Elastic Hearts (Hearts #3)

by Claire Contreras

  The blonde nodded and scurried off.

  “You don’t have to stay,” Chrissy said to her security guy, who was still in tow. “You can go hang out with Marcus, and I’ll text you when I’m ready to go.”

  The way this pint-sized girl ordered such big males around was always amusing to me.

  “I’m trying to see if my sister’s here,” Chrissy said, typing into her phone. Her sisters were as popular as she was, especially in these settings.

  “She’s right there,” I said, looking across from us. Chrissy laughed.

  “How did we not see her? Let’s go say hi.”

  We joined their friends, catching up on whatever loud club music would allow us to talk about. Work, boyfriend, etcetera, until the inevitable subject came up. Gabe.

  I shrugged. “Don’t care. Honestly, I’d rather not talk about it. It’s fine. I’m fine.”

  And surprisingly, I was. I always wondered what I would feel like if and when I actually saw him with another woman. I wondered if I’d be angry or jealous, but I felt neither. I felt nothing. It’d been so long, and I felt nothing. I started to laugh. It was a small laugh that became louder and then stopped altogether.

  “I’m a little tipsy; I’m having a moment,” I said. “And I need to pee.”

  Chrissy laughed and hooked her arm around mine. “Let’s go.”

  We brushed past the crowd, and saw Gabe walking toward the exit with a blonde on his arm. Chrissy looked at me, her eyes wide and comforting.

  “I’m sorry.”

  I blamed the alcohol running through me for the tears that burned my eyes. I wasn’t a public crier and was definitely not going to cry over him. I was done with that. We weren’t together anymore. We hadn’t been for a long time, yet it felt weird to see him walk out with someone else. Had he ever been faithful? Between the woman walking into his room and the clear way in which he depicted that he’d moved on, I had to wonder. Had I been blind or had he been the man I thought he was? I sighed, and shook my head slowly. It was something only Gabe knew. And I wasn’t hurting, just . . . taken aback by it.

  “It’s fine. I’m glad I saw it,” I said, clearing my throat.

  “I hope he gets herpes,” she said. We laughed, holding on to the rails to keep from tumbling down the steps. “Oh crap. We’re blocking,” she said. “Sorry. We’re blocking. Oh . . . wow.”

  I looked up and saw the oh wow in question. He was tall, and lean, with a pair of hazel eyes currently burning holes through me.

  “Holy fuck,” I breathed.

  Chrissy got right into flirt mode. “Where are you going?”

  “The question is, where are you going?” Victor asked, his attention fully on me, eyes roaming down my body slowly before making their way back to my face. I swallowed back the urge to launch myself at him and erase the past ten minutes from my mind. The shots had certainly done a number on me because I felt like I was totally ready and willing to do that.

  “To pee.”

  Chrissy laughed. “She means to the ladies’ room.” She grabbed my arm and shot me a pointed look. “He’s hot. Saying you have to pee is frowned upon.”

  I couldn’t help but laugh. “He’s my lawyer.”

  The look on her face was priceless as she looked between the two of us. Victor was two steps beneath us and at eyelevel to us.

  “Well, then. I’m going to . . .” She pointed toward the door of the bathroom a few steps down. Before she walked away, she leaned into my ear and whispered, “He works for your dad?” I nodded. “He’s the one you . . . you know . . .”

  I tugged at my bottom lip, my eyes still on Victor, and nodded at Chrissy who let out a harsh breath on my shoulder before walking away. She glanced back to give me two thumbs up, and I found myself laughing again.

  “Hey,” I said once she’d walked away. My voice was drowned out when the music picked up again. Victor leaned forward, the scruff on his face brushing my right cheek as he reached up to speak into my ear.

  “Hey,” he said in a low voice that made me shiver.

  “I see you still frequent night clubs,” I said, pulling back a little to look at him.

  His eyes heated, lips curled into a smile that told me he was remembering the same thing I was. Us rushing to the bathroom of a crowded club, him tugging the birthday tiara out of my hair, ripping my panties off before putting on a condom and thrusting inside me with a force I’d never experienced. Because of where he was standing, I could feel his breath on my face, smell the hint of alcohol that lingered. The pull I felt was indescribable. It was as if in that small space everything vanished, including all rational thought.

