Chapter Twenty-Four

Bianca

Okay, so patience wasn’t one of my virtues.

Watching water boil? No way.

Expecting a call? Ugh.

Waiting for eight o’clock? Torture.

What was happening at eight, you ask? Well, remember how Knox and I had finally had our first kiss when I’d shared his bed (don’t be dirty) and he’d told me he wanted to take me out? That. That was what was happening at eight. Finally!

But that was hours off and I had to finish working. Currently, I was at a show—that felt never-ending, but that wasn’t the point—and this was one that Knox didn’t join me for because his blog wasn’t invited. So I was sitting impatiently all by my lonesome.

Don’t get me wrong, nothing made me happier than attending the shows, and Ginevra Salvatore’s was superb—her collection eye-catching and scintillating—but that didn’t change the fact that I’d had my eye on the venue’s exit since I got here.

Here was the way my brain worked: the sooner I got out of here, the sooner I could see Knox and kiss him again. Good way of thinking, huh? I thought so.

Anyway, Ginevra finally came out and began waving at the audience, smiling as the applause kept coming, as it should have.

When she’d turned and left the runway, the audience began their mass exodus and I was right there with them, placing my purse on my shoulder and hightailing it to that exit. Until—“Bianca Morelli?”

What if I pretended I hadn’t heard my name and I just kept on walking? I was so close to the exit, to Knox, to date night.

But that seemed cruel, right, to ignore someone like that?

Ugh, I cursed my penchant for being a good person.

Plastering a smile on to greet whoever it was, I turned and came face to face with Ginevra herself. I raised a brow and answered, “Ginevra, how are you?”

I probably should have mentioned this, but Ginevra was another family friend. She had actually worked at Bellissima for a very short stint when Mom had first opened the magazine. Then she’d left Bellissima and started pursuing her passion for design, but she had always kept in touch when she was in New York. For a while, she and Maria had even taken Italian lessons together. Ginevra was several years older than Maria, but that never mattered much to her—my sister had always been like an old soul. Then one day, she announced she was moving out here to Italy to open a studio.

“I’m excellent, darling. I was hoping to catch you after the show,” she said, and it became obvious that living here brought out her thick accent.

“Oh, what for?”

She crossed one arm over the other, placing a hand on her other arm. “My team is doing a big press campaign at my flagship store. They invited mostly influencers to come and create content for their socials, but I would love it if you could pop in, too. It might give you more to cover in the advertorial about my brand, you experiencing it first-hand, trying on my designs.”

She wanted me to try on her designs? Me? I only worked in advertising. I got asked to do a lot of interesting things, but this was by far the coolest. And it would be such a great opportunity to dip my toe into the retail and flagship side of the business.

I raked my teeth over my bottom lip. It wasn’t like I didn’t have the time. “Are you sure?” I asked, unsure why I was pressing my luck.

My mind practically screamed at me for asking that question. She invited you, what more do you want? What if she went back on it now and changed her mind?

Thankfully, she didn’t, instead nodding. “Absolutely. You didn’t have other plans, did you? Because it’s only after the show for a couple of hours.”

I shook my head. “Nope. No plans. Thank you, thank you so much, Ginevra! This means the world to me. I mean, I can’t believe you invited me.”

Ginevra leaned over and placed a hand on my shoulder lightly. “Bianca, you know I love you and your family.” Then she backed up and chuckled. “Although, this is somewhat selfish because I want my paid advertorial in your publication to outshine every other designers’.”

I understood what she was saying, and she was in luck because no one else had asked me to do anything nearly as cool. “I will go to your store now and we’ll make sure you’re satisfied with your advertorial. Don’t worry about a thing.”

“Bianca, I’m never worried. I trust Bellissima and your family implicitly. It’s why I do paid advertising exclusively with your magazine.”

“And we’re so appreciative of your continued support.”

“All right, well, I have to get going, but I can’t wait to see the proof when it’s ready.”

I watched as she walked away, her long black dress swaying with each step, and pulled my phone out of my purse to text my sisters as I began walking out of the venue. They were going to be so jealous when they found out about this.

Bianca: You’re not going to believe what just happened.

Perla: You and Knox did the nasty?

Bianca: Not yet. Ginevra Salvatore just invited me to try on her clothes at her flagship store.

Maria: Shut up!

Perla: What?! How did you get so lucky?

Allegra: Her horoscope does say that good things are on the horizon. I just assumed that meant with you and Knox, but maybe this is what it meant.

Bianca: That might not be too off base, actually. We have a date tonight.

Allegra: Trying on Ginevra’s designs is an excellent way to kill time.

Maria: The understatement of the century. I can’t believe it, but you should have fun and give her my love.

Perla: Yeah, take lots of pictures!

Allegra: Try on something fabulous for me.

I popped my phone in my purse and looked around to find Knox leaning against the building, a foot propped up and his arms crossed, aviators over his eyes, looking more delicious than ever. Maybe you could’ve said it was his khakis or his blue button-down shirt, or even the sexy tweed jacket he wore, but I liked to believe it was none of that and just the man underneath it all.

