When She Fell for the Billionaire

by Suzette de Borja

  “What is it?” she asked in alarm. She felt his thumb swiping across one cheek. He showed it to her. It was moist. Sabrina realized it was wet with her tears. Her face caught fire at her embarrassing display. She ducked her head and tried to avoid his gaze, but he caught her chin and forced her to look at him. He remained silent as Sabrina endured his scrutiny with a stoicism she was far from feeling. His deep blue eyes would not allow her to retreat.

  “I never cry.” She hastily dried her cheeks with the palms of her hands. She learned long ago that it was a useless endeavor. Crying never changed anything, so why waste tears? “It’s probably just the eye make-up. It’s new.”

  “Va bene, strega,” he crooned soothingly. “It’s okay.”

  Why was Luca looking at her like that? His eyes had gone oddly soft, almost tender. She was tempted to believe everything in her world would be all right just as he said and that he would make it okay, but that was a dangerous way of thinking. They barely knew each other. She was just using him. “I think I’m allergic to it,” she floundered, then with more conviction added, “Yes. That must be it.”

  He didn’t press the matter, mercifully.

  A spot of red diverted her. She touched his lower lip with a finger. “You’re bleeding!”

  He caught her hand and saw the evidence of a dab of red on her index finger.

  “You bit me when you came.” He didn’t sound mad. In fact, he sounded strangely pleased.

  “I’m sorry.” She was aghast. “I didn’t mean to-”

  “Sshh.” This time it was he who laid a finger to her lips. “Your pleasure was worth the pain.” She could smell herself on him, and it equally embarrassed and excited her.

  “Now you’re ready for me,” he growled, levering himself up with a push of his hand off the couch. He proceeded to divest himself of his shirt, tugging impatiently at the buttons. A lock of dark wavy hair fell across his brow. “Keep your feet on the couch and your legs spread wide.” He fished his wallet from his pocket and pulled something out. It was a foil packet. He unbuckled his woven leather belt, unzipped his pants, and let it drop to the floor where he kicked it out of the way.

  Sabrina’s eyes roamed hungrily over his form, enjoying the private strip show. He was tall and lean with just the right amount of definition on his muscles that she appreciated. Her gaze skittered past his broad chest covered with a sprinkling of dark hair, down to his underwear bulging with his erection, and lower to his feet which were still covered in socks. Socks in a tartan kilt pattern in navy blue and hunter green.

  She chuckled weakly. “You have a thing about printed socks.”

  “A thing?” He followed her gaze to his feet. “I’m insulted. I’m half-naked and all you can focus on are my socks,” he said in mock indignation, his arms akimbo as if he were Superman.

  “I like this better than the polka dots you were wearing last night.” Uh oh. Her brain had turned to mush. That was the only explanation she could think off with her slip up. She realized it when Luca cocked his head and shot her a curious glance.

  “You saw me last night?”

  Her and her big mouth! Why couldn’t he have just gone on just kissing her? “Er...at the lobby. Briefly.”

  He quirked an eyebrow arrogantly. “And you noticed my socks?”

  “It was noticeable,” she said lamely.

  “Strange. I didn’t see you.”

  “There were lots of people milling about.” And there was a potted plant.

  “A pity. Think of all the hours we’ve wasted.” He pierced her with a glittering stare that made Sabrina’s satiated body hum to life again. “We could’ve been in bed since last night.”

  He walked to her, his long, sinewy limbs graceful and predatory. He stood right in front of her opened legs then dropped to his knees. “Bellisima,” he whispered, looking his fill. “I think I would like to have you painted like this, strega, open, glistening, and wet. Just for me.” He declared the last sentence with a hint of possessiveness. Before she could think whether she liked it or not, he was reaching down and Sabrina saw him freeing his cock from the confines of his underwear.

  She gulped. She wasn’t a virgin, but she had only one sexual experience in her life. The memory was hazy, just a lot of bungling between two kids who didn’t know what they were doing. She knew it was in poor taste to compare but Chase wasn’t as big as him, not by a long shot, no pun intended.

