Liar Liar Hearts on Fire: Bro Code Book 3 Read online

You could say I don’t miss Hollywood or the music scene.

  I’m also not going to miss these pants. Christ. I can’t even lift my legs without worrying I’ll split the seam, except these seams are double reinforced, which means I’ll break my cock before the denim gives.

  I round the corner at the top of the steps. Beversdorf does a double-take when he sees me, mutters a fuck that I can clearly read on his lips, and gestures to a bodyguard.

  But it’s not a bodyguard who stumbles into me.

  No, that’s a tall, curvy woman with…a strawberry daiquiri in her hair? “Whoa. You okay?”

  She grips my arm as I reach out to steady her, and suddenly the jeans are the least of my concerns.

  Two bright emeralds blink rapidly at me as the slushy pink drink drips down onto her shoulders. Her lush lips part, my heart starts beating for the first time in forever, and my throat is suddenly so parched I briefly wonder if I spent the last six years singing solo, nonstop, in a desert.

  Her makeup is too light for her to belong here, and her black dress is too business formal for a night on the town. She looks just as out of place as I feel.

  “You okay?” I ask again like a total dumbass, sounding more like a prepubescent boy wheezing over his first cigarette than a mid-thirties single father of two on the verge of offering to buy a baseball team.

  Baseball team.

  I shoot a glance to my right, forget what I’m looking for, and then find my gaze subconsciously drifting back to the woman who’s wiping her hands on the back of her skirt. She follows my gaze, and a humorless laugh slips from her lips. “Oh, does he owe you money too? Good luck with that.”

  He. Money. Luck.

  Beversdorf.

  Right.

  I’m supposed to be tracking down Beversdorf.

  Who’s gone.

  Dammit.

  I grab a napkin from a nearby table, but a drink napkin isn’t going to cut it on this mess dripping from the woman’s hair. “Can I…help?”

  She blinks once, glances past me, and grimaces. “Can you teleport me to a bathroom?”

  There’s a woman in a red dress with fire in her eyes headed our way, wobbling unevenly on spike heels around the tables and chairs in her way.

  Uh-oh.

  I’ve been here before. At best, it’s a misunderstanding. At worst, it’s hair flying and drinks being flung to the dancers on the floor below.

  “Foe?” I take my new friend’s elbow, and a zing! shoots through my palm that makes me want to both stretch my fingers and hold on tighter. I’m touching linen, not skin, but I’m still getting an electric shock.

  She shoots me a curious look, but also leans into me as I do my best to get us both to the side stairs that I’m pretty sure Beversdorf just disappeared down.

  Her lips tip up while she leads me quicker. “On a scale of fairy godmother to screeching dragon, we probably need earplugs and a bucket of water.”

  “You touch her egg or something?”

  “I wouldn’t touch her egg unless it was with a cattle prod, but she doesn’t believe me.”

  I choke on a laugh I didn’t know I had in me, and my knees get a tingle that I haven’t felt in years.

  Pretty sure it’s not just the tight jeans talking either.

  One of the bodyguards eyes us, then reluctantly moves to let us pass. “Ma’am. Mr. Wilson.”

  “You might get Mr. Beversdorf’s friend a glass of water,” she tells him. “She’ll appreciate it tomorrow.”

  “You know Al Beversdorf and his crew?” I ask while I follow her down the stairs.

  “Unfortunately,” she tosses over her shoulder.

  Intriguing.

  Not as intriguing as the way she keeps holding her head steady, shoulders back, like she’s not wearing a strawberry daiquiri while she swings her hips down the stairs in a way I couldn’t emulate in these jeans even if I was the hip-swinging type, but now this woman has piqued my curiosity.

  Have fun, idiot, Levi’s voice whispers.

  Or maybe that’s my own voice. “You come here often?”

  Shit. Shit. Could I be more lame?

  But she smiles up at me, and even with the frozen drink sliding onto her shoulders and through her curly hair, she’s gorgeous. And not in the least offended. “Only when I feel like wearing my drink. You?”

  “Can I buy you another one? For your mouth this time?”

