Wicked Ambition

by Victoria Fox

  ‘Benvenuto, signorina.’

  Kristin ventured into town the next day. It was a seaside port peppered with cafés and restaurants, the beachfront stalls selling braiding and jewellery and cut-price handbags.

  ‘Buongiorno.’

  The colours had drawn her, a rainbow of rich smooth orbs half melting in the sun and displayed in buckets as vivid as a palette, their syrups as gorgeous and thick as paint and pooling sweetly in cartons and cornets. Gelati, the Italians’ ice cream.

  ‘You’re Kristin White.’ The boy behind the counter beamed. He was dark, with rusty blond hair, an aquiline nose and a full lower lip that protruded just enough to make his good looks interesting. His name badge read: ALESSANDRO.

  ‘Ti riconosco,’ he said. ‘I recognise you.’

  She had made a partial effort at camouflage in a floppy sunhat and shades but had been told before that she was instantly distinguishable. Most stars looked different in real life—shorter, mostly—but Kristin was by all reports as imagined.

  ‘Will you sign?’ the boy asked, producing a napkin and marker. Proudly he pointed at his nametag and awarded her another grin. For Alessandro, she wrote, with love. She considered adding, The most colourful balls in Italy, or something to that effect, but didn’t.

  On cue he gestured to the ice cream. ‘Would you like…?’

  She chose raspberry and chocolate and Alessandro piled the scoops high, dense as landslides that thawed deliciously down the sides of the cone. It reminded her of a weekend in LA when she and Jax had licked ice cream at the beach, watching the surf roll in and a game of volleyball unfold on the sand.

  He hadn’t been in touch. To know he had tried would have meant something, a scant consolation and even slighter alleviation to the dislike she now harboured for him. How could he have turned a blind eye to Bunny and the grief they had faced? How could Jax be so hard-hearted? Didn’t he care at all? He had to be the most selfish man she had ever come across, and though he couldn’t be blamed for Bunny’s death his callous reveal of Scotty’s secret was a transgression she could never forgive him for.

  ‘Party tonight,’ Alessandro offered hopefully as he passed it over, ‘here. You come?’

  ‘I don’t think so.’ Kristin paid him. ‘This is a break from all that.’

  ‘Is fun,’ he promised, folding the note. ‘Sarà divertente. Una marea de gente, there are many people there. You and me, we go together.’

  She shrugged, hoping that wherever Jax was he had a clue what he was missing.

  ‘Maybe.’

  The party was in the town square, in annual celebration of a folklore hero who heralded the arrival of spring and chased away the winter demons. Kristin had spent the afternoon reading, sleeping and gazing out of her window, convinced that any second the door would open and her sister would be there, smiling infectiously in the way Kristin preferred to remember her—how could that smile be gone, just like that, and never coming back?—and had at last decided that heading out couldn’t possibly make her feel any worse. Surrounded now by music and lights, the dancing stream of locals in carnival costume whooping and wheeling, she embraced the distraction. At the gate an Italian pushed a mask into her hands. Its eyes were arched and high, crimson lips a playful smirk, the border embellished with gold.

  The mask made her anonymous. Kristin wound through the festival, air hot and heady with the beat of a deep, relentless drum. Alcohol was thick on the air and she could smell a red-hot grill, meat cooking mixed with something citrusy, like orange peel.

  She spotted Alessandro on the periphery, his mask pushed up on his forehead. A slick of sweat shone across his brow. When he identified her, his face split into a grin.

  ‘You came,’ he observed. ‘I’m pleased.’

  ‘Good. Do you dance?’

  It didn’t matter that they could barely converse. Humour wasn’t bound by language and they laughed their way through the clumsily trodden steps and Kristin drank sweet beer from a plastic cup that made her feel light and wild and carefree, not the solemn and bloated sort of drunk she felt back at home quaffing Bollinger Blanc at her mother’s soirées. They joined a train of revellers that wound merrily through the square. Alessandro’s hands on her waist were hot and firm, and when they came to a giggling stop and he pulled her into a silent, tender kiss, she responded passionately, burying her fingers in his hair. She was free, untethered, a million miles from everything bad in her life, from memories of Bunny and the hard, cold certainties of Ramona and Scotty and Jax. She never wanted the night to end.

