My Italian Prince: Clean Romance

by Jasmin Jacobs

  Alex looked relieved, took his phone up again, and dialed Brunetti.

  “Just a second babe, I’ll be right back to you and that chocolate cake,” he blinked at her and went up to make his call.

  “That was quick,” Vanessa said as Alex approached just a few minutes later. “What did he want?”

  Alex sat down on the chair next to hers, he playfully took her spoon, and fed her some of the chocolate.

  “I have to go, Vanessa. Trust me when I say I don’t want to but I have no choice. It’s regarding Mitch. Apparently, he’s had some sort of breakdown at the facility over in the states and he’s ushering me to sign some legal documents stating I will be making all decisions regarding his medical situation in case he ends up on life support.”

  “Life support?” Vanessa was shocked. Was Mitch in such a bad state he was considering suicide?

  “I’m sure this is just one of these times when Mitch is being over dramatic, but I must sign the papers otherwise he will never calm down and might even run off from the program.”

  “I’ll take my car and drive down to Nice tonight. I’ll be back in a few hours. You can finish up your dessert and walk back to the B & B and I’ll be back in time to tuck you in,” Alex winked and placed his hands around her waist.

  “Hmm, I guess I have nothing to say on this matter,” Vanessa said in a low voice, afraid if she spoke louder, he would hear how angry she was. She knew it was wrong of her and maybe even childish to be jealous of Mitch and Alex friendship. However, she couldn’t help it. He would do anything for that man, but he would he do the same for her? She must learn to trust him. If he says he loves me, he does, she said to herself in her head as she gave Alex a kiss and told him she would wait up for him.

  Alex looked pleased and headed out of the restaurant.

  “Drive safe,” Vanessa called out after him.

  “The faster I’ll go the faster I’ll be back,” Alex answered, winked an eye at her and blew her an air-kiss. “Love you babe, and see you soon. Don’t eat all of that cake now,” and with a smile he was gone.

  Vanessa rested her back at the chair and sighed. Well, here she was again. Full of strange thoughts about Alex not being as truthful to her as he should be, but why? Had he ever lied to her? Yes, he had actually and that was the case, she couldn’t forget about it no matter how hard she tried. It had been for her own good when Alex had pretended to dump her and then convincing her boss at the hospital to sign her off to go with him as his personal nurse to France. He had later confessed he had been in no need of any medical staff and the reason to bring her was just to be alone with her and get her away from the hospital. Brunetti had put him in that situation when he had threatened to tell the hospital about their love affair and in order to protect her from being fired he promised Brunetti to break up with her. It had all been a fraud and as soon as they were on his private jet on their way to Cannes, Alex had told her all about it. She couldn’t forget her pain, though. She had felt a pain in her heart she almost thought was physical, but she understood it was just her heart aching for Alex. She had been devastated.

  However, it wasn’t only that. She had a hard time not thinking about Alex past as a playboy, hitting all the nightclubs around the world with Mitch and Victoria Secret Models in tow. If she were honest to herself, this was her main problem when it came to trusting him.

  Deep in thoughts Vanessa walked through the village to the B & B and for the first time she didn’t even noticed the beautiful stone buildings, the small antique boutiques, and the bakery where they used to buy fresh baguettes in the morning. It all had lost its shimmering filter somehow when Alex wasn’t there to coo over it with her. She felt alone and sad.

  Back at the B & B, Madame Dupont had made their bed with fresh linen that smelled of a lavender field. She felt exhausted, all her thoughts were tiring, and she lay her head on the pillow without even bother to undress. Alex would be back soon, he could get that honor she thought, and with a smile, she fell asleep.

  Slipping back and forth into sleep and consciousness Vanessa woke up, her head ached, and she felt confused. What time was it? Why did she have all her clothes on? She sat up to look for Alex when she remembered. He had gone off to Nice, he had been called in by Brunetti and interrupting their romantic dinner to head back to the city to sign papers for Mitch. But he should've been back by now? She reached for her cell to check the time. It was three in the morning.

