by Marie Force
I roll my eyes at her because I don’t believe for a second she means that.
“They are admirable, and I’m not making fun of you. I swear I’m not. It’s just… They might be slightly… unrealistic. That’s all.”
“Maybe so, but I’m not changing my mind or my values just because a famous actor asked me out. If I change who I am for one night, who will I be tomorrow?”
Leah puts her hands on my shoulders and looks me dead in the eye. “You’ll still be you. You’ll just be you having been done by Flynn Godfrey.”
She’s so sincere and so imploring that I bust up laughing, which she doesn’t appreciate.
“Mark my words. You’ll look back in ten years, when the cherry has been popped and you’re stuck with the one guy you’ll get to have sex with for your whole life, and say to yourself, ‘I so should’ve listened to Leah and fucked Flynn Godfrey when I had the chance.’”
I put my hands over my ears, pretending I can’t hear her.
“I’m writing the date down so I can remind you of this conversation in ten years.”
“I’ll look forward to that, but for now I need to figure out what I’m going to wear. Are you going to help me or what?”
“Will you please, for the love of God and all that’s holy, wear ‘just in case’ underwear underneath?”
“Absolutely not.”
“Ugh,” she sighs, “you’re ridiculous, but I’ll help you anyway.”
At four o’clock, the buzzer sounds from the lobby with a delivery that Leah goes down to get. She returns carrying the most incredibly gorgeous purple orchid in an equally beautiful ceramic pot.
She hands me the card. “As if there’s any doubt, it’s for you.”
I feel foolish as I take the card from her, because my hands feel shaky as I open the envelope.
Enjoyed meeting you and Fluff this morning. Looking forward to dinner. FG
“What does it say?” Leah is jumping around trying to see over my shoulder, so I hand the card to her.
“Oh my God! That’s so romantic!”
Granted, it’s nice of him to send me such a beautiful plant—that I haven’t the first clue how to care for—but romantic? I don’t know if I’d go that far.
“Isn’t it romantic?” Leah’s excitement is starting to grate on my nerves. It’s just dinner. I can’t figure out why she’s making such a big deal out of it.
“Sure,” I reply, because it’s easier than getting into another debate with Leah about why I’m not wired the way other women our age are. I stopped being like other people my age when I was fifteen. That’s when someone I trusted stole my youth and innocence. But I’m not thinking about that today. If I allow myself to think about that, I’ll never be able to get my act together in time for Flynn’s arrival. I’ve made not thinking about that into an art form, and I’ve learned the hard way what happens when I allow the darkness to intrude on my new life.
By six thirty, I’m a total disaster. I’ve spent all afternoon with Leah, primping and preparing, and I hate the way my hair looks, my makeup is awful, and I’m almost out of time.
She’s spraying more crap in my hair that now looks nothing like my hair. It actually resembles hair in a picture she found in Vogue that she said would be similar to what he’d expect. As if she somehow knows what he expects.
I don’t know who I’m trying to be, but it’s not me, and I can’t do it. “Leah. Stop.”
“What do you mean, stop? We’re not done.”
“Yes, we are.” I pull the towel off my shoulders and turn to her in our cramped bathroom. “I look like a freak. It’s all wrong.”
“What’re you doing? Natalie! He’s going to be here in half an hour!”
I have just enough time to do this my way. “I need the bathroom, Leah.”
Throwing up her hands, she storms out, and I move faster than I ever have in the shower to wash all the crap out of my hair and off my face. I dry my hair in record time, but don’t bother to straighten it the way I normally would before a big event. A bit of mascara, a touch of lip gloss, and I’m done.
I emerge from the bathroom just as Leah is about to leave for work. She takes one look at me and shakes her head, her dismay apparent. “Don’t forget to bring him by the bar.”
“I won’t.”
“Have fun, Nat, and don’t be a total prude. Let your hair down a little—for real.”
“I can have fun without getting naked.”
“Don’t knock it till you’ve tried it, girlfriend. I’m out.”
I want to tell her that virtuous and prudish are not synonymous, but she’s gone before I can get the sentence out of my mouth. I’m not a prude. I don’t judge others for their choices. I don’t expect anyone to embrace my beliefs, nor do I try to inflict them on others. I’ve never said to Leah, for instance, “You shouldn’t sleep with every guy you date,” because that would be prudish and judgmental.
Yet she finds it perfectly acceptable to tell me I need to let loose and get naked with someone I don’t even know. It’s a double standard I could defend all day except I’m down to ten minutes until Flynn will be here. I still cannot believe I’m casually having that thought. Flynn will be here.
In my room, I put on the one black dress I own along with thigh-high hose and high-heeled black boots. I hope I don’t regret the heels, but I’m also hoping we won’t be outside for long, because the temperature has dropped into the teens. Feeling rushed and not at all ready for a date of this magnitude, I fill a small purse with the essentials, adorn my wrist with silver bangles and insert fake diamond stud earrings to complete my ensemble.
I take an assessing look in the mirror, and while I could never compete with the casual perfection of the women I see on the streets, at least I look like me—for better or worse. The buzzer sounds, and I jump a foot, which startles Fluff into a barking frenzy.
