Waiting for him.
He didn’t deserve her, but that made him even more grateful. He planned to spend all his nights reversing the pain he’d caused her. And to think—he’d almost lost her.
No, Beau didn’t recognize the person he’d become, but he didn’t mind. He was forever changed that night he’d thought he’d lost her for good, only to walk into the lounge of the Four Seasons hotel and find her.
Waiting for him.
11
Three weeks earlier
At exactly 9:51 P.M. on the same day she’d fled Beau’s presidential suite, Lola slipped into a high-backed seat at the hotel’s lounge. She’d passed out on the floor of her eleventh-floor room for a few hours, but after a cold shower, she’d slipped back into her white dress. She was reborn—and ready to enter the arena.
Revenge went against her nature, but Lola’s motive ran as deep as Beau’s betrayal had cut. This wasn’t eye for eye or tooth for tooth—it was the most valuable thing you could give another person. Hope for a future, raw vulnerability. This was heart for heart.
“Evening.” The bartender slid a napkin in front of her. “What’re you having?”
Lola’s back was unnaturally straight, her body tense. Tonight, she was both predator and prey, target and huntsman. It was an entirely normal inquiry from a bartender—what drink did she want—but she’d come to learn that friendly strangers were strangers nonetheless, and strangers could be dangerous. She repositioned herself in the chair, trying to get more comfortable. “What do you recommend?”
He grabbed a menu from the bar and held it open in front of her. He tapped it with his finger. “I’m new here, but I’m told the Colony Cocktail is our most popular drink.”
Lola’s mouth soured. The last man who’d picked her drink had also chosen that one, and it hadn’t exactly turned out well. “I’ll have anything but that.”
He laughed, clapped the menu closed and tossed it aside. “How about I make you my off-menu specialty?”
She tried to smile, but it felt more like a grimace. The bartender was a poor distraction. Beau could be back any minute, she had no idea. “Sounds great. I also need a Macallan, neat.”
“You got it.” He picked out a couple liquor bottles and moved down the bar.
Lola released a breath. She was tempted to turn and check the entrance, but she kept her eyes forward and her back to the door. To put him at ease, he had to believe he was in charge, that he could sneak up on her.
The bartender set down both drinks, and Lola moved the Scotch to the side. She unsnapped her clutch.
“It’s on the house.”
Lola looked up from her lap. She’d worked in a bar a long time, and drinks never came free. “But the Macallan. It’s expensive.”
He shrugged. “It’s my second night here, and my manager left me alone. Why not?”
Lola closed her purse. “You won’t get in trouble, will you?”
“Maybe, but it’d be worth it. If I could get a smile.”
There it was, the price of her drink. A little bit of herself. And surely, he expected her to be flattered by his manipulation. It occurred to Lola, she’d agreed to a game of darts with Beau knowing little more about him than she did about this bartender. It’d led to a more dangerous game.
He stood there, waiting, not reading her skepticism.
She smiled. At least she knew better now. “Thank you. What is it?”
“Blood orange juice and gin.” He glanced between her eyes and the red drink. “Strawberries on top. It’s called an Amore Vietato.”
“Amore.” Lola picked up the martini glass and took a sip. “That’s Italian for love, isn’t it?”
“Yes.”
“What’s vietato mean?”
“Forbidden.”
She shifted her eyes to meet his. A love that shouldn’t exist, that survived despite the odds. Or because of them?
“Excuse me,” he said when another customer sat a few seats down.
Lola checked her watch and glanced around. It was after ten o’clock. The bar was right off the lobby, but the hushed conversations and low lights made it feel secluded. It was made for seduction, but that was only half the reason she’d chosen it. She wanted to remind Beau of the hour they’d spent there on their second night, their drinks barely touched, her mouth closer to his than necessary.
Like any woman worth her salt, Lola could fake intimacy, but men weren’t wired that way. Beau’s adoration had been in his touch, his eyes, his whispered words. Even if it was only an ember, something burned in him for her.
