The Bad Boys of Eden

by Avery Aster

  I’m semi-turned on just thinking about the dancer, so I can only imagine how Tal feels. I tug him in the direction of the private elevator and the attendant recognizes us. Within seconds we’re aboard and the elevator is on its way to the penthouse suite.

  I sigh with great exaggeration. “That man of yours has a body to die for.”

  With my arm linked through his, Tal tells me to keep my mouth shut by pinching the tender skin of my upper arm. It’s hard not to snicker. I know I’m being bad, but I can’t help it. Teasing Tal is so crazy easy.

  Once we get off the elevator and the doors close behind us, Tal turns to me. “Please. Do not speak of, ‘my man’, in front of anyone. Even the help.”

  The help?

  Honestly. Despite how well we get along, sometimes I forget how different my life is from Tal’s. While I grew up in a series of foster homes, he grew up in a palace—an actual palace—with hordes of servants. He's got half a dozen palatial residences around the world. I have no residence—well, apart from a vacation home in Greece I haven't visited since I bought it.

  Not that I don't have enough socked away to afford a place or three of my own. Still, Tal has way more money than me. He’s probably got more than the GDP of a good number of nations.

  He also has an enormous family to answer to.

  The only person I answer to is myself.

  Not only is it hard to imagine living his life, it’s hard to relate. So, when he exhibits this sense of entitlement—as he is right now—I retaliate the only way I know how.

  “I promise,” I say, drawing a cross over my heart, “If you let me have a glimpse of Alejandro, you know, up close and personal, sans clothing, I will be good.”

  “No.”

  “You’re so greedy,” I complain as he opens the door to the suite.

  With the door open, I can hear soft, classical music playing and a husky voice calls out, “Tala? Is that you?”

  “Yes,” Tal replies. He steps in front of me, facing me while turning his back to the open doorway.

  “What?”

  He regards me with one part snootiness and two parts lusty impatience. “Promise me you’ll behave.”

  “Of course I will. I’m just teasing. You know that.”

  “I know.” He smiles, but it looks tight. Then he glances quickly into the suite behind him. “This is such a…delicate matter.”

  I pat his chest, trading in my mischievousness for solemnity. “I know. I’ll keep my end of the bargain, I promise.”

  He takes a deep breath and his shoulders relax. This time when he smiles, it’s legit and not the practiced one he’s been using all night. Reaching into his coat pocket, he removes his billfold and from inside takes out a slip of paper. “Here, you can use this at the casino. I’ll text you when it’s safe to return.”

  I glance at the slip and nearly choke on my spit. “Are you kidding me?” I wave the slip in his face. “Tal, I’m doing this as a favor. You don’t need to pay me. And even if you did? This is excessive.” I press the draft for fifty thousand euros back into his hand.

  He takes the slip and then my clutch and deposits the draft inside. “You are my girlfriend—for all intents and purposes—so you must act like my girlfriend at all times.” With fingers beneath my chin, he tilts my face up. “That means no flirting, Miss Savage.” He tweaks my nose. “I know that will be difficult for you. But I can’t have people thinking my girlfriend is out flirting with other men while I’m up in my suite working.”

  I place a hand over my heart in mock indignation. “Me? Flirt? I can’t believe you’d say such a thing.”

  His response is a single arched brow.

  “Okay. Okay. No flirting for a couple more days.”

  “Three days, Tess. Three.” He holds up three fingers. “No drinks with men. No talking intimately with men. I don’t even want you looking at men. Do you understand?”

  “Yes, master,” I say, doing an exaggerated bow.

  Luckily, Tal’s sense of humor has returned and he laughs.

  I grin back. “Look,” I say, straightening his necktie, “I told you I’d help you and I will. Besides, I’m off men at the moment.”

  He catches my hand against his chest. His eyes narrow. “No women either. I know you, Tessa Savage. No cock and no pussy.”

  I groan. “Well, that’s no fun.” Going up on tiptoes, I kiss his cheek. “I promise I’ll be good.” I glance over his shoulder at the half-open door. “Now, you’ve got a very hot dancer in there who has been waiting patiently for you. Go have some fun.” I hold up my clutch. “I’m going to see how long it takes me to lose this money of yours.”