  ‘You have fever?’ Alessandro breathed, running his thumb past her temple. He brought it down and trailed it over her lips. ‘I know how to cool you down. Vieni.’

  Seizing her hand, he led her through the throng. The back of his neck shone darkly in the shimmering, flickering glow and she wanted to reach out and touch it. The skin looked soft, iridescent with perspiration, and she imagined how it tasted.

  Through a couple of deserted alleyways they emerged on to the empty street. The store was shadowy, lit by the electric blue of the coolers, and the GELATI sign outside was extinguished. Alessandro withdrew a key, unlocked and they stepped inside, the low buzz of the refrigerators heralding their arrival. As her eyes adjusted Kristin picked out the colours in the bank of ice cream, every shade and flavour she could think of.

  Alessandro released the cover and lifted it.

  ‘You want? For free this time.’

  With his finger he ran a groove through the nearest container and held it out. Wordlessly Kristin stepped to meet him, taking his hand in hers and bringing the finger to her parted mouth. The gelato was sugary and slid coolly down her throat.

  Alessandro emitted a husky groan and pushed her up against the counter. In a flash he lifted her dress and peeled it over her head. She wore no bra and he dived for her breasts, the nipples firm and taut in the cold, taking one hungrily in his mouth and pulling. Kristin gasped. He sucked so fiercely it teetered on the brink of agony, before flicking his tongue expertly around the bud and tipping her back into an explosion of pleasure. His hardness ground against her, splitting her legs, and she zipped him loose. Alessandro’s length sprang free, smooth and swollen, and she ran her fingers down his erection, clasping his balls.

  Fiercely he pushed her up on the counter, the ice-cream palettes spread gloriously beneath her. She felt the freeze seal on her thighs, her breath visible in the air, ice-white as the hairs at the back of her neck stood on end, prickling in the cold.

  ‘Ti voglio,’ Alessandro muttered, tugging her knickers so that they caught on her knees. With a tear he ripped them off. ‘Facciamo l’amore.’

  Arching her back, she surrendered her body to him, longing to be devoured. Alessandro’s kiss hit her, his tongue in her mouth, and she put her hands back to steady herself, gasping as each palm hit a bucket of the soft melting glacé. His hands followed, scooping the nectar in his fist and bringing it round to her parted warmth, flattening the chill against her drenched heat. The cold struck her crisply and she stretched wider, crying for more, not knowing what she said, senseless in the state of her desire. Her whole body burned, the build sparking in her belly as if it were a living thing.

  Alessandro sank to his knees, ravenous as he tasted the cream. His tongue was slick and wet amid the fruit and her own flesh, sticky and soft as his tip caressed every inch, circling her with torturous control, up, down, around, before plunging in deep, his fingers in close pursuit to deny her reprieve. Bursts of numbness were followed by glimpses of ecstasy so intense she thought she would pass out. Tears threatened, so exquisite was the sensation, and when on the cusp of her orgasm he rose to kiss her, cassis ripe and crimson on his lips so she could taste the black juices of that fruit, she shuddered and shivered in his arms.

  Kristin took his hard-on in her hands, running back and forth till a rhythm built and swelled and he rocked in her grip, his face contorted with the promise of the inevitable and his hands on the edge of the refrig
erator, soldered to the cold. She brought his cock to her open legs, wanting him inside her more than she’d ever craved a man in her life. Right now, this second, her sensuality was raw and uncompromised, it could not be told no. There was no way back but through. Alessandro gripped her hips and flipped her round. Thrust forward, Kristin’s breasts plunged into the slick cartons, the freezing, even surface warmed instantly by her skin so that she slipped like a skater on the rink. His hand slapped her ass, sending a splinter of delectable pain across her backside, and when he did it again it stung her between her legs on that most delicate part and she shrieked in surprise at how much she loved it.

  Desperate for him, she raised her ass. ‘Please,’ she begged, ‘take me.’ His hand came round to clutch her tits, dark and wet with chocolate and coffee and coconut, and he rubbed her down with it, the paint smeared across her belly, and disappearing inside her once more, finding her clitoris so she throbbed uncontrollably against his touch.

