“So, basically no sex until after marriage, so to speak.”
Patrick laughed at how she framed it. “So to speak.”
Layla leaned in closer to him. “In which case, I look forward to the wedding night.”
“It’s amazing,” Layla said in awe, looking around the suite at the Beverly Palm Hotel. Her eyes wandered around the tastefully decorated living room portion of her accommodations. It was all cream and beige and even had a vase with a bouquet of multi-colored, real tulips to brighten up the room.
“Well, we do want to make you happy,” Patrick said coming up close to her as her fingers traced along the curve of one of the blooms in the vase.
She could smell that aftershave lingering on him again. Turning around to look up into his eyes, she wanted nothing more than for her fingers to be tracing a line along his strong jawline instead.
Layla could feel the heat radiating off of him, despite the cool temperature of the room. The look he gave her told her that he wanted nothing more than to press his body up against hers and kiss her hard.
“Would you like this in the bedroom?”
Patrick instantly pulled away and Layla quickly turned to face the vases again.
“Yes,” she said, scooting past Patrick to follow the bellboy into the bedroom that was just as lushly decorated.
She watched him place her suitcase on the little bench. She heard Patrick follow her into the bedroom.
“Will you be needing anything else?”
“No, thank you,” Layla said with a smile and was about to reach for her purse on the console near the sliding doors to the bedroom for a tip. Patrick held her arm and reached into his pants to get his wallet instead. He pulled out a twenty dollar bill and handed it to the man.
“Thank you, sir,” he said with a brighter smile.
“I could have—”
“No,” Patrick interrupted. “Full service. You have one job here and one job only.”
She smiled up at him. “At least until the wedding night.”
He smiled back. “Until the wedding night.”
They both stood there smiling like couple of silly teenagers full of hormonal angst. It wasn’t lost on Layla that they were at the threshold to the bedroom where a large king size bed taunted them.
“Well,” he said after a long moment. “I should get going.”
A tinge of disappointment went through her and she pulled back. “So tomorrow night then? 6 o’clock?”
Patrick nodded then gave her a grin. “We can finally get this wedding business over with.”
17
“Patrick!”
The girl’s huge doe eyes grew to a spectacular size as she looked up at him.
“Sam,” he said hugging her. “Clark,” he added, turning to her fiancé to shake his hand.
Samantha Simon had been all of 12 years old when he’d first met her as a new hire at Lion Studios ten years ago. The obvious crush the shy girl had had on him had long since evolved into the sort of fondness and trust one might have for an older brother.
Patrick often wondered how such a beautiful young lady, with such a sweet disposition could be the progeny of Spencer Simon. Obviously the looks, with a pert nose, bow lips and big, brown eyes had come from her mother. The timid personality had most likely come from a lifetime of living under the roof of a domineering father.
Her fiancé Clark Winthrop, a future pediatrician who had just started medical school at U.C.L.A., was a handsome man with the kind of looks you’d find in Ralph Lauren ads. Although they were both young, the way he looked at Samantha assured Patrick that it was true love. Young and premature love, but true all the same.
“This is Layla,” he said, placing a hand on the small of her back to introduce her.
“Oh, aren’t you pretty!” Samantha gushed, then blushed at her own boldness.
“Congratulations,” Layla said, smiling as she reached out to shake Samantha’s hand, then Clark’s. “You two make a lovely couple. I’m so honored you’ve agreed to let me make your cake.”
He saw her searching the girl’s eyes to see if that was actually the case. In all fairness, it had been Patrick’s idea in the first place. Unbeknownst to Spencer he’d gone to Samantha with the idea first. Since it was Patrick, she had readily agreed. It had helped that he’d shown her pictures of Layla’s prior work. Even Patrick, clueless as to that sort of marital fluff, had been impressed. Layla was a true artist.
When it came time to approach Spencer the wheels were already in motion. All Patrick had to do was make Spencer think he had forced everyone into the idea. The original cake decorator was paid three times the original amount to hand over the duties to Layla.
“Oh, I’m so excited,” Samantha said with a dreamy look. “I think your cakes are beautiful.”
“Thank you,” Layla said, her face glowing at the compliment. Patrick realized how much her work meant to her in that moment and felt a surge of anger and regret run though him that it had been so abruptly taken away from her.
“Let’s get our table so we can hash this out and eat, shall we?” Patrick said, leading them all over to the hostess.
A moment later they were all seated around the table, Samantha next to Clark on one side and Patrick next to Layla on the other.
“So I understand the color theme of your wedding is black and white?” Layla began.
Patrick watched Samantha’s eyes blink down toward the table. “Well, Daddy thought it was best. He thinks it’s classic.”
“I see.” He watched the understanding come to Layla’s eyes. Samantha had had little say in how the wedding would actually turn out. “Well, if you had your way, what would you have chosen? I always like to make the bride and groom happy. It is your day after all.”
Samantha’s big eyes blinked rapidly as though that thought had never even occurred to her.
“Oh, I don’t know…” she turned to Clark. “What do you want?”
