Love, Chloe (17 page)

“Oh my God, I’m—”

“Not yet,” he growled, and his hand ripped at my panties, pulling them down, and his hot mouth was suddenly where his fingers had been, his hands on me, holding me down as he explored me with his mouth, his tongue light and constant as it played across my clit then dipped lower and deeper. The man had no fear, no hesitation, and I dug my hands in his hair as I tried to stay in control, tried to stay coherent. The sensation … it was building, spreading outward from his mouth, every muscle tensing, my body clenching in preparation for what was coming, and he groaned my name in worship and

in that sound, raw and primal…

in the clench of his hands on my skin…

in the wet, perfect flick of his tongue…

in the dark look of ownership and confidence in his eyes…

in the buildup, a hundred pieces of arousal climbing together…

I lost words, I lost thought, I lost every single piece of myself. My shoulders came off the table and I whispered his name, my eyes closing, hands grabbing at him, his mouth staying on me as the intensity grew and stretched and inhaled my world.

I fell down to earth lazy and broken. My legs rolled off his shoulders, and I lay there on his table, his fingers soft as they trailed away, his mouth sweet as it slowly kissed its way off my skin, his arms strong as they lifted me off the table and carried me away, down a dark hall with another stunning Presa Little painting, and onto a bed that was big and soft.

There, he drew me into his arms.
Take your time
, he had said. Quite possibly the best three words I’d ever heard during sex. I ran my hand along his forearm and shifted against him, closing my eyes and listening to the beat in his chest.

There, lulled by the metronome of his heart, I slept.

I opened my eyes and felt the weight of an arm across my stomach.

I didn’t move. Didn’t breathe. I let my eyes adjust to the morning light and caught as many details as I could from my place in the bed.

Light gray walls. No furniture sitting on the charcoal floors. No curtains framing the windows. His room had
nothing
in it. No dirty clothes, no dresser, no desk, no phone charger hanging off the wall. I eyed the closet door and wondered if it was packed full or OCD organized. I bet on organized. The sun was shining through a clean window, his baseboards were dust-free, and his freakin’ fan blades sparkled from above me.

So. One upside to my fall into a handyman’s bed: it was clean. I straightened my right leg, realized my lack of panties, and remembered a second upside: a long-awaited orgasm. An orgasm that had been great for me but had left him with nothing. I smiled despite myself. A sexual gentleman. Vic wouldn’t have let me sleep until the scales were even.

My experience with random hookups was fairly limited, and I wondered at the next step. Should I roll out from under his arm and sneak out? Would we pass each other in the hall and smile and pretend nothing happened? Would he want to have a relationship talk? I stared up at his sparkly clean ceiling fan and felt the first tinge of panic.

Nicole’s ringtone suddenly blared, scaring the hell out of me. I bolted upright, throwing off his arm and crawled over his hard body, headed for his bedside table, my fingers stretching to grab my cell. I answered it while turning around his clock. Saw the time and panicked, throwing some bullshit Nicole’s way while I looked around for my shorts.

“They’re in the living room.” Carter was sitting half up, his bare torso on glorious display, watching me with an amused half-grin stretched across his face.

“Thanks,” I whispered, hopping off the bed. His hand reached out and grabbed my wrists, pulling me back and I was suddenly right
there
, inches from his face, his other hand at the back of my neck, his mouth soft as he gently pulled me in for a kiss. I closed my eyes and enjoyed the moment. Nicole barked a fresh set of orders through the phone and I quickly came back down to earth. “I have to go,” I whispered and pulled away. I waved at him and mouthed an apology, jogging down the hall. “I’m literally right here, Nicole. I’m walking in the door now.”

I found my underwear and my shorts, pulling them on. A spare key for my apartment lay right next to my shoes, my apartment number neatly printed on the tag. I stared at it for a moment, something about the way it was laid out, felt like a giant
Get Out of Here
sign. I shrugged off the feeling, pocketing the key, my feet shoved into my shoes, and ran out.

I waited on the street, my eyes scanning for a cab, and tried to understand the roll of feelings. I felt like a thirteen-year-old girl. One who had just *cough* kissed a guy and had no idea how to handle it. I wasn’t even sure, catching sight of a cab, why I was analyzing this. We hadn’t even had sex. It was a one-night thing, nothing more. I had nothing in common with the man, wasn’t even sure he
liked
me. I had caught him in a weak moment and gotten a mind-numbing orgasm from it. End of story.

Probably.

Hopefully.

Not.

The stack of publications before me grew.
People, In Touch, Variety,
the
Times,
the
Hollywood Reporter
—I added
Star
to the pile and picked up the next, flipping through the newspaper, my eyes skimming for any mention of Nicole. My stomach flipped when I stuck the blue flag on page 7A, right by a story naming
Boston Love Letters
an expensive vanity project, one set to tank.

I shifted on my stool, in the Brantley’s kitchen, and eyed Nicole, who thumbed through a stack of mail. She wandered over, tossing the mail on the counter and reached for the newspaper, pulling it from my hands, her eyes darting over the article. “Is everything—?” I didn’t get the rest of the sentences out, barely having time to duck when she picked her phone off the counter and threw it.

“CLAARRRKKKE!” She screamed the man’s name like she was on the battlefield, and I heard his feet, heavy down the stairs. Then he was in the kitchen, T-shirt damp with sweat, ear buds hanging from around his neck. He stopped in the doorway, his hands braced on the frame, and looked at Nicole, his eyebrows rising in question.

