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She closed it and sat back, fighting the rising nausea.
Desperate was fast becoming her middle name but Ruby refused to accept that the answers to her woeful financial predicament would be found in a skin den.
Biting her inside lip, she exhaled and typed again: Where’s Narciso Valentino tonight?
Her breath caught as the search engine fired back a quick response. The first linked the domain of a popular tabloid newspaper—one she’d become rudely acquainted with when she’d received her first laptop at ten, logged on and seen her parents splashed over the home page. In the fourteen years since then, she’d avoided the tabloid, just as she avoided her parents nowadays.
Ignoring the ache in her chest, she clicked on the next link that connected to a location app.
For several seconds, she couldn’t believe how easily she’d found him. She read the extensive list of celebrities who’d announced their whereabouts freely, including one attending a movie premiere right now in Times Square.
Grabbing the remote, she flipped the TV channel to the entertainment news station, and, sure enough, the movie star was flashing a million-dollar smile at his adoring fans.
She glanced back at the location next to Narciso Valentino’s name.
Riga—a Cuban-Mexican nightclub in the Flatiron District in Manhattan.
Glancing at the clock above the TV, she made a quick calculation. If she hurried, she could be there in under an hour. Her heart hammered as she contemplated what she was about to do.
She despised confrontation almost as much as her parents thrived on it. But after weeks of trying to find a solution, she’d reached the end of her tether.
She’d won the NMC reality TV show and scraped together every last cent to come up with her half of the hundred-thousand-dollar capital needed to get her restaurant—Dolce Italia—up and running.
Any help she could’ve expected from Simon Whittaker, her ex-business partner and owner of twenty-five per cent of Dolce Italia, was now a thing of the past.
She clenched her fist as she recalled their last confrontation.
Finding out that the man she’d developed feelings for was married with a baby on the way had been shock enough. Simon trying to talk her into sleeping with him despite his marital status had killed any emotion she’d ever had for him.
He’d sneered at her wounded reaction to his intended infidelity. But having witnessed it up close with gut-wrenching frequency in her parents’ marriage, she was well versed in its consequences.
Cutting Simon out of her life once she’d seen his true colours had been a painful but necessary decision.
Of course, without his business acumen she’d had to take full financial responsibility of Dolce Italia. Hence her search for Narciso Valentino. She needed him to stand by his company’s promise. A contract was a contract....
* * *
A gleaming black limo was pulling up as she rounded the corner of the block that housed the nightclub. The journey had taken an extra half-hour because of a late-running train. Wincing at the pinch of her high heels on the uneven pavestones, she hurried towards Riga’s red-bricked façade.
She was navigating her way around puddles left by the recent April shower, when deep male laughter snagged her attention.
A burly bouncer held open the velvet rope cordon as two men, both over six feet tall, exited the VIP entrance in the company of two strikingly beautiful women. The first man was arresting enough to warrant a second look but it was the other man who commanded Ruby’s interest.
Jet-black hair had been styled to slant over the right side of his forehead in a silky wave that flowed back to curl over his collar.
Her steps faltered as the power of his presence slammed into her, and knocked air out of her lungs. His aura sent a challenge to the world, dared it to do its worst.
Dazed, she documented his profile—winged eyebrow, beautifully sculpted cheekbone, a straight patrician nose and a curved mouth that promised decadent pleasure—or what she imagined decadent pleasure looked like. But his mouth promised it and, well, this guy looked as if he could deliver on whatever sensual promises he made.
‘Hey, miss. You coming in any time this century?’
The bouncer’s voice distracted her, but not for long enough to completely pull her attention away. When she looked back, the man was turning away but it wasn’t before Ruby caught another quick glimpse of his breathtaking profile.
Her gaze dropped lower. His dark grey shirt worn under a clearly bespoke jacket was open at the collar, allowing a glimpse of a bronzed throat and mouth-watering upper chest.
Ruby inhaled sharply and pulled her coat tighter around her as if that could stem the heat rushing like a breached dam through her.
The drop-dead gorgeous blonde smiled his way. His hand dropped from her waist to her bottom, drifted over one cheek to cup it in a bold squeeze before he helped her into the car. The first man shouted a query, and the group turned away from Ruby. Just like that, the strangely intimate and disturbing link was broken.
Her insides sagged and she realised how tight a grip she’d held on herself.
Even after the limo swung into traffic, Ruby couldn’t move, nor could she stem the tingling suspicion that she’d arrived too late.
