Chapter 19
Chapter Nineteen
Kira
I really should have told him the truth at lunch.
But how could I? We’d had such a magical morning, I didn’t want to undo all that and ruin everything!
It would be ruined eventually, though. I knew it was just a matter of time. After all, it wasn’t as if it was some little white lie I was telling that I could get away with forever.
You know, one of those things like you hate lasagna but your date goes to a lot of trouble to cook dinner for you and makes lasagna so you say it’s your favorite? Yeah. This wasn’t that.
This was me pretending to be a whole other freaking person!
My time with this little charade was limited and I needed to control when it and how Rex found out the truth before something awful happened.
Later, I told myself as we walked into his office over the Frolic Room. In a little while. The right time will present itself and then…
“This place is so cool!” I said, stepping into the small office. Like his car, it was a time capsule.
A framed poster for The Blue Dahliah hung on one wall over a black leather couch, Veronica Lake and Alan Ladd’s names prominently displayed.
On the wall across from it, between two filing cabinets, was a framed poster for The Glass Key featuring the same two stars.
“You have a thing for Vernoica Lake. I know you named your car after her,” I noted.
“Guilty. She was great. I wish her story would have had a happier ending though.” He looked at the posters for a moment and then said, “Ladd was great, too. Plus, both movies are mysteries, so I thought it fit with me being a private investigator and all.” He jerked his head toward a spot on the wall that held another movie poster.
“I sort of broke the theme with that Maltese Falcon one, though.”
“But it’s okay, because Bogie was cool,” I told him.
“Amen, sister.”
He went to his desk that rested in front of the window facing me and the door and pulled back the leather chair and plopped down for a second. “This won’t take long. I just need to sort through this mail. Please, make yourself comfortable.”
I sat on the overstuffed leather sofa and watched him take care of what he needed to. Even doing something so mundane as opening bills, he was so freaking sexy!
My mind drifted to thoughts of him and I doing… well, stuff… and I couldn’t shake them. This was so unlike me! Sure, I’d dated a little off and on—I enjoyed a hot guy as much as the next gal. The romance novels I read often had me worked up, too. And I truly wanted a partner.
But I wasn’t the type to sleep with a guy after only knowing him a day or two.
I also wasn’t the type to lie about my identity and basically con a man. Or so I’d thought. Yet there I was.
I told myself to forget about it. Sleeping with Rex would only make things worse.
Trying to keep my brain away from lustful thoughts—the polite way of saying I wanted him to fuck my brains out—I said, “This building is so cool. I love art deco!”
Looking up, he grinned, and those dimples just made me even hornier.
“Right? Built in 1930. Was a speakeasy but when Prohibition officially ended, it was able to open as a legal bar. Marx Brothers and Sinatra and a whole bunch of other people drank here—or downstairs, I mean—over the years. I’ll have to show you the mural.
A while back the owners commissioned someone to paint some of the celebrities who used to frequent the place. ”
“Do you know the owners?” I asked.
Rex shook his heads. “No. I just rent this little office.” He read a piece of mail, sat it down, and then looked at me again. “Howard Hughes used to own it. And the Pantages next door.” Standing up, he said, “I’m done here. You ready?”
I stood, too. “Sure. You know, you’re like a Hollywood tour guide.”
“I told you I love this town. It’s in my blood.”
“Want to show me some more of it?”
“With pleasure.”
I held onto his arm as we left and he locked up his office.
Mmm. Touching him felt wonderful.
Thirty minutes later, we were at the Original Famers Market.
“This isn’t what I expected when you said the name of it,” I told him.
There weren’t really a lot of farmers selling their stuff, it seemed, but rather it was a bunch of permanent, open-air eateries with a few produce stands sprinkled in.
“Yeah. People mainly come here to eat, though you can still buy some honey and fruit and stuff like that from some of the folks. There’s even a toy shop around the corner that sells old-school stuff. Might have something a Little would like.” He winked.
That familiar guilt I’d been stuffing down since the moment I boarded the plane back in New York came roaring back. I truly needed to confess to Rex that I wasn’t a Little! But it hardly seemed like the right time now.
“We just ate at Musso and Frank’s,” I said, hoping my voice wasn’t cracking under the weight of the shame I felt.
Just change the subject and wait for the appropriate opportunity to tell him, I repeated silently in my head.
“Yeah, but you gotta try these donuts. They’re better than anything in New York. I promise.”
As we walked under the shady overhang, through the people milling about and carrying their food to and from the seating area in the middle, a heavenly scent reached my nose.
Freshly baked donuts.
“Okay, you got me. I’ll have one.”
“That a girl.” Suddenly, Rex was holding my hand. “I want you to stick close. It’s busy. I don’t want us getting separated.”
“Yes, Daddy.”
Oh shit! Where had that come from?
“Sorry!” I said. “I, uh, mean… yeah. It’s busy here.”
Rex didn’t say anything, but when I worked up the nerve to glance at him, he seemed pleased.
Great, Kira. You’re really making a mess of this.
I would have to tell him now. This was getting too out of hand. The best thing would be to get the donut, have a seat, and just lay it all out for him. Maybe we could still salvage this budding friendship despite my deception.
Hopefully. He might not want me anywhere near him and I couldn’t really blame him.
Not only was I not Lila, but I wasn’t even a Little!
How had I gotten to this point? Lila was somewhere in England right now and I was in Los Angeles, pretending to be her! I’d made a mess of things and from my vantage point it almost seemed as if there wasn’t a way back.
Yeah. It was time. This lie couldn’t go on a minute longer.
We arrived at the donut place and Rex said, “Bob’s is the best. Been here since the 1940s. I recommend the cinnamon roll. Though a classic glazed is good, too.”
My eyes grew wide as I looked in the glass case and tapped it by the cinnamon rolls. “Those are huge! I can’t eat a whole one. Not after lunch.”
“Wanna split one?”
“Sure.”
I wasn’t very hungry, given what I needed to discuss with Rex, but they did look amazing. And that smell! It was hard to turn down no matter how stuffed I was.
The main reason I went along with it, though, was having something to shove in my mouth my help during the awkward parts of the conversation.
And there were no doubt going to be awkward parts.
We got two coffees and one roll and then found a table.
All around us, the stalls buzzed with activity. There was just about every kind of food a person could imagine. I would have to explore this further, I thought, when I was hungry.
Then again, I might be on the first plane back to New York after this talk.
Or even worse—what if he didn’t want anything to do with me? The return flight wasn’t for two more days. And if he told Athena and she got upset, I might not have a place to stay!
I couldn’t exactly afford a hotel, either.
Shit. I was screwed.
It was a mess I made myself, though. And as I considered not telling him and just going along with the ruse until I was safely back home, where I could message him, I decided against that.
The time had come to finally do the right thing.
“You okay?” he asked.
Tearing off a piece of the cinnamon roll, I nodded and shoved it in my mouth, hoping the few seconds of chewing would be enough time for me to gather my nerve.
Wow. The conversation hadn’t started and already I needed to fill the awkward void.
Good job, Kira.
After washing that bite down with a gulp of coffee, I said, “Rex, there’s something I need?—”
Before I could get another word out, I heard a man yell, “I don’t fucking care what you say! You’re coming with me!”
Rex was on his feet and going toward the guy.
Charging right into danger.