“We’re not alone.”
He dropped his hand at my words, and I let him go. “Okay, Layla. I’ll take you at your word. You got what you needed. Come on. Let’s go do something fun.”
His phone dinged, and he grabbed it, looking down. “It’s Michael Li getting back to me about your security. Outside.” I followed him until we both stood next to his motorcycle.
“I’m here with her now,” Zeke told Michael. I was only hearing bits and pieces of their conversation over the noise on the street. “Yep. No. Do I need to be worried?”
I touched the seat on his motorcycle. He wanted to do something fun. I’d be up for riding in circles all day at high speeds, feeling the wind and letting him drive and drive, until we were both so tired, I couldn’t see straight for it. That wasn’t likely. He had to work tonight, entertain clients, and I had to go with him and wear the gold dress I’d picked out.
Zeke swung around. “No immediate threats that they’re worried about. Just the constant problem of your father owing money to people he should never have gotten into bed with to begin with. But that’s not new. He had to move you every two years because of that your whole life. If something changes, Li will send security on my request and your father can screw himself if he tries to stop that. Michael might have done it anyway and damned the consequences. I think he’s likely to go one of these days anyway. Start his own firm.”
That was interesting. I’d never thought of Michael as being part of the company. He was like a separate entity altogether, but I guessed he was. Like I was. Like Zeke was. It was that place that connected us, that brought us all together.
“I promised you fun.”
I smiled at him. “Fun is such an arbitrary word. For example, you seem to find eating to be a lot of fun. I don’t think of it that way.”
“Ah, but you will.” His smile was contagious, so I gave him one back. “We’re in France. You can’t help but fall in love with food here. Give it time. You’ll be actually hungry when it’s time for a meal one of these days.”
I groaned. “You want me to fit in those clothes you just bought me, right?”
“I’ll buy you new ones. I’d rather have you fed than fashionable.”
That went contrary to what we were actually doing together, but I loved it so hard, I pretended he could actually give a shit right then. I was choosing the delusion, and even knowing it was that, I liked it. When Zeke was this way, it was easy to like him.
“So no more shopping. And I’m guessing you’re not going to want a spa day either.”
I didn’t mind them when I needed them, but I’d had my fill getting ready for my wedding. “I think I’m all pampered out, and my poor feet… No pedicure yet.”
“Got it. Then I have just the thing. Come on.” He handed me the helmet. My hair, thanks to the bun I kept putting up and taking down, was actually holding up pretty well despite the abuse from the helmet.
“Where are we going?” I took it from him.
“You’ll have to trust me.” He tilted his head. “Can you do that?”
Could I? I didn’t do so easily. “Why did you stay with my father so long when you knew he was doing things like getting into trouble with very bad men? Why didn’t you get out earlier?”
He leaned forward. “I’ve trusted you with the secret about my mom. You haven’t done that with me yet. Not really. What you’re asking me, it goes to the heart of a lot of things about me that I keep entirely to myself. You want to know? You’re going to have to earn it. I extended my hand, and you haven’t taken it yet.”
I swallowed. He meant what had happened in the store. The clothes and why I didn’t want them, didn’t like them, found the whole thing to be just…like going to the dentist. Trying on clothes was like pulling teeth for me. He wanted to know why.
“At some point, it became what I was known for. When I dropped out of college because, let’s face it, I didn’t belong there, fashion was decided as my thing. And at some point, it became all I was. But it’s not all I am. I don’t even like my clothes. I tell people to enjoy their style, to look their best as they are, and I’ve never, not one day in my life, looked like me. I don’t even know what it is but it’s not…shown up yet.”
Zeke set down his helmet on top of the bike. “So what you’re saying to me is that you think you’re a fraud, and clothes shopping only highlights that for you.”
He’d hit the nail on the head. “Yes.”
“They really fucked you up, Layla Radford. But that’s okay. All the best people I know are totally bent in the head.”
I didn’t see how that was a reasonable response to what I’d just said to him. I told him I basically felt like getting dressed was participating in some kind of fraudulent activity and that was his response?
“Zeke…”
He kissed me. I didn’t see it coming, and I wasn’t sure he’d planned it. One second, he stood next to me, and the next he drew me to him hard and kissed my lips gently, a stark contrast to the way he held me still. I closed my eyes, totally surprised by the caress as I gave myself over to it at the same time.
Zeke pressed his mouth deeper, and I wanted it to never stop. My body seemed to come alive. I didn’t know what to do. I’d never been kissed like this before, so unplanned, so spontaneously, and my breasts hardened in the seconds that he held me.
He pulled back, smoothing his thumb over my mouth. “You’re so young. I need to leave you alone.”
If he’d dumped cold water over my head, he couldn’t have destroyed that second any better. “I was going to be someone’s wife. I’m not that young, I assure you.”
“Even if you were waking up as Mrs. Kit Allard this morning, you’d still be young. Too young for me. I don’t do love and romance. I do temporary. Heat. Sex. Fun. You’re living with me until we get this sorted. I won’t be another man who fucks up your life.”
Now wasn’t the time for an argument. I knew enough to know that I wanted Zeke to do those things with me, and I was going to have to convince him when his guard wasn’t as up as he’d just placed it.
That kiss had shown me I wanted more. And maybe for now, the best thing I could do was to have no-consequence sex with the only man I’d ever wanted to have it with.
Chapter Ten
I got what I’d wished for, and for a while, Zeke drove me around Paris on his motorcycle. While we’d never lived in Paris, I had been here many times. Still, I’d never seen it from the back of a motorcycle, clinging to a man who had kissed me into plotting how I could have sex with him in the future. At no time did it feel like I had ants crawling on me or any other upsetting feeling.
We were two people wearing helmets, darting around traffic, and enjoying the heck out of the pleasant weather. No one knew us in those moments, and for just a little bit, I wondered if I was getting to know myself better. I was a woman who liked the wind to hit her body at high speeds, to depend on someone else for my safety, and to try something new on a Sunday that she’d never done before. These were all things I hadn’t realized when I woke up that morning.