“I know what I want when I want it.”
“King’s gala? Your family’s worst enemy? Why would your family want to be there?”
Leo pulled back and met her eyes. “Val never turns his back when he feels a dagger coming down from behind.”
Her eyes searched his.
He sighed. “Say yes.”
“I’d love to go to the gala with you, Leo.”
A wide smile lit up his face, and she zoomed back under his chin, pushing her lips to his chest, eyes out of sight, hiding her shame as he encircled her in his arms. Her heart split as the last lines of the song floated out of the phone’s speaker.
She’d set out to watch his family burn, but she never imagined she’d be in danger of going down in flames with them.
“I don’t have a dress,” she said, only because she was willing to say anything to stop the stomach-churning thoughts in her head.
Leo pulled back, and cocked an eyebrow.
15
It was well past midnight, but the glass exterior of Dior’s flagship store on Fifty-Seventh Street remained illuminated, giving radiance to a block where every other store had turned down their lights. The shop stretched from one end of the street to the other, comprised of glass windows flushed with white light. The Dior sign glowed from the top of the building, demanding the unwavering reverence of anyone who laid eyes on it.
Jessica gaped out of the passenger side window as Leo pulled his growling Porsche to a stop at the curb in front of the store.
“Dior?” She flicked her eyes to the driver seat, the deep part in her hair falling into them.
Leo took the keys from the ignition and leaned back on the black leather driver seat. He savored the sight of her before reaching over the console and pushing her hair out of her eye.
“Are you trying to buy my love now?” she teased.
“Who says I’m buying you anything?”
“If you’re not, then nothing is getting bought tonight. You think I can afford Dior on an agent’s—”
Leo’s eyebrows pulled, waiting for her to finish.
“A graphic designer’s salary?” she corrected, swallowing hard.
Leo tucked her hair behind her ear and then threw his arm across the passenger seat. “You said you didn’t have a dress, so I’m going to buy you a dress.” He paused. “Now I know this is going to be very difficult for you, being a hardcore feminist and all, but please know that I have no ill intention. Just a debilitating need to scam a smile out of you in any way I can.”
Jessica looked away when his eyes fell to her lips. She had a feeling he was going to kiss her, and she couldn’t allow that to happen twice. The first time had almost ended her.
“No way they’re even open,” she said, looking back to the store. “It’s past midnight…” Her words trailed away when the glass doors of the store swung open and a skinny man in a purple suit stepped out, eyes lighting up the moment he saw Leo’s Porsche. He raised his arm high and waved, nearly hopping to his toes in thrill.
“Raul stays on call for me,” Leo said, opening the driver side door.
Jessica was still recovering from her shock when he circled around and opened her door. He offered her his hand, helping her out of the car. Her mind raced, and she didn’t even notice when he linked their fingers.
“Keeping Dior on call is a thing?” she asked. “There are people in the world rich enough to utilize that thing? You’re one of them?”
“It’s not that serious,” he teased. “Calm down.”
To a woman who’d spent entire evenings debating whether or not she could afford to add cinnasticks to her Domino’s order, it really was that serious to Jessica. Because of his calm nature, easy mannerisms, and mischievous eyes—eyes that constantly seemed to be in the middle of a comedy routine in his head—it was so easy to forget that Leo was a multimillionaire. Jessica nearly had.
He armed the car as they stepped onto the sidewalk, and Raul met them on the curb. His black hair was impeccably neat, almost as pristine as the suit he wore. It was a lavender most men wouldn’t dare. Raul pulled it off with zero effort.
Leo,” Raul greeted.
“Always nice to see you, Raul.” Leo smiled. “Your suit is very purple.”
“Thank you.” Raul’s eyes lit up as they moved to Jessica. “And you must be Ashley.” Raul shook her hand. “Just as beautiful as I imagined. I just knew you would be utterly breathtaking. Leo has never brought a female companion to me before.”
“How much did he pay you to say that?”
