Total pages in book: 82
Estimated words: 78155 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 391(@200wpm)___ 313(@250wpm)___ 261(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 78155 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 391(@200wpm)___ 313(@250wpm)___ 261(@300wpm)
“What?”
“The girlfriend thing.” He scanned the room and didn’t look at me.
“Of course it is.” We’d already established we were a pair, but to hear him refer to me as such in public was a new high.
“I don’t like the label, but I didn’t know how else to describe it.”
And then my heart deflated like a balloon. “Oh…”
He must have picked up on my tone because he looked at me. With narrowed eyes, he examined my reaction.
“You don’t have to call me that if you don’t want to.”
He remained focused, like he was trying to solve a complicated math problem in his head. “I didn’t say I didn’t want to.”
“You just said you didn’t like the label.”
“I don’t. I feel like a teenage boy in secondary school.”
“Okay.” I grabbed the champagne and took a drink.
He continued to look at me. “I don’t understand what’s happening here—”
“There’s my boy.” Bastien appeared in a black tuxedo like Luca’s, and his eyes were bright and alive because he seemed to enjoy the party a lot more than Luca. He stepped over to Luca, and they did the grip thing guys often did together. “Have you tried the bacon-wrapped scallops? Some good shit.”
Fleur greeted me warmly, with a smile that seemed genuine, and she hugged me hard. “You look beautiful.”
“You look beautiful too. I love the blue.”
She pulled away and my eyes caught on the ginormous ring on her left hand covered in so many diamonds, including the big one right in the center. So large, it was distracting, equally a threat and a status symbol. “How have you been?”
“Good. Love my new job.”
“Oh, that’s great.”
“What about you?”
“Bastien and I just took a trip to the Loire Valley. Stayed at a hotel there and visited the castles and wineries. Really beautiful, even before spring.”
“That sounds romantic.”
“He pushes me up against any flat surface he can find,” she said with a chuckle. “Not exactly romantic.”
“That sounds pretty fucking romantic to me.”
Bastien continued to talk Luca’s ear off. “And they had these filet mignon bites coated with bleu cheese. That’s good shit too.”
But Luca continued to stare at me like he was stuck in our previous conversation.
“Are you even listening to me, man?” Bastien asked.
“Give me a second.” Luca stepped away from him and came over to me. He didn’t even say hello to Fleur. “I told you I’m not good at this shit. So tell me what I did wrong because I can tell I pissed you off.” He spoke so loudly that Bastien and Fleur could both hear.
And they stared like they could hear perfectly.
“It’s nothing,” I said. “Forget it.”
“I don’t forget anything,” he snapped. “So, tell me.”
“We don’t need to do this right now—”
“Yes, we do,” he barked.
“Fine,” I said with a breath. “If you don’t want to call me your girlfriend, then don’t.”
His eyes moved back and forth as he tried to understand.
“Don’t say what you don’t mean.”
“I did mean it.”
“But then you said you hated it.”
“I do hate it. Girlfriend is a stupid label.”
“Then don’t use it.”
Now Luca looked confused again.
“If I may…” Bastien inserted himself between us. “I think I know what’s going on here.” His eyes were on me like I was the one who needed to be addressed. “Girlfriends are for pussies. It’s not a term we like to use—”
“Then don’t use it—”
“What he means is you’re more than a girlfriend. You’re his woman. But that’s not a term that others understand, so he has to call you his girlfriend, but he hates that because it doesn’t accurately describe what you have. That’s all he was trying to say.”
Luca didn’t interject or disagree, like that was how he felt.
“Make sense?” Bastien asked.
My eyes shifted to Luca.
He continued to stare me down.
Bastien stepped aside and moved back to the table, his arm sliding around Fleur’s waist.
Luca waited for me to do something.
I moved back into him. “I’m sorry I misunderstood you.”
“It’s okay. I told you I’m not good at this.”
“I think you’re better than you realize.” I came close and moved my hands to the crooks of his arms, my favorite place to grab, the bulges of muscle. I leaned in and kissed him.
He kissed me back, and when I pulled away, the tension had disappeared from his face.
“Luca, you’ve got to try this.” Bastien was back at the table, taking the canapés off the tray.
Fleur smirked like she was amused. “Men and food.”
Luca walked back over and took one of the bacon-wrapped scallops. He ate it in one bite. “Damn, that is good. Baby, try this.” He grabbed one and held it out for me.
Bastien was behind him and out of Luca’s line of sight, and he exchanged a knowing smirk with Fleur.
I let him feed it to me. I didn’t care for seafood, but I wanted to participate. As I chewed, he swiped his thumb over the corner of my mouth to catch a crumb that got stuck there. “It’s definitely a winner.”