Beside me, Nikki nodded, and I saw understanding on her face.
“Damien didn’t paint your portrait,” I said. “But I’m guessing you felt the same way.”
“You know about that?”
I lifted a shoulder. “It was kind of all over the news.” Damien Stark had paid a million dollars for a nude, erotic portrait of Nikki. She’d been anonymous in the portrait—her face hidden. But when her identity had been revealed—along with the fact that she and Damien were a couple—the press had gone on a feeding frenzy.
I’d felt bad for her at the time. Now, knowing her, I despised the press even more. “That must have been hell,” I added. “I’m sorry you had to go through that.”
“So am I,” she said. “But I survived it. It wasn’t easy and it wasn’t fun, but in the end I think it made me stronger. It sounds clichéd, but I really mean it. And one absolutely good thing came out of it.”
“What’s that?”
“Damien, of course. We came through it, and we came through it together. And when we did, we proved to the world what we already knew.”
“What’s that?”
“We fit each other.” She shrugged. “Simple, but true.” She smiled then, broad and happy. “I look at you and Cole and that’s what I see. Am I right?”
I glanced across the gallery to where he stood with Damien, two gorgeous men who outshone all of the art that hung around them. “Yeah,” I said. “I think we do fit.” And I could only hope that Cole thought so, too.
nineteen
“You’re sure you don’t want a night on the town?” Cole asked as we stood in front of the Beverly Wilshire hotel and watched Damien’s driver, Edward, pull the limo back into traffic. “Los Angeles. A limo. That’s a lot of potential to pass up.”
“The only potential I want is you,” I said. “In our room. Preferably without clothes.”
He grinned. “Well, when you put it that way . . .” He took my arm and led me inside the hotel that, though I’d never been in it before, seemed so familiar from all the times I’d watched and rewatched Pretty Woman as a teen. At the time, I’d been more interested in the musical shopping montage than in the romance plot. But I did remember that in the end, Vivian had gotten both the clothes and the man, though there’d been a few moments when it had looked like he and his issues were going to blow it for them.
I looked at the man on my arm, and couldn’t help but smile. I hadn’t seen it coming, but I couldn’t deny that I wanted the fairy-tale ending, too. And I was going to do whatever it took to make that happen.
“What?” Cole asked, catching me eyeing him.
“Just thinking about this hotel,” I said, as we moved through the exquisitely appointed lobby to the bank of elevators. “A lot of celebrities come through here. Some pretty hot men, too.”
His brows rose ever so slightly. “Planning to snare yourself a movie star?”
“Hardly.” I linked my arm through his. “I was just thinking that the man on my arm is so much hotter.”
“Funny,” he said, pulling me to a stop and kissing me fast and hard and deep. “I was thinking the same thing about the woman on mine.”
We’d registered before having Edward drive us to Malibu for dinner, so now we headed straight to our room on the eighth floor.
“You still haven’t asked me what we’re doing here,” Cole said as the elevator opened onto our floor. “About what the plan is for your dad.”
“No,” I said lightly, as I walked a few steps in front of him. “I haven’t.”
He caught up with me at the door, then stilled my hand before I could put the key in. “Katrina.”
“I’m just playing by your rules,” I said. “I seem to recall you were very insistent on getting that point across to me in the ladies’ room of The Drake. Or was I mistaken?”
He shook his head, obviously amused, then took the key from my hand. “Not mistaken.”
“Good.”
He opened the door for me, then followed me over the threshold. As soon as the door closed behind him, I eased up against him and started to unbutton the pale blue shirt he’d paired with faded jeans. “The truth is, I’m really hoping that being a good girl is going to be even more rewarding than being punished was.” I lifted myself up on my tiptoes and nipped at his earlobe. “Otherwise, why not just be bad?”
“You raise a good point,” he said, tucking his finger under my chin to lift my mouth up for a kiss. “And I do like to punish you. . . .”