"You know, I could arrange it for you to receive top marks in all of your courses. In addition to continuing your semester here..."
He thinks my studying for the exams means that I"m giving in! I realized. And now he already wanted more than he thought he had.
How many other young women had he run this sleazy proposition by? How many more would have to deal with it if I didn"t deal with him that night?
I had to go through with the plan. I looked at Liam across the room. He felt my searching eyes and turned to me. He seemed so calm and collected, so sure I could do this.
I hoped he was right.
Then it all started happening so fast.
Most of the other guests arrived and sat down, so I could see over them more easily. Isabella appeared in the doorway, hanging from the arm of a handsome, richly dressed man I a.s.sumed was the baron.
She looked around, noticed the stage and the set of stairs that led into the area behind the curtains. Even from here I noticed her smile. It was almost exactly like we"d discussed.
She saw me and waved, keeping her hand low. I didn"t wave back. Dr. Aretino would definitely be suspicious if I did that.
She whispered in the baron"s ear and he smiled at her and then stepped back out of the room.
I could see it all coming together. All the pieces of the puzzle fitting themselves into the final image.
Any second now, Dr. Aretino"s wife would arrive to first see him flirting with me at the table, and then stolen away from me by an even more beautiful woman and brought backstage.
Any second now.
And then a lone woman did step in through the entrance doors. Except it wasn"t Dr. Aretino"s wife. It was Liam"s former secretary, Abigail.
Chapter 23.
What is she doing here?
In my shock, I started standing up again. She started sweeping the room with her eyes, and I knew that she couldn"t be allowed to see me.
She wore her business stuff, that grey skirt and the matching blazer. Professional. She"d pulled her hair back tightly again, really emphasizing that false perfection of her face.
She didn"t fit in here, not with the tuxedos and the evening gowns and the fancy waiters. Everyone else noticed, too, turning and watching her.
My blood ran icy through my veins.
"What? What is it?" Dr. Aretino said, "Do you know her?"
"No, no I don"t," I said. Then I turned and looked Dr. Aretino in the face, holding his attention. If his wife did decide to show up now, I couldn"t let him see her. Not yet. It would ruin everything.
Except then she did see me. I can"t explain it, since I kept my eyes firmly on Dr. Aretino. I suddenly went cold. I couldn"t help looking over my shoulder. We saw each other.
She started towards me.
Right away, this wave of despair pa.s.sed over me. Voices followed in its wake.
You"re not good enough for him. What do you have that any other woman in here can"t offer him?
You aren"t worth anything. Especially not to him. Why don"t you go buy another plane ticket?
Trust me, I knew him better than you do. He"s going to drop you when he"s done using you.
I regressed back several weeks to my earlier self. Inadequate, going nowhere, not worth anyone"s time. Not the school"s, not Liam"s. She brought all of that out in me.
Dr. Aretino peered over my shoulder. "Ah, I see your dancing teacher has showed up."
Turning, I saw what he meant. Liam had seen her. He stood, b.u.t.toning his jacket, and went to intercept her.
I couldn"t tear my eyes away. This wasn"t as big a problem as it sounded. Everyone else watched her, too.
She needed to leave. She couldn"t be here. I knew she wanted to confront me, I could tell that as soon as she entered. If she did, the timing would be thrown off. Dr. Aretino"s wife would come in too soon.
Liam knew this, too. He spoke to her calmly, even as she became more and more agitated so that the tightly-bound hairs began escaping from the bun on the back of her head.
I couldn"t hear what they said, either. The murmur of all the other rubberneckers and the distance between us turned it all into gibberish.
Go. Leave. I urged, hoping that suddenly I might become psychic so that I could order her out of here.
She said something and Liam shook his head. She slapped him. Tried to, anyway. Her hand flew through the empty air where his face had been.
This amused the crowd more than anything, their murmurs increasing.
Isabella, I noticed, had stopped halfway to my table, not certain what to do. She caught my eye, and I shook my head at her. It wasn"t time.
I kept glancing at the door, waiting for Dr. Aretino"s wife to step in. She didn"t. Not yet, at least.
"It looks as though someone didn"t appreciate his dancing lessons very much," Dr. Aretino chuckled behind me.
I managed a, "Hnh," in response. I wished he would stop with the whole dancing teacher thing. Couldn"t he think of another joke?
Finally, when it I thought for certain that the wife would show up and Dr. Aretino would see her, hotel security arrived. Two men in white shirts with radios on their shoulders and duty belts around their waists with flashlights and handcuffs.
Abigail didn"t want to go, though. They had to drag her out. Liam watched, his hands on his hips. Then he shook his head. He turned back to return to his table, his eyes sweeping the room.
"Ah, he knows you are here with me?" Dr. Aretino said, still chuckling, "Perhaps a little jealous?"
"Something like that," I said.
I sat back down, having been hovering over my seat the whole time, my thighs just about ready to cramp into tight little knots.
Everyone settled back to their own conversations around their own tables, waiting for the evening to begin.
