[Billionaires in Disguise 01.0] Every Breath You Take

by Blair Babylon

  Be the slut. What would Georgie the slut say? “I wouldn’t kick him out of my bed. Seriously, if you’re through with him, can I have your scraps?”

  Lizzy grinned harder, obviously thinking she was winning the banter. “He’s not your type. He doesn’t do one-night stands.”

  “No! Crap.” Georgie sighed, gazing back at the hotel room’s door. “What a waste. If I could sneak off with him for a couple hours, I could ditch this whole wedding.”

  Lizzy sat up and stared at her. “Georgie, you aren’t jonesing for The Dom, are you?”

  Georgie shook her head. “Oh, no. I’m fine with him. They’re a cute couple. Tall, but cute.”

  “Rae?”

  Uh, no. “Nah. I rarely swing that way.”

  “What then?”

  Georgie sighed. “I will bet you, dollars to donuts, that at some point today I’m going to have to crawl under a table. I am simply fucking dreading it.”

  Lizzy rolled off the bed and grabbed some stuff out of her checked baggage. “Your mysterious Parisian enemy?”

  Georgie couldn’t hold it back any longer, not from Lizzy, with whom she had lived for almost three years and the one person she might email later from somewhere else. “She’s not an enemy, and she has every right to wrap her pretty little hands around my throat and choke me until I die. If some blonde tries to kill me, just let her.”

  Lizzy sucked in a gasp. “Georgie, what did you do?”

  Georgie shook her head, pulling the hairs on the end of her long braid. “Something that I had to. And I was young and didn’t know any different. But that doesn’t make it any better.”

  Friederike von Hannover and Georgiana Oelrichs

  Georgie

  Georgie hid in her hotel room, applying layer after layer of makeup at the wide bathroom counter and mirror before the civil ceremony where her friend Rae Stone was to marry Wulfram von Hannover. The crystal sconces threw harsh light at her face, slicing deep shadows under her cheekbones and nose so that she looked ghastly. No amount of makeup could hide that kind of shame.

  When she and Flicka had known each other at Tanglewood, Georgie’s hair had flowed long and blond-streaked brown and free, so now Georgie twisted it into a severe knot on the back of her head like she was trying to yank her ears to meet at the back of her skull.

  At Tanglewood, they wore no makeup except for performances, so Georgie pulled out all her own makeup and dipped into Lizzy’s to apply huge, smoky smudges around her eyes, contrasting them until they almost looked hazel. She contoured her cheekbones until her face looked gaunt.

  She shouldn’t have brought a black dress. Musicians invariably perform wearing black formals, and Georgie had worn black dresses around Flicka often. Hopefully, the jewelry-weight silver chains that twisted into a belt around her waist and dangled in back from the high neckband, falling like a silver waterfall down her bare spine, would break it up enough. The green dress that she had procured was, indeed, too slutty.

  The woman in the mirror was almost unrecognizable to Georgie. She hoped that Flicka wouldn’t recognize her, either.

  If she was even there. She might be away on her honeymoon.

  Yeah, Flicka might skip her own brother’s wedding.

  The brother who had raised her like a father.

  The one that she was so lonely for as a teenager that she almost dropped out of Tanglewood.

  She was so going to be there, and she would be all over Wulfram and Rae.

  Georgie applied scarlet lipstick, allowing the creamy stick to go beyond the natural lines of her already puffy lips until she looked like a fucking clown.

  Better.

  Black SUVs picked them up from the hotel lobby, and Georgie and Lizzy rode with some of the security guys.

  At the ceremony in a small law office far up in a skyscraper, everybody spoke French, which Georgie didn’t, so she kept her head tucked down and tried futilely to hide behind the tiny, slight form of Lizzy. She must have looked like a cow hiding behind a sapling.

  During the ceremony, Georgie sat in a chair that had been shoved to the back of the room. Lizzy was standing in front of her, all giggly and bouncy as if true love always wins.

  Georgie kept her chin tucked down and her elbows close to her sides and tried not to scan everyone walking in the door, but she couldn’t help herself.

