Fox buried the fingers of one hand in her hair. “Were you good girls at school?”

“We weren’t teacher’s pets, but neither one of us is rebellious by nature.”

“Yet you ran off with a no-good musician, and you keep talking about some guy called T-Rex with Charlie.”

Molly slapped playfully at his chest. “You’re not meant to listen in!”

A rumble against her as he laughed. “I can’t help it. I’m fascinated by how you and Charlie can chat for two hours without running out of things to say.”

“I could do that with you, too, though you’d probably ask for phone sex.”

“Abso-fucking-lutely.”

Bursting out laughing at the unrepentant statement, she nuzzled a kiss to his throat. “What was the worst thing you did as a student?”

Fox whistled. “That’ll take some thinking. I made it my mission in life to be a problem—until I realized nothing I did would make my mother want me enough to stand up to the prick.” The acceptance in his tone was almost worse than the echo of old pain; Molly couldn’t imagine how badly he must’ve hurt until the wound scarred over.

“Then,” he said, “I became a model student. I think the teachers thought I’d been possessed, especially when I turned out to be freaky good at algebra.”

 “I hope you apologized to the teachers you drove crazy,” she said, taking her cue from him and keeping it light; Fox didn’t have to rip open old wounds, didn’t have to bleed to invite her into himself.

“Naw… but I, uh, sponsor a program for kids like me.”

The unusual hesitancy of his voice had her sitting up, her eyes locked with his. “A program?” It was a soft prompt when he fell silent.

“The ones who don’t have anywhere to go for the holidays,” he elaborated. “The program means they get to travel to another country, spend the time with a host family.”

Her eyes burned. Blinking rapidly to fight it, she said, “That’s wonderful,” her throat thick.

Fox shrugged. “It’s not the same as being with your own family, but I thought maybe the excitement of seeing another country would help blunt things. Anyway,” he continued quickly, “the principal writes me now and then. He says most of the kids stay in constant contact with their host families and choose to go back to the same families year after year, so I figure maybe they’ve chosen new families like I did with Noah, David, and Abe.”

There was so much she didn’t yet know about this gorgeous, talented man. Each piece, each facet, he revealed, it tumbled her deeper and deeper into a love she knew would forever define her. “You’re doing an incredible thing,” she said, and when he looked uncomfortable, cupped his face. “Your girl is allowed to say mushy things like that about you. She’s allowed to think you’re wonderful.”

“As long as you don’t tell anyone.” A scowling warning accompanied by a squeeze of the arm he had around her. “Let’s go for a drive.”

“Now?”

“It’s a beautiful night. I want to show you my town under the stars.”

Late as it was, the paparazzi had scattered and they were able to exit the property in the Lamborghini without stress. The drive proved to be romantic in a sweet, old-fashioned way, which she would’ve never expected of Fox. After a stunning moonlit half hour along the Pacific Coast Highway, the sea crashing to shore on one side, Fox circled back through Sunset Boulevard, stopping to buy her hot chocolate—complete with extra marshmallows—from a canny food-truck driver who’d set himself up within sight of night-shift workers on a road-repair project.

“Mmm, smells divine.” She took a sip of the sweet liquid and settled in to enjoy the sound of Fox’s rough purr of a voice as he gave her a personal tour, the tall palms on either side of the boulevard exotic to her eyes.

“Did you ever play in the clubs around here?” she asked some time later when they hit what he told her was the Sunset Strip, the area dazzling with spotlighted billboards and pulsing with nightlife.

“We had one of our first big breaks at that club over there.” Fox pointed out a tiny doorway with a huge line. “Owner’s nurtured more talent than most in this town.” He kept the car at an easy speed as they continued down the Strip, the gleaming black limo in front of them obviously cruising the sights as well. “You know that TV show you like? The detective one? Check out the convertible next to us.”

Molly’s eyes went wide when she did. A second later, she let out an “Eep!” and sat back while Fox started laughing. Shoving at his arm, she tried to scowl through her beet-red face. “I can’t believe he… that she… at a traffic light! Where anyone could see.” There was no way to miss the sleek blonde head bobbing up and down in the lap of the chiseled actor in the driver’s seat.

“Pity”—Fox hauled her over for a hard, wet kiss before the light changed—“I was hoping it’d give you ideas.”

It did, but Molly wasn’t about to put those ideas into practice anywhere public. On a less populated stretch of road, however, and in a car that wasn’t so low-slung… “Keep driving,” she said, voice husky. “Show me Guitar Row. I read about it online.”

 “That’ll be better in the daytime. We’ll come back another day, have a real look around,” he promised, pointing out a billboard up ahead that featured Schoolboy Choir and their upcoming concert dates. “When we first came to L.A., we used to walk up and down Guitar Row, salivating over all the instruments we wanted but couldn’t afford.”

Fascinated, she put the empty hot-chocolate cup in the holder and turned slightly in her seat. “Did you four meet at boarding school?” It was something she’d assumed but didn’t know for certain.

“Yes, at an honest-to-God choir tryout. The music teacher forced us to go.”

“No!” She grinned. “You were in the choir?”

“Hell, no.” A growl of sound. “I sang flat and off-key on purpose. So did the others—Noah and I were friends already, but that’s when we decided we were soul mates with David and Abe, too.” A pause as he slowed the car to allow another limo, this one virgin white, to merge into traffic, a topless woman popping out of the sunroof to blow kisses their way before she was yanked back down.

“Was she wearing giant bunny ears?” Shaking her head, Molly shifted her attention back to the rock star who intrigued and compelled her far more than anything around them. “What happened next?”

“We made music together,” he said simply, and brought her hand to his mouth for a kiss. “Starting out, we crashed in a cheap two-bedroom apartment, working every day job we could to make the rent and feed ourselves.”

Molly could hear the passion in his voice, knew the dream of music had driven him. “How old were you?”

“Eighteen. Right out of high school.” He placed her hand on his thigh as he shifted gears. “Noah and Abe, they both come from heavy-duty money, but it was an unspoken rule that we did this on our own. Best decision we ever made—money’s never come between us, and the band? It’s ours, no one else’s.”

Molly loved the insight into the band’s friendship, into Fox, and kept urging him to continue. So engrossed was she in his stories of what it had been like to go from flat broke to filling stadiums with screaming fans that it took her a while to realize they’d left the lights of the city behind to prowl up one of the hills. “Where are we going?”

A sinful smile, the dimple lean and gorgeous in his cheek. “Best make-out spot in the city.”

The row of cars at the top, complete with steamed-up windows, proved him right.

Pushing back his seat once he’d parked, Fox said, “Come here, Miss Molly,” and maneuvered her into his lap.

She snuggled close. “This is so romantic.” Los Angeles spread out in front of them like a twinkling carpet, the lights fireflies in the dark.

“Does that get me points?” Fox ran his hand under her unbound hair to touch her nape.

Skin taut at the tone of his voice, she said, “Depends.”