Queen in Lingerie

by Penelope Sky

  Queen in Lingerie

  Lingerie #4

  Penelope Sky

  Hartwick Publishing

  Queen in Lingerie

  Copyright © 2018 by Penelope Sky

  All rights reserved.

  No part of this book may be reproduced in any form or by any electronic or mechanical means, including information storage and retrieval systems, without written permission from the author, except for the use of brief quotations in a book review.

  1

  Conway

  My rage lasted for two days.

  I was pissed about everything. I was pissed she fucked up our relationship by admitting her feelings so publicly. I was angry she accused me of loving her in return. And I was particularly livid about that final comment she made to me—that my parents would be disappointed in me.

  She knew exactly how to push my buttons.

  In my fury, I banished her from my home. I didn’t want her in my bed anymore. I didn’t want her presence in the house at all. I wanted to wipe away any evidence she’d ever been there at all.

  I wanted her gone.

  I wanted her memory forgotten.

  I didn’t love her, and I warned her not to love me. Now the world thought we were happy together, that I was in love with this woman.

  When it was all a lie.

  I hadn’t gone into my bedroom since she left. I stayed in a guest bedroom, using the clothes Dante picked up for me at the store. Everything I wore was new, and it was a much better alternative to walking inside that horrific room.

  I would have asked Dante to clean it up and remove any evidence that she’d been there.

  But I couldn’t bring myself to do it.

  On the third day, my rage finally started to plummet. The exhaustion from not sleeping was getting to me, and the hunger in my stomach was making me weak. I finally had to eat something and sleep. Once I woke up, I was a new man.

  And I could think clearly.

  Was she okay?

  It was the first thought that came to my mind. My men had tried to give her three hundred thousand dollars in cash, but she threw it across the lawn and sped off into the night. She didn’t have any money, not even a cent. Unless she sold the car, she had no way of paying for anything.

  Fuck, I hoped she sold the car.

  I tried to convince myself that kicking her out was the smart thing to do. Our relationship was dead the second she made that confession, and we would never be what we once were. I had to get rid of her and move on with my life.

  But I couldn’t stop worrying about her.

  It was a cruel place out there. Was she alright? Did Knuckles make a move the second she was no longer under my protection?

  What the fuck was I thinking when I kicked her out in the middle of the night?

  Fuck.

  By the fourth day, I couldn’t take it anymore. I caved and called her.

  But the phone didn’t ring. It didn’t even go to voice mail.

  The number didn’t exist.

  Fuck. Fuck. Fuck.

  Now I couldn’t even trace her. What did that mean? Did she ditch the phone so I could never call her again? Or did someone take her and destroy the phone so I couldn’t track her down? What if someone had her tied up?

  I couldn’t breathe.

  I called the number again in the hope it was just a mistake.

  But it did the exact same thing.

  Fuck.

  A few days later, Dante knocked on my office door. “I’m sorry to bother you, sir—”

  “I’m not hungry.” Dante had been trying to get me to eat, but I didn’t have an appetite. I just kept drinking. I sat at my desk with my hands covering my face, stuck in the mental torture I forced upon myself.

  “There’s someone here returning the car you loaned to Sapphire. I just thought you might want to know.”

  My head snapped up and my hands dropped. “Right now?”

  “Yes.”

  I jumped out of my seat and sprinted three flights of stairs until I sped through the entryway and to the outside. The red Ferrari was there, shiny and sleek like it’d been washed. Two men were walking back to a blacked-out car to prepare to leave.

  “Wait.” I caught up with them before they could get into the car. “Where is she? Who are you?” I got in the man’s face, ready to kill him if he’d laid a hand on Muse.

  “Who?” he asked. “I’m just dropping off the car.”

  “Who told you to drop off the car?”

  He shrugged. “That’s confidential. I’m just paid to do what I’m told.”

  My heart was slamming against my ribs. I wouldn’t be surprised if some of them broke from the force my heart was exerting. “Who do you work for? Who the fuck paid you?”

  He raised both hands and stepped back. “Man, I’m just a courier service. When people move or whatever, they ask us to return their shit. The keys were at the office when I got to work, and I was told to drop the car off at this address. That’s all I know.”

  I finally let him go, feeling the relief in my chest. If it was Knuckles or someone else, they wouldn’t return my car. They would keep it. Muse obviously wanted me to have it back when she no longer needed it. And if it were Knuckles, he would leave a note.

  He would want me to know he had her.

  The men drove away.

  I stood in the roundabout with my hands on my hips, still terrified by the turn of events. I’d let my anger get to me, and now I found myself in a worse situation than I was in before. I could pretend I didn’t give a damn about her, but that wasn’t true.

  I did care about her.

  And I had to know she was okay.

  I had to.

  2

  Sapphire

  New York was exactly the same as it was before.

