He stuck his hands in his pockets and turned to make his way out of the party. At the last moment, he remembered Pop and the dance in the moonlight, but then he stepped outside, because no amount of money was worth having his heart broken.
Holding her new mobile in her hand, Bea stared out onto a gloomy London. It looked like a normal Tuesday: people coming and going to work, traffic bustling, lives being lived.
Oddly, she didn’t feel normal. Nothing felt right.
Her office door opened behind her, and she heard the clack of Inga’s efficient footsteps. “Jeff Toland of Stallon-E called again. Shall I ring him for you?”
“No, thank you, Inga.” She set her lips against the emotions that welled in her chest. There were so many of them that she couldn’t pick one from the other. “We’re out of that deal.”
“Sorry, I believe I heard you incorrectly,” Inga said crisply. “I thought you just said that we’re out of the deal, but I know that can’t be what you meant.”
Composing her expression, she whirled her chair around. “That’s exactly what I meant.”
Inga stepped forward, her face pursed with concern. “Do you need food? Or a doctor?”
Bea suspected she needed a certain Italian, but she couldn’t admit that, so she shook her head. “I’m fine.”
“If you were fine, we’d be on the offensive to ensure that Fraser doesn’t get anywhere near Stallon-E. You aren’t fine.” Inga’s eyes went large, and she leaned in. “Have you named your successor?”
She smiled for the first time since Italy, which made her want to give Inga anything she wanted. “Not yet, but you’ll be the first to know.”
“Of course I will.” Sniffing indignantly, she backed out of the office.
Still smiling, she swiped her mobile on and made a call she couldn’t put off any longer.
Marcus came on the line almost immediately. “I hear you were in Italy to meet with Stallon-E.”
“I went to their factory and met with Jeff Toland and their executive team.” She relived seeing Luca in that conference room for the millionth time since it’d happened. It seemed ludicrous now that she hadn’t suspected or figured out his involvement before that moment. Maybe she hadn’t wanted to know.
“What’s your verdict?” Marcus asked without preamble.
“They’re a solid company.” She closed her eyes. “They know their market as well as their technology, and their leadership is …”
“What?” he asked when she didn’t finish.
“Really rather perfect,” she said softly. She pressed her fingertips to the bridge of her nose and cleared the emotion from her throat. “They’re intelligent and know their field, and their product is impressive. I rode in one, and I’d never have figured it for an electric car. If the battery even comes close to a five-hundred-mile range, then it’s a guaranteed success.”
“Then when do we negotiate?”
“You negotiate,” she said. “I’m out of this deal.”
“That doesn’t make sense. You just sang their praises, and I understand Fraser is closing in on them.”
Fraser. She pictured the way he’d gloat about this with her.
Frankly, it hardly seemed important in the whole scheme of things. Of all the losses, that wasn’t the one she was mourning. “I really liked Toland, Marcus. I think he’s going to do great things for that company. I emailed him and told him to expect your call, and that your money was much more preferable to Fraser’s.”
There was silence on the other end. Then Marcus said, “What happened in Italy, Bea?”
“Nothing.” She turned to look out the window, but all she saw was her reflection and evidence of what was likely a broken heart on her face.
She didn’t want to go to Tuesday night drinks with her sisters, but she knew she had to. She’d missed the previous week because she’d been in Italy; if she didn’t go this week, they’d come find her.
By the time she arrived at the Goddess of the Night, she knew what she’d say when they inevitably asked her about Luca. She wasn’t going to appear anything but blasé about it and simply tell them that it was fine but surprisingly lackluster. And then they’d stop pushing her at Luca, and that would be that.
She walked in, head high, and went straight the bar to order her usual martini. She flirted with the bartender, like she always did, and picked up her drink to take to their usual spot.
Gigi and Titania sat there, heads together, obviously in deep conversation. Their mother sat on the other side of the booth with Viola.
Bea’s step faltered—she hadn’t expected both her mother
and
Viola to be there. She could hold her guard against one, but both of them together might crack her façade.
No—she’d be able to put them off the scent. She was adept at hiding her feelings. She had years of practice.
“Hello, darlings,” she said blithely as she set her drink on the table and busied herself taking off her coat and scarf.
