“You can’t stalk people and expect them to love you back.” -Whitney There is definitely going to be a memo on her desk about a raise in four hours. I can practically feel my fingers angrily typing over my keyboard, something that would normally begin at the start of my workday and not at the difficult hour past midnight. But sadly, somehow this is what the executive assistant job for Missy Reynolds entails. The bouncer at Delirium glances from the long queue of socialites, B-rated celebrities, and girls wearing far too much makeup for their age to where I’m standing slightly off the sidewalk in jeans and a pink hoodie. Not what a typical person wears to get into a grandiose club. Thankfully it’s Jude on duty, giving me a pitying look that informs me all I need to know about the situation inside. “Where is she?” I ask. “With Hunter. She’s being held in the control booth since she refuses to leave. We’re already overcapacity so the boss didn’t want to invite the police or fire department,” the hulking Samoan man sighs. It’s clear the night is already verging on tiresome. Or maybe it’s just Missy’s presence affecting him. Awesome. “Can’t you tell him to press stalking charges already?” I grumble.
It’s freezing tonight, though you wouldn’t know it from the way the people waiting in the queue to party are dressed. I guess alcohol can numb anything, including someone’s self-preservation in the borderline winter weather. Jude doesn’t respond, just gives me a wide grin before opening the doorway for me. It became an inside joke of ours about three months into my new job when I had the unfortunate opportunity to find out Missy Reynolds, fashion icon and stereotypical socialite, is a high-key stalker. Her current victim is Aillard Brookwell, Jude’s boss and owner of Delirium, an all-around exclusive nightclub for the rich and famous. “Thanks for the call,” I mutter as I pass him. Once inside the dark void, an open foyer appears. Decorated in black velvet and dark leather couches, with gold accents on the walls dripping in crystals, there is no subtlety about the type of patrons coming to this club. The coat check woman gives me a brief wave. I think her name is Sandra but I’ve yet to introduce myself. The front hall gives off the vibe of a gentleman’s club rather than the debauchery that lies behind the doors directly in front of me. Heaving open the large wooden door, the ambiance of Delirium is otherworldly compared to the posh entrance. Aerial dancers spin in the air to a mashup of EDM and something hypnotic andsexy. The pulse in the room has everyone’s bodies thrashing together to a forlorn beat. Dark blues and purples light up the room in a dizzying effect.
Leather couches and booths occupy the perimeter of the dance floor. And on the far left, tucked just behind the bar that looks straight out of a 1920’s Gatsbyesque party, is the black marble staircase leading to the control room and the VIP lounge. Another hulking figure stands at the bottom of the staircase, a plastic earwig tucked into his collar. It’s easy to spot since it matches Jude’s and the rest of the henchmen of Delirium I’ve grown to know over the past few months Missy has been enamored with Aillard. But tonight, among the millionthings that have piled up on my list of to-dos, I can’t quite remember this man’s name even though I’msure we’ve met before. With a glance at my face, he steps aside, silently assuring me that he’s aware of who I am. Or maybe Jude gave him a heads up from outside. Either way, Missy’s personal servant has arrived on the scene; here to tend to the mess my boss no doubt has gotten herself into. On the second floor, the club below looks tiny. Everyone is packed together like sardines, but I suppose that’s what clubs are supposed to be like. Everyone knows the silhouette of the body next to theirs. Just looking down at all the people, or up at the aerial dancers, causes my head to start spinning and a queasy feeling to settle in my stomach. Turning away from the ostentatious scene, I spot the black door just off the lounge. Ignoringthe crowd conversing on the couches with scantily clad women dangling off their every word, I duck behind the black door hopeful to not cause a scene. Except this isn’t the control room on the other side.
Mentally I run back through my blueprints of this place, which I’m pretty sure results in one door upstairs that has to be the control room. But from the look on the three men’s faces in front of me, I might have just interrupted a mob meeting. Each man is strikingly stunning. Sharp jawlines, Greek noses, and suits that encase bodies solarge and muscular that the linen across their chests stretches to accommodate their width. They look like the type of men you’d find on romance book covers, shirtless and droolworthy. None of them, however, look the least bit impressed by my sudden appearance. I’d say the dark, angry gray eyes piercing into my soul from the man on the far right are downright loathing my interruption. “Sorry.” My awkward voice croaks out because it’s past midnight and thirty minutes ago I was sound asleep like any sane person would be on a Wednesday night. “I’m looking for the control room.” Which this is glaringly not. The man with angry gray eyes stands up fluidly, and the sheer force of his body pulls at something in my chest the closer he gets. His blond hair is a little longer than a buzz cut, pouty lips pressed into a firm line as he saunters over to where I’m standing just inside the door. It strikes me then that he looks like a reincarnation of Apollo, come to defile humanity on earth. Except he looks more like he wants to murder me instead.