  Especially rational thought.

  Because when he opened his mouth to say something, surely his next warning, I pressed my lips against his, and when he moved back slightly to steady himself, my body moved with his. He broke the kiss quickly, but not before sliding his tongue into my mouth once, curving in a deep full circle around mine, and thankfully, not before grabbing a fistful of my hair and groaning against my lips. Suddenly it wasn’t the bass of the music thumping through my veins, but the feel of Victor pressed up against me, holding me, and then just like that, with the same quickness in which it had started, he pulled back.

  “Nicole,” he said, a warning. I opened my eyes and looked at him.

  “Yeah?” I whispered.

  “Follow me.”

  He turned around and walked down the stairs, and I trailed behind him, rounding the corner of the dimly lit hallway until we reached a door he pushed open. I blinked rapidly, looking around, at the desk, the glass walls beside us that overlooked the club, as my eyes adjusted to the red glow of the office.

  “Who’s office is this?” I asked.

  “The owner.”

  “How do you know the owner?”

  Victor tilted his head slightly, stepping closer to me so I had to crane my neck to look into his eyes. My heart lurched at what I saw in them.

  “Is that really what you want to discuss?” he asked, his voice low.

  “What do you want to discuss?” I whispered.

  “You kissed me. In public, Nicole,” he said sternly.

  I blinked and blinked again to clear my head of some of the alcohol. “You kissed me back.”

  He closed his eyes, letting out a huffing breath. “That was a mistake. This whole thing was a mistake.”

  “You mean me? I was a mistake?” I asked, heart rocking a little.

  I tried to gather my bearings, but it was a tough night. First I had to watch my soon-to-be ex-husband leave with another woman, and now I was going to have to stand here and listen to the reminder of why Victor and I hadn’t worked out in the past. A mistake. My self-esteem was definitely taking a hit.

  “Yes,” he said.

  Unable to stand there and listen to him berate me, and knowing that if I left the office and ran to the bathroom it would be to cry, I turned and walked toward the glass, placing my hand against it, feeling the vibrations of the muted house music on the other side, watching the colorful laser lights as they pointed in every which direction. I felt him, rather than heard him come up behind me. It was as if he couldn’t just give me the space I needed. As if he got off on telling me to stay away but also needed to pull me closer. I closed my eyes.

  “You weren’t a mistake,” he said, his voice dark and smooth. “Kissing in public was definitely a mistake.”

  “We were in a dark stairwell,” I said. “And you know the owner, so even if we were caught on camera you can have the footage erased.”

  Victor chuckled behind me and my eyes popped open. I turned around, resting my back against the cold surface behind me, closing my eyes for a beat when I felt the massage of the bass.

  “You’d make a decent criminal.”

  I smiled, meeting his gaze. “I know how to keep secrets.”

  “Nic.”

  “Hmm?” I asked, inching closer to him. I wonder what if would feel like to fuck against this window.

/>   From the way he pulled away from me, I’d either said the words aloud, or he’d read them on my face. He started to pace around the office, running a hand through his hair as he muttered things I couldn’t hear under his breath.

  “This isn’t going to work,” he said finally, turning to face me as he stood behind the desk.

  “What?”

  “This. Us. Me on this case. It’s not going to work.”

  “Because you want to fuck me against the window,” I said.

  He gripped the top of the chair tightly and dropped his head, but didn’t comment on what I’d said. “Maybe we should just see each other when we have to . . . for the divorce,” he said.

  I let out a laugh. “I didn’t plan to come here tonight, let alone run into you.”

  “You’re right,” he said, meeting my gaze. “You’re right, but we should still stick to that plan.”

  “As my lawyer, I don’t think you should let me make rash decisions when I’m drunk,” I said. He looked down again, but I saw his smile before he tried to hide it.

  “I’m serious, Nicole.”

  “That’s fine, Victor. I get it. Is that it? I was talking to a really cute guy upstairs, and I still need to use the restroom. Maybe I’ll take him with me.” Even in my current state, I could see the way his eyes darkened at my suggestion.

