Chapter Thirty-Eight
The alarm blared beside her head, but Isla barely noticed it. She had her head buried in the pillows of her bed, and she reached out in a futile attempt to knock that damned alarm clock off of her nightstand, but she couldn't reach it.
She let her arm drop back on the bed, not even bothering to look at how far away her hand still was from the offending object.
No point. Might as well leave it going. She was getting better at sleeping through the noise anyway.
Unfortunately, it seemed that Jane was not.
The door to Isla's room practically flew off its hinges. She flew up her in her bed, sending pillows and sheets flying with her as she stared at the attacker in her room.
Who was Jane. Jane, whose shoulders were shifting up and down as she took in deep gulps of air, who looked slightly less than human as she glared white hot daggers at Isla's face.
Isla was kind of scared. She wasn't going to lie to herself about that.
Jane panted like a mad woman, and her hair was all over the place, as though she'd just attempted to pull it all out mere minutes before. Her eyes were also a little on the crazy side.
"What. The fuck. Is with. That noise?" she panted.
"Noise?" Isla's eyes slowly drifted to the side, to where her alarm clock blared at her in an obnoxious digital sound.
Isla only just then realized that her computer was also crowing like a rooster, and her phone was making little jingling noises as it vibrated on the floor.
Apparently, Isla had forgotten that in an attempt to actually get herself out of bed at a decent hour and keep herself from moping, she'd set everything she owned that had an alarm on it.
If she'd owned a wrist watch, then it very likely would have been beeping right about now, too.
Isla flew to the nightstand and clicked off everything. "I'm sorry! I forgot that I set all these!"
"Well, turn them off!"
"I am, I—gah!" Isla let out a very unladylike scream as her legs got tangled up in the sheets of her bed, and she went down hard on the floor.
She barely put her hands out to catch herself, but even still her whole body went down, and she officially became a crumpled mess on her own bedroom floor.
She still scrambled for her phone, however, and she slid her thumb across the screen, turning off the alarm before it could let out one more ringing beep.
The silence was almost worse than the noise. How had she not noticed it had been so loud? Jane obviously noticed.
Isla carefully turned her head up to look at her friend.
The shadow that hung over Jane was more than a little scary. "I was up all night finishing my chapters."
"Right, I'm so sorry," Isla said, and she was sorry. She knew that Jane sometimes had to pull all nighters just to get the work done that she wanted. Isla had woken up numerous times before, to either use the washroom or get some water, just to walk by Jane's room and see the glow from her computer, listening to the soft clicking of her keyboard.
It wasn't exactly healthy, and it left Jane exhausted whenever she had to do these, but if Jane didn't do them, she'd never finish any of her books which, according to her, made her current job of working in a coffee house worth it.
Jane looked pretty damned exhausted right now, and irritable. As soothing and comforting as Jane had been when Isla had come home without an explanation, there was none of that patience for her right now.
"I'm going back to bed. You owe me a week's worth of caramel frappuccinos for this."
Isla nodded. "Right. Will do," she said. It only seemed fair, plus, she and Jane practically lived off of those things, so Isla had no problem with treating her friend for the next little while, at least until things got settled.
Jane stumbled her way back out of the room, taking that dark cloud with her. The door to Jane's room slammed, and only then did Isla allow herself to breathe properly.
She kicked her legs out to untangle herself from the sheets, angry with herself, and then she leaned against the side of her bed, put her knees up, and curled her arms around them.
The screen of her phone stared back at her from beside her. Eight in the morning. Not super early, but early enough for Isla, who'd only managed to get herself to fall asleep at around two-thirty in the morning. It was even earlier for Jane, who made it a habit of not getting to bed until the first hints of dawn showed itself in the glowing horizon.
Isla felt like a terrible best friend. She let her head fall against her knees.
She'd been back for four days, and Jane had asked Isla what had happened, what had gone wrong, allowed Isla to even have that embarrassing moment on her shoulder, and then when Isla said she didn't want to talk about it, Jane gave her the space she needed. Jane had been great. Better than ever.
Just for Isla to constantly get in the way of Jane's sleeping and work schedule.
Maybe she'd buy her friend a month's worth of frappuccinos. Wasn't like she couldn't afford it.
Isla looked back down at her phone, and the time it was giving her. She had to get ready. She had no idea when it was going to arrive, but she'd gotten a text in last night from Orlando saying he was bringing her some papers, today, so she needed to get ready.
It was basically the reason why she hadn't been able to fall asleep last night. She'd spent all night tossing and turning, thinking about whatever it could be that Arturo was putting in the new contract.
The contract was the only communication from Arturo that he would be getting ever since he kicked her out. Maybe it was for that reason that Isla had gotten desperate and called Orlando's phone, just to hear him say it in his real voice that he was bringing the papers over.
Orlando hadn't been able to give her any details, not even a real reason why he wanted to deliver the contract himself, instead of getting someone else to do it, or even to email it to her for her to sign on her tablet.
It had just made for an awkward conversation with long pauses, and it had been very clear that Orlando knew Isla probably wasn't coming back. That had just made it worse, especially since he'd been the one to stand up for her again and again whenever he thought Arturo was being mean.
Isla had been too weak to summon any courage at all that would allow her to just ask what Arturo was doing, or to pass on a message.
So she'd thanked Orlando and hung up the phone before she'd made things more embarrassing for herself. Now today was the day. The day she would be getting to see what it was that Arturo wanted her to agree to.
Maybe he'd turn her into his personal secretary. Someone who would be able to service him in ways he wouldn't allow Sylvia to do.