  “Take your time.”

  “Might not be as long as you think. I’ve got a terrible poker face, or so I’m told.”

  He squeezes my hand. “Thank you, Tessa.”

  * * *

  I’m not sure what Talal thinks he owes me. I’m pretty sure fifty thousand euros is more than enough payment for the minor favor of pretending to be his girlfriend for a long weekend. But then, I don’t know what it’s like to come from a wealthy fundamentalist Muslim family and to be gay and trying desperately to hide it. So perhaps in Tal’s world, fifty thousand is nothing. Of course I can’t forget the oodles of dough he spent on my wardrobe, our meals, and the fact that last night I was whisked away for a full spa treatment that went until the wee hours—amazing what people will do when you drop a wad of cash—in order to give Tal and Alejandro some alone time in the suite after the ballet. Tonight our cover is that Tal has to work and I’m pretending to be the bored girlfriend spending money in the casino.

  So that’s where I head, back down to the lobby and a short walk across the Avenue de Monte Carlo to the Casino de Monte Carlo. Though I am accustomed to working with large sums of money, I’m not particularly used to carrying them around—vestiges of my unsettled youth, I guess—and I automatically feel guilty, like the money isn’t mine. Which, of course, it isn’t. Maybe that’s what’s making me feel weird. I don’t typically accept thousands of dollars from friends as gifts.

  However, the man behind the cage doesn’t seem fazed by my flushed features as he scrutinizes my passport photo with a detached expression, not even batting an eye at the sum on the money draft Tal gave me, which is perhaps even more revealing than the actual sum. He doesn’t give me chips, but rather assigns me a private cashier, whose name is Olivier. While I wait for Olivier to arrive, I take in the opulent surroundings—yellow marble with massive pillars topped in gold leaf, a stained glass ceiling and frescoes painted by masters. Coming from America, where casinos are all lights, glitz and noise, this place is more like a museum or an art gallery. I feel like I need to speak in hushed tones and should be wearing one of those headsets for a self-guided tour of the place.

  The cathedral-like atmosphere of the casino is soothing and by the time Olivier appears and directs me to a private salon, I am feeling ready for whatever the evening has in store. Once we pass the security at the entrance, it’s like we’ve entered a different world. Quieter. Posher. Watchful. The private salon is all done in dark wood and gold. Relief carvings decorate the arched ceiling where massive chandeliers hang. Tal brought me here last night but we didn’t stay very long, just long enough for him to play a few rounds of roulette so he would be ‘seen with me’ before we headed up to our room to allegedly ‘get it on’.

  “Where would you like to start?” Olivier uses his chin to sweep the room.

  I glance around at the tables. The only games I recognize are roulette and blackjack. While I sort of played roulette last night—Tal played for me while I fawned over him—the last time I played blackjack was for body shots with a smokin’ hot cowboy and I lost nearly every round. Checking out the patrons in the salon, these folks don’t look like the body shot crowd. The women are all wearing the kind of gowns that make me realize the ten grand Tal dropped on my form-fitting Vera Wang was not excessive after all. There’s a gorgeous Italian heiress who’s wea
ring a gown that I’m pretty sure is studded with real diamonds. All the men are in tuxes or expensive versions of formal attire from their home countries. I’m surrounded by a veritable United Nations of Who’s Who and I recognize the CEO of Toyota sitting at a blackjack table across from an oil baron from Russia whose name escapes me at the moment

  “What are these games?” I point to the tables I don’t recognize.

  “Punto Banco and Chemin de Fer. Are you familiar with either? They are similar to Baccarat.”

  “No, I’m not familiar with them.” I glance around the room again, feeling a little lost. “Maybe we can watch first.”

  Tilting his head in that mannerism that is strictly French, he says, “In here there is no watching. You must play or sit at the bar.” He indicates the private bar with a nod.

