Heartless Defender, Hardened Innocent, Aimee Orozco [top 100 books to read .TXT] 📗

behind her, holding two glasses of champagne. Opening her mouth to explain her leaving, she caught his expression, and promptly closed it. He looked mad. More than mad, he looked furious.
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Andreos could not believe what he had seen. His woman was with someone else. She was holding someone else’s hand, not his, and cuddling up to him, not Andreos. Well, if she wanted someone to hold, he would gladly provide someone. Smiling to himself, he approached her slowly.
“Here, one for you and one for me. And now a toast.” Handing her one of the glasses, he tapped his with a fork, like in the movies, until he had everyone’s attention. “Hello everyone. My name is Andreos, and I would like say thank you for coming to my charity event for the orphaned. And also thank you to those who donated more than ten thousand to this very special cause. Enjoy the food, prepared especially by my personal chef, and the music. Good night, and merry drinking.” He threw back the glass, watching her over the rim. She looked stricken, and the expression brought satisfaction to him.
So she hadn’t known this thing was for kids. That explained her blatant sexual advances on him. At any rate, they’re over with now, he thought.
At least until he flicked a fleeting glance at her. She was sitting with her hands in her lap, the picture of straight-laced girl. He actually started to believe it for a second, until he noticed her eyes. They were wandering over the room in a leisurely pace, seductively lingering on the men. Some were staring right back at her.
“How was that?” He only said it to get her attention. As if he needed confirmation from her.
“Fine. I need to go now though. Good night.” she stood up walking towards the door and leaving him behind. But he wouldn’t let her go so easily.
“What’s the rush? The party barely started.” He called after her, but she wouldn’t listen, hurrying towards the door. He followed, catching her arm before she passed through the gate. Controlling his features to one pleading, he said, “Please stay. I don’t even know your name.” He went through all their conversations, and saw that it was true; even more, he had never revealed his name either.
“Please, I really must go.” She wasn’t even looking at him anymore, instead looking out toward the crowd. Probably looking for that piece of trash I saw her with earlier. He backpedaled for a second. Was that jealousy? But there was no denying it. Whenever he thought of her with him he saw red.
Of course he’d been plenty jealous before, with many of his past girlfriends. All actresses or models, thinking they’ll have a better hold on him if they showed they were ready to leave him at a moment’s notice. They’d soon learned differently. They were the ones dropped in an instant with no sense of what had happened.
But this was different. He couldn’t bear the thought of any man touching her, let alone holding her in his arms. What was wrong with him?
As if hearing his thoughts, her mystery man appeared. He took one look at their joined hands, and rushed towards her other side.
“Are we leaving?” He was talking to her, but it was obvious the glare that came along with it was meant for him. The deep rumbling that was his voice sounded familiar. It struck a chord somewhere in him, but he was too furious to pay much attention to it.
“Are you going to introduce us?” he answered back, with enough venom to make a rattlesnake happy.
“Ummm… Andreos, this is Dante.” Her voice came out slightly shaky and breathless, and by the look of her face, he could tell she was trying to sound calm. It didn’t matter anyways, he was too caught up in the name she had said.
Dante. The Dante. As in playboy, rich, powerful Dante, with so many billions, they had needed to make up a whole new number.
And she was probably banging him, while trying to get another one on the side. She actually had the nerve to try it? To get two billionaire lovers and neither would find out?
Then again, he had been fooled pretty quickly, he recalled. That was probably why she thought she could get away with it. Well he wasn’t going to be made a fool of, not again. “Good evening Dante. Did you enjoy the evening?”His tone had cooled five degrees from the last time he had spoken.
Dante was taken aback by the change in conversation, but covered it well. “Thank you, yes. We were just leaving, so if you mind…?” He motioned with his hand to the gate.
“Of course. I regret though that we couldn’t dance once again, Cherie. I can still remember the way your hot little hand felt on my …” Andreos fell quiet when he saw the stricken look that crossed her face. It passed quickly, but he still saw it. A spark of guilt came, but it was gone when she started to hold her lover’s hand again.
“Of course I remember… just now when you brought it up. Actually at that time, I was remembering last night. Sorry, you just weren’t doing it for me, and I needed to remember someone else. So I thought of my friend, my best friend I should say.” By this time, she had draped herself over her lover, hooking a hand around his waist and leaning in.
Andreos lost all compassion when he saw her holding his hand, walking out in one of the sultriest, least subtle walks he had ever seen. Knowing that it was a deliberate blow to him didn’t lessen the effect though. His skin had goose bumps, and there was a bulge in his pants that hadn’t been there before.
He walked back in with some difficulty, but also with renewed resolve. He would make her regret her little game.