Raul covered his heart. “Oh, darling, I am never for sale, and even if I was—not even Leo could afford me.”
“I didn’t realize he was going to force someone to come down here in the middle of the night during their time off.”
“Sweetness, I’m the store manager. I don’t get time off. I see this place more than I do my own apartment. All I can do while I’m drowning in budgets and spreadsheets is remind myself that I work for the most fabulous designer in the world, and pray that my cats haven’t starved to death.” Raul’s smile grew, making his kind eyes squint as they moved to Leo. “Leo is our best customer. Sometimes I’m sure he’s single-handedly keeping us in business.”
“I still appreciate you taking the time,” Jessica said, feeling Leo tighten his fingers around hers.
“Follow me, it’s much warmer inside,” Raul insisted, making his way back to the doors and holding them open.
Jessica and Leo stepped into the store, the bright lights almost blinding them. A glossy white staircase greeted them at the entry. Lithe, immaculately dressed mannequins faced each other on each step, lining the staircase all the way to the top. The architecture was sleek, with all modern finishes. Every piece of furniture made a reflection, causing Jessica to fix her hair every few seconds.
“We’re looking for an evening gown,” Leo said.
“The only thing worth shopping for.” Raul’s eyes became even more animated. “The event?”
“A gala at the end of the month. Governor King.”
Raul gasped. “I have the dress.”
“You always do,” Leo sang.
Raul was already sauntering away, climbing the steps while looking over his shoulder. “I have your playlist ready to go if you’d like, Leo?”
“You have a playlist?” Jessica asked through clenched teeth.
“I’d love it Raul, thank you.”
Jessica and Leo turned to face each other once Raul disappeared onto the second level.
“Leo,” she chided, matching his playful smile. “This is a little too much—”
A deep hip-hop bass made her jolt, the sound system filling the area so snugly she felt like she was at a club.
When Leo broke into dance before her, his face contorting with each move he made, she burst out laughing, covering her smiling mouth.
“‘Stanky Legg,’ Leo? Really? This is the first song on your playlist at Dior?”
Leo was too busy doing the “stanky leg” to answer, bent over at the hip while rocking his body to the beat, taking his bottom lip under his teeth when he really got into the dance.
Jessica was alarmed that he was actually a good dancer. On par with most of the black boys she’d grown up with in Jersey City. She kept forgetting that he was a Jersey boy.
Leo threw in a head sweep, never breaking his rhythm. “You don’t know nothing ’bout this, girl.”
“A mess.”
“What you know ’bout this?”
Never one to back down from a challenge, Jessica joined in on the dance, throwing in her own flavor, immediately having flashbacks to her club rat days, laughing along with him as a hoot parted his smiling lips. Soon, they were in a dance battle, winding in a small circle as they attempted to out-stanky leg each other.
She found herself getting so into it, she didn’t even notice he was pushing closer to her, moving his body in time with hers until their gyrating chests were just inches apart, panting from the dancing.
&
nbsp; When he covered her lips with his, breathing no longer seemed important. Her shocked eyes relaxed and fluttered closed as she sank into the kiss.
His hand came to her waist and held her close as he parted his lips, moaning when she did the same, sucking his top lip.
“You taste so sweet,” he whispered.
“You too,” she breathed. “But I thought you’d be salty.”
He smiled. “Why?”
She searched his eyes. When “Watch Me (Whip/Nae Nae)” came blaring through the sound system next, she actually cried out, pushing him away.
“Ohhhhh!” She beamed, jumping straight into the dance with a cringe on her face, looking like she was ready to murder him in the name of dance.
Leo was right on her heels, blasting her with his best moves, only stopping when he ran into a small table behind him. It toppled.
Jessica raced over, catching his arms before he fell. “Be careful in here man, good Lord. That ugly-ass table is probably worth more than this building.”
“It’s imported from Madrid,” Raul chimed in.
They both turned, still panting from their dancing, and saw Raul come to a stop behind them cradling a green gown.