  She felt a sudden hint of alarm in her belly as she dialed Alex´s number. It went straight to voicemail. What was happening, was he safe? What if he had been in an accident again? That’s how they had met. Please don’t make this be the universe pulling a joke on me ending this in an ironical way the same way it all started. Vanessa couldn't help but think the worse. She hated that she always did that, but it came so naturally to her it was a hard habit to let go. She had to call Brunetti. No matter how much she hated that man she had to. She dialed the number, no answer. Oh no, this wasn't happening how could this be?

  Vanessa was in tears as she stumbled down the stairs only to find Madame Dupont standing in the kitchen area. The old woman in just her nighties and a silk robe, her hair neatly placed on several curlers. She had swept a large shawl around her petite frame and looked quite happy as she stood blending a mix of milk and honey to a tall man sitting at the kitchen table.

  Vanessa halted in the door, not sure if she should approach or not. What if Madame Dupont had a lover and wanted to be alone with him? But as she turned around to leave the room without entering, the man at the table stood up.

  “Mademoiselle Green?”

  Vanessa looked at him, “Yes?”

  “I have a message for you from Mr. Di Savoy,” he said in a voice resembling one of the king's men in a 1600-century saga.

  “Yes?” she said impatiently.

  “Mr. Di Savoy has the great pleasure of inviting you to his yacht in the…”

  Was this a joke? Vanessa felt angry, why couldn't this man just get to the point?

  “Right,” Vanessa interrupted him. “So what you’re trying to say is that Alex is staying at his yacht tonight and wants me to go there?”

  “Pardon Mademoiselle, I have been ordered to make…”

  Vanessa almost jumped on her spot by impatience and she cut him short. “Yeah, yeah, I get it. I’ll just gather my stuff and I’ll come with you.”

  “Thank you, Mademoiselle.” The tall man said without even blinking at her dry tone. He just sat down on his chair and with a small nod at Madame Dupree, he finished the milk-and honey drink in about three slurps.

  As they drove back to Alex´s yacht in Monte Carlo, Vanessa tried to gather her thoughts. Something had obviously happened that had made Alex send for her. Probably he was just getting so late after he finished his meeting it was no point in driving back tonight. But still, why had he rushed a driver to St. Augustine to bring her back?

  It was a long drive for all her thoughts. At the point where she saw the harbor and all the boats, she had worked herself up into a state. What was going on? Could nothing just go smoothly around her and Alex? Why did it always have to be some drama messing things up? It was Brunetti, she was sure of it. He had always had a finger in the game when things went south in their relationship. Vanessa felt angry and she was fed up with this man trying to destroy what she and Alex had.

  When she got to the yacht, the staff greeted her as if she was a Queen, arriving back to her castle. However, she was too upset to appreciate any of the offered drinks and food, she had to find Alex.

  “Good morning gorgeous! How do you feel?” Alex voice met her in the corridor.

  What kind of question was that? How did he think I feel… Vanessa was too upset to answer him and instead she walked up to him and looked him straight in the eyes. He was hungover, no question about it, she could even smell the alcohol from his breath.

  “What have you been up to?” She asked, demanding an answer.

  “Take it easy, Va
nessa. Calm down!” Alex tried to put his arms around her, but she bolted out from his embrace.

  “Take it easy? Are you for real? I been up all night waiting for you to get back,” Vanessa was outraged, how could he just stand here pretending everything was fine when he was the one who went M.I.A for a whole night?”

  “Come on Baby, don’t be like this, Alex tried again,” I just slept in the other room to avoid waking you. We arrived quite late and you were already asleep and when Gian-Carlo told me you had a migraine, I had the staff prepare another room for me.”

  “I did not have a migraine. I never had one in my life, this is ridiculous, was it Gian-Carlo who told you that?”