  What. The fuck. Is wrong with me?

  Other than the fact that I’m now staring at her mouth. That gorgeous smile. The smoky laugh that trickles through all the other noise in the club.

  It’s called attraction, old man. Do something about it.

  “Can we get this one off me first?” she asks.

  “Yes. Of course. I just—sorry. Been a while. I—I’m going to stop talking now.”

  We reach the bottom of the stairs, and a bouncer nods to us. “Evening, Mr. Wilson.”

  Mr. Wilson.

  It’s my name, even if he also thinks I’m my brother.

  And what would Levi do if he were me right now?

  I lean into the redhead to be heard over the music. “Want me to find the bathroom? To clean up? Dry off where you’re wet? Happens to all of us. I—”

  I need to shut up. Again.

  That is not what Levi would say.

  But he would smile and wink. So I try that.

  Yeah.

  I can be Levi for a few minutes.

  Smooth. Suave. Charming. Flirtatious.

  She ducks her head and laughs. Looks up at me. Laughs again. And then she holds out a hand as we duck beneath the stairs. “I’m Lila. What’s your name?”

  My name.

  My name.

  Fuck.

  My mouth opens, and the words just come out. “Levi. Levi Wilson.”

  2

  Lila Valentine, aka a woman who’s all wet and sticky and weirdly so very fine with that

  Oh.

  My.

  God.

  Levi Wilson.

  Cute was the first word that came to mind when I ran into him upstairs. Funny quickly followed. Charmingly gallant and adorkably real. And semi-familiar in an I think I’ve seen your face before kind of way, which isn’t unusual, since my life lends itself to occasionally meeting with high-powered executives and celebrities.

  Not that they’re my favorite social companions. In my off-hours, I prefer hanging out with librarians, book club friends, and hockey players.

  Long story.

  And my point is, I pegged him as more of the librarian-out-of-water type than the pop-music-god type.

  But I peer closer, realize how many people have called him Mr. Wilson in the last two minutes, and holy. Shit.

  Levi Wilson is flirting with me. This is insane. It’s nuts. It’s crazytown.

  My friend Parker is going to shit seven thousand bricks when I tell her. She loves him. In the way normal people love celebrities, I mean. Not in a stalker kind of way.

  I don’t think, anyway. Pretty sure she’d decline to have his babies.

  I can’t stop shaking Levi’s hand. And he’s not letting go either. He’s just watching me with this surprised expression on his face like maybe he’s stoned, or maybe like my running mascara is dripping down and making pornographic designs on my face, or maybe like he’s never seen anything quite as beautiful as me.

  With a strawberry daiquiri melting on my head and making my hair a total disaster.

  I need to lay off the romance novels.

  Or possibly I need to never leave home again and stick with only romance novels.

  But Levi Wilson is flirting with me. While he’s wearing that hat that makes him look a little dorky, but in the good way. And the sunglasses that say I know it’s already dark in this club, but I need to protect you from my bedroom eyes so that you don’t die of over-orgasming just from looking at my beautiful face.

  Which isn’t nearly as gag-worthy as it should be, because I honestly do think he could smolder me into a climax.

  I don’t care if he is stoned. Or if possibly I am from a contact high, though I didn’t smell any weed in here, so maybe he just has super powerful pheromones?

  Or maybe it’s been too long since I’ve let myself enjoy the company of a man outside the pages of a book, and I should quit questioning this and enjoy the high of having all of the attention of a hot guy in a club who could’ve literally stepped out of the pages of a romance novel.

  Considering what I actually came here for was a total bust, I can absolutely get behind hanging out with Levi Wilson.

  He’s not just a hot pop star. He also spends time in children’s hospitals and takes pictures with puppies at shelters to help get them adopted.

  I know because Parker told me so.

  “You know where the bathrooms are?” I ask him, and I didn’t realize I could yell in a breathy seductive voice, but look at that.

  I’m getting it done.

