Love In Rewind (6 page)

"Look up there. That is the Highline. Bruel Industries is going to build an urban park suspended in the air—right there. It used to be an old railroad track but we're going to be part of a project to convert it into an oasis in this concrete jungle. What do you think?" he asked.

I think you're perfect
, I thought to myself, but said, "I think that's the coolest thing I've ever heard." That produced a full dimple-showing smile from him. We stopped by a bench, hand-in-hand, still hungrily assessing one another before sitting down.

"Tell me what's your favorite book?" I asked him.

"That's easy,
Great Expectations
,
and as of lately it's my favorite movie too," he quickly answered.

"Okay, Pip, what about your favorite color?" I continued to ask.

Louis started laughing and said, "This feels like I'm back in high school, but I love it, so here goes: as of yesterday I thought my favorite color was red, hence my red Ferrari … but after last night it's whatever shade of pink your nipples are."

That made me blush. I playfully pushed at him, only to have him come back at me with a kiss to the tip of my nose.

"Two things you'd take with you to a deserted island?" I continued my barrage of silly questions.

"Another easy one. I'd take one sexy Emily Marcus, of course, and a life supply of Twizzlers."

I was laughing so hard that I started hiccupping. Once my hiccups subsided I needed to know, "Why Twizzlers?"

We finally decided to sit on a nearby empty bench. Louis pulled my legs over his thighs so he could run his finger up and down my exposed skin while we lounged in the sun. All his answers thus far were making me giddy with laughter. He was looking down at his hand caressing my skin, and causing goose pumps to form up and down my body. He then lifted his yearning gaze to meet my eyes before answering me.

"I can't live without them. My dad got me hooked on Twizzlers when I was probably like three years old. I don't think I'd survive more than a day without them. Don't you laugh at me! I don't smoke or drink as much as I use to, so I need me a little Twizzler. Cut me some slack, woman."

I just added cute to his long list of attributes. I asked about his longest relationship, and all I got was, "Pass, next question please." His response made me happy for some unexplained reason.

"If you had to lose one of your five senses, which one would it be and why?"

He took a minute to think about his answer. "Okay, Miss Twenty Questions. Let's start with the process of elimination. If I couldn't see your beautiful face again that would be awful. If I couldn't touch every inch of you, that would be a calamity. If I couldn't hear you cry out my name like you did last night while you were coming deliciously in my lap that would be a fucking travesty. If those lips and tits are any indication of how sweet you'll taste everywhere else, I have to be able to taste you. So, although your scent is intoxicating, Miss Marcus, I'd have to give up my sense of smell."

WOW
, that was not the kind of reply I was expecting. I bravely gave him a light kiss on his lips.

"That was a very sweet answer Louis, a little R-rated, but still sweet."

He kissed me on the lips softly for the first time since last night and I almost had a full-on seizure on that park bench. Since I've established that I'm a glutton for punishment, I had to ask him the next question.

"Why didn't you try and talk to me a few weeks ago at that first party? I thought you didn't like me." That question made him drop the permanent smile he'd had since picking me up that morning. For the first time he looked at a loss for words. I was starting to regret asking him that question. If he told me about his ménage à trois, I'd start crying and die.

"Emily, you know I couldn't keep my eyes off you that whole night. I just didn't have enough balls to bring myself over to talk to you." He stopped, ran his hand through his thick hair and continued, "I kept waiting for the right moment to get you alone somewhere in a corner away from my clients and colleagues. I had all these people I needed to schmooze. But you kept going in and out of that damn kitchen. I kept losing my nerve. You looked so young. I was worried I'd scare the shit out of you. When the party started winding down, I was coerced into going to see a penthouse in the building next door. One of our new clients was thinking of having us put it on the market for her." He took another deep breath and looked into my eyes. "I thought for sure I'd be back in time to still catch another glimpse of you. I was hoping to get you alone. When I came back the party was over and you were long gone. Only the florist staff was still there taking apart the arrangements."

