TAMING HOLLYWOOD'S BADDEST BO- Max Monroe Page 0,53
Lord knows his ego is big enough as it is. I refuse to put another “I’m always right” into his back pocket.
“Before you two head for round three of your bickering,” Lou interrupts, and his eyes quirk up with amusement, “I’d like to let you know that there are fresh towels, soap, and shampoo upstairs in the guest room bathroom. Feel free to make yourself at home, Billie.”
Fresh towels? A bathroom? A shower? It’s like heaven called to notify me of a delivery of modern amenities!
“I just have two questions for ya, Lou.”
“And what’s that?”
“Do you happen to have a—” I pause, trying to remember the term Luca used for it. Cat phone? Sat phone? What the hell’s it called? And why do I suddenly feel like I’m in the middle of a Dr. Seuss book? “A…pat phone?”
“A sat phone?” he asks, his gray eyebrows furrowing. “Short for satellite phone?”
“That’s it!” I snap my fingers in the air. “A sat phone!”
Lou glances between us, before his eyes stop on Luca. “Let me guess, your stubborn ass left your sat phone at home?”
Luca just grins and shrugs. “You know how I feel about carrying a fucking phone with me on hiking trips.”
“God forbid you have a way to reach someone if there’s an emergency.” Lou rolls his eyes and looks back to me. “I do have a sat phone, darlin’. And you are more than welcome to use it.”
I let out a relieved sigh. “Thank goodness.”
I’m pretty sure it’s been days since I’ve spoken to my sister or Serena. My boss most likely expects that, but Birdie, well, that’s a whole other story.
“And what’s your other question?” he asks, and I don’t hesitate to tell him, a little grin painted across my lips.
“Is there warm water in that shower of yours?”
“You can turn that water up so hot it’ll melt your skin off.”
“Praise Jesus,” I say on a relieved sigh and hop up from my seat. I stride right over to Lou and plant a big kiss on his cheek. “Thank you, you wonderful man. You have made my day.”
He grins. “Glad I could be of service, little darlin’.”
“Now, if you’ll excuse me, gentlemen, I have a date with a shower.”
Hallelujah!
Funny thing about always relying on your cell phone—when it comes time to recall any-freaking-one’s phone number—even your own sister’s—you can’t, for the life of you, remember it.
And unfortunately for me, my cell phone is dead as a fucking doornail from my fall, so any hope of retrieving said numbers is an impossible task.
Luckily, Lou’s sat phone is also a smartphone, so before I hopped in the shower, I fired off two emails—one to Birdie and one to Serena, letting them both know I’m alive and well, but that the service is shitty and they shouldn’t expect to hear from me until I’m at the airport, getting ready to fly back to LA.
An hour later, I’m freshly showered and sitting at the kitchen table, enjoying the delicious steak and eggs and potatoes Lou cooked up for us.
I don’t know if it’s because it’s been a few days since I’ve had an actual meal or if Louis Lennox is really that good of a cook, but gosh darn it, I’m one bite away from a foodgasm.
“Lou, this is the best damn meal I’ve had in months.” I stab another piece of steak onto my fork. “Thank you so much for this.” I take another bite and resist the urge to gobble it down like a heathen, forcing myself to chew slowly and actually enjoy the food.
“I’m glad you like it.”
“It’s light-years better than corn and beans.” I toss a teasing glare toward Luca, and he laughs.
“Hey, you’re not offending me. It’s not like I enjoy meals like that. They’re a necessity when you’re on a hiking trip for a few days.”
“A hiking trip that could have been a day trip on a freaking four-wheeler, you mean.”
Lou laughs. “He didn’t know about the new trail, darlin’, so you can’t blame him too much. But now I’m really curious about how the two of you met.”
Luca doesn’t hesitate to lay it all out there. “She just showed up at my cabin the other day, uninvited, and truthfully, she’s yet to tell me how in the hell she managed to find me.”
I look up from my plate and find him staring at me with a quirk of his brow.
“Does it really matter how I found you?”
Lou chuckles, but Luca keeps looking at me, his unrelenting