  Overcrowded, polluted, and loud. I couldn’t see anything in the distance because there was always a building in the way. Direct sunlight was impossible to feel because the skyscrapers cast shadows everywhere.

  But it was home.

  Andrew lived in a large penthouse with his wife and two sons. At ten thousand square feet, it was a mansion at the top of the building. It wasn’t a three-story Italian villa, but it was still a dream house. Decorated fabulously by a professional, it definitely felt like a home for his family. It must have cost him over fifty million dollars to own a piece of real estate like that.

  He was nice enough to let me stay there since I had nowhere else to go. He offered to give me money, but I refused to take anything unless it was a paycheck—wages for work I had done.

  So in the meantime, I was staying with him.

  I had a private bedroom with my own bathroom, and his two sons were hardly ever home because they were both in private school. When they weren’t studying, they were participating in their other academic activities. His wife was involved in their education, so she joined her two sons everywhere.

  I was home alone most of the time.

  My floor-to-ceiling windows gave a wonderful view of the city, but whenever I looked outside, I was always disappointed there were no golden fields to stare at. There were no vineyards or ancient castles. There was no breeze. The windows were sealed in place, so I couldn’t even crack them open.

  The two places couldn’t be more different.

  When I arrived in America, my phone stopped working, so I tossed it in the garbage. Andrew got me a new one, so I carried that with me everywhere I went. I wondered if Conway would ever call me and realize I didn’t have that phone anymore.

  I’d like to believe he would. But maybe he wouldn’t.

  I had his car returned to him when I left. I didn’t want to leave it on the side of the road for someone to steal. I wanted to make sure when I left I di
dn’t take anything of his with me. The clothes in my bag were all paid for by him, but leaving those behind wouldn’t make much of a statement.

  I still proved I didn’t need him.

  A week had come and gone, and I was finally used to the time change. When I went to sleep, Conway woke up. And when he went to sleep, my day was already started. We pretty much lived on different planets at this point.

  Now I could move on and forget about him.

  Forget about the only man I’ve ever loved.

  My first.

  I was still crying over him every night, still living with the deep pain in my chest from his rejection. Who knew confessing my true feelings would drive him away like that? A part of me wished I’d never said anything to begin with.

  I’d still be sleeping with him.

  I’d still be happy.

  But now I had to move on and start over. I had to say goodbye to Vanessa and the rest of the Barsettis.

  I had to say goodbye to the love of my life.

  Andrew gave me a week to get back on my feet before he put me to work. He took me to his studio the following day, a large skyscraper in Manhattan. I used to pass by the building every single day on my way to work, and I never thought I would actually be able to walk inside.

  His studio was much bigger than Conway’s, covered in lighter tones like white and blue. It was commercialized, reminding me of something I’d seen in a fashion catalogue. Conway surrounded himself in masculine colors, painting the area around him to match his dark mood.

  I needed to stop comparing the two designers.

  Andrew showed me around the facility, introduced me to the other models, and then escorted me into his office.

  “Let’s get down to business, shall we?”

  I crossed my legs and looked at him over the desk, seeing the city behind him. It was overcast with thick rain clouds, but according to the weather, it wasn’t supposed to rain until tomorrow. Fall had arrived in New York far sooner than it arrived in Italy. “Sure.”

  He was a man in his forties with kindness in his eyes. He brought his hands together on the desk in front of me. He was nothing like Conway. He was transparent, polite, and easy to talk to. He didn’t possess the intensity Conway did. Perhaps that was why the designers had such different levels of success.

  Conway was a young man at the peak of his sexual exploration. He was bedding all kinds of women, experiencing new things constantly. But Andrew was happily married to the same woman he’d been with for twenty years. He was a father of two boys, making him a family man.

  But Conway was right, after all. Marrying me would only destroy his inspiration.

  “Alright,” Andrew said. “The last offer I extended was three-hundred million. I’m willing to keep that amount, but I have a few terms.”

  I’d told him Conway and I had gone our separate ways, so I expected him to lower the price since I didn’t have any other options. The fact that he didn’t made me respect him, made me see him as a nice guy. “What are they?”

  “This is a ten-year commitment. You model for me and no one else.”

  That was more than fair. “Alright.”

  “The ten-year contract will cover the full amount I’ve offered. So, for the first year, you would receive thirty million dollars.”

  That was more than enough. I couldn’t even grasp what it would be like to have that kind of money.

  “I’ll pay that up front, that way you can get properly settled. In the event that you break this contract, you’ll have to return everything I’ve paid you, plus a twenty-percent fee. Your responsibilities include participation in the fashion shows and lots of photographs. You’re going to be my biggest model, so expect to see your face plastered everywhere. If all those terms are agreeable to you, we can add our signatures.”

  He was more than generous, and I could commit to those responsibilities. I wouldn’t be able to eat as much anymore, but it was a necessary sacrifice. “That’s fair.”

  “Alright.” He grabbed a pen and pushed the contract toward me. “Sign and date here.”