Dr. Aretino"s wife chose that moment to arrive. It was the same woman from the picture. Older, still pretty. Distinguished, I suppose, like a proud bird. She wore a tasteful black dress, a large pendant resting against her bosom that I imagine Dr. Aretino had given her.
She started looking through the room, searching for familiar faces.
I nodded to Isabella, who started towards us again. Then I turned back to Dr. Aretino. I leaned closer and laughed, like he"d shared some flirty little secret with me.
He was none the wiser.
"What is funny?" he asked, smiling uncertainly. His eyes kept straying down my body.
Then Isabella arrived. She spoke in Italian. "Dr. Aretino? Is that you? Oh, I"ve wanted to meet you so much!"
She looked like seduction incarnate in that dress. It hugged her in all the right places, exposed just enough skin to suggest what the rest of the fabric hid. And there was something intoxicating about her perfume.
Just like the baron, just like all the boys who tried to flirt with her on campus, Dr. Aretino stood no chance.
I was almost offended by how quickly his attention shifted from me to Isabella. Almost. He took her hand and kissed her knuckles, his lips lingering on her flesh.
They flirted, Dr. Aretino wasting no time going for the kill. "Perhaps there is somewhere private we can talk?" he said.
Isabella nodded, adding some garnish by letting her tongue play over her lips. I swear I heard Dr. Aretino gulp. Then she took his hand and began leading him through the tables.
I stole a quick glance back towards the doors. Mrs. Dr. Aretino stood there sh.e.l.l-shocked, her mouth open. I felt sorry for her. She deserved better than a man like Giuseppe Aretino. But maybe it was better if she learned about her husband"s philandering ways now.
I looked at Liam, too. He nodded at me.
The curtains on the stage ruffled as Isabella led him behind them. A hollow thump pounded from the speakers along the wall as she turned on one of the backup microphones back there.
"...Kiss me, angel, kiss me." Dr. Aretino said, his voice carrying across the entire hall. All conversation stopped and everyone started glancing at the stage.
"What will your colleagues think when they see you step out with lipstick all over you?"
"Never mind them. They"re all buffoons. They"ll think what I tell them to think."
I smiled.
Someone nearby asked if that was Dr. Aretino. Someone replied that it was. They added that they didn"t think it was his wife back there, either.
"Now come here. I need to touch you, angel. Don"t tease me any longer."
I could imagine Isabella back there, skillfully keeping away from him, leading him on, making sure he said all the things we wanted him to say. He was so enamored that he never even noticed how quiet it had become on the other side of those curtains.
And then Liam started making his way over to stage. I didn"t know why. He glanced at me again with a look that said Trust me.
"Are you certain?" Isabella said, "The dean is here. What if he notices what we"ve done?"
"He is the biggest fool of them all. He wouldn"t know his back from his front if I wasn"t there to tell him which was which. Enough of this. You make me ache, angel."
Liam tugged on a thick cord hanging beside the curtains. A motor began humming, and then the curtains began folding on themselves.
They opened on Dr. Aretino grabbing Isabella and yanking her against him. He kissed her. She pushed him away. He started saying something, but she slapped him. The sound clapped through the speakers, making everyone flinch.
"How dare you!" Isabella said. She stormed off the stage in a huff.
That was when Dr. Aretino noticed that the curtains had opened. I lifted my hand so that he saw me. I smiled and nodded so that he knew who"d done this.
Even from there, I could see the way his whole face reddened. Until, of course, he saw his wife. Then it went a white to match the table cloths. And whiter still when he saw the Dean of Arts stand up from his table.
Liam came over to my table and sat beside me. "That worked out nicely, considering."
I grabbed his tie and pulled his lips to mine in a celebratory kiss.
Epilogue.
I agreed with Liam. All things had worked out, considering.
Dr. Aretino"s wife frog marched him from the hall. The next day it was all anyone could talk about on the campus. The scandal. Dr. Aretino resigned faster than you can say divorce settlement.
Per university policy, all the students in his cla.s.s finished with whatever grade they"d had at the time of Dr. Aretino"s leaving. It wasn"t a great grade for me. However, all the other professors became immediately more friendly to me. Professor Di Cenzo re-graded my paper, for instance.
I got an A+. I"d been figuring on an A, but I didn"t complain.
Without Dr. Aretino, my overall grades made a remarkable turnaround. The advisory board took me off academic probation.
Abigail had showed up because, as Liam had put it, someone back at the home office had forgotten to revoke her system privileges. She"d known right where he"d be and when he"d be there. And had (rightly) a.s.sumed I"d be there, too.
However, I almost didn"t care about any of that any more.
I took the option to stay in Rome for the rest of the school year. Liam stayed as well. Actually, I"ve spent pretty much every night for the last three months with him.
Winter had settled over Rome. There wasn"t any snow, but it had gotten colder and wetter and I didn"t want to be anywhere else, so long as Liam was with me.
I woke up that morning in his king-sized bed. Except he wasn"t there when I reached over to touch him. My fingers met the smooth bed sheet instead. I opened my eyes, jerked to alertness by his absence.
"Liam?" I said, gathering the sheet around me.
"In the kitchen!" he called back.