by K D Grace
‘Paulo, this is Jim.’ The man didn’t take time for niceties. ‘Someone’s stolen the formulas for the new line. Police have taken Liza Calendar to the station. They caught her at the airport.’
Paulo exploded. ‘What the fuck do you mean they caught her at the airport? You can’t really believe she’d do such a thing! That’s bullshit and you know it!’
‘What the hell? Are you out of your fucking mind!’ Rita yelled into the phone before Paulo could shush her. She immediately pulled up her BlackBerry and he could hear her calling the Martelli lawyers.
Jim heaved a hard-put-upon sigh into Paulo’s ear. ‘I know how you feel about her, Paulo, but all the evidence points to her. Who else could have done it? And why would she have slunk away to the airport without telling anyone if she didn’t? She had us all fooled and –’
Paulo hung up on him, and motioned Rita to follow. ‘I don’t know who it,’ he said, ‘but I know as sure as I know my own face in the mirror that she didn’t.’
‘I’m calling Mom,’ Rita said. ‘She needs to know what’s going on.’ Paulo was already out the door with Rita right behind him.
Chapter Twenty-six
It probably wasn’t the smartest thing to do in a police station, but it sure as hell felt good to land a fist in the middle of Jim’s smug face. Rita made no attempt to stop him, but then Paulo figured he’d beaten her to the punch by microseconds. Jim waved off the police and wiped his bloodied nose on a white handkerchief. ‘I’m sorry, Paulo, but it is what it is.’ He stepped back as he said it, putting a little more space between him and his boss. Rita growled at him, and he took another step back for safety. Just then Coraline walked in and, Paulo could swear, the whole police station went quiet with her arriving like the queen of the world in her usual haute couture, looking as good in the evening as she did in the morning. All heads always turned, and he was sure more than a few knees were tempted to bend. She took in Jim’s bloody nose and Paulo’s fist and gave her daughter a hug. ‘You took the Martelli jet from London?’ She asked.
Rita nodded. ‘Might as well, it was there, wasn’t it?’
‘That’s what I left it for.’
Coraline turned to Paulo, her arm still around Rita’s shoulders, and gave him the smile of a woman in control. ‘The lawyers are with her, and she should be released …’ she looked down at her watch ‘… any minute now.’ The Martellis were a formidable lot, and Paulo was proud to be considered a part of the family. ‘You,’ Coraline focused a withering gaze on Jim Dryer, ‘are a very poor judge of character, Mr Dryer. I’m very disappointed.’
Before he could do more than make a couple of fish gasps, the door opened and Liza was escorted through by Martelli’s lawyer, the legendary Mr Serrano, not one of the underlings, but the main man himself. Rita or Coraline, whoever had gotten there first, had called in the big guns, a sign that Liza was of value to the whole Martelli family.
Liza’s eyes ignited as her gazed locked on Paulo. She stepped back and slapped his arms away when he tried to hug her. ‘They arrested me at the airport. At the airport! In front of everyone, Paulo, and all I’m guilty of is helping you find a formula for your damned perfume.’
‘I know that, Liza. You’ve done nothing wrong. We all know you didn’t do it. It was a stupid mistake, you being brought here.’ He shot Jim an incinerating glance. It was all he could do not to pull her into his arms and hold her until she stopped fighting him. Rita gave his hand a reassuring squeeze. He still held Liza’s gaze. ‘I’m so, so sorry. I don’t know what happened, but I’m sure as hell going to find out.’
When she saw Rita take his hand, she softened slightly and gave him half a nod of acknowledgment, then she bit her lip and swallowed a shaky breath. ‘If you take me to the lab now, I can find out for you. Who took the formulas, I mean.’ She touched her nose. ‘If the police haven’t contaminated the scene too much.’
‘Oh for fuck sake! You can’t be serious,’ Jim said. But he raised his hand and moved back out of range when Rita took a step in his direction, fists clenched. Coraline was already on her BlackBerry calling the lab to tell the police to take a break. As if anyone would argue with Coraline Martelli. Then she slid her arm around Liza and nodded toward the door. ‘Don’t worry, darling. We’ll get this sorted out.’
