Prologue
Chapter: Prologue - Chloe
The sun shone through the stained-glass window, coloring the floor and Chloe’s bedspread with a dazzling array of shifting light. Her head felt a bit fuzzy, remnants of too many glasses of celebratory prosecco imbibed amid last night’s festivities with all her schoolmates. She still had one more party to get through tonight, and she knew it was going to be a doozy. That’s why she had purposely taken it a bit easy at this last one. Not that being responsible was hard. Chloe Bruno had always been the responsible one, despite the fact that she was the baby of the family and rather doted on by her parents. On the other hand, her sister Eveline, begrudgingly put up with her existence.
She turned her head on the pillow and saw all her family members smiling at her from a heavy gilded framed photo taken at a Christmas long past. In it she was smiling broadly, proudly exhibiting a missing front tooth. She and Eveline, like living Christmas dolls, were garbed in matching red and green velvet gowns. Getting Eveline to tie that bow for her had been a mission. Her sister loved her, but she loved lording the fact that she was older even more. They had a bad habit of cyclical fighting, and currently they were on the outs. She would try to rectify that when she got back to New York, but today, here in Florence... Firenze... her home for the last four years, she could not be bothered to worry about Eveline and her moods.
The last four years were a blur of Rembrandt and Picasso, Michelangelo and Titian, Monet and Manet, Kahlo and Dali, Pollock and Munch, Hopper and Caravaggio, moving from Surrealism to Pop Art, Impressionism through Expressionism. There was not an art period, movement, or style she had not studied to obtain her degree in art history with a minor in business, but she now felt more than prepared for her next chapter. She had always been a diligent student.
The perfectionist in her could not stomach bad grades, and to her, a bad grade was anything below 92%. It was an arbitrary cut off point, one she had selected long ago as the line dividing her between happiness and despondency with her results. Her parents had always been proud of her and the work she put in, not that she had to put in much. Grades and lessons came to her naturally, like most new skills she tried on for size.
She was nothing if not a quick study. Look at her Italian! It was passable at best when she arrived, but now nobody could tell she was not a native. Granted her family was Italian, but she was born in the city, New York City—and there was no other according to her father. Aside from a lot of cursing and food and funny one- or two-word idioms, they spoke English at home, with a very thick layer of New York Italian on top, as thick as the Muffuletta sandwiches at that deli her father adored. How she loved them, even if she could barely get her mouth around them and all of their meaty, cheesy, olivey goodness!
Thinking about food made her hungry, and her stomach grumbled, reminding her that she needed to have some breakfast, or, at this point, brunch. It was already noon. She ran her hands over her taut belly and rolled over to cycle through a Cobra Pose, into a Downward Dog, and then held a Plank position while she watched the clock pass through two minutes, and finally curled into Child’s Pose. Even after a night on the town, her slim, athletic body responded well to her morning... now afternoon... stretch.
Her figure was nothing she had to watch. In fact, it was worth watching. She could not pass down the street without a cat call or two, especially here in Italy. The men in this country certainly had no qualms about letting you know they were checking you out. Coming to Italy four years ago, she thought maybe she would finally meet someone interesting. The boys she grew up with and went to high school with all seemed so small minded and childish to her, even though they were the same age. Chloe always subtracted nine from whatever age the guy happened to be currently to arrive at what she considered their actual mental age. Again, her brain and arbitrary numbers, but she did it as soon as she discovered how old a guy was like a reflex. If he was currently twenty-four, that meant he was actually fifteen. Her brain did the math post haste. It certainly made dating anyone remotely her age beyond difficult. They were all so juvenile. But she longed for love, for a love, and the few times she thought she had found something, in a flash it was gone, and she realized she had made the whole thing up in her head, building beyond castles in the sky, creating entire kingdoms. In the past, she would have called herself a hopeless romantic, but now she just looked at herself as kind of hopeless in that department.
