by Kailin Gow
Still, I find after the initial shock of seeing her, I'm more at ease than I thought I'd be. My mind hasn't gone completely blank. I wonder if sleeping with Jaymie – if it even was Jaymie – my lust is somehow abated, my wild thirst slaked.
“Where's Terrence?” I ask, looking around at her shiny new Beverly Hills house. It's a huge house – larger, even, than my Malibu coastal cottage, the one I brought Staci to when she was my Blue Girl – but somehow being there alone with her feels strangely intimate.
“Out working,” she says.
She takes me in her arms, gives me a hug. A friendly hug, I know, but that doesn't stop the current of wild electricity from passing between us.
The tension makes us both breathless.
God, I need to get out of here before I start to forget that she chose Terrence and start ravaging her on the carpet. I force myself to pull back from our hug, although I don't want to.
“Listen,” I say. “I need to talk to you about Jaymie.”
“Jaymie?” Staci looks confused. “What about her?”
“Is that her real name, first of all? How did you meet her? Where did she come from?”
“Xander, I...” she looks surprised. “I...called her up. Like I told you. I found her name and number among Rita's personal effects after her...” Sadness crosses her face. “After the funeral. I thought maybe she could help me figure out more about Rita's life, about what it was like for her before the end. We met for a few times, had coffee. I knew she was a PI like Rita. I really liked her. She's different from the lot of women I know. I mean, she has her demons. She doesn't like talking about her past, I know that much.”
“Did she tell you anything about her past?”
“No,” Staci admits. “But I figured it was something bad. Abuse or something like that. But I didn't think it was suspicious. A lot of people have their reasons for wanting to leave the past buried. You and I should know that better than anyone. I didn't even know about my father's family. But I trusted her, Xander. I don't think she's unreliable or sketchy. She's not like Roni Taylor Blue. She has....something in her that I really liked. I can see her fitting in in the Blue Room, making herself useful there, helping us with the investigation. She's more like them than I was, but removed enough from their world to stay loyal to us...”
I ponder this for a while.
“Is that helpful to you, Xander?”
“A little,” I say. “Thank you. You confirmed something else I suspected. And I wanted to see if maybe you knew more about her than I did. And...”
“And? What else could I know?” Staci asks.
“And...I wanted to see you,” I admit. “We haven't seen each other since...” I can't bear to say the words out loud. “I know you're spoken for, now, Staci, but still every time I see you – my feelings haven't gone away. I can't just stop thinking about you just because you're with him now.”
Staci sighs heavily. “I know,” she says softly, “and believe me, Xander, it was the hardest decision I've ever had to make. If there was a way I could have kept both of you in my life that way, I would have, but...” Her voice trails off.
“Please,” I say. I can't take any more of this. I go to the door. I need to get out of her as quickly as possible. “Don't try to explain. I understand. You made your choice I just want you to be happy, that's all. If you're happy, I'm happy.” It's not entirely true, but what else am I supposed to say?
“Thank you,” Staci is choking back tears. “I'll call you if I learn of anything, okay? I'm still in touch with the investigation – Jaymie's been reporting back to me, since I'm technically the one paying her salary. So I'll let you know if I find out anything.”
“That's my Staci,” I grin.
But I feel wistful inside.
After I leave, I stop to wonder. Why is it that I feel like Staci is hiding something from me? I've never felt that way about her before – but for the first time, I start to wonder. How could Staci really just trust Jaymie like that – even knowing there was something sketchy about her background? Was there something else she'd employed Jaymie for other than helping me? Why was Jaymie reporting to her, not me, anyway?
I sigh. I love Staci more than the world, but ever since she got involved in that whole Tannenbaum world I've noticed her changing. She's not the naïve girl I once knew. She's smart, shrewd, a big player – I hate to admit it, but she reminds me a little of her grandmother, Gloria Tannenbaum.
I shudder at the thought. If Staci ever becomes like Gloria, I think, all the money in the world wouldn't make it worth it.
I can't think of a worse fate for the woman I love.
Chapter 6
Staci
I wait after Xander leaves to take a breath. Having him here with me, in the same room, so close to me, so close I can feel his breath on my face, so close I can smell his musky cologne, so close I can feel the heat emanating from him, is a very special and very specific kind of torture – the kind that is so exquisite you feel yourself coming back for more. I know that it's wrong for me to feel this way, still, after everything that's happened, after everything I've been through to choose one man from the two that stole my heart, but I can't help it. My mind may have made a decision; my heart may have followed that same decision, but my body – oh, my body! – is one part of me I can't control. I'm still wildly, riotously, overwhelmingly attracted to Xander Blue, and there's not a damn thing I can do about it.
He knows it, too. He knows how painful it is for me. And sensing how much he still wants me doesn't make it any less painful, either. Even when we're talking about something totally different – talking about that girl Jaymie and the history of the Blue Room and the secrets we're uncovering together – it still sometimes, always, invariably feels like we're talking about us. Like we're talking about that crackling electric tension in the air between us, the tension that makes my toes curl at the memory of how Xander made me feel.