Stopping a few feet away, he gestures towards the left of the door I just walked in with a jerk of his chin. Following his gaze, I realize there’s another door hidden just beyond this one. “Thanks,” I squeak before latching onto the door handle like a lifeline before roughly yanking it open. The next room is smaller, but bright white lights shine down on the three people currently surrounding the wall of monitors. And, beyond the three henchmen, a familiar face is in the back of the room. Sitting in a cigar chair is none other than my boss, glaring at the three men like a hissing chihuahua. “Whit, hey,” Hunter’s deep voice brings my attention away from the heiress towards Jude’s twin. His shaved head gleams under the sharp lighting, giving him an edgier look than usual. “She’s drunk and managed to get all the way up here, yelling about Brookwell needing her number. Caused a bit of a scene.” I almost snort at his choice of words. A bit. Missy Reyonalds doesn’t cause a bit of a scene, she full-heartedly creates them. “How drunk are you?” I ask Missy. Her hair is in a mess of dyed blond curls, some dangling almost straight while others corkscrew tightly around her face.
She’s even got a tiara shoved into her mess of hair and a pair of matching, dangling diamond earrings. Her cheetah print spandex dress does little to hide her body underneath. Though if you ask me, any self-respecting twenty-nine-year-old would forego the cheetahprint dresses and alcohol-induced schemes for a nice, quiet night during a workweek. She slouches back into the chair, continuing to glare at Hunter through glassy eyes. “She was drunk before she showed up, but I clocked her at the bar at least five times before she attempted to reach Brookwell,” Hunter explains in lieu of Missy. “Did you call her a cab?” I ask. “She keeps saying her Uber is on her way.” “And here she is.” Missy flings her arm in my direction. “Miss Hayes isn’t an Uber driver,” Hunter sighs, clearly frustrated on my behalf. “We’ve been over this.” The heiress doesn’t look as though she gives a shit. “She works for me.” “I work for your parents,” I correct. They’re the ones who pay my bills to keep their daughter on time for appointments and shindigs.
They don’t pay me nearly enough to pull her out of the press as often as I do by paying off paparazzi. “Whitney,” Missy slurs my name, coming out more like Wilty, “go and give Aillard this.” She raises a small card in the air. I can barely make out her handwriting, but I believe she wrote her phone number on it. Possibly. Or perhaps the address to where she plans on murdering him for not responding to her advances over the past several months. When I don’t immediately move to grab it, she begins waving it around obnoxiously, bound to whack herself in the face with her flailing arm. Hunter’s low voice comes out in a tired guffaw. “Just go get the stupid card and throw it away in the other room. She’s too drunk to know otherwise, but it took two of us to get her ass to stay in that chair and I’m afraid if you don’t go get that card she’ll try and leap on him when she decides she’s ready to leave.” As sad as it is, he’s probably right. She would fight them with her inch-long nails to get her claws into Aillard. “Sure,” I tell Missy, stepping towards her and snatching the card. “Just sit there and wait for him to text you, okay?” My diversion works as she quickly pulls out her phone and stares at the screen with longing. Hunter and his two buddies snicker lowly as I march out the door into the room where the Apollo lookalike sits.
Choosing to ignore their stares I can feel scalding the side of my face, I dart to the other door where a black trash can is and drop the crumpled card. It floats down anticlimactically. I don’t know what I expected of the card. For it to catch on aninvisible tendril of wind and sail across the room to the intended target as if it was some sort of theatrical object in a romance movie that was bound to tie Missy and Aillard together forever. Somehow that thought stops me from moving to return to the monitor room as I imagine the look onone of the three men’s faces as the card smacks them in the cheek, determined to get their attention in a true Missy-like fashion. Shaking my head to clear the thought away, I move to return to the monitoring room and call a cab to come collect the drunk woman. Part of me wants to send her to her parents’ house in all her glory for them to sort out. But her self-destructive lifestyle is one of the reasons I was hired to babysit her and watch out for people trying to take advantage. That doesn’t mean I want her to puke on me, because she will puke before her night is over like she always does. And I’m getting tired of driving into the city just to stop her from committing a misdemeanor that could potentially turn into a felony depending on how far she goes. “You should tell your friend to lay off the alcohol if she can’t handle it,” a deep voice says. I turn to find all three men staring at me. One looks slightly amused, one looks bored, and the man with gray eyes looks downright lethal. He stubs out a cigarette and stands once more. “Her behavior is atrocious and will get her blacklisted from all my clubs.
