Читать книгу Italian Mavericks: A Deal With The Italian: The Italian's Deal for I Do / A Pawn in the Playboy's Game / A Clash with Cannavaro - Кэтти Уильямс, Elizabeth Power, Cathy Williams - Страница 13

CHAPTER SIX

IT WAS A New York press frenzy at its finest, camera people crawling over one another to get a better position, journalists jockeying their way to the front of the room, extralarge coffee cups clutched in their hands. The buzz of a big story was in the air.

“No doubt way over the fire code,” Savanna Piers, Mondelli’s chic head of public relations, commented wryly, “but no one’s going anywhere.”

Olivia stood alongside Savanna and Rocco in the atrium of the hotel where the annual meeting of fashion designers was being held, the opening press conference about to begin. Standing beside them were spokespeople from the other represented manufacturers, but it was clear from the tone of the overheard conversations nobody wanted to talk to them. They all wanted to talk to her: Olivia Fitzgerald, the supermodel who had abandoned her career at its peak, defected on a three-million-dollar contract with a major French cosmetics company and disappeared from the face of the earth.

A sheen of perspiration blanketed her body. She felt a pool of it trickle down her back. Felt her breathing quicken as the oxygen in the room seemed to drain with every second...

The colors and movement around her faded into a detail-less swirling gray. It reached out for her then, the panic, beckoning her, dark and familiar. She pulled in a desperate breath and fought it. Tried to hold it at bay, but the room grew darker around her.

“I need some air.” She backed away and headed toward the hallway. Standing with her back against the wall in the corridor as catering staff bustled by her, she closed her eyes and made herself breathe in and out, deep long breaths like her therapist had taught her.

Eleven years she’d been having these panic attacks. Since she was fifteen. And they never got less terrifying. On the road in foreign countries with no support system in her emotionally unavailable parents and the stress of having to be the best every time she stepped onto a set, they’d started one night in Berlin. Debilitating, overwhelming, she’d been terrified of them. It had felt as though she was losing her mind.

Petra had finally made her see a doctor. Her therapist had helped her get the attacks somewhat under control, but when the pressure was high she couldn’t fight them. Like that night at the Lincoln Center. It had ended her career.

“Olivia.”

Rocco had joined her in the hallway. She opened her eyes to look at him, but the world kept swaying around her and she closed them again.

“There was no air in there.”

He took her hands in his and pulled her down into a squatting position. “Head between your knees.”

She pushed her head down and breathed. But it didn’t seem as if she could get enough air into her lungs... The blackness was calling to her. Comforting. Easier than being here.

Rocco’s hands tightened around hers. “No. Don’t do that. Breathe, Olivia. Deep breaths, in and out.”

His hands were tight around her ice cold ones. Insistent. She kept breathing, in and out. Deep, steadying pulls of air into her lungs. And slowly the blackness receded.

She brought herself upright. Rocco’s gaze was pinned on her, dark and concerned. “Better?”

“Yes.”

He glanced at his watch. “We’re starting in five minutes. Are you okay to go back in?”

She nodded.

He brought her to her feet with a hand around her waist and kept a firm palm to her back as they walked back inside. Savanna led them to the side of the podium, her eagle-eyed gaze resting on Olivia’s face. “Focus on the feel-good story of you and Rocco and your partnership. No one’s going to choose mean over a picture-perfect story if they have any sense. You’re America’s sweetheart. Go with it.”

Was. She had been America’s sweetheart... Now she was afraid sensational was going to rule the day.

She straightened the hem of her dress as the president of this year’s conference took the stage and made his opening remarks. By the time Mondelli was summoned forward, Olivia’s knees were knocking against one another. Rocco captured her hand in his and started up the steps to the podium. The room blurred into a sea of faces and electronics as she climbed the steps, her clammy fingers clutching tighter to Rocco’s as they ascended.

“Relax,” he murmured out of the side of his mouth, giving her hand a squeeze. “I’m right here with you.”

Despite her ever-present antagonism toward him, she did feel better with him by her side. Rocco was like that tree in a storm you knew would never come down. Its roots were too secure, its foundation too solid, to ever be unearthed by a mere media scrum.

Reporters began yelling questions even before they reached the microphone. Rocco held up a hand to silence them. “If you’ll let me make my announcement, there will be plenty of time for questions.”

When the din finally cleared, Rocco tugged on her hand and drew her to the microphone. “I know you have all missed her, which is why I am thrilled to welcome Olivia Fitzgerald back to the modeling world as the new face of the House of Mondelli.”

