by Jessica Gray
She made it to the bus stop just as the bus arrived and twenty minutes later she hopped out in front of her apartment building. As she stepped out of the lift on her floor, a door creaked. Shame made her ears burn as Roberto came out of his apartment eyeballing her in her revealing evening dress.
“Where have you been?” he demanded.
“You’re up early,” Gina said, trying nonchalantly to slip past him and unlock her apartment door.
Roberto stepped forward to block her path and gave her a scornful glance. “You know it’s not safe to be out all night alone. Anything could happen.”
“Good thing I wasn’t alone then, isn’t it?” she answered and used his momentary irritation to brush past him and stick her key in the lock. She glanced back and felt like a heel. Roberto was obviously hurt by her callous response, but she didn’t have the energy to deal with him right now. Despite being nauseous from lack of sleep her body was humming with need for Preston and this man didn’t have anything better to do than to butt into her personal matters. It served him right. She sighed before stepping inside the apartment and turned again to look at him.
“Sorry, Roberto. I’m tired and need to get some sleep before class. I’ll come by your workshop around noon. Alright?”
He opened his mouth to argue, but she shook her head and gave him one last tired smile. Then she slipped through the door and shut it behind her. She needed sleep or she’d never make it through the remainder of her day. And maybe somewhere along the way, she’d figure out how to get over the need to see Preston again.
Chapter 13
Preston blinked into the sun and rolled over, reaching for the woman he couldn’t seem to get enough of. When his hands encountered empty, cold sheets, he pried his eyes open and looked around the room. Empty.
He pushed himself up on an elbow and glanced to where they’d dropped her high heels after several rounds of the hottest sex in his life. Empty. Then he threw himself back on the mattress, lifting an arm to cover his eyes. Damn, Gina. Why did you leave? The kind size bed with the silk sheets felt huge and lonely without her.
Sure, it had been their mutual understanding that this was purely sexual. A one-night stand. But each time he’d taken her, it had only made him want more of her. Body and Soul. Heart and Mind. Everything. I want to wake up next to her for the rest of my life and beyond. For Eternity.
The thought was so foreign to him, he could only lie down and try to figure out what was happening to him. Love? Not likely. You don’t fall in love in one day.
He pushed his hands beneath the pillow and felt something. He grabbed the soft material and pulled it out. Her midnight blue satin panties. The recognition and the visualization of her walking around Rome without underwear had him hard in one second flat. As if his best friend hadn’t worked relentlessly the entire night.
And the one person, who had the power to soothe his raging lust, had chosen to leave. How dare she? But he didn’t have long to wallow in self-pity before his cell phone chirped.
He reached to the bedside table and swiped his thumb across the screen, “Hello?”
“What’s up, bro?” his youngest brother River asked.
A quick glance at the bedside clock and a bit of math in his head and Preston calculated it had to be close to midnight of yesterday where River was. The time he’d fingered Gina to her first orgasm in the elevator. A hot rush of lust surged through his veins and he groaned.
“Preston? You alright, man?” River asked.
“Yeah, it’s just…I had a late night,” Preston said, doing his best to keep his voice steady. Not that his brother would mind to hear all the juicy details. They’d shared the tales of their conquests many a times. But Gina…he wanted her for him alone.
“Wow. You and Sandrine must be enjoying yourselves…” River said and Preston could see his brother’s dirty smirk in his mind.
Sandrine! He’d all but forgotten about her. Preston groaned again when he realized River was probably calling to make the final arrangements for his wedding gift for them. His brother owned a scuba diving company and had offered Preston an olive branch in the form of a special honeymoon tour on his boat for he and Sandrine.
In the next breath, he realized that he’d have to come clean about the wedding being off, but first he needed to clear the fog of lust from his brain.
“You still up?” he asked to delay the show-down.
“Me? Come one, it’s not even midnight? You should know me better than that. In fact there are two hot Caribbean babes waiting to get banged.”
“Where exactly are you?”
“Curacao. And wow… this island has the hottest babes in the world. And I know about hot.”
“So they say,” Preston chuckled. River was incorrigible. With only twenty-four years he owned a successful scuba diving company, but apart from his sports his only other interest where women. All of them. Nobody could claim River was discriminatory.
“But back to my reason for calling, I need to fix the dates for your honeymoon cruise.” River drawled.
“About that…the wedding is off,” Preston said.
A long silence ensued and Preston started to think that the line had been cut, when he heard his brother clear his throat.
“Whoa. That’s some news,” he paused for a moment and then continued, “Want me to congratulate or give my condolences?”
“Congratulate, I guess,” Preston answered. “I caught her sorry ass wagging in the air with some dick buried deep inside.”
“Ouch.” Despite River’s love for all women, he, like all the Armstrong men, abhorred disloyalty. Once committed – always committed.
His entire family had seen through Sandrine’s antics and tried to warn him, to no avail. Preston expected to hear the inevitable “I told you so”, but River was a much too fine a man to glory in his victory.
“Well, I’d like to say I’m sad for you, but I’m really not.”
“Thanks,” Preston said, a half-smile on his face.
