He bobbed his head back and forth. “There’s part of me that simply isn’t sure. That wonders if the Giovanni I’ve known for the past decade and a half is the real one, or the one he is when he’s with you. Makes me feel like maybe I haven’t been as diligent as I should have been in making sure I know my boss and dear friend.”
“So … you think I mean … more to him than just sex?”
Milli sighed and looked at me, almost like he didn’t want to say it, but then he smiled and said, “Yes. I’ve seen a lot of women mean just sex to Giovanni. What you mean to him is very different from that.”
It wasn’t as much a confirmation as it was more confusion. I was hoping for something a little more black and white, and what I got instead was a murky, shade of gray. I meantmoreto Gio than sex, but what did that mean? Sex and employee? Sex and friend? It didn’t seem like Gio had actual feelings for me, at least sometimes it didn’t. I didn’t know him before I knew him, so I had nothing to compare him to.
I just wished I knew how he really felt.
Sitting up in bed, I planned to pry, when there was a knock on my door. It could have been any number of people. Gio gave me all the keys to my apartment so I could be discerning with who I let in, but I’d been giving them away like sticks of gum. Gio had one, Milli had one, Tamryn had one. Both the chef and maid that handled my apartment. Dr. Aurora.
But the door opened and a head of blond hair poked in. For half a second, my stomach bottomed out thinking it was Lorie, but then the person stepped in fully, and it was someone I didn’t recognize. Her hair, which looked dyed, fell in loose waves on either side of her head, and she had a warm, welcoming smile. Beside her was a guy with short hair and a more wild-looking expression on his face.
They both were smiling at me like I was a child with cancer.
“Hey,” Milli said, sounding confused. “What are you two doing here?”
The woman rolled her eyes. “Gio’s been on us day-in and day-out about coming to stay for a few weeks while he deals with the Narzands. We were refusing at first, but then I talked to Tami and she said that he’s been really anxious about it. If it eases his mind, I guess it’s worth it to be here.”
The guy walked around her and up to the side of my bed, looking down at me like I was an animal on display at the zoo. “This is her, huh?”
“Avion,” Milli said. “Avion, these are Giovanni’s best friends, and co-founders of KGP. Benson,” he pointed to the guy, “and Kellyanne,” he pointed to the girl.
“What’s with the government names,Zariq?” The guy held out a hand to me with a dopey grin. “I’m Punk, that’s Kelly.”
I took his hand and shook it. “Nice to meet you. I’m Avion.”
“Oh we know,” Kelly said. “We’ve heard about you.Somuch about you.”
The tone of her voice was mysterious. I couldn’t quite tell if she was judging me or just sick of hearing about me. “You have?”
“Did Giovanni send you in to meet her?” Milli asked.
“Yeah. He said she could use some friends and we were his favorite ones,” Punk said, then looked back at Milli with a twisted expression. “Since when has he been talking like he’s in Casablanca or some shit?”
Milli just shook his head, looking down at me. “Since we made this lovely new friend.”
Kelly crossed her arms and stared at me, her eyes narrowed and focused. It felt like she was seeing an LED screen that was giving her my exact specifications and she was trying to decide if she should exterminate me or not. Both Punk and Milli seemed to notice the harsh stare, but neither said anything, only watched her and waited. Finally, Kelly walked up to the side of my bed, seeming to push Punk out of the way with the sheer size of her intensity, and leaned down over me. She grabbed my wrist with one hand and pushed the sleeve of my shirt up with the other, until one of the leftover marks from being bound the night before was visible.
“Wow. You’ve made it far,” she said. “Hogtied and still in it, huh?”
A look of understanding appeared across Milli’s face. “Ah.That’swhy he sent you in here.”
I fought against Kelly to pull my shirt sleeve back down. “Um… I’m confused.”
“Punk.” Milli put his hands around the man’s shoulders. “Have you seen the pool? I’ll show you.”
Something about being left alone with this overly scrutinous woman made me nervous, but I’d learned that Milli, at the very least, didn’t intentionally put me in bad situations. If he thought she was going to hurt me, he’d never leave.
Kelly walked over to the table in the corner of my room and grabbed one of the chairs before pulling it back to the bedside. She sat down in it, crossing one leg over the other, and dropped her folded hands into her lap. “So, Avion. You’re a submissive for Gio?”
My face immediately started to burn with embarrassment. “I… um… he… we…”
She let out a shrill laugh. “It’s okay. I was too at one point.” I looked Kelly up and down, suddenly now taking in all of her curves and beauty, and feeling the slightest bit jealous. “You spooked him pretty bad last night. Hogtied is exactly how far I got before I decided I couldn’t do it anymore.”
“You’re not really here just to ease his mind, are you?” I asked.
“No I am.” She smiled. “Giovanni and I have been friends for a long time. Even before we met Benson. He told me about his whole BDSM kink when he developed it, and I agreed to try it with him. We tried dating too, but it just didn’t work. Gio’s not a relationship kind of guy.” That was like a punch to the gut. “I thought I could do the whole domination and submission thing, but the night he hogtied me up like that, I felt so out of control that I had a panic attack. After that, we agreed to just be friends.”
