The Girlfriend Contract Read Online Free PDF Page A

4
     
    Sometime after midnight, Gwen and Beatrice left the party. Gwen's body still vibrated and throbbed to the beat of the music, and a deep, dull headache worked its unkind fingers behind her eyes. She carried her heels in one hand, the coolness of the floor against her sore, danced-out feet a relief.
    Beatrice kept looking at her cell the whole way home in the back of the cab, as though staring at it intensely might make one of the men call or text her right away.
    "So'd you have fun?" Beatrice asked distractedly, checking for the umpteenth time that her ringer was, in fact, on and at maximum volume. The glow of her cell was a constant companion.
    "Yes, actually," Gwen said, giving it some real thought, "Thanks for letting me tag along."
    "No problem, any time..." Beatrice said, not really paying any attention.
    They lapsed into silence, and that made Gwen think of Aiden again. Even this quiet here with Beatrice, the only sounds the hum of the engine and the tires on the road, didn't seem quite so nice as it had been with him.
    "Hey, B?" Gwen said.
    "Uh huh?"
    "Do you know anything about an Aiden...?" she didn't get his last name, she remembered. This irritated her.
    But clearly the name meant something to Beatrice. She actually locked her phone and shoved it back into her clutch. "Aiden? Aiden Manning?"
    "I didn't get his last name, actually..."
    As quickly as she'd put it away, Beatrice retrieved her phone. She tapped away at the screen, then showed it to Gwen. There was the bottom of a news headline, something about a passing of a torch, whatever that meant. And below that, a picture of Aiden. He wore a black business suit in this one, but he still had that cold look in his eyes.
    "That's him," Gwen said.
    "Yeah, you're gonna want to stay away from him," Beatrice said. Her voice took on that same tone it had when she talked celebrity gossip, as though she was intimate friends with every A-list Hollywood celeb and knew their every dark and dirty secret.
    "What do you mean?"
    Beatrice clicked her tongue. "Oh, Gwen, leave it to you to get into an exclusive party like that and wind up with a guy like that. When did this happen, anyway? Tell me everything."
    Feeling somewhat off put but Beatrice's attitude, she related the story of meeting Aiden.
    "What a jerk," Beatrice said when Gwen finished.
    "I don't know. He was a little standoffish, I guess, but I don't think he was an outright jerk. And he's pretty handsome, too."
    "The worst ones always are, my child. The worst ones always are. Anyway, just count yourself lucky that you didn't give him your number or anything... Speaking of numbers, check out this text! This guy actually wants to see me again tomorrow, can you believe it? A bit eager, aren't we?" Beatrice said, waving the phone at Gwen without actually stopping it long enough for Gwen to read the message.
    "I thought you said the three day rule was stupid?" Gwen said.
    Beatrice shrugged, her eyes glued to the screen and her thumbs tapping out a response. "It is, but there's such a thing as too fast, you know. If he's so quick in messaging me, maybe he's... ah... premature in other ways, too, if you get me?"
    "Unfortunately I do. Now can you give your hormones a rest for a moment and tell me just why I'm lucky Aiden didn't get my number?"
    In the front seat, the cabbie did his best to ignore the whole exchange.
    Beatrice sighed a long-suffering sigh and let her hands drop to her lap, the cell still glowing. "He's just bad news, okay? I've met him a few times at other parties, and as you can see, he's in the headlines sometimes, too. People say things about him. No one ever sees him with a woman, or with anyone really for that matter outside of other business people."
    Gwen nodded, considering this new information. Was the guy a perpetual wallflower, then? Handsome, but so aloof and full of himself that he didn't bother to mingle with the mere mortals around him? On the face of it, it seemed to fit. But Gwen still