  There is only one man sitting at the bar and he is surrounded by a knot of women. All young, slim, model-esque girls. Our eyes meet and he lifts his glass in my direction like we know one another. A trickle of cold air runs down my bare back as I narrow my eyes at him. The words, ‘someone just walked over your grave’ whisper inside my head.

  I have an irrational urge to go over to the bar, shoo the girls away and take a seat. My fingers twitch with the illogical desire to run my hands over the man’s tux, to feel the heat from his muscular chest, the one I know is hiding beneath all that formal wear. To relieve him of his bowtie…

  “Mademoiselle?” Olivier breaks the strange trance I’m in by repeating his question about where I’d like to start.

  Averting my eyes from the gaze of the man across the room, I turn toward Olivier. “How about roulette?”

  “As you wish.”

  We make our way to one of two roulette tables and Olivier talks quietly as we go. “The minimum for outside bets is one hundred euros and five hundred for inside bets. One thousand maximum for outside, ten thousand for inside.”

  I nod absently, thinking about my reaction to the man at the bar. Despite the weird sense of familiarity at the sight of him, we’ve never met. Yet I know exactly who he is.

  Christophe Chevalier, heir to the De Rossi fortune.

  The word playboy comes to mind.

  I shudder involuntarily.

  I’m sure the reason I felt some kind of awareness of him is because I just read about him on the plane during the flight to Monaco. According to Hello! Magazine, he’s Europe’s most eligible bachelor, but that little detail has no effect on me.

  None whatsoever.

  Honest.

  Even if Talal’s voice wasn’t in my head reminding me of my promise to stay away from men, I would not be interested in Monsieur Chevalier. Not even if I was in the mood for a handsome French playboy, which I’m not.

  As a business analyst who travels the world and is contracted by some of the largest corporations and wealthiest people, I am very familiar with his type. Entitled. Arrogant. Demanding.

  No thank you.

  “How much would you like converted to chips?” Olivier asks once we’re situated at a roulette table.

  “Twenty thousand?”

  He nods, turns, and whispers in French. I suddenly notice the inconspicuous ear bud he’s wearing. Within minutes, a casino employee shows up with a tray of chips and gives it to Olivier. Once the croupier—the guy who spins the roulette wheel—finishes his latest payout, he looks up, nods and says, “Bonsoir, mademoiselle.”

  “Bonsoir.”

  I study the table and try to remember what Tal did last night. I think he put five hundred on red. I do the same and then glance at Olivier for confirmation that I’m not making some roulette faux pas. His nod is nearly imperceptible. When no one corrects me and the croupier spins, I figure I’m okay.

  The ball bounces up and down in and out of slots until finally the wheel slows. Unlike places like Vegas and Atlantic City, the people surrounding the table do not cheer wildly or groan and pull their hair, they simply nod their heads and continue whatever conversation they were having as the croupier places the marker on the winning number and clears the table of chips. I’m so perplexed by the lack of emotion, I don’t notice that my pile of chips isn’t cleared but is added to.

  I won…I guess.

  The croupier calls for bets and I point to the part on the table that says Passe. Olivier places my bet and the ball starts rolling. People are still placing bets—which I’d forgotten you can do in roulette—until the croupier says, “Rien ne va plus.” Repeating himself in English—in that emotionless bored voice of high stakes dealers—he says, “No more bets.”

  I go on like this, making outside bets, winning more often than losing until my pile of chips almost doubles. I pull my smart phone from my clutch and check the time. Only an hour and a half has passed. Suppressing a yawn, I make my next bet.

  It’s going to be a long night.

  “You’ll never win big unless you bet big,” a deep, accented voice says from slightly behind me.

  I know who it is before I turn around, dammit.

  Christophe Chevalier.

  Chapter Two

  Groaning inwardly because I’m not sure I’m up to the challenge of facing the instant connection I seem to have with this man, I cast a glance over my shoulder.

  Not only is Christophe Chevalier wealthy, he is—unfortunately—extremely handsome. This bothers me on an unnamed level, somewhere between frustration and acute longing.

  Bastard.

