“Ha. You haven’t met Elena. I assure you, she’s capable of hurting me.”

In more ways than one if I didn’t shut the unprofessional feelings down.

Zane grinned. “So introduce us. Hell, bring her to dinner and let Mom meet her too.”

“We’ll see how it goes when I get back…”

17

Elena

I couldn’t sleep after Alex dropped me at home after the film screening. It had been such a roller coaster of a night between the film and seeing Max and then seeing Alex so vulnerable. I didn’t want to feel sorry for him, was so used to mocking the idea of “poor you, you’re so rich and famous.”

The mob who had assembled outside the venue waiting in the off chance they got to see him was eye-opening. Where the hell did people get that kind of energy and how could I get some?

There had been an uncomfortable side to the excitement too. I saw more than one woman touch his chest or squeeze his arms, and one drunk-looking lady grabbed his ass when he turned to take a picture with someone. He was unfazed by it, making me wonder if he was good at pretending or if it really didn’t bother him. As far as I was concerned, sexual harassment was sexual harassment regardless of the gender of the harasser. It had made me want to step in to defend him.

People seemed to think he was public property and they were entitled to him. It reminded me of my clients in some ways. Because my services were for sale, some of them assumed all of me was for sale. But there weren’t millions of them and they had a vested interest in my privacy since they had more to lose than I did if anything got out.

Alex had obviously picked up on the weird dynamic between Max and me. I’d hoped it wouldn’t come up, but since he asked point blank, I’d been forced to lie.

It didn’t really matter if Alex knew Max used to be my client, but I wasn’t going to be the one to tell him. It had been a deeply humiliating experience having to use the panic button. I’d been so powerless that security had to intervene and afterward was so shaken that someone else had to drive me home. Telling him the story would’ve meant reliving all of that. I’d also technically signed an NDA. As though that wasn’t enough, I took the ethical responsibility of not talking about my clients outside of the immediate dungeon family very seriously.

I’d promised not to lie to Alex, but I’d also promised never to talk about my clients. My professional integrity trumped a harmless lie.

I had to throw my phone across the room to get to sleep because I couldn’t stop googling Alex. I spent the next two days torn between waiting for him to text and typing then deleting dozens of messages letting him know I was thinking of him and making sure he was taking care of himself.