The Idea of You: A Novel
The Idea of You: los angeles

On the Wednesday of the second week of September, Daniel and I attended Windwood’s Eighth Grade Back-to-School Night. All summer our exchanges had been civil, perfunctory, business as usual. But there was something about him that evening that I could not quite put my finger on. He was oddly charming, attentive. After the welcome and the walk-through and the mediocre coffee, he insisted on escorting me back to the parking lot. And as we neared my car, he came out with it. “Are you seeing someone?”

“What?”

“I don’t know. You just seem happy.”

“I can’t just be happy? I have to be seeing someone?”

“That’s not what I said.” He smiled.

I watched him wave to Rose’s parents across the lot. So polished, controlled, Hollywood. The very qualities that had drawn me in that first year of grad school. He, the cocky Columbia Law student with the intense eyes and perfect pedigree. He, who had wooed me over Viennese coffee at the Hungarian Pastry Shop on Amsterdam. How quickly I’d fallen.

“Do you remember Kip Brooker?” He turned back to me. “He left Irell a few years back to go in-house at Universal? I had lunch with him the other day … His wife’s family has a place in the Hamptons. They summer in Sag Harbor every year. He told me he could have sworn he saw you there, at a restaurant, with one of those guys from August Moon. Like on a date. Which seems crazy, because…” He shook his head then, laughing. “That would just be crazy, right? For a million reasons that would be crazy.”

I smiled at that, deflecting. “Is there something you want to ask me, Daniel?”

“I thought I already did.”

“He’s a client.”

He stopped. He was not expecting confirmation. “A client?”

I nodded, watching him process. His poker face failing him.

“Is that his story or yours? Never mind. Sorry. None of my business. Get home safe,” he said, tapping the side of the Range Rover.

I’d already started the car and was adjusting my belt when he turned back and indicated for me to roll down the window.

“That’s not entirely true.” His expression was stern. “I’m going to take your word for it. But on the off chance you’re lying, I want to point out that your having any kind of relationship with this kid would likely kill Isabelle.”

“Duly noted,” I said, and closed the window.

*   *   *

Hayes arrived at my doorstep that Friday. In the weeks that had lapsed since our Hamptons tryst, August Moon had completed recording their album in New York. They’d taped a bunch of footage for their upcoming documentary in London. They’d performed on a popular TV show in Germany and accepted an MTV Video Music Award via satellite because they were tied up recording a charity single at home for the BBC. But Isabelle’s return from camp and the start of the new school year made it so I could not join him for any of the above. And so when Hayes booked a ticket to visit his first free weekend, I was thrilled. That it coincided with the opening of our September show made it all the more satisfying. Hayes had come to L.A. for me.

I hugged him for a very long time. And the feeling I had in his arms—protected, safe—was one I could not remember having felt in a while.

“One would think that you’d missed me,” he laughed, his face buried in my hair.

“Just a little.”

“Are you going to invite me in? Or are the Backstreet Boys still here?”

“Actually, the Monkees,” I laughed, leading him inside.

Isabelle was at school, and then fencing. We were alone.

“So, this is home?”

“This is home.” It was strange to have him in my space, his large frame filling the threshold. I had a flash of me and Isabelle dragging in our Christmas tree the previous winter and fretting it would not fit through the door.

Hayes made his way through the entry into the great room and its walls of glass. The Palisades, the Pacific, and points south dominating the view. Catalina rising like a purple phoenix at the horizon. “Bloody hell. I am truly speechless. You live here? You wake up to this every day?”

“Every day.”

“How do you manage to leave this paradise?” His eyes were green in the light. Oh, pretty, pretty boy.

“It isn’t easy.”

“No, I don’t imagine it is.” He turned his attention to the interiors, surveying the space: the Finn Juhl coffee table and Herman Miller Tuxedo sofa in the living room, the Arne Vodder table and Hans Wegner credenza in the dining area off to the left. “Is this your midcentury furniture?”

I nodded. “You know midcentury furniture?”

“I know you like it.”

“How do you know that?”

“You told me”—he smiled—“in Las Vegas.”

“You remember that?”

“I remember everything … especially the things you like.”

I might have blushed then.