  He fisted his cock and rose slightly on his knees, and Sabrina closed her eyes like the virgin that she wasn’t at what was coming next.

  “What did I tell you?” he rasped.

  Her lids shot open. “Eyes on you.”

  “I want to see your eyes the moment I take you.” He grasped her inner thighs and just as he was about to plunge inside her, the doorbell rang.

  They both froze.

  Luca let out a staccato of angry Italian. “It’s probably room service. Ignore it.”

  But the doorbell kept ringing and the mood had been broken. Sabrina planted her shoes on the carpet, righted her skirt, and pulled up the strap of her dress with trembling fingers. Luca pulled up his pants, swearing bilingually.

  She watched him stride to the door, his movements jerky. He yanked at the doorknob violently, his mouth opening to blister the hapless hotel staff. He stilled.

  “Luca!” A femine voice trilled by the doorway.

  Chapter 6

  A woman in a skirt and suit pushed past Luca into the room, stopping abruptly midway inside the foyer when she spotted Sabrina rising from the couch. Dark, curved brows drew together in a slash above a pair of heavily tinted sunglasses. Full lips painted a muted beige pink flattened into a thin line. If the woman were a cat, her fur would have bristled. She advanced slowly but inexorably towards Sabrina, clutching a black rectangular bag that looked like a laptop bag. Her heavy cloud of perfume advanced and choked Sabrina like a heavy mist.

  She heard the click of the hotel door being shut and glanced behind the woman’s shoulder. Luca was striding towards her direction, his face unreadable. He swept past the new arrival and retrieved his shirt off the couch, buttoning it without any hint of self-consciousness that he had an audience.

  Sabrina's cheeks burned. She wished she could be as blasé as Luca. They burned hotter when she spied her panties on the floor near the bar. Shit. She shot Luca a wild glance and tipped her head subtly to where the incriminating evidence lay. His gaze followed her prompt, and one side of his lip pulled up mockingly. He turned to her and did a one-shoulder shrug.

  “Clearly I'm interrupting something.” The woman’s tone was bland, her English accented. She had concluded immediately that Sabrina was a foreigner.

  She was studying her behind those inscrutable sunglasses, and Sabrina pulled herself straighter to meet her scrutiny straight on.

  “You weren’t picking up your phone.” It took a few seconds for her to realize she was addressing Luca while still observing her. “Chiara wanted me to go over the press kit with you one final time before Markos sees it.” Her dark hair was bundled in a tight chignon. The woman oozed confidence and professionalism.

  Sabrina felt…rumpled. She glared beyond the woman’s shoulder. Luca was pouring himself a drink. Her panties were still on the floor. Jerk.

  “I’m sure everything is perfectly in order with you in charge.” Luca’s tone was mild, but was there a frisson of something Sabrina couldn’t put her finger on.

  The stranger’s mouth pulled into a wide smile, baring her perfect teeth. “Thank you for that vote of confidence.” She was still staring at Sabrina. It was downright rude. “But both Chiara and I would like you to go over it one last time.”

  The undercurrents were so thick she could swim in it.

  “I’ll meet you at the function room in fifteen minutes,” Luca said in a bored tone.

  “Make it ten.” The woman’s lips tightened fractionally, but her tone was glib when she said, “Aren’t you going to introduce me to your friend, Luca?” The woma
n did a quarter turn, glancing at him briefly.

  Sabrina caught her breath as Luca deftly picked up her underwear from the floor just in time and jammed it inside the pocket of his pants.

  “No,” he said without any inflection.

  The woman’s laugh was brittle. “Markos’ atrocious manners is catching, I see.”

  Luca just drank whatever liquor he had poured into his tumbler straight up.

  Sabrina felt a pang of pity and embarrassment for the woman. She held out her hand. “Hello. I’m Sabrina Connelly.”

  The woman pushed her sunglasses up her head. Sabrina reared back, startled. The woman caught her surprised reaction and her eyes hardened–one colored brown, and the other a startling blue. Sabrina knew even before she spoke what her family name would be. “Eleni Konstantinos.”

