Desperate and Gorgeous Bk. 01 Ch. 02

Chapter Two

"This isn't half bad," Leah said between bites of pizza. We were in the kitchen, sitting on the bar stools at the counter, open pizza boxes on the counter. The intensity from earlier had faded and Leah looked well-put-together again. Her wedges scattered on the floor and her bare feet were the only signs anything had happened between us. I'm sure I looked like a mess.

"Sabatino's is the best in town," I answered and lifted another slice from the box.

At some point in my life I realized that eating somehow became intertwined with big life events. Cake at birthday parties, family members bringing food over to relatives who just had a child, catered food at weddings, the list goes on. Life doesn't ever go back to what it was before, but food helps remind us that it does go on. Leah was on her second slice of pepperoni when she asked, "So how does this work?"

"Which part?"

"The part where we had sex and you agreed to keep me and my sister out of jail," she said like she was explaining a simple concept to an annoying child.

Right. That. "If I remember correctly, you made an offer, and I accepted," I answered carefully, taking a bite of pizza.

Leah blushed and looked away. "I guess we'll figure that out as we go. What do we do about my sister? She will be out of the hospital soon, do you have a plan for what happens to her next?"

"I'll be right back," I answered and left the room, returning with my laptop. "Yesterday I set up a wire transfer to the county for Brooke's bail," I explained as I logged into the banking portal. "It'll come from a nail salon that she just became a part-owner in." In movies and cautionary tales from cyber-security experts trying to make a sale, they always make it sound like thieves and scammers can steal your life savings right out from under you if they have your bank account number. In reality, that information, along with your bank's routing number, is printed right on the face of every check you've ever written. It's standard practice for businesses to just give that information out for free so your customers can make electronic payments. They need to know where to send the money to, and you want to make it as easy as possible to get paid. The real security is in setting up safeguards so money can't leave your account without your express approval.

The phone rang. "Hello. This is he. Yes I did. Yes one million one hundred thousand dollars and zero cents. Can you repeat the receiving bank account info? Ok, yes, that's correct, it's good to go, thank you." I hung up the phone. "Her bail's paid. When she gets out she's a free woman, for now."

Leah stopped eating and asked, "What is it you do exactly?"

"Like I said. I'm an accountant."

"Mmhmm. An accountant that has a million dollars sitting around in case someone needs to get out of jail." That was closer to the truth than she knew.

"Having access to liquid funds is important to my employers."

"And your employers are... who exactly?"

"It's a long story."

Leah rolled her eyes. "Matt. We're trying to keep my sister and me out of jail. You just spent more than a million dollars and didn't blink an eye. We had sex less than an hour ago and I don't know anything about you. Can we put our cards on the table? At least a little?"

"Cards on the table? Ok, how about we start with why a famous actress was on the run with enough blow to knock out an elephant. That seems like a good place to start."

"Fine. I'll answer your questions if you answer mine."

I thought about it. I had never told anyone what I really did for a living. Nothing good could come from it. My family and friends thought I was a vanilla CPA doing taxes for rich trust fund babies. Between the odd hours, frequent impromptu business trips, and the safety aspect of it all, it was just easier to keep them in the dark. Over the years I had drifted away from my old life. But Leah was in this deep already, what was the harm in filling in a few blanks for her?

"Okay. What's your first question?"

Leah leaned forward, which put her alluring cleavage on display, and squinted at me. She made a show of thinking hard while I tried to keep my eyes on hers. "Hmmm. Alright. Have you ever been married?"

"What? That's what you want to know?"

"Yes."

"Why?"

"Is that your first question for me?" she asked. When I didn't answer she smirked and said, "I have my reasons." When I still didn't answer she became annoyed. "Jesus. We'll get to the heavy stuff." Then her expression softened. "We're going to be spending a lot of time together Matt, some of it intimately. It's important to me to know at least a little about you, personally."

I held up my hands in surrender. "Fair enough. No I've never been married. I came close, once, but I broke it off. This job doesn't leave a lot of room for anything else. Okay, my turn. You said earlier that the night of the accident you had just done a pick-up before you were chased off the highway, so I suspect this isn't your first time."

