by Sarah Andre
“I’ll be fine,” she said with a grim smile. “I’ve put up with athletes and their egos a lot lately.”
He ignored the bait. He deserved it. “You haven’t seen that octopus in action, sweetheart.”
“From what I’ve read, his escapades are tame compared to yours.”
He threw an arm across the back of the seat and leaned in good and close. Her storm-blue eyes widened, but they also dilated with heat, which caught him right in the groin.
“The media lies through their teeth to sell copy,” he said softly. “Consider that crap one of them. I cannot emphasize this enough. If you so much as smile at him, he’ll take that as an invitation to strip off your clothes. In seconds.”
She snorted. “Have you looked at Tiffany’s phone list yet?”
“When have I had a chance? I’ll do it while I wait.”
“This is a priority, Lock.”
“I said I’ll do it.” Like he needed to see how many men called or sexted her that last month. “I have to call Parker first. Shoulda done that the second I woke up.” Except a petite distraction wandered into the bathroom while he was shaving and he completely forgot his lawyer, his trial, Russell Reeves…Christ, he was losing it.
Leo got out and assisted her. As Lock watched her disappear inside, his pulse rose again. He should park the damn car and sit in the lobby. It wasn’t right to leave her.
Aw, hell. He had Leo’s cell phone, and she had the number. Besides, she was the most devious reporter he’d ever met…she’d demolish Vannini like a pit bull with a bone.
“I’ll walk to the library,” his brother said, reaching in for his briefcase. “It’ll be a hell of a lot faster than driving there in this mess.”
Lock grunted. Since their blackout conversation twenty-four hours ago, they’d spoken only out of necessity. Leo’s accusing expression from yesterday remained plastered in his mind’s eye, a chronic reminder of just how rotten Lock was.
A horn blared behind him, and he shifted into drive.
Chapter Twenty-Six
Jordan flipped to a blank page, feeling completely out of her element and very off her game. From the moment he opened the door of his suite, murmuring buongiorno in the low tone of a lover, Roberto had established an expectation that shook her to her core.
Although she chose the suite’s floral armchair, he refused to answer any Sports Illustrated questions until she sat on the sofa with him. Once there, they played the inching game: she inched back and, elaborating enthusiastically on an answer, he inched forward. Now, after half an hour, her spine was pressed firmly against the plush sofa arm. A millimeter of space remained before their knees touched.
As much as she hated to admit it, Lock was right. This Italian took seduction to a whole new level, and that panicked sense of helplessness grew with every passing moment. She would not be leaving here without a physical skirmish, and her mouth grew drier by the second. Sexual harassment of female reporters was widespread in America, especially in men’s locker rooms, but it was mostly verbal harassment or men making naked fools of themselves. Roberto, however, seemed to have his own set of rules and a healthy regard for his prowess.
The paralyzing helplessness of her childhood swamped her senses. She wasn’t expecting a beating, but all the same—Roberto held all the control, leaving her vulnerable to his whim and waiting for disaster.
“…I am the best in the world,” he ended emphatically, after listing his impressive record-breaking slalom times. “I prove it to you next week with World Cup.”
She snapped to attention. After half an hour of bogus questions to establish her Sports Illustrated impersonation, this answer gave her an opening.
Ask the questions that will help Lock, and get out! “But aren’t you nervous sitting around an American hotel instead of practicing for the World Cup?”
He shrugged carelessly. Those charcoal eyes raked over her, pausing without subtleness on her breasts. “I no worried. I am the best,” he repeated. “Every day I ski Aspen Mountain. They give me private slope.”
“How long will you be in Colorado?”
“They say I leave, eh…Thursday.”
“Who says?”
He struggled for the obvious answer “prosecutor” and finally settled for, “The people who arrested quell’idiota.”
“Wow. Today’s Friday. It’s too bad you have to stay almost a week just to tell American jurors that he beat you up in a parking lot.”
Roberto’s face flushed an ugly shade, and a hard glint came to his eyes. “He not beat me. I—” He stopped himself with difficulty and shook his head. “They ask me to no speak to reporters.”
