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“So,” she said, “where are we headed next?”
“Let Warner worry about that. Tell me something, Lola. What’ve you got to be sorry for?”
“Not much,” she said. “I’m not exactly a model citizen, but I have no regrets. My past does shape me. It’s made me who I am. I don’t believe in hiding from it.”
“You’ve hidden things.”
“Hidden? No. Not volunteered…yes.”
“Why?” he asked. “Are you ashamed?”
As one of the few people she knew who’d actually learned from her past instead of buried it, she was almost offended. “You haven’t earned the right to ask me that,” she said.
“I’ll earn it then.”
He didn’t have to. She was his for the rest of the night, and he could make all the demands he wanted.
“You might take it,” she said, “but you won’t earn it.”
“I will. Trust me.”
The way his voice had dropped when he’d said trust me made her want to do the opposite. It was becoming clear Beau had a weakness for a challenge. He’d showed her that at the L.A. Philharmonic gala, when he’d acted proud of being a bad chess player in high school because it meant an opportunity to improve. He’d said he was happiest when conquering himself, but she’d suspected he’d meant ‘himself and others.’
“That kind of thing can’t be earned in one night,” she said. “And I promise, Beau—this is the last night we will ever spend together.”
“Why? Your bank account’s hit its limit?”
It was like being back at Hey Joe, when she’d been transfixed by Beau, and he’d nearly knocked her off her feet with his proposal. She curled her hands into two fists. “I don’t get you. One minute you’re tender and the next you’ve reduced me to nothing more than…than—”
“A whore?”
“Excuse me?” she asked, unable to keep the shock from her face. He’d put her in this position, and now he was accusing her of being a whore? “How dare you?”
“I’m being honest,” he said. “A person who takes money in exchange for sex—what would you call her?”
Lola dug her fingernails into her palms with the urge to clock him.
“Maybe courtesan is better?” he asked. “It’s more romantic.”
Beau had a weakness for a challenge, but Lola’s weakness, it turned out, was Beau. There was no other explanation for why she kept letting him in. He had a way of getting her to lower her shield so he could stick her with a knife. She didn’t seem to learn her lesson. She leaned away from him. “Fuck you. I’m only doing all this because of you.”
“You entered into this agreement willfully.” He tried to take her hands, but she smacked him away and vaulted backward. He grabbed her wrists to pin her arms to her chest and her back against the seat. When she stopped resisting, he said, “I don’t think you’re a whore.”
Her chest heaved. He was so close, she breathed on his face.
“But I’m going to fuck you like one tonight.”
She wanted to fight back, protest, but she was melting at his touch, craving more of him despite his words. “You’re awful. You treat me awful.”
He kissed her. His grip never loosened, and she never stopped pushing back.
“Which one of us are you fighting, Lola?” he asked against her mouth. “Me or you?”
“I don’t know,” she moaned, trying to catch her breath. She was hot, and some of it was anger. She’d empathized with him. It meant a lot that he’d opened up to her. She hadn’t been that vulnerable, even with Johnny, since he’d made her dance for him at Cat Shoppe. “You’re doing it again.”
“Doing what?”
“What you did to me last time.”
“Can you be more specific?”
“First you make me comfortable. Loose. Then you try to humiliate me.”
He released her and sat back. “I don’t know what you’re talking about.”
“I’m right, aren’t I? Last time you took me to a star-studded fundraiser so I’d be awed and see you at your best. Then suddenly you put me on stage and command me to strip. Tonight you take me to meet your sister, open up to me, then call me a whore?”
“My, my.” The corner of his mouth crooked. “What an imagination you have.” His smile vanished. “Remind me to punish you later for being so impertinent tonight.”
“Nowhere in the terms did it say I couldn’t fight back.”
“But it did say I’d always win.”
The threat in his tone resonated everywhere—in her heart, in her stomach, between her legs. Beau would always win, because whenever he decided tonight, he’d have her. As much as he wanted.
“Don’t look so frightened, ma chatte.” He took her chin in his hand and lifted her head. He trailed his fingers under her jaw and behind her neck. “I am going to love you in the way I fuck you. I’ll make everything better,” his voice dropped, “and worse.”
He took his hand away, but his touch remained—a reminder that her body wasn’t in her control. His words were just as unshakeable, and she quickly forgot about her body. Now she worried about his hold over the rest of her.
8
Lola hadn’t noticed they were heading toward the Four Seasons until the limo turned into the hotel’s half-moon drive. She looked at Beau. “Did you forget something?”
“No.”
Her door opened. Fleetingly she’d wondered why she was even more dressed up than the week before while he was in a suit instead of a tuxedo. Now she had her answer—he just hadn’t changed yet.
They unfolded from the car. Beau placed his hand at the center of her back. In the lobby, he guided her right, away from the elevators. “First, a drink.”
He directed her to the hotel lounge. The few people seated around the room were as cool and modern as the bar’s interior. They spoke and sipped their drinks privately. The bartender placed two napkins in front of them. “The usual, sir?”
“And the Colony Cocktail for her.”
Beau had a “usual.” Was it a girl and a Scotch, only his choice of drink the same night after night? What were the other girls like—and did they all have Colony Cocktails? Lola’s dress was elegant—she was not. She wondered if anyone at the bar could tell, and moved closer to Beau.
He looked down and smoothed a hand over her hair. “All right?” he asked in her ear.
She was bothered thinking of him with another woman, but it hardly seemed fair to bring it up, not that she wanted to. It would only invite questions. She nodded that she was fine.
When their drinks were served, Beau picked a corner booth and they sank against the pillows. He clinked his Scotch against her glass. “To the night,” he said. “Underneath its faithful cover, we can be who we want. Or in some cases, who we truly are.”
“Or, I can be who you want,” Lola said. She took a sip.
“Meaning?”
“This dress. The limo. The cocktail—too expensive, I might add. I’m simply a product of your fashioning.”
“Or,” he said, grinning, “a masterpiece sculpted from clay.”
“Whatever you want to call it.”
“I like to think the masterpiece is already there, underneath. I’m just chiseling the clay away.”
“I was nothing until you came along. Is that what you mean?” In case her sarcasm was lost on him, she smirked. “Your money’s made me worthy?”
He touched her knee. Her smirk faltered. “No. I like you just as you are. You don’t pretend to be something you’re not like most people I know.” He slid his hand up her thigh, and it left a tingling sensation in its wake. She exhaled louder than she meant to. “You don’t hide who you are, do you?” he asked.
Her focus was shifting from their conversation to his touch. She wasn’t sure she grasped what he was getting at. “No.”
“You wouldn’t pretend with me.”
She understood. Fighting their connection, keeping her feelings to herself—it was the same as hiding parts
of herself from him. It went against who she claimed to be.
“It’s not that black and white,” she said. “Everyone has some darkness inside to hide what they need to.” She paused. “Even you. Maybe you most of all.”
