Penelope. My name was Penelope.
Luckily the server didn’t seem to notice or care.
“Coming right up,” she said, then pointed to a counter at the side of the room. “If you want any fruit or cereal in the meantime, just help yourselves.”
I leaned across the table to get closer to Lucian, whispering just loud enough that he could hear me as she walked away.
“You called me Elaine!” I said. “My name is Penelope, remember?”
His stare was so firm.
“I know,” he told me. “I’m perfectly aware I called you Elaine.”
“But she might know—”
He shook his head. “She barely knows her own name, I imagine.”
Damn he was so rude. I saw that side of him again. The arrogance. The bluntness. The sarcasm. It was classic Lucian Morelli.
He leaned across the table to me as I leaned away.
“I won’t be calling you anything but Elaine unless I damn well have to. It’s sacrilege.”
“What do I do, then? Go around calling you Lucian right back?”
“Let’s see how far we get around London, then, shall we?”
He smirked. He actually smirked.
“You’re fucking crazy,” I said, attracting stares from an elderly couple nearby.
“You really are a sassy little doll, you know that?” Lucian whispered. “It’s going to make punishing you for it so fucking pleasurable.”
I smirked back at him. “I’d better keep doing it, then, so you’ll be punishing me nice and hard.”
We were still smirking at each other when the server came back with our coffees.
“Breakfast is coming right up.”
I was so ready for it when it arrived. Damn it really was a feast. I dug in like a girl possessed.
Lucian was quick into his along with me.
“Yummy,” I said between mouthfuls, and he nodded.
“Full English will definitely be a staple of mine,” he replied, “especially the black pudding.”
I pulled a face. I couldn’t even bear to taste the thing. It looked like baked shit.
My stomach was nice and full when I finished up and leaned back in my seat. I finished up my coffee with a satisfied smile on my face, and he leaned back to mirror me. Only his smile was something more than just satisfied. I got that flutter again, feeling so…valued. I guess it was that magnetic thing he talked about. Feeling so drawn to someone that you can’t keep your eyes off them. Polar opposites in the most amazing of ways.
It was him who shifted us, getting to his feet with another one of his smirks.
“Let’s go get those cell phones.”
It felt so natural to slip my fingers into his when we walked through the reception lobby. The receptionist held up her hand in a wave as we passed on by and stepped out through the door, and there we were. The streets of London.
“Cab or underground?” Lucian asked, pointing at the sign for the station across the street.
I hadn’t taken an underground train in my life. It was limos everywhere I went for the most of it—limos, and private planes, and cabs at the very worst.
“Underground,” I said, and realized I was grinning. “It’ll be fun.”
“Hardly sure it would be top of the list of London experiences,” he told me, with that sarcastic tone in his voice, but he was smiling as he squeezed my fingers a little tighter and led the way across the street.
The underground was bustling, even in Elephant and Castle, on the outskirts of the city. We went down on the escalator and it had a vibe to it I hadn’t felt before. Busy and British in a different kind of way. The platform was strange when we reached it. The other side had huge posters with London musicals on them. My heart leapt at the thought we could maybe one day go to see them.
Lucian read my mind.
“Don’t worry, sweetheart, we’ll be seeing plenty of those once the world knows we’re here. They’ll be rolling out the red carpet all the way down the fucking street for us.”
I could imagine it. It made my heart race.
The train was empty enough that we could take a seat together. My eyes were glancing all over the place, trying to take it all in. The accents, the people stepping on and off at each station, and the way the train rumbled through dark tunnels.
Yeah, I could live here. I could live in London for the rest of my life. I was loving it already, even on day one.
Lucian guided me off the train at one of the stations closer to the city center. Wembley. We began the ascent on another escalator, and the street we stepped onto this time was a whole other affair. It was busy in a much more, I dunno, classy way. The buildings were so much more stately and grand, and the place had a whole other energy to it. One I felt much more suited to.
That’s another moment I realized just how right Lucian was with our need to be us, as us. We belonged in stately and grand surroundings. Hell, we’d never known anything else.
We only had to walk down the street a little way before a cell phone store came into view. Except they weren’t called cell phones here, they were called mobile phones.
I’m surprised they didn’t recognize Lucian from the very force of his voice as he stepped up to the counter and asked them for two of their best phones and some tablets to go along with them. The guy started asking questions, but Lucian waved his efforts aside.
“Just two of the best,” he said. “Now, please.”
The guy jumped to attention like we’d just ordered liquid gold, boxing things up with a nervous smile.
I don’t know which bank card Lucian handed over, but the payment went through just fine. We headed back out onto the street with a bag of our purchases, practical mission accomplished.
Lucian was all set to head back to the underground and get us back to Elephant and Castle, but my heart dropped a little at that.
I could see the London Eye from where we were. Its pods visible in the skyline.
“No,” he said, seeing where I was staring. “Every hour is essential right now.”
I pouted. “I know that, but I just want to see it so much…”
I knew by the way he shook his head that it was a pointless argument. The London Eye would have to wait until another day.
I sighed and shrugged and took back hold of his fingers.
“Sure,” I said, still pouting. “I guess I’ll have to wait.”
I was only half serious, and my tone was nothing more than a joke, so I wasn’t expecting it when he stopped me in my tracks and tipped my face up to his.
His expression was so damn serious. So damn sure.
“I promise you, Elaine,” he said to me, like he was declaring the truth of a lifetime. “We’ll be getting on the London Eye together and doing it soon. Only we won’t be lining up and stepping onto it like some pathetic little tourists in these pathetic fucking clothes.”
My eyes must have widened in their usual shocked way, because his smirk was magnificent as he kept on talking.
“I’m going to take you on that wheel, baby, and it’s going to be everything you dreamed it would be. Only when I take you on it, we’ll have the whole fucking thing to ourselves. I’ll be taking over the whole damn lot of it, all for you.”
I could have cried as we carried on walking back to the underground. Only these weren’t sad tears waiting to fall, like I’d been crying all the way through my life.