The Couple who Fooled the World (5 page)

The chill that came over him now wasn’t anything like what she’d seen of him before. It seemed more real. And a whole lot scarier.

“Right, well, me, either. High school basically sucked. I had braces and zits and these really thick glasses…”

“Sounds like it was tough,” he said, clearly not of the opinion that it was. “But it’s time to go.”

But he had no idea. No idea what it was like to feel like an outsider, not just in school, but at home. To have your mother pay a guy behind your back to be your date. And to have that date…that date that still had a twenty from your
mom in his wallet, try to force you into sex, then hit you when you said no.

No, he didn’t know about that. And he didn’t need to. It didn’t matter anyway. Because now she understood, understood that normal wasn’t so shiny and perfect. That normal and “functional” didn’t really mean anything at all. Because somehow everyone had thought that a guy who would try to rape his date was normal, while those same people were convinced something was wrong with her.

It hadn’t left her with much confidence in people.

She nodded slowly and he looped his arm through hers. They went back into the ballroom and she felt like all eyes were on them, which they doubtlessly were. They’d just very conspicuously gone out to the balcony for fifteen minutes, and now Ferro was rushing them through the crowd at a speed that spoke of urgency.

Oh, yes, they had earned the stares.

She’d never been big in the dating scene, so it was an interesting experience being on the arm of a guy like Ferro.

Well, since becoming a billionaire she’d had more than a few guys after her, but they were all the same. Gorgeous, dumb, lazy and in possession of very little knowledge of the
Lord of the Rings
trilogy. In short, totally worthless to her.

But they didn’t count. They didn’t even have the decency to want her for her body. Just her money. And that wasn’t exactly a turn-on.

Of course, her for-show kiss with Ferro should not have been a turn-on, but darned if she wasn’t just a little on the turned-on side of things. Pulse racing, breasts aching. Yeah, turned on, for sure.

She hoped her heated cheeks weren’t as pink as she was imagining them, and followed Ferro out of the ballroom and to the front of the hotel, where his limo was already waiting.

“Nice work, Calvaresi—texted your driver did you?”

“I have an app that lets me send down a brief alert when I need to be picked up. It even gives my location to the driver. Just in case over the course of the evening I wind up in a different place than where he dropped me off.”

She got in, and Ferro slid in beside her. “Oh, like if you bar hop or something?”

His smile turned naughty. “Or something.”

Oh. Yes. That. The going back to a random hotel with a random woman. Strange, considering the reputation Ferro had as a legendary lover, that he wasn’t actually photographed with women all that often.

She frowned. “Right.”

“Now, don’t look jealous,
cara
, those other women, they meant nothing.” He wasn’t being sincere. He wasn’t even trying to look sincere, and yet her body, her heart, which, she swore skipped a beat, didn’t seem to care.

She leaned back in her seat and crossed her arms. All the better to keep from reaching out and touching him again. “It’s almost frightening how full of crap you are.”

“Excuse me?”

“The smile.” She punctuated that with a wide, cheesy grin of her own. “The pickup lines. You’re very good at it, Ferro. It’s easy to forget that it’s all a show and you’re just a big empty husk of a man with no heart and no soul.”

“Ah, you see right through me,” he said, still smiling, still looking at her like she was the only woman on earth. “I would advise you to remember the words you just said to me, because you may need them later. I am a man with little in the way of a conscience and it would do you well to keep that in mind.”

“Don’t worry, Ferro, I won’t forget. I’m not in the habit of trusting men. Anyone, really. I won’t lapse with you.”

But with his dark eyes trained on hers, and the impression of his mouth still burned into her lips, she was afraid that if
she didn’t watch herself, she would be tempted to forget. Just so she could enjoy the fantasy of the man.

Because the fantasy of him was more compelling than any reality she’d had yet, at least in terms of kissing and desire.

But the important thing to remember was that it was a fantasy. Was that this was a tentative alliance at best. And that when all of the deceit was stripped away, when this night was nothing more than a memory, Ferro Calvaresi was her deadliest enemy.

And that was much more important than a kiss. No matter how scorching.