“Did you paint all these?” His attention had turned to the myriad watercolors I had mounted and framed salon-style on the far wall.

“Most. A couple are Isabelle’s.”

He made his way across the room to better inspect them. A mélange of landscapes and figures and still lifes. Moments I thought worth capturing. “These are beautiful, Solène. Truly.”

“Thank you.”

“I want one. Have you sold any?”

“No,” I laughed. “It’s just a hobby. I don’t sell them.”

“I still want one. Make me one.”

“Make you a watercolor? I don’t take commissions, Hayes. I do it for myself.”

He did not seem altogether satisfied with that response, but he let it go and we continued on our tour. Down the corridor with the collection of mounted family photos. Most of Isabelle, a few of younger versions of me. We’d had to rearrange them all when we removed the ones with Daniel. It was not a painless process.

Hayes stopped before a black-and-white self-portrait I’d taken my senior year at Buckingham Browne & Nichols, when I was morphing from would-be ballerina to artsy Euro prep stage. An interesting phase, to be sure: long thick hair, oversized leather jacket, angst.

He reached out to touch the frame. “How old are you here?”

“Seventeen.”

“Seventeen,” he repeated, his finger tracing over the glass. “This. Fucking. Mouth.”

I smiled up at him.

“I dream about your mouth.”

“I dream about your dick. We’re even.”

He laughed, throwing back his head. “You can’t just say things like that to me. And then … Okay, hurry up and show me the rest of the house.”

We proceeded down the corridor, Hayes pausing at a photograph of me dancing with the Boston Ballet School, back when classes six days a week did not seem so insane. “How old?”

“Fifteen.”

“Wow.”

And then coming to a complete standstill before a shot of me, seven months pregnant with Isabelle, on the beach in Kona. He was silent as he pulled me into him, my back against his chest, his chin on my shoulder. We remained like that for a few moments, neither of us speaking, until he moved his hand over my belly, holding it there.

“You are so beautiful.”

“Don’t.” I pushed his hand away. “Don’t do that.”

“Oh-kay … What … what am I doing?”

“Don’t do the baby-fantasy thing with me.”

“Is that what I was doing?” He sounded so confused I almost felt sorry for him.

“That’s where it was heading.”

“Oh-kay,” he repeated. “I’m sorry.”

He dropped it, which was wise. Because if I allowed myself to entertain any of the numerous paths I thought he might be taking in his head, I most likely would have asked him to leave and not ever come back. I could not stomach the weight of that just yet. The idea that with us there could be no happy ending.

Our tour continued: my office, the guest room, Isabelle’s bedroom. My daughter was going through a Hollywood Regency phase with her fuzzy throw pillows and ornate lighting fixtures. It was all white lacquer and fuchsia with metallic accents and Moroccan poufs.

“I know this is surprising, but I haven’t been in many thirteen-year-old girls’ rooms,” Hayes said, nosing around.

“That’s probably a good thing.”

Isabelle had a couple of framed graphic prints on her wall, pretty pink posters that read “For Like Ever” and “Keep Calm and Carry On.” But above her desk, tacked up to the busy bulletin board, were no fewer than half a dozen pics of August Moon and the band’s calendar. Her photo from the meet-and-greet was sitting on her night table.

Hayes spotted it, exhaling deeply.

“Weird, right?”

He nodded and then turned to me. “We’ve fucked up royally, haven’t we?”

“Yeah. So now you know what I’m dealing with.”

“I’m sorry. It’s slightly different from this perspective.”

“You think?”

“Yeah.” He plopped himself down on the bed and lay back, his head on the fuzzy pink pillows. “Fuck. This is going to be ugly.”

“Yes, it is.”

“She’ll be there tomorrow evening? What are we telling her?”

“That you’re my client. That you’re a friend. That’s it.”

“She’s going to buy that?”

“Let’s hope so.” Daniel’s words were weighing on me.

Hayes was quiet for a second, his eyes searching mine. “Why haven’t you told her, Solène? You’re feeling guilty…”

I said nothing. Guilt did not scratch the surface.

“Are you trying to protect her? Or are you protecting yourself?”

“Both of us, maybe.”