The room broke out in a fevered pitch. Rocco held up a hand and silenced them. “Combining the talents of one of the world’s most famous faces with one of the globe’s most venerable fashion houses is an undeniably exciting occasion to mark. But,” he added, slipping an arm around Olivia’s waist and tucking her into his side, “as many of you have speculated, there is another union we are even more happy to announce, and that is the forthcoming marriage of Olivia and I.”

The noise in the room grew deafening. Savanna stepped forward and took control of the Q and A. “Francesca,” she called out, pointing to an older blond-haired fashion reporter from one of the networks.

“First of all,” Francesca began, “congratulations on your engagement and partnership.” Her gaze shifted to Olivia. “The mystery we’re all trying to unravel, Olivia, is why you disappeared at the peak of your career. Would you care to set the record straight?”

Olivia swallowed hard. Why couldn’t they just let the past lie?

“It’s very simple.” She forced the words through excessively dry lips. “I just needed some time away. I was working on a project I’m going to be very excited to tell you about shortly.”

The veteran reporter lifted a brow. “You reneged on a three-million-dollar contract with Le Ciel to take some personal time?”

Her heart dropped. Here we go.

“That contract has now been settled,” she said huskily. “For legal reasons, I have to leave it at that.”

“Word is,” Francesca continued, undaunted, “Le Ciel is furious. Do you think this will impact your career going forward?”

Olivia felt some of her old press savvy kick back in. “I was just named the face of Mondelli. Does it look like it?”

The veteran reporter inclined her head with a wry smile.

“Where were you hiding out?” The question came from the center of the room.

“I was in Milan.” She threw a smile at her fiancé. “Where I met Rocco.”

Savanna pointed to another veteran fashion reporter. “Dan.”

“When will we first see Olivia in your campaigns?”

“In the spring,” Rocco answered. “You’ll see her back in New York for Fashion Week next month.”

Savanna nodded at a redhead Olivia didn’t recognize, wearing very fashionable purple glasses. “Tara?”

“How is the House of Mondelli going to move forward without Giovanni’s genius at the helm? Some say Mario won’t be enough to keep things afloat.”

“We have half a dozen spectacular young designers Giovanni trained working with Mario,” Rocco said smoothly. “No company can be content to rest on its laurels. We had always intended these designers to carry the torch forward. Giovanni was seventy after all.”

“Olivia.” A notoriously bigmouthed gossip reporter waved from the front. “How does it feel to land one of the world’s most sought-after bachelors?”

Olivia relaxed back into Rocco’s arm and turned to smile up at him. “Very lucky.”

Eyes glittering with humor, Rocco lifted a hand to cup her jaw. “I am the lucky one to land, as you put it, Olivia.”

“Since you’ve managed to elude us for the past week,” the gossip reporter continued, “how about a kiss?”

Her fiancé let loose a good-natured smile. “I suppose that’s only fair.”

Her heartbeat picked up in a steady thrum as Rocco splayed his fingers wider around her jaw, leaned down and covered her lips with his own. Her lashes fluttered closed as he took her mouth in a thorough kiss that had the camera flashes going off madly like fireworks.

She was just off balance enough when he set her away from him to much applause from the scrum that the next question hit her from left field.

“Olivia. Can you tell us what happened that night at the Lincoln Center? What caused your meltdown?”

She froze, her face suspended midsmile. Frederic, the producer of the show that night at the Lincoln Center, an old personal friend of hers, had swiftly replaced her when she’d faltered and hadn’t been able to take the stage. He’d forbidden any talk of what had happened afterward on pain of his influential wrath. But apparently someone had talked.

How much did they know?

The room started to sway dangerously around her, perspiration sliding down her back in rivulets now. Air got harder to pull in, but she sucked it in desperately, the question echoing over and over in her head. Scenes from that night flashed through her brain—ugly, paralyzing, stomach churning...

“Olivia?” Rocco set a supporting palm to the small of her back. The touch sent words tumbling out of her mouth.

“It was very hot backstage that evening,” she rasped. “I was not feeling well.”

Rocco started proactively detailing some of the key campaign elements they would see from Mondelli in the spring/summer. She managed to plaster a smile on her face as their time ran out and Rocco thanked the media. But it wasn’t over. It was never going to be over.

* * *

Three hours and an excruciatingly boring reception later, Rocco shoved a glass of brandy into the hand of a still blank-faced Olivia in the quiet stillness of their apartment salon, and tried to contain his growing frustration. Neither he nor Savanna had been able to get his fiancée to talk after the press conference, despite their repeated attempts to discover what she was hiding. No one thought it was going to end there, and preempting whatever was to come was the best strategy. Unfortunately, his fiancée wasn’t talking.

