She wasn’t going to make this easy for him. The way she whispered her words, the promises she made, the way her fingers seemed to dance about her body and the white tablecloth…Leo could barely stand it. Everything in him longed for her. But everything in him also kept his mind focused on the person who was not in the room with him: Bailey.
Layana took his silence as an opportunity as she repeated her request for one last romp again. “If you want me to go away, you’ll make love to me right here, right now.”
“Why in hell would I ever —”
“Stop, Leo!” Layana stepped towards him refusing to hear his denial. “I don’t think you understand. You can’t refuse me, and not only because you wanna stay true to that tramp. It’s because you can’t resist me.” Layana spun her body around, leaning her perfectly curved backside into his. One of her hands caressed his leg while the other reached up to find his neck and chest. Slowly, she began to rock back and forth as she continued, “No one will let you fuck her like you do me. No one will let you do whatever you want to her. Face it, Leo, you want this as much as I do.” Her hand shifted to his jean’s button and zipper, slowly lowering it in the rhythm of her hips.
Leo took in three deep breaths and then spun her around. Her feet caught tangled with his as he pushed her down to the table—her head just barely missing the glassware and china plates. The table creaked loudly with their weight, but held steady.
“Oh, Lionheart…you haven’t taken me like this in a long time. Remember Los Angeles?” She laughed wickedly to herself as she lifted one of her legs to hook around his thigh.
Leo looked down on the woman. She wasn’t Bailey. And she was wrong. There was nothing about her with her mindless and petty games, her fake breasts, her perfectly manufactured looks that interested him. His voice lowered as he sternly commanded, “Let go of me.” She laughed again, this time using her arms to pull his head and neck closer by the fabric of his collar. Her lips grazed his as he once again said, “Let go of me.”
But Layana was relentless. Her face contorted lustfully as she dived her free hand down to his unbuttoned pants and began to stroke. Leo grabbed it, this time pinning her arms above her head. A glass near her head shattered as it fell to the floor. But she continued to giggle as she exclaimed, “Yes! Rough! Punish me!”
Leo released her quickly and took five steps back. He buttoned up his pants as he shouted at her, “I don’t care what the hell you plan on doing, Layana. Tell your husband or not—I don’t give a shit. But this, this thing between us, it’s not happening. Ever!”
She sat up slowly, adjusting the thin strap on her dress, “Are you serious?” He turned away from her as he looked for a place to leave some cash for the wait staff left to deal with the mess of the room. She suddenly ran to him, grabbing his arm, yanking him downwards towards him.
“GET OFF ME!” He screamed at her. “What is wrong with you? What do I need to do to get you out of my life?” His roar shook her as he stood straight to tower over her. “I will never, ever be with you. Ever. Trash like you don’t deserve it.”
She released herself, walking back to the torn apart table. Sitting, she took a long sip from the glass that still contained a few remaining drops of the wine. He watched her try to compose herself before getting the nerve up to say, “Whatever you need to do, you do. You want hush money or something, call Jonathan.” He opened his wallet and removed a small wad of bills. Without counting, he tossed them on one of the open tables. “Money’s here. You can take it all. Leave some for the waiter.”
He watched her take the last sip of the wine and then lift her arm swiftly above her head. The wine glass went flying as Leo ducked behind the room’s door, slamming it in the process. He could hear it shatter into pieces while Layana sobbed and shouted incoherently in the background.
Leo looked around to see who had witnessed or overheard their fight, but the surrounding hallway was as empty as when he had entered. He readjusted his shirt collar and sleeve and smoothed out his hair. As he looked down at his hands, he noticed how they still trembled from the anger and frustration. Still, he remembered what his trainer told him: control. He needed to control his strength.
The walk to the lobby felt like an eternity. Each step was heavier than the next. As people came into view, each nasty look from a passerby felt like daggers, each smile looked as if they were in the know, that they had been privy to everything that had happened to two former lovers.
When he finally scoped out his agent from the small crowd, he had felt as if the world had fallen upon him. Jonathan was draped over a silk lounge chair, his head buried in the business section of the Chicago Times. As Leo approached, he gently folded the paper up and stood quickly. His eyes darted side to side to evaluate the positions of the guests standing at the check-in counter and the staff idling waiting for work. “Leo, man! How are you doing? How is life?” Jonathan shouted jovially as he outstretched his arms for a quick embrace and a pat on the back. Leo couldn’t muster a smile, nor fake enthusiasm. His body remained stiff as Jonathan pulled him in to say, “Just play along. The car’s parked in the front. I couldn’t arrange a back door exit.”
He pulled away and gestured for Leo to join him at the small seating area near the fireplace. Despite having some level or privacy, he still loudly exclaimed, “That’s great, kid! That’s so good to hear.”
Leo couldn’t bother to pay attention. He was busy watching Layana make her own covert exit through the front. She, too, yanked at her clothing and fixed the strands of hair that had fallen out of place. Her heels clicked loudly on the tile floor as she weeded through the young male staff gawking at her every move. Even as she walked outside, Leo could see the flashing bulbs appear out of nowhere.
“Jonathan, what the hell is that?” He pointed towards the window.
His agent leaned in low, not wanting to be heard, “It’s the press. They’re here for some pop star staying at the hotel.” He turned his head towards the scene outside, “But by the looks of it, they're getting a bit more star power than they bargained for.”
“You do know that as soon as I step foot outside, they're gonna pin me with her. I can’t walk out there!” Leo was panicked. He had already broken one of his new rules. He had lost control on Layana.