  ‘Please!’ she cried, every part of her surging. ‘I can’t stand any more!’

  Alessandro stood with his feet parted and his grip on the underside of her ass. The ice cream was in her mouth and hair and dripping down her body in a myriad of colours. She felt like an animal fresh from the kill, the barest, most primal part of herself.

  In a plunge he was inside her, filling her up, and Kristin closed instinctively around him, tightening her muscles. She reached out and went wrist-deep into a tub of impossibly buttery strawberry cream, her knee raised to drive him further until she was all but folded into the dome of delights. Alessandro shouted in Italian as he raced for his climax, faster and faster, harder and harder, slamming without mercy till they both exploded in unison, sticky and wet with sweat and joy.

  ‘L’Italia ti ama,’ Alessandro groaned, bent over her trembling back.

  She understood that much, at least. ‘And I love Italy.’

  49

  The interrogation room on the fifth floor of LA’s West Bureau Police Department was hotly oppressive. An overhead fan rotated with the sluggish reluctance of a spoon through glue.

  Fenton Fear gazed forlornly out of the window. He could hear car horns blaring from the street below and the hum of careless conversation as it passed on the warm breeze. Those people hadn’t a concern in the world. How had he wound up in this unthinkable mess?

  ‘We need a straight answer,’ pressed his questioner, which seemed to Fenton a droll way of putting it. ‘Were you or were you not sexually involved with Scott Franklin Jessop Valentine before his eighteenth birthday?’

  ‘I can’t bloody remember,’ replied Fenton angrily. He hadn’t known that Scotty’s middle names were Franklin Jessop either before this blow-up. ‘It was a long time ago, OK? If it was, it was only a matter of weeks—’

  His lawyer cut him off. ‘My client has already answered this point,’ she said. ‘It’s possible that Mr Valentine misled Mr Fear about his age.’

  ‘Goddammit,’ spat Fenton, ‘how many times do I have to tell you it was consensual?’

  ‘Come now.’ The interrogator sat back in his chair and folded his arms over a generous gut. Handling a case of such rampant popular interest had him bobbing up and down in his seat. ‘Do you expect us to believe that? Scott was your selection; he was your number one. You’re telling me the attraction only sparked once he was legal? Love affairs don’t work like that, do they? Passion exists by its own rules.’

  ‘You’d know, would you?’ Fenton challenged, disgusted.

  ‘I think you would, Mr Fear, which is why I’m asking.’

  ‘My client refuses to comment,’ the lawyer interjected.

  ‘It looks like he’s ready to comment to me.’

  Miserably Fenton slumped his elbows on the table and rested his glistening forehead on the heels of his hands. If only they could offer him the electric chair…because what did he have left to live for after this? He was a hated man, an angel fallen so sensationally from grace that he didn’t even know if hell would let him pass. His career was in tatters, he was being labelled a sex criminal and he had lost the person he loved most in the world.

  Curse Scotty for telling them! How could he? He had known fully what it would mean and the monstrous repercussions that would play out: apparently he had deemed the sacrifice of his own career worth the bludgeoning of Fenton’s. Had he really hated him this much? Things hadn’t ended well but what about the love that had passed before, the tenderness? Had Scotty forgotten all about that?

  His young lover had responded to the threat of being cut loose from Fraternity. Fenton hadn’t meant it, Scotty was the golden child, but that had been a risk the boy was unwilling to take. Now Fenton was alone, accused of being a pervert, a sex fiend, a depraved human being…all for the simple offence of following his heart. The ignominy was unspeakable.

  ‘I want bail,’ he told his lawyer afterwards. ‘We’re headed for a release on recognizance, provided you’re not deemed a danger to the community. There might be a home detention order.’

  ‘“A danger to the community”? Are you kidding me? What do you think I’m planning to do, hit up the local schools with my travelling zoo of hand puppets? Look who Uncle Fenton’s got his arm up now, kids! Give me a fucking break.’

  ‘I wouldn’t joke about things like that.’

  ‘Do I look like I’m joking? Just do your damn job.’

  ‘Be patient, Fenton,’ she told him. ‘We’ll get you cleared.’