Can you tell us what happened that night at the Lincoln Center, Olivia? What made you have a meltdown?

The reporter’s question rang in his head. No doubt Olivia hadn’t been the most reliable model in the final couple of years she’d worked, but she’d never been billed a prima donna. So what had the reporter meant? What had happened that night?

He had a feeling it was the key to everything, the key to Olivia, yet no one was talking, not even Frederic Beaumont, the man who had produced the show that night, deflecting Rocco’s inquiry at tonight’s reception with a lifted brow. “As your fiancée said, it was extremely hot backstage. A lot of the models were struggling.”

Closing ranks. He didn’t believe him for one minute.

He glanced at his mute fiancée, grabbed his own tumbler and paced the room. “I can’t help you if you won’t talk to me.”

Olivia pushed the brandy aside, her face white and pinched as she sat curled up in his favorite reading chair. “I don’t want your help. It’s ancient history.”

“In case you hadn’t noticed,” he disputed heatedly, “it came back to life today. You are a very expensive asset of mine, Olivia. You think they’re going to let whatever it is lie? Tell me what it is and we’ll deal with it together.”

She gave him another one of those blank looks. “You heard what I said. I wasn’t feeling well. End of story.”

He eyed her with growing ire. “The reporter referred to it as a meltdown.”

“Reporters like to make things dramatic that aren’t.”

He muttered an oath beneath his breath. “And the reason you fell apart when the question was asked?”

She pressed her lips together. “I am frustrated. I just wish people would leave it alone and stop prying into my personal life when it’s none of their business.”

His free hand fisted at his side, his five-million-dollar investment pounding in his head. He counted to three, forced out a long breath and went to kneel by her chair. “I want to help you, Olivia. Give me something. It can’t just have been the heat that night.”

She pushed her spine back into the chair, recoiling away from him. “You want to protect an asset. Rest assured, Rocco, I will not renege on our deal, and I will perform the duties of my contract to the letter.”

“This isn’t just about you being an asset. You are struggling... I can help.”

Her sapphire eyes heated to a dark blue flame. “Like you wanted to help me when you seduced me that night in Navigli to find out what kind of a woman I was? Like you wanted to help me when you coerced me into a return to modeling you knew I didn’t want? Better we both do our jobs, Rocco, and refrain from pretending we care when we don’t.”

He almost would have bought her bravado had it not been for the wounded, vulnerable glint in her eyes. The pallor in her skin. The look she’d had all day that a slight breeze might knock her over. Her fiery gaze spoke of fear and pain and, most of all, a bone-deep sadness that got to him despite his efforts to remain detached.

He rose, sat on the edge of the chair and caught her chin in his fingers to turn her gaze to his. “Tell me.”

He was surprised at the tenderness in his voice. At an empathy he hadn’t known he possessed. She blinked and stared at him. Dio, this woman did something to him. It didn’t matter she had been his grandfather’s, that Giovanni’s body wasn’t even cold in his grave and still he wanted to comfort her. Touch her. He wanted to carry her to bed and make love to her and banish those demons from her eyes.

Madness. Pure madness.

The far too perceptive Stefan Bianco had had it right. Olivia did have his number. She had always had his number, right from that first night in Navigli.

Her gaze connected with his and read what lay there. Confusion darkened her vibrant blue orbs.

“Rocco...”

Her husky, hesitant tone prompted the return of his sanity. She had never been, nor would she ever be, his. Impossible.

He stood up with an abrupt movement. “Drink the brandy,” he muttered roughly. “I will order us dinner.”

When he’d finally sent an exhausted Olivia to bed and sat on the terrace with a final brandy in his hand, he was glad for the city that never slept. The honking horns and peeling ambulances kept him company, floodlit Central Park a feast for the senses as he tipped his head back and drank it in.

The silence, the solitude, grounded him as it always did. Made his present situation crystallize like the stars emerging from the silvery haze in the cloudy night sky above.

The more distance he kept from the woman inside who was driving him mad, the better. It had taken him hours last night to wrestle his body into an acceptable enough state to get into bed, after which the scent of her had driven him half-crazy. He’d been out of bed at 5:00 a.m. out of the pure need, not to look at his sultry fiancée splayed across his bed, glorious hair everywhere.

But it was more than that. This restlessness in him came from a place he was loath to face. He was bitterly afraid he had been wrong about Olivia. Very wrong.