They being the prosecutors again, no doubt. There was no official gag order from the judge, so all bets were off. Attack his ego. She raised an eyebrow. “But witnesses say he had to be pulled off you.”
Roberto waved the subject away, although it cost him his patience. If he couldn’t tell her what a man he was in the parking lot, the fresh determination in his eyes said he’d prove it another way. Her sense of dread skyrocketed.
How she longed to end this interview and tell Lock and Leo it was a bust!
But she couldn’t and wouldn’t. She owed Lock this much. If she tripped up Roberto’s alibi, maybe she could win back Lock’s trust.
Desperate, she cast about for another opening. He crossed his legs and licked his lips, staring at hers, and suddenly she knew exactly how to get some answers. God help her.
Steeling herself, she reached over and snapped off the mini cassette recorder on the coffee table purposely brushing her knee against his. Acknowledgement flared in his gaze.
This was setting a five-alarm fire, but she owed Lock after all the lies she’d fed him this week. She owed him because of how her heart thundered with longing around him, even when he was angry. She never felt afraid and defenseless with him like she did with Roberto or her father. So she’d risk everything now to get answers that might give Lock his life back.
“Roberto,” she murmured, resting her knee meaningfully against his. “This will not be for print. I know a man of your physique—” she gestured up and down his muscular build, in case he didn’t know the word, “—could win in that parking lot. Why did you walk away?”
Seconds passed, and she waited, breath trapped in her chest as he clearly fought internal demons. She kept the steady pressure of knee on knee, ill at ease and perspiring under her turtleneck. How the hell was she going to get out of this room without being mauled, especially now that she was playing along?
He let out a long breath. “I leave because I no go to the bar to fight quell’idiota.”
“Why did you go to the bar?”
He shrugged.
“To see Tiffany van der Kellen?”
Another shrug. These weren’t answers.
“How long were you and Tiffany lovers?”
He blinked twice, then threw back his head and roared with laughter. His reaction startled her into shifting her knee away.
“Why is that funny?” Every muscle tensed for his answer. He was about to unload, she could feel it. “You were lovers in Milan.”
Roberto slid closer reconnecting with her knee. She watched in horror as his large hand encompassed her kneecap and squeezed.
Panic skittered through her. “Roberto—”
“I tell you something, bella…”
Her cell phone buzzed and danced on the coffee table, causing her to jump like a petrified rabbit. Tossing off a fake smile for his benefit, she grabbed it and glanced at Caller ID. Starr News. Oh, for the love of God!
“You must answer?”
She swallowed thickly. The quarter-million-dollar conversation warred with her instinct to maintain momentum with Vannini. He was primed to talk about his relationship with Tiffany, she felt it in every fiber of her being.
Her fingers trembled as she silenced the phone. “It’s…it’s nothing important. Please go on.”
He smiled seductively and gently s
queezed her knee again while eyeing her breasts. “I am a lover of many women, si? This is who I am.” He gestured up at God as if it were His fault.
“And Tiffany was one?”
The stroking slid higher. “Bella…”
Her spine crushed painfully into the sofa arm. The room felt too hot, his musky cologne too cloying. She shouldn’t have played along. What a stupid, stupid mistake!
In her mind, Lock’s honeyed tone repeated those chilling words over and over: I cannot emphasize this enough. If you so much as smile at him he’ll take that as an invitation to strip off your clothes. In seconds.
Time to gain some control. Grabbing Roberto’s hand, she held it firmly in both of hers, even though it meant letting him feel her clammy palms. He didn’t seem to notice. If anything, his eyes oozed an intense sexual invitation, clearly believing her action was a positive response.
“Roberto, please.” Her voice shook. “Were you Tiffany’s lover?”
“No, bella.”
“What?”
“She too—” He sucked in his cheeks, gesturing with his free hand. “How you say…not good to her body.”
“Too skinny? Anorexic?”
