Relapse: A Novel Read Free Page A

and vast resources, she could get anything accomplished.
    Johnny Wiz was a music industry mogul. The man, in some way or another, touched over 50 percent of everything that got played on the radio, and this week he happened to be her client.
    She picked up her office phone and called Johnny’s room.
    “Hi, Johnny. It’s Beijing. I wanted to warn you there’s a guy down in the lobby with a camera bag and he’s definitely not taking pictures of the beautiful skyline,” she said.
    “Shit,” Johnny exclaimed. “The piranhas will never give me any peace.”
    Beijing heard an exaggerated feminine voice in the background ask, “What’s wrong, honey?”
    “Damn paparazzi are downstairs wanting to steal a picture of me with you,” he told his friend, and then he asked Beijing, “Any suggestions on what to do?”
    “Don’t you worry about a thing. I’m on top of it as we speak. Just don’t open the door for anyone until you look through the peephole and see that it’s me,” she warned.
    Beijing knew that the feminine voice in the background didn’t belong to a woman. Johnny Wiz’s secret rendezvous was with a flamboyant two-snaps-and-a-shake male companion, and theyhad been spending a discreet, quiet, cozy few days together. However, the paparazzi had plans to share their lurid affair with the world. Rumors about Johnny’s sexuality had been floating around the industry for years, and a photo of him with his secret lover would command big bucks from the tabloids.
    After Beijing hung up with Johnny, she called her partner in crime.
    Seville was Beijing’s first cousin, and the closest thing to a real sister that she would ever have. Their fathers were brothers. When they were young, they saw each other for two weeks every single summer and every Thanksgiving when Beijing and her father would visit his brother, Jimmy, in Charleston, South Carolina.
    The two girls had always been as thick as thieves when they were young and had gotten even tighter as they got older. Seville’s boyfriend and the love of her life had recently been transferred to a plant in Germany, and as fate would have it, Seville got a job there, too. Her boyfriend’s contract had a little over a year and a half left, and Seville had agreed to be there with him for the long haul.
    Seville was due to leave for the big trip in a few more days and had been packed and ready to go for over a week now. Beijing couldn’t get time off work, so the cousins had agreed that Seville would hang out today at the Tabby with Beijing. While Beijing put in her hours at the hotel, Seville chilled in her cousin’s luxurious suite and enjoyed all the amenities of the five-star hotel. After Beijing got off work that day they would spend time together.
    Beijing let her fingers do the walking and her mouth do the talking when she called upstairs to her suite. “Seville, I need you to come down to my office. Time for you to work off all that luxuriating you’ve been doing.” She added, “Oh, and wear something sexy and chic.”
    Ten minutes later, Seville slipped into Beijing’s office throughthe back hallway looking stunning in a shoulder-baring top, sandals, and skintight jeans.
    After Beijing explained the situation to her, Seville said, “Girl, that damn Johnny Wiz! I can’t believe he’s bi, but then I shouldn’t be surprised that he would think nothing was off limits to him with that ego of his. And you were keeping his secret from me?” She raised an eyebrow. “And I really can’t believe you are going to help that cocky asshole. After the way he treated you yesterday?”
    “My job is to assist him. He’s in my care until he leaves this hotel. And I don’t want it to ever be said that I allowed a scandal to happen because I didn’t like the way a client spoke to me,” Beijing explained, leading Seville back into the hallway with a quick look to make sure none of those bottom-feeding scandalmongers were in sight.
    “As cocky as he was, I would