Paulo had driven the Land Rover to the police station with every intention of bringing Liza home with him, but when he opened the door for her to get in next to him, she ignored it and got into the back with Rita. ‘Liza, you’ve got to know that I wouldn’t, that I didn’t –’
Rita shook her head and slipped her arm around her friend. ‘Not now, Paulo. Just get us there.’
His heart twisted. He hoped, God he prayed, that Liza could smell how he felt. He didn’t have to scent her to know how hurt and betrayed she had to be, and he would give anything to make it all better for her.
When they arrived at the research facility, it was dark. Coraline had a driver deliver her to the police station and then on to the research facility. Paulo neither knew nor cared how Jim had gotten there. Every time he saw the man, he fought the urge to punch him again. At the facility, everyone had long since gone home except for the police, who were now all congregated in the break room having coffee.
The click, click of their shoes echoed in the empty hallway as they moved toward the labs where the scents had been stored. Paulo didn’t have to listen to know that Liza was already sniff-sniffing. She’d started in the break room, and he figured it was so she could separate the scents of the policemen from the scents that were there before. He tried to catch her gaze before he punched in the code to open the door, but she kept her eyes forward, concentrating.
Once they were inside, the door slid shut behind them and he motioned them all to stay back, knowing that she wouldn’t want their scents, and the emotions, of which there were a lot right now, to interfere with the smells that were left in the room. They all watched her, holding their collective breath, as she walked around the lab sniffing, then cocking her head, then sniffing and closing her eyes. She was fierce. God, she was fierce! When she was like this, with her nose leading the way, she was breathtaking. She was wild and untouchable. But she had certainly touched him, more deeply than he would have ever thought possible, and God, he wanted to believe that he had returned the favour. He wanted her to trust him again, to be with him again, as no one else ever had.
In the middle of the room she stopped, stood dead still, closed her eyes, and inhaled deeply. The look on her face went from questioning to a deep frown.
‘What is it?’ Coraline said in half a whisper. ‘What do you smell?’
She opened her eyes and looked at the Martelli matriarch. ‘Does Vera have access to this room?’
‘Not that I know of,’ Coraline replied.
All eyes were suddenly on Jim. ‘I brought her in here, yes, but I had permission, and I was with her.’ He thrust his hands on his hips. ‘Oh come on, you can’t really believe –’
‘Shut up, Jim,’ Paulo and Rita said at the same time. All eyes were back on Liza.
She sniffed again and moved around the room. ‘You were in here with her, yes, I can smell that. But that’s an older scent, faint. When was that?’
‘Two days ago. Surely you can’t –’
She shook her head and raised her hand. ‘You, yes, you were in here with her two days ago. I can smell that, but her. She’s been her more recently. She smells like wet vegetation. She smells different.’ Liza shook her head again as though she were clearing away spider’s webs. ‘At first, I can smell lust. Hers and yours.’
Jim blushed and shifted from foot to foot.
Liza continued without noticing, or probably caring, about his discomfort. ‘But there’s more. Cinnamon curiosity and … deception, like sour milk.’
‘Oh give me a break,’ Jim said. Though this time he didn’t sound so sure.
‘But the scent of her the second time is different. There’s fear, along with the deception
. There’s excitement.’
‘This is ridiculous,’ Jim said. ‘Look I know you don’t like her, but this is just too much.’
Her gaze turned on him. ‘I like her just fine. I just don’t like the way she smells.’
‘There’s nothing wrong with the way she –’
‘Shut up, Jim,’ Paulo repeated.
Rita erupted like a Vesuvius. ‘This is my best friend you’re talking to, you asshole.’ Then she turned her attention to her mother. ‘How the hell could Martelli hire such an idiot? He brings the woman he’s fucking in here, in a place she wasn’t supposed to be and –’
‘I had permission, and all of the evidence points to her.’ Jim stabbed a finger in the air toward Liza and the room erupted in chaos just as Paulo’s BlackBerry rang.
‘Hey, bro,’ Angelo’s voice filled his ear. ‘You know that little research project you had me on?’
Paulo covered the phone, made a shrill whistle with his fingers in his mouth, and the room went silent. ‘Go on,’ he said into the device.
‘Well, the connection with Liza to Blain may be documented, but it looks to me like it might be the connection with a Vera Bellini you need to be checking out. She works for Martelli, right?’
‘Yes.’ Paulo switched the device to speaker. ‘Go on.’
‘Claims she has a degree in chemistry?’
