18. Matteo
Matteo
The images on my computer screen haunted me, yet I couldn’t tear my eyes away.
I’d been in the middle of a board meeting when my phone began blowing up. Initially, I ignored the incessant buzzing, my professional mask firmly in place. But as each member seated around the conference table pulled out their cells, my gut told me something was very, very wrong.
Excusing myself, I glanced down at the notifications to find no less than one hundred alerts that my name had been mentioned online.
That sheer volume was enough to set off alarm bells.
And when I clicked on the first one and saw the pictures some trashy tabloid had posted of me and Summer at Euphoria on New Year’s Eve, I threw my phone at the wall so hard the glass screen shattered.
Now, I was holed up in my office, watching as the intimate moment when I got on my knees to worship my goddess, my queen, went viral.
It was only a small comfort that, despite the numerous angles, my head blocked the view of the treasure between her thighs. But there was no hiding the sheer rapture on her face, her orgasm on display for the world to see.
Then there were the headlines.
Bellini Back in the Saddle Less than a Year After Wife’s Death.
Bellini’s Nanny Putting in Overtime.
Bellini Sex Scandal Hits Stock Prices Hard
Fuck. It had already leaked over into the business outlets.
I knew better than this. My entire adult life, I’d been in the spotlight, aware that anything I did in public could be recorded. And to this point, I’d been careful. The press had never been given a reason to portray me in an unfavorable light.
Until I let my libido lead me toward an irresistible blonde bombshell, and now the whole house of cards I’d painstakingly built threatened to come tumbling down.
Damage control became my sole focus. That meant putting space between me and Summer until the heat died down and the vultures moved on to the next juicy scandal.
Though there was no telling how long that would take.
I hadn’t been home in two weeks. Putting out the fire I’d started required 24/7 attention.
The board wanted my head, and it was no small feat convincing them they wouldn’t find anyone better suited to run this company—a company that my brother and I had started from scratch, I made sure to point out.
It took a boatload of promises that what had been captured on film at Euphoria would never happen again, not to mention gifting them enough of my personal shares in Bellini Real Estate to cover the losses they’d sustained as a result of my actions.
Pretty sure that’s what finally tipped the scales in my favor, allowing me to remain at the helm as CEO.
It wasn’t all that surprising; I’d learned early on in business that money truly did talk.
Since I had more of it than most, I was able to use it to get pretty much whatever I wanted in this life.
Like you used it to get Summer.
Fuck. Summer.
Two weeks apart from her, from the girls, was absolute torture. But it was necessary, given the current media storm.
Hell, I’d been forced to place them under house arrest when Enzo reported that news vans were parked up and down our street.
Reporters were literally beating down the front gates, hoping to catch a glimpse of Summer, to see if they could coax her into saying something they could twist out of context and exploit.
Fourteen days later, I wasn’t any closer to pulling us out of this mess because social media kept fanning the flames.
The intercom on my desk buzzed.
I pressed the button that would connect me to my executive assistant, Camille. “Yes?”
“Miss Reynolds is on the line for you.” There was a pause. “Again.”
“Tell her I’m unavailable.”
The sigh that came through the speaker spoke volumes, as did the note of disappointment in Camille’s voice when she replied with a curt, “Yes, sir.”
Summer had been trying repeatedly to reach me.
And each time I declined the call because, honestly, what was there to say?
I’d put her in a compromising position, practically made her into an unconsenting porn star.
Issuing an “I’m sorry” at this point would be as useless as slapping a bandage over a bullet wound.
It wasn’t enough but all I had to offer, because no matter how many cease-and-desists my attorneys issued, there was no way to scrub all traces of those pictures from the internet.
This was one fuck-up money couldn’t fix.
Buzzzzzzz.
I pinched the bridge of my nose. “What now, Camille?”
“I have a Miss Gabi D’Amico calling for you.”
That wasn’t surprising. I’d made Summer’s best friend a promise that I wouldn’t hurt her, and I’d failed spectacularly.
I could only imagine my distant cousin’s fingers were itching to get ahold of the gun hidden beneath the false bottom of a drawer inside my desk.
Give it another few days, and I might be willing to let her come up here and put me out of my misery.
“Unavailable.” I reiterated that my status hadn’t changed.
“Yes, sir.”
Reclining in my desk chair, I let out a soul-rattling sigh.
