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She nodded.
Luca went quiet for a long time after that. She stared down at her wine, seemingly lost in thought. After a minute, I slipped my finger under her chin and lifted. “If we only have a day and a half, you’re going to have to tell me what’s on your mind. While I’d love to get inside that head of yours and try to make sense of how it works, I’m afraid we don’t have that luxury.”
She nodded. “I was just thinking that . . . you must have a lot of women throwing themselves at you all the time.”
There was no point in lying. All she had to do was Google and she’d find women flashing me their tits from the front row of almost any of my shows. And I’d indulged my fair share when everything first hit. The paparazzi had captured more walks of shame leaving my dressing room than I wanted to remember. I wasn’t proud of the man I’d been in the beginning, but I’d learned my lesson. “I’m not going to sit here and tell you that I’m a virgin, but those women, they aren’t throwing themselves at Griffin Marchese. They’re throwing themselves at Cole Archer—a man who doesn’t even really exist.”
“Have you had any serious girlfriends?”
My jaw clenched. “I thought I did, but it turned out I didn’t. Haley lived with me for about three months. She was an aspiring singer. On my last tour, I decided to surprise her and come home between shows when I hadn’t been scheduled to. I found her in bed with my forty-five-year-old agent.”
“Wow. I’m sorry. That’s awful.”
“Yeah. That was just the beginning of finding out a bunch of dark shit about the people I thought cared about me.”
Luca stroked my forearm. “I guess I can understand why you wanted to keep your current life a secret from me.”
This conversation had taken a turn toward depressing. I reminded myself that we only had a little time together; the clock was ticking. I scratched at the stubble on my chin. “I have an idea. Do you remember that little game we used to play as teenagers? The one where we would tell each other a couple of true things and a lie and we’d have to figure out which was which.”
Luca grinned. “Two truths and a lie. How could I forget? Like when you got your driver’s license and thought you were so cool going to the drive-through line at McDonald’s the first time, and you placed your entire order yelling into the trash receptacle?”
I laughed. I had forgotten all about that. Figures Luca hadn’t. “That’s the game. The winner used to have to send the other stickers, if I remember correctly.”
“I stickered an entire closet door because I beat you so often.”
“I used to let you win, cocky girl,” I lied.
“Sure you did.”
“I’m thinking it’s time for a rematch. We only have a day and a half to get to know each other again. What better way than to play our old game?”
“I’m down for that. But I don’t have any stickers with me, on the off chance you actually get something right.”
“That’s okay. We’re not going to be playing for stickers this time.”
“We’re not? What exactly are we playing for, Mr. Quinn?”
“Kisses. Winner gets to pick where they want to give them.”CHAPTER 15
LUCAThe way I saw it, no matter who won this little game, I was going to come out a winner if it ended in a kiss from Griffin.
We got comfy on the couch.
“I’ll go first,” he said. “Two truths and a lie.” He rubbed his hands together. “Okay. I once won a pair of Elton John’s old knickers on eBay. Also, during one of my earlier concerts, I blanked out and forgot the words to one of the songs in front of thousands of people. Lastly, for your consideration . . . I haven’t spoken to my father in two years.”
I let the choices sink in as I massaged my temples. “I feel like this is sort of a trick. The knickers thing sounds so bizarre that it almost has to be meant to seem like a lie, but really it’s the truth. While I don’t want to believe you haven’t spoken to your dad in that long, based on your past relationship with him, I’m afraid that’s possibly true as well. So I’m going to go with you forgetting the words to the song as being the lie.”
Griffin stared at me for a few seconds before making a sound that mimicked a buzzer.
“I’m wrong?”
“Yep.” He laughed.
“Damn. I’m losing my touch.”
“What would I want with an old pair of Elton John’s knickers? That was the lie.”
“I don’t know! You seemed to enjoy perusing eBay before your account got shut down, and I remember you used to like him a lot when we were younger. So . . . it made a little sense?”
