Chapter Twenty-Seven

A tray of tea along with a box of lettuces was delivered to the room the next morning, and I spent a happy hour on the balcony feeding the giraffe as I sipped Earl Grey.

"We should order breakfast," Eduardo said, putting on his t-shirt and tucking it into black jeans.

"Isn't there a buffet?"

" Oui , there is." He frowned at me. "You want to go?"

"Honestly, I can't resist a good breakfast buffet, it's one of my versions of heaven."

He laughed. "Of course it is."

"And if you pull on a cap and I put on some shades, hopefully we'll be incognito. It's not like I'm made up or anything."

He glanced at his watch. "And it's getting late. Most families will have hit the theme parks by now."

We wandered into a huge restaurant that had one side sectioned off for breakfast. The air was heavy with the scent of waffles, bacon, maple syrup, and cinnamon.

My stomach rumbled, and my mouth watered.

A member of staff took our room number and told us to sit anywhere. She didn't give either of us a second glance, and the restaurant was half empty, so we hoped we'd be lucky and have a quiet breakfast.

Soon I was tucking into yogurt and granola and sweet berry compote. A plate of pancakes, eggs, and fried tomatoes awaited me.

Eduardo seemed to have piled everything onto his plate, and it was a mass of flavors and colors.

We ate and chatted about the shoot the day before, and the upcoming season and the fact that Eduardo's father and stepmother were coming over from France to watch the first two games.

"I'd like you to meet them," he said.

"I'd like that." I stabbed my fork into a piece of pancake. "And perhaps one day you'll meet my Aunt Mary."

"She's like a mother to you, right?"

"She is now." I pointed to the lobby. A gaggle of people were at the reception desk. "It's getting busy, must have new arrivals."

He set his knife and fork on his empty plate. " Oui , we should get going, I have practice to get to."

"And I need to call Trevor about a few things."

We wandered from the restaurant and into the lobby.

Eduardo slipped his arm around my waist and spoke against my ear. "I wonder if we have time to make good use of that big bed before we hit the road. I am sure I missed a tiny bit of your ass cheek when I kissed you all over."

I giggled and leaned into him, rested my hand over my chest. "I'm sure that could be remedied."

"There they are? Over there!"

A sudden commotion to my right drew me to a halt mid-stride. My breath caught, and a heavy feeling that had nothing to do with breakfast dragged in my stomach.

" Merde ," Eduardo muttered, holding me tighter.

A group of reporters were heading toward us with microphones and camera lenses aimed our way.

I pressed my hand to my cheek, hiding my face, and gripped Eduardo's arm. I sensed a flash going off, and then another.

"The elevator," he said.

"Pippa. Pippa Bentley, can you tell us how long you've been seeing Eduardo Dubois?" A high-pitched female voice rang out behind me. "Is it serious?"

"Eduardo, can you give us a moment?"

"Pippa, what is your relationship with Theo Evans?"

"Is it true you have been watching The Vipers' practice sessions?"

"Eduardo, did you know your teammates are also good friends with Pippa?"

"Can you confirm where you are living? Pippa! Pippa!"

Eduardo stabbed at the elevator button. It was on level three. "Where the hell is hotel security?"

"Eduardo, are you and Pippa together?"

"Pippa, is it true you called off an engagement to Steven Paya?"

I squeezed my eyes shut, and a wave of giddiness came over me. How had we ended up in this situation?

Eduardo shielded me with his big body and his embrace.

The reporters were all around us now, microphones jutting forward with eager, hungry faces behind them. I could feel their body heat, the press of their curiosity.

"Fuck off out of here," Eduardo snapped.

They ignored him.

"A photograph of you with Ben Evans has emerged, taken in a hotel in Cardiff. What do you say to that, Pippa?" A man's voice. "Are you seeing both Evans brothers? And why were you in a wedding dress?"

I turned my head away, burying it in Eduardo's neck. Couldn't they see that having my private life dissected was worse than stripping me naked?

"How many Vipers players are you involved with?"

"Is it true you spent a night with Dylan Sanders?"

My head jerked up at that one.

A woman had asked the question. She was tall and blonde and with bright-red lips. She was staring straight at me, and there was a sting of venom in her eyes.

"Was he as kinky with you?"

The elevator door opened.

"Get in." Eduardo ushered me forward, bumping several reporters out of the way with his shoulders.

My heart was pounding, and my legs barely felt like my own.

Eduardo hit the button for our floor.

Microphones were being aimed at us and questions being fired.

A male reporter, tall and with a dark-brown beard, stepped into the elevator, camera phone held out.

"Get the fuck away from me," Eduardo rounded on him. "Get out, now."

"I just want to—"

"I don't give a fuck what you want, get out or I'll make you."

