Page 53 of Sweet as Sin (Bad Habit 1)
“Get it right, baby. My name isn’t Romeo.” His voice was husky. His nose was touching mine, his body was pressed against mine, those blue
eyes searing straight down to the bottom of my soul.
“No?”
Slowly, Nico shook his head. He brushed his lips against mine, gently sucked my lower lip into his mouth, and pressed his teeth against it just hard enough to sting. He released it and whispered, “I’m the Cookie Monster.”
God, that voice. Those eyes. That wicked grin. The man was sex incarnate. Forget ninety days. Alone with him in the house, I’d be lucky to last ninety minutes.
My widened eyes made his grin grow wider. Without further ado, he grabbed the duffel, grabbed my hand, and led me into his house.
Here’s the thing: I’m no hick. And I don’t say that in a mean way. My point is simply that I’m not an innocent country girl who’s never been away from her little hometown to see the world. I’d moved all over the States as a kid, I’d met all kinds of different people, I’d lived in LA for years, and I’d worked in the industry, which meant even if I didn’t personally have wealth, I was exposed constantly to people who did.
But not like this.
The art collection. The car collection. The guitar collection, which covered the walls of a room larger than my entire house. Larger even than the plot my house was built on.
Then there was the custom recording studio, the fifty-seat home theater, the elevators, the infinity pools (one on the roof), the terraced gardens, the tennis court, the gourmet kitchen with not one, not two, but three enormous double refrigerators, along with a formal dining room that could easily seat everyone I knew. And then some.
The décor was what I’d call Architectural Digest Macho Minimalist. All the furniture, wall coverings, and art was either gray, black, or white. Soaring ceilings, recessed lighting, fifteen-foot-tall glass walls that slid back so that inside was out, and vice versa, completed the look. No rugs or draperies softened the angles and starkness. No color brightened the rooms.
And not a shred of anything personal, anywhere. Other than the room of guitars and the music studio that hinted at the occupant, Nico’s home was as antiseptic as a hospital, as impersonal as a hotel room. The sheer amount of space made it feel worse somehow, like he was living in a rented movie set.
Enormous and echoingly empty, the house made me feel strangely sad.
“What do you think?”
We stood in the living room together, beside a black leather sofa that appeared to have been designed to repel all but the most fearless of guests. The edges were so sharp, the cushions so unyielding, sitting on it might cause substantial bruising. Nico had given me the tour of everywhere but his bedroom. I assumed, contrary to what he’d said, he was saving the best for last.
I was hesitant to be honest, because I didn’t want to hurt his feelings. “It’s . . . incredible. I mean, really . . . there aren’t words.”
There. That should do it. Right?
He looked at me askance. “Pick a few.”
Oy. “Well, it’s just . . . um . . . very . . . ”
I glanced away, focusing on the view stretching for endless miles in the distance. A weird thought struck me: was this how God felt, looking down on His creation, watching everyone busily living their lives from far above, alone?
I said quietly, “Lonely.”
Silence followed, long and cavernous. Then, to my surprise, Nico pulled me into a hug. He wrapped his arms around me, dropped his face to my shoulder and sighed as if a weight had just been lifted from his own. I held him, enjoying the feel of his body, twining my fingers into his hair. He inhaled deeply against my neck, rubbing his cheek there as if he wanted to mark me with his scent.
“I knew you’d get it.”
His words were muffled against my skin. I pulled back to look up into his eyes. He stared down at me, his expression serious in spite of the wry upward curl of one side of his mouth.
“You knew I’d get what?”
“Every single person I’ve ever brought here goes apeshit over this place, but I fuckin’ hate it.”
It took a lot of willpower on my part not to let random images of the “persons” Nico had brought here bother me. “Why do you live here, then?”
One broad shoulder lifted and fell. “Gotta live somewhere. High-end real estate’s a good investment. And it’s secure.”
It certainly was. You’d need a helicopter to see into the living room, mountain-climbing gear to gain access from below, or some dynamite to blast through the high, thick stone wall that surrounded the property on the front and sides. For all intents and purposes, he lived in a beautiful, luxurious maximum-security prison.
“Have you ever thought about moving out of LA?”