The bouncer cleared his throat conspicuously. She turned. ‘Can you tell me who that second guy was who just got into that limo?’ she asked.
He raised one are-you-serious? eyebrow.
Ruby shook her still-dazed head and smiled at the bouncer. ‘Of course you can’t tell me. Bouncer-billionaire confidentiality, right?’
His slow grin gentled his intimidating stature. ‘Got it in one. Now, you coming in or you just jaywalking?’
‘I’m coming in.’ Although the strong suspicion that she’d missed Narciso Valentino grew by the second.
‘Great. Here you go.’ The bouncer placed a Mayan-mask-shaped stamp on her wrist, glanced up at her, then added another stamp. ‘Show it at the bar. It’ll get you your first drink on the house.’ He winked.
She smiled in relief as she entered the smoky interior. If her guess had been wrong and she hadn’t just missed Narciso Valentino, she could nurse an expensive drink while searching him out.
She’d worked in clubs like these all through college and knew how expensive even the cheapest drinks were. Which was why she clutched an almost warm virgin Tiffany Blue an hour later as she accepted that Narciso Valentino was the man she’d seen outside.
Resigned to her fruitless journey, she downed the last of her drink and was looking for a place to set the glass down when the voices caught her attention.
‘Are you sure?’
‘Of course I am. Narciso will be there.’
Ruby froze, then glanced into one of the many roped-off VIP areas. Two women dripping in expensive jewellery and designer dresses that would cost her a full year’s salary sat sipping champagne.
Unease at her shameless eavesdropping almost forced her away but desperation held her in place.
‘How do you know? He didn’t attend the last two events.’ The blonde looked decidedly pouty at that outcome.
‘I told you, I overheard the guy he was with this evening talking about it. They’re both going this time. If I can get a job as a Petit Q hostess, this could be my chance,’ her red-headed friend replied.
‘What? To dress in a clown costume in the hope of catching his eye?’
‘Stranger things have happened.’
‘Well, hell will freeze over before I do that to hook a guy,’ the blonde huffed.
Statuesque Redhead’s lips pursed. ‘Don’t knock it till you try it. It pays extremely well. And if Narciso Valentino falls in my lap, well, let’s just say I won’t let that life-changing opportunity pass me by.’
‘Okay, you have my attention. Give me the name of the website. And where the hell is Macau anyway?’ the blonde asked.
‘Umm...Europe, I think?’
Ruby barely suppressed a snort. Heart thumping, she took her phone from her tiny clutch and keyed in the website address.
An hour and a half later, she sent another Hail Mary and pressed send on the online forms she’d filled out on her return home.
It might come to nothing. She could fail whatever test or interview she had to pass to get this gig. Heck, after discovering that she was applying to hostess for Q Virtus, one of the world’s most exclusive and secretive private clubs, she wondered if she didn’t need her head examined. She could be wasting money and precious time chasing an elusive man. But she had to try. Each day she waited was another day her goal slipped from her fingers.
The alternative—bowing to the pressure from her mother to join the family business—was unthinkable. At best she would once again become the pawn her parents used to antagonise each other. At worst, they would try and drag her down into their celebrity-hungry lifestyle.
They’d made her childhood a living hell. And she only had to pass a billboard in New York City to see they were still making each other’s lives just as miserable but taking pleasure in documenting the whole thing for the world to feast on.
The Ricardo & Paloma Trevelli Show was prime-time viewing. The fly-on-the-wall documentary had been running for as long as Ruby could remember.
When she was growing up, her daily routine had included at least two sets of camera crews documenting her every move along with her parents’.
TV crews had become extended family members. For a very short time when it’d made her the most popular girl at school, she’d told herself she was okay with it.
Until her father’s affairs began. His very public admission of infidelity when she was nine years old had made ratings soar. Her mother publicly admitting her heartbreak had made worldwide news. Almost overnight, the TV show had been syndicated worldwide and brought her parents even more notoriety.
The subsequent reunion and vow renewal had thrilled the world.
After her father’s second admission of infidelity, millions of viewers had been given the opportunity to weigh in on the outcome of Ruby’s life.
Strangers had accosted her on the street, alternatively pitying and shaming her for being a Trevelli.
Escaping to college at the opposite end of the country had been a blessing. But even then she hadn’t been able to avoid her roots.
It’d quickly become apparent that she had no other talent than cooking.