“You settled it right? She’s not gonna talk?” Jonathan wasn’t sure what to expect. Part of him knew that Leo would do anything to protect his reputation. But he also knew Layana wasn’t an easy one to do business with.
“Not exactly.” He watched as Jonathan’s face turned to terror. He stood up, attempting to look above the frosted glass to see what the paparazzi were doing. Leo placed his head in his hands as he barked, “Sit down, Jon! Don’t make this worse.”
“Worse? How could it possibly be any fucking worse?” He nervously began itching his head as he asked, “What happened in there?”
“She wanted me to cheat on Bailey. I couldn’t do it. And when I told her no, she got pissed and threw a glass at me.” He could see Jonathan slowly combusting with each word. He tried to backpedal, “I tried to pay her off! I left her that money. I don’t know if she took it or not.”
“What the fuck happened to giving her whatever she wanted? Come on, Leo!” Jonathan wasn’t even trying to hold it in. Nor did he mind that the security staff had begun to take notice of the commotion he was making. “This is your career! This is my career! You wanna be good to that girl and her mom? You get that bitch to not talk to the fucking press, goddammit!”
Leo stood, taking him by the arm, and then yanking him down to the seat once more. By now, the entire hotel lobby had perked up. There wasn’t an eye not trained on the two men fighting in the fireside seating area. “You need to calm down. Jesus…” Leo tried to think of things to say as he pulled out his cellphone. It had been buzzing against his leg since he had walked out of the restaurant's back room. An unknown number popped up on the screen. A notification blinking red said the same line had attempted to reach him ten times in the last hour and had left several voice mails.
“... I can’t believe you're giving up your passion, your abilities, the money!” Jonathan continued to ramble on loudly about Leo’s mistake. But his client ignored him, holding up a hand to get him to stop.
He pressed the phone to his ear as he struggled to hear the last of the three voice mail left for him. A humorless male voice greeted him, “This message is for Leo Connelly. This is Police Chief Benjamin Wilson. We need you to call us back immediately. It concerns a member of your security team and a missing person report.”
He pressed play on a second voicemail from another number. A nasal voice sounded over the line. “Mr. Connelly, this is Margaret from MCA Securities. I’m calling you with a code 112. Please call us back immediately regarding an urgent matter with Dan Lawrence and his protectee. There has been an incident that requires your attention. Again, please call us back as soon as possible.”
Leo’s face went white as he stood unmoving. His mind raced as he put pieces together. Code 112 meant that there was a guard down—a guard dead. Not only that, but the guard the woman mentioned was the man assigned to watch and escort Bailey and Lily. He replayed the voice mail again, this time listening in for any clue of what had happened to Bailey. “Dan Lawrence AND HIS PROTECTEE.” Her voice sounded as panicked as he was.
Jonathan watched as Leo began to sweat. His change was sudden, like death come too soon. He stopped his rant to ask, “What was that? What’s going on?”
“Get up.” Leo threw his phone in his pocket and checked for his wallet. He motioned towards one of the bellhops who had been staring at him since he walked in. The boy ran to him, eager to be of service. Leo instructed, “Tell concierge I need a car. I don’t care what it is. Just have it outside in one minute. Also, have security try to get the photographers back. Got it?” The teen nodded stiffly and ran off towards his bosses.
Jonathan remained in place, unsure of what to make of the new situation, “What? What’s going on Leo?”
“Get up…” Jonathan failed to move fast enough for him. Instead, Leo yelled, “GET UP!” as he grabbed his agent by the suit collar and brought him to standing. Taking his arm, he forcibly walked him out of the hotel lobby to where press greeted him instantly. The flashes temporarily blinded him as he struggled to see his way past the swarm. Voices shouted at him broken fragments of a story he did not already know:
“Leo! Leo! Do you have any comment about your girlfriend’s disappearance?”
“Do you know who did this? What are the police saying?”
“Leo, why the fuck were you meeting with Layana? Does she know something about Bailey Reed?”
“How’s the little girl? Is it true that she's dead?”
“Leo, who do you think did this?”
Leo spun around, facing the reporters. The street went silent as they waited for the man to speak. He reached down, grabbing the first microphone he could get. Time passed as he searched for anything, something to say. Flashbulbs continued to sporadically chime in the afternoon sun.
Moments passed when Jonathan reached up and whispered behind a protective hand, “We've gotta go, Leo. Don’t do this right now. Remember, this is about control.”
Leo nodded and returned his attention to the press. A man in a suit yelled at him, “Did you have anything to do with Bailey Reed’s disappearance?”
The fire in Leo’s eyes cracked and sparked. An ignition was turned. Leo reached down to the man, grabbing his large and expensive camera from his neck. With no words spoken, he hurled the equipment down the street watching it satisfied as it crumbled into tiny specks on the pavement.
No one moved. No one breathed. Instead their eyes and camera lenses followed Leo as he then took the microphone still in his hands and began bending it with all of his strengths. It split with a loud crack, the wires of its inside bursting from the pressure. He leaned down to the television camera next to him. “GET THE FUCK OUT OF MY WAY!” he screamed into the lens.
The sea of reporters parted, giving him and Jonathan space to enter the town car the concierge had called. The two men silently sat in the backseat as they waited for the burst of blinding lights and the shrill yells to begin. The driver just had seconds before the members of the press descended upon the getaway vehicle.