She had a body to die for, of course, with long slim legs that were made even more impressive by the silver micro mini and heels she was rocking. I snuck a glance at Marcus to see if he looked in any way uncomfortable – talk about a baptism of fire. Not only was he going to have to pretend to be into me, he was going to have to do it in front of somebody he’d once had a fling with. How long ago had it ended, I wondered? Had it been a hookup, or something more?
‘Mia, let me introduce you to Ava Whitfield,’ crooned Dean.
I held out my hand to greet her warmly – there was no reason for me to assume she’d be anything other than lovely.
‘Great to meet you, Mia.’
She gave me a stiff smile, swiftly extricating her hand from mine. If she could have got away with it, I reckoned she would have shaken me off in disgust.
‘You too, Ava,’ she said, for some reason elongating the first syllable of my name, putting an unusual emphasis on it, and I didn’t think it was just because of her American accent.
Then she eyeballed Marcus.
‘Evening,’ he said with a nod.
‘Well, Marcus, you certainly kept that one quiet,’ said Mia. ‘Dean tells me you and Ava are an item now.’
I really thought this was where Marcus would pull the plug. He’d said it himself, he was a straight-up kind of guy who said things as he saw them, but here we were, trying to fabricate a connection that simply wasn’t there. I mentally prepared for him to come clean in front of Mia, upset Dean and then we’d have to deal with the fallout. But to my surprise, Marcus leaned forward in his seat, reached out and tucked my hair behind my right ear, letting his fingers linger on my neck for a few seconds, just behind the lowest point of my drop earring.
‘Well,’ he said, holding my gaze as I tried to remember to breathe. ‘It kind of took me by surprise, to be honest.’
Even though my mind was reeling, I was aware of two things: the fact my skin was now burning where he’d briefly touched me, because it had been so unexpected, I supposed, and because Charlie hadn’t touched me like that for months, fake or not. And the other thing was that Mia Stephens was currently giving me daggers, indicating that if somethinghadhappened between her and Marcus, it had been him who ended it.
Dean had ordered us two cars to get to the restaurant, which was only fifteen minutes away by foot according to Google Maps, so I didn’t see why we couldn’t have walked. On the other hand, I was wearing heels, so I’d probably thank them later.
We all filed out to the front of the hotel and Dean ushered Mia into the first car with him, Patrick and Nick, conveniently leaving Marcus and I to share the second.
‘That wasn’t at all set up,’ I grumbled under my breath as Marcus held open the taxi’s door so that I could slide easily inside.
‘Not exactly being subtle about it, is he?’ said Marcus, shutting the door behind me as I strapped myself in and then striding around to get in on the other side.
We sat in silence to begin with. I was still in awe of Monaco, and this street we were driving down was like something out of a video game: smooth and straight, the strangely appealing central reservation filled with plants and palm trees. But then, after a while, it felt like somebody should acknowledge what had happened in the bar, how we’d upped our pretending-to-be-a-couple game. I wondered if it had been a moment of madness that he was now massively regretting.
‘Hope that was all right?’ he said eventually. ‘That little display in there?’
I winced internally. How to evenbegindiscussing that he’d just pretended to be so into me that he’d justhadto reach out and touch me tenderly in front of a room full of people, one of whom, presumably, was his ex.
I cleared my throat. ‘I suppose if we’re going to do this, we may as well do it properly.’
‘That’s what I thought,’ he said. ‘Just wanted to make sure we were on the same page.’
I nodded, looking out of the window as our car snaked off the main road and up into a tangle of winding streets, away from the sea and into what I presumed was central Monte Carlo. The impeccable streets were lined with brightly lit designer shops – Dior, Louis Vuitton, Prada, Gucci, high-end household names that I could only ever imagine being able to afford. I’d found some random statistics for my article earlier, each one more surprising than the last: Monaco was smaller in size than New York’s Central Park; over twelve thousand millionaires lived in less than one square mile, presumably due mainlyto the country’s zero income tax policy; there was supposedly a curse on the monarchy, otherwise known as the Grimaldi family, whose framed pictures I’d seen displayed proudly all over the city – photos of Prince Albert and his wife, Princess Charlene, were behind glass cabinets in hotel foyers, and beautiful black-and-white shots of his late mother, Princess Grace, took pride of place in every other shop window.
‘Mia didn’t seem happy,’ I said, testing the waters. ‘Did you two used to be an item?’
Marcus sighed. ‘Is this off the record or on? Because I’m losing track here.’
‘That’s what happens when you mix business with pleasure,’ I said with a shrug.
‘And exactly which part of this arrangement are you finding pleasurable, Ava?’ he asked, glancing sideways at me.
‘Pleasure was the wrong choice of word.’
‘Was it, now?’ he said.
I could almost hear the smile playing on his lips, like he didn’t believe me. Why would he, with an ego as big as his? He probably thought that I was finding every minute of being linked with him an absolute delight. And the truth was, part of me, the part of myself I was used to ignoring,wasfeeling more alive than I’d felt in months, but not for the reasons Marcus thought. It was more that I was fired up by the people I’d met, the way they didn’t try to hide their ambition, that the players essentially put their souls on the line every time they stepped out on to that court. It was actually quite inspiring – shame they all had to be so arrogant about it.
‘Mia and I spent one night together last season,’ said Marcus, pinching the top of his nose as though telling me this was in some way difficult. ‘I suspect she wanted more, but unfortunately that wasn’t something I could give.’