Chapter 2


Venice, Italy
Rosa wiped her sweaty brow with her hand. It was the fifth time she had done that in the past hour alone. The café was sweltering this time of year, and the American tourists with their limited Italian didn’t help. Tempers were rising rapidly and Rosa had to run back and forth between the waiters and the tourists. The waiters didn’t know much English and the tourists didn’t know much Italian.
“Hey, lady?” Rosa sighed and went to go help the newest tourist.
“What can I get you, sir?” She looked down at the gentleman and noticed him staring. Only it wasn’t her he was staring at. He was staring at her chest. She crossed her arms over her chest and glared at him. He still hadn’t looked away. If anything he was staring more, enraptured with her uplifted breasts. She walked away, exhaling disgustedly. She felt his hand come down on her bottom, caressing the length of it. Whirling around, she slapped the hand away from her.
He looked perplexed for a second, then angry. Furious. Not good. She took a step back from his inhuman glower. Before she could take another, he hooked his foot around her ankle and swept his leg out tripping her. He caught her before she fell, trapping her back to his front. Rosa was petrified, paralyzed by her fear. What did he want with her?
“Excuse me?” His breath stunk of beer and drugs. How could she have missed it? Now he was going to do something awful to her. And no witnesses.
The café was actually empty now, a first all day. Her coworkers were taking a break and had gone out. Her manager was out back taking inventory and he’d never hear her scream. Sound proof walls were looking really bad right now. She was all alone with a drunken junkie who could do whatever he wanted with her.
The fight reaction within her kicked in. She shoved her elbow straight into his solar plexus, heard his breath come out in a pain-filled grunt. Stepping on his instep, she shoved her head back into his as hard as she could. Hearing his agonized groan was almost as satisfying as when he let her go. Free at last, she ran behind counter and pressed the emergency button hidden there. The man stayed on the floor unconscious, bleeding out of his nose.
Her manager came out of the storage room. “What happened?” he said in Italian.
“Signor, he tried to-“she stopped when he slashed the air in a cut gesture.
“Rosa enough. I can’t have my employees making my customers bleed. This is the fifth guy I’ve found lying on my floor. You said the last one had a gun in his coat. He was a reporter taking pictures.” That one had actually not been an accident. But she would never confess that to him. “I’m sorry, honey, but I’m going to have to let you go.” She felt a small disappointment at his words, but it soon evaporated when he placed an arm around her soldiers. He was slightly shorter than her, but that wasn’t what made her tense.
His hand landed on her other soldier, his hand reaching down her arm. He was rubbing circles with his thumb on her arm. “Unless you promise that it will never happen again.” With every word, his thumb crept lower and closer to her breast. His tone implied something else, another incentive to let her keep the job, and she knew what that was.
Disgusted, Rosa took his arm off her shoulders, gently, but forcibly. “That’s very nice, sir, but I don’t think I’ll be able to accommodate.” Her voice dripped with fake sincerity, and the barely concealed warning.
Before she could see how he took to the threat, she strode out of the small café, stripping off the apron and throwing it on the floor of the Cappa Café.

Dante would kill her if he found out she had gotten quit from this job too. She sighed resignedly.
Well so what if he did? He was a billionaire. He didn’t know how hard it was to keep a job in urban Italy. Hell, he didn’t know the meaning of hard. He thought everything came so easily.
Well maybe it did to people who had money, but for everyone else it was just plain hell.
She shook her head. She was going around in circles with her reasoning. She was still fired and Dante would still yell at her.
Looking up, she noticed the street sign. Imprint

Publication Date: 01-16-2011

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