The Italian's Bedroom Deal

Elizabeth Lennox - The Italian's Bedroom Deal

The Italian's Bedroom Deal
Elizabeth Lennox

romance/billionaire

Chapter 1

“He has to be here tonight,” she whispered to her image in the mirror, shivering slightly when the cold air from the open window touched her bare skin. “He just has to be here.” Clarissa Montgomery smoothed her soft, brown curls and checked her pink lipstick one more time.

Clarissa stared at the cleavage revealed by the low cut dress and push up bra as goose bumps formed on her arms and chest. It was more revealing than anything she’d ever worn before and she couldn’t help being painfully self-conscious in the dress.

She fidgeted and tried to adjust the dress so it was more comfortable, but to no avail. How did women wear these things, she wondered? She pulled the neckline up a bit, then sighed and pulled it back down, reminding herself of her mission. A conservative dress hadn’t gotten her any results so far. She needed to be daring. In order to catch a fish, she thought to herself, she needed the right bait.

Turning away from the mirror, she almost tripped over the chair to her desk since she wasn’t used to the new shoes she’d purchased for the dress. As she held onto the back of the chair, her violet eyes once again saw the screen and she cringed. The computer at her desk mocked her. She re-read the e-mail from her best friend, sighing as Jennifer talked about the latest pregnancy details. Her friends from college, the ones that she’d done everything with, gone everywhere, were all married although not all happily, with her best friend more than twenty weeks along in her pregnancy. Yet, here she was, the last remaining virgin on the planet. She felt like she was a freak from another era.

Tonight, she was going to change that though. Her status as a pathetic, twenty five year old virgin was definitely going to change. And she had just the man in mind to help her with that goal. That meant it was imperative that the man actually show up so she could work whatever wiles she could dream up and get him to change her status, and she was back to her original dilemma.

“It’s now or never,” she told her reflection. “I can just stand here and worry about what might happen, or I can get out there and make it happen.” Her lips firmed in determination and she took a deep breath. “Time to face the music.”

Grabbing her small beaded purse from the dresser, she left the cozy, one bedroom cottage, slamming the door behind her to make sure it closed properly since it refused at times. She negotiated the stepping stones carefully with her higher than normal heels and then made her way to the main house. It was a short walk since she lived on her father’s massive estate in what used to be the old gate keeper’s residence. She’d convinced her father to let her rent it and had happily restored the old style house to its former glory. It had been painstaking since she refused all of her father’s monetary help, wanting to do it on her own like any other normal career woman starting out in the world.

She’d wanted normal all her life but being the only daughter to a billionaire limited that fantasy to a large degree. That was one of the reasons she was still a virgin, and one of the reasons tonight was so important. She had to break out of this phase in her life.

Because of her father’s wealth, she couldn’t live outside the gates of the estate for safety reasons, she knew but at least she could pride herself that she was independent, in an off center kind of way. Being the daughter to such a wealthy man meant there was always the threat of kidnapping to worry about. She’d argued with her father to let her have her own career and apartment but he was unrelenting. Instead of giving in to a wave of self-pity because she had no control over her life, with her vivid imagination, she’d turned his refusal to allow her to live on her own into a show of love from him. In her own mind where she could create whatever ideas she wanted and suited her needs, she credited him with not wanting to risk her life or make him worry about her security. The unfortunate reality was, he simply didn’t want to lose millions by having