She had clearly been lying just now, as she had during the press conference. The shut-down, blank look on her face had said it all. Which pointed out an uncomfortable fact. He’d never seen that look on her face before. Not when she’d denied Giovanni was her lover that night in Milan after he’d seduced her. Not through this past trying week when he’d plied her with a million questions to get their stories and backstory straight. She had always told him the truth, however painful, or she hadn’t said anything at all.

Until tonight. Until today at the press conference. He could tell the difference. He could read her now.

Do you really know your grandfather so little you think he would have been having an affair with a woman young enough to be his granddaughter?

He ran his palm over the stubble on his jaw, a jolt of unease slicing through him. Giovanni not giving him sole control of Mondelli had shaken him, made him question how well he knew the man who had raised him, who had been his heart and soul. But Giovanni was also a complex man with many layers. Perhaps there were facets of him he hadn’t known. Perhaps he had had an affair with Tatum Fitzgerald.

Tonight when he’d had that chat with Frederic Beaumont, the wily old Frenchman had congratulated him on capturing the “most enchanting creature he’d ever worked with” in Olivia, and made a veiled comment about Mondelli men having a thing for Fitzgerald women. When Rocco had lifted a brow at the comment, Frederic had only said sagely that Tatum Fitzgerald had been one of Giovanni’s great muses, but his eyes had said much more.

He took a swig of the brandy, closing his eyes as its warmth heated his insides. If his grandfather had engaged in an out-of-character affair with Tatum Fitzgerald, that was one thing. But to have an affair with her daughter, as well? It didn’t sit right in his chest. Maybe it never had. He’d been so angry at his grandfather’s death when he’d confronted Olivia, he’d wanted to lash out, and she had been the most convenient target. Brand her a gold digger and make himself feel better by solving the problem.

The uneasy feeling inside him intensified. Propelled him out of his chair and to the railing, Manhattan glistening below in all its finery. What if he’d been wrong? What if he’d branded the woman sleeping in his bed an opportunist when she had really been Giovanni’s inspiration in the most innocent sense? When perhaps she had been the one to reinvigorate a creativity that had begun to fail the aging genius? He had seen it in those designs...

He took another sip of the brandy. The spirit blazed an undeniable path of self-awareness through him. Had he wanted to think the worst of Olivia because of just how very much she got to him? How she’d managed to penetrate the ironclad exterior he’d adopted the day he’d realized his father as he’d known him was never coming back? When he’d decided no one would ever get to him emotionally again?

Sandro had only been twenty-seven when his wife of the same age had died giving birth to Alessandra. Suffering from severe preeclampsia, Letizia had delivered him a healthy baby girl, but stolen his one true love in the process. His father had fallen apart, descended into a grief so raw it had scared his two children witless and left them with no one but each other.

At first, Giovanni had been patient with his son. Had turned a blind eye to Sandro’s drinking, to his gambling, but after a time, when he’d decided enough was enough, that Sandro’s children needed a father and he needed his son back at Mondelli, Sandro had said he’d needed more time. Then more. Until it became clear he couldn’t mentally handle a return to the family business, until he’d gambled Rocco’s family home away and it had become apparent he wasn’t capable of taking care of his children, either. Of himself.

Rocco could remember the day vividly when Giovanni had arrived at their house, soon to be taken by creditors, and ordered him and Alessandra to gather their things. He’d only been seven and a half at the time, but he would never forget the anguish in his father’s eyes as his grandfather had scooped them up and took them home to Villa Mondelli, his disappointment in his son palpable in the older man’s demeanor.

Rocco had absorbed his father’s anguish, the hint of madness that losing his mother had instilled in him, and although he had been too young to understand it all, he had known one thing—love meant making yourself vulnerable. Love meant pain. And he would never do that to himself willingly.

He tipped his head back and took a long swallow of the brandy. The lights from the park cast an otherworldly glow over the high rises that soared behind it. It was as mystifying a view of New York as his behavior had been tonight. Because even if he had been wrong about Olivia, even if Giovanni had been mentoring her as a way to pay back what he owed to her mother, even if she was that vulnerable, frightened creature he’d witnessed tonight that his grandfather had elected to shelter and protect, it didn’t change anything. What he and Olivia had was a business deal. He was no white knight to ride in on a steed and save the day.

He finished off the brandy and set the glass down. Whatever crazy thing drew him to Olivia, whatever it had been between them from the start, was precisely what he needed to avoid. His only interest should be preserving his family legacy. In doing what had always been paramount for him. Allowing himself to care for anything beyond that had never been in the cards.