“I’ll get what I get,” she said, stressing that she controlled the terms, trying to downplay the desperation she tasted on her own lips. “Franco, DiGorgio, the Las Vegas Slayers, gambling and football. You want in on that action, Ross.”
“Come to my office and let’s chat about the job.”
“No, a public place, and I’ll decide when. To be clear, you’ll never come on to me again. A salaried position at the paper and some respect are all I want.”
An hour later, she was composed and dressed up, on Mahé and flat broke. A visit to the bank that held her allowance account confirmed that close to half a million euros remained available even after the efforts she’d made to mindlessly spend it all. So she drained the account, taking none for herself but anonymously donating the funds to a Seychelles conservation society.
Santino’s questions about the money for her “extras” had made her rethink why Al had given her so much money to play with when she was reserving the vacation. They hadn’t set a wedding date, for hell’s sake, yet he’d had her starry-eyed about a Valentine’s Day trip.
It was strange, and since she had no intention of taking the funds to the US, she spent absolutely everything here.
Now, as she stopped in front of an internet café, she wished she’d brought along enough for a cup of coffee. She’d skipped coffee at Cora Island’s gorgeous hotel, hadn’t even sampled what Santino had fixed hours ago.
But she had an idea.
Santino didn’t answer her call with a regular “Hello” or “Hi.” He said her name, and his voice was as boldly intimate as his hands had been on her body earlier.
“I realized, since I didn’t drink the coffee you brewed this morning, you still owe me,” she said into the phone, half wondering if anyone on the busy street was there to stalk her.
“Where are you?”
“Mahé. In front of a café.”
“Bindi… You changed your mind about coming with me?”
“Yes. But I could change it again, if you don’t get me that coffee quickly enough.”
“You didn’t give up your second week in paradise for a damn cup of coffee. You know you’re doing the right thing.”
Betraying him to suit her purposes because he’d betrayed her to satisfy his agenda was the right thing? It didn’t feel right. It felt dirty, but then again, shouldn’t she be most familiar with that?
“Santino…” She wanted to backpedal, right here on the street. She wanted to scream into the phone that she did hate him, because he’d hurt her when she’d thought she couldn’t be hurt again.
“I knew you’d come through for me.”
“You won’t always be able to predict me,” she warned, because she felt she had to warn him that the landscape of their game had changed.
“I’m not always going to want to predict you.” He said it like a promise. Promises were usually preludes to lies. But when he added, “I’m going to protect you, Bindi,” she closed her eyes.
Because he said it as though he meant it, as though he knew how much she wanted to believe it and how much it hurt to know she couldn’t take that risk.
*
Alessandro didn’t recognize himself. In a square, musty bathroom above his nemesis’s ceramics market, as good as hidden in a fishing village in Sicily, he could peer through the thick, cracked mirror and see a sixty-four-year-old defying his age with an at-home dyeing kit that darkened his hair and whiskers to “natural black” when not so long ago he’d been smooth jawed, with his silver-gray hair expensively trimmed.
He could still see the ghosts of his past, though. No makeover could hide them when he looked at his reflection. A gap-toothed runt of a child, a second-generation Italian immigrant, playing barefoot and scrape kneed and innocent in a relative’s lemon orchard. A gawky teenager with odds stacked in his favor and aces up his sleeves, eager to make America his permanent home and guard with his life the Francos’ prosperous eyewear company’s Nevada arm. A young man, slick with success, already hardened by corporate logistics, constructing alliances with giants among men and climbing to his success on the backs of others. A husband, a prisoner in love’s bondage, figuring out that growing his fortune like corn in a field with his family’s wealth and his ownership of Las Vegas’s only professional football franchise wasn’t as essential as his Gloria.
A father. Fatherhood was a privilege, and he’d spat on it. The boys were his first wife’s most treasured legacy. He’d destroyed each of his strong, warrior-like sons. His eldest son had grown up to share Alessandro’s love for football, had been a star in the NFL until he’d had to pull his star from the sky and throw him into the depths. His other son had betrayed him, as many sons betrayed their fathers: for the sake of a woman.