“Stop it.” I bend down to pat her furry head and kiss her furry face. “I’ll be back later. Behave yourself, and I might give you a treat.”
At the word treat, she sits and looks at me expectantly.
“Oh, all right.” I fear I’ll be an awful mother to my future children, and it’ll be Fluff’s fault. Fully manipulated by the woeful eyes of a twenty-pound dog, I dole out a couple of treats and grab my coat and purse. Pushing the button on the intercom, I say, “I’ll be right down” and end the connection before he can reply.
My hands are shaking again, and I hate that I’m so nervous. He’s just a man. A man who puts his pants on one leg at a time, as my grandfather would say. On the stairs, my heel catches on one of the rubber treads, and I stave off disaster by grabbing the banister. I strain a muscle in my arm in the effort to keep from pitching down the stairs. That only adds to the remaining aches and pains from my fall in the park this morning.
Humbled by the near miss, I stop and take two very deep breaths. Just a man. One leg at a time. Just a man. A person like anyone else. In through the nose, out through the mouth. While I’m standing still, I finish buttoning my red wool coat and pull on my gloves. Holding on to my composure, I go slowly down the remaining stairs and open the door to Flynn Godfrey himself. He’s wearing a black overcoat that he’s left unbuttoned, which is how I can see a crisp white dress shirt that he’s worn without a tie. I briefly home in on that triangle of exposed skin above his top button.
In that moment, I realize I expected him to have a driver. Movie stars don’t drive themselves around the city, do they? Apparently this one does.
He stares at me for a long moment—long enough that I fear I forgot to wipe the toothpaste from my mouth or worse…
“You… You’re stunning.”
It’s then I realize he’s staring at me for all the best reasons, and my heart begins to do this weird galloping thing that quickly makes me feel light-headed. He extends his arm, and because I’m prone to disaster today, I take it gratefully.
As he helps me down the stone stairs, I notice the shiny black vehicle with tint
ed windows parked at the curb with hazard lights flashing. My hands go sweaty with nerves. I’m grateful for the gloves and the cold air whipping against my heated cheeks.
Flynn opens the passenger door and holds it for me until I’m settled. As I slide into a heated leather seat and breathe in the scent of the most appealing cologne I’ve ever encountered, it occurs to me that no one will know where I am tonight. Leah knows who I’m with but not where I’ll be. She’s working at the bar until two a.m., and she won’t get home until after three—that is, unless she gets a better offer, and then she won’t be home at all. These thoughts begin to make me feel panicky as he gets in next to me and closes the door.
“You are lovely,” he says.
“Thank you.” I look at him, still not quite believing I’m sitting in a fantastically expensive sports car next to Flynn Godfrey. “Could I ask a favor?”
“Of course.”
“My roommate was very disappointed that she had to go to work before you picked me up. I wondered if you would mind—”
“Where does she work?”
I tell him where the bar is, and he considers it before turning his potent gaze on me, seeming troubled. “I hope you understand… I can’t go in there without causing a circus. Perhaps you could ask her to come out to see us?”
“Sure. She can do that.”
“What now?” he asks, studying me so intently that I feel unsettled and on display.
“I… I wondered if it would be all right if we told her where we’re going tonight.”
He raises a dark brow. “Are you scared of me?”
More like terrified, but I can’t say that. “No, but I only met you this morning, and it would make me more comfortable if someone who cares about me knows where I am.”
“I understand.”
Despite what he says, I can’t help but wonder if he really does understand what it’s like to be a young woman, new to the city, navigating the many perils. If I’d been speaking to my parents, they would’ve tried to talk me out of coming here. They were afraid of everything, especially things they didn’t know or understand. But I haven’t talked to them in eight years, so they didn’t get a say in my big decision. The second I got the letter of acceptance into the program, I knew there was nothing that would keep me from moving here to make my dreams come true.
I pull off my gloves and send a text to Leah, asking her to come outside to meet us. We pull up to the bar a few minutes later, and she is waiting in the cold without a coat on.
Flynn puts the passenger side window down, and leans over me without actually touching me, but I’m acutely aware of his nearness.
Leah’s hand comes up to cover her mouth when she sees him.
I’m grateful she doesn’t actually scream.
The words “shut up, shut up, shut up” are muffled by her hand.
“Leah, I presume?” Flynn says in the rough, sexy tone that made him a superstar.
With her hand still over her mouth, Leah nods.
He looks at me. “Is she always so talkative?”
That makes me laugh. “Give her a second to recover, and then she won’t shut up.” I look out at her. “Satisfied?”
“For now,” Leah says.
“Natalie would like you to know where we’ll be tonight. I’m going to use her phone to text the address to you, all right?”
“Um, yes,” she says, her voice squeaky. “That’s fine.”
“If I don’t come back, I expect you to do something about it,” I add.
“I believe she’s concerned I’m going to abscond with her and never bring her home. I have to confess, the thought crossed my mind, but I’m going to save the absconding for our second date.”
Leah visibly swoons, fans her face and spins around in a complete circle. Then she leans in the car and points to me. “Remember what we talked about?”
