They wouldn’t walk the carpet, only the stars would, but Chloe wanted to watch, so they joined Santo and his date in a viewing area for guests off to the side, the atmosphere in the crowd electric. Santo didn’t blink an eye at the protective hand Nico had placed at her back, introducing his date instead, a lovely reporter for one of the New York dailies. And then the stars were arriving in long black limousines.
Near the end of the parade of Hollywood glamour came Eddie and his sultry, stunning girlfriend, actress Camille Hayes. Tall and sleek in a plunging silver-and-gold gown, Camille was outrageously beautiful, the perfect dark foil for Eddie’s blond good looks. His hand at her back, he escorted her down the red carpet to the appreciative roars of the crowd.
Chloe was so thrilled, she could hardly stand it. Eddie had a megawatt star power that glittered like no other with his saucy smile and entertaining wit as he talked to the press. And with her Soar ad playing on a screen just to the right of the logo-emblazoned step and repeat banner where the stars stopped for photographs, Evolution was front and center tonight.
If she could get any higher, Chloe thought, as they moved inside to watch the action-packed adventure movie Score, she wasn’t sure how. It was the most exciting night of her life.
* * *
The after-party for Score was held in a trendy, swish bar close to the museum. A New York institution, the establishment was legendary for its elaborate Christmas decorations, draped in fifty thousand dollars’ worth of glitz tonight, according to Santo, who kept track of such useless trivia.
Nico immediately felt his skin tighten at the overabundance of shiny balls, icicles and endless lights hung from every available surface. He would have turned around and walked out the door if it had been any other occasion. But Chloe was having fun, and far be it for him to steal her joy when she’d worked so hard for her achievements. When Evolution was shining tonight and Eddie Carello had taken it upon himself to introduce her around as the creator of his signature fragrance, his massive ego out in full force.
Ignoring the whole unavoidable ambience, he caught up with his brothers at the bar, while Chloe took Mireille and Santo’s date off to visit the Vivre refreshment bar, where patrons could touch up their makeup and perfume.
“No date?” Nico observed as Lazzero did his usual aloof, unattainable routine leaning against the bar, which only made half the women in the room turn and stare.
Lazzero lifted a shoulder, his eyes trained on a group of people near the windows. “I felt like flying solo.”
Nico followed his brother’s perusal to a beautiful brunette who stood at the edge of the group. “Who is she?”
“Who?” His brother took a sip of his bourbon.
“The woman you keep staring at.”
“No one important.” Lazzero dismissed the subject, clearly unwilling to discuss the fact that she was something, because he’d undoubtedly had about twenty women lined up to accompany him this evening and he’d chosen to come alone. But Nico had learned a long time ago Lazzero confided when and how he wanted to.
Santo pointed his glass of bourbon at Nico, clearly coming to the same conclusion. “I see you’re keeping better company these days.”
Nico kept his tone nonchalant. “Chloe and I have agreed on a casual thing.”
Santo took a sip of his bourbon. Rolled it around his mouth as he considered him. “You don’t just casually see a woman like Chloe. You do it with intent or you don’t do it at all.”
Nico, who’d been ignoring that very fact for weeks, inclined his head. “And your point is?”
“Nothing,” Santo said innocently. “I was just making an observation.”
An observation that once in Nico’s head, refused to budge as a friend of Santo’s came up to greet them and Lazzero set off in the direction of the brunette. His head half in the conversation and half out, he considered Chloe in the very sexy red dress as she chatted up an A-list actress at the perfume bar.
She was glowing, in her glory tonight. It did something strange to his insides to see her like this, rearranged them in a foreign pattern he didn’t recognize. She was smart, beautiful, passionate and empathetic. Transparent. Everything he’d convinced himself didn’t exist in a woman.
He had missed her while he’d been in Europe, and not just in a physical sense. He’d missed her presence. How alive she made him feel. How she filled him up in places he hadn’t even known he’d been empty.
He was crazy about her, if the truth be told.
