Chapter 201 Aurélie #2
“Ivy,” he hissed. “That’s not until next year, and I hired you so we could get ahead of it, not so you could announce it like a press release in front of the fucking grid gremlins.”
“I didn’t announce it,” she shot back. “I hinted. Because you seem to forget I’m the one juggling your sponsors and your mother’s racist comments toward me while you run your mouth to Dom about other people’s locations.”
“I thought you liked my mother,” he said, offended.
“I like her more than I like you, which is not the compliment you think it is,” she snapped.
“This is the same woman who looked me dead in the eye at that party a few weeks ago and said, ‘Bianchi men don’t marry English girls, they marry Italian women who can give them proper Italian sons.’ Forgive me if I don’t feel obligated to protect her feelings. ”
Callum and I looked at each other over the phones, eyebrows both up. There was clearly more history there than either of them had ever admitted out loud. Which was news to both of us.
“Okay, wow,” I said under my breath. “That’s… quite a development.”
“Focus,” Ivy barked. “We can dissect Marco’s impending arranged-marriage crisis later. Right now, I’m trying to keep you two from becoming the planet’s next biggest scandal.”
“If I ruined your sexcation,” Marco added suddenly, and he sounded smaller than I’d ever heard him, “I will personally send you a nice bottle of champagne and lube.”
I made an involuntary sound that was half laugh, half strangled scream.
“There are so many things wrong with that sentence,” I said.
“He’s trying to apologize,” Ivy said. “Very badly. Look, the point is: the word is out that you’re not just hiding in Monaco or the Scottish Highlands or anywhere in fucking France. People know you’re on an island. They’re speculating which one. And some of those people have important opinions.”
“Shocking,” I said.
“But we will talk about what they’re saying when I’m not on a public line that can be subpoenaed,” she continued. “Right now, I just need you to know that the bubble isn’t as airtight as you think.”
The bubble. The little pocket we’d carved out here. Sea and sun and him and me and a ring I kept touching like it might vanish.
My thumb drifted toward it automatically. I stopped myself halfway, refusing to let the anxiety creep in.
“Okay,” I said, the word thin. “And Marco?”
“He’s on thin ice,” she said. “But unfortunately, he’s also our current source of information, so I haven’t murdered him yet.”
“Love you,” Marco said faintly.
There was a shuffle on his side. Something thumped. A new voice drifted through—muffled, low, irritated.
“What are you two doing here?” A voice demanded playfully. Kimi’s. “And why are you shouting about lube in the lounge, mate?”
“Because we have something to take care of,” Marco snapped. “And because I’m being emotionally vulnerable. Shut up. Sorry—wait, who’s this?”
Another voice joined in then, softer, female, trying very hard not to be heard and failing miserably.
“Kimi, if you get us kicked out of this airport, I’m never speaking to you again,” she said. “You said we’d fly under the radar!”
I went still. I knew that voice. Everyone on the planet with an internet connection knew that voice. Crisp American accent, feminine and almost sing-songy even in regular conversation.
“Is that Harper Rose?” I blurted.
More silence. What in the fuck was happening here?
Then a small, horrified denial came from the woman—“Please don’t call me that”—at the exact same time Kimi said, “Yes.”
She rushed on before anyone could react. “Seriously, don’t use my stage name. Everyone thinks that’s my real name, but it’s not, and I really don’t need some bored gate agent’s cousin putting that together. If you’re going to yell at me, can you at least call me Lucy?”
There was a collective beat where every brain on the call tried to rearrange reality.
“You’re telling me Harper Rose is sitting in an airport with you and wants us to call her Lucy,” I said.
“Yes,” she said miserably. “God, don’t say it like that.”
“You brought your secret pop star to my crisis call?” Ivy demanded. “Are you actually brain-dead?”
“She’s not my anything,” Kimi snapped. I’d never heard him this irritated, not at any of us.
“We’re just friends,” Harper—Lucy—added weakly. “He promised me beaches and no paparazzi, not a front-row seat to whatever this is.”
“You’re the one who said you wanted to see the chaos,” Kimi reminded her.
“I meant in your race replays,” she said. “Not in your PR nightmare friends.”
Despite everything, a laugh slipped out of me. It felt like shaking something loose in my chest. Because, yeah, that’s exactly what we all were. Especially together.
