ONE
ISABELLA
I had two problems: One, the neon pink cocktail umbrella stashed in my weathered brown leather tote bag, a relic from my last tequila sunrise on the beach, was laughably insufficient for the torrential downpour brewing outside. And two, I was undeniably, unquestionably late for my introductory meeting with my new boss.
The boss of the job I’d flown 6,337 miles just two days ago for.
The drizzle of New York City seemed a world away from the sun-drenched days of Bora Bora. Now it was time to put the crystal-blue lagoon waters, endless papaya, and island-hopping behind me. According to my mother, I needed to “grow up” and “start my real life.”
At thirty-five years old, with a stamped passport thicker than my resumé, I had to beg my baby brother for a job. Apparently, racking up more miles than Phileas Fogg didn’t count for shit, and world travel alone wasn’t enough to impress potential employers. Luckily, Dominic hadn’t hesitated when he offered me the waitressing position at the club he cofounded with his best friend, Liam.
And, no, I would not dwell on the fact that my own brother got me a job at a sex club. Nope, I preferred to consider it more Liam’s business. I rolled my eyes at the thought of my quiet, elusive brother—the sibling who always seemed to have it together—going off to UCLA and coming back with a best friend and a business idea. Dominic, whose new business was taking off like hotcakes, at least had direction.
The black town car pulled up—thank you, rich Mom and Dad—and I scurried out from underneath the awning of my parents’ building in Gramercy Park, making a beeline for the passenger door. The storm clouds hung around me like a foul smell—or was that just New York? They wanted to engulf me, to snatch me up and remind me of how little progress I’d made in life. I told them no.
The sounds of the city, and my depressing thoughts, were cut off as I settled into the soft black leather seat and shook off the rain that had pelted my skin. I shivered as the cool breeze from the air-conditioned car hit me, and I tilted the vents away. My dress already had dark spots of rain staining it, the tight material stretching over my skin. I wasn’t made for depressing weather like this.
Isabella, or Izzy, as my friends called me, thrived in the sun. My favorite temperature was “hot car.” You know, the suffocating heat you feel when you first slide into a car after it’s been trapped in the sun all day? The kind that takes your breath away and cooks you from the inside out. The kind of temperature they warn you about not leaving puppies or babies inside cars for too long. Yeah, that one.
My high school graduation gown had barely hit the ground before I enrolled in online college classes, pulled my passport out of my parents’ safe, stuffed clothes into a suitcase, and booked the first flight out of JFK. My first stop was Amsterdam, then Barcelona, then I popped over to Athens. I made a little money nannying or waitressing, but most of my income came from the inheritance I’d uncorked when I’d turned twenty-three.
But I had never needed a lot. I could find the most luxurious hotels, which somehow stayed hidden from the tourist crowds and cost nearly nothing. I could tell the street vendors apart—there were the ones who had bright food stalls with red umbrellas that would give me the most delicious meal of my life and then their yellow-clad competitors who would treat me like a rich American foreigner and force me to cut the line at the outdoor toilet outside the Eiffel Tower with my hands covering my butt. But as my friends got picked off one by one—no, they weren’t murdered, just engaged—I caved to my mom’s plea, for the billionth time, that I move back home.
I longed for days lying on pristine beaches and exploring ancient cities. But now, back in the Big Apple, I swapped flip-flops for heels, beachy waves for sleek ponytails, and wanderlust for the Prism Society’s 5 p.m. to 3 a.m. hustle.
The fact that it was an adult club was only a fraction of the reason for the nerves in my belly. Honestly, the nude beaches in France had numbed me. Seeing naked bodies no longer brought out giggles or made my face flush. No, the main cause for the nerves in my belly was that I knew, without a doubt, I would be the grandma of the Prism Society. The rest of the staff were all around my brother’s age, except for the one receptionist, Maureen, and that seven-year age difference between me and Dominic felt more significant than the Trans-Siberian Railway.
Still, I had no regrets for the magical years of travel with the fleeting romances from Amsterdam to Australia. I wore the callouses earned on cobblestone paths and my newfound culinary snobbery, thanks to countless hole-in-the-wall discoveries, with pride.
New York was the real world which was why I’d avoided it for so long, but now that I had returned, I had to get serious. The town car stopped in Brooklyn outside a three-story brick building with large arched windows on both sides. I was surprised, if not slightly disappointed, the Prism Society didn’t have a flashy neon light hanging off the corner. From the outside, it looked like it could be an event space for weddings or birthday parties for wealthy people.
