All That He Loves (Volume 2 The Billionaires Seduction)

by Thorne, Olivia

  I launched into my description of Miranda and the Templetons, and for awhile, my mind stayed off my heartbreak. We ended up talking until 4 AM, when I finally fell asleep on the couch.

  2

  In the few furtive hours of sleep I got, I dreamt about him constantly. I couldn’t even get away from the pain in my dreams.

  I awoke feeling heartbroken and empty. Added to that, I was exhausted from lack of sleep, and uncomfortable from passing out on the couch.

  But worst of all was the heartbreak.

  Anh came out of her bedroom in a stupor, but she made us pancakes and we talked some more.

  The day passed in a long, slow crawl. We watched some bad movies on cable, then talked some more, then ordered delivery for dinner.

  Around 3 o’clock, someone knocked on our door. “Is Lily Ross in there?”

  “NO, GO AWAY!” Anh yelled at the top of her lungs.

  “This is Adrienne Thomas with Channel Five News – ”

  “I’M CALLING THE COPS AGAIN IF YOU DON’T GO AWAY!” Anh screamed.

  When she saw my astonished look, Anh shrugged. “They do that sometimes. Keep your voice down so they can’t hear you. If they know you’re in here for sure, they’ll never stop.”

  I stared at her, open-eyed. “You called the cops?”

  “Just once. After that they cut it out… mostly.”

  “Anh, I’m so sorry,” I whispered.

  “Yeaaah, you so owe me,” she said with a sideways look.

  3

  More than anything, I wanted him to call.

  He didn’t on Sunday, though.

  Or Monday.

  Or Tuesday.

  Or Wednesday.

  Day stretched into day with no way to discern between them, except that Anh left for work on Mondays through Fridays. Then it was just me, alone, imprisoned like before – but with Ramen noodles instead of filet mignon, just like Anh had said. And I didn’t even have a view, because if I opened the blinds, they would know I was here and descend like vultures.

  So it was me, in a dark apartment, watching TV, eating ice cream, being depressed, bursting into tears without warning, looking at the phone every ten minutes, wondering when he would call.

  He didn’t.

  I played our last few times together over and over again in my head, pondering what I had done wrong, trying to figure out how I could have done it differently, wondering if I had made a terrible, terrible mistake, paranoid that I had trusted Sebastian and he had betrayed me.

  It felt like I was slowly going insane.

  I could go through a long litany of all the horrible boring movies I watched, all the gallons of ice cream I ate, all the staring at the wall in depression, and all the times I thought about calling and begging him to take me back.

  In the end, though, I guess it was my stubborn pride that refused to let me pick up the phone.

  That, and my growing certainty that I had ruined everything beyond repair.

  I scoured the internet for stories about what Connor was doing now (especially if he had been seen with any other women), but there was nothing. Oh, there were news stories, alright, and plenty of them mentioned me. But mostly they focused on the solar plan in Nevada and how it was coming along. There were announcements of political protests against the politicians involved, and counter-protests, and op-ed pieces on both sides of the aisle.

  But nothing on Connor’s personal life.

  I kept looking.

  I had a lot of time on my hands.

  4

  Days passed, then weeks passed, and the pain dulled a bit. Not much, but enough that I was only looking at the phone every hour instead of every ten minutes.

  Anh had to take care of the groceries and shopping. She even had to pick up my Nuvaring birth control prescription for me.

  I’m sure the paparazzi would have loved getting pictures of that.

  The vans gradually dwindled out front. I thought they might finally be gone, and I went out for a walk one morning through the backdoor where Johnny had dropped me off.

  Bad idea.

  Three men saw me and ran around the corner, snapping pictures and filming video. One of them thrust a mic in my face and yelled questions like, “Lily Ross, did you extort Connor Templeton for the $50,000? Is it true that you and Miranda Lockwood are lesbian lovers? Is it true that Lifetime is buying the rights to your story?”

