by CC MacKenzie
The girl was more than stunning in a silver dress that managed to be both high-class and sexy. Long, long legs ended in the shimmer of tooth-pick silver heels. Her hair was a long, curling waterfall of ash blonde, clipped at one side with something small that sparkled like real diamonds. Probably the genuine thing. Her eyes were brilliantly blue, brim full of life and an excitement that channelled into a vibe that was pure sex. The mouth was a vision of full lips, painted red and succulent against lustrous skin.
"Olivier."
She repeated his name in a kind of low-throaty sound, the kind a woman might make during sex, the kind that brought up the hair on the back of Anastacia's neck. Now the woman snaked, there was no other word for how her hips moved, her way across the floor, holding her hand out for his.
"I can't believe you, of all people, are in a nightclub and dancing," she smiled as he took her hand in his and brought it to his mouth before he bent his head to the cheek she'd lifted for his kiss.
"Natalia," he said with the Italian in his voice purring through the name, and he brushed her lips, just a whisper, with his. "What a... surprise."
"I simply can't believe it's you, in the flesh!" Natalia slid her hands up his arms to his cheeks and stroked. "Gorgeous as ever. You look well, lover boy."
"As do you. Anastacia, this is a very old friend of mine, Natalia Loewe. Natalia, my fiancée, Anastacia Morgan."
For a split second Natalia's jaw went slack, but she recovered fast.
"Fiancée? Oh, yes, well, lucky girl. I'm delighted to meet you." She smiled down at Anastacia from her height of at least five foot ten inches plus heels. That excitement flared again in her eyes when she clocked Anastacia's empty ring finger. "Excuse me for interrupting. All I saw was Olivier and couldn't believe my eyes." Now those blue eyes glittered with something that she most certainly recognized, conceit. "I hope you understand."
Oh, she understood all right.
"Yep."
With another beaming smile, Natalia all but ignored Anastacia, then curved her body into Olivier's. "I'm in London for a couple of days, maybe we could catch up. It's been what, two years?"
"Three."
"Omigoodness, Sandro, please forgive me." Natalia turned to her escort. "My date, Sandro Gillier. This is Olivier and his girlfriend."
Anastacia opened her mouth to say fiancée, then closed it with a snap when Olivier spoke,
"We have played against each other." Olivier held out his hand. "Buonasera, Sandro."
The man was a good bit older than Natalia, by Anastacia's reckoning, but he was attractive and looked rich. And, she thought, utterly infatuated with his date.
"We're meeting friends so we need to go." Natalia ran her fingers over the back of Olivier's hand, a smooth, somehow intimate, gesture. "We must get together." This time she pressed her lips against Olivier's cheek. "We can do lunch, can't we, and talk about old times. I'm sure you won't mind too much, Anastacia?"
"Won't I?"
Natalia just threw her blonde head back and laughed, a bubbly ripple of sound. "You and I must get together, just girls. We can share our secrets of the great Olivier Conti. I'll ring you. So lovely to meet you."
In response, Olivier said nothing, just took Anastacia in his arms again. They moved as one to a slow, sexy number. Though his face betrayed nothing as he focused purely on her, Anastacia realized she was coming to know him. So she understood that while he hummed in her ear, stroked attentive hands down her back, his mind was across the dance floor and on the VIP bar where the lovely Natalia sipped her champagne in her sparkling silver dress.
CHAPTER SIX
After a long, slow, smooch on the dance floor, Anastacia made her way to the rest rooms. She was feeling pretty pissed-off with herself, with how the nerves in her belly were jangling and with an unwelcome and unwanted fist of what she supposed was jealousy lodged in her throat.
Her emotions threatened to totally overwhelm her, which was why she was distracted, and why what happened next took her completely by surprise.
As she opened the heavy door to the ladies rest room, she was shoved from behind so hard she nearly landed flat on her face. The only reason she didn't fall was due to the hand fisted in her hair that whipped her head back. She saw stars as her skull came into direct contact with the marble wall.
There were three of them on her, nails clawing her arms, her throat, screeching like banshee's in her ear something about, 'Stay away from Olivier, bitch.'
It was hard to get a good look at her attackers since a fist to her gut and a sharp kick to her shin focused Anastacia's attention. And that was when her self-defence training kicked-in and she fought back. In the back of her mind she could hear screams as her fist punched a throat, her elbow sang as it connected with a hard jaw. Women were screaming and yelling for help. The next thing she knew she was being lifted bodily by two black-suited bouncers built like sumo wrestlers and carried out of the club to a chorus of paparazzi yells and camera flashes, and dumped in the back of a police van.
Her head was pounding so bad her eyes were watering with the sick pain of it. Her elbow and her gut ached like a bad tooth and her shin was throbbing like a bitch.
And she was beyond furious.
Just who the hell needed this shit?
Four hours later.