The admission, after weeks of denial, rocked him back on his heels. But then again, he conceded, taking a sip of his bourbon, hadn’t he subconsciously known it was true? He’d broken every one of his rules for her. Was still breaking them. And it felt right in a way he couldn’t articulate.
“Can you believe it?” Chloe said, bubbling over with excitement as she rejoined him, champagne glass in hand, and they walked outside to the patio to get some fresh air. “Sasha Pierce wants me to design a custom perfume for her. Sasha Pierce, Nico. She’s legendary.”
He smiled, drawing her back against his chest as they stood at the railing and enjoyed a view of a light-emblazoned Manhattan. “Of course she wants you to design a perfume for her. Be is the number three fragrance in the world right now. Soar is going to be a huge hit. You’re the talk of the town.”
She wrinkled her nose. “Not quite.”
She was silent for a moment, as if taking it all in, the silence of the high balcony wrapping itself around them. The balcony was deserted, the heaters not quite able to keep up with the chill in the air. And for that Nico was glad because it gave him a chance to clear his head.
Chloe swiveled to look up at him. “Are you having fun, though? You seem quiet.”
He shrugged. “It isn’t really my thing. But you’re having fun—that’s what matters.”
* * *
Something in Nico’s voice, a quiet, distant note, made Chloe lean back against the railing to look up at him. Study his face in the diffused, soft lighting the lamps cast across them. “What’s wrong?” she murmured. “You’ve been off since we arrived.”
Another of those uncommunicative shrugs. “It’s nothing. Jet lag.”
“Nico,” she said softly, trailing a finger down his cheek. “I know you well enough now to know something’s wrong.”
“My mother walked out on New Year’s Day,” he said flatly. “A week later our house was repossessed by the bank. This time of year doesn’t hold very good memories for me.”
Her throat locked, her skin stretching painfully tight across her body. “I’m so sorry. I didn’t know. You never said anything.”
“It wasn’t exactly dinner-table conversation at the house in Great Neck.”
She considered the hard, impenetrable lines of his face. “That must have been awful.”
“It was surreal.” A shadow whispered across the clarity of his gaze. “My father lost it that day. I mean actually lost it. He had been sinking into a depression for some time, but when she walked out, it was the end of him.”
A knot formed in her throat. Grew until it was hard to swallow. He’d been only fifteen.
“What did you do? Where did you go?”
He balanced his glass on the railing. “I called my basketball coach. He was a mentor to me and my brothers. He knew a guy who owned a corner store in the neighborhood. I went to work for him, and he let us live in the apartment above the store in exchange for the work.”
While he’d gone to school at night, refusing to give up on his own future. Her heart gave a painful lurch. “Lazzero and Santo were so young,” she murmured. “They must have been devastated.”
His mouth flattened. “They were in shock. Lazzero retreated into himself, refused to talk. Typical him. Santo started to cry because he wasn’t sure which bike to take with him.”
The ache inside her deepened until it hurt to breathe. She bit the inside of her mouth, the salt tang of blood staining her senses. “I think,” she said huskily, rea
ching up to smooth her fingers over the hard line of his jaw, “that you are extraordinary, Nico Di Fiore. That you had the composure and presence of mind to take charge at that age.”
He lifted a shoulder. “Who else was going to do it? It wasn’t easy—no. I was bitter. Angry at the responsibility I hadn’t asked for. Angry at my life and the loss of my freedom. But you do what you have to do.”
Worse, she imagined, was what it would have been like to watch the man he’d so clearly admired in his father suffer from such a debilitating disease. To become a shadow of himself.
She tipped her head to the side. “You said in Palm Beach you think of your father as the man he was, not the man he became. What was he like—in the early days?”
“Complex.” He took a sip of the bourbon. Swirled it around the glass. “He was never home when we were young. The life of an investment banker—always on, always working, always socializing with clients. It made my mother crazy. But to me,” he acknowledged with a faint smile, “he was larger than life. He loved us, loved being a father. Whenever he did have time to spend with us, it was the best. He would take us to baseball games, up to the cottage, out fishing. That’s when he was his true self. Away from all the pressure.”