“No, no. Too much drugs. She look like…” He pulled at the underside of his eye so she saw red veins. “Ugly because of drugs.”
“Then why did you go to the parking lot with her? What were you talking about?”
“We speak of nothing.”
“You did speak. She said ‘I won’t tell,’ to you. What did she mean?”
His eyes hardened. “I no understand.”
Oh yes you do, you bastard. She pressed her lips together in frustration. “Why did you come to Aspen last May? Why were you at the Avalanche?”
“I come to visit sponsor. After, I go get a drink.”
“Which sponsor?”
“K2.”
She thought about grabbing her cell and Googling their headquarters, confident they were not located in Aspen, but proving he was a liar would shut the interview down immediately.
“You told the prosecutor you left the parking lot with another woman, but nobody saw a woman in your Lamborghini.”
He nodded emphatically. “She there. Like this.” He tucked his body forward, which alarmingly resulted in his curly dark head inches from her lap. She dropped his hand and pushed him up, ignoring the sharp pain radiating from her rib.
“Why would she hide in your car?”
He shrugged, his expression indicating it was of no concern to him how they met. It was all about the end result.
“Had you ever met her before?”
“No. But women,”—again the hand to God—“they like me.”
He dropped his palm back on her knee, and finally, her anger flared. The seething trumpeted the little-girl fear inside, and she grasped it like a lifeline. She disengaged his touch, needing both hands since his felt like dead weight. “You must not to touch me anymore, Roberto. This is a professional interview.”
His lids lowered to half-mast. With a slight twist, he managed to reverse the hand she gripped so now he was holding both of hers. Tight. “You ask me these questions. About this night. I answer. Is no professional.”
The deadly seriousness in those eyes sucked the breath right out of her. She knew what he meant in his broken English. She’d strayed from the professional questions into the lurid gossip by making a sexual move on him. Even turned off the cassette recorder beforehand. He was only going with the flow.
“Well, let’s go back to the ski questions,” she muttered breathlessly.
“I say no more. We speak of you now.”
“Not me. You’re the star.” She managed a smile through very stiff lips. His expression remained unchanged.
She was no match for his strength and determination, but she had to distract him somehow. She scanned her panicked mind. Of course! The main reason she told Lock and Leo she wanted to come here today!
“As a matter of fact,” she said pleasantly, “may I ask for your autograph?” She awkwardly pointed to the pen and legal pad with her bound hands. Roberto let her go, grabbed the pen and scrawled his name across the entire page.
He was left-handed. She shivered. She truly might be face to face with Tiffany’s murderer. Multiple stab wounds. A sure sign of an enraged lover. Dear Christ. She was trapped in this room with him!
He thrust the pad back, the expectation on his face ratcheting up a notch. He’d be paid back for his time and his signature. Her stomach flip-flopped. On every level, her instincts screamed for her to run. In a soft boot-brace. She dropped her gaze from the sexual invitation and flipped the pages closed.
“Grazie, Roberto. We’re finished. I know you’re a busy man.”
“No more talk, cara mia.”
Shit! She was out of time and out of luck. “Yes. No more talk. I have to leave now.” She curled her palm on the sofa and managed to rise a few inches before he yanked that arm out from under her. She fell back, hissing in pain.
He lifted the back of her hand to his mouth, dropping lingering kisses on each knuckle. His dark, half-day growth of whiskers grazed her skin like thick sandpaper. When he got to her pinkie, he reversed order, the tip of his tongue actively involved now too.
The trapped-rabbit sensation threatened to overwhelm her, and she held her breath against the rising anxiety attack until her ears began to ring. She had to get out of here before she fell into a screaming ball.
“Roberto.” She swallowed convulsively. “In America this is not allowed. I cannot…be with you.”
“You can. We will spend a beautiful night with much wine and love—”
“No, I mean, I’m married.” Where did that come from? She grasped the lie, straightening her shoulders. “I cannot.”
He hesitated over her last knuckle searching her eyes, the warmth in his fading fast. She kept her expression earnest, hoping it screamed “very, very married.”