He blinked in surprise as well, as though he’d expected to leave all these details up to everyone else and just show up on the day of in a tux.
“Um, whatever you want, Sam,” he said.
Samantha’s brow furrowed as though she was being asked to find the solution to world peace instead of choose what she wanted her cake to look like.
Patrick was beginning to wonder how these two would ever survive being adults, let alone marriage.
“I have an idea,” said Layla in a reassuring voice that instantly smoothed out Samantha’s brow. “I like my cakes to reflect the personality of the couple, a sort of introduction to the life they will be spending together. Some couples are more formal, wanting everything perfectly in place. Others like things to be fun and even a bit comical.
“Usually what I ask is for them to tell me about a perfect date, something that conjures up fond memories.”
Patrick watched Samantha’s face soften into a dreamy look as she obviously homed in on one specific memory. Clark smiled knowingly down at her.
“Okay, now I want you to close your eyes and tell me about it,” Layla said.
Samantha closed her eyes and scrunched her shoulders together in that way girls did when they were excited about something.
“It was when we first met,” she began. “Hannah threw this beach party thing at Laguna Beach for her birthday. That’s when I first saw him. He was so cute.”
She smiled and crinkled her nose adorably. Clark just stared at her with a ridiculous grin.
“I was terrified to talk to him so Lauren brought me over so she could talk to his friend, and Clark just started chatting me up. He was so sweet and nice and easy to talk to, unlike so many boys. We ended up spending the whole evening together. At the end he gave me his jacket,” another crinkling of the nose and twist of the lips, “and we sat and watched the sun set together.”
Her face turned bright red as she continued. “That’s when he first kissed me. Right while we stared up at the night sky. It was so perfect. I knew right then
he was the boy I was going to marry.”
Patrick watched her in surprised silence. It was a ridiculously sweet story but it drew him all the same. He had no idea he could be this sentimental.
He turned to look at Layla who was watching with her own expression of touched appreciation. Their own introduction to one another hadn’t been quite so auspicious. It had taken time to get where they were right now, but Patrick was certain of one thing he hadn’t realized until right now: Layla was the woman he was going to marry.
As though his thoughts had been broadcast right into her brain, she blinked and looked over at him in surprise. She gave him a sweet and somewhat shy smile.
“Anyway”—the two of them started and turned their attention back to Samantha, who now had her eyes open, looking directly into Clark’s—”the next day he invited me out again. Now here we are.”
She turned to Layla. “So what do you think?” she asked in wide-eyed curiosity.
“That’s a lovely story. Very sweet and sentimental. There’s a bit of whimsical spontaneity but still somewhat of a gradual progression to where you are today.
“I think that sunset is the perfect metaphor for your relationship. It moves slowly, gradually drifting into night, but that final burst just as it drops down past the horizon happens so instantaneously, it’s like the blink of an eye. The next thing you know, you’re staring up at the night sky living your happily ever after.”
Everyone at the table stared at her in awe, even Patrick.
“That was beautiful,” Samantha sighed. Then she gasped. “That’s what I want for the cake!”
Layla just smiled. “I’ll make it perfect for you two.”
“They’re so young!”
Layla was sitting in Patrick’s convertible as he idled in the darkness of the street in front of her hotel. She had been surprised when she first met Samantha. She had a naiveté that reminded Layla of herself at that age, without the stubborn impulsiveness. What Layla had seen tonight had been true and honest love, not the reckless sort of whirlwind romance she had once allowed herself to be caught up in.
“All the same, I think they’ll make it work. Especially once they mature a little bit.”
“I hope so. At the very least, Clark seems to be a decent sort. He’d better be with Spencer for a father-in-law,” Patrick chuckled. “If anything, that alone should put some hair on the boy’s chest.”
They both smiled, thinking back to the happy couple filled with wide-eyed wonder. Layla looked out over the city below them. It was summer, so the air was much more pleasant at night than during the day.
“So I guess no coming up for wine tonight,” she teased as she stared out at the lights of Los Angeles.
Patrick gave a small chuckle. “You have no idea how tempting that is.”
“Well, okay then,” Layla said, chuckling herself. “Thank you for a wonderful evening Mr. Fitzgerald.”
She impulsively pecked his cheek.
Before she could pull away he turned to embrace her, planting his mouth on hers. She moaned as the first touch of his lips sent waves of pleasure straight to her center. His hand came around to cup the back of her neck and his fingers on her skin only added to her painful desire.
She tasted him as his tongue made its way into her mouth. She wanted to devour him, have every part of his body against hers…inside of hers.
It wasn’t fair, this teasing kiss of his. She placed a firm hand against his chest, pulling away. She both heard and felt him growl his displeasure.
“No,” she said, finally managing to disengage herself from him. “I should go up.”
“At least let me drive you to the front entrance.”
“No,” she insisted, pulling open the car door. “I could use the breather.”
She quickly pulled herself out of his car and began walking away before he could make any further protest. She heard the car stay in idle, waiting until she was headed up the slight incline to the front of the hotel.