Biting the corner of my lip, I made my way over to him and touched his bicep, making him turn and look at me. “Why, hi there, stranger,” I purred. “What a nice surprise.”

He returned my flirty behavior with a gentle kiss on the lips. “I missed you.” Snaking his hand around my waist, he pulled me against him so our bodies were flush and all I had to do was stand up on my tiptoes for another kiss.

I brought my hands to his hair and began playing with it, running my hands through it. “Me, too. I didn’t think that show would ever end.”

“I hope it’s okay that I surprised you.”

“Of course it is!”

“Good,” he acknowledged and started leading us away. “I watched everyone leave, but then there was no sign of you.” He cocked a brow. “Did you sell ad space?”

I nodded. “Previously, actually. Ginevra is doing an advertorial with us. Which is why she stopped me after the show.” I licked my lips and stared up at him, coming to a stop. I couldn’t believe I was about to say this, especially after I’d just said it was okay that he surprised me, but I had to tell him—“She has a flagship store here and was hoping I could stop by and get some content for the team by trying on a few pieces from the new collection.”

“When?”

I cringed. “Now?” My eyebrows came together as I dropped that little bomb and waited for him to react.

“You have to go,” he assured me, not hesitating for a second.

“It could take a while,” I warned. “And I want to go, don’t get me wrong, but I know that I’m also ruining whatever it is you had planned.”

He shook his head, tucking a loose strand of my hair behind my ear. “You have to do this, Bianca. It’s opportunities like these that make or break our careers. Plus, your eyes light up any time you talk about these things. You should go. I didn’t really have any big plans anyway. Just wanted to see you.”

Just wanted to see you. It turned out, I’d never loved five words so much. Hearing him say that made me feel infinitely special and that was priceless.

Knox touched the space between my brows. “What’s going on in that pretty little head of yours? You look like you’re hard at work thinking in there. I can practically see the gears turning.”

I shrugged casually. “I was just thinking about how you make me feel.”

Cupping my cheek, he looked into my eyes. “I hope it’s good. You deserve to feel good.”

“Amazing, actually,” I confessed.

He touched my lip with his finger and silenced me. “I feel the same way. But anyway, about this afternoon, I’ll walk around, sightsee a bit, and then you can meet me back at the hotel.”

I gave him a lopsided smile. “But,” I started, dragging the word out. “You came all this way and I really don’t want to see you walk away. Maybe you can come with me.”

Okay, so maybe that was a dumb idea. Why would Knox want to go to a store where a bunch of influencers were trying on clothes?

To my surprise, though, he nodded. “Sure, if it means you’ll go and not feel guilty for doing something for yourself, then I’ll go with you.” He swung his arm around my shoulder as we started walking again to meet my driver.

“You know me so well.”

* * *

Knox

I’d never understood the phrase “organized chaos” until now.

How could I best describe what I’m witnessing? Hmm, how about this: you know when you drag your boyfriend to the mall to accompany you on a shopping trip and he only later finds out it’s worse than he ever imagined because there’s a big blowout sale and everyone’s scanning everything on the racks, holding the clothes up to themselves and trying to snag it before someone else grabs their size? That was what standing in this particular store was like—worse than I could have ever imagined.

Only I felt like the paparazzi was here, too, because everyone had their phones out, taking pictures of this and that.

One influencer was actually doing a live, talking so loud I could hardly hear the song that was playing in the store. Ironically enough, the song was a low classical number, which didn’t seem to go with the otherwise high-strung, on-edge atmosphere.

Put a bunch of chicks in a store filled with next season’s designer clothes and what else could you expect?

Naturally, no guys were allowed in the back, so I was waiting for Bianca to come out and model whatever it was she’d chosen to try on. They didn’t have much in the way of seating, so I stood there like an idiot, moving around as women milled around, flitting from one area to the next, taking clothes off the racks.

It was made only slightly better when employees started assisting some of the influencers.

The next thing I knew, Bianca came out of the back, her head down as she adjusted her top, trying to pull it up as though afraid it would fall down at any moment.

I cocked a brow and let my eyes roam over her body appreciatively before—

Okay, her top potentially, maybe falling down was the least of her worries. She’d clearly been drinking, because she wasn’t wearing any goddamn pants.

“Oh, Knox.” Her words came out sounding slightly muffled by the sound of my blood boiling. She had just looked up and realized I was standing right in front of her. She should have been so lucky that it was me she practically ran into coming out of the dressing room. “What do you think of this? It’s their most popular item, a denim corset cropped top,” she explained.

Who cared one iota about the top when she was missing an article of clothing? A very pertinent article of clothing, if you asked me. I walked toward her, trying my best to cover her with my body and coat. Seriously, what was she thinking? Clearly she wasn’t thinking at all. “I think,” I started through gritted teeth, “that you’re not wearing any pants and that string isn’t doing anything by way of properly covering you.”

