He wasn’t mine to look after. Not really.

I didn’t want him to feel like I was one more person invading his privacy. If he wanted space, I should respect that. We hardly knew each other and I was essentially his employee. It was fine to care about your clients, but what I was feeling crossed a line into psycho stalker territory.

I’d never checked the tabloids so much in my life, and the only update was an apology from the hospital and a promise to investigate.

The isolation made me hyper-aware of how few friends I had. I tried reaching out to Ophelia, but she was well-known for taking days to answer a text when she got focused on something else. Or someone else. I tried to read, but for the first time in my life couldn’t focus on any of the books I picked up. I even called my bridge partner, Leigh, to see if she wanted to hang out, but she was in Palm Springs with the girls.

He didn’t text, so neither did I. I told myself over and over again that we weren’t really in a relationship and he was just a client. I wasn’t going to make a client feel like I was prying into his personal life.

I bounced off the walls waiting for him to get back, obsessively reading through the script. I was grateful he’d managed to include me in the table read because this script needed some work. Alex and I could do all the work we wanted, but if the raw material was problematic, he wasn't going to be able to act his way around that. Working on the script kept me busy, but it didn’t help to distract me from Alex since I pictured him every time Lucas Steel spoke.

In a stunningly low moment, I fell asleep watching an Alex Chase movie.

Finally, the day of the table read arrived without any word from him, but since they hadn’t rescheduled, I assumed he must be back.

I was determined not to tell him I’d missed him, or how many times I’d picked up the phone to reach out, or that I’d worried about him since we’d been apart. I would not make a fool of myself by behaving like one of his besotted fans in front of the production team.

It was important to me that they got this film right and I had some serious concerns about the script. No one was going to take me seriously if they just saw me as Alex Chase’s girlfriend. This was also the first time I would be forced to interact with Max in a professional setting and I was nervous about that too.

I was Lady Elena, for fuck’s sake. Men bowed before me. I could handle a table read.

18

Alex

I hadn’t heard from Elena since the screening, and that shouldn’t have bothered me as much as it did. She didn’t owe me anything, but I thought she would’ve at least checked in while I was away. A text, a call, any sign that she gave a damn about me beyond this contract. But it had been crickets.