Grounded (Up in the Air, #3)(77)

I shrugged, but I couldn’t help but wonder how many of the women in that chorus line he’d slept with.

“There seem to be a lot of things that he did years ago that just keep popping up,” I said, my tone neutral. I didn’t feel neutral, though.

She grimaced. “That sex tape… I heard about that. And just when he’s cleaned up his act. Life is funny like that, making us pay for the same stupid mistakes even after we’ve learned from them thoroughly.”

Now that sounded like a heartfelt statement. I studied her, still dying to know what had happened between her and the sexy as hell Tristan. I wouldn’t pry, though. Perhaps we’d get more chances to hang out, and someday she’d just tell me about it.

Danika walked me to the office reception before saying her goodbyes. We set up another meeting for the following week. She was coming all the way back to Vegas just to meet me again, but she didn’t seem to mind.

Reception led me immediately into James’s office, but I saw that he was busy on the phone as I walked in. Blake only followed me to the door. She didn’t seem to need to search the office, with James already there.

I sat in the chair directly in front of his desk, crossing my legs and watching him. I was torn on when to tell him about the tattoo. Should I just let him find it on his own? Chances were, if I did it that way, we’d be on the verge of having sex, and he was bound to be in a better mood about it…

James looked up, a phone to his ear. His eyes changed when he saw me, going from business-like and serious to smoldering between one blink and the next. I adored that I could put that look in his eye just by being there.

He held up a finger to me to show that he would only be another minute. I just nodded, watching him. The view never got old.

He hung up the phone and smiled at me. “We’ll go to my house from here. Stephan is out but he says he’ll crash there with us tonight. He doesn’t mind staying with us until the danger’s past.”

I was relieved, though I hadn’t really thought that Stephan would give him a hard time.

The tattoo just didn’t come up, or rather, I didn’t work up the nerve to bring it up, until he found it himself that night.

Frankie had predicted his reaction well. He was completely incensed.

He was at my back, peeling off my shirt when he spotted it.

I knew what was coming, and so I stiffened just before he did.

His eyes bored into my back for long moments before he began to curse, succinctly and fluently. He finished his tirade with an impassioned, “I’ll kill her.”

“She said you’d say that,” I told him.

That just made him curse even more. “I can’t believe I didn’t see it coming, when she called me up saying that you were all doing a girls’ day, and that I should keep on working. I knew she wanted to get her hands on you.”

I shot him an exasperated look. “You really think that she did all of this just so that she could very briefly touch me? She was completely professional, James.”

“I should have known she would try this, but I can’t believe that you agreed to it. What were you thinking?”

“You did the same thing for me—to prove something to me. You wanted me to see that you really were devoted to me, and that you wanted a long-term commitment. I was trying to do the same thing for you. I wanted you to see that I’m just as committed. It’s not something that should make you jealous. I branded your name on my shoulder, and all you can do is get jealous that someone else was holding the needle. I didn’t do this because Frankie wanted me to. I did it for you. We belong to each other, James, and now we both have the ink to prove it. I thought that you would love seeing your name on me.”

In terms of defusing his anger, it worked like a charm. He pressed hard against my back, murmuring into my ear. “I do love seeing that on you. How could I ever stay mad, when you say such wonderful things to me? So tell me, Bianca, just how committed are you? Committed enough to take my name and wear my ring? Devoted enough to like the sound of Bianca Cavendish?”

My heart tried to pound right out of my chest. Because I knew he wasn’t really joking, even though his tone was light. And because it didn’t only make me want to panic anymore to hear him say a thing like that. Now a picture was beginning to form in my mind of something real and sustaining for us. Perhaps what had happened to my mother hadn’t forever ruined any possibility of my own happily ever after. The thought was both encouraging and terrifying.

James didn’t wait for me to answer. He knew me too well.

He kissed my neck. “Start growing accustomed to the idea, Love, and try not to tie yourself in knots second-guessing yourself. And try to remember that I’m head over heels in love with you, and that I’ve never even come close to saying those words to another person.”

“I love you, too,” I whispered back, loving him more at that moment than I’d even thought possible. How could I ever have imagined that Mr. Beautiful could be so incredibly sensitive to my needs? It was as though he’d known me forever.

If I was surprised at how quickly he dropped the subject of the tattoo with me, I was equally unsurprised at how he didn’t drop the subject with Frankie. Even a full week later, at her show’s Vegas Strip red carpet event, James was giving her the cold shoulder.

James wore a black tux with a black shirt and white bow tie. It was very fitted, very fashion forward, very supermodel James.