"Is there a question coming?"

"Who were you working for?"

Leah took a bite of pizza and thought about how to answer. "When I was sixteen I had a crush on this boy, Oliver. He was a few years older, cute, and wore nice clothes. All the girls liked him, but he asked me out." She walked to the sink and washed her hands. "We went on a few dates to some fancy restaurants, and one night he asked me to do him a favor. He wanted me to drive to St. Catharines and pick up a bag of clothes and other personal items he left at a friend's house. He said he couldn't do it himself because he was taking care of his grandmother that night. I agreed, but I had to bring Brooke with me so she wouldn't tell our parents." She looked around for a towel, which I pulled out of a drawer and handed to her. "On our way back, after we crossed the border, Brooke looked in the bag and saw a package of white powder. I was freaked out. Driving over the border with drugs, and my little sister, in the car was terrifying. By the time we made it back to Oliver I was pissed and yelled at him, but he handed me a folded up stack of hundred dollar bills and said it was my cut, and that they never stop cute girls." She handed the towel back to me. "That was the most money I had ever seen in one place. It felt like a movie. This type of thing didn't happen in rural New York. Anyway, that's much more than you told me, it's my turn. Why did you break up with her?"

"My work started to get messy. It came to a point where I had to choose between her and the job. I chose the job. What can you tell me about the people you worked with? Do you have names, addresses, anything like that?"

Leah rolled her eyes at me. "You're going to have to give me more than that." I kept eating and she huffed, "Fine. We picked up from two guys, Thomas and Charles, in St. Catharines and delivered to Oliver in Buffalo for a few more years, but we never dated again. Then he moved away and we started delivering to a man named Felix." Leah moved around the counter, gathering up trash. "When I got my first job in a commercial I moved to L.A., but Brooke stayed here and kept driving. I came home for her birthday. She just turned twenty-one. When we left the bar she said she had to make a trip. I should have said no, I have so much more to lose now, and there was a chance I would be recognized at the border. But she's my little sister."

"Felix? Felix Morin? Is this him?" I asked and showed her a picture on my laptop.

"Yes that's him, do you know him?"

"Only by reputation, but we have a new problem on our hands now. Felix is part of a drug cartel that has a solid foothold across eastern Canada, and he's pretty high up in the organization. They're not people you mess with, and a lot of them will now be missing a payday. Not to mention the fact that they'll be wondering why your sister isn't going to jail and trying to find out who she's been talking to. I'd say you two should get out of town, but Brooke can't leave the area on the terms of her bail."

"You think they will try to hurt us?" she asked.

"The cops are holding a lot of their product, which represents both missing cash for a lot of folks, and a serious risk to their operation if it can be traced back to them. People will be mad. And you two are the easiest to throw under the bus." I spoke as I worked through how this would play out in my mind.

She looked at me with wide eyes, paper plates forgotten in her hands.

By now it was likely that the Sanabria cartel knew Brooke and Leah were together the night of the accident since they did the pick-up together. It was possible they knew she had visited me. But I was an unknown to them. Since I was good at my job they wouldn't know who I was, and I had a large isolated property set back in the woods. Thanks to the high security fences around the perimeter the only way in or out was through the main gate, which had armed guards. If Leah or Brooke were on their own they would be easy targets, but here it would take a serious effort to get to them.

"I think you should both stay here for a little while. It's the safest option right now. In fact, I want to send some guys to stay with Brooke until she's out of the hospital. Can you write a message so she'll trust them?"

"I'm supposed to be back in L.A. in a few days. We're shooting the pilot of a new show."

"You should probably tell them you won't make it. First of all, it's dangerous to be out alone. But your sister will also need your help through this."

She paused before she said, "That could get... awkward when she arrives," and looked at me meaningfully.

"Awkward is better than dead," I responded.

Leah nodded and started writing. Every time her arm moved to start a new line it did the most interesting things to her chest.

"If I'm going to be staying here I'll need my things brought over from Brooke's apartment. She'll need her own clothes too. And Marcus should go home." I assumed that was her driver.