  Eleni had mistakenly attributed her reaction to her mismatched eyes. She met Sabrina’s stare with an “I dare you to comment” expression. It smacked of someone who was used to receiving odd attention about her condition. Sabrina blinked, as if the action would reassure her her contacts were still in place.

  “Eleni is Markos’ cousin,” Luca drawled. The odd glint in his eyes unsettled Sabrina.

  “You know Markos?” Eleni frowned.

  In a way. Sabrina shook her head, still reeling from the unexpected shock and evidence of their shared characteristic. She wanted to tell her what she came out here for but stopped herself just in time. “Is he already here? In Seirenada? Markos?”

  Eleni’s perfectly arched brows met together in puzzlement at her eager question. Sabrina saw Luca’s body uncoiling from the bar, a palpable alertness emanating from him.

  Before Eleni could answer, he cut in. “I was just sharing stories over lunch, about Markos and I, when we were brats around the island.”

  “It must have been quite a cozy chat.” Eleni’s full lips pulled up in a stiff smile.

  Sabrina flashed her one just as stiff. “Quite.”

  “Lovely. We’ll have to have one too, then. Soon.” The invitation sounded more like a threat. “Any friend of Luca is a friend of mine.”

  Over my dead body.

  “It’s Sabrina’s first time in Seirenada.” Luca nursed his drink with one hand, his expression bland. He twirled the refilled liquid with a gentle rolling motion of his wrist that Sabrina found mesmerizing. "Her schedule will be tight since we’ll go around visiting all the nice little spots on the island.”

  We are? Sabrina frowned at him. He smiled innocently.

  “Well then. I must be off. Loads of things to do for the launch. I’ll see you in the conference room, Luca.” This time Eleni’s smile, though unsure, appeared to be the real thing as she glanced at Luca briefly.

  Luca stirred from the bar and escorted Elena to the threshold of the door. She paused and spoke in Greek: “Your new plaything?”

  Sabrina pretended not to understand. She’d learned the language two years ago since she had discovered secrets that had been kept from her for twenty-five years.

  Luca’s answer in Greek was terse and painfully accurate. “She’s no one.”

  Eleni slanted a calculating look in her direction and patted him on the cheek. Then she was gone, leaving only the hum of the air conditioning, a whiff of exotic perfume, and humiliating silence.

  She’s no one. Sabrina’s hand on her bag fumbled. Shit! She had to get out of the room ASAP because this time, she actually felt her eyes smarting. All these years she had never felt the least bit like crying and in a span of less than thirty minutes, she actually had and was now in imminent danger of doing so again.

  She was no one. The truth hit her like a brick on the head. She wasn’t anyone’s granddaughter anymore. She didn’t feel like a sister to her estranged siblings. And she felt like she hadn’t been anyone’s child for as long as she could remember. She had always been on the fringes. She was nobody’s girl. She marched to the door, focusing on her limbs. Luca was still standing beside it.

  “Where do you think you’re going?”

  “Leaving.”

  “You can’t leave yet.”

  “This no one is. Watch me.” Her voice had a slight tremor.

  Luca cursed. “You speak Greek, too?”

  She shook her head, avoiding his gaze. “Not fluently.”

  “Look at me, strega.” When she did, he added, “I’m sorry you had to hear that.” His blue eyes were contrite. “I had to say it to Eleni-”

  “It’s the truth. Don’t apologize. We’re nothing to each other.”

  To hell with trying to get to the wedding. She would find another way. Maybe camp out in the lobby until the family arrived. Or bribe the bellhop. She should have thought of that first rather than this ridiculous attempt at being mercenary.

  She felt a thrill of satisfaction in seeing him wince.

  “Eleni’s my ex-girlfriend. She still doesn’t like seeing me with other women.” Luca ran a hand through his hair. “I’ll explain later. After the meeting. I’ll take you to dinner.”

  “I don’t think it’s a good idea.”

  “Ten minutes ago, on that couch, you thought it was a very good idea.”

  “Not anymore.”

  “We can be good together, Sabrina.”

  “In bed,” she said starkly.

  “Where it matters.”

  She had nothing to prove to him or to anyone else. “I’ve changed my mind.”