” This is Aillard Brookwell? The Apollo-imposter. The one who looks like a sexy villain youboth loath and want to climb in bed with because your body and heart are at war. His ashy blond hair looks almost brown in the dark lighting of the room as he strolls toward me. No, not strolling. This man moves with the leisure of a panther in his kingdom. The closer he gets to me, the more my brain seems to stop firing on all cylinders. He’s gorgeous. The stop you in your tracks and have an orgasm kind of gorgeous that simultaneously makes me want to lick him and punch him in his pretty face just to break the spell. “You should press charges.” I’m not sure how my voice comes out calm and reasonable when my insides are going haywire, but at least I don’t faint at the sight of him. When Missy was stalkingOrlando Bloom, I did faint the one and only time I got near him. When Aillard gives me a baffled look instead of immediately agreeing, I realize Missy is sofar removed from his radar he must not realize the extent of her obsession with all wealthy men in the New York City zip code. “She’s stalking you,” I supply helpfully. “You should press charges and she’ll leave you alone.” The man who looks bored suddenly leans forward in his chair.
“You’re being stalked?” I nod at the same time Aillard scoffs, “No.” The man who looks somewhat intrigued by my revelation leans back in his seat. “She seems truthful. Although I’m a little confused as to why she’s trying to tell you to press stalking charges against her friend. Seems like something weird is happening.” My body jerks back at the impression that Missy and I could ever be friends. “She’s not myfriend.” “Then why are you here?” Aillard frowns. A sigh escapes. There’s not enough time in the day to accurately defend my reason for sticking with this job. “She’s my boss, kind of. Her parents employ me. I’m supposed to keep an eye on her but my job ends at five and she likes to stir up trouble when I leave. She’s essentially a stalker with her eyes set on your pocketbook. So just do us all a favor and inform the police and blackball her because I really enjoy sleeping and she’s making it impossible by coming to Delirium every chance she can.
” The man who previously spoke to me begins laughing and pulls out his phone. “I’m tellingEmilia. This is grand.” “King,” Aillard turns his sharp gaze to his friend. “Don’t encourage her.” “Me?” King gestures to his chest with an innocent look. “I will do no such thing. Emilia will simply find the fact you have a stalker amusing. And that the stalker’s personal assistant is encouraging you to seek out a restraining order is the highlight of tonight.” He winks at me. “Let me know if you need any help getting her out of here.” I wave him off. “Hunter and Jude can usually get her out fine once she sobers up some.” Aillard’s attention snaps back to me. “You know Jude and Hunter?” My gaze collides with his.
“They’re your security. Obviously, I know who they are. I just toldyou my boss is stalking you. Do you know how many times I’ve shown up here to collect her? Usually, they keep her at the coat check but with how many people are lined up to come inside I suppose they didn’t want to expose the clientele to Missy Reynolds’ drunken temper tantrum.” “It is pretty busy tonight,” the other man who was previously quiet points out. “I’m a little surprised by how adamant you are that the police be involved.” Adamant isn’t the word I would use. More like desperate. “I’m tired. It’s late. I have to beawake in four hours and I’m on the verge of committing a homicide just to not be put in this position again.” Twisting my head back to Aillard, I tack on, “Your security is lovely to work with, but they shouldn’t have to be babysitting someone who could pose a threat to you.” “A threat?” Aillard’s dubious look doesn’t resonate well with me. As if a socialite can’t possibly be deranged enough to inflict harm. “She’s taken a letter opener to someone.
Spiked GHB into the drink of another person. And that’s just been since I startedworking for her.” Not to mention the Orlando incident that will forever be seared into my brain. “I’mtelling you for your own safety to be on the lookout for her craziness if you aren’t going to get a restraining order. Usually those scare her off onto someone new.” “How are you still employed?” King’s wondrous voice asks. My shoulders lift in a tight shrug. The real reason is that Matthew and Regina Reynolds haveno idea how absolutely fucking insane their child is. It seems like my entire job is to pay off people to keep them happy, pay off people to keep their mouths shut, or quickly help Missy escape situations such as these before the boss of the establishment is notified. Except she’s stalking the boss this time. “Whitney?” Hunter’s voice startles me as he pokes his head out of the doorway of the monitor room. He dips his head in a nod towards Aillard before sighing heavily. “She puked all over the cigar chair and the table with your documents on it.” For a brief moment, I expect Aillard to lose the calm composure he’s tightly holding onto and lash out in rage, but all he does is pinch the bridge of his nose and tilt his chin towards the ceiling as if wondering how God himself put him in this predicament. “I can pay for the chair,” I quickly assure Aillard.