The realisation that the Trevelli gene was truly stamped into her DNA was a deep fear she secretly harboured. It was the reason she’d cut Simon out of her life without a backward glance. It was also the reason she’d vowed never to let her parents influence her life.
Which was why she needed a ten-minute conversation with Narciso Valentino. A tingle of awareness shot through her as she replayed the scene outside Riga.
With a spiky foreboding, she recalled the dark, dangerously sensual waves vibrating off him; those bronzed, sure fingers drifting over the blonde’s bottom, causing unwelcome heat to drag through Ruby’s belly.
God, what was she doing lying in bed thinking of some stranger’s hand on his girlfriend’s ass?
She punched her pillow into shape and flipped off her bedside lamp. She couldn’t control the future but she could control the choice between mooning over elegant hands that looked as if they could bring a woman great pleasure or getting a good night’s sleep.
She was almost asleep when her phone pinged an incoming message.
Exhaling in frustration, she grabbed the phone.
The brightness in the dark room hurt her eyes, but, even half blinded, Ruby could see the words clearly. Her CV had impressed the powers that be.
She’d been granted an interview to become a Petit Q.
CHAPTER TWO
Macau, China, One Week Later
THE RED FLOOR-LENGTH gown sat a little too snugly against Ruby’s skin, and the off-the-shoulder design exposed more cleavage and general flesh than she was comfortable with. But after two gruelling interviews, one of which she’d almost blown by turning up late due to another delayed train, the last thing she could complain about was the expensive designer outfit that spelt her out as a Petit Q.
She was careful now to avoid it getting snagged on her heels as she walked across the marble floor of her hotel towards the meeting place, from where they’d be chauffeured to their final destination. In her small case were two carefully folded, equally expensive outfits the management had provided.
An examination had shown that they, too, like the dress she wore, would be tight...everywhere. It was clear that someone, somewhere in the management food chain had got her measurements very wrong.
She’d already attracted the attention of an aging rock star in the lift on the way to the ground floor of her Macau hotel. It didn’t matter that he’d seemed half blind when he’d leered at her; attracting any attention at all made her stomach knot with acid anxiety.
She’d let her guard down with Simon, had believed his interest to be pure and genuine, only to discover he wanted nothing more than a bit on the side. The idea that he’d assumed because she was a Trevelli she would condone his indecent proposal, just as her mother continued to accept her father’s, had shredded the self-esteem she’d fought so hard to attain when she’d removed herself from her parents’ sphere.
She wasn’t a coward, but the fear that she might never be able to judge another man’s true character sent a cold shiver through her.
Pushing the thought away, she straightened her shoulders, but another troubling thought immediately took its place.
What if she’d made a huge mistake in coming here?
What if Narciso didn’t show? What if he showed and she missed him again?
No, she had to find him. Especially in light of the phone call she’d received the morning after she’d signed on to be a Petit Q.
The voice had been calm but menacing. Simon had sold his twenty-five-per-cent share of her business to a third party. ‘We will be in touch shortly about interest and payment terms,’ the accented voice had warned.
‘I won’t be able to discuss any payment terms until the business is up and running,’ she’d replied, her hands growing clammy as anxiety dredged her stomach.
‘Then it is in your interest to make that happen sooner rather than later, Miss Trevelli.’
The line had gone dead before she could say anything more. For a moment, she’d believed she’d dreamt the whole thing, but she’d lived in New York long enough to know loan sharks were a real and credible threat. And Simon had sold his share in her business to one of them.
Panicked and angry with Simon, she’d been halfway across the Indian Ocean before she’d read her Petit Q guidelines and experienced a bolt of shock.
No doubt to protect its ultra-urban-legend status, the Q Virtus Macau caucus was to be a masked event at a secret location in Macau.
Masked, as in incognito. Where the chances of picking out Narciso Valentino would be hugely diminished.
The memory of broad shoulders and elegant fingers flashed across her mind. Yeah, sure, as if she were an expert in male shoulders enough to distinguish one from the other.
Her fingers clenched around her tiny red clutch. She’d come all this way. She refused to admit defeat.
The redhead from Riga turned towards her and Ruby fought not to grit her teeth as the other woman dismissed her instantly.
As the door to the Humvee limo slid shut behind them another jagged stab of warning pierced her. Every cell in her body screamed at her to abandon this line of pursuit and hightail it back home.
She could use the app to find out when Narciso returned to New York. She could confront him on home turf where she was more at ease, not here in this sultry, exotic part of the world where the very air held a touch of opulent magic.
