“Not because of me,” said Kara meekly.
“No, not this time, that was before when I found you screwing my boyfriend in our bed. Then I left because of you.”
She turned on her heels and was heading for the exit followed by Jim who quickly caught up with her.
“Can you wait until I get my phone back off Simone before you finish storming out?” He laughed at her.
She laughed back, realising that she was storming out and then some. “She winds me up.”
“I noticed,” Jim said as he spotted Simone and his phone.
Chapter 41
They were sitting in the back of another cab on their way back to the hotel when Tasha, looking down at ‘Betrayal’ asked, “How much did that cost you?”
“Nothing in the end. I thought Gerry was going to play hard ball, but I told him to name his price and then he gave it to me, for you. Do whatever you want to do with it.” He handed it to her.
She looked down at it sadly and he thought she might actually cry.
“Do you want to talk?”
“No. Not about this. Tell me about Lizzie and Lenny,” she said as the cab pulled up outside the hotel.
They made their way across the lobby again where Tasha looked across at reception where a night porter sat smiling at her. She returned his smile and followed Jim to the lift.
“Lizzie told Lenny about her plans to come over here and see your shoot and that you are going to give her some help and advice on modelling.”
“And?”
“He started by telling her that it was a ridiculous ambition to have and whilst she wasn’t as bright as Rosa, she did have some potential to contribute to society.”
Tasha looked up at him as they entered the lift to find him looking really cross and upset, too. “What an arse.” She shook her head and hoped Lizzie hadn’t taken his comments to heart.
Jim continued as she wrapped her arms around his waist and tucked her shoulder under his arm. “Then he told her that he was forbidding her to do it in any way and if she insisted on coming to London and pursuing modelling then she’d need to find somewhere else to live, because he wasn’t prepared to have someone with such questionable morals and a lack of true ambition, someone willing to show themselves off to the world, living in his house. In fact, he reckons modelling is just one step away from prostitution. Sara assured her that he was just angry because Lizzie had been goading him about other stuff and that he wasn’t really mad at her dreams and he didn’t mean it, which he didn’t, but Lizzie was still upset. Sara also assures me that there’s more to Lenny’s current mood and she has spoken to him and he has apologised to Lizzie and begrudgingly said that he won’t stand in her way, but has made it clear that he still disapproves. So, like I said, he got off lightly at £300,000.”
“Poor Lizzie. I can’t believe Sara would allow him to speak to her that way.”
The lift stopped at their floor. Tasha was genuinely surprised by Lenny’s thoughts and Sara’s reaction to them. Although, if she considered what her mother had allowed to happen to her at her father’s hands…
“Lenny is so used to being in charge at work that he treats everyone at home as if they are his interns. She was his nurse for years so is used to him bossing her around and if Sara is happy to be treated that way, fine, but Philip wasn’t and Lizzie shouldn’t be either.”
Tasha smiled. “Maybe people who are in charge at work don’t see that they can’t have the same degree of control over the people at home.”
“What? Like me?” he asked as they reached the door to their suite.
Resting against the wall next to the door, Tasha shrugged as Jim continued to speak.
“I bet your friend the receptionist bitch would get where Lenny is coming from, all judgemental and snobby,” he teased.
“Mmm, probably,” she agreed as he flung the door open.
He stared at her now, changing the subject. “You really are very beautiful and if we don’t go in soon I will be removing that dress right here in the hallway.”
Tasha smiled coyly as she teased, “And if we do go in?”
“Then I will still be removing it, but not on CCTV,” he replied, pointing to a camera.
Tasha walking through the door with an exaggerated swing of her hips. She had barely crossed the threshold when Jim slammed the door shut and pinned her against the wall where his mouth found hers in the darkness and his hand disappeared beneath her dress to stroke the flesh between her stocking top and pants.