  Pierre Grimaldi, Prince of Monaco, strode into the room and was even more gorgeous close up than in the pictures on Georgie’s computer. The pictures didn’t show the sensual way he moved, like he was built out of pliant, limber muscle that he might wrap around you at any moment. His sultry glance around the room caught even Georgie’s attention, and she knew that he was married.

  Beside him, a willowy woman wore a pale blue dress that brought out the brilliant green of her eyes and made her skin all the more perfectly porcelain. Her curly hair was woven into a golden chignon that made her look like a goddess.

  Despite the years, Georgie could have picked Flicka out of a crowd of perfect blondes without blinking. She was more beautiful, but she hadn’t changed.

  Flicka began to turn toward Georgie.

  Georgie ducked behind Lizzy and waited, but she didn’t hear anything.

  She hid until the short ceremony was over, then trotted into the generic, whitewashed corridor and sneaked around the corner until the rest of the wedding party had left the office.

  Flicka walked up ahead, so Georgie hid behind the wall of black suits that surrounded Rae and Wulfram von Hannover.

  Every time she looked at Wulfram now, she could see Flicka’s elegant bone structure in his face, although his was obviously a masculine version of it. How could she have been so blind? Years. Georgie had known him for years.

  Flicka strode across a wide sidewalk and climbed into a waiting SUV. The door slammed, and she was gone.

  Georgie deflated with relief, but she followed Lizzy and Rae into the waiting SUVs and then hid in her hotel room, typing about Latin American hegemonies, until she absolutely, positively, had to go to the reception downstairs in the George the Fifth hotel.

  Rae, still glowing in her ivory cocktail dress and nearly giggly with happiness, had shown Georgie to the center table with the rest of the wedding party, where scarlet roses and royal purple hydrangeas built enormous centerpieces. The sweetness of the roses perfumed the air so heavily that Georgie couldn’t smell the croissants that must be baking 24/7 in the hotel’s ovens. She caught a glimpse of herself in the table settings, rimmed with gold, as were the crystal goblets. The paleness in her face looked ghostly, but maybe that was the snowy white bone china and not her own trepidation.

  If Flicka did see her, Georgie could duck under the many tablecloths, sumptuous layers of royal purple, blue, and red topped with a pristine white one. Her New England mother would have gasped at the decor, first with horror at the excess, then at the audacity of the opulence, and then she would have gone back to their home in Conyers Farm and recreated it for her lady friends, and they all would have tittered about what better taste they all had than the royals.

  Georgie hid on the perimeter, sometimes in the hallway, sometimes near the back among the greenery, checking the location of Flicka and her crew—because Flicka had always been gregarious and a cadre of gorgeous people had always crowded around her, and her brother’s impromptu wedding was no exception.

  Rae and Lizzy had sent Georgie in search of champagne because evidently Georgie was just picking at her food, and she clutched four flutes of champagne in her fists by the stems, watching to make sure Flicka’s back was turned before she wove through the crowd toward Lizzy and Rae.

  Georgie dodged a woman in a ruby choker and matching dress, threaded between a few men in morning dress or perfectly tailored suits, and made a beeline for Rae’s table, fully intending to drop off the booze and break for the shrubbery again, when she heard a woman’s dulcet tones behind her ask, “Georgiana Oelrichs?”

  She cringed. Georgie would have known Flicka’s voice a
nywhere, too.

  “Um, yeah, but it’s Georgie Johnson now.” She reached without looking, stretching four champagne flutes toward the table. The wine glasses were plucked out of her hands just before she dropped them.

  She turned and stared right into Friederike von Hannover’s shocked and hurting green eyes. She was even more beautiful up close, and Georgie felt even more like a little shit. “Hi, Flicka. Can we talk somewhere?”

  Flicka wound her arm in Georgie’s, just like they had when they had strolled the fields around Tanglewood together, and guided her toward the hallway outside.

  The truth, Georgie decided. The whole truth and nothing but the truth, so help her God.

  Outside the double doors, she and Flicka sat on a velvet settee bench and bent their heads toward each other. Flicka’s golden hair, always as soft as silk, stroked Georgie’s cheek.