Arghhh! Okay, enough of her typical mental carousel of thoughts. Time to get off! She needed to get her day started. Pulling threads from the somewhat fuzzy memories of last night, she did recollect there was a discussion of shopping to find the perfect dress for the final graduation hoorah that was taking place this evening. She popped her pedicured toes into the pair of fluffy silver slippers that peeked out from beneath the edge of the linen duvet like a devoted pet. Even in her mildly inebriated state, she had still managed to land them toes facing out for a perfect exit from bed. They slid across the wide, ancient wood planks that comprised the floor. What was more pressing? A shower? Or an espresso? She did not believe in those horrid pods, but luckily her father, knowing her life and her education ran on the dark, silky liquid, had gifted her a gorgeous machine complete with grinder, so she could make her own espresso at home. Her Italian friends had gawked at the extravagance, telling her it was one of the best machines on the market, and she had been shocked to find the same unit online for over $6,000. What was her father thinking? How he spoiled her! But she wasn’t going to tell him to stop. That seemed silly. There was a part of her, a big part of her, that loved to be spoiled. That was her role as the baby in the family rearing its ugly head.
Watching the espresso leak from the portafilter into her favorite porcelain espresso cup filled her with a certain kind of joy only really good coffee can give, and she thought about the impending fun of the day and evening as she smelled the heavenly aroma and took that first orgasmic sip. It was definitely going to be a double espresso kind of day!
The apartment belonged to her. Yet another extravagant spoil her father had surprised her with when she got accepted into the school. “Why rent for four years. That’s a waste of my good money!” he had told her. The building was the typical old stone of Florence replete with vaulted ceilings, frescoed long ago by yet another struggling Italian artist. That was one of the things she loved about this city. Everywhere you looked there was art, even on her ceilings. She had had such fun decorating the space in an eclectic mix of antiques and midcentury finds carefully curated from some of the local markets and secondhand shops. On the walls, she hung pieces she had commissioned from local street artists she had met and a few of her brethren students. She knew her parents would hate it. They liked big names when it came to art, names she had come to know so well throughout her studies, but it didn’t matter. This was her place, and she wanted it to reflect who she was. Well, that was something she was still desperately trying to figure out. But currently, anyway, what she was most desperately in need of was a shower.
The giant square rainfall showerhead streamed from its place mounted high in the ceiling, washing away the last remnants of yesterday’s party, moist remains of the slightly steamy dream she had been having, and the thoughts of seeing her family again at the end of the summer. She was not ready to surrender her life in Florence just yet and had asked to extend her internship at the Uffizi past graduation, but her father had mandated she come home. He said he had a surprise for her but would not tell her a thing beyond that. The suspense was infuriating. It was her life, not his, but it certainly felt like it belonged to Antonio Bruno. She lathered up with her beloved coconut body wash, the one that always made her feel like she was on a tropical vacation. She purposely used too much, allowing copious bubbles to foam on her body and her loofah. Her olive hued skin had taken on a slightly darker tone during the month of May, throughout which her schoolmates had been dragging her to boat on the Lago di Bilancini. All her girlfriends went topless, but for some reason she could never squash the American side of her, the prudish part that never felt quite comfortable baring her breasts to the world, so the shape of her bikini remained evident on her skin. All the scrubbing in the world could not wash these tan lines away, and they remained alongside the memory of her friend’s on-again-off-again boyfriend Giuseppe drunkenly attempting to grope at her in the cabin, pressing himself against her, while she had simply been trying to make everyone on deck some drinks. She had not told Angelina, because really, nothing had actually happened, nothing that she had really wanted to happen. She scrubbed some more.
As she emerged from the shower, she heard her phone ringing. It was still on the bedside table, so she slid down the hall, pounced on the bed and answered it.
“Speak of the diavola,” she said. “I was just thinking about you, Angelina!”
“Are you ready for me, tesora mia? Angelina asked, her voice purring seductively in thickly accented English. She always called her “my treasure” in Italian. It was her pet name for Chloe. “I’m coming now to get you, naked or dressed,” she quipped and hung up the phone.
