Total pages in book: 113
Estimated words: 105615 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 528(@200wpm)___ 422(@250wpm)___ 352(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 105615 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 528(@200wpm)___ 422(@250wpm)___ 352(@300wpm)
The elevator doors opened right into an office. It was large. Open plan. It smelled like a three hundred-dollar tobacco scented candle I once got in a goodie bag after some PR event.
In front of me was a set of floor-to-ceiling windows that looked out on to the entire club. Impressive art on the walls, black sofas beneath. A large desk right in the middle with a man sitting behind it.
A man.
One who matched the room. Expensive. Clad in all black. Tasteful.
He was watching me intently.
With cold eyes. They were sharp green, almost glowing against the rest of the room.
My feet moved even though everything in my body told me to stay in place. That somehow the elevator was my safe place, and if I stayed here, nothing bad would happen. But people could die in elevators just the same as anywhere else.
The man watched me approach.
He did not stand, did not speak, just watched.
I watched him right back. He was handsome. It was a weird thing to notice, considering how terrified I was. But there was no way not to notice. This man was ... something else. His hair was jet black, just long enough to curl around his neck. That was the only messy thing about him. Everything else was smooth, perfect. His skin. Jawline. Neck, visible because he was wearing a black shirt under his black blazer, open at the collar.
He was tan. Not fake, something all too common here in L.A. and something I was trained to notice in my line of work. It was something in his genes. Italian. Cuban, maybe.
I couldn’t determine his height because he was sitting, but I got the feeling he was tall. That he’d tower over me. Not overly muscular, but something about him was big. Foreboding.
His jaw was sharp, as if it were cut from stone but his lips were full, soft looking, complete with a cupid’s bow. Eyes that were carved from emeralds. He looked like the devil, since I imagined the devil appeared to everyone as their own version of utter dark perfection.
I stopped in front of his desk with no clue how I’d gotten there, my legs had a mind of their own, enchanted by his dark beauty. I was dressed in my favorite dress, second favorite shoes and sassy but not slutty makeup. And I was going to die. My intuition told me this. That I was in grave fucking danger. There were hundreds of people visible below me, but I was beyond help. I’d gone without a fight, and now I was here. Staring at death’s sharp green eyes.
There was nothing in the immediate vicinity for me to use as any kind of weapon, not that I really rated my skills in defending myself against this man. My best friend, Wren, and I had signed up for a self-defense class two years ago, but then we discovered a really great cocktail place that had remained undiscovered from the Instagram masses, so we’d gone there every Tuesday at six instead.
Not that some shitty, Groupon self-defense class would’ve helped me here anyway. I needed something else. Anything else.
“I’m terrible at remembering people’s birthdays,” I blurted. “Though I expect everyone to remember mine. It’s a double standard I hate about myself, but I can’t seem to change.”
I pressed my clammy hands against my bare thighs, forcing myself to keep the gaze of this man. “I keep buying houseplants because I want to be a person who has houseplants, but I keep killing them,” I said. “I do have a cat called Voldemort who I’ve managed to keep alive, but that’s more him than me, really,” I continued. “My dad is my best friend. It’s lame maybe, but he raised me on his own since I was six years old. My teenage years were not kind to him, yet he was always kind to me. We talk every day.”
I sucked in a breath, tears prickling the backs of my eyes at the thought of my father getting some call that my body had been found in a shallow grave.
No. Keep talking. Keep breathing.
“I’m terrible with money,” I rasped, my voice scratchy with fear. “Ditto with credit cards. Not because my father didn’t teach me well, he really, really did. He’s responsible. Sensible. He’s tried his best to raise a sensible girl, but unfortunately, he didn’t take in to account men like Jimmy Choo or Christian Louboutin and his daughter’s affinity for such men.”
I bit my lip hard enough for the metallic twang of blood to wash onto my tongue. “I haven’t done everything I thought I was going to do. No, I haven’t done half of the things I planned on. Except moving here and making a life for myself. I still have to see a sunset in Bali. Drink tea in Morocco. Climb a mountain in New Zealand. Do something for humanity that isn’t just helping keep ateliers in Paris in business.”