“I didn’t mean any offense,” Jessica said, still holding Leo’s arm. “My condo looks like an Ikea showroom threw up in it, so I’m not exactly well versed in good furniture.”
The moment she said my condo, she was stunned at the slip-up. When her eyes flew to Leo, however, he hadn’t noticed.
He was too busy watching her with a sweet smile on his lips.
She had to turn away.
Raul curled his lip. “The table is imported from Madrid, but you’re right.” He held a hand up next to his mouth, as if he had a deep dark secret. “It’s ugly as sin.”
Leo took her around the waist, pulling her close while nodding to the dress in Raul’s hands. “Green, huh?” he asked, looking at Jessica. “You like green?”
“Her skin tone demands it.” Raul became much less agreeable. “It must be green. It absolutely must. It will look extraordinary. There are very few women who will dare to wear this color, and even fewer who can pull it off. We’re going to make sure all eyes are on her.”
Jessica couldn’t believe it when she felt her heart warming. She didn’t even want to know the price of that dress. She was afraid she might drop dead. “Leo, you really don’t have to do this.”
His eyes fell to her lips. “But I am. I will. And I want to.”
Jessica’s eyes fell to his lips, too.
“So let me, Ashley.”
Ashley.
Once again, her heart was at her feet.
***
“Wow,” Chet said, later that night, the moment Jessica stepped into the mansion with a large Dior dress box cradled under her arm. “Just wow.”
“Fuck off.”
“You like this dude.”
“Fuck off.”
“You kissed him.”
Jessica dropped the dress box on the kitchen island before moving to the fridge and fishing out a soda. “Ashley Williams kissed him.”
“I’m surprised you didn’t let him take you home.”
She took a seat next to him. “I have to keep him close, and keeping him close means not sleeping with him for as long as humanly possible. He will keep me in his life, for the rest of his life, as long as he believes a piece of ass is on the horizon.”
“At the rate you’re going, he won’t have to wait much longer.”
She curled her lip. Chet always told her the God’s honest truth. She loved and hated that about him. “Why don’t you ever want to talk about what I’ve done right?”
“I was getting to that. An invite to King’s gala. That’s pretty huge.”
“That’s all I need. Especially now that we know Reggie King used to be a friend of the Romanovskys.”
“Leo sounded pretty upset when he was talking about him at dinner the other night.”
“That’s what I’m saying. Angie Colt called it months ago. The Kings and the Romanovskys have a history. Why do I have a feeling that history is tied to the Blacks?”
“Because there’s no way it isn’t.” Chet laughed.
“Exactly. Whatever happened that night caused a huge rift between them. They’re all bursting at the seams with hatred for one another, and the truth is one dramatic evening away from breaking free. Something tells me that evening is going to come sooner than we thought.”
“Like, a gala at the end of the month, maybe?”
“Sir, yes sir.” Jessica nodded. “I’m about to close this thing, so give me some credit, fucker.”
“Harp thinks it’s a great lead, too. I’m surprised Leo trusted you enough to tell you Reggie used to be a friend of the family.”
“Leo told me that, because Leo has no idea what his brother has done.”
“We don’t know that.”
She jammed her fingers into her chest. “I know it.”
“But you don’t.”
“If Leo knew Val killed the Blacks, and that King helped cover it up, he would never tell me Reggie used to be a friend of their family. Never. He wouldn’t risk me putting the pieces together.”
“But why would he worry about you putting the pieces together? He thinks you’re Ashley Williams, graphic designer extraordinaire. He has no idea you’re a fed.”
“Neither does Val, but he is a brick fucking wall. There’s a reason Val is so rude, short, and condescending. It’s because he doesn’t want to invite dialogue with people he doesn’t know. He has so many secrets eating him alive, he can’t even risk casual conversation for fear that he’ll expose himself. But Leo is different. He’s different, because he doesn’t know.”
“You seem very protective of your new boyfriend.”
“Oh, please crawl up your own ass and die.”