That meant she had about fifteen minutes to finish getting ready. They were just going shopping for clothes, but in Florence that still meant you had to look elegant and put together. Could she do that in such a short time? She towel dried her mahogany brown hair. The length of it just barely nodded past her shoulders, now angled longer in the front and shorter in the back, as Angelina had directed the hairdresser the last time they went. Previously, her hair had hung to the middle of her back and had been the same style—no style at all—through high school and most of university. This new cut made her feel older, more mature, and a bit more badass, even though she really wasn’t. It was a lot like wearing leather, which was far too warm for an Italian summer, but always filled her with a bit more confidence. With little time to pick and choose through her wardrobe, she pulled on a silky Missoni crochet-knit halterneck maxi dress. It left her back bare and vulnerable, so she grabbed a sky-blue wrap to throw around her for protection. The color matched her eyes. Those were the only things about her that did not look purely Italian and made her distinct from the rest of her family, who all had eyes the color of dark chocolate. Her dress flowed down the length of her trim, toned body, and, leaving behind the comfort of her slippers, she slipped on a pair of summer wedge sandals that gave her height and arched her calf muscles to perfection. She ducked into the bathroom to grab some product for her hair, finger combed it through her dark tresses, and quickly put on some mascara and lip gloss. That’s all she really needed. Her flawless skin and eyes glowed strongly in the vanity mirror, the shower having accomplished miracles. She threw on some fun bangles and was looking at her reflection doing some last-minute touch-ups when the buzzer went. She was out of time.
Grabbing her purse and tucking her phone inside, she headed downstairs to meet Angelina. Angelina was waiting on the sidewalk in a slinky brown dress that barely managed to stay on her as she moved. The strings and straps wound around her in a complex pattern, a deep shade of brown, only one shade darker than her skin, so if you saw her from afar, she almost looked naked. Her lips, perfectly pouty and full, kissed Chloe when she emerged, leaving a warm, tingly, sticky feeling and most likely some of her signature color “Make Me Melt Pink” on Chloe’s. To say she was comfortable with her sexuality was a serious understatement. Standing next to Angelina always made Chloe feel like a child hanging around with an overtly sexual mother.
“Bella!” Angelina said walking around Chloe in a circle and drinking her in. “I approve, tesora mia!”
“Why, thank you! Now, where are you taking me?” Angelina was always taking her somewhere.
“First, we mangia. Then we shop! I am starving!”
“I’m so glad you said that! I am absolutely famished! Pizza?” Chloe knew Angelina’s weakness for pizza as it perfectly echoed Chloe’s. She could live off of those wondrous circles of joy. Her love of pizza was profound, and her long-term relationship with the food proved more gratifying than most of the short relationships she’d had with men.
“Perfetta!” She cried. “I know just the place!”
Chloe knew five places within walking distance in her neighborhood alone, but she also knew better than to contradict her friend. Four years of beguiling history between them told her Angelina wouldn’t get pizza wrong, so she did not have an issue letting her take the reins. In her life, she was used to people taking the reins and holding them rather permanently. Even though she had spent most of her life at boarding school and now university, she always felt these decisions were not her decisions. Angelina pushed her to be bolder than she was, and she liked that about their friendship.
They ate enough pizza to satisfy their craving for Mozarella di Buffala, tomato, and basil, the pies proudly wearing the colors of the Italian flags, the crusts the perfect smokey char from the wood-burning oven. Even though she preferred champagne with pizza, she stuck to a Spuma Bionda, a classic Italian soft drink she had come to love during her time here, saving what little she had of an alcohol tolerance for later.
Angelina had poo-pooed most of Chloe’s choices at Valentino and Prada as too staid and matronly: “You like my grandmother!” she told her, before pulling her out of the shop. She dragged her into Versace and picked out a dress that Chloe would never have chosen. The top plunged down exposing her decolletage and pushing it up and out with a built in bustier of ornate red and gold. Shoulder straps held her breasts up and in place, but they were a gilded black lace that looked like lingerie. The body of the dress hung black and angled, opposite of her hair, short in the front and longer, just covering her rear, if she did not bend over, in the back.
“Yikes! I can’t dance in this!” she exclaimed as she caught a flash of her white panties.
“You can, yes, if we go and get you some matching panties and sexy stockings!” Angelina told her. Today she was a life size dress up doll. “There will be lots of good-looking men at the party tonight, tesora mia! Maybe, finally you’ll find one to take home with you?” she winked and laughed.
Angelina sure liked to tease Chloe about her lack of experience with men. She wasn’t technically a virgin, because there had been that one time with her best friend in the last year of boarding school, but it was so quick and fumbling and awkward, one could barely call it sex. She looked like walking sex now, especially when she added the lingerie and some strappy black high heels. Charging the lot to the credit card her father had given her long ago when she first left home for school, she chalked the entire purchase up to necessary graduation expenses.