  “Yes it was, but I don’t see the problem here? When I arrived in Nice last night and after I finished Mitch’s papers, you’d left a message for me, Gian-Carlos said. Saying you had a migraine and preferred to go back to the boat so you could see a doctor in the morning. He was really quite concerned about you Vanessa, and arranged to have you picked up. We had to eat something so we just went over to La Terrazza and had light dinner. Some friends happened to sit on the next table and invited us over. We stayed just for a short while before I left to go back here to see you.”

  Vanessa didn’t know what to believe. It was all confusing to her.

  “Well, first of all, I never called Gian-Carlo, I tried to call you but your phone was switched off when I couldn’t reach you I almost panicked by worry.”

  “I’m sorry about that, it seemed as if I forgot my phone at the office but since you had already talked to Gian-Carlo who said you just went to sleep as soon as you came onboard, I didn’t see the point in waking you up.” Alex looked as confused as Vanessa did.

  “I don’t understand why you would take Gian-Carlos word over mine,” Vanessa said her voice sounding all wobbly and she could feel tears in her eyes.

  “What are you talking about, Vanessa? I just wanted you to rest because of your migraine.” Alex sounded as confused as he looked.

  “I never had a migraine, that’s the whole point, don’t you get it?” Vanessa suddenly felt tired and she didn't have the strength to stand here arguing about something that had never occurred.

  “I think I’ll go to Monte-Carlo for a while, do some shopping, and calm down. Why don’t you go back to sleep? You look awful. I’ll be back around noon” Vanessa was eager to get off the yacht and be alone with her thoughts and perhaps she could figure out what was going on. Because something was up, that she was sure off.

  “Fine, if that’s what you want I’ll arrange for someone to take you,” Alex looked tired and even more hungover than a few minutes ago. “I’ll rest for a while and then I come in and meet you and we can go back to the village.”

  “Fine.” Vanessa quickly turned around not giving him a chance to embrace her.

  Without looking back Vanessa stormed out from the corridor and onto the deck, she found one of the boat-boys in the staff and asked him to take her to Monte-Carlo at once. She couldn't get of the yacht fast enough. She was angry and upset about all the confusion between her and Alex and she was sure Brunetti was the one behind it. Migraine? That was so low, he had obviously told Alex the lie so he could bring him along to the party.

  When she sat on the smaller boats and waited for the driver to get the engine started, she looked up at the boat and caught a glimpse of someone moving on the deck. She squinted her eyes to see better in the bright sunlight. It was Brunetti. He stood leaning on the fence on the top deck looking down on her as she left the yacht. She looked away, she didn't want to give him the pleasure of him seeing her this upset, it would only fulfill his evil plan. As the boat turned in the direction of the harbor, her eyes couldn’t resist her but going up to the deck where Brunetti stood, still not moving, just watching her. Then she saw it, his face turned into a grimace, his normally angry expression now had changed into what looked like an evil smirk. Even if the sun was shining and the temperature high, Vanessa suddenly felt cold and she shivered in the sun.

  Chapter 17

  Vanessa wandered the streets of Monte-Carlo in a state, with Brunetti's smirk still clear in her mind. She sighed, this man was such a pain. But of course, nothing ever came easy to her. Alex was the man of her dreams and she was thankful she’d found him but it certainly came with a hitch. Nothing came for free in this world, she’d learned that the hard way. If you succeed in one area, you had to sacrifice in another. It was almost ironic how everything in her life turned out the same way. She had the most adorable father, who stood by her side no matter what, but he’d be diagnosed with Alzheimer’s a few years ago, and was now in such a bad shape her mother wasn’t sure for how long she could take care of him at home. They had begun searching for a nursing home. She’d been one of the top students and athletes in school, but to the cost of good friends. She’d been pretty and quite popular with boys at school but because she was also independent, she soon got the reputation of being tied up.

  Enough dwelling Vanessa, she told herself. She sat down at a café, ordered an espresso, and leaned back in her seat. She would go back to the boat, talk to Alex, and force him to see Brunetti for who really was.