I'm happy with Terrence – there's no denying that. I'm happy with him in all the ways that count – and that includes the sexual. But he is a very different sort of lover from Terrence. Terrence is all passion, all red-blooded excitement, all heat that the two of us create as we both get carried away, lost in the insanity of our desires. Xander was older, more experienced, more controlled: a gentleman and a scholar, an artist who knew how to play my body like a violin while remaining entirely, effortlessly, unscathed. And I loved them both, in very different ways. I desired them both. If I could have gone on sleeping with both of them for the rest of my days I would have been very sorely tempted to do it. Physically, it was what I wanted. But deep down I knew it wouldn't have worked. There were feelings involved in both men, and while I could certainly sleep with both of them, I couldn't have a relationship with both of them – neither of them was the type that would be willing to share – and ultimately I realized I wanted a relationship more than I wanted the pure, orgasmic satisfaction of having both of these men in my bed.
But that doesn't make it any easier. I still hunger for Xander Blue. I still need to sit down at my desk and just breathe after seeing him, the mental equivalent of a cold shower. I need to close my eyes and practice some of the tricks Rita used to teach me in yoga class: meditation and the like. But unfortunately the art of meditation seems like it's all but lost on me. What can I say – meditation was clearly not made for women torn between two equally eligible and equally gorgeous and well-endowed young men? When I close my eyes and breathe and try to make my mind go black the way Rita taught me, all that happens is that images of me and Xander, locked in flagrante delicto, flash before my brain, driving me wild, driving me gorgeously crazy. I start to see him: his chiseled abs, his perfect six-back, his long lean muscles and his strapping arms that used to pin me to the bed with such powerful devotion, his flashing Blue eyes – his familial inheritance that meant more to me than any of his money – the way he used to graze his fingers up and down my body, the way he used to so delicately use his tongue, flicking at t
he honey between my legs...
Down, girl, I tell myself.
I've made my choice, after all. I've committed to Terrence: and that means body, heart, and soul. No cheating – even of the totally fantasized kind. I can't marry Terrence if I'm still running through the Staci and Xander Greatest Hits Album in my head. First of all, because it's not fair to Terrence, and secondly, because it's not fair to me. Why fan the flames of a desire I can never realize again? Why make myself crazy over something I've already decided is a done deal?
I don't regret my decision in any other way. Terrence and I are happy together in a way that I don't think Xander and I ever could have been. What Xander and I had was a beautiful, romantic fantasy: the kind of thing erotic novels are written about. But as a basis for a relationship? Sure, Xander wanted to spoil me, buy me things, take me to galas, dress me, get me jewels and champagne and strawberries and all the things that girls are supposed to like. And that was wonderful – for a time. But forever? Sometimes a girl just wants to kick back on her sofa and veg out on Netflix and not have to be a perfect courtesan princess all the time. Especially a girl who's used to being a perfect courtesan princess for her job.
And that's what Terrence and I have. Sometimes we go out to dinner at the fanciest restaurants in LA, with champagne and oysters and chocolate soufflé – I always pay, despite Terrence's protestations; I tell Terrence that after the Blue Room, I enjoy being the one to pay for a handsome man's company for a change, and that if anything, I'm glad to use the Tannenbaum family fortune to level the gender playing field – but sometimes, we spent $10.99 each on the Special Buffet Delivery Special from Tokyo Ribs' Fusion Asian BBQ Cafe – and watch ten episodes in a row of some shitty TV show while eating our food straight from the container. With Terrence, I don't feel like I have to put on an act, to convince him that I'm the beautiful Blue Girl all the time. I can just be me – and being me means being human. I won't say that Xander didn't understand that – I'm sure he would have understood it, one day. But the way we started, the way we lied to each other – it would have been so difficult to see one another as people, not embodiment of ideas.
I sigh as I clear through my desk. I'm happy – can't I just move forward without always questioning my decisions, without always wondering what if, what if?
I turn on the laptop. I look at the files.
The laptop's not mine. I mean, it is now – but it wasn't always. Once, this laptop belonged to my grandmother – the late Gloria Tannenbaum – and contained all the information she used as leverage over some of the most powerful men in the world. I'd found the laptop in my grandmother's vault at the bank shortly after learning the truth about my identity, as I started to put the pieces together to sort out who I was and what being a Tannenbaum really meant. A full-time job, as I've discovered. My own father never looked into Gloria Tannenbaum's belongings when she passed away. He was too busy searching for his long-lost daughter – me – to pay any attention to his past. His mind was on the future. But now that I've been found – the long-lost heiress to the Tannenbaum fortune – it's time for me to figure out what, exactly, I'm the heiress of .
Being a Tannenbaum, I learn, is no easy business. It means I'm part of the oldest family there is – that my blood is the bluest this side of the Atlantic. You'd think I'd be happy about this: the wealth, the power. But instead I find the responsibility to be overwhelming. I didn't grow up with money or power or blue blue or social standing. I don't know what to do with any of it. Donate it all to charity? Try to run a business? Just go move to a little cheap island somewhere and live on the beach and forget that I'm a Tannenbaum at all? Terrence doesn't understand. He's gotten so used to being a Blue – even if he didn't grow up as one – that he doesn't get that it's a really big deal to realize how rich you are.
