Center Stage (Bright Lights Billionaire #2) Read online

"You're so vulgar." She smiled and knelt down to pick up another shell.

  "You're not at all curious if we would make a good couple in the bedroom?" I pressed my hand to the front of my slacks again, wishing I had control of my body around her.

  "Of course I am." She glanced back at me, looking more like the woman that took care of me on the plane and less like the angry bitch that slapped me harder than was necessary at the beginning of the week. She had as many sides to her personality as I did. It was almost concerning.

  "Then let me take you back to my room and make you writhe in pleasure. It's a release we could both use." I licked at my lips and tried to still my racing heart. The idea of getting her naked and memorizing every sweet curve of her body had my head spinning. As a man who could have any woman I wanted in the world, I wanted the one before me, and of course she was holding out.

  "I have a fuck-buddy, Ethan. It's hard enough not to fall in love with him. I'm not playing the balancing game with you too." She stood up and walked down the beach away from me.

  "Okay, fine. I think the day will come when we give in to each other, but until then, let's at least build up a tight friendship." I jogged to catch up with her.

  "I'd like that. Just remember that it's just a friendship." She rolled her shoulders before lifting her hands to the sky. "Nothing more."

  "A good working relationship too, right?" I poked her side, causing her to yelp and drop her hands. "We gotta pretend to be hot for each other during the scenes too."

  "I'm aware of that. I can fake just about anything." She gave me a cute smile that had me thinking along the same lines as she'd spoken moments before. How easy it would be to seduce her and let lust bleed into love. It was a fucking scary thought, and yet one that seemed to linger as we continued down the beach.

  "Are you really still thinking about graduating from UCLA?" I slipped my hands in my pockets and kicked at a patch of seaweed.

  "That was the worst transition I have ever seen." She laughed and pushed me from the side with her shoulder.

  I laughed. "Yes, that was horrible. My train of thought went from licking every inch of you to what you planned to do when we get back. Then I realized that you were still in school. You mentioned mid-terms, and I thought, damn... I couldn't manage all that. I wondered how you were doing with it, and if you really planned on finishing."

  She stopped and knelt again as laughter rose up around her. "You're incorrigible."

  "What?" I knelt beside her and pushed, knocking her over.

  "You ass." She reached out and pulled me down with her.

  I moved onto my side and reached out, running my fingers along her arm as she turned on her side to face me.

  "What was incorrigible about asking you if you were graduating?"

  "Not that part." She sat up and pulled her knees to her chest, leaving plenty of leg for me to stare at. I had to remember to send a thank you note to her momma for teaching her to wear shorty-shorts. The bottom curve of her ass peeked out as she shifted and looked out at the water.

  "What part?" I pressed my teeth into my bottom lip and forced myself to look back up at her face.

  "About licking every inch of me." She was a little breathless. I loved it.

  I reached out and ran the back of my fingers down the back of her thigh, curving along her exposed flesh.

  She stiffened beside me. "Ethan."

  "I do want to lick every inch of you." I licked my lips and moved up to sit beside her. "I wanna know how you taste. It's driving me nuts."

  "You're such a whore." She laughed.

  I wrapped an arm around her shoulder and pressed my lips to the side of her head. "It's lonely being a whore by yourself. Be one with me?"

  Her laughter made the moment. Something told me that my desire for sex was just a safe way to ask for more. I'd never given myself to anyone in a relationship outside of Deza and Liam. Feeling her worm her way deep inside of me was frightening and thrilling all at the same time.

  Chapter 18

  Riley

  We'd parted ways after a few more minutes together, which was for the better. I was close to agreeing to just about anything he wanted. The goal was to build my career and give Mr. Ethan Lewis a good dose of reality, but it seemed like he was pulling me into fantasy instead.

  The text I got shortly after getting back to my room and flopping down on the bed was a request for me to have dinner with him. I laughed at the thought of him trying to get through dinner without hitting on me, talking about his greatness or moving the conversation toward his cock in some manner or form. The guy’s modesty hadn't seen the light of day - ever.