I’m so petrified she’s actually going to say it out loud that I refuse to even nod for fear of encouraging her.
“No time like the present, my friend. Mr. Godfrey, it was indeed a pleasure to meet you. If you abscond with my roommate, I won’t call 911.”
“Leah! Yes, you will!”
“Relax. Have some fun. Go a little wild.” She waggles her brows and succeeds in infuriating me. I hope the look I give her makes it clear I’m going to kill her in her sleep.
“We can leave now,” I say to Flynn, who seems to be settling into the conversation.
“But this is just getting interesting.”
“Go to work, Leah.”
“Go wild, Natalie.”
“It was very nice to meet you, Leah,” Flynn says, chuckling softly.
“You, too. Thanks for coming by. Come back again sometime when you can come in and I can impress all my coworkers because we’re friends.”
“I’d be happy to.”
She waves and skips back inside, no doubt ready to spill the beans about who her roommate is out with.
“She’s hilarious,” he says, earning a glare from me. “What? She is.”
“If you say so.”
“May I borrow your phone to send her the text I promised?”
I find Leah’s name on my list of contacts and hand him the phone with the text screen open.
He taps out a quick text and returns the phone to me.
“Do I get to know where we’re going?”
“When we get there.”
I don’t like his answer. All of a sudden, I don’t like this whole thing. His vague response to a legitimate question coupled with Leah’s foolishness has put me in an unsettled mood. I wish I was at home with Fluff, eating takeout and watching movies on TV like I do every other Saturday night. What am I doing in this car with Flynn Godfrey?
“I’d like to go home, please.”
Chapter 4
For the second time, she has stunned me. I turn in my seat so I can see her face. She’s staring straight ahead, refusing to look at me. “Excuse me?”
“I said I’d like to go home.”
“Why?”
“Because I don’t know why I’m here, and I no longer wish to be.”
“You’re here because I enjoyed your company this morning, and I’d like to get to know you. And I sort of hoped you felt the same about me.”
She finally looks at me, and I discover she’s even more stunning when she’s angry. “Why me?”
It occurs to me that I should choose my words carefully. Any chance I have with her rides on what I say right now. “I found you to be a refreshing change of pace. Do you know how rare it is for me to meet someone who doesn’t go all crazy about what I do and who I am?”
“I did that. A little.”
“A little. And then you were… normal. I liked that. I appreciate that. I want to spend more time with that. With you. You’re beautiful and sweet and unaffected and passionate about your job and your new city, and… I like you.” I shrug off the unexpected swell of emotion that starts in my chest and threatens to close my throat. “I miss normal conversations with normal people. Do you know how long it’s been since I met someone normal?”
“I appreciate that you think I’m normal, and I understand you mean that as a compliment.”
“As the highest of compliments.”
“But…”
“But what?”
“I don’t know how to say this without hurting your feelings, and I don’t want to do that.”
She’s adorable, and I want her with a desperation that stuns me. “Don’t worry about me. I can take it. Lay it on me.”
“I know things about you.”
That frightens me, another emotion that catches me by surprise. “What things?” I notice her fingers are trembling when she brings them to her throat. “I know about your feelings in regard to women and relationships and marriage and commitment.”
“You know what’s been reported in the media.”
“Yes, and it’s not particularly flattering to women. I didn’t take the time earlier to consider
how I feel about those things. Now that I have, I don’t see the point in spending time together when nothing can come of it.”
“You have to know that much of what’s reported about me is utter bullshit.”
“Much but not all.”
“No,” I concede, “not all of it.”
“Is the part about how you were so burned by your first marriage that you’d never marry again true?”
The question registers a direct hit to the gut, and I fight the need to squirm under her sharp gaze. “That part might be true.”
“So then there really is no point at all to us spending more time together, because if you’re like most men, and I suspect you are, the dating ritual is undertaken with one goal in mind—to get your flavor of the week into bed. Since I have not and will not sleep with anyone I’m not married to, and you have no intention of ever marrying again, I’d say we’re at an impasse.”
“So wait, you haven’t… That’s to say…”
“You heard me correctly.”
For the third time, she has knocked the air out of my lungs. “Well…”
“Let’s skip this whole thing, shall we? Would you mind taking me home?”
“I…” Suddenly, I’m panic-stricken at the thought of her escaping before I have the chance to know her. I realize I’m in deep, deep trouble when it occurs to me that it doesn’t matter if she won’t sleep with me. What I want from her, what I need from her, goes far beyond sex. “Please.” My voice has been reduced to a mere whisper. “Give me tonight. If after that you don’t want to see me again, I’ll respect your wishes.” I reach for her hand and bring it to my mouth, brushing my lips lightly over her knuckles.
She draws in a sharp breath that tells me she’s not immune to me. Not at all. But as always, I have no idea if she’s reacting to me or to the fact that a movie star kissed her hand. I’d like the opportunity to find out.
“Please.”
She looks at me for the longest time, and I have the oddest feeling that my entire life and any chance I have to be truly happy depends on what she says next. It’s a feeling I’ve never experienced before, and it shocks the living shit out of me.