J
ULIA HUFFED OUT
a curse word as the doors to the elevator opened. She’d been in her office, ready to start the day with a tureen of coffee, when Ferro had called, demanding her presence at his office. No, he wasn’t going to her. No, it wasn’t negotiable.

And he hadn’t had the decency to give her any details about it, so of course, if only out of curiosity, she’d decided she had to go. But only after Thad had tracked down the biggest to-go mug he could find so she could bring her daily dose of caffeine with her.

She stalked down the hall, pausing for a moment to take in the caramel marble floors and the artwork on the walls. It was very similar to Ferro’s home. Opulent and unrestrained, like no office building she’d been in.

She’d gone for the Zen approach in hers. Bamboo floors, and yes, the little sand gardens on her employees’ desks. So she was a little bit of a cliché. She felt it made for a relaxing work atmosphere so it was worth it.

She walked toward the ornate, dark wood reception desk at the end of the walkway, satisfied by the harsh sound her heels made on the floor. It was her favorite part about the makeover she’d gotten a few years back. All the sexy, black shoes. The way her steps sounded on the sidewalk, or on hard
floors, made her feel powerful. Confident. Especially after she’d learned to walk in them without falling on her face.

There was a man sitting behind the reception desk, which shocked her. She imagined Ferro would have had some pretty young thing hired to be his assistant. And why not? She did. But no. His assistant was just a very normal-looking, middleaged man in a blue shirt and tie.

“Hi, I’m here to see Ferro. And yes, he’s expecting me.”

“Ms. Anderson.”

“Yes. That’s me. Julia Anderson, Anfalas.”

“I am aware,” he said, looking back at the computer screen and typing in a few things.

“Are you looking for an appointment? Because I don’t think I have one.”

“No, I’m sending an email, just a second.”

She huffed out a short breath. “I’m just going to go in.”

“They’re locked.”

She didn’t turn and look at him again, she just walked on down another corridor, until she got to two, dark wood doors, carved in a similar fashion to the reception desk. “What does he think this is? The Sistine Chapel?” she muttered as she approached the doors and pushed on the door handles. They didn’t budge. Stupid Ferro.

She knocked, hard.

“Yes?”

“It’s your dream date, Calvaresi, open up.”

She heard his heavy footsteps crossing the office, then both doors swung open. “Did Jerry give you a hard time?”

“Is that his name? Yeah, he treated me like the enemy at the gate.”

“Well, he must not have seen the news this morning. Or he did and he’s afraid you’re trying to seduce secrets out of me.”

“Me? Seduce secrets out of you?”

“You are very much the Femme Fatale, especially with all the black.”

She looked down at her skinny jeans and tight top. “Yeah, all set for corporate espionage. Can I come in?”

He stood to the side and she brushed past him and into his office. It was as opulent and overdone as the rest of the building with marble and wood trim, art pieces and vases. And in here there was even a very plush, very busy oriental rug.

No one could accuse Ferro of minimalism.

She took a seat in one of the leather, wingback chairs in front of his desk. “So what was so important that I had to come across town before I finished my coffee?” She held her mug aloft. “So I could talk to you?”

“Did you see the news?”

“Been busy.” She’d been avoiding it. After the explosion that had happened after their first public outing she’d been genuinely terrified of what might be in the paper today. And she really, really didn’t want to see pictures of them making out. She really didn’t.

“Then let me enlighten you.” He smiled and picked up a tablet device from his desk. He touched a news app and it opened, giving headline after headline, from tech blogs, to traditional news publications, about Julia Anderson and Ferro Calvaresi’s scorching affair.

Heat pricked her face when she saw the photos. Each article had more than one of them, revealing, sexual. And the look on her face was much too sincere. There she was, pressed against the wall, her arms twined around Ferro’s neck, their lips fused together. She had to admit, they made a pretty hot couple. She actually looked okay with him, not completely out of place.

“Well. Wow,” she managed after a few minutes.

“And that’s not the best part,” he said.

“Oh. Yay.”