  I shot him a note back that I'd be in the kitchen at six and we could grab something to eat. After laying down the rules about the evening, I curled up in the bed and let my mind go wild. I'd not been daydreaming about what the night would have looked like if we were lovers in an old-fashioned movie for more than ten minutes when Deza walked in.

  "You awake?" she whispered.

  I rolled over and sat up. "Yeah. Just thinking."

  "Everything all right?" She dropped down on the edge of her bed and ran her hands over her hair.

  "Yeah. They're good. I'm excited about filming the boat scene next week. I love being out on the water." I propped myself up on my elbow and studied her. "You okay? You look like something is wrong."

  "I'll be all right." She lay back and let out a long sigh. "I just wish I could figure out how to get Darren to trust me again. It's been ten damn years. It was a mistake to sleep with Zane. I know that now. Hell, I knew that then."

  "Have you talked to him about it?"

  "A million times." She turned over and crawled up into her bed. "He won't listen to me. He thinks that once trust is broken, that's it. There is no getting it back."

  "Do you believe that?" I pulled the covers around me and snuggled under them, wishing I had some advice to share. I was nothing but a kid with a dream and very little positive life experience to back it up. There were days when I was surprised that I wasn't beside my mother, living the hard life in the midst of drugs and whatever else she'd gotten herself into.

  "I don't know to be honest. I'd like to think I'm the kind of person that would give another person a chance if they fucked up, but I don't know if I would. Trust is such a delicate thing, you know? One lie can break it all apart."

  I nodded, but kept silent. My lie about Jace was weighing heavy on me. I'd come clean with Ethan at the beach an hour before, but it still felt like a shitty move on my part. Compounding that was the lie about testing him in his kitchen during our first mentor meeting. He shouldn't trust me at all, and yet I knew that he did. He planned on the two of us protecting each other for a long time to come.

  "Maybe I should just let it go." Deza's voice softened, lost steam.

  "No." I sat up and brushed my hands over my hair. "No. You don't let it go. If you love him, you fight for it. He's worth fighting for, right?"

  "Absolutely." She pressed her palms to her face. "You're right. I haven't been fighting. I've been tiptoeing around the edges of our fucked up relationship. I need to dive in deep and risk it all. Maybe then he'll see me for who I really am. I'm a good person. I was young and dumb."

  "He'll see it. He's old and dumb now." I smiled as she chuckled. "Go all in. The worst thing that can happen is that you're rejected and then you get over it. You heal and finally move on."

  "Have you always been an old soul?" She sat up and pulled her phone from her pocket. "I'm going to go call him while I have the nerve to do it."

  "Good. I've got my fingers crossed." I moved to the edge of the bed and pressed my hands against my knees. "Deza."

  She stood and turned to face me. "What?"

  "I know you don't want to hear this, but I'm honestly considering Ethan's proposal for us to take care of each other."

  "I think that's awesome. You guys are going to have to bind together. These films get harder and harder. Taking advice from the other and working t
o make sure-" She paused and tilted her head a little. "Wait a minute. Like protect each other or like... take care of each other."

  "Both." I rolled my shoulders in and held my breath, waiting for the ass chewing.

  "I see. Well, you're a woman. You know the consequences of giving yourself over to someone only to have the possibility of them rejecting you the next time. Ethan is a fickle creature. Just make sure if you decide to be stupid, and let's get this straight, I think you guys are being quite stupid, that you keep your heart out of the mix. He's an ass in the bedroom because of his issues."

  "His issues?" I stood up as my stomach sickened. Why had I brought up my thoughts to sleep with Ethan with his agent? She and I were growing closer, but there was still a defined line between us. She wasn't my agent yet, even though she was taking care of me much better than Darren ever had.

  "His size." She put her hands on her hips. "Don't tell me you haven't noticed."

  "Why in the world would that be an issue? Men would pay millions of dollars to have what he has." Confusion raced through me. Was there more to the story that I wasn't getting access too?