Bianca’s eyes were filled with laughter, an emotion I couldn’t empathize with at the moment.

“You think this is funny?” I asked pointedly. “These people are taking pictures and posting them all over social media. Do you really want your. . . you know, lower half online for every man to ogle?”

She didn’t even hesitate, she just started laughing. “All right,” she gave in, though. “I didn’t see the big deal, but I’ll go back and put something on.”

“Good,” I replied, softening my expression.

I tried covering her as much as possible until she finally disappeared into the back again.

I raked a hand through my hair. What’s the matter with her?

When we’d shared my room she’d acted all coy at the prospect of me seeing her in her pajamas when she’d come out of the bathroom, but this, this she had no qualms about?

Bianca was going to be the death of me. She was comfortable with her body. Not that there was anything wrong with that, but maybe there was such a thing as too comfortable. At least for me. I just didn’t feel the need to share my girl’s intimate parts with complete strangers (read: Internet creeps) when I hadn’t even unpackaged that gift myself yet.

And yes, I’d said my girl because I felt we were at a place where she was mine and I was hers. There were definitely problems looming, but we had promised not to focus on those things right now. The rest of our time in Paris was going to be for us to continue exploring things, to see if us being together was worth it before she told her father.

Let’s just say I was sure it was.

I pulled on the back of my neck as I waited for her. What’s taking her so long? My thoughts were cut off when she walked out in a black strapless dress, a hand on her chest to hold it up.

My mouth immediately went dry.

The way her hair was flowing over her shoulders.

Her lips, pink and pursed.

Her eyes, shining with joy.

Those short heels she wore that were drastically different than her typical tall ones.

* * *

Bianca

Please, please, please let that be an appreciative stare.

I sucked on my bottom lip as I waited for him to say something, anything.

He didn’t, though. He just brought a hand to his chin and scratched. So I turned around and asked over my shoulder, “Can you zip me up, please?”

I felt one of his hands come down and rest on my hip as he leaned in and whispered in my ear, “You look stunning.”

So it was an appreciative stare.

“Thank you.”

With one hand still on my hip, his other found the zipper resting on my lower back, and his fingers grazed my skin as he slowly brought the zipper up.

Was it just me or was he taking his sweet time?

It was pure torture because, as he zipped me up, I could feel his steady breath tickling me in a way that sent shivers up my spine.

I immediately wished we were anywhere but here. It suddenly felt too crowded for my liking. I wanted to be alone with him and for him to be pulling that zipper in the opposite direction, letting the dress pool on the floor at my feet so I could step out of it. I would turn around, jump in his arms and wrap my legs around him as he claimed my mouth.

* * *

Knox

The amount of pent-up sexual energy that was zinging between Bianca and I right now had to be criminal.

I felt her shutter at my touch, her breath hitching as I slowly inched the zipper closer to the top. “There are so many things I want to do to you,” I said, my voice barely above a whisper. I watched her closely as her head turned and she tried to look at me over her shoulder.

“If only you had access to my thoughts in this moment,” she whispered back. “Tell me we did the right thing by not sleeping together yet.”

I told her what she wanted to hear: “We did the right thing.” Logically I knew it was the right thing, but physically I wanted to kick myself for being so responsible when it came to her.

We were taking things slow, though, I reminded myself.

* * *

Bianca

He finally finished zipping me up and I turned around, dropping my hold on the dress and letting him get the full effect of it. “I was actually thinking of buying this one.” Correction: I wasn’t really, but as I watched him wet his lips and take in the sight of me again, I thought I might.

He nodded and, with a huskiness in his voice, responded, “I think you’re making the right call.”

“You know,” I said, splaying my hands on his chest as I looked up at him, “I wouldn’t mind if we skipped our first date and went straight to the fun part. Bonus points if this dress doesn’t make it out unscathed.” Because with the way I felt, I wanted him to tear it off me using his teeth.

“As much as I’d like that, we agreed not to rush this and I think if we skipped right to the good stuff, we wouldn’t know the full potential of this”—he motioned between us—“and we owe that to ourselves.”

What I owed myself was a hot night with this man or an award for having kept my hands to myself for as long as I had. For those of you who weren’t sure, this man was meant to be enjoyed and worshipped. He looked. . . delicious.

Clearing his throat, he backed up and ran a hand through his hair. “So we should probably get going.” He looked around and I did the same, noticing what he already picked up on—that everyone was starting to leave. “I think our time is up.”

I smacked my lips together and nodded. “Well, it was fun while it lasted. I’ve always thought these things were so cool when I saw content creators posting about their experiences. I’m glad I got a chance to do it.” I found his hand and laced our fingers together. “Thank you for coming with me.”

Knox was always supportive of me. That was worth something. I had never experienced that with anyone else I’d been with. Usually I supported them and their passions and dreams, but never the other way around. I had to admit, it was nice for him to encourage me and be there for me.

He smiled. “Where else would I be, other than right by your side?”