“The talk in the online forums, and on the tech blogs, isn’t as negative as it was yesterday. There’s some buzz that there may be a big merger coming. They’re already speculating about what the love child, so to speak, between Anfalas and Datasphere would look like.”

“But there isn’t.”

“Barrows will be the love child. That navigation system. And we’ll have the prebuzz. Can you imagine it? Can you imagine how desirable this product is going to be by the time it hits? This is better than we could have imagined.”

It didn’t feel better, it felt…It was making her dizzy. “You do know how to spread a rumor, don’t you?”

“Not just me. And in the age of media run by the masses things can spread at unbelievable speed. Even if they’re half-truths and speculation, people take them as gospel. And once it’s out there like this…eradicating it isn’t possible. All you can do is skew it to work in your favor.”

“You’re a master there, aren’t you?” She thought of that biography. Of all the secrets it had spilled. She wondered if any of it was true.

It seemed too fantastic to be real, honestly. She didn’t see how it could be true. A boy from the streets of Rome, barely scraping by, started making murky connections, dating wealthy women, manipulating them for their money. Then saving, investing, starting up a company and becoming one of the richest, most powerful men in the world.

Yep. Far too unbelievable to be real. And yet, Ferro had never corrected the rumors. He’d never said a thing about them. Had never seemed affected. He’d just smiled, that Calvaresi smile, and shined it on any reporter who asked. No denial, no confirmation.

If anything, the rumors had made him more popular. Women already loved him, and the idea that he’d managed to use his body to earn his success only made him more intriguing.
Rare was the computer genius with a body like Ferro’s, and he was consistently ranked one of the sexiest people alive. The year the biography had come out, he’d been top of the list.

Oh, no, the rumors had never hurt him. And he’d never seemed at all bothered by any of the talk.

“I’m not a novice,” he said. “Anyway, this is all going as we planned. Now all we need to do is get a product proposal into Barrows.”

“Oh, that’s all.”

“We’re two of the greatest minds in the world, I’m sure we can come up with something.”

“Or kill each other trying,” she said.

“That is a possibility.”

She bit her lip and debated saying anything else. She totally resented having to ask him this, but, all things considered, it would look really strange if she didn’t. She’d almost asked yesterday, but even then she’d been sort of hoping there would be a way around it.

Because the plan was to go back to the way things had always been at the end of this. And the more time she spent with him, the harder it would be. And this…this was going to require a lot of time spent together.

But she was trapped. They were trapped. Hoist by their own petard, as it were.

“I have a…thing,” she said. “An event thing. And it was to Julia and Guest and since I was Guest at the
Cold Planet
premiere and the charity, I thought you should maybe be Guest at this.”

“I see. And what is it exactly?”

She flinched. “A wedding? It’s for one of my staff members and she invited me and this is a huge industry type of event and if we don’t go together after all that, then what’s even the point?”

She was rambling because she knew that he would probably like to go to a wedding like he wanted a hole in the head, but it only made sense.

“If I go alone people will ask questions,” she said, sensing from his silence that he was not amused at the thought of being roped into this.

“And why didn’t you ask me yesterday?”

She winced. “I was hoping to come up with an exit strategy. I failed.”

“No exit door past this point,
cara mia.”

“Obviously,” she said. “Which is why I am now asking you. But I was waiting until I had no other option.”

“I see. And when is this wedding?”

“Next weekend.”

“Saturday or Sunday?”

She flinched again. “It’s kind of an extended thing.”

“Why is that?”

“Because it’s a destination wedding. Very trendy. Especially for a highly paid junior executive at a very successful tech company.”

“And where is the destination?”

“It’s sort of in Alaska.”

“Who gets married in Alaska?” That’s what she’d asked.

“It’s a very beautiful resort. And the bride’s family is from there, so it’s a returning to her roots…thing.” That had been the bride’s answer anyway.

“And you expect us to go to Alaska for the weekend. As a couple?”

“Well…yes. Come one, Ferro, you know if I go alone it will cause more trouble than if we go together. We’ve got this great online buzz and by the time Barrows gets the proposal from us they won’t even be surprised. They’ll be thrilled in fact since, as you mentioned, everyone is champing at the bit to get a glimpse of the unholy spawn our union will produce.”

