I had no idea what was going on, nor did I want to know. I had too many problems of my own at the moment to want to be dragged into anyone else’s, so I decided to leave as quickly as possible. It wasn’t worth the few bucks I’d save on gas to wait for Barnett’s ride.I took a couple steps toward my car, determined to leave Barnett to handle his own marital problems, when I felt his arm wrap around my waist. He pulled me close to him. “Julia, this is my new girlfriend, Anna,” Barnett said, sticking his chin out proudly. My eyes widened, and my jaw dropped. I couldn’t even enjoy being so close to Barnett with the shock I was in. Tears welled at the edges of Julia’s eyes. Her cheeks turned bright red, and the color crept up the back of her neck to her ears. “How dare you!” she screamed. “You cannot treat me this way. I planned to give up my modeling career so we could start a family, and you found someone else?” “Oh, no,” I said. “I—”
I checked my social media accounts more often that day than I ever did. I wished I hadn’t. Everything, even my workout vlogs, were swarmed by Julia’s fans. They had nothing but abuse and death threats for me. Who does this b*tch think she is, getting in the middle of a happy couple like that? Just because she couldn’t keep her marriage together, she had to ruin someone else’s? Barnett’ll dump her in a week. A week? I give them a day! How did a fat cow like her manage to catch a 10 like Billionaire Barnett anyway? The comments went on and on. Some went so low as to suggest that I was only in the relationship for Barnett’s money; others went even lower and said that if Barnett were to pay someone to be with him, she’d be a lot hotter than me. Ouch. By the time I got off work, people had made compilations of my workouts with Julia’s runway videos. Titles included “Beauty vs. Beast”, “Fab vs. Fat”, and the eve
I muted the TV and answered the phone.“Hello?”“Hello, Anna? It’s Barnett.”“Hi, Barnett.” I paused. “You’re calling a bit late.”“Yeah, I know. I was just looking through my social media, and I wanted to apologize for everything.”My heart fluttered. “You don’t need to apologize.”“Don’t I?”He almost sounded angry. At me? At himself?“No. You didn’t do anything.”I waited for him to respond, but Barnett remained quiet. The silence between us stretched to an almost uncomfortable length when he finally spoke again.“Well, it’s getting late. I should probably let you get to sleep.”“Yeah. Thanks for calling.”“No problem. Good night, Anna.”“Good night, Barnett.”•* *When I fell asleep, Barnett filled my dreams.He stood in front of my bed. His eyes narrowed as they roved over my body. Chills ran up my spine at the hunger in his stare.I looked down to see that I wore nothing but a pink, lacy, see-through nightgown. My instinct was to cover myself from Barnett’s gaze. Instead, I foun
I scrambled into the car. My seatbelt was scarcely buckled before Barnett booked it out of the parking lot. The paparazzi soon disappeared from the rearview mirror.“Why are you here?” I asked as I settled into my seat. “Don’t you mind being photographed…with me?”Barnett didn’t look away from the road. “I don’t know why I’m here. In fact, I’m missing a very important morning.”I shriveled in my seat. “I’m sorry.”“Why apologize? You didn’t do anything wrong.”“I…”“You don’t always need to be concerned with other people’s feelings. Anna, your mistake was that you intruded on my dreams last night. So, when I woke up, I decided to come to you.”My eyes widened in surprise. “What-what did you say?”Barnett pursed his lips and didn’t respond. The muscles in his neck and jaw tightened.I didn’t dare to say anything else. Even if I wanted to pursue the question, I couldn’t. He obviously wasn’t in the mood to talk.I decided that I must have heard him wrong. We couldn’t have dreamt about ea
I heard Rebecca talking with one of Arthur’s dog walkers.“I can’t believe she actually finished putting that makeup on him,” the dog walker, John, said so loudly that I was obviously meant to hear it.“What was she going to do? She was running out of time.” Rebecca’s mocking tone cut me to my core.“It’s just so hideous. She shouldn’t have even kept it in rotation.”“We all make mistakes. None usually so big, mind you…”The two share a laugh. My first clenches as I resist the urge to punch them both.“I doubt that even Arthur’s favorite will get away with this one,” Rebecca continued.I should have known that they hated me for how gentle Arthur was with me, especially when the rest of them had been working for him for so much longer. It wasn’t my fault that I had made friends with my boss. Still, even I doubted that this seeming favoritism would get me out of trouble this time.“That’s enough.”I turned to see Arthur step out from behind the folding room divider. I died a little insi
I couldn’t believe I had heard him right at first. “What about who pretending to be my what?” I asked.“Me. Pretending to be your boyfriend. Do you need me to?” That time, I knew I had heard him right. “No, I don’t think so.” Arthur’s smile faltered, but it never disappeared. “Are you sure? With this whole Barnett and Julia situation, I figured that a fake boyfriend would be the perfect cover to throw the paparazzi and Julia’s crazy fans off your scent.” “That’s really sweet, but I couldn’t impose on you like that.” “Of course not. You’re too considerate to impose on anyone.” He took my hand in both of his and ran his thumb along the top of it. Heat flooded my cheeks. His smile seemed to grow wider. “I…It’s getting late, don’t you think?” Arthur didn’t answer. Instead, he merely called the waitress over and paid the check. I hoped that would be the last time we would mention the subject.•* * I ha
Now I knew Lily was just being delusional. I shook my head. “No, that’s not possible.” I was well aware of the ever-growing gap between me and socialites like Barnett and Julia. There was no way that Barnett would be interested in some upper-middle-class-if-her-divorce-settlement-paid-off worker like me. Not old money like him. There was the fact that Barnett and I might have had the same dream, but that didn’t mean anything. Honestly, I didn’t even know what his dream was about. It might not have even been the same as mine.Everyone was right. There was too much of a gap between us—age-wise, financially, and socially. “You don’t know him too well.” Lily smirked. “He never wastes a second on useless people.” “It’s probably because I brought him trouble.” I took a drink of my flavored water and shrugged. “I’m sorry, really.” “Trust me, sweetheart, you wouldn’t even have the chance to bring him trouble without his permission.” Lily
Inside the office, Julia appeared ready to pounce with her assistants barely restraining her, if they were even trying. Barnett, meanwhile, made certain to keep his desk firmly between him and his crazy ex. His eyes darted to a nearby corner, where a hulking figure stood in waiting.“Jack, can you please diffuse the situation?” Barnett asked, motioning towards Julia and her two assistants. Barnett’s bodyguard stepped forward, gently took Julia’s arm in one hand, and more forcefully grabbed the arms of her assistants with the other. “You can’t do this!” Julia exclaimed, trying to wrench her arm out of Jack’s grip. “Yes, I can.” Barnett turned on the web camera perched on top of his PC and directed it at Julia. He then stepped in front of the desk, in view of the camera. “I am sick of your games. You are nothing but a user and a witch. You only care about what I can do for you, not about me as a person. “You know what else? You haven’t gi