Chapter 260 - Household Name
"The clutter gives character," she said simply as she looked around.
"I tried to clean up but Ian… yeah, he ruined every surface I cleaned." He followed with a nervous laugh and the scratching of his hair.
"It's okay. We can just clean up a little before filming." She remained neutral and nice throughout.
"Really?" He blinked, feeling like he had met an angel. Like her tolerance knew no bars. "Your apartment was so clean… You must like cleaning." Katherine wanted to laugh her head off.
"I'm not that big on cleaning either. I like it to be organized, though." Laurence nodded in understanding. Not a neat freak, but enjoyed a clean room. Nothing wrong with that.
Ian came barreling out of a room, looking ecstatic. "Hey Katherine, thanks to you, I have a lot of interaction on my account." He came forward to shake her hand. Katherine stiffened as she immediately looked at Laurence.
It seemed that this man hadn't brought up the conversation with his friend yet, or this friend was tone deaf and couldn't read a room. Either was possible.
"Uh…" she hesitated.
"We talked about this," Laurence interjected quickly. "He's kidding."
Ian looked at his friend with an unreadable expression before a smile broke out on his face. "Don't worry. It was a slip up. I can delete it if you want."
Angelina, who was on Katherine's side, let out a little huff that no one apart from Katherine caught.
"You don't need to do that," Katherine began. Ian looked really pleased with himself for some reason, so Katherine continued. "People pay more attention and make stories when you post something and then delete it. It looks like you were forced or you have something to hide." Ian's shoulders slumped slightly.
"So, are you going to cook for us?" Ian began, diverting the conversation.
Katherine shook her head, wondering how she was supposed to cook in a hotel room.
"She's not here to feed your ass. We're just going to shoot a photoshoot video. We just need you to fix the camera. We can screen record the rest, right?" Laurence looked at Katherine for approval.
"Yeah, but before that, let's clean up." Her skin felt itchy just seeing the train wreck that the room was. She brushed the hair off her neck and tied it into a ponytail. She stretched her fingers before ordering Laurence to help her, as well.
She dared not call the cleaning service. Laurence and Ian would be pulled up for bringing in food and alcohol from outside.
Anyway, as she was cleaning, she heard Angelina's phone go off. Katherine glanced back, uninterested until she picked up and brushed her hair over her shoulders and smiled at her phone.
"What are you up to?" she heard Stephen say. Katherine looked up in surprise.
"Just watching Katherine clean…" she trailed off. She bounced off the couch and placed herself across the room. She must have flipped the camera over because Katherine heard Stephen swear.
"Baby, shouldn't you be helping out?" Stephen commented, sounding mildly amused.
"I did my nails. Acrylic nails and cleaning don't go hand in hand. You wouldn't tell me to clean if you knew how much it hurts to break a nail." She sounded bored. "How is the shoot today?" she asked passively, her eyes roving over the room to see who was listening.
"It's been hectic today but I think we will finish before the usual time," Stephen informed. "Is Katherine there?" he asked suddenly. Angelina hummed before she called Katherine over.
Katherine pressed a hand on her hip as she took the phone and smiled at the man on the other side. "Hey, Stephen. You miss your girlfriend too much," she commented, envy evident in her voice.
"Well, I can't help it!" he exclaimed as he turned around. In the frame, right behind Stephen's head, she saw Cage. His head was leaning against the wall and he was asleep. Katherine's eyes widened as she smiled.
"Thank you," she said suddenly. Her words were so out of the conversation, the people in the room looked up at her. She remained silent as she saw him scratch his face cutely and then turn his head a little. "I'll give the phone back to Angelina now," she said.
"No, no!" Stephen interjected, looking at her with urgency. "Your championship starts in six days, right?" Katherine counted the days in her head and nodded. "Are you prepared for it? You need to take your camera and laptop so that you can edit videos and post on your social media. You know that, right?"
"Of course. With you helping me out, I'll be a household name in no time." She smirked. "I'm going to take a poll, I'll send you the plan by tomorrow for your approval. How does that sound?" She was going to do it anyway, but with Stephen taking the initiative, she didn't feel too bad doing it. She would have to pay him back somehow, she wondered how she would do that.
"Take your time. I'm a little drowned with work at the moment, with the reporters blowing up my phone. I'll look into it and make some changes." Stephen nodded sagely. "Now, give the phone back to my precious girlfriend."
Katherine snickered as she passed the phone to Angelina like a hot potato.
"Why do I feel like this call was made to talk to my friend and not me?" she asked sassily.
"Jealous?" Stephen bit back. Katherine knew that the end of this conversation would be explosive. She pursed her lips and waited for the banter to begin. Ian was watching Angelina talk with rapt attention. There was no romantic interest but he was curious who Angelina was talking to.
The call ended before either of them could scream or anger the other. "Boss has woken up," Stephen claimed as he waved goodbye and hung up.
Katherine's lip raised slightly as her phone pinged. She ignored me for some time until she was done cleaning. She took in a cleansing breath before pulling her phone out of her jeans.
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