Layla did need a breather. Tonight had been a revelation for her. As she had worked with Samantha to help create a vision for her cake, her own words had hit her hard. It was almost comical that the couple barely out of their teens would be the ones to open up such strong feelings inside of her.
“Happens so instantaneously it’s like the blink of an eye,” she muttered to herself, laughing a little. Out of the mouths of babes…or at least in a manner of speaking.
When had she decided she liked—loved?—Patrick? Somewhere between pushing him away and seeing him again back in Olla. Such a cliché. She walked through the front of the hotel with a smile. That’s when she finally heard Patrick’s engine rev as he put it into gear and drove off. One day down, thirteen more to go, she thought to herself. She allowed the small smile to turn into a grin.
The grin was frozen in place, a complete contradiction to the ice cold chill of pure terror that ran through her when she saw him sitting in the lobby.
Boris Sokolov.
18
When he saw her, his face lit up and he gave her that same smile that had initially attracted her to him in the first place: like a wolf ready to devour his prey. He'd been a bouncer at the club her friends had taken her to. At the time she had been flattered and turned on. Now she knew better.
"Layla," he said coming over to her.
He wasn't an exceptionally tall man, but at 5'10" and a body that focused on lifting weights, he practically dominated her smaller frame. He was dressed in jeans, black boots with pointed toes and a black button-up shirt. Casual, but sophisticated enough not to raise any eyebrows of the staff at the hotel. The bastard even had roses with him.
Or perhaps it was the danger in the ice-blue eyes that belied the amicable smile in his rugged face, warning anyone that it wasn't worth the effort to try and get rid of him.
She was frozen in place, moving only to cringe slightly when he cupped her face with his hand.
"I knew I find you eventually, Angel,” he said using the term of endearment that had once caused her heart to flutter. Now it just made it stop cold.
“And now, here I am. I come to bring my beautiful bride back home where she belong. I have to say, I was so sad to see you change name back to Brown instead of Sokolov,” he pouted.
The words came out sweet and tender. Anyone passing by would think he was referring to a long lost love who he'd finally managed to catch up with. Especially with the roses he handed to her.
Layla knew better.
The feel of his hands on her face disgusted her and she pulled away, taking a step back from him. She didn’t touch the roses.
"What are you doing here?"
"What kind of question is that for your husband?" he asked with that Russian accent of his she used to love.
“How did you find me?” She refused to acknowledge their marriage.
“I see in the papers that you are baker in California? I was quite surprised.” He reached out a hand to her face and she took another step back. He just smiled. “I knew it was fate. I had to find you. You know me, I am not without my resources. The hired detective, he say it only took half a day of phone calls to find out which hotel you are staying at. I took the first plane out to see you. Now I see you have ownership in a movie? I must say, my Angel has been quite busy.”
So there it was. “I don’t have the money any more. It’s gone. As for the movie, that deal is off.”
His smile faltered and she saw a trace of the dangerous persona that had originally caused her to flee. “Gone?”
“Gone.”
“Well, I’m sure that is something you and I can resolve. Now that I find you, we have plenty of time to discuss these matters.”
“There is nothing to discuss Boris. I left for a reason.” She looked at him. Maybe it was fate that he was here. Now that she wasn’t the stupid girl she’d been when she was with him, she could finally free herself. “In fact, now that you’ve found me I—I’m going to file for div—”
“
Don’t!” he growled, then closed his eyes, taking a deep breath and opened them with an eerily calm gaze. “There will be no divorce, Layla. You are my wife.”
“Is that why you tried to kill me?” she asked with her own eerily calm gaze.
He blinked as though she had slapped him. The he recovered, his eyes narrowing dangerously. “I don’t know what it is you think happened but,” he smiled and reached out to stroke her face, “I love you Layla. I always will.”
He leaned in close to whisper in her ear causing her to cringe back. “Forever.”
Boris pulled away and handed her the roses. “For you, Angel. So you have something to remember me by in this nice hotel.”
He looked around with an impressed expression that told her he wasn’t stupid. He shrugged amicably when she refused to take the roses.
“Do not worry, I will be around, Layla. Two years is long time to make up for.”
She watched him walk out the front doors of the hotel then ran to the elevators. She jabbed the up button with her finger so incesantly it began to hurt. When the doors finally opened she ran in and pressed her back against the wall, willing the doors to close as though Boris would jump in at the last moment.
She held her breath all the way back to the front of her room and it took five tries before she was finally able to insert the key card properly enough for the door to unlock. She pushed it open then fell back against it, slamming it closed.
That’s when all the tension left her body, followed by a release of trembling shudders that soon had her on her knees when her legs failed her.
He had found her. All of this, Patrick back in her life, the cake she’d just been hired to make, the trip to L.A., even the past two years living in perfect bliss in Olla, it had all been too good to be true. She knew one day he’d make an appearance back in her life.
She thought of how easy it had been for him to approach her. Then she thought of her trek back to her room. It would be so easy for him to follow her. He could be on the other side of the door right now.
Sweet Seduction Page 11
