I had so many questions about Laila’s family but had to hold my tongue when both Guillermo and Arabella came out of the kitchen to serve us drinks and our meal. They’d whipped up some sort of pasta concoction in a creamy marinara sauce that tasted like heaven. Laila swooned, explaining that she didn’t get to eat as much pasta as she’d like, what with her career choice, and how this was the best meal she’d had in ages. Guillermo told her she was welcome back anytime. Arabella made eyes at me during the whole exchange, communicating how much she liked Laila and how beautiful she thought she was.
I felt like a sixteen-year-old kid on my first date while my eager parents hovered close by, hoping for my success.
Once we were alone once more, I attempted to ask Laila more about her mother and father, but she beat me to the punch.
“You must have been a real handful for your poor parents,” she said.
“What makes you say that?”
“I don’t know. Perhaps your stubborn ways and your uncanny ability to ignore every social cue that someone doesn’t want to talk to you might have something to do with it.”
I threw my head back with laughter.
Laila watched me with an amused twinkle in her eye. “That being said, I’m glad I agreed to come out with you tonight. I’m having a really nice time. This place is a refreshing change of scenery, too. It feels… normal.”
“I assume that’s not something you get to experience much of these days?”
“Not since I became one of Cupid’s Arrows. It’s been two years of nonstop media attention. I can’t count how many gossip columns have written about me or how many friends I’ve lost because the lifestyle is overwhelming. Everywhere I go, someone wants a piece of me. But not tonight.”
I understood exactly how she felt. “That’s why I started coming here, too. Guillermo and Arabella gave me a place to come to when everywhere else felt too crowded. Even my own home.”
“Where you were being a handful?”
Smiling, I shrugged one shoulder. “I think I was a handful for my mother. She liked to stay on top of me as much as she could, but I had a way of slipping through the cracks, as most young boys do. She wanted me to learn etiquette and how to be a proper young man, but I was much more interested in playing in the trees on the property and catching frogs down in the creek.”
“That sounds pretty fun.”
“It was.” It was lonely, too.
I didn’t have any siblings to share my childhood with. No cousins, either. Or neighbors. Where someone like Luke grew up in a rundown neighborhood, he at least had a dozen kids around his age he’d meet outside every night for chaotic games of street hockey or capture the flag. I’d never experienced any of that. I’d been on my own, locked in a giant house with a man and his wife who didn’t like each other anymore, let alone know each other at all.
I cleared my throat. “You mentioned you have a sister? Older or younger?”
“Younger.” Laila leaned back in her chair, bringing her drink with her. Guillermo had poured us each single glasses of something bubbly and not too sweet. She swirled her drink and ice before taking a sip. “Her name is Casey and she’s a royal pain in my ass.”
“Is she a model, too?”
“No, she hops from job to job. She’s got a talent for getting herself fired. Right now she’s waiting tables at a family restaurant near where we grew up. She seems to be making decent money and likes it well enough, but it’s only a matter of time before the boredom sets in and she moves on to something else. She changes jobs as quickly as she changes boyfriends.”
“Is she as beautiful as you?”
Laila blinked slowly at me, considering her response. “I’m not falling for any of your tricks, Storm Thornton. My little sister is a beautiful young woman and she’s off limits. Do you hear me?”
I laughed. “I wasn’t implying I wanted to date her.”
“I had to be sure.”
“Fair enough.”
One hour turned into two, which turned into three, and by the time eleven o’clock rolled around, Guillermo had to come out and basically tell us to get lost.
On our way to the front door, he draped a heavy arm around my shoulders. “Come back anytime, my boy. We’re always here. Next time you see Luke, tell him to bring his ass by. I need someone to help me move some junk out of the storage room and haul it off to the dump.”
I offered my help instead.
Guillermo patted my chest hard. “Good man. Don’t be a stranger. It was very nice to meet you, Miss Laila. You are welcome back anytime.”
Laila bundled herself in her coat, bracing for the cold weather outside. “Thank you, Guillermo. It was nice to meet you, too. I’m sure I’ll be back. I think my dad would really like it here.”
Guillermo pretended to blush. “You flatter me. Now really, Miss Laila, you should know, our boy here is one of the good ones.” He smacked my chest hard again, making me unsteady on my feet as I put my scarf around my neck. I muttered for the big man to take it easy, and he gave me his cheesy smile that glinted with his one gold tooth before returning his attention to Laila. “I mean it. He might swim and bite like a shark, but he’s a big old guppy. Aren’t you, boy?”
Grumbling, I muttered out of the corner of my mouth. “I don’t know if I’d go so far as to say guppy.”
Laila giggled.
Guillermo saw us out the front door while his wife hollered goodbye from the kitchen. Laila and I walked down the sidewalk back to my car. Once inside, Laila sank down low in the seat and closed her eyes.
I glanced over at her after we’d pulled away and got stopped at a red light. Lord have mercy, she was stunning. The streetlights painted her cheeks with long dark shadows from her eyelashes.
“Did you have a good time, or were you just saying that to appease Guillermo?” I asked.
She cracked open one eye. “I enjoyed myself. Guillermo and Arabella are wonderful. And much to my own surprise, I didn’t hate the company, either.”
“That’s the nicest thing you’ve said to me since we met.”
“Yeah, well, I didn’t really like you when we first met.”
“You don’t say? I never even noticed.”
Laughter bubbled out of her and she proceeded to give me directions to her apartment. The route took us out of the rougher neighborhoods and back to Manhattan, where a short fifteen minutes later, I pulled up in front of a glamorous high-rise building called the Citrine Tower. It sparkled like a jewel in the middle of the city.
Laila put her hand on the doorhandle but didn’t open it. She peered around first, as if on the lookout for someone or something.
Frowning, I looked around too. “Is everything okay?”
“I have been ambushed more than once by the paparazzi trying to get to the front doors. They can’t come in the lobby, but they can make the short walk to the building a total nightmare for me.”
She didn’t need to say anything else. I got out of the car, walked around to her door, opened it for her, and offered her my arm.
She took it with a tight-lipped smile. “Thank you, Storm.”
No paparazzi bombarded us as I walked her up to the front door of the lobby, which glittered and dazzled under a crystal chandelier. I opened the doors for her and Laila stepped inside, turning to face me with her hands in her pockets and her chin tucked into the collar of her coat.