Dirty Laundry

I’d been dodging Genevieve’s calls all week, despite the knowledge that she wasn’t going to disappear unless I actually spoke to her. Sloane could tell her until she was blue in the face that I’d get back to her as soon as possible and that these things took time, but it’d be of no use. If her fiancé wasn’t interviewed in the Wall Street Journal each week and plastered across the pages of every finance magazine in Manhattan, I would’ve ripped up her contract and told her to piss up a rope. Some people just weren’t worth the money.

Aside from the obvious, my clients had a lot of preconceptions about me. To them, they simply dropped a large sum of money for instant results, like plastic surgery or a shopping spree at Saks Fifth Avenue. And as eager as I was to take their money, I spent a lot of time doing research. I guaranteed results, and that meant skimming those Wall Street Journal interviews and trying to read between the lines. A spade isn’t always a spade, and I knew it’d do me no good to submerge myself in a lifestyle without knowing how to swim.

Genevieve supplied the minor details, like what restaurants he frequented, who his comrades were, where he liked to drink his Old Fashioned after a long day at the office. Sometimes all I needed were those minor details, but Harry Styles was going to be different. A man of his success and recognition would undeniably be guarded and instantly suspicious. People with money usually were.

“What’s a name that screams, ‘I’m rich and want to sleep with you’?”

Sloane shrugged, not bothering to look up from the magazine she was reading. “Where’s your list?”

“I threw it out after I used them all.”

Although she didn’t make eye contact, I knew she’d stopped reading once her jaw stopped chomping on her gum. “There were two-hundred names on there.”

“I gave some to Mia, too.” I rolled my eyes. “What do you think about Penelope?”

“No.”

“Why not?”

“Can you honestly see Harry Styles banging someone named Penelope?”

I pulled a face that fell somewhere between disgust and incredulity. “Pretty soon I’m gonna stop asking for your opinion.”

“Who do you think I am, Liam?”

Snorting, I crossed Penelope from my list. Even if I didn’t want to admit it, Sloane had a point, and it didn’t matter if a Kardashian used the name if it wasn’t going to get me paid. “What about Astoria?”

“Too Harry Potter-esque. Why don’t you use something normal?”

“Because rich people don’t give their children normal names, they give them shitty ones like Apple and Paris.” Liam, who’d been in the process of carrying a steaming takeout container back to his desk from the break room, shot me a questioning stare. I ignored him.

“Did you know Evangeline Lilly’s going to be in the next two Hobbit movies?”

“You know I couldn’t give two shits less about that nerd porn, but thanks for the name.” I grabbed a blank sheet of paper and began practicing my new signature, trying to mold myself into a believable version of Evangeline du Pont.

Liam and Sloane didn’t even spare a glance as I click-clacked all the way to my office to begin preparing documents. Genevieve would be thrilled with my progress, of course, but I had no overwhelming urge to call her and share the good news. All I had was a name; I had no game plan or way in. Having an alias and nowhere to flaunt it was akin to being all dressed up with nowhere to go.

Cornering him in a bar would be easy, but there were connotations that went along with women in bars. Restaurants were more tricky because it’s not socially acceptable to eat out alone, and since Mia was knee-deep (or worse) in Zayn Malik, I had no proverbial wingman. The option of playing on his home turf was always there, but I had reason to step foot in Franklin & Roberts. Banking wasn’t my thing.

But it was Liam’s.

I pressed the intercom button on my desk phone and played up my most over-the-top flight attendant voice. “Mr. Liam Payne, please report to my office. Thank you.”

Sloane’s laughter could probably be heard from Hoboken, and even Liam’s footsteps sounded nervous. Dealing with him was a lot like ripping off a band-aid: if you didn’t do it quick, you lost your nerve. Mia and I asked a lot of him, both in our personal and professional lives, so asking him for favors wasn’t especially high on the list of things I enjoyed doing.

“You rang?”

I waved him in, gesturing for him to take a seat. He didn’t, just stood in front of me with his hands at his sides. “Have you looked into this Harry Styles guy?”

He nodded. “A little. I haven’t really been able to find anything worthwhile, though.”

I huffed, sitting back in my seat. I’d perfected the art of suckering someone a long time ago, and if Liam wasn’t so eager to please me and Mia, he would’ve caught on. He was smart—much smarter than 95 percent of the men I dealt with on a daily basis—but very much a sucker.

“Are you having trouble with him?”

“I don’t know,” I sighed. “I just have no idea how to approach this. A bar seems too cheap, Mia’s busy so I can’t play up the club angle, and he’s the CEO of a banking company. What kind of business would I have at a banking company?”