The corner of his mouth curled slightly, more sorrow than smile. “Do you feel like if you just wait long enough this will be over, and you’ll get away with not saying anything at all?”

“I suppose that’s a possibility, isn’t it?”

He held my gaze, serious. “I’m still very much here…”

“So it appears…”

“Come here,” he said, tapping the duvet beside him.

My expression was beyond incredulous. There was not a chance in hell I was going to lie on Isabelle’s bed with Hayes. “Absolutely not.”

“Sorry.” He sat up. “I suppose that’s awkward.”

The doorbell rang. I had not been expecting anyone. “All of it’s awkward. I’ll be back in a sec.”

There was a fine art delivery service at the gate. I recognized them from the gallery. I had not arranged to have anything shipped, but Marchand Raphel was on the work order, so I signed for the package and led the two handlers in. The guys carefully positioned the large piece against one of the walls in the living room and cut away the cardboard packaging at my request. Josephine’s name was on the attached paperwork, but when the tableau was finally revealed my heart leapt. There, in my living room, was Ailynne Cho’s Unclose Me.

I began to shake.

“Hayes!”

It took him a moment to appear from the corridor, an impish grin on his face.

“Did you do this? Is this from you?”

“You said it was the one piece you loved.”

I nodded, and then, unexpectedly, I began to cry.

Hayes saw the embarrassed handlers to the door, and then returned to me, holding me in his arms. “Shhh.” He was kissing the side of my face. “It’s just art, Solène,” he teased.

I laughed. Through the tears and the waves of emotion and the realization that what he’d done was huge, I laughed.

“Thank you. You didn’t have to do this.”

“I know that. But I couldn’t give up the opportunity to make you feel—what was it you said?—‘everything.’”

My heart was melting. “You.”

“Me?”

“This is why they love you, isn’t it?”

“Who?”

“Everyone.”

He smiled. “Yes, everyone.”

I stood there for some time, losing myself in the seductive image. The garden, the woman, the light. The rush, the idea that it was mine. The realization: this was what it was like to be high, on art.

Hayes made his way back to the walls of glass to admire the vista. The sun was beginning to lower, casting the room in an apricot light. “Are you happy?”

“I think you know the answer to that.”

“Good,” he said. His eyes were still on the water, but I’d heard the change in his voice.

“When do you have to pick up Isabelle?”

“Six. We have a while.”

I watched him stroll across the room.

“Is this a midcentury dining table?” he asked, his finger running along the lines of the oblong Arne Vodder. I’d got it in the divorce—the furniture, the house. Daniel got the cottage on the Vineyard. And Eva.

“It is.”

“It’s nice,” he said.

“Glad you like it.” I made my way to him at the table’s head, where he was once again gazing out at the view: the lawn, the sky, the sea, the dipping sun.

Hayes reached for my hand, and then, without warning, twisted my arm, turning me away from him. He did not speak, letting my wrist loose and placing his palm firmly at the center of my back, folding me until I was bent completely over the table, the rosewood smooth and cool against my cheek.

He took his time.

His hands: climbing the sides of my thighs, lifting my skirt, peeling off my underwear. I could hear him unfastening his belt, unzipping his jeans, and then the maddening lull. My eyes were on the Cho piece, the colors blurring, evocative, while I anticipated the crinkle of the wrapper. It did not come. I felt him against me suddenly: hot, swollen.

“You’re not wearing a condom.”

“I’m not.”

I lifted my head to look back at him, but did not speak.

“I made a choice,” he said. His words sat in the air, heavy.

I didn’t stop him when he slid it in. Thick, smooth, deep. The feel of him, unadorned, raw, sent me spinning. Hayes, filling me. He pulled out for a moment and waited, teasing, before gliding it back in, slow. Deeper. And then withdrawing again.

The third time he did it, he spoke, low, “Do you want me to put one on?”

“No.”

“You sure?”

I could feel him at the opening, tempting. Fuck. Me.

“Yes.”

“Good,” he said, and then drove his dick in so hard and so fast, I bruised my cheekbone against the table.

In the middle of it—with his hands gripping my hips and the sound of his balls slapping up against my skin—I had the thought that perhaps this table had experienced this before. Some Danish 1950s housewife, her pale thighs banging along the smooth edge, making the most of the Scandinavian design, with a casserole in the oven and the kids upstairs in the playroom.