“Why are all of you together?” I asked. “Since when are Marco and Ivy and Kimi and Lucy sharing an airport gate? Unless it’s a holding cell?”
Ivy made a strangled noise. “We do not have time for this.”
“So that’s a yes to you and Marco are together and a yes to Kimi finally convinced a situationship to get on a plane with him?” I pressed. “Because I would like that on the record. A historic event.”
“Absolutely not,” Ivy said. “We are not having this conversation while you’re naked on the floor.”
“How do you know we’re naked?” Callum said.
“Because I know you both,” she shot back. “And because you sound smug. Point is, we’re sorting some things out on our end too.”
There was a shuffle, like she’d stood up, and her voice shifted slightly, echoing more. Airport acoustics.
“We’re boarding soon,” she said. “So here’s the headline: rumor mill is grinding. Location might be out of the bag thanks to the himbo. I’ve been doing damage control, but this isn’t going to stay quiet. It’s better if we talk face to face.”
My heart skipped.
“We’re coming to you,” she said simply. “Milos. Your villa. All of it. Don’t argue.”
“You’re—what?” I sat up too fast, the room tilting for a second. “You’re flying here. Right now.”
Marco made a wounded noise. “You sound like that’s a bad idea.”
“Marco, you can’t even go to the grocery store without causing a scene,” I said. “You think four public figures booking last-minute flights isn’t going to ping someone’s radar?”
“Three public figures,” Lucy corrected. “I’m in disguise.”
“You’re wearing your own merch,” Kimi said. “With your name on it.”
“Incognito,” she insisted. “Because why would I wear my own merch? That’s, like, the opposite of stealth. No one expects me to be this obvious.”
She had a point. None of us wore our own merch unless we were being paid to. Walking around in your own name felt like bragging about your status, and in our world, that was just… icky.
Callum snorted. “Point to Lucy. Also, did any of you assholes book first class?” Crickets from their end of the call. “Real discreet, guys.”
“Enough. This is exactly why we have to come,” Ivy cut in firmly. “If people are going to start circling, I am not letting physios and PR vultures be the first ones through your door. We’ll figure the rest out when we get there.”
Physios. PR. Vultures. The words lodged somewhere low in my spine, but I didn’t follow them. Not yet. Not until I had more information. I looked at Callum. He was already looking at me, jaw tight, eyes dark and unreadable and so, so familiar.
My bubble felt like it had a hairline crack now. But I had my person beside me, so even as the outside world started to pour in, so did the sunlight that was love.
“We’ll talk more when you get here, then,” he said finally, voice steady.
“We’ll be there tonight. Try not to spiral before then, okay? And please, for the love of God, Aurélie—” I flinched at her use of my name, because she only used it on me when she was lecturing me, “—do not go onto your socials yet.”
“No promises,” I said.
“Of course not,” she said softly. “Look, if shit is going to hit the fan, I’d rather it hit all of us at once. Love you, Frenchie.”
“Love you too.”
We hung up. The line went dead. For a second, there was nothing but the sea and the fan and the rush of blood in my ears.
I stared at our blank phone screens for a long moment.
“Okay,” I said eventually, eloquent as ever.
“Okay,” Callum echoed.
We sat there in the middle of the rug, our skin cooling, the imprint of what we’d just been doing still vivid in my body.
The villa felt… different. Same white stone, same blue horizon, same champagne bottle sweating on the table from last night.
But something had shifted. A pressure change, a new weight.
“Rumors,” I said, mostly to myself.
He watched me, jaw working. He seemed agitated. “We knew it wouldn’t stay quiet forever.”
“I know,” I said. “I just thought we’d get more than a week before everything caught up.”
He sat up and reached for my hand.
Instinct snapped through me; I snatched it back, hiding my left under my right. It was a panic-inducing reaction. Our friends were going to be here, and a very famous stranger, and what did that mean for our elopement?
Callum’s brows kicked up. “Aurélie.”
“I just—” I swallowed, suddenly acutely aware of the band around my finger, of how easily a camera could catch the way it caught the light.
How much I’d truly let my guard down already.
“I’m not ready to have that conversation with anyone else, Cal.
There’s always questions and big emotions and I just want this to be us for a little longer. ”
“I wasn’t planning on flashing them the ring on the tarmac,” he teased wryly.
I huffed out a laugh that sounded a little too thin. “You say that, but you also jokingly proposed, like, thirty times before actually proposing. Your judgment is… romantic, but not always practical.”
