Beau had no doubt he was. If he wanted Lola as his own, for good, he could have her. There was no question about that—he’d done it once, and no matter how much work it would be, he could do it again. Beau was a better man than Johnny—and fuck, he was certainly a better man for Lola than Johnny.
“Yes,” Beau said. “Lola and I are—” What did he want to say? Not that they were a perfect fit. Maybe that they were both hard to handle, both impossible to hang on to, but that if anyone could, it would be each other.
“Look,” Churchill said. “Can I give you some advice? Don’t be an idiot. Whatever you did, make it right. If Lola truly is like my wife, which I suspect she is, she needs someone who won’t be deterred by anything. And those kinds of men are few and far between.”
Beau hadn’t been deterred by anything yet. Not Johnny, not Lola’s resistance to his offer, not the fact that in order to win her love and win his game, he’d had to open up to her in a way he never had to anyone—not even Brigitte, who was like family.
Beau only focused on challenges that held a prize worthy of everything he had. He’d wanted his pride back. He’d wanted to redeem himself of the one failure he’d never overcome. But now it began to dawn on Beau—maybe he’d made the mistake of ignoring what was truly at stake. And maybe he’d been fighting for the wrong prize all along.
5
The front door of Lola’s apartment was unlocked, and she walked right in.
Johnny sprang instantly from the couch. “The sun’s been up over an hour.” He met her at the door, clasping her shoulders. “Are you all right?”
She looked into his earnest face. His concern was clear, but it was also overdue. Any number of things could’ve happened to Lola overnight. She could’ve been kidnapped by a crazy gunman and whisked away in a pricey sports car. She could’ve encountered a stilted admirer from ten years ago who’d never let go of his grudge. Considering whom she and Johnny were dealing with, being late at all was actually a perfectly valid cause for alarm.
“I’m fine,” she said.
“I was worried. I thought about calling the cops.”
“Did you?”
“Well…no.” His eyebrows lowered. “What would I have told them?”
Maybe that she’d spent the night with the devil himself?
“I don’t know,” she said, wriggling out of his grip. The glass coffee table shook when she set the package of money on it. She stretched her aching arms and rolled her wrists. “We got into an argument. I refused a ride, so I walked.”
“From where?”
“The hotel.”
Johnny cocked his head. “He took you to a hotel? Doesn’t he live in L.A.?”
Lola stared at him a moment. Johnny was a pretty big guy. He wasn’t quite as tall as Beau, but he was meatier. He should’ve been the one to keep her safe in the gas station, but he hadn’t even been there. She would’ve been there for Johnny. She never would’ve let him go off with a stranger. All so he could buy a fucking bar.
She was already heated from her walk. The more she’d thought about all the wrongs done to her by both men, the faster she’d strode and the higher her temper had risen. She knew what she had to do—what she wanted to do—but in all her anger, she hadn’t stopped to figure this part out yet.
She turned away from Johnny, and her eyes landed on several days’ worth of mail scattered on the counter. She’d start there. She walked over and sorted quickly through it, grabbing anything addressed to her.
“Was the hotel nearby at least?” Johnny asked.
“Beverly Hills.”
“That’s miles away.”
She was well aware. She returned to the coffee table and dropped some envelopes next to the cash.
“I would’ve picked you up,” Johnny said, following her from room to room. “You should’ve called.”
She faced him, and her heart clenched. He could be so clueless. His simplicity was one of the things she loved about him except when she needed him to not be that. Like now, when what she was about to do would be that much harder because he had no idea it was coming.
She wrung her hands. “Johnny—”
He waited. “Yeah?”
Her heartbeat ping-ponged at the same rate as her thoughts. There was no right way to say I care about you, but you screwed me over, but I don’t want to hurt you, but I can’t stay here anymore. Was it fair that maybe some small part of her might want to hurt him for this? Did she even owe him an explanation? Had he just sat here on his ass all night, staring at a wall as she’d been bound, fucked, wooed, robbed, loved and then broken? Her chest stuttered with a deep breath, her fear ebbing slightly as anger took over again.
“I couldn’t call you,” she said. “My purse was stolen last night, and my phone was in it.”
“Stolen? What the hell happened?” He let her pass to the bedroom. “Lola, for God’s sake, stop moving around and talk to me.”
She turned around. It was a plea, not an order, but she was tired of being told what to do. Just because Johnny didn’t do things the same way as Beau didn’t mean he hadn’t also treated her like a pawn. Not giving her a straight answer, forcing her to make the decision for both of them—that was how he’d manipulated her. She hadn’t seen it clearly at the time, but now it was all she saw.
“Don’t tell me what to do,” she said, her eyes narrowed.
He pulled back a little. “What? I’m not. I just want you to slow down, and tell me what’s going on.”
“Why should I? Do you honestly care how my night went?”
He raised his eyebrows and scoffed in a way that sounded like a laugh—as though she’d made a joke. “Of course I care. What kind of a question is that? You’re acting like—” He stopped. His neck reddened around the collar of his T-shirt. “Holy shit. Did you…did he give you something?”
Beau had given her lots of things. Almost as many as he’d taken. But she didn’t think that was what Johnny meant. “Like what?”
“You’re not yourself. You can’t stand still, and you look at me like you don’t recognize me. No matter how long it’s been, I haven’t forgotten how you get when you’re high.”