The two young ladies got dressed back at Chloe’s place. She let Angelina do her makeup and hair, which she slicked back from her face, giving her a feline-like look that her friend then exaggerated by doing a serious black cat eye. Covering her eyelids in a bold metallic gold, Angelina stepped back to look at her treasure and smiled.
“Perfetta! I can do no more to improve this. You are magnificent! Oh, how I will miss you,” she said, stroking her cheek adoringly.
Chloe stepped back to look at herself in the mirror and barely recognized the stunning woman reflected back at her. The butterflies in her stomach kicked up their activity, noting her excitement about tonight. Something, or hopefully someone, was waiting for her to appear. Was this going to be her Cinderella moment?
They grabbed a cab over to their favorite bar, and as she walked through the door, she noticed the streamers and a giant banner on the back wall with her name on it. Before she could register anything more, the whole room turned to her and shouted.
“Sorpressa, Chloe! Sorpressa!” and erupted into hoots and cheers.
“Angelina, I am going to kill you!” She grabbed at her friend’s arm as the mass of bodies moved around her to congratulate her.
“You didn’t think you were going to get to leave Italy without a going away party, did you, tesora? That was not happening on my watch. Tonight, we drink, and we celebrate you, you beautiful girl, and how much we will miss you when you go.” She planted a deep kiss on Chloe’s lips and pulled her toward the bar. The sea of familiar faces parting as she moved. It seemed everyone she had gone to class with, worked with at the museum, or met at her favorite pizza spots was here tonight to say goodbye. Emotion filled her as she realized she would have to say farewell to all of them, to all of this, come Sunday.
“Bartender, we need to celebrate! Prosecco for everyone!” Angelina ordered, and the man behind the bar happily obliged as he drank in the two gorgeous women, falling into the depths of Angelina’s heaving breasts while she positioned herself on the barstool like a priceless figurine.
“To getting what you want out of life, tesora mia!” Angelina clinked her glass against Chloe’s. Pressing her lips close to her ear she whispered, “So, which one do you want? There are a lot of good-looking men here tonight to see you off! But I don’t want to fight over a man, so you have to tell me which you like.”
“I’m going to need a lot more prosecco for that, Angelina!” She blushed, but she still took a moment to look around the room from her vantage point on the barstool. Angelina was not wrong in her assessment that they had their choice of attractive men.
The party wore on, faces coming and going, bidding her farewell and good luck like so many busboys at a restaurant, blurring into one, until she hardly remembered who she had seen or what they had told her. It could have been the prosecco playing its tricks, because that drink had magically turned into shots of Limoncello which she sipped cautiously. Unlike Angelina, who devoured them with spirit like she did most things, including men.
At some point, Chloe snuck off to empty her bladder and freshen herself in the bathroom. The smoky mirror within told her that despite her intoxication, she still looked fabulous, just a little glassy eyed. As she was closing the door behind her, someone in the hallway smashed into her back, pushing her forcefully against the wall. The rude man ran past, dashed into the crowded bar, then changed his mind, circling back toward the hallway he had come from. This time she saw his face, angry, scarred, and panicked. His bloodshot eyes focused on her, and that was the moment she noticed he had a gun in his right hand. He held it in a comfortable way, like it was a clutch purse instead of a deadly weapon, and before she could think further, that same gun was sticking into her ribs. The reason he had changed trajectory made itself evident in the following seconds, when three rather large men pushed their way through the crowd coming toward them. Yelling at them in Italian to stand back, he brandished his gun and then stuck it firmly against her ribs once again.
“You move. You die!” He told her gruffly, and pushed his way forward through the room. The large men in the beautifully tailored suits moved out of the way to let him pass unimpeded, with Chloe, now a hostage, in tow.
She saw Angelina’s face as they moved closer to the bar. At first, she smiled, seeing Chloe pressed up against the rugged stranger, but realization dawned quickly when she saw the fear in Chloe’s eyes and her gaze moved down to see the gun the man now held firmly at her hip.
Stepping aside to let her kidnapper through, one of the other strangers said, “We will find you, Massimo. If not tonight, then tomorrow. The boss wants to see you. More importantly, he wants to see what you did with his money. You’ve signed your own death sentence!”