  I hesitated before I filled it out, missing Conway as I stared at the contract. I used to be his muse, the inspiration for everything he made. But then he turned his back on me, treated me like I’d done something unforgivable simply by loving him. He hurt me so much, and I was grateful I got something out of the ordeal. It wasn’t the career I wanted, but it was a career that would pay the bills.

  I signed it.

  “Great.” Andrew added his signature. “Welcome to Lady Lingerie. We’re happy to have you, Sapphire.”

  3

  Conway

  Another week went by.

  My waistline was slimmer, and my sleep was even worse.

  I didn’t get any work done–not because my inspiration was no longer around, but because I was so worried about her.

  My muse.

  I needed to know if she was alright.

  In my heart, I believed she was. But I needed to see it with my own eyes. I needed to hear her tell me she was okay. I knew my pain wasn’t from missing her. It was simply from the protectiveness ingrained in my mind.

  But her phone never came back online, and none of my guys had seen her in Milan or anywhere else. I was combing the streets looking for her, but I was trying to be discreet about it because if I announced that Muse was missing, Knuckles would see it as a perfect opportunity to snatch her.

  If he didn’t already have her.

  When I got desperate enough, I called Carter.

  We met at Club Lingerie in the middle of the day. There was hardly anyone there, so we sat at the bar and ordered round after round. He turned on his stool and stared at me, looking at my full beard with pity. “I want to ask what’s wrong, but I already know.”

  “You do, huh?” I asked before I downed more scotch.

  “You ditched her.”

  No, I did something worse than that.

  “What the fuck are you thinking? So what if the woman loves you? You should feel like a king hearing a woman like that pledge her undying love for you—on camera. Even if you don’t feel the same way, which I doubt.”

  I dragged my hand down my face.

  “Con, if you want her back, just tell her. She’ll give you another chance.”

  “It’s more complicated than that…”

  “How?”

  I told him the story, up until the point where she had my car returned.

  Carter wore a look of pure shock. “You kicked her out of your house? When she doesn’t have a dollar on her?”

  “I gave her three hundred thousand dollars—but she didn’t take it.”

  “Still. You’re a fucking asshole.”

  I didn’t argue with him. “I know.”

  “And the fact that she didn’t take it makes her a class act. Don’t you get it, Con? She’s never wanted you for your money or your cars. She wants you for you. How many rich men can say that about their women?”

  I understood I was lucky. I never doubted that for a second.

  “You need to fix this before it’s too late.”

  “I can’t.”

  “Why?”

  It hurt to say the words out loud. “I can’t find her…”

  “You can find anyone.”

  “I’ve tried—and failed. That’s why I’m here with you. I need your help.”

  He breathed in his cigar and let the smoke escape through his nostrils. “My help?”

  “Yes.”

  “Your dad would be the best person to turn to.”

  When Muse said my parents would be disappointed in me, she hit a nerve. It hurt because it was true. “I’m not asking him for help unless I absolutely have to.”

  “Why?”

  “You think I want him to know about all this?” I snapped. “The story won’t make sense unless I tell him everything. And he already has a pretty low opinion of me right now, and I’m ready to dig my own grave.”

  “Alright.” Carter fina
lly let it go. “We should check the airlines first. She may have been able to buy a ticket in cash or on someone else’s card, but she can’t lie on the manifest. She’s from New York, right?”

  “Yeah, but I don’t think she would go there. She really loves Italy.”

  “But she doesn’t have any money, so what else would she do?” he asked. “I can have my guys check the listings. What’s her last name?”

  I drank the rest of my glass.

  He pulled out his phone to take the note. “Con?”

  I closed my eyes before I said it. “I don’t know…”

  Carter’s look was even more incredulous. “You’re shitting me.”

  “When we first met, she wouldn’t tell me her last name. She was running from Knuckles and the Feds.”

  “And you didn’t think to ask her later? In all the months you were fucking her?”

  I wanted to slam the glass over his head. “I don’t know her last name, alright? Let it go.”

  “Con, this is going to make it a million times harder.”

  “Just check the damn flights and see if there’s anyone named Sapphire on there.” I was going on little sleep and nearly no food, so my patience was at an all-time low. The stress was eating me alive.

  “Alright, I’ll try,” he said. “But passengers are organized by last name. So we may not find anything.”

  “We’ll figure out what to do then.” I waved the bartender over and demanded a refill. When my glass was full, I took another drink.

  Carter stared at me for a while.

  I felt his gaze on my profile. “Whatever you have to say, I don’t want to listen to it.”

  “Yeah, you’re probably right. But I’m going to say it anyway.”

  I sighed.

  “Sapphire called me the night she left.”

  I slowly turned to him, caught off guard. “Why?”

  “She wanted to know why you were being so cold to her…so I told her. In the beginning, she was confused. She didn’t believe me because she was so confident that you loved her too.”