Lola sipped her Amore Vietato and took comfort in the fact that even roaring, rampant fires had started as embers.
Minutes passed. When Lola’s posture began to slouch, she corrected it.
The bartender returned and leaned his hip against the counter. “So, what is it? Blind date?”
Lola shook her head. “Just a friendly drink with a…friend.”
“Right.” He raised an eyebrow. “That dress is about as opposite of friendly as it gets.”
Lola cocked her head. “You think?”
He dropped his gaze for the briefest moment. “If he’s male, your friend might get the wrong idea.”
“And I guess that would be my fault.”
“Of course. You know what you’re doing. Nothing is ever as it seems with you ladies.”
Lola stuck her elbows on the counter like she and the bartender were old friends. “That’s a lot to put on an article of clothing.”
“My ex wore white when she’d done something especially devilish. It was a subconscious way of seeming innocent so I’d take pity on her.”
She squinted at him. There was no ring on his hand. Not even a tan line where a ring would be. That didn’t mean anything, though. A ring could change a person’s entire identity, and it could also be slipped on and off. Like her, he was black-haired and blue-eyed, but his face was round and inviting. Her face was not round, it was heart-shaped, and she doubted it was particularly inviting tonight. That would have to change once Beau got there.
She lifted one shoulder. “What if a dress is just a dress?”
The saleswomen of Rodeo Drive had shown Lola many outfits earlier that day. Red was aggressive. Black was too her—she didn’t want to be herself tonight. She only wanted to play herself. White’d been the least threatening. Perhaps the bartender had something there.
“It’s just a theory,” he said, another shrug. “I never asked her. Then she’d know I was onto her.”
Lola was leaning a little farther over the bar now, envisioning what Beau would see if he’d walk in right then. “Sounds like you two had some trust issues.”
“Show me a relationship without trust issues, and I’ll show you bullshit.” He laughed, genuinely amused, then scanned her face. “I’m Sean, by the way.”
She shook his outstretched hand. “Lola.”
“Beautiful name for a beautiful woman.”
Lola rolled her eyes. He wouldn’t have said that if she’d been herself, normal clothing, just a girl having a beer. This dress, this hotel in this part of town, it was like a parallel universe. “Surely you can do better than that.”
He shook his head, shamefaced but grinning. “You’re right. How about—an angelic name for an angelic dress. As for the woman in it…”
“Not angelic?” she suggested, crooking the corner of her mouth.
“That’s to be determined.” He winked, then looked over her shoulder, his expression souring like he’d just eaten something questionable.
Lola didn’t have to ask what’d caused that look. Something ghosted against her ear, causing the hair on the back of her neck to stand on end.
The familiar voice was deep, warm and unequivocally male, but Lola sensed the edge in his words. “What are you doing here?”
She turned to face him, the man she loved and loathed, her expression soft and her hands balled into quiet fists—fragile as a vase hiding igneous rock.
&n
bsp; 12
Beau loved Lola’s hair—to feel it between his fingers, to pull it in a fist as he took her from behind. She responded to that as much as he did, arching and moaning toward the ceiling. Even with her back to him in the hotel lounge, there was no mistaking her shiny hair, obsidian-black against her white dress.
Lola turned her head over her shoulder, hesitating a moment before she looked up at him. After the way they’d parted in the early hours that morning, he would’ve expected anger. Their time together had been short, but he’d learned to read her mood through her eyes—she was calm.
“I’m sorry.” She sighed as if she’d been holding her breath a long time. “To just show up this way. I didn’t know where else to go.”
Beau stood up straighter. He was more than a part of her world—he was all of it. She had nowhere to go—because of him. Yet she’d returned. Why? She wasn’t the type to come slinking back.
