The fundraiser was in The Eleanor, an upscale event venue in the middle of downtown Austin. My Uber driver pulled up in front of the two-story black building squeezed between two multi-story buildings on 5th street. There was a small round sign jutting out from the building with the name of the venue. I thanked him and carefully got out of the car, then walked up to the double glass doors.
I stood on the sidewalk, staring at my reflection as the Uber pulled away behind me. My heart was beating so hard I thought it was going to burst right through my rib cage, and again, I wondered what the hell was wrong with me and what I was doing there. But before I could change my mind, the door was opened from the inside and I was greeted by a doorman in a black tuxedo.
“Welcome, madam. Do you have your invitation to the party?”
Shit. I should’ve grabbed Luca and Veda’s. Would he have known it wasn’t mine? Probably. I made a show of looking in my clutch purse. “Oh, no,” I murmured. One hand still in my clutch, I looked off in the direction my driver went. “I must’ve left it in the Uber.” I gave the doorman an apologetic glance. “Let me see if I can call him back.”
He seemed content to wait, but fate was on my side because it chose that moment to start raining. Just a few fat drops here and there at first, but anyone who’d lived in Texas for any amount of time knows that those drops were your one and only warning that you have about ten seconds to find some shelter before the near hurricane level downpour hits you, soaking you through in a matter of point five seconds. And there was no awning or anything on the front of this building. It was only about forty degrees, and if he turned me away, I wasn’t looking forward to freezing my ass off out here.
It only took one look of supplication from me for him to glance at the sky—even though it was too dark to see any rain clouds—and to wave me inside. “Don’t worry about it,” he told me. “I’m sure a lovely lady like you wouldn’t have gotten all dressed up for nothing. May I take your coat?”
I glanced around. The room was made up entirely of shades of dark umber—the cement floors, the wood slat walls, and even the ceiling—lit up by sparkling pendant lights over the bar and large sconces along the walls. Even the benches and tables were a rich, dark brown, but from what I could see of the bar between the crowd, it was a creamy white with a dark top. I turned my back to the room and allowed him to help me remove my coat. He gave it to a younger man who’d been waiting behind him and then handed me a ticket, which I put in my clutch purse. “When you’re ready to leave, just come back here and I’ll fetch your coat for you.”
“Thank you,” I told him with a smile. We both glanced out the doors as the rain began to come down in earnest.
He turned back to me with a smile. “You’re very welcome. Enjoy your evening.”
I could feel the high testosterone level in the room. It hung in the air like a heavy fog. Apparently, you could take the man out of Italy, but you couldn’t take the Italian out of the man. Letting one side of my straight blonde wig fall partially over my face, I turned to face the lions and walked into the room with long, sure strides. I felt numerous sets of eyes upon me, some of male interest, even more of female envy, but I didn’t stop as I worked my way through the crowd, brushing past more men in tuxedos and women in their fanciest gowns. I just kept walking as though I knew exactly where I was going…
Because Enzo and Jade were standing at the bar in the front lounge.
Jade’s back was to me, but even from this angle, I could see how stunning she looked in her backless, shimmery gold dress that fell just above her knees and showed off her gorgeous golden skin. The silky material clung to her perfect figure in all the right places, and I suddenly felt like a stuffed sausage the way my plump curves filled out my own dress. Her legs were bare, and her feet were in scrappy gold heels.
Enzo stood beside her, his head bent down to hers, one hand on her lower back above the material of her dress. I watched from the corner of my eye as his thumb caressed her bare skin. My stomach knotted as fire flashed through my blood, heating my face. I wanted to grab my friend by her shiny black hair and rip her away from him, then smash his damn sunglasses with my fist hitting his face.
But I did neither of those things. I did no more than give them a passing glance as I continued down the hallway and into the main room, where a small orchestra was playing pretty instrumental music. I kept walking until I reached the stairs at the back of the building and climbed them to find myself on the mezzanine level. Stopping at the bar, I ordered something in a martini glass made mostly of tequila and walked out onto the balcony. The couches were occupied, so I found an empty corner by the railing where I could look down over the main room. A few couples had started dancing to a version of a Halsey song and I sipped my drink as I watched them and tried to calm myself down.
But the longer I stood there, the more I wondered what I’d hoped to accomplish with this stunt. Why I was torturing myself like this. Standing here all night and watching Enzo with another woman, even if that woman was the only real friend I’d had in this town, would accomplish nothing but make me feel like shit about myself.
And what was I going to do when they left? Follow them like some kind of crazy girlfriend? Bust in after them and then freak out when I caught them in bed together? How many times had he brought her back to his hotel before he’d met me? I had no claims on Enzo. I didn’t want to have any claims on him. The only thing I wanted was to get away from him and this world of fucking men who thought women were nothing but bargaining tools or playthings. Men who thought they could blackmail you and get away with it. So, what the hell was I still doing here? I’d seen what I’d come to see.
That was a good question.
I needed to leave. I shouldn’t be here. Just because I didn’t recognize anyone didn’t mean that one of these assholes didn’t know my father or hadn’t seen my picture. And sooner or later, my luck was going to run out.