Hayes’s hand was in my hair, yanking my head up from the table. His breath hot on my neck, his teeth on my shoulder, his dick so deep it hurt. His arm wrapped around my ribs then, his fingers grabbing me through my blouse. And just the sight of the veins in his forearm, his watch, his rings, the size of his hand, was enough. I was done.

After, when he’d collapsed atop me and I was once again lying with my face on the cool rosewood, so close I could count the striations in the buffed grain, I had the realization: this was what it was like to be fucked, on art.

*   *   *

Joanna Garel was a Filipina model turned actress turned fine artist whose Pop Art–influenced pieces centered on Los Angeles beach culture. She’d created a series of iconic lifeguard towers in mixed media that was the basis of Sea Change, her first solo exhibition at Marchand Raphel. The turnout was impressive. Even before my boybander was added to the equation.

That night the gallery overflowed with Joanna’s photogenic multiracial family and model friends and an eclectic mix of our usual diverse clientele. And to me, it was the most lively, colorful crowd anywhere on our stretch of La Cienega. At some point early in the evening I hugged Lulit and thanked her again for birthing this idea. The desire to shake things up.

Hayes arrived to what I hoped was little commotion. I had told Isabelle that he was planning to attend, but to not set her mind on it. And yet still she spent countless hours on the phone with Georgia and Rose, scheming about what they were going to wear (jeans, not dresses) and how they were going to act (cultured, not crazy) and where they would all gather after for a full postmortem (Georgia’s for a sleepover, which I encouraged for obvious reasons).

I knew he was there before he’d made his presence known. I sensed it: atoms shifting, heightened excitement, a variation in the volume. People change when they’re around celebrities. First they become quiet and murmur among themselves. Then they talk louder as if they want to be overheard. They become bubbly and jovial and terribly witty. I’d seen it at Starbucks with Ben and Jen, and at the premiere for a film Daniel worked on with Will Smith. I’d seen it at SoulCycle and at yoga and Pilates. I’d seen it at Whole Foods. This kind of bizarre, forced “see, we’re just like you, our lives are just like yours” behavior. But I never imagined someone so close to me would inspire it.

“Mom, he’s here, he’s here, Hayes is here.” Isabelle found me in the kitchen, where I’d been instructing one of our servers.

“Did you say hi?”

“No, I didn’t say hi. He won’t know who I am. I can’t just go up to him and remind him I met him once, that’s so embarrassing. Please come and reintroduce us.”

“I’ll be right there,” I promised. If she’d had any idea that only yesterday he’d been lying on her bed, she would have died.

She led me to him, in the front room, where the crowd was thickening. Where chatter was loud and wine was being swilled and Georgia and Rose were lurking off to the side, trying to play it cool while waiting for their introduction. Lulit was showing him one of Joanna’s pieces: a bold lifeguard tower, shadowed by Ben-Day dots in sunset colors, rendered on a large slab of wood.

I caught his eye as I approached him, and the expression on his face was pure sex, and I knew we were not going to make it through the night without one of us fucking up.

“Hi.”

“Hi.” He smiled.

“You came.”

“I came.”

Lulit smiled knowingly. “I am going to leave you two alone, yes. I have people to flatter, art to sell. Hayes, can I get you a drink? Wine? Water?”

“No, thank you. I’m fine.”

“Well, if you need anything, don’t be shy. Although I’m sure this woman will take good care of you.”

“I don’t doubt she will.”

I leaned in to kiss him the second she stepped away, one of those double-sided French cheek kisses, which was something I’d never done with him before and which felt so awkward and foreign that we both started to laugh. But I could feel it: people watching him, watching us. Including the newly minted teenager just beyond my shoulder. The one who would later sleep at her friend’s house, completely oblivious to the fact that her mother was engaging in unspeakable acts with one-fifth of the world’s greatest boy band, just down the hall from her pink-and-white bedroom. Keep calm and carry on, indeed.

“Hayes, do you remember my daughter, Isabelle?”

“Isabelle. I believe I do.”

