Chapter Twenty-Seven
The only good thing about the traffic on the way to Calendri Corp was that it meant Isla couldn't ask Sam to turn around and take her back to Arturo's house. Turning a limo around in a slow moving river of cars wasn't a simple thing. She couldn't chicken out.
When Sam finally dropped her off and waited until she was in the front door before driving off to the underground parking, Isla felt her entire body start to tremble.
And she'd been thinking Arturo was a coward. So much for that. Now she knew who the real coward between them was.
She was just going to suck it up. She was clutching her phone in her hand now. It had the reply text on it from Arturo. He was expecting her and waiting in his office.
No one stopped her for ID as she walked into the building. It wasn't like the first time she'd come in here, needing a verified appointment before she could get passed the second set of doors.
Now those same doors were held open for her, and the doorman, including the secretary behind the front desk, all smiled and nodded at her, like she was supposed to be here, like she was where she belonged.
She took the executive elevator, the one that only Arturo was allowed to use since it would take him immediately from floor one to floorI'm-Mr-Big-and-Important without having to worry about any stops on the way.
When she got to where she needed to go, Sylvia was still at her desk, she was on the phone with someone, but her gaze turned up when Isla approached.
"Excuse me," she said, and then pulled the phone away from her ear. "Just go on in. They're expecting you," she said to Isla.
Huh. Isla could actually get used to being treated like this. Sylvia didn't even buzz Arturo or anything. Of course, he really was expecting her, so it probably didn't matter.
Isla pushed against one of the heavy wooden doors. It was smooth and silent, but she was still careful, as though waiting for that door to let out a loud groaning shriek that would give away her position. So not what she wanted.
Not that it mattered anyway since Arturo was able to see her perfectly from his desk when she walked in. Him, and Orlando and one other dark haired man with chiseled good looks.
She almost froze on the spot, but then caught herself and quickly shut the door behind herself. "I'm here," she said, looking from Arturo to his two brothers. The second one had to be Silvio, if she remembered his name right. "I'm sorry, I didn't know you were busy."
Arturo leaned his cheek on his fist. "I see that."
"Arturo," Orlando said softly, but he sounded so tired as he said it.
Arturo looked like a corpse. They all did. Well, not real corpses, but definitely something out of a Night of the Living Dead movie. The original where the actors all basically wore pasty makeup and had bags under their eyes. That's what he looked like. A cheap horror movie zombie.
Her first reaction to that was to be both repulsed and petrified for them. What had they been doing in here for all this time? Because now there was no doubt in her mind that Orlando and Silvio had spent three days and nights here, too.
Not that she wanted that to be heard in her voice. "Have you been sleeping at all?"
"Of course I have," Arturo said, leaning back in his leather office chair and crossing his arms over an expensive, no doubt tailored, shirt that had probably not been washed since he'd left for the office that day after the game.
Isla let her eyes roam over the workspace. The sofa on the far side of the wall certainly did look s though someone had been sleeping on it. There were even rumpled jackets thrown over the back, and the pillows were a mess.
There were a dozen or so of opened cans of red bull on his desk, with some on the side tables and a few more in the trash, along with several takeout containers. Guys had definitely been occupying this space.
Arturo's treadmill was out, and currently it was being used to hang his suit jacket while an extra pair of shoes sat on the machine itself, as if they'd been running Arturo's exercise regimen for him while he sat at his desk. Orlando and Silvio's clothes were rumpled, their ties on the backs of the chairs, and their shirt collars way open with their sleeves rolled up. That, and there were papers everywhere, some crumpled and others just tossed around. A mini windstorm could've come in here and it wouldn't have explained all of this.
Whatever they were working on, they were working hard.
"Is this an emergency?" Isla asked, still doing her best to keep from sounding worried.
"If it was, do you really think I would tell you about it?"
Orlando didn't come to Isla's defence this time. He looked too tired, but Silvio put on a soft, very strained smile. "Ignore him, sweet, he's cranky. We all are."
She glanced up at him. "No, it's all right. It's a good point, actually. It smells like a gym in here. And old takeout. You should at least have a shower, get someone to bring you all some clean clothes."
"I'll worry about my hygiene and my clothes if I have to meet a contact in person. Until then, I can get by like this while talking over the phone. And it's not an emergency. Not the kind that would shut down my business, anyway."
"Then what kind?"
He glowered at her. The fact that he looked so bad, so damned human and tired, made him look so much more scarier.
Orlando straightened the papers in his hands and tapped Silvio in the stomach with them "This sounds private. We should go."
Silvio looked to Arturo, and then to Isla, and then he shrugged. "Sure. I need that shower she just teased me with."
Isla hadn't meant to do that, but there wasn't much she could say about it now. The two brothers walked around her, and then were out the door.
Isla really wished she wasn't alone with Arturo when he continued to give her that look.
"Aren't you here to yell at me for embarrassing you? I would've thought you would've had a few calls from your parents by now."