“I
told
you this would happen!” Nicole screamed the threat as if it were the plague, and thrust out the newspaper, stretched tightly so we could read the headline:
BOSTON LOVE LETTERS ALREADY IN TROUBLE
. I slowly eased to my feet and picked up the laptop, ready to escape the carnage. “Chloe!” Nicole barked, pointing a finger in my direction. “Don’t go anywhere!” I slunk back down on the stool. Chanel deserted my feet and ran for cover, her nails clicking down the marble hall and out of sight. Lucky bitch.

“Nicole, calm down.” Clarke let go of the doorframe and stepped closer. Brave man. I shifted slightly, hunching behind my laptop in case things started flying in my direction. As quickly as possible, I navigated over to TMZ to see if there was any news about
BLL
there. This shit was about to get nuclear if they’d grabbed the story too.

“Calm
down
? Do you know what this says? It says
I’m
the reason we’re behind schedule and over budget. It calls me a C-list actress!”

“Well, this
is
your first big—” His stupid statement was cut off by another scream, this one punctuated by Nicole’s toss of the newspaper onto the floor, her fists waving in the air as she physically jumped up and down on it.
Jumped
up and down. In four-inch slingbacks. I watched in fascination.

“Fix
TTHHHIIISSS
!” she screamed, continuing her jumping fest, her breasts bouncing with each hop.

“I’ll call the publicist. We’ll get the papers to issue a retraction,” he started.

“It needs to be done NOW. Or so help me God…”

“It’ll be fixed.” He made a shushing sound and stepped closer, his hands reaching out and rubbing her arms, pulling her protesting body into his chest. Her stance relaxed for a moment, folding into his arms and pushing away only when she realized he was sweaty.

“By tomorrow,” she pouted, stepping out of the ruined newspaper bits.

“Okay.” Clarke shot a relieved look my way, and I smiled weakly, wanting nothing more than to be out of their kitchen, their house, their lives. Nicole snapped her fingers at me.

“Chloe, order beignets from that place around the corner.” Her tone was mild, like nothing had happened, and I nodded, looking down at my laptop.

And that was when I saw it. The top story on TMZ.
Joey Plazen dating a new Mystery Blonde
? Right below the headline was a grainy photo of Joey, his lips pressed hard to his latest conquest.

Me.

It’d been less than four hours since the TMZ story hit and the entire world of entertainment had gone nuts. I locked my phone and resisted the urge to chuck it in the trash, my social media exploding as every friend I’d ever had felt the need to tag me on every news outlet that picked up the story. Thank GOD I wasn’t on Facebook anymore. One less gallon of blood in the shark-infested waters.

My phone rang and I glanced down, Nicole’s name lighting up my screen for the third time in the forty-five minutes I’d sat on these steps. Ignoring Nicole was dangerous, but I had to talk to Joey and whatever she needed would draw me from that task. I silenced the call and wondered, for the tenth time in the two weeks since my hookup with Carter, why he hadn’t called. Granted, we hadn’t exchanged numbers. But he was a resourceful guy, with full access to my rental application. From behind me, Joey’s trailer door swung open, and I pushed my butt off the steps and stood, wiping off my Hudsons, ready to give Joey a serious piece of my mind.

Instead, Hannah stared down at me. “You waiting on me?” She dug her phone from her back pocket as if to check for calls.

I shook my head. “Him. I have to talk to him about the … you know.” I glanced around nervously. Nicole was still clueless. One benefit of me cutting out her tabloid articles, I could hide all mine with one visit to the shredder.

“The what?” Hannah raised her eyebrows, showing off impressively applied purple shadow and matching lashes. Apparently, the Joey Plazen camp didn’t stalk the tabloids. I suddenly felt pathetic, my attention-hungry boss and me.

“Pictures of me and him.” Her eyebrows rose even higher. “No, not
those
kind of pictures,” I rushed to explain. “Tabloid—is he in there?”

“He’s all yours,” she said airily, jogging down the steps. “But I’m just gonna warn you, he’s in a bitch of a mood.”

That was fine. I was in a bitch of a mood too.

I pushed open the door and stepped into Joey’s trailer, him sitting directly before me, on a worn leather couch, a notepad in hand, empty coffee cup on the table before him. “What do you want?” he growled.

I shut the door. “Have you seen the articles about us?”

“I don’t read the tabloids. First thing I learned.”

“They’re calling me your new
fling.
They have a picture of us
kissing
.” I spit out the words, and he lifted his eyes from the notepad, looking into my face for a long moment before tossing the pad down.

“So? Your street cred just went way up. You should do some interviews. Tell them I have a big dick and made you come ten different ways.” He laughed and reached for the cup, raising it to his lips before scowling into it. “Get me some coffee, will you?”

“No.” I glared at him.

“You’re seriously going to make me get my own coffee? I stopped doing that like eight years ago.” He gave me a wounded expression that was so blatantly adorable that I almost laughed. No wonder his ego was so big. He was impossible to hate.

“Yes.” I glared despite my urge to smile. “This is serious.”

“Don’t worry about the pics; they’ll move on to something else in a few days.” He waved his hand at me and stood, lifting the cup.

“Can’t you do something? Tell them we’re not dating?”

He turned around, away from the coffee pot. “I don’t date. They know that. And besides,” he shrugged, “you’re not my type.”

My self-esteem sank further, passing right through the floor. “Do
they
know I’m not your type?”