Page 45 of Wanting What’s Wrong

One

Lennie

C ade Jamison paces like a general, ordering his troops into battle.

Although, in my mind, I imagine him pacing in front of just me , ordering me down on all fours as he slips his belt from the loops on his perfectly tailored black slacks, laying it across my back as he unzips his fly...

Yes, hell awaits me. I’m lusting after my stepfather.

Who is also my boss.

“ This is not a fucking party ,” he seethes. The line of agents stand wide-eyed and silent. His voice is barely above a whisper, yet it shakes the room.

And me. Down into the gooiest parts of my core.

He scans the staff lined against the glass wall of the venue where the post-Oscars party is taking place. The mega-mansion overlooks the valley, and the air reverberates with thumping music from Usher’s performance on the lower deck by the infinity pool.

Cade’s forehead furrows, his eyes locked in an annoyed scowl.

It’s a look I know well. With his hard edges and dark corners, he is both gorgeous and intimidating.

And I can’t help but fantasize about every inch of his six-foot-four tattooed frame darkening my bedroom doorway at night as he gives in to the secret passion he’s been too guilty to act upon.

But, yeah, that’s fantasy. This is reality.

His impeccable black tuxedo contrasts with the unruly deep golden beard that covers his jaw.

His dark golden slicked-back hair is never out of place.

The vivid colors of his painted body and arms show only on the backs of his hands and up the sides of his neck.

Countless times, I’ve admired every swoop and letter of those colors that cover most of his upper body. Then, there’s his eyes.

Lord, in heaven, they are the bluest-blue of all the blues on this planet. A new Crayola color should be named after his eyes.

Cade Jamison blue.

He’s a living, breathing work of art, and I’m so in love with him it hurts.

Since we first met, I’ve watched him in silent and shameful awe.

I wait for those times when he’s by the pool or walking around shirtless usually cursing at or into his phone.

I sneak pictures of him to fuel my lusty fumblings under my sheets in the darkness of my bedroom while clouds of guilt hover over me.

As my fear that he’ll ask me to move out has grown in the last few months, I’ve fought a daily battle against sneaking in the smallest of physical contact with him. A struggle I’ve lost every time. Desperate that my time close to him is running out.

They are small touches like a brush of my arm against his as he helps me unload the dishwasher. Allowing my fingers to linger on his when he passes me my cup of tea in the morning or hands me my vitamins. Every second, every contact lights me up while simultaneously, my self-loathing grows.

I want my stepfather.

It consumes my every thought.

“Tonight is not for celebrating.” He glares at the wall above the heads of his crew of ruthless talent agents, rarely looking directly at anyone. “Tonight is for finding and fighting for opportunities. Opportunities that only come on nights like these. This is war. Don’t forget that.”

A new-ish agent to my left with jet-black hair and skin as white as mine raises her hand, causing a collective cringe through the rest of us.

I don’t know her name. And if she’s going to interrupt my stepfather, she won’t be around long enough for it to matter.

“But—” she starts as the group shoots her irritated looks.

Everyone else's eyes are lowered, looking anywhere but at the train wreck about to happen. “A lot of us worked hard to get our clients here tonight. Don’t you think it would be appropriate for us to celebrate with them? A little fun might be good for us.” She scans the rest of us for support but quickly realizes this is not a team-building moment.

“You’re fired.” Cade grunts, those Frank Sinatra baby blues focused on the phone he holds in one hand while pointing to the glass door to his left with the other.

She releases a nervous chuckle, looking around for us to save her.

We won’t.

I’ve been surrounded by Hollywood elite my entire life and I must be missing the chip that makes that important to me.

I could have attended the ceremony tonight, but Cade likes to fly solo for most things, and I felt no need to sit in a chair for four hours, forcing a smile while tapping my fingers relentlessly and fighting off the urge to run away.

Instead, I begged him to let me come to the after-party, despite my discomfort with the crowds.

And even though he looked surprised, he agreed.

I plan to impress him tonight. For that, I have to hold it together and land a special new client.

He snaps his fingers toward the door, eyes still low while his pacing resumes. “If I turn around and you are still here, I’ll make sure no other agency will hire you. Not even some back-woods, back-room outfit where they peddle pageant girls to trade shows.”