Bella Charlotte Blue. Al appreciated the look of the woman who’d won his younger son’s loyalty. A stunning, curly-haired African-American beauty, she reminded him of Gloria.
“Cazzo.”
Al shut his bloodshot, rheumy eyes, skated a hand over the whiskers that didn’t do much to camouflage his hollowed-out cheeks and the jagged angles of his bony face.
He had been handsome once. When Gloria had died, he’d worn her death, reflected it. The details about her—the color she liked on her nails, the habits that had annoyed him, who she included in her nightly Christian prayers—he’d started to forget soon after he’d lost her. But her essence and her aura stayed with him, even when he’d remarried twice and set out to marry again.
Marrying Daisy, a fashion-magazine somebody, and Penelope, a teacher who’d been so confident that she’d hit the jackpot that she’d retired the week of their wedding, he had felt Gloria’s anger. Proposing to Bindi, a young woman with the kind of wisdom you didn’t get living a safe, protected life, he’d felt Gloria’s grief. There was nothing he could do for Bindi except hurt her—he’d know that when he’d promised to take care of her.
Her beauty was so addictive, her spirit purer than even she recognized. Bindi had denied him, and when he’d finally lost his sons’ respect, his reputation and his maybe even his mind, too, he thought he had lost his chances of making her his. But he would get her back.
Gian DiGorgio, his comrade, his only prayer of living as a free man, had helped him slip out of the United States and travel unseen to Italy. Friends took care of each other, so Al knew he could trust Gian’s promises. After all, without Al’s assistance, Gian wouldn’t have been able to make over a billion dollars of side cash betting on games. Al had come through for the man. Now it was Gian’s turn to come through for him.
Al touched his damp hair, trying to get used to the new look. When was the last time he’d had a head full of purely dark hair? Decades ago, it had to be. He’d started graying in his thirties. His son Santino, a good-looking boy, was beginning to gray with a few silvery streaks at the sides.
“My son. My boy.” Al sighed, stepped back from the mirror. He’d never see either of his children again, but that was something he’d accepted when Gian had come to him with a way out. At least he’d have a woman to make the days a little more bearable.
Tonio, whose ancestors had been mortal enemies to Al’s ancestors, whose father and long ago fallen out of favor with Al’s father when a business investment had turned out to be as valueless as a week-old cannoli, had come to him a few days ago with word that Bindi Paxton had made her way to the Seychelles.
Not even Bindi could piss away over two million dollars, so he had not a worry that she’d spend the money he needed to survive. Tonio, who was ten years out of prison, had given up narcotics and had said up front that he could hold Al only so many days—as a favor to Gian. So the sooner Al could get to the Seychelles and coerce his gorgeous ex-fiancée to open the treasures that belonged to him—first the bank account that held his funds, next that beautiful body of hers—the sooner he could begin again.
This time, he thought as he took the soft, creaky steps of a narrow stairwell down to the kitchenette of Tonio’s market, he’d live
a humble life. Perhaps he’d run a market of his own, or buy his own lemon orchard. As an afterthought, he considered Bindi. She could adapt, if she wanted his money desperately enough. Or, if need be, he’d take the money from her and they’d nicely part ways. She was intelligent, crafty, and would be smart enough to not cause trouble for him or Gian or anyone else who needed Al to make a safe, calm escape.
Potent scents of breads and sauce and spices, combined with the raucous clatter of violence, blessed the kitchenette. Al lingered on the final step, assessing the brawl in front of him. Despite his potbelly, Tonio had his fists wedged into the back of another man—kidney shots. On closer inspection, Al found the dull, dingy floor streaked not with sauce, but blood.
Grunting, Tonio’s victim scrambled for a broom.
To earn his keep, Al had to interfere. He crossed the room fast, skidding on a puddle of blood, and kicked the broom out of the man’s reach.