  I ran back inside the apartment building, screaming at them to leave me alone. For the next thirty minutes, people pounded on my door until I called the police. The cops came and cleared the assholes out, but after that, I was terrified to go outside.

  However, over the next few days my stir-craziness overwhelmed my fear, and I began to badger Anh for help.

  “I can’t take you anywhere, they’ll do that thing where they made Princess Diana’s car crash,” Anh said.

  She was actually serious when she said that.

  “I’m not nearly that big a story. Especially not now. My fifteen minutes are almost up.”

  “You’re going to have to wear a burka so they won’t recognize you,” she protested. “And then you’re going to look weird because you’re wearing a burka.”

  I finally wore her down, and convinced her to smuggle me out on the backseat floor of her car. That actually worked; she’d been coming and going for so long that they ignored her. She took me on hikes in Runyon Canyon or Griffith Park for as long as we could stand. With my hair pulled up under a baseball cap and a pair of sunglasses on, I looked like any other LA wannabe hiking the dusty trails, trying to work off extra pounds for my next audition. No one ever noticed who I was, and I began to feel slightly human again.

  But the pain never went away. It lessened, slightly, but never, ever went away.

  5

  The good news was that I didn’t have to worry about rent and food. I gave Anh my share of the rent and utilities and groceries, and paid her back all the small loans I owed her from the previous months.

  As I watched the amount in my checkbook slowly dwindle, though, I began to think of the future. $50,000 (now $47,329) was a huge sum of money for me, but it wasn’t going to last forever. I had to think about what I was going to do.

  A regular job was pretty much out of the question. I figured all my bridges in the corporate world had been burned to cinders by the photos, at least for a year or more. On the other hand, I probably could have gotten a few interviews just because people were curious and wanted to meet somebody famous (no matter how bizarre it was to think of myself as ‘famous’).

  Except I really didn’t want to work for anybody who wanted to meet me because I’d been naked on national news.

  Playboy offered me a photo spread in a phone message – for $100,000. Which they also leaked to the media. Anh playfully (and not at all seriously) kept urging me to take it.

  “But Lily, you’ve already shown ‘em – you might as well get paid for showing ‘em. And they probably won’t even blur them out this time! And a hundred grand! Think of it like Vegas, you get to double your money! Tell them I’ll do it for ninety!”

  I have to admit, I was just a little bit tempted. I mean, $100,000 is $100,000. I could live off that for years.

  But after about five seconds, I came to my senses. More than anything, I never wanted Connor to see me as that woman – somebody who turned our time together into a sordid money-making proposition.

  Speaking of Connor, I kept coming back to what he had said during our car trip back from the desert:

  What if you ran a consulting firm where you went in and interviewed the low-level employees about what worked and what didn’t? Basically, you culled all the problems and all the suggestions from the people on the front lines? The good people. That would be half your work, separating the wheat from the chaff. But you’re excellent at grasping large-scale issues. You synthesize information rapidly. And you have six months of high-level Exec Comp experience. You basically did all the heavy lifting for an Executive VP.
What if you could sell yourself as a consultant for smaller companies, with, say, more than 50 employees but fewer than 500? You go in, find out the problems… and then present the issues to management with suggestions, also pulled from the best employees. You’d basically be crowdsourcing the problems and solutions, but from the group of people who know the system inside and out.

  It was an awesome idea… for somebody else. For me it was ridiculous. What did I know about running a business like that? Nothing. Who would hire me? Nobody. What connections did I have to get started? None.

  But I kept returning to the idea like a loose tooth, absentmindedly poking at it, probing it, working out little issues about how I would do this or that. A fantasy to keep my mind off my pain.

  And then I got the phone call.

  6

  When the phone rang, I checked it as I always did.

  I had been disappointed five hundred other times.

  But this number looked familiar.

  It wasn’t Connor’s cell, though, because I had stored his name – and his name wasn’t appearing. Not only that, but it was a 212 number – New York City.

