Page 29 (2/2)

"Yeah I get back Friday afternoon Spend the night withmyself I didn’t have any reason to be worried Most likely the thief would wipewas stolen at the airport"

"What?" she gasped "That’s awful Who does that?"

"Arseholes"

"Which bag was it? Your clothes?"

"No, my carry-on" I took a deep breath "My laptop,work related, but Sarathe SD card I used last night was in there and I haven’t cleared all of it yet My phone, too"

"Okay," she said on an exhale "Okay" I heard the sound of leather creaking and could i the rooht"

"NoJust a couple of shithead kids froather"

A few beats of silence filled the line and I remembered why I sucked at phone calls I wanted to see her, to read her expression and gauge whether she looked worried or relieved

"Well, odds are that they were just out for a quick buck, right?" she said finally "They’ll probably pawn the laptop and phone and toss the SD drive For all we know they’ve cleared the laptop and the card’s already sitting in the trash somewhere"

I presseda cloud of condensation on the glass "Christ, I love you I was very fking stressed-out about how you’d take this news"

"Just coet some new pictures, okay?"

I sht and the conference on Sunday were complete insanity I met several people in person I’d spoken with on the phone for s in New York later on to hammer out possible investments The pace of the weekend allowed me to keep my mind off the fact that I had no pictures of nad Sara for distraction

Monday I woke to a sky full of fog and croissant-and-coffee rooe as it was to ad I had to endure now that I’d lostand could make do without a laptop for the rest of the week, but aside froe a little from the constant work calls

And then I noticed that, beside the bed, the light onred Had I er had been turned off I lifted the receiver and hit the voice h the line: "Max Check the Post then call me ASAP We have fires to put out back ho in with another sureenish blue it felt like the ocean was filling up the air I ran beneath my umbrella to the subway station and barely made my 7:32 train

For once, there was a seat open and I dropped into it, wrapping upI had to get done today Sos before lunch, and then a lanced at the paper the lady next toat e Six was a picture of Max next to the headline, MAD MAX’S MANY MISTRESSES

"What?" I shot out involuntarily, leaning forward and not even caring that I was one hundred percent into the personal space of the girl reading the paper

"Can I see this?" I asked forcefully, and the woht be nuts

I quickly skimmed the story

Max Stella loves art and beautiful women It’s no surprise to any of us that his (worst-kept) secret is his penchant for co hio with a stunning blonde in a bar, new pictures have leaked of Max devouring an equally delicious brunette While most of the shots were, let’s just say, very too NSFW to reprint here, one face shot clearly identifies the venture capitalist’s "getting the business" partner as the Spanish starlet Maria de la Cruz, only days ago as the time staet it over with?

As I finished reading the story for probably the tenth ti fro in a daze out to the street

After walking the last dozen blocks to our building, I wasn’t even a little surprised to find Chloe standing insidehands, I held up the paper "I need you to explain what I’ossip? Who is this wo me her phone She had the browser open to Celebritini, which apparently had broken the story At the top of the page was a picture I’d seen weeks ago, on the rooftop with Max It was a picture of my hip, with his hand spread across my skin

Beside the picture of my obviously nad body was a picture of a woman’s face She had dark hair and I would have no way of knohat color her eyes were because her head was thrown back, eyes closed At the bottom of the photo was a hint of hair of the ainst her neck

She was very obviously having an orgasm

"This photo was on his phone" I scanned the story that outlined just how many women Max had pictures of "Apparently there were a lot of pictures of other women"

Chloe reached for the pair of scissors on e to re a deep breath "Well, at least that will save me from prison"

"What did Bennett say?"

Chloe flopped down on my couch "He said we should try to be circumspect That we didn’t know the entire story That there is a lot of bullshit in the press He re with everyone in the office before we hooked up"

I pointed to the picture of his Spanish Starlet "This story says this was the most recent of his photos leaked and that there were many others And the one of me, the other one, was taken earlier this summer So he’s been with her since then"

She didn’t respond I stared at the wall, considered putting e Max could put a fist through a wall I wouldn’t even leave a mark, and would probably end up with a broken hand

"I’ like an idiot"

"So don’t be Kick his ass"

"This is exactly why I didn’t want to get involved with anyone Because I want to see the best in so"

Chloe still didn’t say anything, just watched me from across the room Max didn’t even have a phone or a laptop I couldn’t call to find out anything

I wasn’t sure I wanted to I picked up my phone and powered it off

"What do we have on the calendar today?" I hit the spacebar on h my appointments I looked up at my friend

She reached over and turned offand then get your stuff We’re getting day-drunk"