Total pages in book: 82
Estimated words: 78155 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 391(@200wpm)___ 313(@250wpm)___ 261(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 78155 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 391(@200wpm)___ 313(@250wpm)___ 261(@300wpm)
It wasn’t much, but from Luca, it was the world. “Bye.”
18
ALIÉNOR
The driver drove me past the gate, and one of the guys opened my door. The other took my bag even though it didn’t weigh much, and I was escorted to the elevator like I was a real guest in a hotel.
I went up the rest of the way on my own, as if the help wasn’t allowed beyond the entryway. When the doors opened, I was in the wide hallway where my bedroom had been situated on the right. His was at the end of the hallway, the walls covered in wallpaper, mirrors and artwork mounted along the way.
When I reached his door, I knocked.
“It’s open.”
I let myself inside, finding him standing in the living room where I’d given him head for the first time, talking on the phone to someone with a cigar between his lips. He stood in only his gray sweatpants low on his hips, his back to me, all his thick muscles hugging his spine in the center. “I counted it three times, Carvel. I’ve never been wrong before, and I’m not wrong now. We’re done here.” He hung up and returned the phone to his pocket. He bent over the coffee table and put out his cigar, the cloud of smoke hovering above him and drifting toward the twenty-foot-high ceiling. He was clearly in an irritated mood, but it improved the moment he looked at me.
He crossed the room to me and kissed me the way he’d kissed me when he saw me at Holybelly, like he’d missed me in the hours we’d been apart, time he’d probably spent sleeping. He took the strap off my shoulder and set the bag on the armchair. “You want a drink?”
“Sure. I’ll have whatever you’re having.”
When he looked at me again, there was amusement in his eyes. “I’ll get you some wine.” He walked to his private wet bar, uncorked a bottle of wine, and poured me a glass of red before he came back to me.
“Thank you.” I took a drink as I continued to look at him. “You think I can’t drink like you?”
“You’d be dead if you tried.” He pulled out his phone and fired off a text. “Dinner will be here soon.”
“Ah, room service. I miss that.”
He moved to the six-seater dining table near the windows that showed the city and the lights from the buildings across the Seine. He sat down, his scotch on the rocks already there, and he relaxed in the chair, sexy in the way he slouched, like the weight of his muscles was the equivalent of walking around with a stacked barbell across his shoulders.
“How’d you sleep?”
“Like always—a rock.”
“Did you work out? Your arms look…plump.”
A gentle smirk came on to his lips, only a small portion of a smile but enough to be noticeable. “I work out after I wake up.”
“Yeah, I remember.” I looked at his arms again, one of his sexiest features. One of many. “What do you do?”
“Lift.”
“Lift what? Tires? Cars?”
His smirk grew, and he chuckled slightly. “Feels like you’re hitting on me.”
“Just trying to get sex.”
He gave a quiet scoff. “You don’t have to try when it comes to me.”
I drank my wine and stared at him, this quiet, sexy man who’d become mine seemingly overnight. “Bastien and Fleur are nice…”
The smile went away. “Sorry about that.”
“Why?”
He gave a slight shake of his head but didn’t give an answer.
“I got the impression that you didn’t want them to meet me.” He’d told me Bastien was like a brother to him, but when he showed up at the same restaurant, Luca was borderline hostile. “Like you were embarrassed of me or something—”
“No.” He straightened in the chair and gave me that hard look. “It’s not you.”
“It felt that way.”
“You’re right. I didn’t want them to meet you. But that’s got nothing to do with you.”
“How so?” I asked, trying not to feel wounded by what he said.
He took a breath and gave a drawn-out sigh. “I told you I’m not good at this shit. And I’m not good at it because I’ve never done it. I don’t want Bastien weighing in on my relationship—and I know he will.”
“You called him your brother, didn’t you?”
All he did was stare at me.
“That’s what brothers do. It’s annoying, but that’s how it is. I know you don’t have siblings, so you may not understand. I wish I had someone to talk to about you…” My sisters would lose their fucking minds at the sight of Luca. They’d want all the tea—size, girth, technique…
“Fleur doesn’t have any family either. All she had were her in-laws before she got divorced.”
“She was married before Bastien?”
He nodded. “I don’t think she’s been divorced for even a year yet. It happened quickly.”
“Whoa, that is quick. No judgment.”