His mouth curved. “Point stands,” he said. “We decide when we tell them. Not the internet. Not Dom. Not anyone else. If you’re not ready, we keep it ours a little longer.”
The knot in my chest loosened by a fraction.
“Okay,” I said.
He leaned in and kissed the corner of my mouth—light, quick, like punctuation.
“Besides,” he murmured, “I’d like to keep at least one secret to ourselves while our deranged friends turn our sexcation into a group holiday.”
I could see it already. Ivy pacing with her phone in one hand. Kimi raiding our fridge with a glass of whiskey in one hand. Marco heckling at least one of us and it backfiring. Lucy… well, I couldn’t speak to her. Maybe taking notes for a song.
Intrusive chaos. The kind that crashed through your doors and rearranged the furniture and somehow made the place feel more like home.
The thought was terrifying and comforting all at once.
I laughed. “As tempting as that sounds, I’m not going to delay marrying you because our family is coming to help us. They can be our witnesses, mon amour.”
“They can be whatever they want,” he said quietly, thumb brushing my jaw. “I’m still only looking at you.”
Heat crawled up my throat, ridiculous and instant.
“Let them sign the paperwork, drink the champagne, start ten different scandals while trying to stop two,” he added. “As long as you say yes when it’s just us, I don’t give a fuck who else is in the room.”
My chest did that stupid, aching squeeze it always did when he talked like that—like the vows were already written somewhere under his skin.
“We should shower,” I said. “And find real clothes. If they’re landing tonight, they’ll be here soon.”
He looked me over, from messy hair to flushed chest to my bare legs.
“I’m very comfortable with your current outfit,” he said.
“Rug gremlin chic is not the impression I want an international pop sensation to have when she sees me,” I said, flailing my arms. “I have to act… chillée.”
He blinked. “Chillée.”
“Yes,” I snapped defensively. “Like… chill. But in French. Elevated.”
“That is not a word,” he said, biting back a smile.
“It is now,” I argued. “I am très chillée. So relaxed. So normal. Definitely not about to spiral because my best friends and an incognito popstar are invading my sex island. She’s a virgin! I don’t want to corrupt her!”
He huffed a laugh. “You just put an extra ‘é’ on the end like you’re seasoning a personality trait.”
“Exactly,” I said. “Garnish the anxiety. Make it fancy. And I’m sorry, did you miss the part where I said they’re invading our sex island?
” I jumped to my feet, legs burning from our hike today.
“If they’re here, how are you in here?” I pointed toward my vagina, and his eyes dropped, darkening with lust.
“They’re not going to stay here with us, love.”
“Ivy literally said she was coming to our villa. Do the mathematique, Cal.”
“You are absolutely unhinged,” he murmured, completely unbothered, and fuck, why was that nonchalance so goddamn hot? “My unhinged, but still.”
“Unhinged and correctly concerned that our holiday-honeymoon—holymoon? honeyday? moonday?—is about to have significantly less sex,” I shot back. “We haven’t even used the spreader bar yet. Do you understand the level of injustice?”
His gaze dragged slowly up my body, heat licking over every inch. “Trust me, baby,” he said, voice gone rough. “If the sex stops, it won’t be because of them. I’ll fuck you quiet with a house full of people if I have to.”
A shiver chased down my spine. “That is not helping my heart rate,” I muttered. “Or my ability to walk in front of company.”
His eyes sparked. “Okay. You need to relax.”
“Do not tell me to relax—Callum!”
He leaped to his feet, bending to throw me over his shoulder. I hung upside down limply, not even bothering to fight.
“If you’d let me finish speaking,” he smacked my ass hard enough to make me yelp, “we need to finish what we started. Can’t have my fiancée greeting our uninvited guests all wound up and desperate for my cock, can we?”
We did, in the end, have sex hard and fast under the hot spray, steam curling around us, his mouth at my neck, my nails biting into his shoulders, his fingers pressing into my ass to fill me everywhere.
By the time we stepped out of the shower and pulled on actual clothing, my pulse had stopped trying to break my ribs, and I was, annoyingly, calmer.
So calm that when he turned to grab his shirt, I snapped the towel against his ass, catching him squarely. He swore in Gaelic, shot me a murderous look over his shoulder, and I just smiled sweetly and informed him I was très chillée now.
Balance, restored… at least until our chaos brigade landed.