I agreed and set things in motion. I called down to Steve and asked him to send men up to the house to pick up Leah's note, and then over to the hospital to stay with Brooke while she recovered. More would need to go to Brooke's apartment with a list of clothes, bags, and other items Leah wrote out for them. Only one or two were ever stationed here at the house, so the others would have to be called in.

That was one of the things I loved about this house. When I moved north from Florida I knew I wanted privacy and safety, but there weren't many properties on the market that could give both. I spent a few months searching, but eventually my real estate agent, Shannon, brought me here. "This one's been on the market for a while. I haven't shown it to you yet because it's in pretty rough shape, and even when it's fixed up it'll need a lot of maintenance," she had said when we pulled up to the house.

From the outside I could see the roof would need to be replaced, the concrete patio was cracked, and there was water pooled against the house from rain the night before. Vines were climbing up the red brick walls, and patches of moss were everywhere. The inside was somehow worse. The old brown carpet matched faded wood paneling. I noticed the distinct smell of urine. There were water stains on parts of the ceiling, and the kitchen was straight from the seventies.

"I love it" I said. The location and size of the house and surrounding property were all perfect. Plus, I was secretly worried about how to make certain customizations to a house that was already in good shape. Shannon looked surprised, but recovered with a winning smile, sensing a sale was within reach. She touched my arm and said "I thought you might like it. With a little TLC this place could be beautiful. It has that old charm everyone's looking for." We put in an offer well below asking price and within a couple of weeks I moved in. I spent the last two years renovating the place and it was finally just about finished.

Leah finished her message and lists, the guards had gone about their tasks, and her driver was sent home after she retrieved a small bag of clothes and toiletries she kept in the car for emergencies. We sat in comfortable silence for a few minutes. "Why don't I give you a tour of the place?" I stood and offered her my hand. The kitchen and living room were one large open area that divided the house. The guest bedrooms and bathrooms were on one side, along with a room I used as a gym, full of exercise equipment and weights. It was getting dark as the last of the day's light faded from the windows.

When we reached the master bedroom on the other side of the house I started to feel uncomfortable. I had never been in a situation where someone agreed to sleep with me as part of a transaction, of sorts. I had also never spent this much time around someone as attractive as Leah. Putting the two together was a recipe for awkwardness, and I didn't know how to approach the subject of sleeping arrangements.

It seemed Leah felt the same way. She stood in the doorway while I pointed out the bathroom and laundry, and then ran out of things to talk about. I wondered how she felt. Did she hate me? Was she repulsed by the thought of surrendering to me in exchange for her freedom? I couldn't deny that the idea of taking, while she reluctantly submitted, appealed to certain, darker, fantasies.

But she didn't seem to hate me, at least not yet. In fact, she was handling it all pretty well. Much better than I would have. Did she feel overwhelming gratitude? Would she throw herself at me at every opportunity? The thought of Leah in a skimpy secretaries' outfit kneeling under my desk, eagerly waiting for the opportunity to show her appreciation, called to fantasies on the other end of the spectrum. I was getting turned on.

In my professional life I dealt with some of the most dangerous people in the world, navigating extremely tense situations, and managed to stay calm. My employers liked that about me. But in my personal life, sometimes I reverted back to the shy high school kid who didn't know how to talk to girls. "Well now you've seen it," I began without knowing how to finish the thought. "It's, um, been a long day. I'll probably go to bed and get an early start tomorrow. If you need blankets or pillows or anything let me know." I awkwardly gave her a small wave as she stood a few feet away.

She seemed to come to a decision and closed the distance between us, her bare feet silent on the carpet, then leaned in for a hug. She was soft and smelled good. And she bumped against my stiffness.

"Thank you again for agreeing to help, Matt. An early night is a good idea, I imagine there will be more long days ahead." She glanced down at my tenting pants, then looked back up, her eyes twinkling. "Down, boy," she smiled, and walked across the house without looking back. My eyes followed her ass until it disappeared.