“Welcome back to the single Armstrongs. A species threatened with extinction after Chuck and Drake both dropped like flies into the arms of monogamy.” River chuckled. ”You know, there’s no reason you and I couldn’t still do the cruise. Shoot, I give Tyler a call, round up some willing girls and it would be just like old times. Fun in the sun.”
Tyler was the second youngest Armstrong brother and worked as a firefighter in Los Angeles. Like River, he rarely passed on an opportunity to get down and dirty with a pretty girl.
Preston opened his mouth to accept, only to realize that the picture River was painting didn’t hold any appeal. Yesterday he would have jumped at a chance to spend some time with his brothers and a few fun-loving girls. Today, however, he wanted Gina. Only Gina.
“You know, I think I’ll take a raincheck. I need to clear my thoughts…”
“Nah, nothing is better to get over a bitch than a few more bitches. You need to get back in the saddle right away.”
“Thanks for the offer, but I’ll definitely pass,” Preston assured him.
“Uh…huh, you already covered that part? Those Italian girls do have quite a fame,” River insisted.
“I tell you, there’s no woman,” the moment he uttered those words, Preston felt like a lying scumbag. Which he was. Because there was a woman. She’d worked her way under his skin and then left him high and dry.
“Come on, this is me you’re talking to. Your partner in crime, remember?” River teased him. They knew each other too well to keep any secrets.
“Okay, okay. Found guilty. I thought a one night stand would help me get the anger out of my system…except now I can’t stop thinking about her.”
“Biggie. Man, you’re in trouble up to your eyeballs. Want me to reserve the boat for you and your new flame?” River asked. Preston wasn’t sure if he was joking or not.
“Nah. Thanks,” he said, but secretly he admitted the idea had merit. Just him and Gina…for an entire week…naked on the boat. Lust surged through h
is veins. “I gotta go. You tell everyone?”
“Sure will. Let me know when your plans change.”
“Take care,” Preston said and disconnected the call. Then he slid his legs over the edge of the bed and pondered how to find Gina and convince her to go for a repeat of last night.
Chapter 14
Gina woke up and cursed at the late hour. Class stared in thirty minutes and she felt like she could sleep for another ten hours. She got the coffee pot going while she jumped into the shower and put on the bare minimum of makeup. Then she pulled her hair into a loose ponytail, gave herself one last glance in the mirror and rushed out of the bathroom.
On her way out she tossed on a pair of worn jeans and a t-shirt, grabbed her shoulder bag and darted to the closest bus stop. Getting around the city without her Vespa would be a nuisance. But she couldn’t afford to miss class, not a mere two weeks before graduation exams. I’ll go see Roberto right after class and hopefully he’ll have the bike fixed.
Right besides the bus stop was a newspaper kiosk. She usually didn’t pay much attention to celebrity gossip, but while she waited for the bus, her eyes scanned the headlines of the glossy magazines. Until a particular cover picture caught her attention.
A gorgeous blonde woman hung to the arm of a handsome man. And the man looked just like – Preston. Horror, rage and shame fought for dominance and Gina wished for the earth to open and swallow her whole.
Instead she grabbed a few coins and bought the magazine. Then she jumped onto the approaching bus pressing the evidence against her chest, so nobody could see the picture. After peeping at the other passengers and making sure nobody looked, she opened the magazine and read the five-page article about the upcoming society event of the year.
American billionaire and owner of the prestigious Palazzo Borghese, Preston Armstrong has chosen the Eternal City of Rome to exchange wedding vows with his fiancé Sandrine Johnson.
The article went on and on about how invitations to this wedding were one of the most coveted things in the Roman society. Only personal friends and business partners receive this privilege.
The letters blurred and Gina ripped out the pages to crumple them. Her pulse raced with fury, but her heart felt as if someone had torn it apart. Gina’s hands shook violently as emotion rolled through her. That cheating bastard had played her for a fool.
“Merda!” she cursed and received a tsking sound together with a scalding glance from an elderly lady a few seats away.
She sank back into her seat and her mind devised a million and one ways to take revenge on Preston for having tricked her into sleeping with him. At the University, she stormed off the bus, still fuming. This day couldn’t get any worse.
She was wrong.
When Gina entered the classroom, small groups of students hovered around iPads and smart phones, ahhing and oohing over the newest sensation. The tension in the room was palpable and curiosity got the better of her. Gina grabbed her phone, wondering what piece of news everyone found so entertaining.
Seconds later she no longer had to wonder what she’d missed. Scrolling from one social media site to the next, the nausea she’d been feeling worsened. Gina swallowed hard to keep the rising bile where it belonged.
Her eyes almost popped out as yet another picture appeared in her feed. Oh. My. God. I know that man – and the woman.
On the photo Preston was shown entwined with a brown-haired woman wearing a shimmering midnight-blue dress. His hand cupped her butt and the dress had inched up to show way too much of her leg. My leg.
Gina slouched down in the desk, hoping no one had recognized her. At least the picture showed only her backside. If her parents saw these pictures of her in such a scandalous embrace, she’d never hear the end of it. Her mother and father were conservative to the bone and they might be able to forgive her the one-night stand, but not the fact that she was making out in public with a man, a soon-to-be-married man no less.