  "Yeah but, not that big." She let out a soft sigh. "Everyone sees what they want to see, Riley. I don't want Ethan to think I was talking about his personal life behind his back. He's like family to me. I'm just saying that he's way too big for most women, and he's incredibly frustrated because of it. It's not a joke or a positive scenario for him. He takes a huge risk every time he takes off his clothes. I honestly couldn't do that to myself if it were me."

  "Wow." I sat back down on the edge of the bed. "It's that big of a deal."

  "Absolutely. He's incredibly sensitive about it." She shrugged. "Do what you think is best, but you're going to have to understand that if you guys try each other on for size, the chances of that turning out as anything positive are slim to none."

  I sat in silence, but nodded as she turned and walked out of the room. I couldn't remember having had a more awkward conversation in my whole life, and I'd been involved in a few doozies during my teenage years.

  The conversation with Ethan over the size of his cock raced through my mind. He'd been so different after I teased him about it. I'd assumed he was just having another one of his emotional imbalances that he seemed prone to. That wasn't it at all.

  Pulling out my phone, I pulled up his bio again and lay back on the bed. I had an hour before I needed to start getting ready for dinner and wanted to know more about him. If we were going to be friends or lovers or both, I needed to better understand who he was as a person. Who the man behind the mask was, and if I cared about him, or just one of the many faces he wore.

  *

  A host of emotions assaulted me as I finished putting on a little bit of make-up for our dinner. The white dress I'd chosen was flirty and fun, a little too sexy maybe, but I didn't care. After reading about Ethan's parents pimping him out as a kid and moving across the world on the money he'd made without worrying much about him and Liam after that, I was heartbroken for him.

  He'd been raised by his grandmother on his mother's side, and his bio had so many great things to say about the woman. She'd died when he was sixteen, but by then, he was with Deza, living the life he thought would help him find wholeness. I couldn't force myself to read any more as my heart was already filled to the brim with his honesty in the book, his openness.

  "I wanna know that guy so badly." I brushed my thumb under my bottom lip and cleaned up my lipstick a little.

  A knock at the door surprised me. I checked my hair one more time and opened the door to find Ethan standing there with a single yellow lily in his hand. His white polo looked good against his tanned skin. The dark blue shots he wore gave him a casual and yet dressy appeal all at the same time.

  "You ready?" He pressed his hand to the door as his eyes moved down the front of my dress. "Damn, you're so far beyond fine."

  "Thank you?" I laughed and snagged the flower from him. "Is this for me?"

  "Nope. It was for Deza. She here?" He winked and moved back to let me out. "You in the mood for sushi? I found a place about half a mile down the beach. There might be adoring fans there, but I'll make sure to beat them off of you all right?"

  I laughed again, finding a warmth beside him that I was almost frightened to find. We didn't know anything about each other and yet there was a comfort that permeated our relationship if I allowed it. It was the angst of lust that blurred the lines.

  "I love sushi. And in all honesty, if we get bombarded by a group of raging mad women with lust in their eyes and saliva dripping from their jowls, then I'll protect you." I moved closer to him as we walked down the hall toward the stairs.

  "Wow. That was... dramatic." He chuckled and opened the door to the back exit of the house. "Did the ones the other day have a drooling problem?"

  "Most women do around you, silly. You're Ethan Lewis... America's heartthrob."

  He gave me a look that said he wasn't at all happy with the title. "Can I just be Ethan tonight? Mr. Lewis went to bed early with a headache and a hangover."

  "Too much liquor and sex?" I teased him as we stepped out onto the sand.

  "Yep. He's a bastard, that guy... I tell you what. I'm surprised he has a friend in the world."

  "Well, he has me." I lifted the flower to my nose and let the moment settle on me. My words were true. He did have me.

  Chapter 19

  Ethan

  She looked like an angel in her dress and dainty brown sandals. It was going to be a long night of keeping myself in check. The fact that she was being sweet was gnawing at the part of me that wanted romance and love over sweaty hot shower sex. That guy was still there too, but he was getting sucker punched by the toga-wearing cupid inside my chest.

