Ella
Note to self: next time Tate Burke calls you to his room, make sure he has pants on before you go.
I don’t know what annoyed me more, the fact he wanted me to get rid of that girl like she was a bag of trash or that he didn’t put his pants on before he called me.
Worst thing is that I didn’t exactly hate that he wasn’t wearing pants.
Maybe that’s why I was annoyed. Why I still freakin’ am. He pulled an asshole move, something totally disrespectful to the girl and to me, and I was still marginally attracted to him.
Marginally. Just a tiny bit. Because, you know, it’s easy to find someone that looks, like, that incredibly attractive. With the selection of tattoos snaking up his arms and onto his chest, not to mention his lean, defined physique, he’s like a . . . I don’t know. A walking wet dream.
I cover my eyes with my hand. Boss, Ella. No men, Ella. Find yourself before an orgasm, Ella.
“Okay,” I whisper to myself. Sheesh—here we go again with the talking to myself. Maybe Kye’s right and I really am going crazy.
I wouldn’t be surprised, after everything.
At least Tate’s act last night proved something to me. He won’t hurt me. If I spoke to Matthew the way I spoke to Tate last night, I’d be dead right now. At the very least I’d be clinging to life desperately.
But Tate. . . . He just stood there and threw words at me. They were sexy words, yep, but that was it. He didn’t slam me against a wall with his hand around my neck, or introduce his fist to my nose. He did nothing. Like a normal guy. Like a normal, non-abusive, level-headed guy.
Well, I’m not sure level-headed guys actually treat women the way he treated Siobhan last night, but it’s close enough.
“Cake! Oh my shit!” Sofie shrieks from the other room.
I poke my head around the door. “Huh?”
“Ella!” She claps her hands to her cheeks and looks at me, horrified. “I forgot to get Mila a birthday cake!”
“Mama!” Mila stomps up next to me. “No cake?”
“Oh shit!”
“Mama, bad!”
Sofie moves her hands to her mouth and looks at me, wide-eyed. “Mila, where’s Tate?”
“Tay ahind.” She points a chubby finger over her shoulder.
I glance in the direction she’s pointing. Tate’s sitting in a plush chair, slouched back, and is very obviously staring at my ass. I cough, and he snaps his eyes up to mine with a smirk.
“Did you already get breakfast?” Sofie looks at him.
“And a cupcake,” he confirms. “A pink one with ‘sarkys, peez, Tay.’ ”
My lips twitch into a small smile.
“A cupcake? It’s not even ten a.m.!”
“And she had McDonald’s for breakfast. What point are you makin’?”
“I was coerced into agreeing to that because you already promised her and it’s her birthday.” Sofie glares at him.
“Well, there ya go.” He holds his hands out. “It’s her birthday and she coerced me into a cupcake, didn’t you, Mimi?”
Mila gazes up at Sofie, eyes wide, grinning.
Sofie sighs heavily and laughs. “Okay. Sheesh. I’m gonna take her upstairs and then get a cake.”
“I can do it,” I offer. “I don’t mind going to the store.”
“It’s okay.” Sofie rests her hand on my arm. “I’ll get one of the guys to go.”
“I’ll go with her.” Tate stands up and stretches his arms over his head.
“Er,” I stutter.
“Do you know your way around Charleston?” He raises his eyebrows.
“I . . . no,” I admit.
“There we go.” He looks at Sofie. “Sof, we’ll get her a cake. You go do your thing.”
Sofie exhales slowly. “Okay.”
“And stop freakin’ out. You’re drivin’ me fu—froggin’,” he glances to Mila, “crazy. She’s gonna have fun with us. Ain’t that right, Mimi?” He bends down, swoops the tiny girl up, and spins her around.
Mila giggles. “Uh-huh. My lub Tay. Awww.” She wraps her arms around his neck, and Tate hugs her tightly.
“My lub Mimi.” He smacks a big kiss on her cheek. “Be good and I’ll bring you another cupcake, okay?”
“No!” Sofie snaps when he puts an excited Mila down.
Tate grins playfully and looks at me. “Let’s go, Els.”
I glare at his back. Him and that damn nickname.
He gets one of the security guards to follow us and leads me into the private parking lot. The tour bus takes up most of it, but there are a couple of huge SUVs in the corner. Tate pulls some keys from his jeans pocket and points a black fob at one of the vehicles.
“Come on.” He holds the passenger side door open for me.
“Thanks?” I put my purse on the floor and grab the door to help get me in. Jesus—this thing is massive. “Eeek!” I squeal, feeling Tate’s hands on my waist. Fear jolts through me at the touch, but all he does is boost me up into the car easily.
He walks around to his side, and I shake my head at myself. Wasn’t it only twenty minutes ago that I was telling myself I know he won’t hurt me?
Looks like this habit of fear will be harder to break than I thought.