I glance to my right as Davis, Cade’s best friend, and partner, as well as my mentor, gives her a thin smile and urges her toward the door with a flick of his head.

Everyone in this room has a love-hate relationship with my stepfather.

Except me. I’m zero hate and all love.

I won’t say I was immediately in love with him the day my mother introduced us. That was after a Little White Chapel Vegas elopement, and I wasn’t dialed in beforehand, which was typical for my mother. Her career and many other needs always came before being a mother.

The next day, as she slept off the bottles of three-hundred-dollar wine from the previous night, I came downstairs, finding the kitchen after getting lost in the house for thirty minutes.

When Cade saw me, he dismissed the cook and made my breakfast himself.

Working away in the enormous stone and stainless-steel space wearing baggy jeans and a white t-shirt, he made me avocado toast and scrambled eggs without saying a word.

And those were the best-scrambled eggs ever made in the history of scrambled eggs.

Sitting on a stool waiting for my first breakfast in my new home, I reflected on how my world had been turned upside down in the last forty-eight hours.

I watched him cook in admiration and knew I was in trouble.

I was in love with my mother’s new husband right then.

From that moment, the guilt blinded me and lay next to me every night, whispering in my ear what a horrible daughter I am.

I could have been mad at her; my mom didn’t tell me about Cade until after they were married, but I could never stay angry at her, not even when she’d relapse and forget to buy groceries in the early days.

Or when her career took off, and she had people around her that both fed her sickness and cleaned up her mess.

She was loveable. One of those people that, even in their worst moments, could make you smile and feel special. That’s why everyone loved her, including my stepfather, who has been my guardian since her death and is now my boss as well.

I know when she knew she was dying, she made Cade promise to take care of me until I could stand on my own two feet. We have no other family, and all I know about my birth father is he wanted nothing to do with me or my mom after she told him she was pregnant. I don’t even know his name.

She said it was better that way, and I trusted her the way a daughter trusts a mother. Right or wrong.

The heartbreak of losing her was only softened by being around Cade, whose calm, quiet presence became my north star. He makes sure I’m safe. He’s a man of few words, but I hang on each and every one.

His actions gave me a foundation I’d not experienced before he came into our lives. He was always distant, but still made me feel special somehow.

If he thinks I’m hurt, he loses his mind.

If he thinks someone has slighted me or treated me in any manner other than you would a princess, he turns absolutely feral. The juxtaposition of his quiet dominance with the crazed violence he’s shown a handful of times captivates me beyond words.

Bodyguards are with me whenever I’m out and about.

I have a black Amex and stacks of hundred-dollar bills are left for me every morning next to my avocado toast, medication and vitamins on the mornings he’s not around.

When he is around, it’s about the same, only he hands me the money, even when I tell him I don’t need it.

He just shrugs, always telling me I might want something someday so I should keep it.

I end up putting it with the rest of the cash inside an enormous golden birdcage he got me in for my birthday that first year in preparation for a special, rare pair of blue and lavender Love Birds he had bought me as pets.

But, my mother had to tell him I was terrified of birds. So, he sent them to a sanctuary and now, I fill the cage with money. Life is weird.

When I was so sad and lost after Mom died, he pulled me out of the school I hated and surrounded me with doctors, tutors, therapists, and every other LA expert on well-being and mindfulness until I found my feet and realized life would go on.

He makes sure I have everything I want and need.

What I really wanted was to snuggle in next to him on the couch, watching one of my comfort movies like Hairspray or Pretty in Pink. Have him kiss my head, stroke my cheek and tell me I would belong to him forever.

I’m a horrible daughter and a silly girl.

After I got my diploma at seventeen, he insisted I come to the office with him every day. I just hung around his admin staff for the first year, doing little tasks, but I wanted him to see me. Notice me. Need me in some small way.

The agents got his attention and received the closest thing to praise I’ve ever heard him dole out. The agents always earn his approval by landing a big client or a great contract. So, I convinced him to let me try to be an agent.

He said yes because he always says yes, even when he knows he should say no.