  “You just said you were drunk,” he growled, gripping the chair harder.

  “Not that drunk.” I paused to search his face. “Would that upset you? If I hooked up with that guy in the bathroom? I kind of like bathroom hookups.”

  “Nicole,” he said, his tone hard, his eyes searing into mine.

  “You know, you’re actually the only guy I’ve done that with,” I admitted. “But it was so hot. You kept saying all these dirty things in my ear, remember?”

  “I remember,” he said, voice grating.

  “You were doing that,” I said, pointing at his fingers, which were digging into the top of the chair. “Gripping my ass. I had marks the next day, the soreness. So hot.”

  “Nicole,” he growled.

  “It’s too bad you’re all business, otherwise we could have had a little fun,” I said, pivoting to face the door and walking toward it. “We done here?”

  Before I could even turn the knob, Victor was at my back, his hand covering mine over the doorknob.

  “Why are you making this so difficult?” he asked, his voice a deep murmur in my ear. I didn’t know. I honestly didn’t know. It was him. I blamed him for clouding my judgment every time he was around. I closed my eyes. I wanted to lean my head back, give him access to my neck for him to suck on. I wanted to get lost in the feel of him thrusting inside me. I really, really needed to get laid. And my body really, really wanted Victor Reuben to satisfy that urge.

  “Why would you bring me into a dark office to talk to me about not kissing you in public? You could have told me that in the hall,” I said, opening my eyes. His hand gripped mine so I couldn’t move.

  “I can’t seem to think straight around you,” he said, his breath on my neck.

  He turned the doorknob and put his hand on the small of my back to lead me out of there and back to the VIP section. I shivered at the feel of his touch. I looked at him over my shoulder and locked eyes, wondering if he felt this pull too. His nostrils flared. When we reached the dark corner, where the hallway had three options: exit, bathrooms, or stairs to VIP, we stopped walking and I turned to face him. His hand ran from my lower back, to my side, and my abdomen before he dropped it.

  “I guess we’re sort of on the same page after all,” I said.

  “If that’s the case, we need to get on different chapters fast,” he responded, tearing his gaze away from mine and looking toward the exit.

  “You’re really leaving?”

  He looked at me again. “It’s best if I do.”

  “Because I’m tempting you,” I said, my mouth dropping slightly open when he nodded.

  “Nothing good happens after twelve,” he said. “It would be wise for you to do the same.”

  “You just don’t want me hooking up with anybody.”

  He smiled and reached behind me, grabbed a fistful of my hair and tugged it gently. It was something he used to do before and just like then, I felt the notion to the tips of my toes.

  “You already said I was the only guy you’d done that with. I don’t expect you to break the mold in one night.” He winked at me as he let go of my hair.

  “You know me, I like being spontaneous,” I said. His jaw twitched as he tore his gaze away from mine momentarily.

  “Be careful, Nicole. Please don’t do anything stupid,” he added, leaning in to brush his lips against my cheek before walking away and out the door.

  It simply wasn’t fair. The man was too sexy. Too enticing. Too desirable. I wanted him. My body wanted him. Although, after that encounter, I was fairly sure my heart wouldn’t survive a repeat with Victor Reuben.

  I SPENT MY morning off, nursing a hangover and dodging calls from both Gabe’s manager and Victor’s assistant. Around three o’clock, I got cozy on the sofa in my room, eating my cup of cereal and watching Peaky Blinders on Netflix. It was a perfect afternoon until the pounding on my door started. I closed my eyes, begging for Cillian Murphy to be the one on the other side of the door. Knowing I was about to be highly disappointed as soon as I stood to open it. I sighed, threw my blanket off, and unlocked the door. Gabe and his manager were standing on the opposite side. I closed my eyes and counted to three before opening them again. Darryl looked like someone’s dad, with his salt and pepper hair, thick glasses, and round belly. Someone’s dad or someone with an underage porn fetish. I was always crept out by him to the point that I may or may not have had him photoshopped from some of our wedding photos. But the guy could talk his way in and out of anything, and he was as ruthless as they came, which was a gift in this industry.