“Can’t you take Sloane?”

“Are you out of your mind? I’m not dragging her into this.”

“It’s just a club.” He sounded like a child getting scolded for drawing on the walls. Putting a dent in his ego wouldn’t win me any favors.

“No, no, you’re right. I’m just really stressing over this one, you know? Her contract is front-loaded, so I have to give her something.”

Liam plopped into the chair in front of me. He stared at the ceiling for a few seconds before a light switch flipped on. “I have an idea, but you’ll owe me.”

“I always owe you.”

“That’s true,” he agreed. “I saw on their website that they’re looking for interns. I could apply and use you as a reference. Big firms like that are really selective, so they’d probably want to meet with you.”

“The CEO of the company wouldn’t be interviewing you, Liam. They have HR people and hiring managers to do that.”

“Let me worry about that part, yeah? Finance is my thing, I’m good at it. If my plan doesn’t work, you’re not even involved. There’s no downside.”

I mulled it over. There was a downside, of course, and that was Liam actually getting hired and being in cahoots with Harry and his minions. Some stupid banking firm would steal him away from me and I’d lose half my staff, and that was unacceptable. Then again, if he left me he also left Mia.

“Fine, let’s give it a shot. How quickly can we get this done?”

He shrugged. “I’ll go put in an application now. What fake name are you using this time?”

“Evangeline du Pont,” I replied, doing my best take on a French accent. Liam was none too impressed.

“You keep working on that. I’ll keep you posted.”

I shouted my thanks at his back as he left, already calculating how large of a Christmas bonus he was going to get this year. For as much as we tortured and annoyed one another, Liam was truly the younger brother I never had. He faked like it physically pained him to look after my well-being, but he wouldn’t hesitate to severely injure anyone that hurt me.

The man of the hour returned roughly twenty minutes later. He dropped a scrap of paper on my desk and allowed himself a moment to gloat. “Who’s the greatest person in the whole wide world?”

“Ryan Gosling.”

He rolled his eyes. “No, but I’ll give you a hint: it rhymes with Piam Lane.”

“Viam Wayne.”

He finally gave up and wiped the grin from his face. “I called and talked up the secretary for a bit, had a laugh with her and all—you know what I mean, yeah?—and told her my boss fell on hard times and was real sketch about coming in for a meeting.”

“And?”

“And, thanks to the artist formerly known as Liam Payne, you’ve got an appointment tomorrow afternoon with the Harry Styles.”

I smiled so wide my face hurt. “I could kiss you right now.”

“By all means,” he said as he puckered his lips.

“Don’t be cheeky. What’s my story?”

“Haven’t the slightest, so just go in and play dumb. I scheduled your appointment under Evan du Pont, so I’m sure he’ll just about die when you walk through the door.”

Without warning, I grabbed Liam’s face and planted a kiss right on his lips. He turned fifty shades of crimson before he sped out of my office with me right on his heels. If I had any intention of fulfilling my contractual duties, I’d need a serious day of pampering before I met anyone.



Genevieve offered to email over a couple photos of her fiancé to familiarize me with his face. I didn’t need them. Harry Styles was one closed deal away from being on billboards, lumped in with the likes of Mark Zuckerberg and every other young, successful human being on the planet.

Still, just because I’d already memorized his face didn’t mean I knew jack about the layout of his building. The ground floor wasn’t the lobby and there was no secretary in sight, Liam be damned. There was no directory near the elevator, so, out of options, I pressed the button for the top floor. Where else would the CEO’s office be?

The ride was smooth with no stops at all, which was a magnificent feat for having to travel forty floors. What wasn’t magnificent, however, was finally reaching my destination and still being in the wrong place.

As soon as I stepped out of the elevator, all eyes were on me. I probably looked just as dumb as I felt.

“Can I help you, love?” I groaned at the sound of another accented voice, as if Liam’s didn’t haunt me enough on a daily basis.

I spun around anyway, expecting to take in an overworked yet deceptively polite intern who took the job expecting to analyze profit reports but got stuck fetching coffee and getting berated instead, but that wasn’t the case. The man in front of me wasn’t Harry Styles, but damn if he didn’t give him a run for his money.

“I have a meeting with Mr. Styles.”

He smiled as if to say this sort of thing happened all the time. “His office is the floor below.” My confusion must’ve been obvious because he quickly added, “Apparently the view is better.”

