Protein Shake

Cara

“Your eleven o’clock is already here,” my secretary tells me through the intercom, minutes after Alexa left. Sitting by myself in the office, I was taking a few minutes to unwind and ready myself for the next meeting, but I guess that my break is now over.

“Alright, send her in,” I reply to my secretary, and a few seconds later there’s a gentle knock at my door. “Come in,” I say, sitting up straight as the door swings open to reveal a woman in her mid-twenties.

She’s wearing a tight navy blue dress, and the first thing I notice is her perfect tapered waist. More than having a perfect body, she knows how to draw the attention to her strongest characteristics. Her straight golden hair cascades down her shoulders and, as she walks toward me, I notice the big (and expensive) sunglasses hiding her eyes. She has her arms folded over her chest, and in them she carries a tiny dog. From the look of it, it’s a Yorkie, one of these small dogs that socialite women just love to be seen with.

Despite all that, there’s a sour smile on her lips. She’s beautiful, that much is for sure, but the expression on her face isn’t a happy one.

“Please, take a seat,” I tell her waving at the chair facing me. I usually have my first conversation with a client on the couch I have in the corner of my office, but I decide to skip that for this meeting.

Women usually come to me during their most desperate times and, more often than not, they end up needing a shoulder to cry. That’s why I always start off my relationship with a client on a more intimate and personal note. Not today, though - something about this woman’s strut as she walked into my office told me that I should keep it strictly professional this time.

She sits down on the chair I pointed her to and, folding her legs, she just stares at me from behind her sunglasses.

“My name is Caralyn, and --” I start to say, cutting through the silence, but she just waves me down with her manicured fingers and cuts me short.

“I know who you are,” she tells me, patting the head of her dog as she speaks. By the look on his face, he isn’t enjoying it. He still hasn’t bitten her fingers off, so at least he seems to be tolerating it. “And I figure you know who I am, don’t you?”

“I do,” I respond, leaning back against my chair. “Misty Lane,” I whisper, drumming my fingertips against the surface of the desk as I say her name. In case you haven’t watched TV or used the internet in the past year or so, Misty Lane is as famous as anyone can get. Not the good kind of famous, mind

you.

More often than not, she’s gracing the cover of some tabloid magazine, the life she leads like a beacon for the paparazzi. I’m not a big fan of the vultures in the press, but Misty seems to enjoy the attention.

She rose to fame with a reality TV show called Authentic Heiress, and she had cameras following her around 24/7 as the producers showed America how the heiress of a billionaire lead her life. Her audiences shot through the roof after just two episodes, and I wasn’t too surprised by that. Her life’s a train wreck, and there’s nothing more hypnotizing that seeing someone ruining her life while you sit in your ass and stuff yourself with cheap beer and Doritos. We all fear a world of constant surveillance but, given the chance, we’re the first to give in to our voyeuristic tendencies.

Unfortunately for her, Authentic Heiress only lasted one season. Despite being a home-run for the network channel behind it, some higher-up decided to axe the whole thing. Rumour has it that, more than being self-destructive on live TV, Misty also carried that flame whenever there were no cameras around - apparently she was sleeping around with one of the producers, and the guy’s wife found out. Understandably, his wife wasn’t too happy about it.

To top that, she apparently enjoys coke too much for her own good. She denies these rumours, of course, but her vacant eyes always seem to tell a different story.

“So, I need your help,” she finally says, drawling out the words, and I can’t help but wonder if she has started the day with half a bottle of champagne. It’s only eleven in the morning, but I figure that for the socialite it’s always champagne o’clock.

“And what can I help you with, Misty?”

“Well, there’s this guy, you know?” She drawls again, and I nod, already feeling sorry for whoever the poor guy is. “And I want you to bring him down,” she says in a single breath, leaning forward and perching her sunglasses on her forehead. Her eyes are bloodshot, and the makeup around them is a complete mess - she has been crying. “He vanished! Into thin air! He doesn’t return my calls, he doesn’t reply to my texts…!”

I listen to her as she pushes the words past her gritted teeth, and I can tell that she’s on the verge of bursting into tears. Oh, look, here we go - there’s already a lonely tear streaming down her face.

Going up to my feet, I walk around my desk and rest my right hand on her shoulder. “Hey, hey, it’s okay,” I whisper, patting her shoulder softly.

“No! It’s not okay!” She cries out, a sob making her whole chest shake. “Everything’s definitely not okay! I thought… I thought he could be the one, you know?”

“These things happen, Misty,” I tell her softly, sitting on the chair next to her. She strutted inside my office like royalty, but she has let that mask of superiority fall in the blink of an eye. I thought I had to act like the cold-blooded professional that I am, but I was wrong - in the end, what Misty really needs is a shoulder to cry on. More than anything, she looks like a girl that has lost her sense of direction in the world.

I kinda feel sorry for her, you know? Despite leading a self-destructive life, there are a lot of people interested in stopping her from getting her shit together. From the paparazzi to the studio execs, everyone prefers an hurricane to a cookie-cutter woman.

“He broke my heart!” She howls, her chin quivering as she tries to hold back the tears. “He cut it into a million pieces, stomped over it! He ruined me for other men!”

“Okay, okay… We’ll figure it out, Misty. Who is he?”

“Liam Donovan!” She whispers, lowering her voice as if, somehow, her saying his name would make him materialize inside my office.

“The Liam Donovan?” I ask her, leaning back against my chair. Interesting - this job might be more complicated than I had anticipated.

“Yes, that Liam!”

Well, this was bound to happen, wasn’t it?