She frowned. “I remember my father saying he was the guy on Wall Street. That everybody wanted to be him. That he was fueled by this ambition that seemed to consume him.” She pressed the rim of her glass to her chin. “Where did that come from, do you think?”
He considered the question for a moment before replying. “The estrangement from his own father was a part of it. His father was abusive to his mother. He tried so many times to intercede—to persuade his mother to leave—but she wouldn’t. So he left when he couldn’t handle it anymore and came to New York to start a life for himself. He had nothing. No money, no one to fall back on. He was it.
“It fueled his ambition on Wall Street. He was imminently successful because of it—a risky, brilliant deal maker. But his ambition was also his Achilles’ heel. Once he got caught up in the rush, he couldn’t turn it off. He constantly needed more. The money, the power—it all went to his head. He had affairs, began living on the razor’s edge.”
Chloe frowned. “So your mother had reasons for being unhappy, other than the loss of her career?”
Antagonism darkened his gaze. “She drove him to it. She was never happy, not from the beginning. The affairs weren’t right, clearly, but I can see why it happened.”
And she could see the whole story was far more complex than it seemed on the surface, even if she understood why Nico wanted to blame his mother for all of it. “There are always two sides to a story,” she said, treading carefully. “Perhaps you don’t know the whole truth.”
His jaw hardened. “Perhaps I don’t want to know. Perhaps I don’t care. Maybe it’s a fact that two people always mess up a relationship one way or another.”
“That’s not true,” she countered quietly. “Look at my parents. How in love they were. What a great team they were. They were stronger together.”
“What Martino and Juliette had is a rarity, I promise you.”
“Perhaps,” she agreed. “But it does exist.”
“Anything’s possible.” He shook his head at her. “Don’t start spinning romantic illusions around me, Chloe. I’ve never been a believer in fairy tales. My experiences have taught me differently.”
She took a sip of her champagne. Studied the cynicism on his face. He made so much sense to her now—why he was the way he was. He had the same driving ambition his father had had, for exactly the same reasons. Because his once-safe, if tumultuous life had splintered apart and he would never let the same thing happen to him. Would never make the same mistakes his father had.
Instead, he had made himself into a rock in the middle of the storm for his brothers. For her. He had given Santo and Lazzero the faith that life could be trusted, people could be trusted, because he had been there for them like his parents hadn’t been for him.
A hand fisted her insides. She wanted to be that for him. The one who taught Nico he could trust. That he could believe in what they had. Because she couldn’t lie to herself any longer and say she didn’t want all of him, because she did. She always had. And maybe, just maybe, she had enough faith for both of them.
Or perhaps, she acknowledged, her stomach hollowing out, she was setting herself up for a fall.
A dark fire lit his gaze. “Hey,” he murmured, his arm sliding around her waist to pull her close. “That’s ancient history. We are not letting it kill the mood. And I am in the mood. It’s been a week since I’ve had you.”
Heat shimmered through her insides. She let him remove her champagne glass from her hand. Framed his face with her hands as she kissed him long and deep. Refused to let fear rule her, that instinctive need to retreat that had always directed her actions, because she was through doing that. She was seeing this thing with Nico through to the end, just like she’d promised herself, because she thought he was worth it. She thought they were worth it.
“Are you ready to go?” he murmured, when they came up for air. “I’m done with holding that thought.”
Her blood on fire for him, she nodded. They said their goodbyes to Mireille and his brothers, collected the car from the valet and made the drive back to Nico’s penthouse in an expectant silence that had every nerve in her body tense with anticipation.
* * *
Nico tossed his keys on the entrance table when they walked into the penthouse, shrugged out of his jacket and threw it on a chair in the living room. Sinking his fingers into the knot of his tie, he set his gaze on Chloe as he stripped it off, his body hard and hungry after a week without her.