“We’ve been very impatiently waiting for you to get here so you could tell us everything,” Viola said.
Gigi leaned forward, her gaze bright. “I cannot believe you had an Italian adventure with Luca and didn’t tell us before you left. But we shall promptly forgive you when you give us
all
the details.”
Titania wrinkled her nose. “Please not all the details. Like I don’t need to know whether Luca wears boxers or briefs.”
“He’s more the type of man to wear nothing,” Jacqueline said.
They all stared at her.
She rolled her eyes. “You can’t possibly tell me that you don’t think about such things.”
“And Declan, Mother?” Gigi asked with the devil in her eyes.
Their mother blushed charmingly as she lifted her drink. “I don’t have to think about that. I know what Declan wears under his trousers.”
“Bloody hell.” Titania covered her ears with her hands. “Was that necessary?”
Gigi nudged their youngest sister and faced Bea. “Well?”
She opened her mouth to tell them the little story that she’d rehearsed, but what came out of her mouth was “He threw my mobile away.”
There was stunned silence around the table.
Viola shook her head. “I don’t understand what you mean.”
She remembered how he stormed toward her, grabbed her phone, and pitched it over the wall, and she felt the righteous anger take hold of her all over again. “I mean he took my mobile out of my hand and tossed it over a high wall, and it shattered on the other side when it hit the ground.”
Titania started to laugh.
Frowning at her youngest sister, Bea picked up her martini. “We didn’t beat her enough as a child.”
“There had to be a reason why Luca did that,” Jacqueline said, watching her as if she knew a secret.
“There’s absolutely no reason ever for anyone to destroy another person’s mobile,” she declared.
“The mobile is sacred in Bea’s worldview,” Gigi said with a toss of her hair. “However, Mother’s right. Luca must have hit a boiling point if he threw yours away. He knows how important it is to you. He wouldn’t do something to deliberately hurt you.”
“Wouldn’t he?” She forced a sip of her cocktail down before setting it back on the table, knowing they were right. Why was it so hard to admit?
“He wouldn’t.” Viola covered her hand. “Luca has your best interests at heart, dearest. He would give anything to please you.”
“So why’d he do it?” Titania asked, leaning onto her forearms, her gaze inquisitive.
“Because I was working.”
“You’re always working,” Gigi pointed out.
“Yes, but I’d promised him I wouldn’t while I was there.” The incriminating silence made her frown. “I know I was wrong, but that doesn’t condone his actions.”
“What happened with the business deal?” their mother asked, diverting the conversation.
“I’m not investing in the company.” She withdrew her hand and crossed her arms.
Brow furrowed, Jacqueline leaned forward. “Didn’t Luca help you the way he said?”
“He did.”
“So you’re saying that you reneged on your deal, he became furious enough to break your phone,”—Gigi tipped her head—“and yet he still helped you?”
“Yes.”
Gigi nodded. “So even when he’s angry, he’s thinking of pleasing you?”
It made no sense to her either. She was waiting to find out what his endgame was, because there had to be some sort of twist. “I wouldn’t look at it that way.”
“I would,” Titania chimed in.
Jacqueline smiled. “I would, too.”
Bea looked at Viola, who shrugged apologetically. “I can’t disagree with them.”
Arms spread across the back of the booth, Gigi sat back. “You know the scene in
Notting Hill
where Julia Roberts sends Hugh Grant the Chagall painting, and his friends point out that Hugh’s being a daft prick for rejecting her? Because he’s just doing it out of fear?”
Bea narrowed her gaze at her sister. “What are you insinuating?”
“Nothing.” Gigi smiled, coy. “I just like that scene.”
“This is the civilized way of having a bachelor party.” Sebastian reclined in the large chair and crossed an ankle on his knee. “It almost makes getting married look attractive.”
Luca nodded at the crystal glass in the man’s hand. “How much whiskey have you had tonight,
caro
?”
Sebastian held his glass up with a grin. “Not nearly as much as I’m planning.”
Nick and Merrick joined them, pulling a couple leather chairs closer. Ian had called to say he was helping Rowdy with a personal issue and that they wouldn’t make it. Finn, Declan, and Jon had already bowed out for the evening, clearly eager to return home to their women.
