Let Her Go

Glitter

Glitter: [verb] to shine with a bright, shimmering reflected light

The pounding in his skull had been growing steadily worse since his arrival forty-five minutes ago and he didn't see any signs of it letting up. For the hundredth time he wished he'd gone with his intuition and stayed home to go over those contracts. The deals had to be closed in the next couple of weeks and although he'd already looked them over twice, he would have liked to do it once more. Instead, he'd let Bobby talk him into going to this charity event. There might be no such thing as bad publicity, his business partner had told him, but good publicity is great for business.

And he had to agree. In their line of work a clean record was the best way to ensure a steady stream of clientele. It was a strategy that had borne fruit. Almost six years on, their reputation so squeaky clean it practically smelled like pine needles and spearmint, and they were beginning to look at expansion. Hopefully, in another six, they'd be one of the top ten household names in production. He just wished these social events weren't a prerequisite.

He bit back a sigh and realised that the woman at his side, as oblivious as he was inattentive, was talking a mile a minute about—

What was she talking about? His train of thought disappeared around a bend as he forced himself to tune back into her inane chattering, peppered as it was with rhetorical questions and unnecessary emphases.

"They put me in white," she was saying. "White. I mean, isn't that like the most out-dated colour ever. No one looks good in white."

"Hmm."

He'd met her at a function earlier in the week and she'd seemed charming. She was a blonde bombshell; tall, toned, and – as it turned out – vapid as fuck. He knew that particular quality was a turn-on for many of his acquaintances, but he'd never subscribed to it himself. He liked a bit of spice in his conversations, something that required more than the occasional, obligatory nod and murmur of agreement.

She'd segued into a casting session she'd had a couple of days earlier when he caught himself drifting again. A model, he remembered, using that thought to keep himself focussed. She was a model. One of many who seemed to have scored invitations to the gala tonight.

He was only sorry that hers had come from him.

Though he had to give credit where credit was due: as dull as her conversation was, she was a knockout in her red evening gown. It wrapped around her torso like a second skin, emphasising every line of her slender physique and leaving her long arms bare. She might have overdone it with the jewellery – dozens of little stones sparkling at her throat, wrists, fingers, and in her hair – but she looked good. And she knew it.

"Would you like a drink?" he asked, cutting over her newest tangent.

She blinked, then smiled at him with those bright red lips. "I'd love one! Would you like me to come with you?"

"No," he said quickly. "I should be fine. Hang around here and I'll be back in a minute."

"Okay, I'll just be over there with my friend, Maria."

"Sure." He turned and pushed through the crowd of people, looking for Bobby, feeling his every heartbeat as a pulsing pressure in his brain. His friend had better be there, or so help him...

Ah-ha.

He was in the corner of the room, talking to a record producer he half-remembered from Kinghouse Studios and an older woman in an elegant black dress wearing enough diamonds to give his own date a run for her money.