Yet I couldn’t stop myself from searching the crowd below me for a glimpse of spiky dark hair and a hard jaw, eyes hidden by dark sunglasses so no one could see the fire behind them that I knew so intimately. When I didn’t see him, I slammed down the rest of my drink and set my glass on a shelf set into the wall beside me. This was stupid. I needed to get the hell out of here and stop torturing myself. Fuck this. I was going to walk to the nearest bus stop, steal a wallet or some cash or something, and get the hell out of this city instead of just waiting around for someone else to decide how my life was going to go. Enzo could keep my fucking money. And I’d pay back the person I stole from the first chance I got.
I ignored the pain in my chest and the longing in my soul as I gave the room one more good search, telling myself it was only to get their location so I could make sure they didn’t see me leave. I didn’t see Enzo or Jade, so I could only assume they were still at the bar. Lifting my chin, because I was fucking better than this, I turned away from the railing…
“What the fuck are you doing here, Sera?”
His soft tone couldn’t contain the rage seething beneath his calm words. My eyes widened as I came face to face with Enzo. Unable to help myself, they skittered down his body and back again. He’d added a black tuxedo jacket with a vest underneath to the black slacks and black dress shirt I’d seen earlier. Instead of a bowtie, he wore a satiny, narrow black tie. His pants showed off his muscular legs perfectly, and his shoes were scuffed to a shine. My breaths sped up with my heartbeat and I felt my stomach tighten at the sight of him. “How did you know I was here?” It was the first thing I could think of to say.
He took a step closer, forcing me to take a step back and to the side until the railing was at my back and his big body completely hid me from view of the people behind him. Even in my heels, I barely came up to his chin. “Did you think your little disguise would hide you from me?” His eyes dropped to my breasts, then lower to my hips. My nipples hardened, and the silky material of the dress felt scratchy compared to the wet heat of his tongue that I longed for. “Did you think I wouldn’t know the way you walk and the sexy curves of that ass?” He frowned as his chin lifted and I could feel his eyes traveling over my face and hair. “I fucking hate that blonde wig,” he informed me.
With the way his mouth was twisted in disgust, I half expected him to rip it from my head and expose me to everyone there. “Jade wears wigs all the time.” The words left my mouth before I could stop them.
He cocked his head to the side. “I couldn’t tell you if Jade has ever worn one around me. I’ve never paid that much attention to her.”
“That’s not what it looked like when I got here. I saw you at the bar. It looked like you were paying quite a lot of attention to her.”
He didn’t feed my jealousy or try to explain his way out of it, which only pissed me off more. “So I take it you somehow talked the guards into letting you leave Luca’s. And yet, instead of running—like you keep telling me is the only thing you want to do—you come here. Tell me why.”
I dropped my eyes. I couldn’t look at him. “Because I wanted to see.”
Hooking his finger under my chin, he brought my eyes back up to his. “Wanted to see what?”
I tried to see his eyes behind the dark lenses of his glasses. “I wanted to see you with her,” I said after a pause.
He stroked my cheek with the back of his fingers. “Why?”
It took me a moment to respond. “Because I thought if I did, I would stop wanting you.”
“And did it work?”
I shook my head as tears of self-pity filled my eyes. I wanted to lie. To spew my jealous rage into his knowing expression. But I couldn’t. All I could do was admit the truth. “No.”
He brushed my cheek with the back of his knuckles, down my throat to the center of my chest, following the curve of one breast until the material of the dress stopped him. “No,” he repeated softly.
The electricity that always crackled between us grew stronger. I wished I could see his eyes. “Where is Jade?”
“I put her in a cab.”
“Why?”
“Because I don’t want her,” he told me. “I want you.”
One tear escaped to slip down my cheek, and he brushed it away. “But I saw you whispering in her ear,” I told him. “Saw you touching her back. Like you do to me.”
“Not like I do to you.”
“What’s the difference?”
“I touch you like that because I can’t not touch you, Sera. If I was touching her, it was just…” he paused, searching for the right word, “…habit.”
I sucked in a shaky breath.
The tip of his finger followed the neckline of the red dress. “All I can think about right now is getting you out of this dress and being inside of you. I don’t even remember what Jade was wearing.”
“It was a gold—”
He cut me off. “I don’t care.” Glancing around my arm to the floor below, his brows came together in a frown. “Come on. I’m taking you out of here before you get us both killed, because if I see one more stronzo down there eating you alive with his eyes, I’m going to lose my shit.”
My heart stopped, and I dug the narrow heels of my shoes into the floor as he reached for my hand and started to drag me away. “No, please!” I whispered loudly. “Enzo, wait!”
I didn’t think he would stop, but he did. His jaw clenched so tight I could see the muscles pop out on the sides of his jaw, he waited.
“I can’t go back there,” I told him. “I can’t go back to the lake house. Please,” I begged. “I’m sorry I came here. I really am. But I was about to leave anyway.” I paused, gathering my courage. “You can keep the money. You’ve taken what you wanted from me. Just let me go and I’ll be out of the city by morning. No one will ever find me.”
The corners of his mouth lifted in an evil smile. “Oh, baby girl. But I’m not finished with you. We’re just getting started.”
