Which is how I ended up moving in with Cooper Cartwright. After I found my live-in boyfriend, Jordan—Cooper’s brother and lead singer of Easy Street—exorcising some of his inner demons with Cartwright Records’ newest rising star, Tania Trace, in our bed, I had nowhere else to go.
Cooper and I came to a very businesslike arrangement: He rented me a floor of his downtown brownstone in exchange for my doing his client billing.
How we managed to keep it businesslike for nearly a year, I have no idea, especially given that in the past three months since we revealed our true feelings to each another we’ve managed to boink in every room of the house too many times to count (except for the basement, due to spiders).
“Well,” I say, in my own defense, “the last time he and I talked, Christopher said he was starting a dance club or nightclub or something. Isn’t that what guys like him do? Roofie girls’ drinks?”
The son of the college president and I are not friends, to say the least, mostly because for a while he was not only actually sleeping with every Fischer Hall resident he could lure into his bed, I also suspected him of murdering them. The fact that he was proved to be innocent of the latter is beside the point. The former is still true.
“Why would a budding nightclub mogul who likes to sleep with young girls live with his parents?” Cooper asks.
“I’m pretty sure Christopher’s got his own place in Williamsburg,” I say. “He only crashes here when his parents aren’t in town.”
Or so I’ve inferred when I’ve seen him slinking from the elevator across from my office early in the morning to sign out an overnight guest. It’s always highly noticeable when anyone in Fischer Hall steps off the elevators before ten, since very few students at New York College schedule their classes prior to eleven, but it’s especially noticeable when it’s the president’s son and a blond woman in her late twenties wearing business attire, Louboutins, and a $20,000 gold Rolex. Although I suppose it’s nice that Christopher’s found a friend his own age for a change.
“Williamsburg,” Cooper says with a grunt. “Of course. Where else would any self-respecting young roofier be residing these days but the current hub for indie rock and hipster culture?”
I give him a sour look. “Considering they’ve all been priced out of the Village by this college, celebrities, and trust fund babies like you,” I say pointedly, as the numbers on the dial above our heads reach 20, “where else are they supposed to live?”
“Touché,” he says with a grin. “But all I inherited was the brownstone, not a trust fund. You’re the only celebrity in this neighborhood. What I wonder is why—”
The doors slide open before he can finish his question or I can protest—I was a celebrity back when the Taco Bell Chihuahua was popular, and I’m about as widely recognized now as that deceased canine—and we see that the EMTs are in the hallway outside the Allingtons’ penthouse.
Christopher Allington is standing in his parents’ doorway, holding a clipboard and a pen and saying, “Sorry to be such a pain, but if you guys could just sign these waivers before you come in, that’d be super.”
The two uniformed ambulance attendants, holding their heavy kits beneath their arms, are looking pissed off.
“What kind of waiver?” the female EMT wants to know.
“It’s a quick release stating that we can use your—” Christopher breaks off when he sees me and Cooper in the hallway. “Oh hey,” he says, his expression going from one of cordial welcome to one of complete disdain.
Then, just as quickly, the cordiality is back again. But there’s an undeniable coldness in his voice as he stares at us. Who can blame him for being touchy, really, considering the murder thing?
“What brings you folks up here?” he asks.
“The ambulance parked in front of my building,” I say just as coldly.
“Your building?” I can tell that Christopher means for his laugh to sound casual, but there’s a hard edge to it. “I believe this building belongs to New York College, of which my father is the president. So it’s not really your building, is it?”
Christopher is wearing a blue dress shirt, white trousers, and a white jacket. He’s sweated profusely through the shirt. I won’t deny that it’s hot in the hallway, which, unlike the rest of the building, is elegantly carpeted and painted a subtle olive green, in deference to the floor’s high-prestige—and only—residents. There’s a gilt-frame mirror across from the elevators in which I can see my reflection. I’m perspiring too, enough so that tendrils from my blond ponytail are sticking to the back of my neck. But I can feel cold air coming from the apartment behind Christopher. He’s got the air conditioning on full blast in there.
Skipping the niceties, Cooper asks, “What’s that all over your suit?” He doesn’t mean the sweat stains either. Christopher has dark brown flecks all over his otherwise pure white linen suit. I know I’m not one to talk, with the big glob of Day-Glo paint I have on my back. So far as I know, Christopher wasn’t on either of the paintball war teams downstairs.
“Oh, this?” he says, swiping at some of the larger stains on his jacket, smiling like it’s nothing. “Well, yes, this is from an unfortunate situation that arose earlier in the evening, but I can assure you that everything is—”
The female ambulance attendant turns to me and Cooper. “I know when I see blood, and that’s blood,” she says flatly. “Either one of you in charge? ’Cause we got a call about an unconscious woman at this address. This gentleman”—she uses the word “gentleman” sarcastically—“says she’s conscious now, but he’s denying us entry unless we sign some kind of waiver.”
“Well,” I say, because between the spots on Christopher’s suit and the EMT’s mention of a woman being unconscious, I’m ready to take total charge. Roofies is all I can think. Roofies and blood. “I’m the assistant director of this building. This man doesn’t even live here. He has no authority to require anyone to sign anything. So I say you can go on in.”
A male voice calls my name from a room in the apartment behind Christopher, apparently having overheard my little speech.
“Heather? Is that you?”