  50

  Sex with a member of her crew had its benefits. It released the pressure before the lights went down, it solved the problem of surplus adrenalin after a show, it calmed her when she woke from bad dreams—and it sure gave Robin something to do on her nights off.

  Farrell was gorgeous. She tried not to overthink how much he resembled Leon Sway but the similarity was extraordinary, the only real discrepancies being the crescent-shaped dimple in Leon’s cheek, the cleaner green of the athlete’s eyes, and, while Farrell’s body was incredible, it was the frame of a dancer, not a sprinter. When Leon had held her she’d felt shielded by his strength, even being next to him had electrified her in the shadow of his might. Leon’s body was a machine; Farrell’s, however honed, couldn’t come close.

  ‘You’re real pretty, you know that?’ Farrell, fresh from the shower, sank down next to her on the bed and kissed her shoulders. Her Denver penthouse suite was boutique and stylised, the bed sheets and bath tub black, the carpets cream and the fittings chrome. Dark orchids rose from elaborate vases and the view over the city was astonishing.

  ‘Hmm.’ Robin turned her head to meet his kiss, melting as his touch trailed a line down her back and peeled away the sheet. His chest was still wet and his breath minty from having cleaned his teeth. She moved on to her back and succumbed to his caresses.

  ‘Not tired yet?’ he teased, nibbling her ear lobe. They’d had sex all night, and going by Farrell’s rock-hard dick pressed against her inner leg he wasn’t done yet either. Lifting his washboard stomach, he loosened the towel around his waist. His majesty sprang free.

  ‘D’you want it?’ he groaned, close to her ear. ‘Let me hear you say you want it.’

  ‘I want it,’ she whispered, guiding him in.

  ‘You’re so wet,’ he choked. ‘I fucking love how wet you are.’

  They fell into momentum, their wearied muscles concerned only with the urgency to climax. With her eyes shut tight Robin could imagine for an instant she was with Leon. It was unfair but she couldn’t help it; she couldn’t tell herself not to feel what she felt. Farrell’s shoulders were broad, pinning her down, his backside lifting and falling on top of her: he was an able lover, he knew what he was doing, but with him as with all men there remained a sliver of detachment that stopped her engaging completely. With Leon, despite the fact they had only kissed, it had been different. She couldn’t put her finger on how, or why, but it had.

  ‘Are you ready?’ he breathed. She strained against him in response, raising her back
and contracting her legs against the sides of his waist and then he was pounding harder, winding his hips in the way that brought her pleasure. In a searing flash she was coming, and held him to her as she rode it out, screaming his name over and over again.

  Farrell finished quietly. He was a long time dismounting her, and when he did he sat on the side of the bed with his back to her.

  ‘That was fun.’ Robin propped herself on one elbow. ‘D’you think we should get up now? You’ve given me a serious appetite—’

  ‘Who’s Leon?’

  The question threw her. ‘What?’

  ‘Leon. You just said his name about sixteen times.’

  She yanked the sheet up, blushing like crazy. ‘No, I did not. That’s ridiculous.’

  ‘Only saying what I heard.’

  Robin didn’t know how to reply. Had she said Leon’s name? Oh dear.

  ‘Sorry,’ she muttered. ‘I didn’t mean to.’

  ‘Obviously not,’ he answered tightly. ‘So who is he?’

  ‘No one.’

  ‘Why do I doubt that?’

  ‘Sorry,’ she said again. ‘It was a stupid mistake, forget it.’

  Farrell turned. ‘I know this is just fun—’ he gestured between them ‘—whatever this is, but I have to know where I stand. If you’re with me, you’re with me. Not someone else.’

  ‘I know.’

  ‘So who is he?’

  She got up, pulling on her vest and jogging pants. ‘It doesn’t matter.’

  ‘Funny, it kinda does to me.’

  ‘Forget it, Farrell. It was a slip.’

  ‘Is it that sprinter? Is it Leon Sway?’

  Robin ran a hand through her hair. ‘If this is just fun, can’t we let it go?’

  ‘No. It makes a guy feel kinda shitty when you pull a stunt like that.’

  ‘Which is why I’ve apologised. Let’s move on.’