“One more stunt like that and we won’t hesitate to replace you, Ms. Perkins,” Ester threatens.
“Got it.”
I knew how important that night was to Lila, and I had to go and pick a fight with her over every little jab. Even though she’s responsible for what she did with Glifford, I still harbor some of the blame. I can’t push every single one of her buttons and be surprised when she retaliates.
I know I’ll probably regret this, but I reach out and gently brush Lila’s hand, reaffirming our boundaries but toeing the line just a little to see how much of it gives. And she glances at me, fleetingly, with a softness in her eyes that I haven’t seen since we weretogethertogether. That girl I know is still in there, forced beneath the surface to make way for someone colder…someone who only exists because of my ill-doing. A hollow husk of the person she once was, stripped bare of the vulnerability she trusted in my hands. And I ruined her every time I kissed her, every time I told her how much I cared about her, every time I dangled a future in front of her and tore it away in the same breath.
But Lila’s softness does not flourish. It disintegrates, and it calls home a steel edge that I’ve cut myself on prior. There are three other people in the room right now, and none of them dare to cross the impasse between either of our stares.
Ester tsks disappointedly, pulling her associates aside to discuss with them. They leave me and Lila in stifling silence, back to evading the other’s line of sight, back to keeping a measurable distance between our bodies. It hurts me not to hold her hand—not to swallow up every lingering bit of pain still tormenting her.
After a one-minute debrief with her colleagues, Ester turns her attention back to us, clinically cold as she discloses the next plan of action. “I’d like to implement a new strategy to help boost the campaign. A foolproof strategy that will ensure something likethisdoesn’t happen again in the future.”
The last thing I’m thinking about is this stupid campaign. All I can think about is Lila. This girl’s crawled underneath my skin, burrowed into my bone marrow, and infected every inch of my brain with the melodic sound of her laughter, the irresistible way she smells, the big, beautiful smile of hers that makes her eyes crinkle. I can’t escape her. She’s going to kill me, and that’s the only way I want to go.
“To steer this…unwanted…publicity away from the rumor mill, it’s heavily advised that as our leading models for Menoulé’s campaign, you two come across as…intertwined,” Ester explains slowly.
Lila and I both stare at each other, and Ester doesn’t need to spell it out in big, bold letters to get her point across. Oh, thepoint is across alright. It’s across the goddamn ocean, speeding sixty miles straight toward me to capsize my entire world.
“You two need to be a couple,” she finishes with a deadpan look, completely oblivious to the internal panic hailing down around me.
Dear God. Does Ester realize what she’s just done? She’s thrown me into the lion’s den with only the clothes on my back, and news flash, I’m about as edible as a chicken wing slathered in barbecue sauce. No way will Lilaeveragree to something as farfetched as this—at least, not quietly.
“Excuse me?” Lila croaks, a bright pink blush puddling in her cheeks.
Ester slams her palms against the surface of the table, leaning threateningly over us, permeating the cramped boardroom with mothballs and Mucinex. “The public doesn’t want to see headlines about our lead models getting cozy with their significant others. The public wants to see headlines about our lead models getting cozy withone another. People need a connection to be invested in something—it’s human nature. And what better way to drive sales than with a blossoming workplace romance?”