“That’s true.”

“Name your price,” she said. “I could put some money on the dresser every morning.”

The words hung in the air, so awkward and not what she’d intended. It wasn’t supposed to be all sexual innuendo-y but it was. She blamed those pictures. Well, and the make-out session that had produced them.

She shook her head. “Oh…gross. I’m sorry, that wasn’t what I—”

“Don’t apologize,
cara mia.”
He smiled, and it was so off considering the situation. He hadn’t been in full charm mode thirty seconds ago and now he looked…There was something haunted in his eyes and she didn’t like it. But it was gone almost as soon as she identified it. “A joke. I get it.”

“Great,” she said.

“And of course I’ll go to the wedding with you. There’s no work I can’t do remotely so it won’t mess with anything on that score.”

“Great.”

“We will have to share a room, you know that, of course?”

“Maybe they’ll just think we’re old-fashioned and sleep separately?”

He gave her a hard look. “I doubt it. But won’t there be more than one bedroom in the suite?”

She winced. “Well, no. Because all the suites were booked.”

“What?”

“I mean, I still have a suite, but it’s this big, one room sort of thing. All open.”

“And how did that come to pass?”

“I went to book the best room, then felt like a jerk because the bride and groom should have the best room. So I got the Royal Suite for Dana and Josh. But then I thought her parents and his parents needed nice rooms, so I booked the town house suites for the families.”

He let out a long breath. “And let me guess, the bridal party needed rooms, too.”

“Well. Yes.”

“You’re generous to your own detriment,
cara
. But in advance, I’ll tell you I’ll be sleeping on the couch.”

Ferro watched the color in Julia’s cheeks darken. She was still mortified from her previous gaffe regarding leaving the money on the dresser, he could tell. She was the rare person not quite jaded enough by failure or success. Things still affected her, and in spite of her armor, her emotions were still visible. But he wasn’t going to comfort her. It wasn’t his job to make her feel all right about herself. He shouldn’t feel compelled to tell her it was all right.

She doesn’t know about your past
. No, she didn’t. But it didn’t matter if she did.

A twinge in his chest called that a lie. He did care. He didn’t like people thinking he’d manipulated women out of their fortune by seduction. But the truth was worse. The truth that he wasn’t the one doing the manipulating.

Still, her little joke was cutting a bit too close to the past. They were trading, not sexual favors, but they were walking a fine line. The kiss had proven that. She had been affected by it, he could tell. He hadn’t been. She had been interesting to kiss. Inexpert and clumsy, enthusiastic in a way he’d never experienced before.

But in truth, it had been just like the times in his past. Times when he’d had to do things to survive, whether he wanted to or not. When he’d had to use the only asset he’d possessed to get ahead. To survive.

He’d been smart, but mainly uneducated. A hard worker, but not able to get jobs that would truly advance him.

Then he’d met Claudia. And everything had changed.
You want to make money
, caro,
you use what you have
.
Why be hungry when you have something people will buy? A nice body. Women will pay to use you, and you will be rich
.

No mention of the cut she’d taken, but in the end, she was right. He had gotten rich. Though, mainly through investing the money he earned.

But in order to do a job like that he’d had to learn how to detach his mind from his body. A perfect division of the two. It was the only way to feel okay. To survive it. Otherwise…otherwise the shame was crippling. So he’d built walls around himself. Now it was like second nature. He flipped it on and off like a switch. He’d been a casual observer to the kiss with Julia and she had clearly been an active participant.

Again, not unusual for him, but it left a bad taste in his mouth.

This was why he avoided relationships. Why he avoided women. Because as skilled as he was at separating mind from body, he couldn’t put them back together now. It was all a transaction. All about him giving, then taking payment. It was all he understood, and he was burned out on it.

Twelve years on and it still made his skin feel like it was coated in dirt. Still made him feel like his body belonged to other people. Like he was a product, waiting to be used for the buyer’s pleasure. He still felt that his past clients owned little pieces of him. Like he’d been torn apart and parceled off.