Still fuming and shivering from an adrenaline crash, Anastacia sat huddled in a police cell, an environment that brought back too many bad memories of a time long gone. She very politely thanked the nice young policewoman who'd brought her an extra blanket to cover the livid scratches on her arms, her throat. A middle-aged, tired-eyed doctor had seen her and confirmed she was not under the influence of alcohol or recreational drugs and stated that she was able to answer questions. Three times she'd given her statement to two stony-faced and built uniformed officers who looked as if they chewed tack nails for fun. Not once did she flinch or deviate from her story. For a while things had looked dicey for her because the three bitches who'd attacked her were sticking to their story that she'd lashed out at them first.
Riiiight, one against three.
However, help had arrived in the form of CCTV footage from The Blue Lagoon, released immediately by Ethan Monroe. Footage which had caught most of the attack on her and at least six witnesses who'd seen the whole sorry saga.
The police agreed she'd acted purely in self-defence and did Anastacia want to press charges?
She lifted her eyes to the policewoman and beefy sergeant who were watching her keenly.
"You bet I do."
The sergeant patted her shoulder.
"Good for you, love. But you'd better get ready for plenty of publicity. The pap's are out in force at the entrance."
Remembering the pap's earlier in the evening as she was hauled out of the Blue Lagoon, Anastacia shrugged.
"At the moment I seem to be a magnet for trouble."
"Well, if you date a top footballer what do you expect?" the sergeant asked her with a relentless logic she could get behind. He was right. "There are plenty more women like them who believe they own a piece of him."
The hard rock in her gut made its presence felt.
Was this what her life was going to be like from now on? Was she prepared to be a target for online trolls and idiots who felt they had a God-given right to verbally abuse and to physically attack her? Living with a man like Olivier, a football star, just knowing tens of thousands of other women would do anything to crawl into his life if he so much as looked at them?
She closed her eyes at the mere thought of Natalia Loewe having witnessed the way she'd been carried out of the club.
Jealousy, a horrible emotion she'd never felt before threatened to consume her.
And it devoured her now.
She had a decision to make.
If this was what falling in love with a footballer did for a woman, she wanted no part of it.
Anastacia collected her belongings from the police and marched past a flint-faced Olivier, straight o
ut the door and right into the middle of a mob of baying press.
She was so incensed when a journalist shoved a microphone in her face, she shoved him back and yelled, "Fuck off," in his face.
A strong arm wound around her waist and lifted her bodily into the back of a waiting black Range Rover. Nico Ferranti's voice growled in her ear. "One more word and you will be more than sorry."
The whole thing: the night in a police cell, the deep gouges made by long fingernails that burned on her neck and arms, the throb of her shin bone and the headache from hell, plus the bruise on her heart made Anastacia's throat close, her eyes swim. It was so terribly unfair. She'd done nothing wrong. Nothing.
Except break the rule of a lifetime and date a world famous soccer player.
Worse, she'd gone and fallen in love with him.
How stupid could she be?
A frustrated fury burned in her heart, in her throat.
The passenger door opened and Olivier slid in beside her.
He turned to her, reached out, and gripped her chin to eyeball the deep scratches to her neck.
"Satisfied?" she spat.
"Madre de dio! What happened?"
"I was assaulted by three women who told me to stay away from you or next time it would be acid in my face."
"Did you tell the police?"
"Of course I did. At first they didn't believe I was acting in self-defence. They thought I was the one who'd started it because I can fight and defend myself, until witnesses came forward. They corroborated my side of the story. And apparently the club's CCTV footage nailed my attackers, too."
Olivier went very pale as he took her hand, but Anastacia snatched it back, folded her arms to hug herself tight.
"Anastacia..."
"Just leave me the hell alone," she almost snarled the words.
She wanted to scream.
She wanted to rant.
She wanted to rave.
Instead, she stared unseeing out of the window and clenched her jaw so hard she was amazed every tooth in her stupid head didn't fracture.
The streetlights swam as the car sped along the dark streets of London.
Nico's features were tight as he drove and not once did he look at her in the rear-view mirror.
She closed her eyes at the thought of the phone call that must have got him out of his nice warm bed with Bronte.
What a fucking mess.
"I don't need this crap in my life," said Anastacia into an electrified silence.
"Anastacia..." Olivier's voice sounded weary and exhausted.
He was tired?
Well hell, so was she.
Tired of everything.
Tired of him.
Tired of herself.
The thought had no more entered her mind when it shot out of her mouth.
"Would you give up the game for me?"
She turned her head to look dead into shocked and devastated dark eyes.
"How could you even ask me such a thing?"
"Ana..." said Nico in a tone that meant do-not-say-another-word.
"This is none of your business," she snapped at her boss. "Butt out."
Now she turned again to Olivier and saw the answer loud and clear in his face.
"I see," she said. "It's okay for my life, my career, to be in tatters. It's okay for me to be assaulted, harangued on a daily basis on social media, my freedom curtailed and my life made a complete misery because I date you? So I'm the one who does all the giving, while you do all the taking? I sense a certain imbalance in this relationship, don't you?"
"Once we marry, all this harassment will end."
"Marry?" asked a sincerely shocked Nico.
"She said yes. She will marry me."