His rendition of what really happened that night was so much better than my twisted imagination. I ran my fingers through his thick wavy hair. Louis leaned into my hand and ran his lips along my inner arm.

He continued his explanation, "The next morning I called Mike and booked Crown Affairs for four more events that I didn't even have planned … I had to see you again. I couldn't stop thinking about you," he said, kissing his way up my arm. "You were wearing that tight white tank top. I could see the outline of your nipples. When you'd get close enough to me I could tell how hard they were under that thin top. Your tight little ass in that short mini skirt with those heels. I wanted to bite it and have those beautiful legs wrapped around my neck." He made a rough sound in the back of his throat. "You've been on a loop in my mind ever since. I think I jerked off at least three times that night imagining sucking your perfect tits."

I blushed at his crude description of my body. But I loved every word. I leaned into his ear and whispered, "Before I fell asleep that night after the party, I imagined you in my bed and that made me have my first orgasm … EVER." I left out the crying part.

He looked at me with an,
Are you shitting me?
face and I nodded to his silent question.

"Okay, little girl, I think we've been in public long enough. It's time for me to show you where you'll be spending the majority of your time from now on."

Standing up, he took my hand in his and led us back to his little red sports car.

Home sweet ... Lord of the Flies...

L
ouis drove very fast. I was holding on for dear life. He was a man on a mission. I asked him, "Where are you taking me now?"

To which he replied without taking his eyes off the road, "Bed."

My heart stopped. Oh my God, was I ready for bed? No, definitely not ready for his bed.

"Are you taking me to see your apartment?" I was trying to ask questions to calm my nerves down and not think about what
bed
really meant. He finally looked at me while stopping at a red light. He reached for my hand and kissed my fingertips.

"No Emily, definitely not my apartment. I'm taking you to my place … to my home."

I was too nervous to understand what he was talking about—his apartment, his home; it all sounded the same to me. It all added up to us ending up naked in his bed. Fuck, what now? I couldn't keep teasing him like this. If he took me to his bed could I stop him or me from going all the way? I didn't even take notice which direction we were driving. I tried to make myself aware of my surroundings. If this gorgeous man was kidnapping me, I wouldn't even know where the hell he was taking me. I looked up and noticed that we'd just passed Houston Street and then he quickly pulled up to an old building that looked like an abandoned warehouse. I was too anxious and petrified about going
home
with him that I hadn't even taken the opportunity to let my mind try and picture where a guy like Louis Bruel would live and call
home.
I looked over to find my handsome kidnapper smiling from ear to ear.

"Are you ready to see my lair? Ha, ha, ha," he said in his best impression of Dracula.

I must say my heart skipped a beat but this time from sheer fear. He pressed a button in his car and a huge metal gate that looked like a loading dock entrance started to pull up. He drove his car right through the gate and into the dark unknown. The gate lowered slowly behind us blocking out any remaining light from the street. We were now in total darkness. I was starting to have my life flash swiftly before my eyes. All of a sudden the lights came on and the car started moving up. We were in an oversized elevator for cars, apparently. I heard a ding and then I saw numbers illuminating one by one: 2, 3, 4, 5, then stop on the fifth floor. Louis got out first and came to my side. I felt faint. My legs were shaking. My heart was beating out of my chest, and my mouth was wide open trying to gasp as much air into my lungs as possible. This is how horror movies began, with naïve stupid girls like me going to unknown places with gorgeous men like him—and nobody knows where the hell they are. I should've at least told Sara.

"Baby, relax, breathe. Please don't be nervous. I promise I won't make you do anything you won't be begging me to do."

That didn't make me feel better at all.

"Louis, this is a little crazy. We just officially met last night and I don't really know you and I'm at a warehouse with you, alone. Nobody knows I'm with you." Maybe I shouldn't have told him nobody knew I was with him. Now he'd definitely kill me.

"Emily, I promise I don't live in a warehouse. I don't want to hurt you. I just really need to be alone with you. I want to kiss you and taste you. I need to touch every inch of you. I don't want to worry about looking like a pervert in some public place. I'd go back to your place, but if your parents knew what I plan to do to their daughter, they'd have me arrested. This is just a comfortable place for us to explore each other privately and intimately … don't be scared, baby."