‘That’s right,’ Jim said.
There was a grunt and a curse on Angelo’s end of the conversation. ‘Well, there is no degree in chemistry. I checked her out. She’s had an on again off again relationship with Blain for ten years, and whenever Blain pulls a dirty buy-out, she’s never far away.’
Suddenly Jim looked a little green around the gills, as he grabbed onto the counter for support.
‘Bro?’ Angelo said, sensing the tension in the air. ‘What’s going on?’
‘Someone’s stolen the formulas from the lab, and I think you might have just found our culprit.’
‘She hasn’t been answering her phone.’ Jim’s voice was barely audible. ‘I thought maybe she was just busy. I … I didn’t think it was strange that she kept wanting to see the research facility. I mean it’s an interesting place.’ His mouth was a hard line. Paulo didn’t want to know what was going through his head at the moment, and as much as he deserved it, he couldn’t help but feel sorry for the dumb bastard.
‘She’s probably on her way to the airport,’ Angelo said. They could all hear the tapping of computer keys over his phone. ‘Yup! Blain’s private jet is there and due to depart in … an hour.’
Paulo didn’t want to know how Angelo got his information. He was just glad he did.
Coraline was already calling the police.
‘This time,’ Rita said, slipping an arm around her friend, ‘maybe they’ll get the right person.’
‘If Blain gets those formulas, and we’ve got nothing more to go on than Ms Calendar’s sense of smell, then he can pretty much do what he wants,’ Jim said, unable to meet Liza’s gaze, or anyone else’s for that matter. ‘As heavily invested as Martelli is in this project, a hostile takeover is pretty much a given.’
Coraline clucked her tongue. ‘Oh there was not going to be any hostile takeover, Jim, darling, in spite of your stupidity.’
‘What? How can that be?’ Jim looked as though he was about to pass out. ‘I know how much money Martelli invested in those scents, and it was a lot. A helluva lot.’
‘Oh I know exactly how much money it was.’ Coraline took out her compact and powdered her nose. ‘But you don’t have a clue of the depth of Martelli’s resources. You haven’t been here long enough to understand.’ She snapped the compact shut and stuffed it back in her bag. ‘Carl Blain is no more likely to succeed at a hostile takeover of Martelli than his father was in his attempt back when I was the new CEO. You see, Jim, Martelli is family owned with deep pockets. Very deep pockets.’
‘I don’t understand,’ he managed.
‘Martelli’s family is worldwide. Oh for heaven sakes,’ she said when she saw the direction his mind was headed. ‘Not mafia, though there are times when I suppose it might feel that way. The Mount, you silly man. The Mount is worldwide, and The Mount has been heavily invested in Martelli for, well for as long as there’s been a Martelli. Carl Blain couldn’t have touched us even if he had stolen the formulas.’ She looked at Paulo. ‘The right formulas, I mean.’
‘Wait a minute.’ Jim’s eyes darted to Paulo, then to Coraline and back again. ‘What do you mean the right formulas?’
‘In spite of your stupidity, Jim,’ Paulo said, his eyes locked on Liza, who looked as though she were in shock, ‘I can promise the formulas are quite safe. Surely you didn’t think I’d risk all of Liza’s hard, brilliant work, did you?’
There was a murmur among the troops. Liza shifted slightly and half whispered, ‘I don’t understand.’
‘You sneezed the other day while we were here, remember? That was after Jim told me Carl Blain might be planning something.’ He stepped closer and risked life and limb by touching her arm. When she didn’t pull away, his pulse danced against his throat. ‘Do you really think I’d risk all of your hard work, all of your brilliant efforts, knowing that bastard was around?’ He shrugged. ‘Granted, I didn’t know about Vera, but I still wasn’t taking a risk. Blain can do what he wants with the formulas that were stolen from here. They aren’t worth anything without our secret ingredient, and the only samples that have that secret ingredient are locked away somewhere safe. We’d never leave them here in the lab unprotected.’
Liza’s knees went loose and this time she allowed Paulo to slip his arms around her. ‘Then you mean …’ She swallowed hard, unable to finish her sentence, and her eyes misted slightly.
‘I mean I know you, Liza Calendar. I know your scent. Weren’t you the one who told me that the nose never lies?’
