Lust for Danger: A Mafia Romance -- Book One: The Family [Erotic Mafia Romance Book] (8 page)

Chapter Twelve

Without opening her eyes, Jessica awoke suddenly from a fuzzy dream, aware of nothing except the fact that she was thirsty. Her head was spinning, her eyes were closed, and she was very, very thirsty.

For a brief moment, those were the only conscious thoughts she had; soon after, though, came the realization that she didn’t know where she was or how she’d come to arrive in her present condition. 

Keeping her eyes shut, she tried to piece it together.
Bed… headache… thirsty.
She reached out with a clumsy hand to try and grab her cell phone, thinking it might hold some clues, but after a few seconds of fumbling around unsuccessfully for it she decided it’d be easiest to just forget about that idea.

Okay,
she said to herself,
her thoughts arriving slowly one by one.
I think I should open my eyes.
Cringing, she lifted open one eyelid halfway, groaning as the bright light of the room flooded her vision. She snapped it shut again instinctively, but the brief flash of light was enough to let her get her bearings a little bit more. She was lying in bed, thirsty and with a headache, and it was morning. This scene felt familiar, somehow… And sure enough, suddenly, it clicked. She had a hangover – and one for the ages.

She groaned at the realization, knowing full well that she was in for a full day of feeling like death warmed over. It had been a long, long time since Jessica had gotten drunk to the point of excess – she couldn’t remember the last time, probably sometime in college – and she’d never dealt well with hangover symptoms. Forgetting about trying to piece together her night for the time being, she knew she had to worry about making herself as comfortable as possible so that she could somehow ride this out.

First things first: she needed some water.

She opened both eyes now, forcing them not to shut even though the sunlight felt like it was scorching her retinas. She sat up abruptly, causing her head and stomach to reel like ferryboats in an ocean storm.

“Unhhh,” she muttered, clenching her teeth against the punishment her body was giving her. “Fuck.”

She looked around the room, taking stock of her surroundings and seeing evidence everywhere of a late, drunken night. Her clothes were everywhere; one of her shoes was on top of the mini-fridge, for God’s sake. And she didn’t have to look in the mirror to guess that her makeup was probably smeared all over her face. The one thing she didn’t see, though, was a water bottle anywhere. That was one of the downsides of not drinking very often: she wasn’t an expert at hangover-prevention like some of her friends. In college, she’d seen girls trying every trick in the book, from the one who’d take an Alka-Seltzer just before bedtime to the girl who’d uncap two bottles of lemon-lime Gatorade and set them on a chair next to her pillow before heading out for the night.

She turned her gaze listlessly to the bathroom, where – of course – the light was still on. She saw a glass next to the faucet.
Is the tap water safe in Rome?
her mind wondered suddenly, and somehow in her current situation the thought of it made her laugh.

Pulling off the covers, she gingerly stepped onto the carpet and walked slowly to the mini-fridge, steadying herself with a hand on the wall as she pulled the fridge open. There before her was a big, gloriously cold-looking bottle of water; in front of it, there was a price tag for €4.99.
Fuck,
she thought to herself,
that’s really expensive.
But right now, it was also really worth it. She grabbed the water bottle and tore the cap off of it greedily, gulping down a few mouthfuls before holding the ice-cold bottle to her forehead. “Oh, God,” she groaned. It felt good and bad at the same time.

As she stood there by the mini-fridge, lamenting her life choices, Jessica slowly began to remember bits and pieces of what had happened the night before.

The beginning of the night came back to her easily enough. She remembered getting ready, standing here in the hotel room trying on that drop-dead gorgeous outfit and feeling like a million bucks. Then she’d gone to that bar – the Terrace, or something? – and she remembered the nice treatment she’d gotten from the bouncer at the door.

She remembered, too, the way that club owner had talked to her: in retrospect, it had been totally harmless, but she remembered that in the moment she’d given him no small piece of her mind about it. And then came the drinks… dancing… and more drinks… yep, this was the part of the night where things started to get a bit hazy.

In fact, the only thing she remembered toward the end of the night was that damn club owner. The confident swagger he had to him, the tattoo peeking out from his forearm, that sexy salt-and-peppery look he had going on…
damn,
now that she thought about it, he’d been a very good-looking man. And as she now stood in her hotel room, groaning in self-recrimination, a fleeting memory came back to her – of how she’d hurled abuses at him in what must have been a near-blackout state of drunkenness.

But after that incident, she couldn’t remember anything. She had no idea whatsoever how she’d gotten home, and in the state she’d been in she found it impressive that she’d even been able to hail a cab. She racked her brain, but couldn’t remember what had happened. It was possible, she decided, that she’d made it out of there on her own accord – but more likely, she knew, was the possibility that the club itself had called a cab for her. But if that was the case, then that meant the club owner – what was his name again? Damian? Dominic? – must have ordered the cab himself. And how embarrassing was
that?

“Oh, God, Jessica,” she groaned to herself. “This is why you don’t drink much, remember?”

She raised the bottle of water to her lips again, wishing the cool water would wash away her sins of the previous night and leave her feeling fresh and renewed. If it had been Sunday, she would have probably gone to confession. But it was Friday, and what was done was done. Her best course of action now was to take a few Advil, crawl back into bed and just try to forget about it.

Hmm…
forget about it.
That phrase rang a bell, somehow. She could feel the gears in her aching head turning slowly to process the thought. Suddenly, she gasped.

“The museum!”

Frantically, she leapt up and began throwing her sheets off the bed, looking desperately for her cell phone to see what time it was. She heard a clatter as her phone hit the floor, and she ran over to pick it up in a near-panic.

