It’s too much to bear. I’m ending it all now. Goodbye, Mama and Father. I tried to make you proud of me.
“It just doesn’t seem right to me. The writing…” Andy says with a frown. I nod silently in agreement, afraid I’ll upset her more by prying. “Another thing,” she traces a fingertip over the words, “is that Kyle never called our mother ‘Mama.’ He joked about her that way. He’d put on a goofy French accent and pretend he was visiting royalty or something. But when he spoke to her directly, he called her Mother.”
“That’s definitely odd,” I say. The more I look at it, the less this all adds up. And the more it points at Whitlock’s involvement.
“What do you think it means?” she asks huskily. I shake my head, feeling my jaw clench because I’m in an impossible predicament.
Kyle Carter was doing dirty business with his father and Mark Whitlock. Mark’s obsession with Kyle’s baby sister probably pushed things over the edge. But I’m pretty sure that it was their criminal activities that led to his death. I imagine he was trying to tell her. But he never got a chance to come clean and face the horror she would certainly have felt. And there’s no way I can tell her. Because this woman is getting deeper and deeper under my skin. If I tell her what I know now, she’ll never let me back into her world.
Chapter 13
Andy Carter
“You’ll be delighted to know we’ve invited every major tabloid on the continent, Daddy,” I tell my father as the limo cruises up to the hotel. “So, you can rest assured that you don’t even need to be at the party to get all the media attention you could wish for.” I let the irony of that sink in. I’m certain that my father would rather drop off the face of the planet than have this news spread around.
“You’re making a big mistake, Andrea,” he spits so sharply that I almost hear the lash of his voice over the phone line.
“Well, that’s too bad,” I keep my voice steady. “I don’t give a damn, as long as the world knows that I am marrying Mateo Ricci.”
I can picture the expression on his face as I’m speaking. I’m sure my mother’s carefully schooled expression is probably slipping too. They must be spitting mad. And I love it. The only thing that makes me happier is the thought of Mark’s reaction. I’d be delighted if the top of his head exploded, letting his black soul go shooting off to hell where it belongs.
I adjust the oversized diamonds at my earlobes, take a final look at my lipstick in my compact mirror, and brace myself to get out of the car.
The gleaming doors to the Diamond Grande have been thrown open. A red carpet leads from my car door to the entrance. As the driver tugs it open, I reach for the hand of the man standing waiting for me.
“You are a vision,” Mateo says under his breath as he runs his eyes over my body. “That dress…” He licks his lips.
“Just the dress?” I say equally softly as we turn to face the flurry of flashing cameras.
“Oh, there’s that…and then what lies beneath,” he whispers into the shell of my ear. I feel his hand slide down the gold satin sheath of my dress. He squeezes lightly over my ass, and I shudder. My asscheeks are still tingling from the toe-curling spanking I got before we left his apartment. Who knew it would be my new favorite thing? I’ve had lovers who’ve occasionally given me a light swat on the butt during sex. But after that first night when he barged into my apartment, I’d been mortified to know how much I loved it. Not to mention the rest of his adventurous little kinks. In the ten days since then, we’ve been almost inseparable. He says it’s to protect me.
I keep teasing him that it’s for the sex.
Though in the silent moments when my heart is at its weakest, I feel something else. Something…more. Something I don’t want to acknowledge.
“You don’t look so bad yourself, by the way,” I say, running my fingertips over the line of his dark jacket. The man is groomed impeccably; clean-shaven, not a hair out of place, his tuxedo was clearly tailor-made for him. Which would be essential because those shoulders would never fit into anything off-the-rack.
“Oh? I pass muster, huh?” he winks at me.
Pass muster? The man looks like a god…a Greek freaking god! I could chew the buttons from his shirt one by one and lick every inch of that hard, muscled chest. Then below— I stop myself abruptly before I drag him back into the limo and tear his clothes off.
“Hmm,” I say mildly. “You’ll do.”
He tightens his grip on my tender butt, making my pussy clench immediately. Holy shit, the things this man can do to me with just one touch. I swallow hard, not resisting as he pulls me into the curve of his body, tucking my hand through his elbow.
“Let’s do this thing, angel,” he says, emphasizing the little term of endearment that he’s been using increasingly frequently. I give a nod, listening to the clamor of questions being called to us as we head to the door. Nearby, a TV announcer is speaking excitedly into a camera. It looks like Dario has pulled out all the stops for this little get-together. Although “little” hardly covers it. He’s packed out the ballroom of the five-star New York branch of his luxury hotel chain.
“Have you set a date for the wedding?” someone yells.
“Who’s designing your wedding gown, Miss Carter?”
“Looks like true love! When did you know she was the one, Mr. Ricci?”
The TV announcer is babbling into the microphone, describing our outfits in detail. As we cross the threshold of the lobby, the clamor dies down, and I heave a sigh. I look up at Mateo, who’s staring down at me with a strange intensity.
Looks like true love…
The words keep ringing in my ears, and I find myself inexplicably happy. It’s a strange feeling for me. Yet, despite the strangeness of it all, I can’t remember when last I felt this content or relaxed.