  Georgie started with what was on the top of her heart: “I am so sorry.”

  Flicka whispered, “I was so worried. You just disappeared. I couldn’t find you.”

  “My father, what he did, it was so awful, and I got you involved. I am so sorry.”

  Flicka seemed to have not heard. “When I emailed, I got a bounce from the lawyers. I couldn’t find you. I wanted to help you.”

  “I came home from Tanglewood, and when I woke up the next morning, there were lawyers downstairs demanding my passwords to everything, and they took my phone. My father and Benedict left with them. I couldn’t do anything. I couldn’t get word to anyone. Even at school, they restricted my access to everything. I couldn’t get an email out, and then after the settlement, I was too ashamed.”

  “How did you get here?” Flicka asked.

  “I’m in college. Rae Stone is my suitemate.”

  “Do you know Wulfram?”

  “I did, but I didn’t know he was related to you. I didn’t know his name.”

  “However not?”

  “It’s complicated. It’s a very complicated thing. I didn’t know he was your brother. I was hiding, so I never told him my old name. I’m Georgie Johnson now.”

  “It wouldn’t have mattered. I never told him about what happened.”

  “Why not? He could have helped you.”

  “Oh, Georgie. It was nothing. It was a pittance. I missed you. I wanted you back. Are you okay?”

  The horror broke through Georgie’s carefully manicured mask, and she twined her arms around Flicka’s neck and sobbed. “I’m not. For two years, everyone at my high school hated me and knew where the tuition money had come from—and then I ran away. I ran away from everything. I’ll pay you back. I have a plan to pay everyone back within the next ten years.”

  “I don’t care about the money, Georgiana. I care about you. I would have helped you, and I want you back in my life. Do you still play?”

  She meant the piano. Georgie nodded. “Every day. It’s the only thing that keeps me going.”

  “Play for me.”

  “I don’t ever perform.”

  “Please.”

  “Other people here might know me, might come after me, and I have nothing. I’m saving up for law school so that I can work in corporate law and pay everyone back. I just lost my job, but I’ll do it, and I’ll do it in ten years. I swear that I will.”

  “Georgiana, you don’t owe me anything, and I’ll tell anyone else who has wrong ideas to back off. I just want you back. Come sit with me. Talk to me. Give me your phone number and your social stuff, and don’t get lost again, not from me.”

  “Flicka, they’ll know me.”

  “I’ll introduce you by your new name. Johnson, right?”

  Georgie nodded. “Someone will recognize me. You did.”

  “We were like sisters. These are all people from school, not Tanglewood, not music. Only one guy is a musician at all. The rest are just,” she fluttered her long, slim hands, “normal. Come on. I’ve only just found you again. Sit with me.”

  Maybe sitting with Flicka would keep Georgie away from Wulfram von Hannover. She didn’t think she could stand talking to him about everything just now. “Okay. I am sorry.”

  “No more apologies,” Flicka said, her firm voice sounding more like an imperious princess every minute. “It’s the past, and today is a new day. I’ve found my best friend again, and I won’t lose you this time.”

  Georgie cleaned up her mascara in the ladies’ room with Flicka hovering like she might bolt again, but she didn’t want to bolt. She wanted to crawl under Flicka’s arm and pretend that the last six years had never, ever happened.

  She wandered by the table to talk to Rae and Lizzy for a second. She leaned with her fingers splayed on the tablecloth and couldn’t quite meet their curious eyes as she said, “Flicka is an old friend, so I’m just going to go sit with her for a minute and catch up.”

  Under her hands, the white tablecloth blurred, and she sucked in a deep breath to keep from tearing up again.

  “Okay,” Rae said and handed her purse to her from the back of her chair. “Wave us over if you need us, okay?”

  “You bet.” Georgie turned toward Flicka and her entourage. “I’ll be back in a few minutes.”

  Georgie walked over to the table near the windows. Flicka patted a chair beside herself. Georgie glanced around the table but didn’t recognize anyone else, thank the stars.

  She sat down at her table, blinking in the noontime Parisian sunlight that streamed through the windows, and Flicka started making introductions.