  “Are you afraid?” he asked maddeningly.

  “Of you?” She injected disdain in her tone.

  “Of this thing between us.” He frowned, sounding puzzled, as if he had just made an unpleasant discovery.

  “There is nothing between us,” she said crisply.

  Luca’s tone hardened. “If that’s the case, then there’s no problem continuing where we left off later. It will be just sex, then we'll say goodbye.”

  “No, Luca." Sabrina pushed past him to the door. “We say goodbye now.”

  “I’m not done with you yet, Sabrina Connelly,” he said, his voice ringing resolutely as she trudged down the length of the deserted corridor . She resisted the urge to look back, knowing he would still be by the door of the suite. She pressed on the button of the elevator several times, willing it to open. When it did, she stepped inside quickly, seeking sanctuary. She sagged against one of the cold, metal walls in relief. She hadn’t felt that raw and vulnerable in a long time. And she hated it that for a few moments, in his arms, she had forgotten it was all just about sex.

  She’s no one. She stared back at her reflection in the mirror. Wild hair, swollen lips, a hint of blush on her cheeks. And her eyes. Luca had it right. She could see it in them now. She could see her fear.

  * * *

  He should have gone after Sabrina the way his gut dictated him to, but business had to come first.

  Eleni was waiting at the conference room, her laptop open. She looked up when he strode in, spearing him with her unnervingly direct gaze. The Konstantinos had a familial condition called heterochromia iridum. It rendered one eye different in color from its pair. Eleni shared it with her billionaire cousins. Luca was used to it, but he understood how people who saw them the first time would find it a bit disconcerting, especially when you were being subjected to intense scrutiny, as was the habit of the entitled family members when it came to meeting other people not of their own social ilk.

  Luca had admired Eleni even before they had started dating. She had been born rich but had not been content to live off on her family’s wealth. Eleni was focused and driven. She was a go-getter. They were things Luca admired in a woman.

  Until Eleni made marriage to Luca one of her goals. Her determination and manner in achieving that goal was one aspect Luca found unacceptable.

  “Please take a seat. Give me just a few seconds to find the folder.” She tapped on the keyboard briskly. “The advertising firm Markos chose has done a great job.”

  Luca settled on the chair beside Eleni. “We’ve worked with Laurenti and Pa
pillon in a couple of our ad campaigns for the Casa Argenti line. They’re a young firm but brilliant and promising.”

  “I agree.” The video presentation of the relaunch for The Medeia Seirenada appeared on screen, and for a few minutes they watched in total silence. Capitalizing on the Greek influences on the island, the ad campaign panned around several spots and ruins in the principality juxtaposed against the refurbished interiors of the hotel. It ended with a shot of a stylized mythical creature that was half-woman, half-bird–a siren that was carved on the domed ceiling looming over the hotel lobby.

  “What are you doing with her, Luca?” Eleni got to the point. Luca’s opinion about the marketing material was not needed at all. It was just a pretense to further her agenda.

  “Judging from what you interrupted, I would guess it’s pretty obvious.”

  There was the tiny flinch that Luca almost missed. He felt mean and petty, but what she said after wiped off any misgivings.

  “Don’t be snide. You can do better than her.”

  Eleni spoke her mind. It was one of the things he had liked about her at the start.

  “That’s not for you to say.”

  “Maybe not, but think of what your mother would if she learns that her son is consorting with a woman like Sabrina Connelly.” She mistakenly thought his silence was a cue for her to continue. “I looked her up. She had an affair with a married man that led to him divorcing his wife of twenty years. Plus she was living blatantly with her boyfriend at the same time.”

  So that was what she had been busy doing on her laptop when he came in. His Catholic mother had very strict requirements for what she wanted as wives for her sons. If his mother had her way, all her sons would be marrying virgins. Since his father had left her, she had become quite a realist. She had relaxed her requirements and would be happy if they settled for a biddable, maternal girl from a good family, career not necessary.

  His mother had approved of Eleni. She was intelligent and very good in projecting what one wanted to see. She played the part of the doting, submissive girlfriend in front of friends and family. In private, she was anything but.