Chapter 91: ANGELA 019

ANGELA 019

Regardless, I don’t want to look dowdy when I meet Parker’s girlfriend. I don’t know why; it just feels wrong. He has a few pictures of her around — not in frames, but as vacation snaps printed and propped up loose on his massive black desk. Samantha is stunning. I feel an unreasonable desire to compete.

But when I suggest running home, Parker laughs. “We’re family,” he says with an unreasonable emphasis, as if trying to convince himself, “and I have too much money as it is.” This turns me on a little in a way I’m ashamed of. I push the feeling down.

We visit boutiques in Beverly Hills, right there on Rodeo Drive. He won’t let me see any prices. He keeps repeating that as obnoxious as it is to point out, the highest prices mean nothing to him. He keeps telling me that he likes to give gifts, and that by accepting his offers, I’m doing him a favor.

I wonder what Mom will think of these clothes. Will she think I’m a sellout, gone the way of my previously Hellbound, suddenly birthday-card-worthy stepbrother? Or worse: Will she congratulate me on narrowing the gap, bringing the three of us closer to gold?

Parker must have appointments even though it’s Saturday because his cell keeps buzzing. He declines the calls every time. “Not important,” he says. And: “That’s what assistants are for.”

This is making me nervous. He’s doting too much. Yesterday, I hated him, and he barely remembered me. Now we’re best pals — but not just best pals; he’s spending his day in shops and salons, talking to me while I’m having my hair done on his dime, chatting me up while I’m getting a manicure. It takes all day, and I can’t help but wonder what he’d normally have done with this time.

I’m not stupid. I know this is lingering affection. I keep turning the discussion to our families, and he keeps turning it to this mysterious Samantha, just to keep us honest. The fire at my heels is burning hotter. We’re risking burns that will scar. But I can’t stop. He’s out of line for doing all of this; I’m out of line for letting him.

We should stop. We don’t. It’s all so familiar because we’ve been on this seesaw before.

Dinner’s at eight. We have reservations somewhere fancy. He showed me the menu, but I don’t recognize a single thing. But it’s been such an amazing day that I don’t care whether any of this is smart of us or not.

When we reenter his penthouse, I’m carrying several bags from the most expensive places I’ve ever shopped. I pause to look in the mirror and hardly recognize myself. I look like a model. I suppose it’s arrogant to say that, but what the hell; I’m here with the king of arrogant. He was cocky as a hot teen boy, and now he’s cocky as a hot wealthy man.

“You look amazing,” he says, coming up behind me. He’s wearing a very fine suit — fine enough, in fact, that even my terrible eye for tailoring can see the difference. I haven’t seen him in a half hour, and right now he looks positively delicious.

Alarm bells screech inside my mind:

I’d thought of him as a “hot wealthy man.”

I’d decided he looked “positively delicious.”

And I’ve already mentally made myself at home here, in this place, so far from my home. Somewhere out there, my mother and stepfather are waiting for me. I have a job and responsibilities. Yet here I am playing fairy princess, acting like this is how things are for me now, and forever will be.

Whatever I’ve tried to stuff down inside me regarding Parker Altman, I’ve failed.

It’s too late to get out of dinner. After all he spent — in money and time — to gussy me up, it would be unbelievably rude to run off or cancel. I have to get through it, but that will be hard now that I’ve heard my yearning heart.

My eyes are softening for him. And oh shit oh God oh hell, I’m getting wet for him.

I’m longing for the bathroom and about to make an excuse, knowing full well how incredibly undignified it will be to hike up this fancy dress and play sticky fingers. But I’m left with little choice. I’m in too deep.

I’ve watched the fire at my back, but without warning here I am, surrounded.

I want to turn, but Parker’s pulled out a beautiful silver necklace with gemstones at the throat. He lowers it to my skin from behind, his hands brushing my bare shoulders and the nape of my neck. He clasps it and whispers, “For you.”

I don’t know what’s happening.

Parker doesn’t finish saying those two words before I’m turning my head and pressing my lips to his.