Almost boring.
Rob had refused to let them change the security for the penthouse access. Because no one had contacted the cops, he hadn’t bothered to keep any of the footage.
The guy was an incompetent dickhead. They had Corbin looking into his background, but so far he’d found nothing. Still, Bain had a bad feeling about him.
But they had put in another camera in the small foyer to cover any blindspots, and an alarm system which notified them whenever anyone entered.
The strangest thing? They’d barely seen the client. She spent all her time in her bedroom, even getting her meals taken there.
The few times he had seen her, she was barely able to make eye contact, basically racing back into her room. She was friendlier towards Dominic, obviously preferring to talk to him. Which suited Bain just fine.
“Hey, man. You set for tomorrow?” Dominic joined him in the living room. Arianna never used the room, so they’d taken it over.
“Yeah. You get that information from Larry?”
“Finally,” Dominic muttered with a frown. “That guy’s a prick. He stalled on purpose just to be difficult, even though we’re protecting his client.”
Larry was a class-A prick for sure. He did his best to block or undermine them. Tomorrow, a series of interviews had been booked for the lead up to the concert. At least Arianna had agreed to limit it to three interviews, and they were being held here at the apartment.
“You sure you want to stay with Arianna?” Dominic asked. “You can take the door and I’ll remain with her.”
“No. I got it.”
Dominic just gave him a look.
“It’s my job, I’ll do it.”
“Just. . .don’t be too hard on her, okay? If you gave her a chance, you’d find out she’s actually really sweet.”
“Sweet? She ignores me. She runs each time she sees me coming. She spends all her time in her room, making Estelle serve her food there instead of coming out and eating with the staff. I wouldn’t exactly call her sweet.”
Dominic sighed and leaned forward in his chair. “I think she’s a bit intimidated by you.”
“What?” He was a big guy. And he could be a bit abrupt. But he was here to protect her. Why would she be intimidated by him? She got up onstage in front of thousands of people regularly and she was scared of him?
“All I’m saying is give her a chance. You might find you quite like her. And you got to admit, you judged her before you even met her.”
Had he done that?
Yeah. He totally had.
“Fine. I’ll give her a chance.”
“I think she doesn’t have many people to talk to. She’s a bit shy. Well, maybe shy isn’t the word. Socially awkward? Hmm, maybe the two of you have more in common than you think.”
“Shut up,” he snarled at the other man stood and walked away, chuckling to himself.
Something in common with the ice princess? Yeah, he so didn’t think so.
Bain walked over at the knock on Arianna’s office door. For the last two hours, a crew of make-up and hair stylists had been in here, primping Arianna in preparation for these interviews.
He didn’t know how she could stand it. But he supposed women like that sort of shit, didn’t they? Seemed like a waste of time to him.
Now everyone had cleared out. Including Larry, who had gone off to greet the first interviewer. When Bain opened the door, he was surprised to see Estelle standing there.
“Hello, dear,” she said sweetly. She held a small tray with two glasses of water with lemon in them.
“Here, let me take those for you.” He reached for the tray, but Estelle shook her head.