“You all right?” Tate looks at me from the corner of his eyes when he starts the car.
I nod my answer, because my mouth is too dry to speak.
“Sure?”
Another nod.
He doesn’t say anything else, but his eyes flick to me every few seconds for the next couple of minutes. I shift in my seat. I’m uncomfortable with his silent pushing for me to speak, because that’s what it is. And it’s kind of working, because I want to snap at him to stop. Looking. At. Me. Now.
“You planning on escaping, darlin’?”
“Huh?” My head spins in his direction so fast my neck aches.
“You’re so close to the door I think you’re about to fall out.”
I slide back into the middle of my seat. “Oh.”
“Oh?”
“Oh.”
He frowns, but the lights change at the intersection and his focus is forced back onto the road. Thankfully.
I look at my hands resting in my lap for the rest of our journey to the store. When we get there, I push the door open and jump out of the car. I barely remember to grab my purse. I just know I need to get out of the small space.
“Wait,” Tate calls. Another car pulls up next to ours and the security guy steps out. Of course—the Dirty B. boys rarely get to go anywhere without being mobbed by either fans or cameras, especially on tour.
Tate and the security guy catch up with me halfway across the parking lot. Another car pulls up and a camera lens is poked out of a window. Immediately, I duck my head so my hair is covering my face.
The more hidden I can stay, the better.
Tate eyes me curiously but doesn’t say a word, and I’m grateful.
We enter the store and walk through the aisles to where the boxed cakes are. Tate scans the shelves until he finds a Frozen one. He sets it in the cart gently, then turns to me. “Last month it was Peppa Pig. This month it’s all about Olaf.”
“I have no idea what any of that is.”
He stops and looks back at me. “You don’t know what Peppa or Frozen is?”
“Frozen is a movie?” I guess.
“Do New Yorkers live under child-hating rocks?”
My lips twitch. “In my parents’ circles? Yes.”
“Awesome.” He glances at the watch on his wrist. “I have approximately thirty minutes to educate you on Frozen.”
I blink at him. Did he just—is Tate Burke seriously going to tell me about a kid’s movie?
Twelve hours ago I was kicking someone out of his room. Now I’m about to get a lesson in Frozen.
This must be the Twilight Zone.
I stare at the snowman-style tea set. “That’s Olaf?”
“The snowman.” Tate nods. “If you really want to get her a birthday present, she’d love you forever if you got this.”
“Right.” I pick up the box and study it. Disney sure has come a long way since The Little Mermaid. “I still don’t understand the movie.”
Tate wheels the cart down the aisle to the books. I follow him and stop next to him. He grabs a Frozen book off the shelf and hands it to me. “Here. Educate yourself, Els.”
I cut my eyes to him. “You want me to stand in the middle of the aisle in Target to read a children’s story?”
He shrugs. “Or in the car. I’m buyin’ her the book anyway. Conner loves to read stories.” His grin is mischievous.
“I think the car will be best,” I say slowly, putting both the tea set and the book in the cart with the cake. “Do you have wrapping paper?”
“Am I supposed to?”
“Um, yes.” I roll my eyes and hook my finger over the end of the cart. “Come on.” I tug it. “Seriously, you know all the kid’s shows but you don’t know to wrap presents. And you say I lived under a rock.”
“Frozen. Peppa Pig. Sesame Street. Doc McStuffins. Mickey Mouse.”
“I know Mickey Mouse!”
“Clubhouse?”
“What is that?” I stop by the rolls of paper and look back at Tate.
He shakes his head. “Amateur.”
My jaw drops. He grabs four rolls of paper then drops them into the cart.
“I don’t have any kids in my family, and neither does my ex. I’m not used to . . . this.” I look at the contents of the cart.
“Ex, huh?”
I freeze. “What? Just because you don’t have one, you think no one else does?”
Tate spins on his feet, twirling the cart round with him. “No. I’ve just been wonderin’ how and why you ended up as a PA with a degree from fuckin’ Harvard, and now I know. You’re runnin’ from an ex.”
“N-no. I’m not?”
His lips twitch. “You don’t sound so sure there, darlin’.”
“I’m not running,” I repeat, forcing my voice to be steady.
“So why are you here?”
“I needed a change of scenery.”
“Riiiiight.” Tate rings the items through the self-checkout, even mine, and deposits them back into the cart.
“I can pay for mine.”
“Sure you can, but I’ve done it now.”
“I’m paying you back.”
“I’m sure you will, Els.”
“Will you stop calling me that?”
“Will you stop lyin’ about why you’re here?”
I inhale slowly when he opens the trunk and puts the shopping bags in. “I’m not lying.”
“Mhmm.” He pushes the cart to the security guy, who wheels it over to the cart shelter. Then he walks to me, slowly, and reaches around my body to the car door. With his fingers curled around the door handle, he leans his face toward mine. “Then why,” he whispers, “don’t you look at me when you tell me?”