“Hi, Hayes.” Isabelle was divided between offering up the biggest smile of her life and hiding her braces. S~ᴇaʀᴄh the Find ɴøᴠel.nᴇt website on Gøøglᴇ to access chapters of novels early and in the highest quality.

“How have you been?” He hugged her, and she visibly turned to mush, her arms folding in at her sides, her hands not knowing quite where to go.

Oh, if she knew … If she knew …

“I can’t believe you’re here.”

“I’m here.” He placed his hand atop her head. “I think you’re taller. Are you taller?”

She nodded, beaming up at him.

Something fluttered in my chest. Something like betrayal.

“And you brought your friends?” Hayes continued, sticking to the script.

Rose and Georgia had sidled up to us. I reintroduced them to their idol and watched as they fawned.

“Congratulations on your VMA,” Georgia blurted.

“We were really hoping you would perform,” Rose chimed in, flicking her red hair over her shoulder. According to Isabelle, she’d had it blown out earlier that day, signifying just what a big deal this evening was.

“They teased us and made us think you were going to be there, but you weren’t really there, so it was just a whole lot of Miley.”

“Ah, yes, Miley.” Hayes smiled.

“My mom doesn’t approve of that video,” Rose said. “She says she’s a bad influence and she’s putting ideas in our head.”

“Is that what Miley’s doing? Okay, then you should probably listen to your mum. And stay away from construction sites and such.”

“But it’s a great song,” Isabelle added.

“It is a great song.”

“Are you guys still recording your album?” Georgia asked. How they managed to know everything going on in these guys’ lives and still live their own was fascinating to me.

“We’ve just now finished it. They’re still doing some mixing, but we’ve done our bit.”

“I can’t wait to hear it.” Isabelle smiled, her hand hiding her mouth. The ring from Eva was twinkling on her middle finger. She had not taken it off since camp.

“I can’t wait for you to hear it.”

I took my cue when Georgia crossed her arms over her breasts (dear God, when had that happened?), cocked her head, and very seriously said, “So, Hayes, are you into contemporary art?”

I gathered this was all part of their “act cultured” plan and so I politely bowed out.

“I’ll be wandering about, should you have any questions,” I said. “If you can’t find me, check my office.”

He smiled, nodding. Rakish Hayes with his silk scarf, his gaggle of pubescent girls, his perfect hair, his fetching smile. “I will,” he mouthed. It was a promise.

Josephine had assembled a playlist for the opening, and Ed Sheeran’s blue-eyed alternative hip-hop acoustic soul pumped throughout the gallery. It was the perfect complement to Joanna’s serene pieces. Pop Art done in unexpected muted shades of sun, sea, and sand.

“Your boyfriend.” Lulit approached me in Gallery 2, the middle room. “Wow.”

“Please don’t call him that.”

“He’s killing me with the puppy dog eyes. The way they follow you around the room. What did you do to that poor boy?”

“I have no idea,” I said, waving off a server with a passing tray. “We just … click. It’s terrifying actually.” I turned my body into her and away from those surveying the art. “You know why he’s not drinking anything? Because he can’t.”

Lulit’s eyes widened, and we both started to laugh. “Oh, Solène. That’s bad.”

“Yes, I’m aware of that. I have no idea where this is going. I’m just enjoying the ride.”

“I bet you are … You are like the poster woman for reclaiming one’s sexuality.”

I laughed at that. “I didn’t know I’d disclaimed it.”

“I think it was lying dormant, and now it’s back in full force. Lest anyone think we women of a certain age were no longer sexually viable.”

“Yes.” I smiled. “Lest anyone think that.

“I’m going to give him a few more minutes and then I’m going to save him from the girls. And then I’ll get him to take some pictures, yes?”

“Yes.” She nodded, stroking her neck. Her hair was pulled back, and the thin straps of her dress accentuated her delicate bones. “Daniel is going to lose his mind.”

“Yes, well, Daniel fucked up, didn’t he?”

*   *   *

I was navigating the sea of bodies filling our space when I bumped into Josephine chatting up a guest. She stopped me, grabbing my elbow.

“Great show. Great turnout.”

“Yes, I’m very happy. You guys worked hard. Awesome DJ-ing, by the way.”

