Virtuous(20)

“Whipped cream. It gave me ideas.”

Her blush is nearly as adorable as the rest of her. “What are your rules in the area of ice cream?”

“What kind are we talking?”

“I have coffee chocolate chip, strawberry, which is probably out due to your rules, and French vanilla.”

“Coffee chocolate chip is my favorite.”

“You’re making that up,” I say, echoing her earlier claim.

She laughs. “No, I’m not!”

“Whatever you say.” I take our plates to the sink and leave them to deal with later. I don’t want to waste one second of the time I have with her doing dishes. I make bowls of coffee chocolate chip for both of us and return to the bar where I get to enjoy the supreme pleasure of watching Natalie enjoy ice cream.

“Mmm, so good.”

My throat tightens around the cold blast of ice cream as I wonder if she might react similarly to my hands on her skin. I quash those thoughts before they can lead to an embarrassing reaction. I take another bite, hoping the ice cream will cool me off.

She lifts the spoon to her mouth, and I’m transfixed by the slide of her lips on the metal. “Did you really ask me to go to the Golden Globes with you?”

“I really did.”

“You’re crazy. You know that, don’t you?”

“I’ve been called worse things.”

“You can’t take someone you just met today to one of your most important events of the year.”

“Why not?”

“Because.”

I tip my head and raise my brows, letting her know she’ll have to do better.

“It’s not done.”

“Sweetheart, let me tell you the upside of celebrity. Everything is done. We’re a bunch of self-indulgent sloths. I’d think, with all the reading you do, you’d know that about my people. If I want to take someone I just met to the Golden Globes, no one is going to stop me. Except you, of course.”

She shakes her head. “This whole thing is nuts. I feel like the clock is going to strike midnight and your Bugatti will turn into a pumpkin.”

I stare at her, horrified. “If my Bugatti turns into a pumpkin, I’ll never forgive you. I love that car.”

“You know what I mean. This entire day is right out of Cinderella or something.”

“Do you have an awful stepmother? Terrible stepsisters?”

She pauses long enough for me to wonder what she’s thinking. “No.”

I put down my spoon, push my bowl aside and reach for her hand. “It may be hard for you to believe this, but underneath all the hoopla and attention, I’m just a guy. I eat and sleep and breathe the same way everyone else does. I’m just a guy who met a woman who interests him. I’d like to spend more time with her. I’d like to take her with me when I go to LA for the Globes because I’m kind of nervous. They’re saying I’m going to win this time, and if I do, I want to celebrate with you. If I don’t, I want you to make me feel better just by being there. That’s why I asked you to come.”

“You’re totally serious.”

“Dead serious.”





Chapter 5





Nothing about this night has gone the way I expected it to. I’ve been surprised and caught off guard from the minute he picked me up in a car he drove himself and brought me to his lovely but small apartment where he clearly gets by without household help.

And when he asked me to go with him to LA for the Golden Globes, he blew my mind. It’s all I can think about… What would it be like to walk the red carpet on the arm of the biggest movie star in the world? It’s right out of a fantasy, thus my correlation to Cinderella.

Strangely enough, I want to go. I want to be part of his big night. I want to see Los Angeles and Hollywood for the first time with him as my tour guide. The thought of meeting Max Godfrey and Estelle Flynn nearly makes me swoon, but not nearly as much as the idea of spending three days with this charming, handsome, utterly beguiling man who says he’s just a regular guy and enjoys the same food I do.

“I’d like to go,” I say tentatively, “but nothing has changed in regard to how I feel about a relationship with you.”

“I understand that, and I respect it.”

“So you, who could have any woman on the planet, are choosing to spend time with the one woman who won’t fall into bed with you at the snap of your fingers?”