Tonio landed a few final battering strikes, then kicked the man and gave a labored laugh as the man slid and hit a stool. “Figlio di puttana!”
The man coughed, struggled to his feet.
“He stole from me,” Tonio said to Al, pulling a dented package of smokes from a pocket. Offering one, he nodded his thanks. “Nobody steals from me. Eh, I’m a teddy bear of a guy, right? I let him walk. He’s walking away.”
Al said nothing, but watched as the man slumped over a counter and struggled to lift his dark head.
“Be back here in an hour to work,” Tonio shouted to the man as he limped out the scratched wooden door. “They don’t make good help these days, do they, Franco?” Another labored laugh, this one whistling with congestion and Al wasn’t surprised. Tonio was in advanced stages of congestive heart failure.
“Franco, I got through the channels some information you’re going to need.”
Al searched Tonio’s faded brown eyes. “Go on.”
“That bella donna you’re going out to the Seychelles for? She ain’t there.”
“Bindi Paxton. It’s a two-week vacation. Of course she’s still there.”
“She ain’t there,” Tonio repeated coldly. “She left.”
Why would Bindi leave in the middle of an all-expenses-paid vacation? Had Gian relocated her? Had someone warned her that Al was coming for her?
“Gian will be connecting. Give him time. But Franco, this ain’t a permanent arrangement. Track down the bella donna and do it fast.” Tonio tsked, went to grab a dishcloth. “Look at this. Cut knuckle. But a man fights with his God-given weapons.”
Al’s mind felt light, fragmented. If Bindi was gone, how would he access the money stored in her account? How would he begin again without the woman he needed? “There’s no shame in fighting with manmade weapons,” he said to Tonio.
“No,” Tonio agreed after a hollow moment. “But there’s no pride in it, either.”
Chapter 6
Bindi took a moment to center herself—the way she’d been taught in the Acting 101 course she’d signed up for freshman year when she’d had bright ideas about finding herself and veering off her parents’ journalism-and law-focused paths in a pursuit of happiness—before sashaying into the only establishment in Las Vegas she considered a true-blue friend.
Cleopatra’s Barge wasn’t the epitome of glamor, wasn’t the most exclusive lounge in this city and yes, some were intimidated by the floating craft’s unique, proudly wanton breast-baring statues that provocatively greeted you at the entrance, but for her it was something she could depend on when she wanted an extra shot of confidence or pizzazz. The place had a personality that meshed with Bindi’s, and without judgment or chastisement, it welcomed her into its warm hospitality.
Patrons probably didn’t see past the red-and-gold decor, dance space, live bands and the prices of the drinks at the bar, but Bindi sort of enjoyed figuring out the soul of a place. More than a building or a gimmicky tourist haunt, the Barge was a friend. Bindi knew, because when her wolf of an ex-fiancé had begun to shed his sheep’s clothing and she’d dropped soundlessly out of Vegas society’s favor, she’d watched her friends trot one by one out of her life, until there was just this club left to hold her up. It hadn’t changed its attitude or appearance. It hadn’t turned her away like a rat seeking shelter from the cold.
Maybe she was searching for hope in the wrong places, but she needed all the confidence she could find to get through tonight’s meeting with Drew Ross. The Vegas Beat maintained a rivalry with the Las Vegas Sun, competing for readership and relevance in a technology-dependent world. The editor in chief had Hollywood-star charm and hunted news as though he were a predator beyond all redemption, and Bindi knew the extremes he’d take to gain an edge or get what he wanted.
She’d stuck to her guns when she’d contacted him to schedule a talk. No, she wouldn’t come to his office when most of the staffers would be gone for the night. No, she wouldn’t give him her address and let him bring over Chinese food. No, she wouldn’t meet him in anyone’s VIP room.
A public place, with people around, and where—God willing—a man and woman sitting down and talking business wouldn’t be misconstrued as a serial gold digger looking for her next conquest.