  “I feel like I must have done something horribly wrong in my past life.”

  “Nice to see you again too, Nicole,” Darryl said, flashing his megawatt fake-ass smile at me.

  “What do you want?” I asked, looking at Gabe, who had his hands tucked into the front pockets of his jeans and his head down.

  He looked like a sullen school boy, and the fact he looked that way and was standing beside his manager could only mean one thing. One really, really bad thing. My heart dropped.

  “What?” I said, trying to ignore the way my heart spiked.

  “We have a proposition for you. A very big one, one that will benefit you immensely if you agree to it,” Darryl said. Despite the mistrust I felt for him, I knew he always had his client’s interest at hand. My brows rose.

  “Let’s hear it.”

  We sat down at our long dining room table. The one we’d only used a handful of times to entertain guests on holidays or to talk about the laughable proposition, because that’s what it ended up being. Absolutely ridiculous and laughable. They basically wanted me to pretend that maybe, just maybe I wasn’t going to divorce Gabe after all.

  “We haven’t been seen out together in almost a year,” I pointed out. “And in that time he has been seen with multiple women. All of whom weren’t me.”

  “He’s been traveling for work. You’ve been busy with your own career. He’s back temporarily and is finally realizing how good he has it and he wants to save his marriage,” Darryl said.

  My heart sunk again. Did he not realize how much this hurt? Listening to this with my estranged husband, whom I had longed to patch things up with, sitting across from me? Yes, I was over him. Yes, I wanted to move on, but his manager pointing out that Gabe would never feel the way he just described, still hurt. I swallowed my emotions and tilted my chin up.

  “What I’m hearing is ‘Gabe wins again.’ I still haven’t heard the part where Nicole gets something out of this,” I said.

  Gabe cleared his throat, clasping his hands in front of him. “Maybe it’s true. Maybe I want to try.”

/>   My jaw dropped. I blinked, blinked, blinked. “You can’t be serious,” I said, once I finally found my voice. The way he said he wanted to try made me think of the time he took me to my favorite sushi restaurant because he wanted to do something nice for me, but instead we ended up in the ER because he was allergic to the crab he’d ordered. It was sweet when I told him we could never go back there again and he looked at me, big puffy red eyes and said, “Maybe I want to try again. For you.”

  He shrugged those broad shoulders of his and I blinked out of my memory. “Why not?” he asked.

  “What the . . .” I paused, trying to rein in my anger before it got the best of me. I took a deep breath in order to regroup. “Gabe. I just filed for divorce.”

  “Forget about that,” Darryl said. “Let’s leave emotions out of this. We don’t need to complicate something simple. If you want to discuss your marriage, that’s fine, even though I think we can all agree it’s probably not working out for a reason.” He raised his dark eyebrows over the frames of his glasses and shot Gabe and me a knowing look.

  “Bastard,” I said.

  Gabe sighed.

  Darryl shrugged. “The proposition is this. Go with him to the movie premiere this week, and give the media some comments about your relationship. Positive comments. Keep them guessing. Wear your wedding ring once in a while. Gabe will keep his on and just play the part.”

  “What’s the point of that? The divorce has been filed. The papers were leaked. This whole thing will look stupid, and I still haven’t heard the part where this benefits me.” I looked at Gabe, who was watching me with a look I wanted to slap off his face. It was almost an admirable look, as if he was impressed with me.

  “We talk to all of the production companies and tell them that I acted out of spite when I said I wouldn’t work with them if they hired you as their costume designer,” Gabe said. I clenched my jaw and stabbed him in my thoughts. Repeatedly. I put my hands under the table and sat on them when I felt them begin to shake.

  “You guys think you’re so fucking cute playing with my career. You think that just because you’re Gabriel Lane, Hollywood’s sweetheart, that I can’t end you?” I asked. “You forget whose hometown this is, Gabriel Rogers. Or is your birth name something you’ve forgotten too? Maybe you should lay off the fucking drugs once in a while.” My chair screeched against the marble floor as I stood up.