Total pages in book: 81
Estimated words: 77018 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 385(@200wpm)___ 308(@250wpm)___ 257(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 77018 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 385(@200wpm)___ 308(@250wpm)___ 257(@300wpm)
And while he was having his little panic attack… I shouldn’t have, but I pulled my phone from my purse, went to InstaPic and clicked on the camera—since it was his Live Feeds that had allowed him to steal my damn trip in the first place—and pressed record. After all, our hating each other was the basis of this stupid assignment… “So, basically,” I said, zooming in on his handsome, clearly panicked face, “what I’m hearing you say is, we can’t go to the Louvre?”
A sheen of sweat dotted his forehead. His gaze trailed from my device to my face, and I’d be a liar, liar, pants on freaking fire if I said I didn’t delight in it.
“I mean, I’m sure Wanderlust won’t care,” I continued, amazed at my ability to keep it together. “Why would anyone care about the Louvre, anyway? It’s not like it’s one of the most famous museums in the world or anything.” It was literally the most famous museum in the world, and he would tell me exactly that at any—
“It’s the most famous museum in the world, Blake. It has an average of eight million visitors a year.”
“This year looks like it will be seven million nine hundred and ninety-eight.” Keeping the camera on him, I backward shuffled forward in line while he continued to check every pocket for a third time, then I cut the recording.
Another of Vance’s alarms buzzed. When he went to step out of line, I grabbed his solid arm. I couldn’t actually let him leave, or could I? Could this be an angle? How to travel with someone you hate: Pretend you lose the tickets to the attractions, then go by yourself… The peace and quiet. The solitude. The lack of annoying alarms buzzing every time he needed to breathe.
I shook the thought from my head, then looked up to meet the gaze of the clearly dejected man having a sad-panda party.
“Just calm down for a second,” I said, then pulled the tickets from my purse, smiling as I passed them over to the man checking admission. After he’d waved us forward in the security line, I looked back at Vance. “Tell me how much you hate me.”
“You’re a horrible person,” he mumbled.
“Some people find me delightfully entertaining.” I placed my purse on the conveyer belt. “Besides, it’s the twenty-first century, Vance—the age of smartphones, apps, and Apple wallet. Why in the hell did you print out the tickets for every attraction we’re supposed to see?”
“Smartphones die. Tickets don’t.”
“Tickets almost get left,” I said.
We stepped through the open doorway of the glass pyramid and onto an escalator. The murmur of conversation echoed up from the bottom of the atrium as we descended. People crisscrossed paths, some with maps, some staring up at the structure in awe. When I stepped off the escalator, I tilted my head back under the warm rays of sunshine pouring through the glass. Then I spun around in “The Hills Are Alive” fashion as I took it all in.
Paris. The Louvre. A lifelong dream that made it a little easier to forget how shit everything was back home.
About three twirls in, I whirled into Vance hard enough that it knocked me off balance. In the milliseconds between my losing my footing and the floor hurtling toward my face, a terrible scenario played through my head. I was going to land, face-first, on the floor of the Louvre. The smack of my body hitting the marble would echo into those glass pyramids, catching people’s attention as I lay sprawled out. Knowing my luck, my skirt would probably flip over my ass so every Pierre around could take a gander at the black lace thong gifted to me by my best friend.
Halfway to the ground, I made a mental note to tell Margot there was a valid reason for wearing full-coverage, sensible cotton—for instances such as these.
Just before I hit the floor, Vance’s arm hooked around my waist, hauling me back to my feet. My ass hit his thighs; his warm breath touched my neck. I tried to ignore the goose bumps that scattered my arms and how incredible his thick arm felt banded around me.
Panicked at how much I’d just enjoyed that, I jerked out of his hold and turned around. My already-hot face flushed more when I noticed the impossible-to-ignore bulge in his jeans. The bulge that had just been pressed against the top of my ass. “Why were you that close?”
“That close?” He cocked a dark brow. “I wasn’t anywhere near you when you started wobbling around like a drunk.”
“I was not wobbling. I was spinning, taking it in.” I motioned toward the overhead pyramid. “Not that I’d expect you to understand that since there’s not a massive clock attached to it.”
His lips twitched with a hint of a smile. He did a crappy imitation of my spin, which, I had to admit, looked more like the twirl of a staggering drunk than of a person drinking in their surroundings.