“Ah, I’ll head that way then. Thank you very much for your help…”

“Oh! How rude of me.” He quickly took a step closer and offered his hand. No ring. “Lou Tomlinson, attorney-at-law.”

I raised a freshly-groomed eyebrow. “An attorney, huh? Impressive.” Trying not to smirk at the way he visibly turned into melted butter, I returned his manners. “Evangeline du Pont. The pleasure’s all mine.”

Sauntering toward the elevator, I looked over my shoulder as I waited for it to arrive. “I do hope we meet again, Mr. Tomlinson.”

Seducing men was easy. Most of the time it was too easy, and that made my job infinitely easier. However, there were always the few that held out, immune to my parlor tricks and charms. Those were not the men I was used to dealing with, but like I could spot a cheater, I could spot a resister. Louis Tomlinson was a resister, and those types were no fun.

On Harry’s floor, I was instantly enveloped in a large-scale version of my own office. Everything was modern and geometric with clean lines and contrasting colors. The walls and doors were made of frosted glass, leaving only a silhouetted view of what went on behind them. A secretary with a tight bun and crisp blazer sat behind a massive desk and robotically offered me a smile as I stepped onto the floor—mahogany hardwood, naturally.

“How may I help you?”

“I have an appointment with Mr. Styles,” I repeated.

She spared a second to take me in, and I knew right then what I’d be dealing with. Not only would I have to compete with a basket case fiancée, but a jealous secretary-turned-mistress as well. “Can I have your name, please?”

“It should be under du Pont.”

Her dark eyes shot upward. “Evan?” I nodded, not bothering to bare teeth as I smiled. “Great, I’ll let Mr. Styles know you’ve arrived. There are refreshments available, so please help yourself.”

I ignored her hospitality and took a seat instead, refusing to pick up any of the Forbes magazines littered across the large glass coffee table. For a businesswoman—and a successful one at that—I had no interest in business. I didn’t care about stocks and exchanges and accounting reports, I simply cared about money. I cared about doing whatever I had to do to provide a comfortable income for the people I worked with.

Minutes turned into tens of minutes which turned into an hour. Harry’s secretary would eye me every now and then and mouth her apologies, assuring me someone would be right with me, but I knew her shtick. New York’s most successful businesses had to play up the customer service angle or they’d be prey to a company that did it better.

Finally, after Bunhead’s fifth apology, the forcefield otherwise known as Harry Styles emerged from a long hallway. He paused briefly to speak with his secretary who nodded in my direction. Just as Liam predicted, his entire demeanor shifted as he took me in. I wasn’t what he was expecting, which was probably a six-foot, clean-cut businessman just like himself. He was expecting competition, and I was more of that than he bargained for.

“I’m so terribly sorry for the wait.” He extended his hand and I offered mine, not at all surprised when he kissed it. “Harry Styles, CEO. Please, let’s talk in my office.”

The room in question was more of the same—all geometric lines and shades of gray. I didn’t know how he could stand having so little color, but I guess it doesn’t matter when all the desk was used for was a makeshift bed.

“Please, have a seat. May I offer you a drink?”

My professional facade kicked in immediately. I wasn’t here to admire the décor, I was here to bust a cheater. Technically I already had, but Genevieve was paying out the derriere for proof and my instincts alone never seemed to pay the bills. So I played it up, crossing my legs and batting my eyelashes. “Only if you’re paying.”

He chuckled. “I don’t pay for anything in this city, Miss—or is it Misses?—du Pont.”

“Evangeline is just fine,” I answered, ignoring his question.

He handed me a tumbler of whiskey, no ice. “I must admit, Evangeline, you weren’t what I was expecting.”

Smiling, I took a sip of the alcohol. “Aren’t you going to ask me why I’m here?”

He moved behind his desk but didn’t sit down. “Isn’t everyone here for financial advice?”

No, your secretary is here to get shagged after hours. “I suppose that’s a safe assumption to make.”

“I’ll be honest with you, Evangeline. I much prefer doing business in a more relaxed setting. Wouldn’t you agree that this office is much too stuffy?”

“I think it suits you perfectly.”

A smile crept onto his face slowly. Unlike Louis, Harry was not a resister. “And why is that?”

“You’re the third most wealthy businessman in Manhattan. I know businessmen, and they’re all stuffy.”

Planting his hands on his desk, he leaned forward. “Trust me, love, I’m no ordinary businessman.”

Bingo. As Harry turned to fix himself another drink, I shot Genevieve—who I’d put in my phone as Jen Daniels, just in case—a text. I’ll have what you asked for by the end of next week.