There’s nothing I can do about whatever documents Hunter brought up. Hopefully they can be reprinted. “Just have Jude or Hunter get me anestimate and I’ll write a check to replace it.” “It’s a custom chair,” Aillard grunts. Somehow that makes me feel worse. And that means it’s going to be way more expensive than I originally thought. Since Missy doesn’t pay for any of her mistakes, it’ll have to come out of mysavings account which is going to blow. All my emergency fund is going to go weeping down the virtual drain. “You should really get her out of here, Whit,” Hunter implores. He’s not wrong. I’ve already been here an hour and some change. Not to mention the thirtyfive-minute drive it took to get here in the first place. “Call us a cab,” I tell Hunter. “Make sure it goes on her card, though. I’m not paying to drive myself out of the city.
” “Sure thing.” His head disappears back behind the black door. “Sorry to ruin your night,” I say to the three men. “It was nice meeting you.” Before I can walk into the control room to collect Missy, Aillard’s deep voice asks, “Does Jude call you every time there’s an issue with your boss?” “Yes. I gave him my number with instructions on when to call me or when to call her best friend Jenna depending on the situation. He didn’t want to call me at first, but after she made a nuisance by dancing on the bar a few months ago, Jude will call me. He doesn’t bother trying to persuade her to leave by herself since she won’t.” Aillard nods, though it seems to be more to himself than to my speech. Perhaps he’s used to people making spectacles of themselves at his club that nothing surprises him anymore. Hunter peeks back out from behind the door. “Cab’s downstairs waiting. Jude is keeping those leaving from being able to steal it, but you know how belligerent people can be when they’re drunk.” Smiling softly, I nod and begin to walk towards him to get the drunk socialite back home. Missy’s surprisingly more sober than I expected as one of Hunter’s coworkers guides her towards the door.
She doesn’t even put up a fight, but her cheeks are stained an unflattering shade of pink, showcasing her embarrassment for anyone to see. The moment she steps outside the control room, her gaze collides with Aillard’s. A millisecond later, she makes a beeline for him. Hunter’s coworker reaches out to grab her arm but she’s too fast. In a blink, Missy’s clear across the room and has looped her arm through Aillard’s, holding him forcefully in a vice grip. “Hi,” she beams up at him, “it’s so nice to meet you. Ohmygosh, you’re even better looking in person than you are on TV. Whitney,” she calls my name as she cranes her neck to spot me still near the doorway. “Take our picture together.” Another sigh escapes me. “We’ve been over this, Delirium doesn’t allow phone use while on the premises, remember? You have to sign a contract every time you decide to come here.” Except for me, since I signed an NDA to enter to collect Missy whenever I get called. It was easier to just be aone-and-done than have to wait around for me to be approved to enter every other day. Plus, it seems that rule is irrelevant to Aillard’s friends since the one called King is actively texting while trying to fight down a smirk. “Ally doesn’t mind, do you?” Missy blinks blue eyes up at him.
From behind her, I can see King bring his fist to his mouth and bite down on his knuckle to control the shake of his body. He’s outright jovial at Aillard’s apparent nickname and discomfort. At least someone tonight is enjoying themselves. “Actually, I do mind.” Aillard slips his arm away from her and takes a step towards Hunter. “Please see to it that Missy is banned from any Brookwell establishments in the future.” His dark eyes cut towards a stunned Missy. “I don’t particularly care to be followed or harassed. Be sure to make wiser choices in the future, Miss Reynolds.” Hunter and the two other security guards immediately usher Missy downstairs. Thankfully it still doesn’t fully set in what she’s done until we’re slipping into the back of a yellow cab door held open by Jude. Unfortunately, it isn’t the reaction I was hoping for, nor does it seem Aillard’s speech accomplished anything. “Did you hear him, Whitney?” Missy curls her sharp fingernails into my shoulder to shake me a little. Add being a ragdoll to my list of what not to look for in a future employer. “He knows my name!” My head hits the black cloth seat as I stare up at the cab’s ceiling, wishing to be in my bed or anywhere that doesn’t have a chattering socialite with the IQ of a pencil telling me about her dreams for her future wedding as she becomes Mrs.