  With trepidation and hope, I answered. “Hello?”

  A very familiar, very gay voice crooned, “Welllll, aren’t we brave answering our phone – or have the reporters stopped calling yet? Don’t bother lying, I know they haven’t. Or are you going to surprise me with your foresight and preparedness and tell me you programmed my number into your phone?”

  I smiled. Both happiness and a pang of sorrow nudged my heart. “Hi, Sebastian.”

  “Which is it, brave or prepared?”

  “I forgot to put your number in, but it looked vaguely familiar. So, uh – ‘brave,’ I guess.”

  “Mmm, you know by ‘brave,’ I meant ‘stupid,’ right?”

  “I’ll make sure to program it in so I can avoid you next time you call,” I said with mock sweetness.

  “Even stupider. You should ALWAYS take MY calls, darling. Just wanted to check up on you, hadn’t heard a peep.”

  “I’m fine.”

  “Good, though I don’t believe you. Johnny told me to say hello, too – he knew I’d be calling, but he’s off doing bodyguard things.”

  Hope springs eternal. “Did… Connor ask you to call?”

  “No, I took the initiative myself.”

  “Oh…”

  “Well, it’s nice to talk to YOU, too.”

  I smiled. “It is nice to hear your voice.”

  “I know what your next question is, spoken or not, and no, he’s not doing well.”

  My eyes opened wide. “What?! What’s wrong?”

  “DUH. I’ll give you one guess.”

  “Really?” I asked, my voice trembling. “But – he hasn’t called – ”

  “No, of course he hasn’t, he’s Connor. I’ve told him he should call you, but he prefers to remain a drunken hot mess when he’s not working himself to death.”

  It’s hard to describe the combination of emotions I felt: joy that I hadn’t been forgotten, and in fact was being mooned over; sadness that Connor was hurting; irritation that he obviously still cared, but not enough to call; and schadenfreude – the German word for happiness at others’ misfortune. In this case, the fact that Connor was miserable.

  I rebuked myself for the schadenfreude and came back to the present.

  “So what should I do?”

  “NOT call him, that’s for certain.”

  “But – if he’s never going to call me – ”

  “Lily, leave the strategic planning to the professionals. Don’t worry, if an opportunity arises, you’ll be the first to hear. Don’t be grabby. Now, the more important thing at the moment is to get your shit together. Have you had enough Ben & Jerry’s and crying during sappy movies?”

  “I like Haagen Dazs,” I informed him.

  “Oh, excusez moi, Uptown Girl.”

  “And no, I – I haven’t been doing that,” I protested lamely, then added, “…in awhile…”

  “Mm. Any thought as to what you’re going to do with your life?”

  “You sound like my father when I was in college.”

  “Good, I’ll sound like him again: any thought as to what you’re going to do with your life?”

  “No, I’ve been eating too much Haagen Dazs and crying over sappy movies,” I said sarcastically.

  “I thought as much.”

  I had forgotten how annoying Sebastian could be. Memory fades even over a short period of time.

  “Actually,” I said, spurred on by his snarky superciliousness, “I have been thinking about something,” and I told him all about Connor’s business advice.

  “Hmmm… that could actually work really well for you…”

  “Yeah, well, it’s just a pipe dream. I don’t know anything about running a business.”

  “For God’s sake, Lily, it would only be YOU starting out. It’s not like you’d be in charge of hundreds of people. Or even ONE other person.”

  “Yeah, but I’m sure you have to have business licenses, and – I don’t know, other stuff – ”

  “You’ll also need to form a corporation or an LLC in California, and you probably need to get bonded. I’ll have our legal department handle it for you.”

  I started to feel the first bit of panic that, hey, maybe Sebastian was actually serious. So of course I began to backpedal and try to talk him out of it.

  “What?! You can’t do that – ”

  “Of course I can. They’re just sitting around on their asses suing somebody, it’ll be a nice change of pace for them.”