He kissed the last knuckle, his tongue swirling over the ridge. “No problem. We forget your husband this one night.”
Oh shit. “I…I’ve been in a car accident.” She’d told him upon entering, since her boot clomped so loudly on the marble foyer, but now she swept her hair back so he saw the small forehead bandage and then touched her rib. “I’m injured.” She’d already rejected the man of her dreams for that very reason, something she regretted more and more as the hours passed. “I really must go.”
His response was to seize the back of her head and kiss her wetly, thrusting in a bulky tongue. She stiffened in his arms, but he pushed on, angling his head and moaning lewdly. His coarse stubble scraped her jaw, and she could barely draw a breath in his powerful embrace. Ignoring the piercing pain in her side, she struggled against the onslaught.
He broke the kiss. “Yes, bella, yes. Like that,” he moaned, his breath fanning her face. His hand slid to her lower back and yanked her under him, his thigh prying hers apart as he settled his erection onto her. His full weight crushed her rib cage.
She shrieked in pain, frantically pushing at his shoulders, arms, chest—anywhere to get him off her rib. Instead he gripped her chin and forced her lips back to his, the pressure so brutal it buried the back of her head deep into the seat cushion. She reached out, wildly clawing the air, but her cell phone was still a foot away.
Oh God, oh God, oh God!
Grasping fistfuls of his curls, she yanked with all her might and managed to break the kiss. Whipping her head sideways, she gulped air, tried to breathe his name. The ringing in her ears became a high-frequency pitch.
“Stop,” she gasped, trembling violently in his arms, pushing and pushing against his bulk. “This is against the law, Roberto!”
His response was to suck hard on her neck, directly over her carotid artery which pinched in pain. A knock sounded far away, probably across the hall, but she didn’t have enough air in her lungs to scream. A few seconds later she heard the knock again, louder this time, and Roberto eased back, loosening his tight
grip on her head.
She gulped precious air into her flattened lungs as he sat up, muttering in Italian. It didn’t take knowledge of the language to realize he was swearing up a storm, and she almost sobbed with relief. The knocking is his door. Thank you, thank you, thank you!
“We are no finito.” His accent was thick, his flushed face grim. “I show you how Italiano loves women. Sit.”
Sweeping the black curls from his face, he stood and straightened his sweater over tented slacks. Without a backward glance, he strolled to the door.
Jordan bolted upright, ignoring the torque in her now throbbing rib. Her pulse was so erratic it took a few seconds of dizziness before she could leap into action.
She scooped up her cell phone, tape recorder, and pad. If that was Lock at the door doing some kind of knight-in-shining-armor thing, she’d vault right into his arms.
She clomped toward Roberto, her stride swift and clumsy. Searing pain from her ribcage spread into every nerve in her body, which still felt a hell of a lot better than his assault. Just as she reached his broad back, she heard him murmur bella in the same seductive manner he’d greeted her.
“You’ve got to be kidding,” she said under her breath. Peeking around him, she noted two striking features on the frizzy blonde gazing adoringly up at him. The fuchsia sweater she wore displayed a grossly inappropriate amount of braless, double-D cleavage, and even through a thick layer of the wrong foundation, her complexion was marred by deep acne scars.
But whoever she was, she’d just become Jordan’s best friend.
“Hello,” she blurted to the woman. “I was just leaving.”
Roberto didn’t budge.
“Who’s this?” the woman snapped, and, not trusting his answer, Jordan thrust her hand in the small space between him and the doorframe.
“Jordan Sinclair, Sports Illustrated.”
The gathering storm on the woman’s face cleared, and her shoulders slumped, revealing more cleavage. “Oh,” she said in disappointment. “Do you want me to come back, Roberto?”
“Si.”
“No!” Jordan forcefully and painfully squeezed past the unmoving athlete. “We’re finished.” She wanted to choke on the next words and uttered them without eye contact. “Grazie, Roberto. Good luck in the World Cup, and I hope the trial goes quickly for you.”