I avert my eyes to the side, saying nothing. He’s standing so close to me, and he smells good. Like, really good. Like coffee and cinnamon—warm and comforting. Nothing like the harsh cologne Matthew used to wear, and definitely nothing like the whiskey and cigarette smoke he occasionally smelled like.
“Huh?” he prompts, his voice still a gentle breezing whisper. “That’s what I thought.”
“Leave it alone,” I reply, finally bringing my eyes to meet his. They’re burning into me, thrilling and scary, and it’s all I can do to ignore the shiver that cascades its way down my spine. “Please,” I finish quieter.
“Never.” He steps forward. There’s barely a breath of space between our bodies, and my heart is pounding double time, but I don’t know why, because this is wrong, he’s wrong. “I will get it out of you, Ella Dawson. I’m dyin’ to know why a pretty little city girl like you is slumming it on a tour bus with a boy band. And, darlin’ . . .” He runs his thumb along my jaw. “I will get it out of you, even if you’re on your back beneath me when I do.”
I swallow the lump in my throat. “Still not happening.”
“The telling or the fucking?”
Defiantly, I stare at him, despite the quivering of my hands. “Neither.”
Mila is hands down the sweetest little girl in the world. After she demolished every inch of paper on her present from me, she clapped her hands to her cheeks and gasped. Seconds later, she launched herself at me for a giant “skeezy hug.” Which is apparently a really, really tight squeeze around your neck.
Everyone got the same treatment as she made her way through the stack of presents in the corner, but Tate won the battle of the gifts. The life-size Olaf—which is bigger than the birthday girl—almost reduced her to tears, she was so excited.
Now she’s sitting on the sofa next to me, with Frozen on the giant plasma-screen TV, explaining every scene to me. Well, as good as a toddler can.
“Ven! Ven!” She claps her hands excitedly. “Ahh, Ven! Get Anna! Go, go!”
I glance down at her and smile. “Does he get her?”
She looks at me and sighs. “Watch, Ella. Watch.” She points vigorously.
“Okay, okay.”
Tate perches on the arm of the sofa next to me. “You get the story yet?”
I jump at his sudden arrival, then nod. “I’m going to move to Norway and find my own Olaf.”
“Don’t bother. Mila already convinced me to be Olaf for Halloween.”
My lips form a grin, and I turn my face toward him. “For real?”
He shrugs. “She agreed to let me be zombie Olaf.”
“Unbelievable.” I laugh as Conner calls for Mila. She whines in protest until he mentions the c-word—“candy.” I’ve quickly come to realize that Mila’s absolute favorite thing in the world is Sour Patch Kids, and that Conner always seems to have a stash of them somewhere around his person. He uses them for anything, including bribery.
Hey, it works. I’m not judging. I’ll probably do the same one day if I ever have kids.
Mila climbs down from the sofa and runs across the room to where he’s standing.
“Hey!” Tate shouts, sitting up straight. “Where you goin’?”
“Dadda,” Mila answers simply, her hand clasped around her bunny’s ear.
“Uh, where’s my kiss?”
Her eyes widen and she toddles back over, trailing her rabbit. Mila stops in front of Tate, lifts her rabbit, and presses its mouth against his. I cover my mouth with my hands as she skips away laughing manically.
Tate gets up, and in a few long strides, swoops Mila up and over his shoulder on her back. “That wasn’t a kiss, Mimi! Was it?”
“Was too! Bunna kiss!” She attempts to make kissy noises, but it’s completely overshadowed by her ear-ringing shriek when Tate blows a raspberry on her belly.
I laugh hard, leaning on the back of the sofa. Oh my gosh. I challenge someone to find something cuter—and hotter—than a sexy, tattooed asshole loving on a two-year-old girl.
You won’t find it.
Ever.
“Kiss kiss!” Tate laughs to himself, the effectiveness of his raspberries declining severely.
“Tate—what the hell?” Sofie stops in the doorway. “What are you—never mind.” She giggles softly.
“Dammit, Tate!” Conner straightens. “Now how am I meant to sneak her candy?”
“Grab her and run, bro!” Tate darts across the room, deposits Mila into Conner’s arms, and blocks the doorway. “I’ll hold Momzilla off.”
“Momzilla? I’ll Momzilla your ass, you dick!” Sofie rushes toward him, but Tate wraps his arms around her.
“Go, Con, go!” he shouts, carrying a squirming Sofie over to the free couch. She screams when he throws her down.
“Tate Burke, I’m gonna kick your sorry ass!” She scrambles up, pushes her hair from her face, and half-giggles, half-frowns at him.
“How do you think you’re gonna manage that, short stuff?”
“I’ll call your mom.” She folds her arms across her chest and smirks.
“You wouldn’t.”
