“I just don’t know what I’m going to do.” Henry took another drink, draining his glass. Was that his second or third? Juliet had lost track. It was hard enough pretending she was paying attention to him at all when all she wanted to do was jump back into her waiting car and head back home to Rome.
The smell of him on her skin had washed off in the shower, but she could still feel his touch lingering there. If he had intended to sabotage her attempts at convincing Henry that she was interested in
Thinking about all of the other places in the world he’d rather be than headed to the set to film movie number two in his ten part litany of horrible movies had given Rome something to do as he’d ridden in from the solace of his beautiful beach home back to the sound stage where he was all set to make a film about zombie unicorns. While his explanation about why he’d decided to make the awful robot movie had gotten him a lot of positive press, and left Henry trying to make excuses as to why he’d chosen that particular script, there wasn’t going to be any saving himself from whatever torrent of bad reviews this piece of shit movie resulted in. Not unless Juliet’s plan worked, and he was able to manage to crawl out from underneath this mess. He
Ella was up to her ears in work, putting out fires and making sure everything was ready for the Montage art show, which was coming up quickly. While having an alter ego to help her come out of her shell while she was in public was great, Juliet couldn’t do anything to help with the show itself. Great assistants had done a lot to move things along, but there were certain things she could only do herself, like decide where to move a few items that hadn’t fit in their initially planned location for one reason or another or find a priceless painting that had been mishandled by the airlines despite the artist taking all of the precautions necessary when sending it.
The second show from Montage, Inc. was an even larger success than the first one had been. It was clear, not only from the excessively large crowd, but also from the bids registering, that Juliet’s team had done a tremendous job securing pieces the art world was thrilled to have a chance to acquire and had invited the right people. While Juliet had expected there to be quite the turnout, she was shocked to see that nearly every single person of the five hundred or so that had received invitations was present and accounted for. Even more had been invited to make bids over the telephone or via the new app her team had created. She could see what each piece was going for, though it took a while to update so it wasn’t exact. Currently, it looked like the piece that had b
Finding Lloyd Sinders wasn’t difficult. A crowd of older businessmen formed around the man wherever he went. Despite the fact that Mr. Sinders didn’t go out much these days, or perhaps because of it, he always attracted a group of admirers who wanted to learn from him, to be associated with him. That was the case now, too. Rome watched for a few moments as Ella’s dad told a story, getting a few chuckles out of the others. He held a flute of champagne in one hand, which seemed out of place. Sinders was more of a hard liquor man, but since Juliet wasn’t serving whiskey at her art show, the current beverage was about the best Sinders could do.
Schmoozing the filthy rich wasn’t something even Juliet enjoyed (Ella despised it) but it was part of her job as owner and chief executive officer of Montage, so she put her head down and did it. So far, it had made her a lot of money. After her first show, months earlier, she didn’t think it was possible to bring in much more revenue at one event, but she’d been very wrong. Even without the Vinune, she was going to make three times more money than she had at the first show, in profits alone. She was sitting in a good position to be able to buy Henry’s entire company outright if she wanted to.
Walking away from his wife when she clearly wanted to talk to him wasn’t the easiest thing to do, but Rome knew it was more important for Juliet to speak to Henry at the moment. She could talk to him later--at home. Besides, he wasn’t sure he wanted to speak to her considering what he’d done. The bottom line was, they’d gotten what they wanted. Or, they would, as soon as Sinders sent him the finalized contract.He stood in the back of the gallery, speaking to actress Chrissy Indiana, not hearing a damn word she was saying, despite the fact that
“Well, tell me all about it!” Fae insisted as Ella came into her room at the nursing home and settled onto the couch. She had two cups of tea ready on a silver server. Ella wondered how she’d managed that without a kitchen but figured Fae had her ways. The staff absolutely adored her, for good reason. “Did you have a nice time?”Ella smiled at her, slightly amused that she was most concerned about whether or not Ella had had a pleasant experience. She honestly couldn’t say that she had, but she’d choose her words carefully for
Rome walked into the sound stage building, dreading every step he took closer to another day of pretending to chase around unicorns and annihilate them. Drew’s acting was almost as atrocious as the script. The little girl wasn’t bad to work with, but she could only be there for a few hours each day. He spent most of his time listening to Guy argue with the set construction team, hating his life, and praying that the lawyers would hurry up and process the sale of his contract from Henry to Lloyd. It had been two weeks since the Montage show, and so far, nothing had changed, even though he’d only given Lloyd one week to get it done initially. Every day, he walked past the Vinune, wrapped and stored in his living room so that if and when the sale went through, he