I wink, and to my surprise, she chuckles. It’s not a full-body laugh, but it’s enough for now.
“Fine. I’ll wear my bikini underneath something more comfortable.” She starts walking to her bedroom. “I’ll be right back. Make yourself comfortable.”
She closes the door to her bedroom and leaves me in her living room. I walk around, staring at all the things in her living room that are varying shades of white. I’m surprised that I don’t find many photos in her living room. I don’t see any of Wes. The only one I see is a picture of Sloane with who I assume is her grandmother.
I pick the picture up and study it a moment. Sloane is a little younger-looking in the picture but not much younger. She has her arm wrapped around her grandmother’s shoulders while her grandmother blows out the candles on her birthday cake. It’s a sweet picture. Full of love. It’s obvious that Sloane loved her grandmother.
I place the frame back on the end table where I found it, and a familiar feeling washes over me. I shake it off because the feeling makes no sense. I haven’t been in this building before and certainly not in Sloane’s place.
I walk over to the kitchen counter and see a pile of pictures and papers piled up. I don’t think anything of it at first until I spot a surfboard that is very familiar, sticking out from beneath one of the papers. I pull it out and see a picture of myself staring back at me.
What the fuck?
Why does Sloane have a picture of me?
I rifle through more of the pictures. They’re all of me. Then, I realize what the pictures are when I spot Wes in the background. Sloane is the one who hired me to take the ad photos and video. That just leaves me even more confused. I know Sloane works for a nonprofit, so why would she want to have photos of a surfer for advertising? It doesn’t make sense to me.
“I didn’t realize it was you that I had booked; otherwise, I wouldn’t have booked you,” Sloane says from behind me.
I turn and look at her, and I completely forget about the photographs. “You’re beautiful.”
She shakes her head and blushes a little, which makes her all the more enduring. She doesn’t blush when she should be embarrassed, but one tiny compliment, and she’s a blushing fool.
Sloane runs her hand through her hair, shaking out the curls that were there before. “No, I’m not. I’m in a T-shirt and shorts. I don’t have an ounce of makeup on, and I’m blotchy from crying. It’s not possible to look beautiful at the moment.”
I frown, trying to come up with the words that will make her see what I see. I doubt I can convince her of anything in the moment. “It doesn’t matter if you believe me or not. You’re the most fucking beautiful woman I’ve ever seen. And, right now, you are more beautiful than I have ever seen you,” I say, meaning every fucking word, my eyes glued to hers.
She stares back at me until she is finally convinced that I am telling the truth. I don’t know when she’ll realize that I never lie. Never. I don’t lie to women to get them to leave their husbands. I want an honest fight. I just usually win, which must mean that the women don’t really want to get married. Marriage is a ridiculous concept anyway. No one should be with just one person for the rest of their life. People are constantly changing and not always in the same way.
Why would you stay with the same person when you no longer fit together anymore?
I try to search her eyes to see if she is just like the rest of the women, who were looking for an escape from a marriage that they thought would be everything they’d ever dreamed up but realized too late that it was going to be a nightmare that there was no way out of. But whatever she feels, she hides it well. She might just be the exception. She might really love Wes and want to marry him. I just can’t see how a woman like her, who seems to have such ambition and is constantly changing and wanting more out of life, would be happy with settling down with one man for the rest of her life.
“The video and pictures we took are for an ad my new head of marketing came up with. I don’t love the idea, but she is insistent that, since I spend so much time in Hawaii and many of our donors live or at least vacation here, we need to add more inspiring images of what our children and families could eventually achieve with the money they are given instead of just images of hungry children.”
“Why don’t you use images of people who have gone through your program and made something of their lives?”
“We did.”
“I didn’t do any ads with children that have gone through your program.
She shakes her head. “You did.”
I pause for a second. “Wes? Really? But he always seems like—” I stop myself from saying how I really feel about Wes.
Sloane smiles though. “Like a spoiled rich kid.”
I nod.
“He thinks he needs to act that way to fit in with me and my family.”
I glance around her expensive apartment and raise an eyebrow. “I can understand why.”
She lets out a huff of air. “I guess so.”
I don’t want to spend the rest of the evening talking about Wes. My job today is to cheer her up and be her friend. I made a promise, and I won’t go back on my promise.
I hold out my ar