The absolute certainty in Olivier's clipped statement merely dumped fuel on Anastacia's already burning fire.
"I wouldn't be too sure about that if I were you, boyo. If you're not prepared to give up the game, we're finished."
He blinked. "Just like that?"
"No. Not just like that. I want my life back and by God I'll get it back. The ball's on your side of the pitch, Olivier. It's up to you. Football or me. You can't have both."
The silence in the car was so loud all she could hear was her heart beating too fast in her throat.
She knew she was being unfair.
Of course she was.
But she couldn't seem to help it.
What sort of a person gave the man she loved an ultimatum like that? Football was Olivier's life. It had brought him wealth beyond his wildest dreams. But football was not her life. Her mother used to say the game with its cliques and hangers-on, plus the relentless pursuit of other women, had destroyed her marriage, her love, and ultimately, her life.
For the first time, Anastacia could understand why her mother had done what she'd done.
Well, she wasn't going to let history repeat itself.
She was getting out while she still could.
What was the old saying?
Marry in haste, repent at leisure?
Well, she was even married yet and already doing plenty of repenting.
Plenty.
"Could you drop me off at home please, Nico. And thank you for coming to collect me."
Staring straight ahead, Olivier sat in absolute silence.
Nico's eyes flicked to hers in the rear view mirror.
"I had not realized things had deteriorated so fast on social media. I will organize protection, people who can help and advise you on how to stay safe."
A wave of exhaustion hit her.
She was so tired she felt physically sick.
"I'll talk to you later. I can't do this, Nico. Any of it. I can't do it."
Again Nico's eyes flicked to hers.
He sighed.
"I will speak to you after you have rested. Do nothing in haste, cara mia. We will fix this."
As the car slowed to stop at the entrance to her apartment, Anastacia thought that comment was so typical of her boss, Mr. Fix-it.
"Nothing can fix this, Nico. Don't waste your time trying."
CHAPTER SEVEN
Both men watched her run into the building, waited until the light went on in her apartment.
"Are you going after her?" asked Nico into an eternal silence.
"No."
Nico puffed out a breath, started the engine and the car pulled away.
In the rear-view mirror, he eyed a shell-shocked looking Olivier.
"So, you are coming home with me."
"Grazie, Nico."
"She is going through a great deal at the moment, Oli."
"Si, I know this. But how could she ask me to give up the game?"
"She is hurting. She is upset and lashing out. And she needs protection from the crazies."
"I did not realize things were so bad."
"Knowing her, she would want to deal with it herself, not worry you. That is how Anastacia works. For her whole life the only person she could count on was herself. She never asks for help."
"I have made a mess of my relationship with her. She is right. I take from her and do not give. She is tired because I want to love her all night, every night."
Nico shook his head.
"You are in love, it is only natural to feel such things."
"Si, but she is also working hard on the campaign. Deep inside maybe I have resented the amount of time we are apart. Resented the amount of time she spends with her friends. We move to Paris in a few days...." Olivier lay his head back on the leather headrest and closed his eyes. He was running away from dealing with his problems, while Anastacia had no choice but to face hers head on. "Take me back. I will talk to her, make it right."
Nico did as he was told and turned the car around.
"Care is something Ana's never had in her life. She needs love, lots of it."
Oliver let himself into Anastacia's apartment.
In his heart he knew Nico was right. His woman was lashing out against things she cou
ldn't control. Things like her father, her extended family, appearing in her life and the complications that had brought. And the issues with his so-called fans, which had hurt and scared her. Hell, the crazies scared him at times, too. Plus, her perfectly reasonable anxieties about a career that meant the world to her. Perhaps he hadn't been as understanding about that as he should have been. And by her outburst in the car, right at the top of the list, were her complex feelings for him. And to cap it all tonight, bloody Natalia Loewe had crawled out from under whatever rock she'd been living to deliberately (he was sure of it) cause him trouble. If it wasn't one fucking thing it was another.
And as far as Anastacia was concerned, none of the above would have happened if he hadn't entered her life and turned it upside down.
He had to admit she had a valid point.
He'd taken one look at her and decided she was his.
Since then, neither of them had had much time to even catch their breath.
Did he regret any of it?
Nope.
They'd get through this little blip.
He was sure of it.
He stepped into the bedroom at the same time she emerged from the bathroom.
She was wrapped in a bath sheet of thick white cotton, her curls pinned on top of her head.
By the look of her swollen eyes, the pink tip of her nose, she'd been crying.
His heart clenched tight in his chest.
Her blue eyes were hard as they stayed on his.
"Who is she?"
He didn't pretend not to know she was referring to Natalia.
"An ex-lover." His eyes met hers. "It was a long time ago."
"Three years isn't a long time."
"I wish it was longer."
"Seen her somewhere before, what does she do?"
"A model." He did not tell her exactly what sort of a model his ex was because he had a feeling his woman would not be impressed. He knew Ana was sensitive about her petite frame, her height. And the way her mouth went tight, as if she was sucking on a lemon, made him bite down hard on his bottom lip. "It should not matter since what happened between us was over long before I met you."