Claiming Beauty (Taking Beauty Trilogy 2)

I always hated when he did that.

It made me feel like I couldn’t keep any secrets from him… because he always saw right through me, straight down into my core.

“Yes, yes, sorry to bother you on your, uh, date,” Jeremy smiled, although nothing in his eyes was grinning. “I just wanted to swing by and tell you that I’m glad you’ve moved on. You deserve to be happy. Why, after that nasty business before, I was afraid you’d never date again… but, that’s not my place.”

He turned to Dalton with a smug smile and shrugged. “Anyway, enjoy your meal. I’ll see you around, Clara.”

“No, you won’t,” I gritted my teeth.

“I think I will,” he promised quietly before turning on his heel and sauntering back to his table. I glanced over my shoulder at him, noticing that he never looked back.

I sensed Dalton stiffen up behind me.

“Okay… who the fuck was that?”

With an exasperated sigh, I turned back to him. “That’s my, uh, ex-boyfriend,” I replied. “We dated for just under two years. He’s not exactly a high point in my life.”

“How long ago did you two break up?”

“I’m not talking about this right now,” I told him, trying to keep the edge out of my voice.

Dalton silenced himself, staring at me with a mixture of surprise and irritation. I could already sense the night slipping away from me, and it was all thanks to that absolute asshole.

Why the fuck did he have to be here?

“You’ve lost your appetite,” Dalton observed, watching how I wasn’t touching my food. “It’s because of him, isn’t it?”

“I said I’m not talking about it,” I replied angrily. “But yeah. I’m not hungry anymore. Can we just go? I don’t want to be here.”

Dalton looked hurt, and I realized that it wasn’t Jeremy who was fucking up the night… it was me.

“Wait, no, I didn’t mean–”

Dalton was already getting the attention of our server, who had chosen that moment to pass by the table. “The check, if you’d please.”

“Oh, of course,” she replied, glancing at our plates. “Was everything alright? Do you two need boxes?”

“Everything’s fine, we’ve just had a change of plans. And yes, boxes would be grand.”

“Very well then,” the waitress nodded, subtly checking him out again before scampering off towards the nearest terminal.

“We can stay here,” I tried to backtrack. “I just… it was a knee-jerk reaction. Tonight doesn’t have to end like this. I’m sorry that I overreacted, it’s just that that guy–”

“Don’t worry about it,” he replied dispassionately. “Anyway, the night’s not over. So what if dinner didn’t work out? We’ve still got the rest of the evening.”

“What’s… the rest of the evening?”

Dalton chuckled. “You’ll see.”

He paid the waitress as I boxed up our food. After we were done, he pulled me close and whispered into my ear: “Follow me.”

I did as I was told as he led me outside. Despite my best intentions, as we crossed towards the door, I couldn’t help but glance towards the bastard who’d thrown a kink into my entire evening.

Jeremy was watching me over a glass of wine, sipping quietly with a slight, mischievous smile on his face. There were a couple of other people with him – friends of his, who were all following me with their snarky, insidious gazes.

I swallowed the lump in my throat and tried my hardest to ignore the looming pit in my stomach.

“Alright, we’re not going too far from here” Dalton indicated once we’d stepped outside. “Like I said, just follow me. If a light cycle separates us, I’ll just pull over. Fair enough?”

“Fair enough,” I confirmed.

“Good,” he smirked. “Right this way…”

I climbed into my faithful old car as he mounted his motorcycle. Twisting the key in the ignition… nothing happened.

No. Not now. Don’t you dare do this now.

I gave it a few more twists. Silently, I prayed to whatever entities were listening, and vehemently cursed the car with each breath.

“Is everything alright?”

I looked up, and saw that Dalton was wandering back over. No, don’t embarrass me NOW, I rapidly thought to myself.

“Yeah, everything’s good! Car’s just giving me a little bit of trouble. I shouldn’t be any more than a few more seconds…”

He didn’t look convinced as he paused outside my door. Steeling myself, I put my energies into one final twist of the keys. Come on, you piece of shit car! Don’t fail me now! Surprisingly, it kicked into gear – just in time for me to spot Jeremy stepping outside to smoke a cigarette, his eyes somehow finding me with a glance.

Goddammit all to hell, I thought to myself.

“You’re good?” Dalton asked.

“I am. Let’s get out of here.”

He shook his head with amusement and wandered back over to his motorcycle. A few moments later, he was revving the engine, I pulled out of park, and we were on the road.

Of course, Jeremy appeared to watch me drive off, following Dalton’s bike.

Dalton’s mystery locale took us down the major roads, but I couldn’t particularly tell where we were going. For a moment, I thought he was driving us towards the nearby mall – but he made a crucial last turn before the road pointed us straight to the parking lot. Instead, it wrapped through a neighborhood nearby, redirecting us towards a nearby, major shopping avenue.

I was starting to get amused with this.

After all, I had no idea what he had in mind.

A few moments later, he made a turn down a small road. I followed him, realizing that it extended back behind all the stores and the local cinema, taking us towards the new, lavish hotel that had been built back there.

Oh, this is going to be interesting, I smirked.

We parked in the massive parking garage, and he led me towards the elevator. We barely spoke a word to each other until the lift was moving downward towards the lobby.

“…A hotel,” I observed.

“What, is that a problem?” He raised an eyebrow. “Not a fan of hotels?”

“It’s a bit… forced, isn’t it?”

“Just wait,” Dalton chuckled. “I don’t think you’ll have a problem with the arrangements I have in mind, even if they were a bit last minute…”

I bit my tongue, sincerely interested to see where he was going with all of this.

We stepped off at the lobby, wandering over the front service desk. A young, cheery clerk with fluffy ginger hair and cute makeup greeted us.

“Checking in?”

“Yes. The reservation’s under Dalton Carlyle,” he casually remarked to her, as if there was some special weight to this that I just didn’t understand.

The front desk clerk ran the name. After a second, her eyes bugged out. “Ah, yes. You were our last-second reservation, weren’t you? My boss mentioned something about this… could you possibly wait a moment? I want to check on this before I hand the keys over.”

“Certainly,” he replied, clearly unperturbed by her surprise. Personally, I wasn’t sure I knew what was going on, and I kept drifting my attention from one of them to the other.

“Excellent. If I could have you step aside, I just need to make a quick call…”

We did as we were asked, in case other guests were to come up behind us and require immediate attention. Meanwhile, the clerk lifted a telephone receiver and dialed in three buttons, waiting for the line to pick up.

“Yes, I’m calling about the Carlyle reservation from today… yes, they’re here now… I see… are you sure?... No, I understand, I just wanted to… mhmm… yes… okay. Thanks. I’ll let them know.”

She disconnected the call and waved us back over. “Right. Sorry about that, I just wanted to check on the preparations first. I’m afraid that they were running a little behind schedule, but I’ve been given the all clear to

let you through. Let me assign you your keys…”

The clerk took a moment to run our door keys through the system, and quickly assembled a folder of reading material, hotel rules, and assorted information for us.

“Now then, you’ll be in Room 4B. Let’s see… I’ve got the wifi password right here, written up here at the top…” She quickly pointed out the information with a fingertip, “and beneath that is the code you type in to request room service. If you have an emergency, please type in Pound Sign, One into the phone, and wait three to four seconds. That should be on a sticker on your phone but, you know, just in case…”

We quickly signed the liability and reservation forms she presented to us, and the clerk smiled chirpily at us.