Drew had at one point threatened to call off the deal, but when Bindi had calmly replied that she could accept his decision, he’d tried to steamroll her again. Now as she entered the club and looked through the strands of patrons moving about, she felt icky. She’d be nothing but professional tonight—would shake Drew’s hand if he offered it and would be as transparent as any solid journalist strived to be. But it was the sleaziness of her knee-jerk reflex to make a side alliance with this man that she second-guessed.
An entire day after parting ways with Santino at McCarran International, she was still raw from his duplicity. She was torn straight down the middle, half of her so livid that the shock of it made her catch her breath and the other half so unwound from being with him on the island that she imagined her skin tingling everywhere his mouth had touched her.
She’d had a clear goal when she had stepped off the ferryboat on Cora Island: get her crap together. With a kiss and a touch and a night of sex she couldn’t erase, he’d unwrapped her ambitions and undone her progress. And by lying to her, taking away what she’d appreciated most about him, he’d shaken loose her respect. He hadn’t tossed her taxi fare, swatted her ass and sent her on her way, but he’d damaged some piece of her all the same.
Or, he would, she reminded herself, if she didn’t go through with her gut reaction to turn the tables. Sex was sex, but now they were dealing with survival. Journalism was the only career that might take in a disgraced politician’s daughter who hadn’t finished her college degree and had spent ten years prancing from one rich boomer to the next. It was the only industry that might pay her bills, even as it constantly held up a cruelly revealing mirror every time she pursued someone else’s hardship.
She couldn’t say she wanted this life any more than she wanted to give up her body and affection and future to men like Alessandro Franco. She’d prefer to someday look at her reflection and recognize someone she loved. She’d prefer to look at a man who loved her for her flaws, because her ugliness was as vital as her beauty.
A dream, though. It was just a dream.
Fully awake now, Bindi found Drew at the bar and prepared herself to do business.
Hollywood charm in position and his enormous ego no doubt polished by his inclusion in a BET television Black History Month feature on America’s übersuccessful black urban men, Drew slid off his stool and took her hand as she approached. “Bindi Paxton, you’re trying to kill me. Where you been? I’m liking the mocha skin and the dark hair… Mmm, girl.”
“Drew, hello.”
“All right, level with me.”
“About?”
“What are you?”
Bindi paused. What was she? “A human being. A woman…”
Drew rolled his lips in a way that made her feel naked, and she didn’t like
it. His eyes half-mast, he said, “You got a white girl face, but a black girl booty.”
Instant wrath nearly blinded her. Insulted, offended, she felt herself trembling. “Does it threaten you, to not know what I ‘am’?”
“Not at all. I’m just curious about your recipe.”
Recipe? What the actual— “Drew, I’m the product of people being free to travel this world and courageous enough to not let skin color or religion be an obstacle.” Eventually those factors had come into play to sway her father to identify himself as African-American and to influence her mother to convert to her husband’s religion to “simplify” their family. “And I prefer genealogy, not recipe. I’m not a damn soup.”
There went her resolve to be utterly professional.
“Ease up now,” Drew said, his gaze dropping low then riding up her body to her “white girl face.” Likely he wished she’d do a twirl to show him her “black girl booty.”
“I didn’t mean any negativity. You’d do yourself a favor to not be so sensitive, if you want to work with me.”
She didn’t want to work with him, per se. She wanted a steady paycheck with benefits and some stability and a chance to contribute to society. High society shut her out, to be sure, but she was still a part of a social web, and she found it only fair that she pay it forward in some meaningful fashion. Donating the excess funds from an extravagant vacation was one thing. But suppose she were to find herself more involved in environmental conservation, in horticulture and rebirth and renewal and all the hopeful second-chance things that some believed nature symbolized?
If enduring the likes of Drew Ross led to that path, could she be courageous enough to crawl past adversity to find her way? Did she have to make more mistakes to make lasting changes?
Mine Tonight Page 9