  He watches my lips while I’m talking, and it takes a second or two after I’m done before his head snaps up. “Yes. Yes, they’re…” He trails off as he looks around, and then his face lights up again. I can’t tell what color his eyes are behind those sunglasses, but I want to know, because when he glances back down at me, and our eyes meet, I swear I feel that lightning bolt in my soul that I’ve only ever read about in books.

  Or possibly that’s residual adrenaline from Uncle Al’s girlfriend thinking I was trying to make a move on her man and attempting to freeze my brain with her drink, when all I really wanted was the one thing he’d promised he’d bring here tonight.

  And didn’t.

  Naturally.

  “This way.” Levi tugs on my elbow again, and I realize he’s happy that he found the bathroom. That’s so…so…

 
Dammit.

  Even if I’m not stoned, he probably is. For real. Because who gets that excited about a bathroom?

  But he’s not only a distraction from my woes, he’s also just so damn cute. Even in the white pants. I didn’t know I liked white pants on men, but these are molding to everything, and is there anywhere that Levi Wilson isn’t blessed?

  Except maybe in his better judgment?

  But really, who needs better judgment when you’re talking about a pop star? And any man who can see past the fact that I look like a redheaded squirrel who fell into a vat of frozen, neon-pink drink and smile at me like making jokes about dragon eggs is the highlight of his day probably still has a hold on his better judgment.

  I drop a smidge behind him while we make our way to the bathrooms, not the least bit ashamed of watching how his ass is hugged so well in those jeans that I could easily be convinced to become more of a butt woman than a pecs and shoulders woman.

  I wonder if his pecs and shoulders are as nice as his ass?

  “Ladies’ room?” he asks a woman.

  She drops her panties, flings her dress off, and offers herself as a sacrifice to him.

  Okay, not really, but her eyes go round, and she licks her lips and purrs. “This is the line, but you go ahead. Actually, do you want to just wait for me in there?”

  Levi studies her briefly, looks back at me, and I swear the city sighs happily along with me as that dreamy smile takes over his face once more. “Thank you.”

  “I have to pee really bad, but I can totally hold it for you, Levi,” she replies, even though he was looking at me when he spoke.

  I shiver.

  He frowns. “Cold?”

  “N-no,” I reply as my teeth start chattering.

  Am I cold? Or is this adrenaline? I’m no virgin, nor am I prudish. I am a workaholic, so my hook-ups don’t happen often, but when they do, they’re exactly how I like them—brief and satisfying.

  Which is exactly how this will play out, if the tidbits I’ve picked up from Parker are any indication.

  Perfect.

  Hopefully.

  His eyes study my face—it’s nice that his sunglasses aren’t the kind that shield his eyes from view, but rather the kind that make it obvious he’s making a fashion statement, and no, I don’t usually go for the guy who likes to make fashion statements, but there’s something so weirdly relatable hiding under that Levi Wilson bling, and I. Am. Enamored.

  Maybe I’m dreaming? Or am I high? Was there something in the air up at Uncle Al’s table?

  Levi’s starting to smile again, and I feel about thirteen, discovering my first romance novel all over again, which isn’t normal for a hook-up, but I ignore the warning buzz and let him pull me through the waiting line of people, past B-list celebrities and models and social influencers who know that he’s first in the pecking order here, to rap his knuckles on the bathroom door.

  And I swear he mutters something about no one carrying a diaper bag when they need a change of clothes, but I’m probably making that up.

  The bathroom door opens, and a half-drunk Instagram star peers up at him. “Selfie?” she squeals, falling into him.

  He obliges with a wink and a smile, holding her camera for her while she shoves me out of the way, nearly falling off her heels in the process. As soon as he hands her back her phone, he grabs my arm again—hello, delicious fingers heating me through my suit jacket—and drags me into the bathroom.

  The noise from the club is softer in here, and now we’re alone—just me, Levi, and a toilet. He grabs a handful of cloth napkins and starts wiping my hair and face gently. “I’d like to ground her for throwing her drink on you.”

  I laugh again. “Aw, go easy on her. She’s in love.”

  “With Beversdorf?” His eyes widen in horror, and honestly, could he be any more adorable?