“That’s right. Get all the profanities out of your system now, Ashley Williams. Oh wait, you already got them out of your system during dinner the other night,” he teased. “You actually slipped up a lot at the restaurant.”
Jessica frowned around the soda she was sipping.
“Cussing, telling the real truth about your brother and your father. I’ve never seen you fall out of character like that,” he said. “And tonight you actually invited him to the water tower? Your favorite place on Earth? Maybe you and Ashley Williams aren’t all that different. Maybe she’s just a less loud, less crass, much less explicit version of Jessica Borgia. A family friendly Borgia.”
Jessica knew what Chet was really trying to say.
Maybe Ashley Williams was falling for Leo Romanovsky.
Because it was obvious Jessica Borgia already had.
16
Jessica was determined to prove Chet wrong. She was not falling for Leo Romanovsky. She was just a damned good actress.
She’d convinced herself that was true, even as the distant roar of that Flat-6 engine painted an instant smile on her face. Trying to fight it away, she resumed jogging through the Westchester neighborhood that Sunday evening.
In moments, the red convertible came screeching to a stop next to her, inches from scraping the curb, and she slowed, jogging in place, still trying not to smile.
“Do I hear the penis car?” Chet asked, his voice sputtering through her earpiece, which was doubling as headphones.
Jessica pulled the buds from her ears as the tinted driver side window rolled down, revealing Leo inch by inch, a pair of sunglasses shading his eyes.
He leaned an arm out of the window, smiling wide. “Oh hey, Wednesday.”
Jessica smirked, holding her hands up. “Please don’t hit me. I’m on the sidewalk this time.” Of course she’d put herself on that sidewalk on purpose, and had been running the same block, back and forth, for half an hour, waiting to hear that Flat-6 rumbling in the distance.
Leo licked his lips, sweeping the sunglasses off his face.
Jessica was drawn in like a zombie, leaning down onto the window frame, l
ips spreading. “You looking for a date, handsome?”
“As a matter of fact, I am.” His deep voice boomed, eyes going to her lips. “To my family dinner tonight.”
She clicked her tongue. “That’s gonna cost ya.”
“Whatever the price,” he said. “You’re worth it.”
She pushed away from the car, ending their fun hooker charade. “I can’t intrude on your family two weeks in a row, wearing the same inappropriate attire I wore last week.”
“You won’t be intruding,” he said. “In fact, this time, they may not let you leave.”
***
“Yo. Same girl? Two weeks in a row?” Gary beamed. “Somebody pop a bottle. This is a new record for Leo.”
Zoey pushed open the blinds of the kitchen window behind her and then came back to the table with a smile. “Nope, no pigs flying.” She and Gary shared a laugh, neither of them blind to Leo’s glares of contempt as he led Jessica into the dining room.
“I’ll kill you,” Leo mouthed to Gary, pulling out Jessica’s chair. He gave her the seat next to Tony this time, putting himself between her and Gary. His glaring eyes went to Zoey after he sat down. “I thought you were the homie, Zoey. I really did.”
“I am the homie.” Zoey pouted, perking up. “I can’t bust your balls now? Since when are you so freaking sensitive?”
“It’s good to see you again, Ashley,” Bette said.
Leo motioned to Bette. “That is what an appropriate greeting to a guest in our home sounds like. Take notes everybody. Thank you, Mom.”
“You’re welcome, baby. I’m just so happy to see a girl finally stick.”
Zoey and Gary snickered.
“Ma,” Leo admonished.
Tony spoke from the other end of the table. “So, you just happened to end up under Leo’s car last week, and now you just happen to be the girl he brings by, two weeks in a row.” Tony held Jessica’s gaze with his hands curled into fists at his mouth. “It’s just interesting. Same girl. Never seen that happen before.”
“Never,” Val confirmed. “Not once.”
Leo groaned, still under the impression that his family was chiding him.
Loving Leo (The Romanovsky Brothers Book 3) Page 17