  "So tell me a little more about your school program. Are you graduating with drama as your major, or did you go a different route?" I wanted to take her hand, but it would be too intimate. I'd ruin the evening later for sure with a dumb-ass move. I'd hold off as long as I could until then.

  She glanced over at me, stealing my breath. "I'm a drama major. I thought I might go into international business, but I just couldn't force myself to give up on my dreams of acting one day." She shrugged. "I figured I would graduate in May with my degree and change agents. If I could score the right one, I might have the chance to get in front of the right people and yadda yadda. You know the drill, I'm sure."

  "Sure do." I slipped my hands into my pockets as we approached the restaurant. "Are you guys doing a spring production, or is that just something the movies make up about drama departments in college?"

  I was ignorant to most things outside of the acting business only because I'd been suffocated by it for all of my adult life, and most of my childhood. I held the door and followed behind her, wishing we were a couple so I could touch her as freely as I wanted to. I was a guy without patience for easing into anything. It was a head-first dive off the tallest diving board available for me, regardless of what lay below.

  She waited to answer until we were seated across from each other at an intimate table in the back.

  "We are doing a play in a few weeks. I'm the lead for it this time, which is exciting, and yet so overshadowed by what you guys are giving me the opportunity to do." Her smile was contagious. The sarcastic, quick-witted woman that had my cock acting like a fit-throwing child for attention was tucked away somewhere.

  Funny enough, it didn't seem to matter which side of her I got to experience, my body demanded the naked side. I smirked at the thought, but covered it up by glancing at the waitress and ordering a bottle of wine.

  "Wait. Are you... Oh my God. You're Ethan Lewis."

  "Nope," Riley spoke up. "He just looks like him. We get that all the time, don't we, baby?"

  My cock twitched at her words. I'd have rolled my eyes at myself if I could have gotten away with it.

  "That's right, sweetheart. You're just a lucky girl to have found a body double for that big, sexy hunk."
I wagged my eyebrows.

  The server laughed, and Riley rolled her eyes dramatically enough for the both of us. I laughed as the server walked off and Riley gave me a look.

  There was my girl under the sweet smile and the light covering of make-up.

  "Really? You're so full of shit." Her grimace turned into a smile as she laughed and sat back. "Are you going to come see my spring production?"

  "Do you want me to?" I pulled my napkin in my lap and let my eyes move down to the sweet swell of her breasts just above the top of her strapless dress. I wanted to brush my lips by her exposed skin and drown in the sound of her begging for more.

  "Yeah. That would be pretty cool." She wagged her eyebrows. "I mean... can you imagine it? Me? Little old, nobody of a person, me having the biggest actor of our time come sit in the auditorium at UCLA to support me?"

  "You're not a nobody." My smile faded. "Don't say that again. I don't like it."

  Her smiled faded too. "Okay. I'm just saying."

  "Well, don't. I'm no different than you. You're somebody’s something special, I'm sure. Hell, I'm fighting like a madman to make sure you don't end up mine." I tried to play my words off as being cheeky, but the realization that rushed across her pretty face told me that I was caught.

  "Anyways," she whispered and glanced down at her lap. "It's going to be a fun play. The only hard part is having to kiss the male lead. He's not at all someone I would look at twice."

  "So shallow." I winked at her and enjoyed the power I had to make her smile again.

  "You're telling me that you've never struggled having to kiss someone in a movie that you weren't turned on by?" She moved her forearms up to rest on the table. Her position pressed her breasts together and lifted them even more.

  My body throbbed with need as I swallowed hard. If we ever ended up naked, I'd have to see if she’d let me press myself between her pretty tits and-

  "Are you still with me?" She lifted her eyebrow and smirked.

  I swallowed hard and reached for my water as embarrassment rolled over me. I would normally have just told her what I was thinking, but it seemed almost too crass to speak out loud. What the fuck was wrong with me?