  “The world’s a complicated place, and people can’t help who they love. Or why.” Why in this case being that it gets her a college education, which I can’t really fault her for. If Uncle Al wants to believe she loves him for something else, that’s his business.

  Levi’s hand stills in my hair. “You sound like you know the secret.”

  “Oh, Mr. Wilson. I definitely know the secret to love.”

  “Do you?”

  “I do.”

  He lifts his brows, and oh my god, what am I saying? I drop my head back and laugh, because I am being so absurd. “Nope. Not a chance. You won’t believe me if I tell you, plus you’ll share the secret and rob me of my chance to sell how-to videos on the internet.”

  “If I wouldn’t believe you, why would I tell everyone?”

  “Because it’s outrageous.” It’s not—if more people read romance novels, they, too, would know the secret to love. Which is a lot easier to spell out than it is to put into practice.

  Case in point: I am never falling in love. Even though I know what it would take.

  “Huh.” His eyes are twinkling like he’s amused, and honestly?

  My heart’s getting a little warm and squishy at the idea that I’m amusing him.

  Not normal.

  And I don’t care, because he’s saving what was otherwise a disastrous night.

  “People always talk about the outrageous,” I whisper conspiratorially.

  “And what do they fall for, my dear Lila?”

  His lips part, and oh, he has lovely lips. Not too plump. Not too sharp. They look smooth and soft set in the five-o’clock shadow he has coming in, but not like he moisturizes incessantly.

  More like he’s merely blessed in the lip department as well.

  I very much want to kiss them.

  And it’s not like I’m going to have another opportunity. Ever. In my entire life.

  And would he have come all the way into the bathroom with me if he wasn’t interested in being alone? Why not just point? It’s there. Go clean up. I have better women to do tonight.

  No.

  He asked me for a drink. He’s still here.

  With those lips. And those eyes transfixed on me, dropping to gaze at my mouth while his pupils go dark. And his body angling closer to me while he oh-so-gently wipes my forehead with a napkin, as though I’m a delicate flower that he wants to preserve.

  And so I go for it.

  I push up on my toes, wrap my arms around a hot, irresistible stranger, and smush my sticky face to his.

  He freezes for half a second, but before I can reconsider this plan, his arms go around me, he backs me against the wall across from the toilet, and he slants his mouth against mine for the kiss to end all kisses.

  Levi and Lila... Livi? Lela? Wilentine? Valson? What would our celebrity name be? Does he like chocolate or vanilla cake on his birthday? Does he secretly know calculus? Does he do crossword puzzles? Would he be the kind of man who would read a romance novel out loud for me?

  Or sing it to me?

  Hello, those hands on my ass are making my vagina ask if she could please have some attention too.

  It’s not wrong to be a groupie for one night, is it?

  Not when it feels so right. And not when I felt that spark even before I knew who he was. And not when I read about flings every night, and haven’t had one myself in…well. We don’t need to talk about that.

  Let’s just say if my favorite romance heroines were to come to life and sit on my shoulder as my conscience, they probably would’ve been suggesting I proposition complete strangers on the street weeks and weeks ago.

  Levi presses me harder against him while I part my lips and he groans and dives deeper into the kiss, and I don’t know how those jeans are holding that thick ridge pressing into my belly, or how I’m still standing. He tastes like toothpaste and smells like fresh satin sheets and his stubble is setting the nerve endings around my mouth on fire in the best way, and I’m fairly certain I need to be naked.

  “You’re…so…wow,” he gasps between kisses, and then he licks my jawline, and my nipples tighten so hard that they might’ve just turned inside out.

  “Oh, god, yes, there.” I’m jerking his buttons open and pushing his slick shirt over his shoulders so I can feel the holy grail of tight, bunched biceps and triceps that are making my panties way wetter than my hair, and he’s tugging my dress up and sliding his hands all over my bare legs, up to tease the bottom of my ass at my panty line.

  I wonder if our kids will have red hair, or if he’s missing that recessive gene in his family pool. And if he’ll propose with a guitar and a song, or somewhere special, like right here in this bathroom where we first consummated our love.