Lowering himself onto the sofa, he reached for her, pulled her onto his lap.
When her lush lips parted in invitation, her dark eyes full of passion, he didn’t hesitate, didn’t even try to resist her. Cupping her cheeks with his palms, he settled his mouth over hers in a hot, hungry kiss.
She sighed. He took full advantage, sliding his tongue inside her mouth to tangle with hers, tilting her jaw up to provide him with better access. The taste of her exploded through him, sweet from the champagne she’d consumed. Uniquely her.
He slid his hands beneath the slippery, shimmery material of her dress that had been inflaming him all evening. Found the warmth between her thighs and stroked her through the silky material of her panties with leisurely, teasing caresses. She moaned low in her throat, her soft, breathy sighs making him crazy. But when he would have lifted her to straddle him, desperate to have her, she swept her delicate hand along the hard ridge of him instead, erasing any coherent thought.
“Chloe,” he murmured. “I am more than ready.”
She ignored him, sliding her fingers up to the button of his jeans to undo it. Every muscle in his body tensed as she lowered his zipper, the rasp of metal against teeth amplifying the pounding of the blood in his head. And then her hands were on him, uncovering him, pulling him out of his boxers.
His heart thundered in his chest as she slid to the floor in front of him. She had been too shy to do that to him up until now, and he hadn’t been into pushing her because he’d known with the passion they shared it would happen. He just wasn’t sure he could handle it tonight. Didn’t know if he had that in him with the need driving him.
He watched, transfixed, as she slid her mouth over the velvet length of him, used her lips and tongue to make him wild for her. Blood pulsing through his body, he arched into her touch, spellbound by her unpracticed seduction.
“Like this,” he instructed hoarsely, sliding his hands over hers, showing her how he liked to be touched. How hard. How fast. How to drive him higher.
When he couldn’t take it anymore, when he knew he’d finish it that way if he didn’t put a stop to it, he reached for her, picked her up and laid her on the sofa like a feast for his consumption.
Red silk dress askew, plunging open to reveal her taut, creamy flesh, h
er long legs a tangle of olive skin, he had never known such lust. Such need. She was sweetness and innocence, brilliance and fire, an intoxication to his senses he couldn’t seem to fight.
He pushed the dress up to her waist. The tiny panties that clung to her hips did little to hide the shadow of her femininity, firing his blood to a fever pitch. He spread his palm over her abdomen, absorbing the shiver that went through her. Trailed his fingers down to the tantalizing piece of silk that covered her. Eyes a deep, dark espresso, she watched him strip it from her.
He got rid of his pants and boxers in one swift move. Came back over her, caging her in with his arms braced on each side of her. “You burn me up,” he whispered against her mouth, “until I can’t think for wanting you.”
She pulled his head down to hers, her fingers sliding into his hair. He slicked his tongue over her lips and gained entry to her sweet mouth. Every stroke, every lick, sensual and earthy, bound him to her in a way he’d never experienced before.
Sliding his palm over her thigh, he found the hollow at the back of her knee. Curved her elegant leg around his waist so that she was open to him. His to take. Settling himself against her moist, welcome heat, he held her gaze as he stroked inside her with a single hard thrust. Claimed her tight, silken flesh with a possession that made her internal muscles spasm in erotic response.
“Fast or slow,” he murmured. “Your choice.”
“Slow,” she breathed, eyes locked on his. “As slow as you can make it.”
He regretted asking because he wasn’t sure how slow he could take it. His breath coming hard and fast, he possessed her with smooth rhythmic strokes, corralling the fire raging through him as her silken body clenched around his pulsing flesh. Her eyes were liquid fire, the perfection they created together written across them as she curved her leg tighter around his waist and met him thrust for thrust.
It was too intense, too much. Burying his mouth in her neck, he tasted her salty skin as he drove harder into her amazing body until they came together in a rush of violent heat that blanked his head.
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