“I made sure not to put any August Moon on the mix.” She smiled.

“Probably wise.”

She introduced me to the guest she’d been chatting with, an early-thirties male with a man-bun and one of those lumbersexual beards. I did a quick check of the condition of his shoes and fingernails. These days, it was getting harder to tell who the potential buyers were.

The hipster excused himself to look at a piece, and Josephine leaned into me, furtively. “I assume you got your package.”

“I did. Thank you.”

“He wanted to surprise you. You have no idea how difficult it was to not mention it all this time. And the look of disappointment on your face when you realized it was sold…”

That Saturday night in July, at the Smoke; and Mirrors opening, I’d noticed a mark on our master list indicating the piece had been purchased. When I asked Josephine who the buyer was, she threw out some name I’d never heard.

“… I so wanted to tell you then.”

“I’m glad you didn’t.”

“So,” she said, sipping her Pellegrino, “I guess this means the Access Hollywood thing is true? I mean, you don’t have to say anything. But he’s here. And that piece was fourteen thousand dollars.”

“I know how much it was. Thank you.”

“And then that video in the Hamptons…”

I froze then. “What video?”

“TMZ. It’s not … It wasn’t a big deal. Just footage of him in an SUV with his bodyguard. And you’re in the back. You’re turned away from the camera. It’s fuzzy, and you can’t see your face, but it’s your hair, and I recognized your dress. The white one with all the little buttons up the back. I love that dress.”

I stood there for a moment, unable to speak. The idea that we, that I, had been caught. We weren’t even doing anything. And I felt guilty.

“No one’s mentioned it,” Josephine said eventually.

I nodded, slow. “I appreciate your discretion. Get the guy with a bun a drink. He may buy something.”

They had not moved very far. Although the number of guests who had gravitated to Hayes’s general vicinity had appeared to multiply, the girls were still surrounding him. They had positioned themselves strategically before SexWax, Joanna’s nod to Warhol’s Campbell’s Soup Cans. The canvas featured a brazen image of the popular surf wax with its iconic logo. “Mr. Zogs Sex Wax,” it said. “Quick Humps, The Best for Your Stick.” Lovely.

As I neared them I could see Rose tossing off a joke with her attitudinal stance, and Hayes laughing, and I feared where their conversation had turned.

“May I borrow him for a second?” My voice sounded off to me, the side effect of my worlds colliding. The revelation of TMZ. I just needed to get through the night.

“Hayes, I need to introduce you to someone. Ladies, I’ll bring him right back. Promise.”

Hayes excused himself graciously and followed me through the crowd.

“Sorry about the girls.”

“Oh, it’s fine. They’re very sweet. She’s very sweet, your daughter.”

“Yes,” I said. And then: “I hope you’ll remember that when we’re breaking her heart.”

“Oh bollocks!” he said, which actually made me smile. “Very much looking forward to that. All right, so to whom am I being introduced?”

“No one. I just wanted you to myself for a little bit.”

“Ooo, that sounds naughty.”

We made our way into Gallery 2, which was marginally less crowded. I could see the artist, Joanna, across the way, radiant and ebullient, a vision in a black minidress. She was laughing loudly, the crowd in her hand.

“Okay.” My attention returned to the boy a half step behind me. “Just look very serious and act like we’re talking about art.”

“Can we talk about this dress?” He smiled.

“No.”

“Can we talk about your arse in this dress? Because that’s kind of like art.”

I laughed. “No, definitely not.” I stopped him in front of one of the larger pieces. Low Tide at No. 24, acrylic on linen. “I want you to act like you really like this.”

Hayes’s eyes scanned the print. “Oh, I do quite like it.”

“Even better. Act like you’re interested in purchasing it. I’m going to go to my office and return with some information on the piece, and then you are going to follow me into my office, as if you’re planning to buy it.”

He nodded, slowly. “Oh-kay. I see you’ve thought this through.”

Hayes cocked his head then, eyeing me closely. “What happened to your face?” His hand gestured toward my cheekbone.

I stood there, staring at him, looking for signs of recognition, but nothing was registering. “Really? The table.”

His eyes widened and his jaw dropped, and I wasn’t sure if he was going to laugh or cry. “Oh, Sol.” He’d never called me that before. “Why didn’t you say something?”