  With her own as well as others’, Flicka had always been casual about titles, and she introduced Georgie to “my very new husband, Pierre Grimaldi,” and the heir apparent to the sovereign throne of Monaco rose from his chair to shake Georgie’s hand, smiling sedately, and while he didn’t leer at all, there was a sparkle in his dark eyes that Georgie didn’t like.

  Around the table, Flicka introduced the ladies first.

  Victoria Adelaide’s firm handshake, grim smile, and rigid posture suggested the military or a very thick stick up her butt. Georgie smiled back as warmly as she could.

  Alexia giggled, and her hand flopped in Georgie’s handshake. Four empty champagne flutes already crowded around Alexia’s plate. “So nice to meet you,” Alexia said. “So nice.”

  “And so nice to meet you,” Georgie said, not with sarcasm but amusement. As she swiveled to shake hands, the silvery chains dangling down her back tickled her skin.

  The men lifted from their chairs while they shook Georgie’s hand. All of them had good skin, sharp cheekbones and jawlines, and white teeth. Flicka ran with the beautiful royals.

  Flicka finally introduced the man seated beside Georgie, “Alexandre de Valentinois, who goes by Alex because he’s too cool for school, may I present Georgiana Johnson, my dearest friend.”

  Georgie’s face warmed at that because she didn’t deserve it.

  Alexandre de Valentinois didn’t rise from his seat to shake like the other guys but just stuck out his hand with a weary smile. His light oak-colored hair swished past his shoulders and was bleached bright blond at the ends, as if he actually had some style in this very conservative crowd. He wore a dark blue business suit with a peach tie, knotted tightly, and even under the layers of cloth, his body looked lean, like he was a runner or a swimmer. With his pale golden skin, like he could tan if he wanted to but never saw the sun, and that long hair that faded to blond at the ends, plus his large, dark eyes, the effect was slightly vampiric.

  His eyes weren’t big and round, though. They were long, and tilted, and thickly lashed, more exotic than classic.

  In another second, she got it. He looked a little sleepy, like he was just about to rouse himself from your bed after a long, rough night.

  Alex leaned his head to the side, long hair swaying, and said, “Nice to meet you.”

  Flicka told him, “Georgiana is a musician, too. We were at Tanglewood together for piano. Her Chopin is incredible.”

  Interest flickered in Alex’s deep brown eyes, and he lean
ed toward Georgie a bit. “That’s high praise, coming from Flicka.” A posh British accent tinted his voice, which was deep and quite hoarse, like he had been sick recently.

  “She hasn’t heard me play for a long time,” Georgie said. “I’m not sure my current skills are equivalent to my previous reputation.”

  Wow, her own upper-crust vocabulary roared back as if Flicka were contagious.

  Flicka said over Georgie’s head, “If she hasn’t lost ground, then she’s still better than I am now.”

  Georgie said, “Now, that’s just patently false. You were better than I was at Tanglewood.”

  “I have a certain sensibility for modern, atonal music, but you could always play Chopin better than I could, a lot better,” Flicka said. “And you’re right that I haven’t heard you in ages. That’s why you’ve promised to play something here.”

  “I did no such thing,” Georgie protested.

  “Oh, come now, Georgiana. You owe me.” Flicka’s green eyes snapped with merriment.

  “I never perform,” Georgie said. She clenched her hands into fists under the tablecloth.

  Flicka dismissed this with a wave. “Alex, teach her something of yours. You can sing.”

  A crease drew itself between his eyebrows. “You promised that you wouldn’t impose.”

  “Pierre promised. My wedding was yesterday. This is my brother’s wedding, and he will listen to those stodgy old violins all day if we let him.” Her dismissive hand flick encompassed all four tuxedoed musicians in the corner.

  Alex glanced over at the string quartet sawing away on their instruments. “The flat D-string on the second violin is distressing.”

  Georgie took another look at Alex. She hadn’t been able to nail down whether the mistuned string was on the viola or the second violin. “It’s the D-string?”

  Alex raised one dark eyebrow. “They’re playing Ravel’s String Quartet in F major. The second violin’s part is playing flat, and they are the notes played on the D-string.”