Brookwell. 2 “I could really go for a cigar and a stripper right about now.” – Aillard King, my former best friend, seeing how he finds my entire situation hilarious, shuffles papers across his desk as I stare at the square invitation he handed me approximately two minutes ago. I reread the elegant script several times trying to form the words. I know what it says, I’m not an idiot, but the fact these words are staring at me creates a ball of hostility I’m grappling to control. You have been cordially invited to the wedding of Missy Elenore Reynolds and Aillard Johnathan Brookwell. With all our love and wishes, RSVP for plus one or plus two. “This is a joke, right?” I lean back in my chair in King Huntington-Ward’s office at the top of Ward Enterprises. “My middle name isn’t even Johnathan.” King puckers his lips while trying desperately to keep a straight face. “Does that mean I should tell Emilia to hold off on RSVPing until your bride-to-be learns your middle name is actuallyBaron, you pompous prick?” I choose to ignore that. “When did you receive this?” “It was in Emilia’s mail this morning. She came to inform me just before our meeting that she was disappointed she didn’t know you were seeing anyone.” King folds his arms across his chest, causing the blue Armoni suit to stretch tightly. His dark hair falls in his eyes as he sweeps his gaze around the brightly lit room.
He works among a sea of glass walls and white, shiny marble that makes me flinch every time I exit the elevator onto this floor. “This isn’t funny.” “Her assistant did warn you,” King points out. “Maybe you should have taken her advice andcalled the police so you could file a restraining order. I know a judge who will look at it over lunch to get it squared away rather quickly.” My agitation leaks through my voice as I tug on the silk tie at my neck. “I’m not sure a restraining order is going to get rid of my bride-to-be.” “Do you want me to intervene?” King asks. Tossing the wedding invitation into the trash can next to his enormous desk, I settle back in my seat reluctantly. “At the moment, we’re putting a pin in this stalker issue and focusing on the reason for our meeting.” Like a switch, King goes from one of my best friends to one of the most notorious fixers in the country. His gaze sharpens as he nods, looking down at the stack of paperwork in front of him with diligence. “Corbin Ducaine.” The name alone causes me to sneer. Corbin went to college with King, our other friend Thorin, and myself.
His parents aren’t as wealthy as ours. More Manhattan in the summer instead oftouring Greece and Croatia. Still, the slimy son of a bitch landed in our small group of friends. Something that I have come to realize must have been his intention all along. As a stakeholder inDelirium, he is paid a portion of the profits the club makes. For a while, he was the financial master while I stayed behind the scenes doing the computer software for security and inventory. It wasn’t until Corbin said he was going away for a few days, several months ago, that I began to go through the financial logs for several of our properties. He was stealing from me. At first, it was barely noticeable. Five thousand here and there; spread out enough over several properties that it was easily overlooked in the beginning. Until the sums became larger and larger. Instead of waiting several months in between, he became cocky and started withdrawing funds more often. When I realized he was not only stealing money outright but embezzling, I immediately cut off his access to my company, and called King. It took a little while to gather all the financial materials that King requested, but I was going to bury Corbin before he could bypass the security measures I putin place. Only a select few are aware of the fact I own ASF, the Advanced Semiconductor Foundry, a global graphics and artificial intelligence company.
Our biggest competitors are NVIDIA and Intel.All of Ward Enterprises and half of the city run off of some form of my electronics. It’s empowering to be a closet billionaire. Most people assume my money only comes from Brookwell Properties, a variety of properties I own that range from restaurants to nightclubs, like Delirium. Just the momentary thought of my favorite nightclub brings forth the image of Whitney Hayes. Her jeans and pink hoodie combo was a striking difference to the ambiance normally afforded by rich kids looking to burn cash. She wasn’t scantily clad like her boss who I vaguely recall because she was dressed like every other woman that walks through my doors. But Whitney Hayes has the face of a supermodel with thick, dark brown hair that almost shined black under the drastic lighting. A body with curves that were easy to spot under the lumpy sweatshirt, with hips that begged to be held tightly while you fuck her from behind. Her hazel eyes drew me in, captivating me at the worst moment since we were busy discussing Corbin’s scandal. Yet, I couldn’t get the image of her out of my head. Hunter had given me her information after she left last week. It wasn’t typical for my securityguards to allow anyone access to places that were out of bounds to regular clientele. Her background check they ran was thorough, but not deep enough in my opinion. It barely mentioned her family or where she went to school.