I took a very deep overdue breath.

"You technically haven't even set foot in my house, just my car lift."

Okay, this is it. It's time to pay the piper.
I smiled, took another deep breath, and bravely walked through the huge drawn iron gate that Louis was now holding open for me.

When I walked through Louis' gate, I wasn't prepared for what I saw. I guess because we hadn't yet had the opportunity to really get to know one another, I didn't know what kind of style he preferred. Was he into ultra-modern or Art Deco design? My brain really didn't let my head conjure up what kind of house a thirty-year-old successful bachelor living in New York would have.

Maybe it was my traditional upbringing. I lived in the same townhouse my whole life. My mother designed our traditional five-story home with lots of warm earth tones. My house always seemed warm and very pleasant. This is what I considered normal.

Louis, on the other hand, wasn't kidding when he said his
lair.
Since we entered from the side the whole space seemed to just sprawl out indefinitely in both directions. It was like
Crocodile Dundee
called
Indiana Jones
and asked him to design his New York City bachelor pad. I could sense Louis watching me for some kind of verbal reaction:
wow, beautiful, great.
Any of those words would've worked. I was so shocked and unprepared for this visual feast, that I really couldn't produce any coherent acknowledgment of my feelings. My eyes did all the talking for me by enlarging to the size of plates.

I was in the biggest tree house on the planet. Everywhere I looked I saw raw wood, leather, animal skins, and rope used to hold things up. The staircase was suspended in midair in the middle of this huge loft space. It looked like a flattened out and then coiled ladder, made of wide, highly polished tree planks that were held together by thick rope. I think I'd be scared of falling trying to walk up that thing. The room had such high ceilings that the staircase seemed to just float right into the sky. I have to admit the effect was breathtaking.

There was a wall on the left side full of old worn out books that made the New York public library seem small. The books seemed to reach all the way up to the thirty-foot ceiling. I craned my head up to find at least ten chandeliers. They were all made out of some kind of tusks. Never in a million years would I envisage Louis Bruel, playboy millionaire, living in a tree house. Louis stood quietly holding my hand and letting me slowly drink it all in. I finally landed back on his dark searching eyes. I could tell by his weak smile that he was nervous of my reaction to his so-called
home.

"So Emily, what do you think? Is it a little too wild for you?"

I exhaled and nodded. "Yeah … wow, it's not what I expected. Not that I've known you long enough to have any expectations. It's just that I don't think I've ever seen anything like this. Louis, it's tremendous and unreal. It almost looks like a movie set."

"Are you disappointed?" he asked me, his smile weakening.

"No! Not disappointed, just overwhelmed and surprised … it's so huge and very masculine. I just need a minute to take this all in. But it's the most spectacular thing I've ever seen."

He finally smiled. I could feel him relax when he released the death grip he had on my hand.

"It used to be a pen factory before World War Two. It was the first building my dad bought in the early sixties. I suspect it was already run down when he purchased it. I couldn't bring myself to sell this place. I knew in my gut my dad would've wanted me to keep it. I turned the whole factory into my dad's favorite book,
Lord of the Flies
by William Golding. He started reading me that book as a bedtime story when I was six or seven years old. Emily, I was enamored. That's the book that did it for me and started my love of reading."

I was staring up at him in awe. Could a red Ferrari driving millionaire really be so nostalgically idyllic? I didn't even know he liked to read. He continued telling me what I suspected was not at all common knowledge.

"My dad and I would spend lots of time together analyzing that book. I woke up one morning all grown up and was told my dad was gone. I read that fucking book over and over; it helped me remember our heated debates about that paradisiacal country. Years later when I was showing this place to some asshole investors, they were talking about turning this building into condos. I thought, no way! My dad, if he were alive, wouldn't sell it to be turned into some overpriced condos. That's when I turned one of my favorite memories of my eccentrically romantic dad into a fantasy world."