  “No – isn’t that – like, an abuse of power or something?”

  “If we were a democracy, maybe, or even a publicly held corporation. But we’re not. L’etat, c’ést Connor, and when Connor’s not around, l’état, c’est MOI.”

  “This is crazy. Nobody in their right mind would ever hire me – ”

  “You don’t have to tell ME that.”

  “Thaaaaaanks.”

  “But if you do an amazing job on the first one, you won’t have to worry about more clients.”

  “‘The first one’? Who’s going to be the first one? ‘Oh, hi, you don’t know me, but maybe you’ve seen my naked pictures on the evening news – would you like to hire me as a consultant?’”

  “It’s an interesting pitch, but I would advise you not to use it, you’ll attract the wrong kind of clientele. Speaking of which, you’re turning down the Playboy offer, right?”

  “How do you know about that?!”

  There was an exasperated sound on the other end of the line. “I watch the news, you know.”

  “Oh, yeah…”

  “I repeat: you’re turning down the Playboy offer, yes?”

  “YES, of course!”

  “Good, because I would consider that to be covered under the NDA you signed.”

  My temper was beginning to boil. “Oh, I’m so glad you – ”

  “I have another call I have to take,” Sebastian interrupted. “Just think of what you want as a business name – Ross and Associates comes to mind, or Ross Consulting, or Crowdsourcing Inc., but that’s just me – talk to you soon.”

  And then the line went dead.

  “Sebastian?” I asked, a little fearfully. “…Sebastian?!”

  My heart thumped nervously in my chest.

  He wasn’t actually taking this whole business thing seriously, was he?

  7

  Turns out he was.

  He called again that afternoon.

  “So, did you think of a name for your consulting business?”

  “Sebastian, this is really nice of you, but – ”

  “No, actually it’s not, this is just what I do. Did you come up with a name yet?”

  “No, not yet.”

  “Apparently what YOU do is dither and procrastinate. Think of something in the next ten seconds. Go.”

  “Why?” I asked, irritated. “What does it matter?”


  “Legal needs the name so they can file with the state and get everything in motion. We’ll be expediting it, but it will probably still take a week or two – ”

  “You’re serious,” I realized, and my heart constricted in fear.

  “Of course I’m serious. Well, what’s the name?”

  “Sebastian, I can’t do this – ”

  “You COULD, it would just take you months to figure it all out and get the paperwork in, IF you actually stayed the course, which I doubt you would, so it makes more sense for our legal department to do it. They’re going to create an S corporation for you, so you’ll need bookkeeping and tax preparation services – don’t worry, we’ll set that up, too. Just keep track of any expenditures and receipts. We’ll get you a business bank account and credit card in the company name, which is what I need right now, soooo…”

  “Why are you doing this?!”

  Sebastian sighed. “Connor asked me to.”

  My heart, which only a moment before had felt like it was going to be crushed by fear, expanded three sizes. “What?!”

  “He told me to do whatever it takes to make sure you’re okay.”

  Tears sprang to my eyes. “Did he – did he ask about me?”

  “No.”

  “…oh.”

  But he was still looking out for me. That was something, wasn’t it?

  “Tell him thank you for me, Sebastian, but… I can’t do this…”

  “He also told me to say something to you when you started backing out, just like you’re doing now.”

  I sucked in my breath.

  “…what?”

  “Fake it till you make it.”

  I smiled. Yeah, that was Connor, alright.

  “You want my advice, Lily?”

  “About the name?” I asked sardonically.

  “No, I already GAVE you that earlier. You want him back? Get your life together first. Build something for yourself. It doesn’t have to be this – it could be painting lessons if you always wanted to be an artist, or join a non-profit to help underprivileged kids, or visit another country to learn a different language – but you should do SOMETHING. Because men like Connor tend to respect a woman who makes her way in the world, rather than sitting around, watching sappy movies, and crying into their Haagen Dazs.”