LOL: Laugh Out Loud (After Oscar, #2)(8)
I ignored him and gave a stern warning to Nugget. “Behave. Your new daddy isn’t going to treat you well if you make a mess in here. Don’t fuck this up for us.”
She made a pppbbbttt sound and began to nibble on the corner of one of the landscapes. Good enough.
When I turned to start up the stairs after Roman, I came face-to-face with a Hollywood-perfect ass. His low-slung pajama bottoms sat low enough that the twin divots above each cheek were clearly visible, and the material of the pants was thin enough that I could almost, almost, see through them. There was no way I couldn’t not watch the way the muscles contracted as he took each step. The movement was mesmerizing.
Don’t look at his ass, I scolded myself. That led me to look up at his back instead, the smooth expanse of skin rippling over sculpted muscles. Was it suddenly hot in here, or was it just me?
I scowled. It’s irrelevant, I reminded myself. Even though the man is bi, he’s way out of your league, jackass.
And that was a fact. Roman Burke was arguably the hottest star in moviedom these days. Sure, he’d had an unfortunate dip in his career due to some not-so-flattering news stories, but he was already on track to get an Oscar nomination for his recent role in The Last Blue Curve, so I had to assume he was doing just fine.
Fine enough to stable a horse anyway.
“Don’t suppose you have a chef in this place who could whip me up a hot meal, do you?” I asked, trying to remind myself of my priorities. Number one, take care of Nugget. Number two, take care of me. And if I didn’t get at least a little food today, I was going to be in trouble.
“You like eggs?” he asked when he reached the top of the stairs. He glanced back at me, and there was something so casual about the movement, so familiar, as if I was a friend rather than a stranger who’d just barged my way into his house. With a horse.
It set me a little off balance. I’d expected him to try to get rid of me as quickly as possible, not offer to cook for me. “No, but I’ll eat them anyway,” I said, not really quite sure how to react to the unexpected hospitality. “I’ll take anything you’re willing to part with.”
He nodded and led me down a hall and into a space-age kitchen, something fresh out of a fancy magazine. It was huge, with a wall of windows along the far side and countertops that seemed to stretch for miles.
“Holy fuck,” I blurted, looking around. “You must be really serious about your food.”
“Mpfh,” he grunted, making his way to a high-tech coffee machine of some kind. “Espresso? Cappuccino?”
“Um… coffee? Would be good?” I wandered through the room, running my hand along the cold marble surface of the counters. “I’ve never seen a kitchen like this in real life.”
He paused in the middle of pouring coffee beans into some sort of shiny bullet thing and glanced at me. “What do you mean?”
I shrugged. “It’s huge, for one. I don’t even know what all those appliances are for.” I gestured toward a space-gray box built into the cabinetry. Right next to it was a small flat-screen panel the size of a cell phone. “Like, what’s that for?”
He blinked. “It’s a microwave,” he said in a deadpan voice. “Surely you’ve seen a microwave before.”
I narrowed my eyes at him, careful not to let them lower to take in the expanse of his smooth bare chest. Which was very, very tempting. “I know what a microwave is. I’ve just never needed to call one before.”
He wrinkled his forehead. “Huh?”
I pointed to the cell phone screen next to the microwave.
“Oh.” He chuckled. “That’s not part of the microwave. That’s the smart fridge.” He said it as though it were obvious. When in fact, it very much wasn’t.
I looked around, noticing the lack of fridge. “Is it smart because it’s not here?”
He laughed again. “It’s here. But you can tap on the screen to see what’s in it instead of opening the door and letting all the cold air out.” He turned back to the task of making the coffee.
I thought about the night spent curled up in Nugget’s crowded stall at the stables last night. How I’d been lucky to have access to cool, clean water for me and horse feed for Nugget. “Right,” I said softly. “Good. Wouldn’t want to spoil all that food by looking at it too much.”
Roman glanced at me with the crinkled forehead again, but I cleared my throat and barreled ahead. After all, we had business to discuss.
“So, she gets clean alfalfa hay at night and horse feed during the day. Right now she’s been on—”
Now Roman looked really confused. “Who does?”
“Nugget,” I told him. The duh was silent. “You know, the horse. You may remember her from such things as flinging you across Manhattan and being downstairs in your entry right now.”
Roman threw up his hands. “Whoa. Whoa. Hold on. I am not taking care of your horse. I don’t have a place to put a horse. Don’t be ridiculous. I don’t even want a horse.”
And, with that, I lost whatever final thread had been holding my composure together.
I slammed my hand on the counter. “Oh! You don’t want a horse?” I asked in a high-pitched screech. “Well, why didn’t you say something? Here I thought you needed a horse to round out your fucking celebrity status. You know the one? The one where you’re the baby daddy of Polly’s unplanned pregnancy? The one where you’ve vowed on every fucking news outlet to support her financially even though she’s a megastar in her own right and has millions of dollars? So, just to be clear, you’re happy to support a baby who doesn’t need shit from you but not an innocent horse who never fucking asked for this and whose worst crime was taking your scammer ass across town for shits and giggles?”