Chapter Twenty-seven
A Week Later
Liza chuckled as she got onto the lift in Bernini Place, checking the text from Coraline. Apparently a very repentant Jim Dryer was taking his much-deserved punishment from Fidelia, though Coraline worried that they were both enjoying it way too much. Still, the man made a mistake, and men often think with their cocks. It was biology. All things considered, everyone was convinced that it wouldn’t happen again.
Like his father before him, Carl Blain had made the fatal mistake of underestimating Coraline Martelli. It was a mistake he’d not get the chance to make again. Coraline had connections, powerful connections, and very, very old money. Carl’s plane was grounded and the missing scents were found. Even though they were useless, the plot was exposed along with the break-in in order to get the scents, and there were enough people who knew about the hostile takeover plans that the plot was obvious. As much as the new line had cost Martelli, it was nothing compared to the expense Carl Blain had gone to in order to try and guarantee his success where is father had failed. Blain Holdings was ruined, and Carl would be doing time. High Rising magazine had way more of a story than it had bargained for, and there was an influx of new advertisers. Addie was already looking to hire a couple of people and Liza would then become the silent partner – the one with the Nose. She smiled to herself. The fact that Carl had actually planned to use Liza in his scheme when he found out she would be doing a story on Martelli Fragrance showed how little he knew about her. She was never the type who went all starry-eyed over celebrities and important people. She trusted her nose, and as she approached the door to her flat, her nose smelled something yummy – two somethings yummy, in fact.
Inside, she sat her computer bag down, kicked off her shoes, and followed her nose past the kitchen and living room and down the long hallway to the bathroom where the smell intensified and mixed to a pussy-drenching cocktail of male heat. Beneath that she could smell the soft scent of lavender and geranium. On tiptoes, she peeked around the corner of the bathroom door and let out a squeal of surprise as Paulo, completely naked, pulled her into a deep, tongue danc
e of a kiss, bending her back until her feet nearly lost contact with the floor. She didn’t know how he’d managed it, but he had her blouse unbuttoned and pushed off her shoulders before the kiss ended in a trail of nips and licks down into her cleavage as he righted her and undid her bra in a single smooth move.
‘Congratulations to Martelli Fragrance’s newest exec and The Mount’s newest recruit,’ this time it was a very naked Angelo who knelt in front of her and set to work on her skirt, lingering to tongue her navel and nuzzle down into her panties until his hot breath brushed against her tight curls. Paulo moved behind her to keep her from tumbling backwards, nipping and nibbling her neck and cupping and stroking both her breasts as she leaned back against him. She could feel his erection pressing against her lower back. Angelo hooked his fingers in her knickers and dispatched them efficiently. It was then she noticed the bottle of Moet et Chandon peeking out from the bucket of ice on the marble counter.
The two men nudged and manhandled her until she was in position, then Paulo stepped aside just enough that Angelo could lift her until her bottom rested on the cool, polished surface of the countertop. Without a word, he shoved her legs open wide and stood in between, his cock rubbing maddeningly close to her pussy. Then the two men nodded to each other, and Paulo opened the bottle of champagne with a pop and an eruption of cold bubbly foam cascaded down over Liza’s breasts and belly, just as he tilted her head back and primed her mouth with a wet tongue kiss. Then he tipped the bottle a few inches above her lips so that its sparkling contents cascaded into her mouth and down her chin. She yelped and gasped and nearly choked, then she smacked her lips and drank sloppily. Both men moved their mouths to catch their share of the downpour, taking turns lapping and sucking from her fizz-drenched breasts and belly. As she drank, Angelo hooked his hands beneath her knees and pulled her closer until her butt was off the edge of the counter and her shoulders rested against the mirror. Then he knelt, lifted her feet onto his shoulders and ran his tongue down to part her pussy lips, causing her to shudder. There was barely time to catch her breath before Paulo moved the champagne bottle and the flow pooled in her navel, then ran down over her pubis. It flooded over her hard clit and sluice between her pouting labia right into Angelo’s waiting mouth, which lapped and slurped noisily. Between the tickle of the bubbles and the nibble and suck of Angelo’s very impressive mouth, she came, bucking and grinding against the marble. ‘You gotta taste this, bro,’ Angelo gasped, smacking his lips, his breath cool against her fizz-drenched slit. ‘Liza’s pussy makes champagne taste so damn good.’
