I might never want to leave.
And then I see something to my left, hanging on a hook over a door. It’s a dress: a long, sexy black dress. I stand and nearly trip over myself, I’m so excited as I cross the room to read the note pinned to the hanger: For you.
I press the note to my lips, grinning.
I am Alice, and this is wonderland.
*
The girl in the full-length bathroom mirror is a stranger. Watching her I let out a deep breath. The fabric of the dress, so smooth against my skin, clings to the curves of my body. I run my fingers along my hips, feeling the delicate black silk.
I feel beautiful.
It’s already nine-fifteen when I walk out to the balcony overlooking New York. Car horns bellow up from below and there is a steady thrumming, like the city has a pulse, a heartbeat that never stops.
When the chill creeps into my bones, I move back inside, walking around the suite, eventually collapsing back onto the bed. Where is he? Hank said he should be here by now. By ten o’clock I feel my eyelids grow heavy but I don’t remember drifting into sleep until there is the warmth of someone beside me.
His breath is hot against my neck, and it rouses me from a half dream. Then a hand flattens over my hip bone, sliding down to my thigh. My eyes flutter open.
“I’m sorry I’m late,” he whispers beside my ear. “We ran long at the studio.” I can feel his lips lingering against the back of my neck. “Are you hungry?”
I nod and turn to face him.
“We missed our reservation,” he adds, watching me now, his eyes burning into mine. I want to kiss him, touch him, fold myself up in his arms. So I do. I plant my lips on his and he kisses me back, our mouths intertwined and my heartbeat rising swiftly. He touches my hair and gently tugs it back to look in my eyes. “Let’s eat first,” he says. And the first implies there will be an after, and my heart thuds more rapidly at the idea of his hands on me again. “There’s an all-night pizza place only a block away.”
“Sounds perfect,” I say.
He takes my hands and lifts me from the bed, giving me a lingering once-over. “You, in that dress, are almost too much.”
I inch up on my toes to kiss him. “You bought it,” I say. “So you only have yourself to blame.”
Inside the elevator, Tate slides his hand around my waist as we descend down the floors. I’m about to speak, to ask if he always stays in this hotel when he comes to New York, when his grip suddenly tightens and he presses me into the corner of the elevator. He kisses me again, his tongue soft against my lips, teasing the inside of my mouth, and I sink into his arms. When his kiss moves down to my throat, I say, “Maybe we should skip dinner.”
He shakes his head. “You need to eat.” And then the elevator doors slide open onto the lobby.
Outside, the city feels just as awake and alive as I imagine it is during the day. Crowds of people move up the sidewalks and I love the anonymity, the feeling of being lost and free in a city where no one seems to recognize Tate. Where we are just two people passing through the drizzling rain.
I am completely overdressed for the modest pizza shop, but no one bats an eye. We order two slices and sit at a small red-and-white-checkered table by the front window.
Tate runs his hand over my leg beneath the table. “You wore the bracelet,” he comments, nodding down to where his Valentine’s Day gift glimmers on my wrist.
“I love it, I just don’t get a chance to wear it that often,” I say. “If my grandma saw it...” But my voice trails off. I don’t want to think about her right now, about the lies I told to be here.
“I’m glad you wore it tonight,” he says, smoothing over my thoughts. “It looks incredible on you. You look incredible.”
I pull in my lower lip, hiding a smile, then take another bite of sundried-tomato pizza. We spend the rest of dinner catching up on each other’s week in between doughy, greasy, heavenly bites of the best pizza I’ve ever tasted. I tell him about the man who called the Bloom Room to order two bouquets—one for his wife, the other for his girlfriend. Both cards the same: I love you forever. Tate fills me in on the album’s progress—I don’t understand the more technical terms, but I can tell from his face that it’s going well. And he seems happy.
When we’re finished eating, I feel an urgency sparking between us, threatening to ignite us both. The street is bustling with activity and Tate holds me close as we weave around taxicabs. There are no paparazzi waiting for us, no fans screeching his name. We could be anyone. And I really do feel like someone else, like this is our city and we belong here...together.