Lucky fools. Luca sipped his whiskey slowly, letting it burn all the way down.
“I think it’s time for a toast,” Sebastian said, lifting his glass. “To Merrick, for bringing us to his highly civilized club, even though there are no strippers. And to two more men being taken off the market.”
“Two men?” Nick looked at the American inquiringly. “Have you met someone, too?”
“I’m talking about Luca.” Sebastian flashed a sly smile at Luca.
The other two turned to stare at him. He scowled back, not inclined to talk about any of it.
Sebastian shrugged. “Except he looks like he wants to throw himself under a subway train, so maybe I’m wrong.”
“It’s called the Underground here, not the subway,” Merrick corrected. “And, no, he has the tortured look of a man newly in love with a Summerhill.”
He wasn’t newly in love—he’d been in love with Beatrice from the moment he’d first seen her. “I’m not going to throw myself under a train.”
Not unless his ghost could come back and make Beatrice’s life hell. Though he really didn’t want that. He didn’t wish her ill. He wished for
her
.
If only she weren’t impossible. He pointed his drink at Sebastian. “If you were smart, you’d run away from the Summerhills while you can, before they entangle you in their world.”
“Too late,” the American said cheerfully. “I love them all, even Bea who won’t give me the time of day. It’s something you and I have in common.”
Luca narrowed his eyes. “It’s good that I’ve had so much whiskey that I can’t stand up.”
Nick shook his head. “What happened? I thought she went to Italy with you.”
“I threw her mobile away,” he murmured.
Sebastian spewed his whiskey. “
You threw away her phone?
Do you have a death wish?”
“I wasn’t thinking.” He shrugged. “I went mad for a moment.”
“You’re in love,” Nick said with a nod. “Love causes a man to do extraordinary things.”
Sebastian shook his head. “You make love sound comparable to being bitten by a radioactive spider.”
“Close,” Merrick said, and everyone clinked their glasses to that.
“I tried to offer her everything she wanted”—Luca leaned forward—“
I offered her the world,
but she didn’t want it.”
“It’s Bea,” Sebastian said as though that explained everything.
“Reginald was a bastard,” Nick added. “He was a lousy father to all of them, but I imagine it was hardest on Bea since she was the oldest.”
Luca remembered the stories she’d told him while they were soaking and nodded.
Sebastian made a dismissive noise. “At some point though, you have to own up to your childhood and get past it. Bea’s smart, she’s strong. She knows better. She’s just stubborn.”
There was that, too. Luca sank in the chair and frowned at his drink. “I’m going back to Italy once and for all.”
Nick sat up. “Before the wedding?”
“I’ll come back for the wedding, of course.” Luca smiled sardonically. “Will you miss me, Nico?”
“I’m a little at a loss at what I’ll do without you here to plague me.”
“What do you plan on doing when you return back to Italy?” Merrick asked, his gaze shrewd.
“Have you heard of Stallon-E?”
“Heard of it?” Merrick raised his brows. “Don’t tell me you’re involved with the company.”
Luca shrugged. “It was simply luck. My cousin had the idea, and I know cars. It was a natural fit.”
“And you managed to hire the man who brought Ford into the twenty-first century.” Sebastian rubbed his hands together. “I love it when a plan comes together.”
They all stared at him.
“All the advertising companies in New York are hot and bothered by the hope that they’ll get to come up with Stallon-E’s first ad campaign.” Sebastian pointed at Luca. “Be picky when the time comes. You have clout so they’ll be willing to go low just to nab the account. If you want recommendations for good teams, let me know.”
Merrick eyed the American speculatively. “I didn’t know you were in advertising.”
Sebastian winced. “I’m not anymore. Some habits die hard.”
As Merrick and Sebastian began to talk business, Nick leaned toward Luca. “Are you really leaving London for good?”
“Yes,” he said, grim.
Nick stared at him silently. Then he shook his head. “I never thought I’d see the day when a woman brought you low. It isn’t like you to give up.”
“She made her desires clear.”
“And you aren’t going to fight for her?”
“She should be willing to fight for me, too, no?”
“Yes, I suppose,” Nick murmured.
“Makes you appreciate how easy the one you picked is, doesn’t it?” Merrick said with a wry twist of his lips.