The guy didn't move.

Eduardo shoved him center chest, just one push sending him back into the crowd and creating a domino effect as the elevator doors closed.

"What the hell?" My ears were ringing. "How did they…?"

"Know we were here?" He clicked his tongue on the roof of his mouth. "We should probably have been more discreet when we arrived." He kissed my head. "I'm sorry, I know how important your privacy is to you."

"But…but who was that woman? The one who asked me about Dylan? I've never been seen out with him, and she said about him being kinky? And she looked…mean."

"Maybe she's one of his past rink bunnies."

I balled my fist on my stomach and forced down a wave of nausea. "This is awful."

"It will be okay, I promise."

"But—?"

"I promise."

The elevator door opened, and we stepped out onto a thankfully empty corridor and raced for our room.

Eduardo took out his cell. "Theo?" He put it on speaker.

"Yeah, what's up?"

"Got a problem here."

"Pippa all right?" There was instant concern in his voice.

" Oui , but…"

"But?"

"But we're in a fix. We're at this hotel, and the press have found out. We've just been mobbed in the lobby."

"What? Fuck. She'll hate that. Let me speak to her."

"You're on speaker."

We went into our room and shut the door. "I'm okay, Theo, it was just a shock. We were so relaxed—a false sense of security, I suppose."

"As long as you're okay."

"What's going on?" Ben's voice.

"We need to go get Pippa and Eduardo out of a tight spot." Theo quickly explained the situation.

"No, we will figure it out," Eduardo said, "but you needed to know, right, pictures are bound to hit the internet any moment. You guys were mentioned, and they know about Pippa and Ben being together in a room in Cardiff."

"What? Dylan stayed in my fucking room with her?" Ben's indignation was clear.

"They seem to have a photograph of me and you, Ben, me in my wedding dress," I said. "Sorry."

"Don't be sorry about anything," Ben said. "It will be okay."

"Fuck," Theo muttered. He was quiet for a moment. "We'll come get you. Organize with security to have a back door opened. I'm guessing you can't get to your car, and if you do it will be followed."

" Oui , that is right."

"And use the fire escape, the staircase."

"I'm not sure if…" I said, staring out at the view from the balcony. It was so serene, such a contrast to the mayhem I'd just encountered.

"It will work," Ben said. "Stay strong."

"Dylan's gonna be mad," Eduardo said. " Merde ."

"He'll be good if Pippa is," Theo said. "Message me the address and we'll be there."

He ended the call.

I went to the bathroom and splashed water on my hot cheeks. I was still shaking slightly; the shock of it had got to me more than it usually would. It wasn't as if I hadn't been spotted before and had a ton of questions thrown at me, but this time…this time it was different.

This time I'd been with a new lover. The situation had come out of the blue, not like at an airport or after a runway show or a big designer shoot. The sense of invasion made my skin crawl.

As did thinking what gossip would appear online.

"Hey, stay strong," Eduardo said. He rested his hands on my shoulders.

"I am strong." I dabbed my face and looked at him in the mirror. "I've been through worse, much worse, but the press, those press, they just want dirt and gossip and to make money out of my life and my photo. They're like parasites and—"

"And you hate them, I know." He kissed my temple. "But there are many more good people in the world, and you have us now, to stand at your side."

"I'm grateful for that." I turned and rested my hand on his chest. "But they seem to know everything, they have photographs of all my movements of late."

He said nothing. What could he say? The bare bones of my life were about to be spread out for all to see.

Thirty minutes later, Eduardo and I stood in front of a closed delivery door with hotel security conversing nervously with each other.

The mob had been thrown out of the hotel but had yet to depart the valet area.

"Hyenas." The security man shook his head. "They should never have got into reception."

"But they did." Eduardo squeezed his lips into a tight line. He was not happy with the security team. "Any sign of it?"

We were waiting for Theo's white Jeep to come around the corner. He was to bypass the usual setting down area and come to the back entrance usually reserved for staff and vans bringing in food and linen.

"Yep, it's here." He opened the door, and the Florida heat and light flooded in.

Within a second, the Jeep drew up about twenty feet from the door. It couldn't get closer because of pallets and refuse and recycling bins.

Three car doors opened. Out jumped Ben, Theo, and Dylan. They each wore stern serious expressions and instantly their attention locked on me.

"Thank you," I said to the security man and stepped into the sunshine with Eduardo's arm around my waist.

Ben was first to reach me, and he took my hand. "Are you okay?"

"Yes, fine." I hated that he had worry creases on his brow because of me.

"Honey, this is a mess, but we can sort it." Theo was also in front of me. "It will be old news tomorrow."

"I know."