Isla's spine went stiff as a steel rod, the reminder of her righteous anger coming back hard. "Yeah, about that," she said, trying to sound calm, but even to her own ears, that was coming out sounding a little more psychotic than it needed to, "why the hell would you do something like that? Because I told you to fuck off once and it hurt your goddamned precious pride you needed to let my mother and father and grandfather think I'm whoring myself out to you?"
"That kind of is what you're doing, isn't it?"
"That's not the damned point!" Isla snapped. She nearly through her phone at him, the one that she'd been clutching in her fist like a weapon. She needed her phone, so it was with a very thin thread of self control that she managed to hold that one back.
"That wasn't what we agreed to. You weren't supposed to do that to me. I never humiliated you in front of your damned family."
"I know, relax."
"Don't tell me to relax!"
"It was an accident, all right?" Arturo snapped.
Isla snapped her mouth shut. Stared hard at him, and then opened it again. "What are you talking about?"
"It wasn't to rub anything in your family's face. That was something that I honestly hadn't even thought about until later. Sebastian was either being a dick head, or he really believes that was what I was doing to you."
"Bullshit," Isla said. "Who the hell else would you want to see something like that? It wouldn't matter to anyone else."
Arturo rolled his eyes. He even clenched his teeth as he gripped the edge of his desk. Even from where Isla was standing she could see that his knuckles were turning white. "I wanted my dad to see it. Will you drop it already?"
Isla was knocked back a step from that one. "Your...your father? You wanted him to see that? Why?"
The way he looked at her, the severe annoyance tied in with how damned tired he was, coming down and crashing after having all of those energy drinks...he didn't want to speak with her about this. Isla could tell that for a fact.
"I wanted him to see it because I want him to be angry with me. I want to irritate him and torture him however I can."
"Which has what to do with me? He doesn't even know me."
"Yes he does," Arturo said. "You're the only granddaughter of the only man who told him to get the fuck out of his office."
Isla's brain was working over time with so muchknew information, coupled with the fact that she was still so damned angry, which was clouding everything else. But then she got it.
She thought she did, anyway. "Your father took over my grandfather's company because he was angry with him? Because he wanted to get back at him?"
"Basically, yes," Arturo said. "I was there the day he tried to negotiate the deal. I wasn't just used to scope out the businesses he wanted to take over."
"Which was how we met," Isla said. Why was she blushing? Why was it that she was the one who was blushing at remembering something he'd done wrong? Granted, she'd been rude about it, which didn't make her any better, but...
Ugh, this was getting to be too much for her.
Then Isla thought of something. "Wait, that makes no sense. He only wanted Baciami because my grandfather pissed him off? That's not a reason to take over a company."
"That's pretty much every reason to take over a company," Arturo countered.
"But it could've lost him money in the long run. He would've lost money just to spite my family?"
"You're talking about a man who had billions of dollars at his disposal. A couple million is a lot to you, but it was nothing to him. He could've easily taken the loss."
Oh, well, he had her there, didn't he?
"Okay, so your dad is the sort of man who's vindictive enough to be pissed off that you're dating me. How does that work?"
Arturo pinched the bridge between his eyes. It wasn't an over acted gesture either. He really looked like Isla's questions were giving him a headache.
"He hates your family, so the thought that I might be sweet on you would be enough to severely upset him. He'll hate it. He'll hate it even more if he thinks I'll just give back the company for nothing."
"He used to be a billionaire, I thought you said it wouldn't matter to him?"
Arturo looked like he was trying with her, he really did. "Isla, my father was the sort of man who brutally murdered my mother because he didn't want to pay her child support for us, or alimony for the rest of her life. All right? This would matter to him. He takes insults to him or the family seriously. Knowing that I might let you have the company back for nothing, giving it back to your grandfather, who was probably the first person in years to tell him to get the fuck out, will drive him insane. If it gives him a heart attack or a seizure because he gets so pissed, then it'll be a successful day for me."
"I...oh," Isla said.
The silence was heavy and thick. Isla never would've thought that description would hold weight to something that was supposed to be as serene and peaceful as silence, but it did.
Arturo wet his lips. "I am sorry if this causes you trouble with your family, though. That honestly wasn't the idea."
Another silence. This time it was a more calm, peaceful thing, instead of that heavy, thick fog from before. Isla's head was clear, and she could think properly.
He was telling the truth. She didn't consider herself to be a scholar when it came to body language, but there was something in the way this confidant man almost refused to meet her eyes that told her it was the truth.
If he didn't care, or was lying about what he was saying, then she got the feeling he would be looking her full in the face and be making no apologies for it.
And after everything she heard, and just by looking at how much he was clearly suffering over...whatever it was that was going on in the company, her forgiveness came easily.
Strange, considering she usually held a grudge like a master.
"All right. It's okay," Isla said.
Arturo looked at her, his brows lifting a little. "It is?"
