Page 5 of Mr. Wrong (Hollywood Knights #1)
Five
Ellenore
For the first time I can remember, I have no idea what’s going to happen next. Even when Derek broke up with me, I had a backup plan. A hastily assembled backup plan, but it was still a plan, even if I was weaving myself a safety net while I was falling.
Right now, with Lex, on the back of his bike, flying down dark, unfamiliar city streets, the last thing I’m worried about is tomorrow. The only thing I’m thinking about is now .
Lex slows and I lift my head. Opening my eyes, I expect a run-down apartment over a liquor store.
Or maybe an outrageously priced studio, coveted for its swimming pool and zip code.
That’s not where Lex takes me. Scanning my surroundings, there isn’t an apartment building or liquor store in sight.
We’re in a quiet, residential neighborhood.
I notice how far apart the houses are. How far they’re set back off the street.
Security gates. Guard shacks. Privacy hedges three times as tall as I am.
Lex turns onto a private drive, rolling to a stop in front of an unoccupied guard shack before planting his feet to keep the bike steady.
Standing sentry in front of it is a box with a keypad and small blank screen.
Leaning to the side, he presses his thumb to the screen and there’s a faint humming noise while the screen glows green.
A few seconds later, the huge iron gate in front of us starts to roll open on its track, letting us in.
We follow the cobblestone driveway past the main house, a gorgeous, ivy-covered chateau that looks like it was plucked from the French countryside and transplanted in LA, before finally rolling to another stop in front of what looks like a converted carriage house.
A long wooden staircase runs along the side of the building before ending in a platform outside a curtained French door.
It might be my imagination but I’m pretty sure the curtain just twitched away from the door, like someone is checking us out.
As soon as Lex cuts the engine, I let go of him to reach up and unfasten the strap on my borrowed helmet before pulling it off my head. I hand it to him over his shoulder before sliding off the back of the bike.
Standing close by, I wait while Lex engages the bike’s kickstand and secures the helmet before climbing off to stand beside me.
“You have questions.” He sounds resigned when he says it. Like it’s inevitable. Like answering them is the last thing he wants to do.
He’s right. I do have questions. I have a million of them, and every one of them is encouraging me to be rational.
Think this through. Run away. “I have one…” I take a deep breath and give it a voice because right now, it’s the only one that matters.
The only question I care about. “Will you kiss me again?” I say it in a rush because the fact that I actually said it is equal parts embarrassing and terrifying.
“Because when you’re kissing me, I stop thinking and I’d really like to not—”
Lex steps into me, lifting his hand to wrap it around the back of my neck to pull me close.
His mouth presses against mine, his tongue skimming along my lower lip before pushing its way inside.
This kiss is different than the one at the bar.
That kiss was slow, almost methodical. Perfectly designed to get me here.
To coax me into saying what he wanted to hear.
Yes.
This kiss is just as slow but there’s a desperate undercurrent that threatens to pull me under with each stroke of his tongue against mine. A wild heat that scorches its way down my spine, settling deep and low in my belly.
Finally pulling his mouth away with a low-throated groan, he gives me a lop-sided smile that seems to be at total odds with what I’m seeing in his eyes. “Better?”
“Yes. Thank you.” I nod my head and try not to be mortified by my response. Instead of laughing at me, he leans in and gives me another kiss, this one barely more than a soft press of lips against the corner of my mouth.
“You’re so goddamned adorable,” he murmurs, his mouth sliding from my mouth to my cheek. From my cheek to the soft spot right below my earlobe. “It’s almost a shame…”
“Shame?” I tilt my head, offering my neck to the soft brush of his lips. “What’s a shame?”
His gaze finds mine again, the blue of his eyes dark in the moonlight.
“I’m going to corrupt you, Ellenore.” The hand wrapped around the back of my neck squeezes gently, the feel of his fingers gripped against my flesh sending a shiver through me.
“I’m going to do things to you...” The thumb pressed against the side of my throat sweeps over the pulse that pounds, hard and heavy, under my skin.
“So, say the word and we’ll get back on my bike and I’ll take you home. ”
I know that I should. I know I’m not ready for whatever he’s about to do to me. That Lex is once-in-a-lifetime. A blue-eyed mistake, just waiting to happen
But he’s a mistake I’m dying to make.
“If I didn’t know better…” I shake my head, tilting it ever so slightly to deepen the press of his thumb against my throat. “I’d say you’re trying to scare me away.”
“I don’t want you scared, Ellenore.” His gaze drops to my mouth, the heat of it searing my lips. “I want you prepared for what’s going to happen the second I get you behind closed doors.”
He looks like a hapless beach bum—an off-the-charts hot, ridiculously sexy beach bum but in his faded jeans and tousled blond hair he looked normal. Almost harmless.
There is nothing hapless or harmless about the way Lex is looking at me now. A look that reminds me that, other than the fact that he rides a motorcycle and smells absolutely fantastic, I know nothing about him. A look that tells me I should be scared. I should be running away.
Instead, I give him a puzzled smile. “I thought all you Christian Grey types were supposed to be billionaire CEOs that drive Maybaches and wear Armani suits.”
That earns me a laugh. “Sorry to disappoint…” The thumb pressed against the side of my neck makes a soft, lazy sweep against my jugular, stirring my blood.
Making it hard to breathe. “But trust me, I don’t have to tie you up to make you do what I want, Ellenore.
” His laughter trails off and he leans in close, his lips warm against my ear. “Last chance to run away.”
I’m quaking in my low-tops. My knees are the consistency of jello and my heart is beating so fast I’m expecting it to burst like a balloon at any moment.
But, despite the fact that I’m five seconds away from a full-fledged panic-attack, running away is the last thing I want to do.