"Come on, hurry." Dylan puffed up his chest and glanced up at the hotel. "One of the fuckers could be lurking." He seemed to pluck me from Eduardo's embrace and dragged me close.

The next thing I knew I was running at his side to the Jeep.

Ben held open a back door, and I scooted in. Dylan was close behind me. Quickly, I sat. Eduardo jumped in the other side so I was sandwiched between them in the back.

Theo slid into the driver's seat, and before Ben had even closed his door, he'd revved the engine and we spun away.

"Ah fuck." Ben glanced up. "There's someone with a phone up there."

"Might not be a reporter," I said.

"Yeah, maybe we'll get one bit of luck today." Dylan held me closer. "You sure you're okay? They didn't hurt you?"

"No, no, it was just a shock after such a lovely night with Eduardo, and the press are so insistent, and I'm so sorry to drag you all into this and…"

Theo drove past the crowd of reporters. My attention landed on the woman who had asked me about Dylan. Again there was a sharp, piercing quality to her eyes as she stared at the darkened windows of the Jeep. I didn't know how much she could see in, but it was like she was seeing into my soul, like she knew everything.

"Fuck!" Dylan said with venom. "It's her. That damn woman again."

"Who?" I asked, despite being pretty sure who he was talking about.

"The woman who spilled the details of our night together."

"That's her?" Eduardo asked. He peered out.

"The blonde?" Ben asked.

"Yeah, bat-shit crazy." Dylan pursed his lips.

"Maybe you hurt her," I said.

The Jeep picked up speed again.

"Nah, I'm a decent guy, or at least I hope I am." He squeezed my hand and looked me in the eye. "I didn't lead her on."

"You are a decent guy," I said, seeing the desire for my approval in his eyes.

"We agreed it would be a night of fun not marriage and kids," he went on, "we said goodbye the next morning with that agreement intact, yet when I went on tour and stopped responding to her millions of texts she got nasty. I was polite, always polite, but I had games to win, a team to support. I wasn't ready for a relationship."

"She wanted more from the beginning," I said matter-of-factly. "From the moment you said hello."

"She said she didn't." His brow creased in confusion. "Several times."

"She lied. Some people do that."

"Then she shouldn't have. Because it meant her heart got involved when mine hadn't."

The tension radiating off him was palpable, so I decided to drop it. But it was clear this woman hadn't forgotten a thing. A night with Dylan's special brand of kink had clearly got into her system, and she wanted more. Would she be a problem in the future? Only time would tell.

"We should be all good now. You can relax, honey." Theo threw me a glance. "We'll be on the freeway in a minute and well away from the hotel."

"Are they following?"

Ben and Theo both checked the mirrors. Eduardo and Dylan glanced over their shoulders and out of the back window.

"No," Ben said. "We're good."

My cell rang. I reached it from my purse. Trevor.

"Hey," I said. ‘What's up?"

"What's up? What's up? I'll tell you what's up. You, Pippa, you. You're what's up, my little runaway bride."

"Er, why?"

"Don't pretend you don't know. We've spent years keeping your private life private. Top supermodel, highest paid on the runways, elusive, aloof, untouchable, and now this. Now your name has gone stratospheric with the pap shots to match, and I have no idea about your love life, nor does anyone else and…and…oh dear Lord above, the speculation, the gossip, the rumors."

I set the phone on my lap and hit speaker. The guys needed to hear this so they knew what I was dealing with. "Go on."

"My phone is blowing up," he said, his voice higher than usual. "Alerts with your name bouncing around like some kind of meteor shower. What the hell have you been doing with this hockey team? Have you any idea how this looks? And they have pictures of you in Cardiff with Ben Evans and you wearing the Westwood—it seems he's the one who took off your wedding dress that night and not your fiancé—and then there's Theo Evans, his hottie of a brother in some park giving you a foot rub and, and…"

"It's okay, Trevor." I pressed my index fingers on my temples. "Please breathe."

"Breathe! Breathe! It's only okay if you don't mind being pictured with all these muscle-bound guys with jawbones that could sharpen flint and off-the-scale hockey talent."

His words stuck. Yes, they were hot and talented, and maybe I didn't mind being photographed with them. But it was the way the pictures had been taken and the tittle-tattle that surrounded them I didn't like. The ones with Eduardo at Mae's shoot I knew I'd love forever. They were different.

"And Eduardo, the Frenchman. Sweet Jesus, the guy is sex-on-a-stick and—"

"Why thanks, Trevor, appreciate it, man." Eduardo spoke toward the phone and then grinned at me.

"What? What the actual…fuck? He's there with you now?" Trevor gasped.

I could visualize him pacing in his minimalist office with views over the Thames, his favorite white silk shirt, Armani, hanging perfectly from his broad shoulders and a cup of Darjeeling on the desk.