“Maybe. Maybe not. Time will tell, but not tonight, boys. Not tonight.”
They had reached the front door, and Chloe was now looking back on her party and guests in abject terror. Her abductor, Massimo, turned to move them both out the door when she felt them get shoved from behind. She hit the ground hard, her knees painfully embracing the polished cement floor, the weight of her attackers pinning her down. Massimo was struggling with someone, his arms and legs flailing, trying to bring the gun around to aim it at this new participant in the melee. A knife struck the floor by her face, and she let out a panicked scream. Just as quickly as the blade appeared, it disappeared, but she did not have to wonder very long at where it went as she felt it slice through her upper thigh. She was pushed once more into the ground and heard Massimo cry out as the same knife that had slashed her leg found its way into his stomach. The weight on top of her disappeared, and she managed to roll over and look at both her attacker and his. Massimo was slumped on the floor, a brilliant red pool of blood spewing through his hand, and the man who had done this was now holding him against the wall while the three men in suits came forward out of the crowd to collect their wounded prize.
“Grazie mille,” one of them said, clapping her savior on the back in hearty praise. “We will let the boss know who he owes for this gem.” The big man pulled Massimo up off the floor as if he was a rag doll, and yanked him out the door of the bar, leaving a trail of blood in their wake like tragic confetti.
Chloe looked down as her leg throbbed, and she gasped at the size of the pool of blood she was sitting in. Finished with his bounty hunt, the man now bent down to see the other victim of his knife wielding shenanigans. He got on his knees in front of her to assess the damage. She was starting to feel a bit woozy, a combination of blood loss and anxiety getting the better of her. Despite the haze, she managed to note how attractive he was. That jawline, those dark curls... For a moment, they eased her pain.
He ran his hands up her injured thigh, making her squirm and call out.
“Relax,” he told her. “We need to stop this from bleeding.” Looking around for something to use, he was just about to rip the bottom of her dress when Angelina appeared and handed him her scarf.
“You can use this, darling,” she told him, stooping down to check on her friend.
He drew the patterned silk under her leg and swiftly pulled it taut, tying a very tight knot that made her wince and see stars.
“This is going to need stitches. She needs to get to the hospital,” he told Angelina in a flat, no-nonsense voice. He spoke in Italian, good Italian, but Chloe could tell he was not a native.
“We will have to call for an ambulance. I did not drive,” Angelina told him.
“It will take too long. She’s already lost too much blood. My car is right outside. I’ll take her. This is my fault,” he said in frustration.
“I’m coming too!” Angelina told him in mounting concern.
“Sorry, you can’t. Unless you plan on getting in the trunk, I only have two seats.”
Angelina looked perturbed at the idea, but what choice did she have? The room had started to fade to black just as Chloe felt strong hands lift her from the floor. Her head fell against his chest. She could hear his heart beating, strong and steady, the sound comforting in her ear. The smell of him, remnants of some expensive cologne, filled her nose as she nestled into his collar. She felt him lower her body, and the cool slide and smell of rich leather replaced his scent. He leaned over her and buckled her seatbelt, the warmth of his nearness blanketing her for a moment. Her body started to shiver uncontrollably as soon as he moved away.
“You’re going into shock,” he told her, not unkindly, and adjusted her short skirt to cover her exposed undergarments. He tucked something over her, but it took her a moment to realize it was his jacket.
“Chivalry is not dead,” she mumbled.
“Dormant, but not dead,” he quipped.
“I’m Chloe,” she told him. “If I’m going to die, I want you to know my name.”
“You’re not going to die. You won’t be running a marathon tomorrow, but you aren’t going to die. That much I can assure you,” he told her with confidence.
Something about his tone made her feel better, made her feel safe, even though he was a complete stranger. He slid into the camel-colored seat beside her and revved the engine. It roared to life, the expensive sound of high-end Italian horsepower, and her eyes flitted over the silver trident on the steering wheel as the Maserati sped toward the hospital. He definitely wasn’t struggling in the money department if he could afford a car like this. She watched through half closed eyes while he skillfully maneuvered the car down the narrow streets at unnerving speeds.
“I thought you said I wasn’t going to die,” she whispered over to him.