He reluctantly shifted his gaze from Lola to the bartender, who needed to be dealt with before either of them said another word. Beau’d walked in on an unpleasant scene—Lola, in an uncharacteristically sexy dress, getting winked at by a bartender. Hadn’t Beau taught her about the dangers of unfamiliar men? As the day had passed, he’d been less convinced she’d broken things off with Johnny. Johnny, who deserved his balls in a vise, might still have Lola, and that brought Beau’s blood to a boil. Now he had to worry about the entire male species?
“You must be new here,” Beau said.
The man crossed his arms. “And you are?”
“A man with a very helpful tip.” Beau picked up the amber drink next to Lola and studied it, his upper lip curling. “The staff is here to serve, not to enjoy my things.”
Lola glanced up at Beau.
“I don’t understand,” the bartender said.
“The valet doesn’t take my car out for a joyride. The housekeeper doesn’t wear my Rolex while she cleans.” Beau put his other hand on the back of Lola’s chair. “You look at her like that one more time, I’ll have you fired.”
The man’s jaw dropped into a disbelieving, open-mouth smile. “Dude, I was keeping her company. Bugs me to see such a beautiful woman waiting on anyone.” He unfolded his arms and set his palms on the edge of the bar, leveling a glare at Beau. “Especially someone who just referred to her as one of his possessions.”
“Don’t, Sean,” Lola said in warning. “It’s not your problem.”
For Lola’s sake, Beau refrained from explaining that up until recently, she had been his possession. The way she’d referred to Beau as a problem, though, he was tempted. Instead, he slid his glass across the bar. “This isn’t Macallan.”
“It’ll have to do.” Sean pushed the glass back. “We’re fresh out.”
“We can go somewhere else.” Lola tried to stand, but Beau put a heavy hand on her shoulder, keeping her in her seat.
“If you’d like to keep your job past the end of this conversation,” Beau said, ignoring her, “you should check again.”
“My job?” Sean raised his eyebrows. “I’m sorry—I wasn’t aware I had a new boss.”
“I’m worse than your boss—I’m a guest here. An important one. Make my drink, and put both mine and hers on my tab.”
Lola shifted in her seat. “Mine was on the house.”
“No, it’s not.” Beau didn’t take his eyes off the guy, who wouldn’t have felt like a threat any other time, but Lola being suddenly there was throwing him off. “Charge it to my room. Beau Olivier.”
Sean blinked once and pushed off the bar, taking a step away. “You’re Mr. Olivier?”
“That’s right.”
“Of course. I’m so sorry.” Sean picked up Beau’s drink and set it down again. “I didn’t realize—I just started here. I thought you’d be…different. Like an old guy.”
“How about that drink?” Beau was eager to get back to Lola. From the corner of his eye, he could see her staring up at him, her eyes wide, like he was God. It was making his pants tight.
“Yes, sir,” Sean said, turning in almost a complete circle as he mumbled to himself, “Beau Olivier, Macallan, neat. I knew that.”
Not until the bartender was out of earshot did Beau look back at Lola. “When I talk to the manager, that poor kid’ll be fired. Because of you. Doesn’t that make you feel bad?” Beau slid his hand down her shoulder, tracing a finger along the low-cut neckline of her dress. Less than five minutes, and he had the overwhelming need to touch her again. “Or does that kind of power over another person turn you on?”
Lola closed her hand around his, stopping it in its tracks. “I didn’t come here to screw you.”
“What makes you think I want to?”
She glanced down at his pants and licked her lips, forcing Beau’s eyes directly to her now-glistening pink mouth. He’d done unspeakable things to that mouth, and to her round tits, her flat, quivering tummy. And the first time he’d touched the petal-soft skin of her inner thighs, parted them like the sea, it’d been with ten years’ worth of anticipation.
“My mistake,” she said smoothly, drawing his attention back up. She glanced over at Sean, who was pouring Beau’s drink.
Beau took her chin and turned her face to his. “Don’t look away from me.”
She just blinked at him. “I’m not.”
“You’re alone?”
She swallowed.
“Is it over?”
