Love, Chloe - Alessandra Torre Page 0,62

a smile.

He turned down a side street and parked, somehow right in front of the tile store we’d been headed to. I glared at the sign. Dammit.

My purpose in tagging along with Carter had been to help him pick out materials. I had readily agreed, thinking it would be easy to pair a backsplash with granite, especially for someone as stylish as myself. I stared at the countertop before me, at the eighteen different options I had pulled for review, and my confidence wavered. I glanced out the window, at the truck, where Carter was helping load a vanity. His T-shirt tight, his biceps bulging, he pulled the heavy piece up into the bed. The picture was so utterly male that I almost fanned myself. I watched him as long as I could, my eyes darting away in the moment before he pulled open the store’s front door, his steps echoing across the floor toward me. “Pick something?” he asked, wiping his hands on the front of his jeans and I looked up from the options, my breath catching in my throat as I saw the damp cling of his T-shirt to his chest, the wide grin of his smile, the way his eyes even smiled at me. The man looked at me as if I were something special, a look so foreign that a part of me wanted to cry. How long could that look last? How many women had gotten it?

I wasn’t special. I wasn’t even—the more I got to know myself—that great. But that look, that smile—it made me want to be more. I smiled back at him. “Yeah,” I said. “I found the perfect thing.”

“Awesome.” He stepped closer and leaned in, pressing his lips to mine softly, then pulled back. “Meet you at the register?”

“Yeah.” I mumbled, already wanting more. “I’ll be there.”

He walked off, and I stared down at my mess of tiles.

I needed to stop overthinking it and just make a decision. It was two colors that some renter would never notice.

I grabbed two samples and headed for the counter.

55. She’s a Monet.

Presa Little’s show was at the Gagosian Gallery in Chelsea, the place for anyone to hold anything. I debated for a good hour over what to wear, finally opting for a silk T-shirt dress that, paired with heels, worked as well for a cocktail party as for a formal event. When Carter knocked at my door at eight, I smiled at the view—him in a suit. A very nice suit, one his build filled out perfectly.

“Nice threads,” I mused, running my hand over his lapel before tilting my head up for a kiss.

“Thank you. You look stunning.”

“Thanks. Ready?”

“If you are.” His face was tight, and I felt my first bit of unease as I grabbed my purse.

“Are you feeling okay?”

“Yeah.” He smiled. “Just a long day.”

I bet. There’d been plumbing vans parked out front all day, men in uniforms carrying things up and down our stairs, all with urgency in their steps. Nothing like that to stress me out every time I flushed the toilet. “Is everything okay? I saw workers…”

He shrugged. “A leak on an upper floor. It was a beast to get to. Sucked up the whole day.”

Glamorous stuff, our conversation. I nodded and stepped into the cab, double-checking my wallet for the tickets.

“I should probably warn you about Presa…” Carter glanced out the window, and I looked up at him, suddenly alert.

“What about?”

“She can be territorial. Aggressive,” he corrected himself. “Unfriendly.”

I blinked, surprised at the string of adjectives, none of which matched the worldly ambassador I had pictured. “Territorial? Over what?”

“She’s known me a long time. With girls I’ve dated in the past … she can come on a little strong. Protective.”

“Like a momma bear with her cub?” I tried to follow his train of thought.

He grimaced. “No. Like…”

Our conversation was interrupted by an accident, two cars ahead of us colliding, our cab slamming on the brakes, throwing us both forward. Carter’s hand reached out to protect me, my eyes rolling as he took advantage, his fingers caressing me through my dress. I swatted his hand and reached for the handle.

By the time we stepped out, there was already a full-fledged New York City argument going on between the drivers over what looked, to my untrained eye, like a big scratch. He slipped the cabbie a ten and we decided to walk the remaining four blocks to the gallery.

When we approached, there was a crowd outside, paparazzi clustered, a