Buzzzzzzz.
“For fuck’s sake, disconnect the damn phone!” I roared, unfairly taking out my frustration on a loyal employee.
Camille hesitated, but eventually she spoke. “It’s Mr. Bellini this time.”
My ears perked up. “Gio?” We hadn’t heard a damn word from him in months, and hope filled my chest that he was on the way back. I was more than ready to hand over the crown and let him reclaim his position as the head of the family.
“Enzo, sir,” she clarified. “He says it's urgent.”
“Yeah, I’ll bet it is,” I mumbled under my breath. Probably tired of playing babysitter and looking for a way to convince me to man up and come home.
Pushing away from my desk, I flung open my office door.
A wide-eyed Camille watched as I made a beeline for the elevator.
The sliding doors parted, and I stepped inside. “I’m going upstairs. I expect not to be bothered again.”
She ducked her head in understanding.
We owned the whole building, and the top two floors were split into four penthouse apartments.
Gio, Enzo, and I had each claimed one as a secondary residence within the city.
The fourth should have belonged to Gemma by all rights, but before her departure for parts unknown, Uncle Dario kept her on a short leash, refusing to let her live anywhere but under his roof.
He subscribed to the antiquated belief that women inside the mafia were nothing more than possessions—first belonging to their fathers, then to their husbands.
When it came to my own daughters, I couldn’t bear the thought of them spending the rest of their lives as nothing more than caged birds with their wings clipped.
They would be granted the opportunity to choose their own paths, their own partners—if they wanted one at all.
Pressing my palm to the fingerprint scanner to unlock my apartment, I pushed inside and headed straight for the wet bar in the living room.
My fingers closed around the crystal decanter of scotch, and I brought it directly to my lips, letting the liquor burn a path down my throat as I drank greedily.
Enough of this, and I might be able to forget—if only for a little while—that I’d allowed one impulsive moment to wreck everything.
Ice-cold liquid hitting me square in the face shocked me into consciousness, and my reflexes had me on my feet in a flash.
“What the fuck?” I screamed, blinking to clear my blurry vision. It didn’t help much because the room was spinning.
A quick glance at the decanter lying on its side on the carpet betrayed that I’d polished off the whole thing. No wonder there were two fuzzy Enzos glaring at me.
“What the fuck?” He shook his head. “What the fuck?” The second time, it came out louder, accompanied by a sharp shove to the shoulder that had me falling on my ass. “I’ll tell you what the fuck . You’ve been unreachable, and Summer’s losing her goddamn mind trying to get ahold of you!”
“I’ve been busy,” I grunted.
Enzo scoffed. “Yeah, real busy trying to drink yourself to death. I thought we’d moved past this shit.”
“It’s been a rough couple of weeks.”
“You think I don’t know that? While you’ve been holed up here doing God knows what, I’ve been holding down the fort with the co-star of your little public playtime performance.”
My throbbing head dropped back on a groan. “I never meant for this to happen.”
Sympathy filtered into his tone. “No one’s saying that you did. But you can’t hide from it. And you can’t shut Summer out.”
Both hands came up to run through my hair. “I’m doing everything I can to diffuse this situation, and her incessant calling is a distraction I can’t afford. I get that she’s upset. She has every right to be. I promise she can chew me out once we make it out on the other side.”
Enzo folded tattooed arms over his chest. “You need to pull your head out of your ass and remember that she’s not just the woman you’re sleeping with; she’s the one taking care of your daughters. So, when she calls, you need to pick up the fucking phone! Every. Fucking. Time.”
That had me straightening. “She was calling about the girls?”
“Yeah, asshole. Serafina’s in the hospital.”
“What?!” I struggled to rise to my feet. Though he was pissed, my cousin offered me help in getting up.
Panting as black spots danced in my vision, I managed to ask, “What happened?”
“Well, if you’d bothered to answer any of the dozens of times she called, Summer would have told you that what started as a cold got progressively worse this past week.
This morning, when she went to get Serafina out of her crib, her lips were blue, and Summer’s cries for help are still echoing in my ears. ”
“Is—” My gut twisted so painfully that I feared I might vomit. “Is she going to be okay?”
“Yeah.” He nodded. “They’ve got her on oxygen, hooked up to IV fluids, and have administered antiviral medication.”