She places her hand into mine. “Valentina Moretti,” she says, and I kiss the top of it, letting my lips linger longer than they did on the hand of the fake Francesca.
“A pleasure,” I say, and come out of my bow.
“I apologize, Mr. Augustin,” Miz Ghita says suddenly, “but Madam Moretti has other guests to speak with, and a showing in thirty minutes; we really must be on our way.”
I nod with respect. “Don’t let me keep you,” I say, looking first at the fake Francesca, and lastly at Valentina.
When they’re no longer in earshot, Izabel pushes up on her toes and pretends to be kissing my ear—she may as well be…
“What are you thinking?” she inquires and then pulls away, a soft smile remains on her face, not indicative of the serious words we’re exchanging.
I lean toward her and slide my finger through her hair, tucking it behind her ear to free a space for my mouth.
“Well, I think we both know that woman isn’t Francesca,” I whisper onto her ear. “But I have a feeling I already know which one of them is.”
“So do I,” Izabel says, blushing, pretending. “Who are you thinking?”
“I’ll tell you when I’m one hundred percent sure of her myself.”
“Fair enough, but in the meantime,” Izabel says in a quiet voice, always smiling as if we’re simply enjoying one another, “you should try not to piss anyone off—Emilio seems like a real piece of work; he could probably mess this up for us. Heed Miz Ghita’s warning; don’t make this any more difficult than it’s already going to be.”
“I know what I’m doing, Izzy.” I stand with my hands folded down in front of me, nodding at guests as they stroll by.
“Yeah—you’re being Niklas Fleischer,” she comes back, as if that’s a bad thing.
Unclasping my hands, I hook my right on her slim waist and nod at another buyer as he passes with a girl on his arm—he glances at Izabel, probably still seeing her naked from her bold little display earlier.
“There’s not much difference between the two,” I say about the real me and the pretend one. “Besides, the worst thing I can do is show weakness, and letting another man belittle me in public is a weakness no matter what face I’m wearing. The real Francesca Moretti is a strong, vicious woman, or she wouldn’t be in the business or the position that she’s in. My guess is that she won’t give me the time of fucking day if I’m the type who’ll get on my knees and lick the shit from her boots.”
“Maybe so,” Izabel says, “but proving yourself at the expense of her brother probably isn’t the safest way to go about it.”
I look right at her. “Nothing about this is safe, Izzy. Not a damn thing. And you really shouldn’t have taken your fucking clothes off. What the hell were you thinking?”
Izabel smirks at me—Izzy, not Naomi—and then she leans toward me and says in a low, derisive voice, “It looked to me like taking off my clothes in that moment saved our asses. I guess some good came out of you shooting me, after all.” Then she adds bitingly, “But what bothers me the most was that you didn’t even remember.”
Grinding my teeth behind tightly-closed lips, I glare at her. “It wasn’t that I didn’t remember,” I bite back, “but that I’m always trying to forget.”
There’s a loud crash and the shattering of glass as another servant girl carrying wine who had walked past Nora falls to the marble floor; she and Nora tangled in a sloppy mass of bare legs and long hair; the servant’s dress covered in red wine. Every pair of eyes in the room dart our way, and the many conversations that had been going on all around us cease in an instant.
“Forgive Aya, Master,” Nora says as she goes to push herself to her feet, stepping around the wine. “A-Aya didn’t see the girl.”
Jumping back into my role—and that’s exactly what Nora was trying to achieve by tripping the servant with the wine tray—I reach down and collapse my hand around the back of Nora’s neck, yanking her to her feet. Afterward I take up my briefcase from the floor.
Miz Ghita is next to us, pulling the servant girl from the floor, but with a little less roughness. “Go to your quarters,” she demands, “and get out of your soiled clothes. Stay there until Emilio