“The girl has a sense of humor even when she’s bleeding out!” he chuckled.
“The girl has a name, remember? Chloe. I’m Chloe,” she said with annoyance. Somehow it was very important to her that he remember her name. Why couldn’t he remember her name? Was she that easy to forget?
He rounded a sharp corner, and she slid over toward him, her short dress hitching up a bit higher, her legs on full display, her head connecting with his broad shoulder.
“I know, Chloe.”
She liked the way he said her name. Her gaze fixated on his profile, his strong jawline, his Roman nose, and the chiseled features even Michelangelo would be jealous of. Dark curls drifted toward his cheek, attempting to be angelic in the nature of their spring but managing to be more mischievous. What was wrong with her? This man had stabbed her! Why was she looking at him like that?
“Are you okay? We’re almost there.”
“No, I’ve been stabbed. By you!”
“Well, you can’t say that at the hospital. You’ll have to tell them it was a kitchen accident. You were slicing bread and the knife got away from you.”
“How bad of a cook do you think I am?”
He chuckled. “Unless you want me to go to jail for saving you from that murderous gangster—and you should know he is a horrible, dangerous man who would have killed you—then, Chloe, you will tell them you have the worst knife skills known to man!”
“I’m rather proud of my knife skills, but to thank you for saving me, I will tell them I’m an idiot girl in the kitchen pretending to be a top chef and making a mess of things. But who is going to believe I was cooking in this outfit?”
“Ehhh. This is Italy. It’s plausible. You could have been cooking for me. I’d let you cook for me in that outfit.”
She could feel his gaze rolling over her, and she felt so exposed, legs splayed out, her dress riding high. Thank goodness for the jacket, otherwise the top of her breasts would have been laid bare for him to visually fondle as well. Something wet and sticky by her hand broke her train of thought, and she looked down to see Angelina’s gorgeous Versace scarf soaked through with a new pattern, one made by her blood. The sight made her woozy once again.
“Stay with me, Chloe! We’re here!”
He jerked the car to a stop at the emergency entrance. Hopping out, he ran around to her side and scooped her gently from the low leather seat. His arms felt secure around her as he hurried her inside the hospital.
“Per favore! My girlfriend cut herself in the kitchen, but she has lost a lot of blood,” he said to the desk attendant. He placed her gently on a gurney in the hall. Turning her head to look up at him, she realized he was holding her purse, but he still managed to look masculine doing so. He caught her looking at the bag.
“Your friend gave it to me. She thought you might need it.” He opened her Gucci tote and started rummaging through it without any remorse. “Okay, you have some money, and credit cards, oh, a black Amex... Fancy, and an insurance card. No condoms? Your phone is in here too. I’m going to put my number in here just in case you need something from me.” He typed numbers she could not see into her phone then dropped it carelessly back inside her purse. Clicking it closed, he tucked it by her side, just as a nurse approached. “You can keep the jacket as a souvenir.”
The woman took one look at her leg and started to wheel her back into the sterile depths of the hospital.
“Wait! You aren’t coming with me?”
“Is he family?” the nurse asked.
“No,” Chloe replied.
“Then he stays here,” the woman said to her in a tone that told her no amount of wheedling would change a thing.
She watched as his beautiful face disappeared down the length of the hallway. While she waited for the doctor to finish stitching her up, she looked through her phone to find his name. She could not believe she had not even asked for it while they were in the car! The only entry she did not recognize was listed under K. No name, just K. It was a local number, but she dared not dial it. Instead, she called Angelina, who no doubt would be worried sick. Of course, she hurried over to the hospital and was waiting for her when Chloe was wheeled down to the lobby. Scanning the room for the mysterious K, she felt her heart fall when she didn’t see him there.
“Where did that beautiful man get to?” Angelina asked, voicing Chloe’s thoughts.
“I don’t know,” she said despondently. “The least he could have done was wait to see if I was okay!” Her frustration mounted toward anger.
“Let’s get you home, tesora mia! You have some packing to do. Well, now I have some packing to do for you.”
“What would I do without you?” she said, looking once more around the waiting room and scanning the sidewalks as they left the hospital. Stop looking for him! she told herself. She was being a simpering idiot, and that look was not flattering on anyone, especially Chloe Bruno.