“It’s okay. I’m fine.”

“No, it’s not okay. I’m sorry.” He leaned in as if to kiss it.

“Don’t.”

“I’m sorry,” he repeated. “No more tables. Promise.”

“I liked the table,” I said, and then turned and walked away.

*   *   *

Minutes later we were in my office, the door securely locked.

“Now can we discuss this dress?” He did not waste time, his hands moving over the material, my waist, my hips, my ass.

It was a clingy jersey halter dress in smoke gray. Paired with my four-inch black Alaïa Bombe “fuck me” sandals with the embellished ankle strap. He did not stand a chance.

“What is it you wanted to say about it?”

“It’s very … nice,” he said, lowering his mouth to mine, his hand traveling up over my abdomen and reaching in the top of the halter.

“I did not bring you in here to do this.”

“Didn’t you?”

“No. I just wanted to smell you.”

“Really?” He smiled. “Just smell me? That’s all?” His mouth was on my breast. I could hear voices outside the door. Ed Sheeran: “Don’t.”

“You. Are like a fucking drug. Hayes Campbell.”

He pulled away after a minute and stepped back, smiling like the Cheshire cat. “Go ahead. Smell me, then.”

I took the opportunity to inhale him. His neck, his throat, his ridiculous silk scarf. I reached into his perpetually unbuttoned shirt and ran my hands over his smooth chest, his perfect erect nipples. I could live here.

“I have gum,” he said.

“Gum, but no condoms.”

He smiled then, sheepishly. “I have condoms.”

“You have condoms here?”

He nodded.

“Yesterday, then … Were you just testing me?”

“I was enjoying you.”

It hit me intensely, the memory of it. The feel of him.

There was laughter in the corridor. Familiar. It might have been Matt.

He leaned into me then and whispered in my ear. “Can I just bend you over this desk, please? For like a second?”

It was not like him to ask.

I looked at him as if he were crazy. And then I heard myself say: “You have two minutes.”

“I can be done in two minutes.” He smiled.

“Do not get anything on my dress.”

“Won’t. Promise.”

*   *   *

Six minutes later we were back out in the gallery and no one was the wiser. At least I wanted to believe that.

“Will you do me a huge favor?” I asked him as we made our way into the crowd. “There’s a photographer here from Getty. I would love to get a shot of you with Joanna. But if you feel uncomfortable doing that, I completely understand.”

I hated asking him. I hated everything it insinuated. I did not want him to think for one second that I was taking advantage of our relationship and his celebrity to sell art.

“Solène.” He grabbed my wrist then, pulling me into him. “Why wouldn’t I do that for you?”

I turned to look at him, aware that he was touching me in this very public space. The boy who I had just let fuck me in the office.

“I came here for you, right?”

“You came here for me. You didn’t come here for Marchand Raphel.”

“I came here for you,” he repeated. “And last I checked, that was a huge part of you.”

*   *   *

We shot him along with Joanna and her husband before Low Tide at No. 24. Hayes insisted on there being a third person in the photograph because Joanna was “far too beautiful” for him to be pictured alone with her.

“They’ll assume I’m sleeping with her,” he had said when I questioned his reasoning.

“What? Who are ‘they’?”

“The press. The fans. The world.”

“She’s like twice your age, Hayes.”

“Yes, well, clearly that doesn’t stop me, right?” He smiled, salacious, chewing his gum. “Do you want to sell art, or do you want a scandal?”

Evidently, Hayes knew what he was doing.

Joanna’s husband was a chiseled Jamaican-Chinese model who had apparently spent some time at the gym and whose dimples rivaled those of Hayes. It only sweetened the photo op.

The photographer, Stephanie, posted a dozen photos of them on Getty Images the evening of the opening. By Sunday, they’d been picked up by numerous sources, including Hollywood Life and the Daily Mail, and by the following week they’d run in Us Weekly, People, Star, OK!, and Hello!. By then, our Sea Change show had long sold out. And the demand for Joanna’s work had far exceeded any of our expectations.

Sᴇarch the FindNovel.net website on G𝘰𝘰gle to access chapters of novels early and in the highest quality.