Isla shrugged. "I still hate that it happened, but there's nothing to do about it now. It's done. My whole family saw us, and they're going to want an explanation."
"You would tell them about the contract?"
"What else would I tell them?"
Those dark brows lifted almost all the way up into Arturo's hairline. "You could try lying to them about it. Tell them we're actually dating. That you have feelings for me and that's all this is about."
"I can't do that!"
"Why not?" Arturo asked.
"I just...because I can't!"
Arturo blinked at her, twice, and then chuckled and shook his head. "Jesus, you really are a good girl, aren't you?"
"What? No I'm not!"
"What makes you think that? You won't even lie to your parents about why you're with me because it'll make you feel guilty."
"A good girl wouldn't have signed your contract."
Arturo leaned back in his chair. "Good point. So this should be easy for you."
Isla crossed her arms. "I'm starting to get pissed off again."
Arturo lifted his hands. "Oh no, can't have that," he said, and then laughed.
Isla was so furious that she started laughing too. She'd never been so angry that the only response was to laugh, and it kind of made her feel better. "You're such a dick."
She approached the desk, pulled back one of the leather seats in front of it that Orlando had been in, and sat down. Might as well make herself comfortable.
"Whatever. So will you pretend to be my actual girlfriend or not? We've already fucked a couple of times, and I did technically take you out on a date. If it makes you feel better, all of that means that you're not technically lying. You just happen to know when this relationship is going to end."
That was true, and Isla was starting to not like how he continued to point out so much that made sense. "And what will I say when we break it off and I suddenly have ownership of Baciami Boutique?"
Arturo shrugged. "Just say that it was a token of my affection for you. Water under the bridge since we'd been dating, and that I wanted to make nice about the whole thing with my ex girlfriend."
"It's weird how easily you can just pull that out of your ass."
"Yes, it is a gift," Arturo admitted.
Now Isla realized why this felt so strange. He was playing with her. Not in a terrible way, but in the way that a man might play and have fun with a girl who really was his girlfriend. Or just a friend.
That was the most likely candidate for this behavior. Arturo wasn't putting on the holier than thou act, and it was kind of nice to see him relaxing.
After working three days non stop like this, his defences were probably a little low.
"All right, but we'll have to have dinner with them."
Arturo tensed. "What?"
"I always bring new boyfriends to my parents for dinner. They call it an inspection, but if I don't do it soon, they'll know something's up."
Arturo shut his eyes, becoming tired once more. "Fine, but this is going to take a couple of days. Let them know we're coming over, but I still have work to do here."
"You don't have to sound like you're marching to die. It's just a dinner."
"Parents and I don't get along. Don't worry about it, though, I can charm them into thinking I'll be marrying you if that's what you need me to do."
Isla frowned. "I thought you said you and parents don't get along?"
"After I let them think that their daughters are my one and only, no, they hate me more than any of my exes every do."
"Then I'm glad we're not actually dating."
Arturo grinned at her, a wolfish thing that made Isla shiver. Even when he looked like total crap, he was so sexy. It was beyond not fair.
She leaned closer to his desk. It was a lot messier up close, and there were papers everywhere.
The letter heads all looked like something that would come from lawyers. That wasn't exactly a dead giveaway to anything. There were always legal hassles in businesses that were worth more than a certain amount, and Arturo's company definitely shot beyond that point.
The thing that looked strange about them were the notices of a certain prison that Isla recognized. She knew that logo because she'd seen it enough times while she'd been reading up on Arturo.
"You've spent the last three nights here, not because of anything to do with Calendri Corp, have you?" Isla asked.
Arturo looked down to where Isla's eyes had fallen, and he sighed before collecting the papers and straightening everything up. "Yes and no. My father's still trying to make some claim to the company's money from prison."
"I thought that wasn't allowed," Isla said.
Arturo shrugged. "It's not supposed to be. He's still got a lot of influence, even with little to no money to his name."
Isla felt sick inside of her stomach for what she knew had to be going on, what Arturo and his brothers were going through. "You were all working so hard in here because he's trying to get out of prison?"
Arturo looked at her hard, and then, as though deciding it wasn't worth putting up a front, he nodded. "Yeah, that's basically it."
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End Chapter Twenty-Seven! I wanted to post this today since I made everyone wait for twenty-six. Not sure if the next chapter will be up tomorrow because I have to get back to work, but at least with the Christmas story started, I can focus a little more time to this one. Basically, this means that I have three contracted stories to write for various people this month aside from The Arrangement, just so that everyone has a clear idea of why chapters won't be coming in every night, though they'll be more consistent than they were since the beginning of the month :)
Getting into the juicy bits with Arturo and his family. I can't wait to show a little more about them, and get into why Sebastian is a shit disturber ;)
Thanks for reading! Please leave a vote if you liked this chapter as those may or may not help with The Watty's contest coming up, and they also help my ego.
Cheers :)
~Mandy