Gina wasn’t sure she could forgive herself, because she valued loyalty above all else. And even though he’d tricked her, she’d still slept with an engaged man.
Her face flamed red with shame as more and more pictures appeared in her feed showing Preston and her making out at the nightclub. They weren’t of a good quality, but good enough to sense the heat passing between the two of them. Gina shivered at the memory of his huge hand roving over her body, igniting every last cell with pure lust. See what your hormones have gotten you into?
So far the media didn’t know who she was and speculated about the beautiful stranger, who definitely wasn’t Preston Armstrong’s wife-to-be.
Gina cringed and was about to toss her phone with disgust into her bag, when yet another picture appeared, this time showing her face. All blood rushed from her face and she had to grasp onto the desk to stay upright. Sure enough, a pregnant silence ensued in the room and the next thing she heard were giggles and rushed whispering from a group of girls sitting three rows behind her.
“That’s her!" One of them pointed a finger in Gina’s directions direction.
“Yes. Look, it must be her. That’s so exciting,” another one all but shouted.
“We’re going to be famous,” the first one shrieked in excitement, hopping up and down on her seat.
“What’s her name? We need her name.”
For the second time in less than one hour Gina wished for the floor to open up and swallow her whole. She grabbed her bag and rushed from the room, barely avoiding to bump into the professor entering the room at the same time.
In the empty hallway, she paused, her heart beating furiously in her throat. What to do next?
Chapter 15
Preston had just exited the shower when he heard someone knocking on the outer door. Frowning, he grabbed a robe and headed for the door. “Yes?” he asked.
“Preston, it’s Ornella,” his manager answered, and he pulled the door open.
“Ornella? What is amiss?” He frowned at her. It was highly unusual for her to disturb him in his suite.
“There are reporters downstairs…” The way she wrung her hands gave her uneasiness away.
“Have security show them the door,” he answered, but something in her unreadable face alarmed him. There must be more to the story. “Exactly why are there reporters in the lobby?”
“Well… I’m sorry…” Ornella clasped her hands in front of her, avoiding eye contact with him.
“Sandrine went to the press. That’s just like her…” Preston’s stomach churned at the thought of the cheating bitch. But he could care less, what that despiteful woman had told the press. If they already knew about the cancelled wedding, better for him.
“No. Your fi…ex-fiancé isn’t the one in the pictures.”
“Pictures? What pictures?” Preston demanded, taking the newspaper she held out to him. “Damn it!”
“The reporters are beleaguering the hotel to get a statement from you. I have already doubled up security and instructed them to make sure no reporter enters the lobby. We have other guests… and it’s not in keeping with the image the Palazzo Borghese likes to portray,” Ornella explained.
Like always he had the situation under control, but Preston knew the press would wait like hungry wolves until they got what they wanted. His statement. Or Gina.
Hot and cold shivers shot up his spine. With the sudden turn of events he now was even more concerned with Gina’s reputation than his hotel’s.
“They won’t go away anytime soon,” Ornella’s soft voice reminded him.
“I know,” he growled at her. His brows furrowed he paced the room until her voice stopped him in his tracks.
“It’s not just the newspapers. It’s everywhere.” She showed him some of the social media sites on her tablet.
“Damn it! Why can’t they just let me live in peace?” Preston shouted.
“Most of the time, they do,” Ornella answered with a smile.
It was true. He usually kept a low profile and desp
ite being a billionaire, the press rarely harassed or even recognized him. They had more interesting targets to hunt down. The world was full of publicity-seeking heir, pretty princesses and scandalous actors. He continued to pace.
“We will hold a press conference later today,” he suggested as he came to a stand in front of his manager.
“And say what? They’ll want to know who the woman on the picture is. Even if you don’t it’s only a matter of time until someone recognizes Miss Giordano and then things will get very sticky for her.”
Preston couldn’t tell whether Ornella disapproved of him being together with Gina on the pictures or not. But then, it didn’t matter. She was his employee, she had no right to judge him.
“You’re right.” His shoulders slumped. “What shall we do?”
“First we have to get rid off the reporters and send them on a wrong track,” she answered.
“How?” Preston sank down on the coach. Gina will hate me.
“I’ll call Monica Russo, the hotel’s publicist, she’ll know,” Ornella said and reached for her phone.
“Put her on loudspeaker,” Preston said and gestured for her to come into the sitting room while she made the call. The publicist answered on the first call and after exchanging some pleasantries she cut right to the chase.
“I’ve been expecting your call. This is a publicity disaster for the hotel. But I’ve already designed a plan—“
“Wait.” Preston interrupted her. “It’s not how the press is delivering the story. Miss Johnson and I broke up yesterday morning, before I met…Gina for the first time.”
“Ohh.” Monica said and paused for a while. “That does change things, I’ll have to come up with a different statement.
“We thought about holding a press conference this afternoon,” Preston said as he leaned forward to speak into the cell phone lying on the coffee table.
“Excellent idea. I have 250 reporters on my shortlist. I reckon you don’t want to hold the conference in the hotel?”
“No.” Ornella and Preston said with one voice.