“Do you want it to be?”
Beau didn’t answer right away. He was having trouble reading her for the first time. Without knowing why she was there or what exactly she wanted, he wasn’t about to admit anything she could use against him. “It makes no difference to me.”
Her expression stayed clean, but her cheek twitched. “You were right about him.”
Beau’s hand tightened a little around her jaw. He was on edge, and he didn’t want to hear about Johnny, but that statement wasn’t something he could ignore. “What was I right about?”
“A lot of things.” Her voice had softened—because of his hand? Or because she was hurting? “He was with Amanda last night while I was here.”
His mouth was closed, but he ground his teeth hard. It didn’t surprise him. Beau had seen Johnny for the coward he was the night he’d met him in Hey Joe. For one, Johnny hadn’t beaten Beau to a pulp for propositioning Lola. He was weak, selfish. Beau considered himself above physical altercations, but right then, he wished he’d taken a swing at Johnny when he’d had the chance.
Beau loosened his grip a little. “I warned you that would happen.”
“It’s not the reason we broke up,” she said, her voice hedging but her intent clear, like she wanted him to know that. “By the time I found out, we were already done. There’s so much more to it than that.”
Beau didn’t need to hear the reasons. He nodded. “I know.”
“You asked why I’m here—that’s why. My mom and I don’t speak. I don’t really have anyone else. If I go back to my apartment—”
“You’re not going back there.”
She shied away as much as she could while in his grip, which wasn’t much. “Then where am I going?”
Beau didn’t have an answer for that. He wasn’t sure why he’d even said it. The idea that he wasn’t ready to let Lola go had been growing on him all day, but now it was a fact. He wasn’t finished with her, and she was there, but that didn’t mean he understood why he was happy about it. “You could go to the eleventh floor.”
Her lips parted, a small gasp. “You knew I was staying here?”
He almost laughed at her shock. Had she learned nothing about him and what he was capable of the past few weeks? “I saw you in the lobby earlier.”
Her eyebrows gathered. “When I checked in? Have you been—following me or something?”
“You walked right by me.” Beau ran the pad of his thumb under her chin and tsked. “Didn’t even notice. You really should be more careful, ma chatte.”
“How do you know my roo
m number?”
Beau didn’t know which room she was in, but he could find out before she’d even finished her drink—the one turning her mouth an affected shade of red. “It’s my business to know these things.”
She scoffed. “What I do is none of your business. You made sure of that.”
Beau cocked his head. Finally, a reaction—the fire that excited him as much now as it had the first night they’d spent together. “You should know by now—if I want to, I make it my business.” She tried to look away, but Beau wasn’t about to let that fire go out now that he’d sparked it. “What’re you really here for?” he asked. “An apology?”
She shook her head. “Words could never make it right, what you did.”
It didn’t matter. Beau’s plan had never had a second part. Once he’d dropped the axe on their connection, it was supposed to have severed any hope of redemption, of reconciliation. Like any deal worth making, he’d been ruthless, anticipating Lola’s every move, manipulating her to his own end. He’d proven he could buy things that couldn’t be bought. He was a master at something that couldn’t be mastered.
So why did he feel as if he’d lost something? After he’d gone through so much to own her for those two nights, she didn’t belong to him now. When they parted ways tonight, she wouldn’t be where he could see her. She wouldn’t come when he called.
Beau released her face. “What could?”
Lola raised her chin, her eyes narrowing almost imperceptibly. “You’re asking me how to make this right?”
She was as proud as he was, yet she’d come back. Her feelings for him were even stronger than he’d thought. Was love that overpowering, that healing? Was Lola finding the strength to move past the pain, to accept Beau’s flaws—in the name of love? It was as if some softer, calmer version of her sat in front of him instead of the real thing. The problem was, Beau had fallen for the real thing—the girl who’d stopped him in his tracks when she’d put a dent in a car with her Converse.
Explicitly Yours Series Page 38