The next day Steve informed us that cars were sitting outside Brooke's apartment, watching. We agreed they should wait until it was clear before they went in for the women's belongings. It would also be a few days until Brooke was out of the hospital. There was plenty of work to do, and that, along with my uncertainty around how to treat Leah, kept me in my office for most of that time. I officially added Brooke as an owner of Delilah's nail salon, coordinated with the lawyers on her release, and delicately reached out for information on Felix, their Sanabria contact. All while keeping up with my day job.

Leah and I did bump into each other though. Living out of an emergency suitcase meant she wore simple outfits of tee shirts, shorts, and sweatpants. She still managed to look incredible.

"Hey Matt," she said as she stood at the kitchen counter making a late-afternoon sandwich. She wore an oversized sweater that hung off one shoulder. It was bare. She wasn't wearing a bra. I instinctively watched her chest move under the fabric as she spread mayonnaise on the bread.

Feeling like a creep, I looked away as fast as I could. It wasn't very fast. "Hey, I was going to order lunch, you want anything?"

"No, thank you, your fridge is very well stocked. I hope you don't mind that I helped myself. Can you grab something for me though? I can't reach the mustard." She stood on her toes and reached with one arm, not quite making it to the bottle on the top shelf. The movement pulled her sweater up, revealing inches of tan skin.

I moved to stand next to her.

"Ah, yeah, here you go."

She took the bottle and stayed in our shared personal space. "Thanks Matt. How are you doing? It must be hard."

"What?"

"You've been working all day. It must be hard to keep it up for so long."

"Ha. Um, yeah, there's a lot to do. It's not too bad though." She went back to her sandwich. "Mayo and mustard mixed together?" I scrunched my face up.

"Don't knock it until you try it." She licked mustard off her finger for a long few seconds. Did she linger on purpose?

The next morning I woke up to the rich smell of coffee. I didn't drink it very often; I always thought it smelled better than it tasted. But anything would taste good with enough cream and sugar so I kept some in the house. I rubbed my eyes as I went into the kitchen. Leah sat at the dining table with an open laptop in front of her. Books and sheets of paper were scattered around her and she was staring down at one as she wrote. Her head bopped while soft music played from the computer speakers.

"Thanks for making coffee."

She jumped. "Jeeze. Don't do that. Let a girl know when you're coming."

I poured a cup about two thirds of the way, then topped it off with heavy cream from the fridge and plenty of sugar. I sat at the table next to her and picked up a book while I took a test sip.

"Stratification, the Family, and Gender Relations. Doing some light reading?" I asked.

She took the book from me and set it on the other side of the table. Then gathered the papers and moved them over also.

"Don't make fun."

"I'm not making fun of anything. I just don't know what I'm looking at here."

"I'm taking an online course at SUNY Buffalo. Race, Ethnicity, and Social Inequalities."

"That's great. Why would you think I'm making fun of that?"

"After high school I went straight into modeling. But I started taking classes online in case that didn't work out. It's nothing complicated like science or math."

I put my hand on top of hers. "Leah, first of all, I think it's awesome that you're taking classes. A ton of people never get that far. Don't be embarrassed about it. You should be proud. Second, I knew people who majored in chemistry or engineering or whatever. Trust me, they're not smarter than anyone else. They just have a higher tolerance for boredom."

"Thank you for saying that Matt. I just feel silly sometimes. I can only take a few classes each year, so it will take me forever to get this degree. And with the acting going well sometimes I think, 'what's the point?'" She shrugged. "But each time enrollment comes around a little voice in my head tells me I'll be disappointed in myself if I quit. So I sign up for another one."

"You're doing a really great thing, even if it feels like it doesn't matter. And for the record, I agree with the little voice." I stood up. "Let me get out of your way. I know how hard it is to work when someone's distracting you."

She laughed and said, "Sorry. I'll try to be good."

"I don't think you could stop if you tried."

Later that evening we bumped into each other again. She was heading to the bathroom with underwear and a towel in her hands. She stopped and said, "Hey I'm going to take a shower... let's talk after about how things are going, okay?"

Images of Leah in the shower were in my head for the rest of the night.