Before - Bethan-Kris Page 0,6

attempted to get Gigi hooked up with one of Matty’s friends. A guy from the crew, she liked to say. Hell fucking no. Her life was already a spectacularly busy mess without adding something like a guy with shady business into it, too.

She wasn’t that hard up for dick, either.

“What’s his name?” Cassie asked.

“Andino—”

“I’m gonna head to the bar and just order another drink,” Gigi said, pushing up from the uncomfortable wooden chair at their corner table. “Because I’ve waved at that girl five times, and the last time she even looked at me.”

But still didn’t make her way over. It wasn’t like the server could pretend she hadn’t seen Gigi that time. No doubt, the black romper and leather jacket she had on that matched the three-inch pumps on her feet didn’t scream the same kind of wealth as the suits and dresses of the patrons closer to the ring. And that was exactly why the girls working the floor selectively chose who they wanted to serve at any given time.

Bitches.

“Oh, bring me back another of these,” Cassie said, waving her half-full glass of gin and tonic.

“They won’t bother IDing you.”

She passed Matty a look, but he was more concerned with ogling the guy in the black suit across the room that, for whatever reason, he seemed to have a fucking hard-on about. If the guy really was mafia, as he’d said, then she didn’t understand why he would even want to mess with that kind of trouble.

Matty was bad news, sure.

Not that kind of bad news.

Whatever.

It wasn’t Gigi’s business.

“Sure, thanks for the info,” she muttered, stepping away from the table. If they cared or noticed that she left, well she couldn’t say because she didn’t bother to glance back over her shoulder.

The phone in her clutch burned a hole in her mind as she made her way through an overcrowded floor to get to the far end of the bar. She managed to find one stool that wasn’t full. All it took was one good look at the three girls and one guy working the crowd gathering at the bar for drinks to know it was going to be a while before she would get her drinks. Not to mention, the constant stream of servers that returned with trays full of empties and ready for refills.

Instead, her mind drifted back to the phone as she waited to be noticed and served. She wasn’t going to throw up her hands and shout at the bartenders who were already moving as fast as they possibly could like everyone else was doing. Besides, wasn’t there enough noise in the place without her adding to it?

She thought so.

Gigi resisted the urge to pull out the phone just to check the email about Paris one more time—like she hadn’t already done it fifty times since leaving the apartment. As if the email might suddenly disappear, and the dream that had just been placed into her hands would go up in smoke all because she decided to read the email again.

Still ...

It was there.

Real.

Actually happening.

Soon, she would be on a plane to Paris, contracted to a satellite agency while working exclusively as a model for a major designer that for whatever reason ... picked her. She had so many questions. Starting with why and ending with how.

Right then, all she could do was smile.

“Has anybody ever told you that your face should be on magazines?”

Gigi’s head popped up as a laugh burst from her lips. The man that had been working with the girls further down the bar approached her spot at the end, passing by at least twenty other people who gestured with a bit more ferocity at his blatant disregard for their shouts and demands. The white tee he wore stretched across the broad bands of muscle that made up an expansive chest. Rolled up at the sleeves, the fabric tightened to show off the way his strong arms and golden skin, dusted with dark hair, glinted under the pot lights that made up the backdrop of the bar when he placed them in front of her spot on the shiny top.

Black hair, shaved down to a well-groomed buzz, had a blue tint and only added to the sea-color of the stare that flicked over her features and then chanced a glance down at the low dip in the front of her romper. The man had no shame that he was checking her out, but she didn’t really mind all that much,