  She enjoyed her coffee and tried to shut out all negative thoughts when she overheard a conversation from the table right next to her, where they talking about Alex? She had a hard time understanding, as they spoke in French, but as she leaned towards them she saw they were both looking at a magazine spread one of them was holding up so her friend, and handy enough even Vanessa, could see. She stared at the spread from over the woman's shoulders and although it was in French, she could understand the words Scandal, cocaine, playboy-bunnies, and Alessandro Di Savoy. She leaned forward, she had to get a closer look at this. It had to be quite an old gossip magazine but Vanessa was still curious to see what it said about Alex. One of the women looked over her shoulder and saw Vanessa who by now almost had her face in between the two of them.

  “Pardon?” One of the women looked at Vanessa.

  “Oh, pardon,” Vanessa sat up straight and pretended to look in her purse as she continued to glare under one of the women's arm. Damn! She couldn’t see a thing.

  “Excuse me, but what magazine it that you’re reading?”

  “You want a look at it? The woman handed her the magazine with a smile. “You can have it.”

  “Oh, thanks,” Vanessa eagerly reached for the magazine and began flipping through the pages.

  Her jaw dropped and she gasped when she saw the picture of Alex, zoomed in so much you could hardly make out his face from all the pixels, but it was no question that it was him, and it was not an old pic, it was from yesterday. He had the same shirt on he’d had during their dinner and she knew this by the fact that she had been the one carefully ironing it for him in Madam Dupree’s kitchen the night before.

  He sat at a table surrounded by girls dressed, or rather non-dressed, in bikini tops all wearing bunny-ears. On another pic, zigzagged in over the other, were a white powder and a golden visa card laying on top of a table. On a third pic the card was zoomed in and the name on the card clearly visible. A. Di Savoy. Vanessa stared at the pictures so hard her eyes began hurting and her nose almost touched the paper. Not until the paper became wet from tears running down her face she tore the paper in half and threw it into her purse.

  She walked out from the café on autopilot. Out to the sunny crowded street, one foot in front of the other, just another tourist walking along. Except, she was different, she’d just lost the man of her dreams to a pile of cocaine and a bunch of Lingerie models wearing bunny ears. She couldn’t understand how it had happened. Her mind kept turning it over and over obsessively. Her thought felt like drum beats in her head. Why hadn’t she seen this coming? How could he’d been fooling her so completely? Vanessa wanted to wake up and find it was all a bad dream, it had all happened in a movie. It had happened to someone else. That it was a story she had read in the gossip section and she would feel agog thanking her lucky s
tar it wasn’t her. Nevertheless, it was her. It was all over. Alex and her were over. Vanessa’s breaths were getting shorter, her head felt dizzy. She felt as if she was being smothered. Was she having a panic attack? She sat down on a bench and waited for it to pass, prayed for it to pass.

  “Ok, I’m not feeling better. I’m feeling worse,” Vanessa said out loud to herself after a while and suddenly jumped in terror as her phone vibrated in her pocket. She pulled it out and gave it a look. It was Alex. She couldn’t talk to him, she couldn’t talk to anybody, not right now.

  A moment later, the phone told her that she had a new message. Looking at the display, she scrolled down to read it.

  “Vanessa! Where are you baby? I’m waiting for you. Love you. Alex.”

  She almost wanted to burst into tears. But... she wouldn’t! “Love you?” How could he say that after humiliating her like this? She thrusted her phone in her purse and got to her feet again. She began walking faster and faster, weaving through the pedestrians, ignoring the strange looks she got. Her head was pounding and she had no idea where she was going, but she just couldn’t stop walking. She wanted to flee. Vanessa walked in what felt like hours. With her head in a daze, her feet had moved on their own along the sidewalk. The sun was beating down and after a while, her head started to throb. At some point here mobile vibrated again but she ignored it. At last, when her legs had started to ache, she slowed down and came to a halt. Her mouth was dry, she was totally dehydrated, she needed water. She looked up and around trying to figure out her location. Somehow, she’d seemed to have reached the Marina. Of all places! She’d been walking up and down the steep streets of Monte-Carlo, just to end up at the harbor, almost on the same spot where the boat-boy had dropped her off earlier that morning.