As the car splashed to the curb, my phone buzzed with an incoming message. Glancing down, I found a picture from Natalia, my friend who was still annoyingly basking in the sunny bliss of Bora Bora. In the selfie, Natalia grinned widely, the blinding sunlight casting a halo around her golden curls. Beside her was a bronzed Adonis whose name Nat most likely didn’t remember.
It was a few minutes after eleven in the morning where Nat was, and she already had the glassy-eyed look of too many Aperol spritzes. I rolled my eyes at the picture. The contrast between Natalia’s beachy nirvana and my own rain-soaked reality made me homesick for a place I wasn’t even from.
“Beach bum,” I muttered, my thumbs flying over the screen as I sent back an eye roll emoji and a middle finger one. But then, feeling guilty, I typed back, Nice tits. With that, I swiftly slid my phone back into my bag and steeled myself for the task at hand. I was in the real world now, so no more beachside frolics or carefree flirtations. I scooped up my bag, took a deep breath, and stepped back outside into the rain.
With a rhythmic drumming of my heart echoing the downpour around me, I reached for the roughcast iron handles affixed to the imposing wooden doors of the Prism Society. Adorned with intricate scrollwork, the cold iron clashed with the warmth of the building’s aged brick. Despite their ornate appearance, they remained stubbornly immobile under my insistent tugs.
My dress, a tight cream number more suited for a beachside bar than the dreary NYC weather, grew clingier with every passing second. The rainwater snaked its way down the fabric, staining it a darker shade of taupe and making me shiver from its icy touch. A stubborn stream of water raced down my back, slipping under the material and tracing a cold line along my spine.
As I gave another frustrated tug at the door, I looked up and was promptly drenched by a gush of water cascading from an overflowing copper gutter lodged above the door. The deluge doused me, matting my hair to my face and eliciting a startled squeal as the cold water seeped into my dress, running rivulets down my skin.
With a screech, I pushed myself into the doors, and they finally gave way. Push, not pull. The doors could’ve used a sign. The glimmering skyline of New York City and the towering structures, now hidden behind heavy, ink-black clouds, disappeared behind the curtain of rain and the thick door as it slammed shut. I took a deep breath, held my arms out from my body in a hopeless attempt to keep myself dry, and pushed through thick velvet curtains into the club.
As I stumbled into the Prism Society, I could hardly see through the droplets clinging to my eyelashes. I stood there for a moment in the grand entrance, water dripping from my hair and down my face, mixing with the salty tears of frustration that had welled up in my eyes.
With a deep, steadying breath, I wiped the rain off my face with a drenched palm—not exactly a towel, but it would do. I blinked and squinted my eyes, trying to adjust to the club’s softer, moodier lighting. My nose picked up an odd cocktail of leather, musk, and a hint of pine. The latter made me smile. Leave it to my brother to keep a high-end sex club smelling like a forest.
As sophisticated as it was seductive, the Prism Society resembled a burlesque Narnia with its wallpapered nooks, cozy chairs, and winding staircases. I pictured Dominic, my practical, numbers-oriented younger brother, poring over lighting options and discussing the merits of satin versus silk. I bit my lip to keep from laughing at the ridiculous mental image.
In the middle of the entrance to the Prism Society, I stood like a drowned rat—an on-brand welcome for New York, to be honest. I wanted nothing more than to crawl back to the screened-in porch Nat and I had fallen asleep on four nights ago. Instead, I held my head high and walked through the dimly lit lounge, my wet feet sliding in my Chloé wedge heels.
I grabbed a handful of cocktail napkins off a small table to soak up as much rainwater as possible. The paper napkins dissolved into a wet ball in my hands. I took a deep breath, mentally restarted “my morning”, parted another set of velvet curtains, and headed toward the bar spanning the back of the lounge.
My fresh resolve cracked as I gaped at the sight in front of me. A man—no, scratch that—a gorgeous man stood shirtless on a wooden ladder against the shelves high above the bar like a goddamn smutty Beauty and the Beast. Hozier played quietly from the bar speakers as he reached to pull down a fresh bottle of red wine.
His back muscles flexed—who has back muscles anyway?—as he plucked bottles from the shelf, added them to a box, and began his descent. I shook my head clear, swallowed, and masked my face with indifference as he turned to face me.
