Southern Comfort - Natasha Madison Page 0,58

bags from the trunk.

“Are we checking in?” the bellhop asks, and I nod my head.

“Mr. Barnes,” I say my name, and he nods. “Your butler is waiting for you at the concierge station.”

“Thank you,” I say and look over to see Olivia standing beside me. My hand goes out to hold hers. There is no way I’m walking into this hotel and it’s not known that she’s mine or at least that she’s with me.

When we walk in the lobby I look around and someone must have called them because someone in a suit walks up to us. “Mr. & Mrs. Barnes, so great to have you with us.” I don’t correct him and neither does Olivia. “I’m Diego, if you will follow me this way.” He smiles at us and I nod following him to a secret hallway where a private elevator is waiting for us. “You are on the twenty-sixth floor. The penthouse takes the whole floor.”

“Penthouse,” Olivia whispers from beside me followed by a whistle. “Mr. CEO.” She laughs and I look down at her as she leans over and pinches my ass. “You think you know someone and then poof. Millionaire.”

I shake my head, looking over at the butler who tries to hide his smile. The elevator pings open and the butler waits for us to get out. “It’s a two-bedroom penthouse,” he says, and I look over to see if Olivia noticed, and of course, she did. For the past week, we’ve been sharing the couch. She follows Diego as he takes us from room to room showing us the master bedroom, his and her bathroom. The kitchen that leads to the great room and then finally to the private covered terrace. “Is there anything that you would like to eat?” He looks at me, and I just look at Olivia.

“I’m good with anything,” she tells him and then looks at me. “Do you want a burger maybe?”

“Yeah, that sounds good.” My phone pings in my pocket. I get it, seeing that it’s a text from Derek.

“Excuse me.” I look at them and walk out to the terrace calling Derek.

“Hey.” He answers right away. “They just left your house.”

“Good,” I say. “Did they get everything done?”

“They did,” he says, and then his voice trails.

“What aren’t you telling me?” I ask him and turn to look over my shoulder seeing Olivia talking to Diego.

“They left a note,” Derek says, and the hair on the back of my neck stands up.

“What do you mean? What kind of note?” I ask him, my eyes never having Olivia out of my sight.

“What the fuck does that mean?” I ask him and then see that Olivia is coming outside and the smile on her face goes away when she looks at me.

“What happened?” she asks, and I look down and wonder how I can say this.

I think about lying to her but then I will be like all the other ones and I refuse to be in the same category. “They left a note,” I say and she walks over to the couch and sits down.

“What note?” she asks almost in a whisper.

I put the phone on speaker. “Derek, Olivia is here, and you’re on speakerphone. She wants to know what was in the note.”

“Um,” he starts and I know he isn’t sure what to do.

“The truth,” I say and I watch her face as he tells her what he just told me and her eyes fly to mine.

“Okay,” he says, his voice going low. “The sooner you give us what we want, the sooner you get to live your life.”

Chapter Twenty-Three

Olivia

It’s a good thing I’m sitting down because the words on the note would have had me on my ass. I shake my head, and my legs start to move up and down automatically. “I have no fucking idea what I have that they want,” I tell them, almost shouting. “If I knew what they wanted I would give it to them gladly.” I look up and blink away the tears. “I have no idea what they want.”

“I know you don’t.” Casey comes over, taking me in his arms sitting with me in his lap.

“Is there anything else?” Casey asks Derek.

“Not that I can see,” he tells him. “But we are looking into her phone and there was an application on there that I’ve never seen before.”

“I don’t really have applications on the phone,” I tell them. “I mean, I have Instagram and Pinterest.”

“Um,” Derek says. “You have at