She knew from experience that she often, after drinking, woke up at some ungodly hour the next morning and had trouble falling back asleep. She could only hope that was the case this time around. They’d agreed to meet at 11:00 – maybe, just maybe, the booze gods would smile on her this time and it would only be 8:30 or 9:00.

But as she mashed the buttons on her cell phone in a frenzy, the electronic display made her heart sink.

12:05 in the afternoon… and five missed calls from an Italian number.

She groaned, collapsing to the floor in a guilty heap. She’d totally dropped the ball on her date with Carlo. That in itself was bad enough, but to have stood him up because she’d been out all night boozing? She couldn’t remember the last time she’d done something so irresponsible.

Sucking it up, she hit redial on the phone and closed her eyes as she brought it to her ear. She could only hope he’d be understanding – the thought of him pacing around the museum waiting for her made her cringe. It was so unlike her to do something so inconsiderate, and even worse was the fact that Carlo seemed like a wonderful guy. She was so interested in getting to know him better – but now, who knew if there was still any chance of that.

Three, then four, then five rings… no answer. She didn’t wait for his voicemail. She hung up and threw her head back, resting it against the foot of the bed behind her and closing her eyes. Her headache had seemingly doubled in intensity within the past two minutes, compounded by her frantic activity as well as the guilt she felt.

“Jessica, Jessica…” she muttered to herself. “You’ve really gone and done it this time.”

Just then, the doorbell buzzed. She tilted her head lackadaisically towards it, her fatigued mind wondering why anyone would be buzzing at this hour. Then she realized: it was after 12:00. Housekeeping probably wanted to clean the room.

“Come back later,” she called out, wincing as the noise of her voice hurt her ringing ears. Out of nowhere, some Italian words from her phrasebook popped into her head. “Piu tardi.”

“Miss,” came the reply, slightly muffled behind the door. “Delivery to your room, please.”

…Delivery?

“Just a minute,” she replied. She sat in silence for a second or two, then sighed and pulled herself gingerly to her feet. Luckily, she looked down at what she was wearing before opening the door – yelping when she realized she was half-naked in a strapless bra and panties, she hurried into the bathroom and grabbed a robe before coming back out to the doorway.
Jesus,
she thought to herself,
that’d be the icing on the cake.

She opened the door to reveal a grinning middle-aged attendant holding an enormous bouquet of flowers in a vase. “Delivery,” he smiled proudly, and thrust the flowers into her hands. She took them from him in confusion, staring quizzically at the vibrant bouquet and then back at the worker’s face.

“Uhh… who sent this?” she asked, but the attendant had turned away from her and was busy rolling a metal room-service cart into her room. She stepped back reflexively to let him pass, but as her senses came back to her she tried to call him off. “No no no,” she said, flustered. “I don’t need any room service.”

“Madam, this is part of the delivery,” said the man, beaming. He took the bouquet back from her and set it on her bedside table, pushing aside a stray pillow as he did so. He turned back to the cart, where a classic-style metal serving dish sat underneath a silver lid. He pulled it open with a flourish, revealing a bottle of Perrier sitting in a bucket of ice. Next to the sparkling water was a white porcelain dessert plate holding two tablets of Advil, a package of biscuits, and an orange.

He bowed, not pausing for any questions, and left the room as abruptly as he’d come in.

Jessica stared after him, blinking in confusion at what had just happened in a matter of a few seconds. Her gaze turned towards the flowers: even in her fuzzy hungover state, they were strikingly beautiful, and she let her eyes linger for a few moments on the glorious orange, yellow, pink and white blossoms, spilling out from the vase like fireworks. Her eyes trickled down, and she saw a white card dangling from one side of the vase. She picked it up and opened it; inside, in simple black handwritten script, was the message:

“Thought you could use this. The flowers are for the room; the Advil is for your head. It was a pleasure meeting you, Jessica. Please do come back to Terrazza sometime. Dominic.”

And below that, written just under the man’s name, was a phone number.

She sucked in her breath.
Holy shit.
In her disoriented state, she had no idea whether anything more had happened last night between her and Dominic – all she remembered was their two brief conversations, but given that she was so drunk, anything was possible. Still, she found it very unlikely that she would have kissed him or done anything else, for the simple reason that she was sure she’d remember something like that in the morning, no matter what else had happened.

So maybe he was just sending this as a nice gesture, his way of saying “no worries” for her behavior last night. Maybe it was an Italian thing, to go above and beyond for your guests to make them feel welcome – no matter how they acted.

Or
, her inner voice whispered with gentle insistence,
maybe it’s as simple as the chance that he’s interested in you.
After all, if this had happened in the U.S., she’d have no doubt about what a bouquet of flowers sent to her hotel room could possibly mean. And was it really so bad for him to do this? He was undeniably handsome; sexy, even. That was what scared her. Because the attraction she felt to him was something that operated on a raw, basic level, persisting no matter what else happened between them.

The way she saw it, she had two choices. One choice was to simply throw the card from Dominic in the trash can, enjoy the sight of the flowers for as long as they lasted, and put last night and the Terrazza firmly out of her mind forever. It was the safe option, the easier thing to do – and it was probably the right choice, considering she was just coming off a breakup and already felt something for Carlo. She wasn’t sure what that feeling was, but she wanted to explore it… if Carlo still even wanted to talk to her after this morning’s screw-up, that is.

The other option – the choice that was a little bit dangerous, a little more frightening, but all the more exciting for that fact – was to call Dominic back and see where fate took her after that. She knew, though, that once she called him, there was no going back from her decision. The pull he had over her was too strong; if she was going to make a clean break from him, it had to be now, and she had to be sure. 

Even as she reasoned back and forth to herself, in her heart of hearts she felt as though she’d always known what she was going to do. Smiling softly, she walked over to the table and popped the two Advil, chasing them with a swig of the sparkling water.