“Mhmm. And I’m sure she’d be real pleased to hear how her eldest baby disrespected a woman last night.”
“Evil bitch. And I thought we were finally friends.”
“Behave yourself.” She puts two fingers to her eyes then points them at her. “I’m mom around here, doll. I’ve got my eye on you, and I have your mom on speed dial.”
I bury my face in my hands at the horror in Tate’s eyes as Sofie walks backward out of the room. I have to laugh. I can’t help it.
The biggest asshole of Dirty B. can be brought to his knees by a two-year-old girl and her mom.
This. Is. Priceless.
“What are you laughin’ at, Els?”
I stop and glare at him. “You want me to get your mom’s number?”
“You wouldn’t dare.”
“You sure about that?”
He launches himself toward me and, with his hands on the back of the couch on either side of my head, leans forward. Inches are separating our noses, and I wish like hell he’d stop getting so freakin’ close to me. There’s this crazy warmth that radiates from his body, and I’m not gonna deny that my eyes are flicking to his tensed biceps.
So I’m an arms girl. I can’t help it.
“I’m sure,” he breathes, his eyes hot on mine, begging me to look up at him.
I do. For some reason, I damn well do.
Bright and hinting at that turquoise color I’m coming to recognize, his eyes are intense, serious yet teasing, mischievous.
And I breathe in, slowly, because he shouldn’t be affecting me. I don’t want him to know he’s affecting me.
“You won’t call my mom because you’re too fuckin’ nice to. You’re too quiet and shy, despite that crazy-ass sassy mouth of yours that pops up now and then.”
Of their own accord, my lips move into a small smile. “How do you know my sassy mouth won’t pop up and call her for my shy self?”
“Because if it does, I’ll have to kiss it into fuckin’ silence.” He leans forward, just a little more. Enough that my inhale isn’t all that slow or quiet.
“How do you do it?” I whisper. “How do you go from woman-using rock star to adoring uncle to . . . this?”
“What is . . . this?”
“I don’t know. Gentle asshole?”
“I’m still your boss, y’know. I should have had your ass for calling me an asshole last night.”
“Why didn’t you?”
“I was too busy staring at your ass as you walked away from me to remember.” He smirks. “For what it’s worth, you have a real fuckin’ nice ass.”
“Thanks. I guess.” I raise an eyebrow. “And back to my question?”
He smiles, his eyes sparkling, and drops onto the sofa next to me. “I love my family, Els. And Mila most of all. She fuckin’ hated me the first time we met. First time she looked at me, she burst into tears.”
“Seriously?” I turn to face him. “I don’t believe you.”
“I swear. She didn’t let me go anywhere near her until I returned her Bunna to her. Since then she’s been like my best friend.”
“But you’re such a dick to everyone else.”
“Me and my brothers—we’re like that. Do you have any siblings?” At the shake of my head, he continues, “We’re together all the time, especially when we’re on tour. It grates on you. We gotta bitch at each other or we go fuckin’ crazy. It’s better to bitch playfully than have it go too far, because that’s ended up physical more than once.”
I swallow.
“But Mila? Dammit.” He shakes his head. “I love that kid somethin’ fierce. I’d kill anyone who tried to cross her.”
I look at him. The darkness of his hair, the brightness of his eyes, the curve of his jaw. “But if you can love so much, why are you so hateful to the girls you sleep with?” He opens his mouth, but I sit up and interrupt him. “Oh, come on. I might not have known about Frozen this morning, but I read the tabloids, you know?” In secret. On my phone. On the toilet. “Your reputation isn’t exactly a secret.”
His lips purse and he straightens. “Seriously? You wanna know why?”
I nod slowly. “It doesn’t make sense in relation to this other person you are. I swear, you’re giving me whiplash with your multiple personalities.”
He laughs. “All right, Els, darlin’, because it’s you.”
“Because I’m so special.”
He winks. Leaning forward, his expression becomes stoic. “All the girls are interested in is my money and my fame. They wanna be a notch on my bedpost, my arm candy, my spoiled bitch of a girlfriend.”
“So why do you even take them home?”
He shrugs a shoulder. “I don’t trust anyone, Els. Only my family. Too many people have betrayed me for me to give that shit out like it’s candy on Halloween.” His eyes convey his meaning: he doesn’t trust me either.
That’s cool. I don’t particularly trust him.
“I don’t blame you,” I reply softly, looking away. “I don’t trust anyone either. It’s more hassle than it’s worth.”
Tate stands, his eyes still on me, despite the fact that mine are staring at the credits for Frozen on the TV. “Trust Sofie,” he says, breaking the moment of silence. “She’ll never lead you wrong. She’s fucked up plenty, but she’s also made all her mistakes right. She’ll be your best fuckin’ friend if you’ll let her.”
I swallow hard, and I meet his eyes for a brief second. “I’ll try.”