"Yes, Trevor." I paused. "I'm with all four of them."

"As in physically, like now, or as in you're with all four of them?"

Ben turned around. "You trust this guy?" he asked very quietly.

I nodded.

"So tell him."

I sighed. What was the point of hiding anything from Trevor? If he was going to help me, he needed to know the truth. And I liked telling the truth. "Yes," I said, squeezing both Eduardo's and Dylan's hands and looking straight at Ben. "I am with all four of them. Dating all four of them."

"In heaven's name, you are a dark horse, sweet pea. All those years with hardly even a date and then you leave a Greek god at the altar and run off with four studly hockey players."

"I didn't exactly plan it, Trevor."

"I'd like to say I know, but…" He sounded confused.

I'd taken a very different path to the one I'd spoken about for the last year.

"I didn't plan it." I caught Theo's gaze in the rearview mirror. "It just happened, they were exactly who I needed when I needed them. All of them."

"And…I mean, Eduardo…" Trevor said hesitantly, "You're cool with her dating your teammates?"

"I want her to be happy," Eduardo said. "That's my main goal."

"We all do," Dylan added. "And if that's what it takes we can handle it."

"Some women are meant to be shared, it's what gives them everything they need," Ben said.

"And we'll do everything to protect her, to undo this mess," Theo added. "I can assure you of that."

"Bloody hell with bells on." Trevor let out a big sigh. "You really are all there. What are you doing? Are you driving? Can I hear a car?"

"Just giving some reporters the slip," Theo said over his shoulder. "Persistent assholes."

"You're sizzling news," Trevor said then… "What? What is it, Daisy? I'm on the phone—"

His secretary's calm quiet voice sounded in the distance.

"There is what?" Trevor shouted. "Another one…oh, my precious little sweet pea, you've really done it."

"Done what?"

"I'm sending you the latest picture to hit TMZ . There's no hiding it now, I'm afraid. OKAY are going to be all over this, Steven, too."

"I don't care about Steven." My phone pinged, and I opened the image. "Oh fuck."

It was a shot of me being bundled into the very Jeep I sat in now. Dylan was close behind me, and the angle gave the impression that his hand was on my butt. Eduardo was leaping in and throwing a furious glance over his shoulder. Ben and Theo were also in shot, Theo with his shades on, Ben's on the top of his head. The photograph had an air of subterfuge and urgency. It had been taken from above, so there was no hiding for any of us.

"Of all the…" Dylan clenched his fists. "These people stop at nothing."

"And so damn quick," Ben said, stretching to look.

"What is it?" Theo asked. He slowed as we reached the entrance of the gated community.

"All of us, just now," Ben said. "Getting into your Jeep."

"Sons of bitches." He banged the steering wheel. "Can they really move that fast? They have no morals."

"It's all good," I said then closed my eyes and rolled my neck backward, forward, and then to each side. "Really, it's going to be fine?"

"Pippa, are you crazy? This blows you up, all these photographs, and now a shot with all the guys you're…you're…carrying on with and—"

"Trevor." I opened my eyes and stared at the palm-tree-lined street. "No one is dead. This is manageable. This we can handle, overcome, live with."

Trevor went quiet. So did everyone in the car.

I let the pieces fall, let perspective show itself. It wasn't ideal for the press to have the information they did about me, and I hated the feeling of being stalked by them. But alone, with my four men, I was perfectly fine. We were all together, healthy, and happy.

"Talk to me, sweets." Trevor was pacing again, I could hear it in his voice.

"Sit down," I said to him. "And drink your tea."

He hesitated then sighed. "Okay, okay, I'm just worried about you, it's my job and has been for a long time."

"I know, and I appreciate it. But I have four boyfriends now, and they're a great support and they're all with me. Don't bother replying to any questions from the press until at least tomorrow and then just say ‘no comment.'"

"Yeah, no comment," Dylan said. "We're none of their business."

"Trouble is, you guys come with your own huge fandom," Trevor said. "People want you to be their business.'

"Which we can handle, we have done in the past," Ben said. "Seriously, man, chill, we've got this. Pippa is safe with us."

"I believe you," Trevor said. "I'm just used to being—"

"Trevor, I love you dearly," I said, "and we'll speak later, drink your tea and go home and hug your husband. All will be well."

"It's good to hear you say that. I was so worried that you, that you would…that it would send you into a dark place again and…"

"I'm strong, Trevor, you know that, so give me the credit for it."

"I do. I really do. I know the hell you've risen from in the past." He paused. "We'll speak later, but call if you need anything."

"Might just be from a deserted island in the Caribbean," Theo said. "Extreme measures and all that."