I've been looking through the files. Trying to understand what exactly the connection is between the Blues and the Tannenbaums. There's a password-locked folder called The Blue Room that's been tantalizing me since I first opened the computer. I wish I knew – why was Gloria so interested in the first place in the Blue Room? What did the Tannenbaums have over the Blues? Why was Xander so indebted to her in the first place? And why would someone of Gloria's wealth and social standing be interested in a glorified brothel?
I search through file after file, deed after deed, contract after contract, mergers and acquisitions, until my head starts to spin with the effort of my search. I may have taken a few econ classes in community college – but I'm in no position to understand half of these documents. Every piece of information just seems to lead me further and further down the insanity of this rabbit hole. What is the correlation between the Blues and the Tannenbaums? Does one even exist – or am I just making it up, looking for a connection where none exists? I spy a document about the Tannenbaums acquiring a huge chunk of land in Texas – but why? What are they doing – just investing? Or is something more insidious afoot?
When will this mystery come to an end?
According to my files, Gloria's final days were spent making enormous purchases of land and property – in Europe, and all over the world. Paris, London, Vienna, Prague – what was my grandmother doing there? Why is there so much about her – and my past – I don't know, will never know?
I'm almost through one folder when I hear a knock at the door?
“Terrence?” I say, automatically, although I know he has the key.
I go to the peephole and look through. It's Jaymie, standing in front of the door.
I open the door in surprise.
“Jayme?” I say. “What are you doing here? Aren't you supposed to be at the Hotel?”
“I need to talk to you in person,” says Jaymie. “I got a lead right away.
Despite my exhaustion, her words wake me up like a shot of caffeine.
“I think I might have found a reason why your late grandmamma wanted an in into the Blue Room.”
Chapter 7
Jaymie doesn't say anything at first. She just stands there in the doorway – an inscrutable expression on her face. Jaymie has always been a woman of mystery, I think – even I don't know much about her – but I trust her. I trust that her discoveries are the right ones.
“Come on,” I say. “You'd better come inside.”
I sit her down on the couch – the gorgeous snow-white couch I bought when I first moved into this new apartment – and pour us both a drink.
“So,” I say. “What's the story?”
“Well,” Jaymie takes a deep breath. “The thing is, Staci…”
But she doesn't have time to finish. No sooner does she open her mouth to speak than we both hear the sound of the key in the latch.
“Good evening, ladies!” It's Terrence, sauntering in with that raffish smile on his face – the arrogant but self-assured wink that made me melt the first time I ever saw him, and makes me melt even now. He strolls into the living room and makes his way over to me, kissing me lightly on the lips. Then he turns round on his heel, acknowledging Jaymie sitting beside me. “I'll pretend I didn't see you here instead of on the clock at the Blue Room,” he says, “how about that?” He gives a little laugh and tosses back his head. “Come to think of it, Jaymie – what exactly are you doing here, anyway?”
Jaymie looks worried – she looks down, avoiding Terrence's gaze. I wonder why. What about Terrence is making her uncomfortable? I decide to cut off any awkwardness. I stand up to face Terrence. “She's here to meet with me, silly,” I explain to Terrence. “I hired her, remember? So I called her over here to give me an update.”
“Well, I know that, Stace,” Terrence rolls his eyes. “But I mean why is she here telling you this, instead of us meeting her at the Blue Room. After all, if she's found out any intel about my company, I'd like to hear it too. I'm assuming you've found something – that's why you've come to our home?” He turns to Jaymie.
Our home. It feels so strange hearing Terrence say the words out loud. One of my conditions for agreeing to m
arry Terrence was that he had to move out of the Blue Room. I trusted him to be faithful to me – it wasn't that – but I still felt weird about having my fiancé live in a brothel. Call me conservative, but it was a little much for me to think about spending the night back with him at the Blue Room in the same place where I used to be a working girl. I wanted to get as far away from the Blue Room as possible after my experiences there.
Terrence takes off his coat, placing it casually over my chair. Like he's home. Making a mess – I smile, a little. It's nice to see this place a little messy. It makes it all feel lived-in. Real.
I shut down the laptop I was on. I trust Terrence absolutely, but I don't want to involve him in my Tannenbaum research. This is something that Jaymie and I need to handle on our own – the Blues as a family have been too involved in my business as it is.
“Have you eaten yet?” I ask Jaymie, taking her arm and leading her over to our dining room table. “I was just about to heat up some leftover curry from last night --- or we could order a pizza?”
“A billionaire and you still heat up your leftovers in the microwave?” Jaymie is looking at me incredulously.
“I did tell her...” Terrence sighs. “But she won't listen.”
“It's true,” I admit. “I'm not used to having food go to waste growing up the way I did – it never leaves you. All the money in the world won't get rid of the terrified feeling you might not have enough for tomorrow. Besides, I hate wasting things.”
Terrence goes to check on the amount of curry we have in the refrigerator while I pour another round of drinks for all three of us.
“No curry,” says Terrence, “but we have the fixings for casserole. I hear it's very big among the finer hotels in Geneva.” He laughs. “Staci's helping me get in touch with my populist side. Shall I start whipping something up?”