It only told me that she’d never so much as had a speeding ticket. She was a goody-two-shoes. An afterthought to a normal night of debauchery. Except I couldn’t stop thinking about her and where she was. How she ended up being a personal assistant to someone as airheaded as Missy Reynolds. Most women who meet me become stargazed, lost in a void of their own daydreams as they make up ideas on how to woo me. It was clear from Whitney’s first look she found me attractive, but she never gave into the pull to try and slip me her number. In fact, in a way, I was warned not only away from her boss but her as well. “Aillard.” King draws my attention away from the mental image of the stunning brunette. “There’s a legal way to go about this and an illegal way. Choose one.” I raise my eyebrow to establish that either of those options suits me just fine. “Above board means legally going after him. But you won’t be able to get your money back.
The courts will rule in your favor, but Corbin being able to pay back retribution isn’t likely. You won’t see that money again.” “He’s probably already spent it anyways.” “But,” King adds with an edge to his voice, “hackers like Corbin typically learn their skills somehow.” The unsaid prompt to disclose my abilities with a keyboard and monitor makes my head pound to an uneven beat. Cursing, I clench my fists and try to resist the urge to leap out of the chair and begin pacing. “I know he knows how to hack because I taught him, King. So what?” King’s retort is swift and lacks any trace of emotion. “Hack him back.” “Absolutely not.” King doesn’t so much as blink as he shoves a pile of paperwork towards me. “Then sign these so I can bring them to our legal department.” I don’t move to snag the pen resting neatly on top. “The issue isn’t the legal way. My issue is that no one can find him.
He’s gone completely off the grid and I don’t know where to even start. Myprivate investigator is no help either.” King runs his hand over his jaw as he thinks over what I just said. “You want to get to himlegally because it involves prison time, but you can’t find him through legal means. Is that the gist of it?” “Precisely.” “Run a parallel investigation to mine. I’ll cover your tracks if you get caught. It’s not like he’s going to turn you into the police for corrupting his computer systems if he’s the one who stole all your money to begin with.” While that’s true, part of me doesn’t feel right for considering this. That feeling only lasts several moments before I nod my head. “Alright, then that’s our plan.” “Should we go back to the topic of your wife now?” “I hate you.” “You hate stalkers.” King taps the pile of paperwork with his fingers. “Sign these and tell me about how you’d like to handle this situation.
According to the woman you’re not going to deter her unless you file a restraining order.” Picking up the gold pen because Huntington-Ward’s are fucking rich pricks to sign away on contracting him for the Corbin debacle, I scrawl my name in a quick flourish of ink. “Fine. Get me arestraining order if you think she’s that mentally unstable.” King opens a drawer in his desk and retrieves another, much smaller, packet and sets it down next to the one I’m already flipping through. “I had a dossier created on her Thursday morning.” That was six days ago. “Dare I ask what you found?” “She seems like the type of person to drug you before stuffing you into an unmarked car and cutting up your body at the docks to release into the Hudson if you reject her.” “So she’s O’Rourke’s type then.” I’m referring to a criminal King sometimes employs inBoston for certain jobs. Son of the Irish mafia boss, the man is a fixer amongst the politicians and Senators that visit his town. Though O’Rourke is far less above-board than King. “She has a long rap sheet as well.” King pulls on one of the folders and begins flippingthrough pages. “Most are for stalking.
There’s the date rape drug incident. The harassment of someone’s new girlfriend.” He pauses briefly. “Whitney was a witness in this one.” That captures my immediate attention. Laying the pen on top of the rest of the papers, I snatchthe folder from his hands and quickly flip through the documents until I find her name. “Missy tried to attack Orlando Bloom with a switchblade knife.” The disbelief in my voice is obvious. “Whitneyjumped in front of Bloom to protect him, even though his bodyguard was also jumping in the way. It says Whitney interfered on Bloom’s behalf and was injured during the scuffle. She was treated for a minor cut that needed stitches by an EMT.” “Please don’t forget the small portion that when Bloom went to thank her for attempting to stop the whole thing she fainted.” King chuckles as he snatches the folder back. “Personally, that’s my favorite part. Whitney seems so indifferent to the glitz and glamor thanks to her job, it’s hard to imagine that Orlando Bloom was her undoing.
”
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