  His tux fits him so fucking perfectly, showing off broad shoulders and a narrow waist, it makes me want to slap him. Or possibly kiss him. His dark, wavy hair is on the long side yet he’s managed to style it in a way that looks well-coiffed while still appearing as if you could run your fingers through it, and it’d be soft.

  Not helping, stupid hair.

  His jaw is strong and closely shaven, yet there’s a shadow that tells me by morning he’d have that lovely stubble that I find so deliciously masculine.

  This aggravates the hell out of me.

  Then there are his lips. Full. Sexy. Made for kissing—for fuck’s sake—and turned up in a way that says he knows it. Oh hell, he knows it very well.

  Finally, there are his eyes. Cobalt blue surrounded by dark lashes. Heavy lidded. Sinful. Teasing. Bedroom-fucking-eyes.

  Jesus.

  I tilt my head in the off-hand mannerism of the French that I have just adopted this very second. “Who says I want to win big?”

  “Doesn’t everyone?”

  “I don’t know,” I reply, turning my attention back to the table. “I make a point not to speak for everyone.”

  My attempt to snub the man fails. He moves closer to my side and whispers, “Then it is as I suspected.”

  “What’s that?”

  “You are unlike anyone I have met.”

  I don’t reply because there is no point. A pickup line is a pickup line and I am oh-so-not-fooled by them, it doesn’t matter how fancy the suit, how kissable the lips and how much one’s eyes say, come fuck me. Not even when his voice speaks to a secret part of me that seems to recognize him.

  Neither am I impressed by the amount of cash a person drops on the table in front of me.

  Which is exactly what Christophe does.

  Seconds before the croupier calls, “no more bets,” Christophe sets a pile of chips on the line between number twenty-two and twenty-three. The ball bounces a few more times before landing in the twenty-two slot. I don’t need to know much about the game to know he’s just won big. I try to do my best to emulate those around me and to look bored about the fact that he’s now got a zillion times more chips than he had before.

  I totally don’t care whether the man wins big or not.

  Okay, I may be gritting my teeth…a teeny bit.

  But, I’m no sissy when it comes to men like Christophe Chevalier. The fact I am uber aware of his presence makes me want to prove how much his presence does not affect me. So we continue to play—side-by-side, but in silence at least, thank God—me always making safe b
ets, for some reason winning more often than losing while Christophe continues to make risky bets, losing more often than winning.

  However, when he wins, he wins big.

  Jerk.

  “Interesting choice,” he says, after I’ve placed my chips on the M12 position, hoping for the ball to drop in the middle dozen numbers.

  “Thank-you,” I say. Not exactly sure why.

  He waits for the croupier to spin the ball before calling, “Dix-sept complet.” Then he pushes an enormous pile of chips onto the table.

  The croupier repeats Christophe’s wager and then places a special marker on number seventeen on the table. He gives that French nod to the table inspector who counts the chips—forty blue chips, I know this because I count along with him.

  Blue chips are ten thousand euros. Forty chips means four hundred thousand euros.

  Holy shit.

  My curiosity gets the better of me. “What does dix-sept complet mean?”

  Christophe steps closer so he can speak softly in my ear. It tickles—in a nice way.

  Dammit!

  “It is every inside bet that involves the number seventeen. Straight-up, four splits, a street, four corners two six-lines. I placed the maximum number of chips for each.”

  The ball continues to bounce and my curiosity is stronger than ever. Almost as strong as Christophe’s aftershave—which I wish was overpowering but isn’t.

  It’s enticing.

  Ugh!

  “What’s the payout?” I ask, breathing in deeply as I lean toward him.

  “If the ball lands on seventeen, the payout is three million nine hundred and twenty thousand euros.”

  I turn slowly. My gaze tracks from the bowtie on his tux up his chiseled jaw to his eyes. They sparkle with amusement.

  Sinful.

  Sexy.

  Too damn sexy for his own good.

  Or for mine.

  “That’s big,” I say a little out of breath.

  He tilts his head, a small smile playing about his full lips.

  My mouth returns the smile without my permission and I spin around to watch the table in order to stop looking and smiling at Christophe.