Just the thought brought on all kinds of fantasies, the sort of things she probably wouldn't be thinking about at all had she not read so many Billionaire and CEO romance novels with Jane.
Because Jane's bookshelf was full of that sort of thing, and because of Isla's depression, she'd borrowed a couple and had spent part of her moping time reading through them.
Plowing through them was more like it. She didn't even fully understand why. It wasn't like she and Arturo had anything going on other than the sex. They didn't even like each other.
They weren't even that much to each other.
No. No more. She was going to cut this out. Isla got to her feet, grabbed her phone, and went to her vanity. She had more than enough products on here to make her look and smell better than she felt. No point sitting around and doing nothing while she waited for Orlando to get here. Isla didn't want to be seen looking like this anyway. One glance in the mirror and she wanted to look away. She bags under her eyes had aged her into her mid thirties almost over night. That would take a couple of hours before that swelling went down.
God, she was gross. She hadn't showered at all yesterday, and had spent all day in her pyjamas. She needed a long bath and a clean change of clothes.
And a nice vat of skin cream.
She should've known that murphy's law would come into effect and strike at the absolute worst possible time. Her phone buzzed again, but this time not from the alarm.
A call. Orlando's name was right on her screen. She added him as a contact after he'd first texted her, and she picked up without thinking about it.
"Orlando?"
"Hey Isla, yeah, it's me. I'm downstairs now. Your doorman just let me in. I'm coming up with your new contract."
"I...what?"
He sounded shocked. "Is this a bad time?"
Isla felt the tiny muscle just beneath her right eye twitch. "N-no, of course not. I just thought you'd be coming later."
"If it's a bad time I can come back later."
Isla yanked open the first drawer of her vanity and pulled out some dry shampoo. This would have to do. She was already lifting strands of her hair and spraying it down. "No, it's fine. I'm ready. Come on up."
"Isla—"
She hung up before he could say anything else. She had to hurry. Hurry, hurry, hurry.
Her phone rang again, but she ignored it as she ran into the bathroom she shared with Jane. At the very least she needed to brush her teeth and splash her face with cold water.
The phone rang again, but again she ignored it. She'd already told him to come up. What was he doing?
Because she couldn't resist and her skin felt too bad, Isla pulled out the facial scrub and began to quickly exfoliate.
If Arturo had come with him, she didn't want to look like a total slob. At the very least she could try and make it so that her messy look was done on purpose.
She'd rinsed off the scrub and was working a pad wet with toner over his skin when the chime for a text came in.
Frustrated, Isla looked at it, knowing it was Orlando.
I don't know your apartment number.
Oh. Well shit. Isla quickly tapped in the number and sent it off, ignoring the little drops of water her fingers had left behind. Then it was time to moisturize.
With the extra four minute she bought herself before Orlando knocked on the front door, Isla managed to get into a nice pink summer dress from Desigual and ballet flats. She only managed to get on a tinted moisturizer and some lip gloss, but she figured she looked all right enough.
Just before reaching the door, she quickly turned around and ran back to her room, though. "Be right there!"
Earrings! How could she have forgotten? And without a necklace her chest felt a little too bare. Also, she'd heard that the right kind of necklace would draw attention to her cleavage.
Okay, now she was ready. Pink pearl earrings and a matching pearl teardrop necklace and she looked pretty damned good for only seven minutes of prep work.
Isla fluffed her stupid hair, trying to get it to work right for her, and when she opened the door, she realized too late that she hadn't put on any deodorant.
She froze on the spot, and she also wanted to vanish into a puddle on the floor. Orlando took one pitying look at her, as though he could already see everything that was wrong with her, see that she'd just fallen out of bed and had been a mess for absolutely no reason for days. Silvio stood beside him. Isla had almost mistaken him for Arturo, and she was now glad that Arturo wasn't here to see her. Or smell her.
This wasn't much better, however.
"Are you okay?" Orlando asked.
"Right, I'm right. I mean I'm fine, just get in here," she said, stepping aside and hating herself. She didn't look into Orlando's face as she tried to keep her distance, not wanting him to smell her. Did she smell? Shit! She couldn't tell.
He and Silvio came in by themselves in matching black suits. The only difference was in their ties. Orlando's was navy while Silvio's was blood red.. There was a noticeable lack of anyone else in the hall, wearing a suit or not. "Is it just the two of you?"
"Yeah," Orlando said, liking he was biting on that word.
"Big brother sent Orlando on an errand," Silvio said, a smile on his face and in his eyes as he made fun or Arturo. "Orlando's the nice one, so he figured it would make for a personal touch as he tried to avoid you."
"Oh, okay. I guess he thought the same for you?"
Isla just had to excuse herself for two minutes so she could spray something under her arms. That's all it would take.
Silvio shrugged. "No, not really. I just wanted to show up. Now that you're not with Arturo, I figured I could make him jealous and have you all for myself."
Even knowing he couldn't possibly mean that, Isla's face went centre of the sun hot.
"And I'm telling you, you're not doing something like that again," Orlando said, a very clear look of annoyance on his face. He was a little red in the cheeks, too, but it actually looked like it was more from anger than embarrassment over what his brother had said.
Again?
Silvio shrugged one more time. "I'm just kidding, don't get your panties in a bunch," he said, pressing his hand to the top of Orlando's head, petting it and messing up his hair.
Orlando growled and slapped his hand away.
Silvio just laughed.
Isla had once overheard Sebastian say that Arturo and Silvio treated their younger brother like shit. It didn't look that way to her. This looked like normal sibling teasing.
Though it was still kind of embarrassing to watch. Seemed sort of private, and either way, Orlando didn't seem like he was a push over. A frown pulled down on his lips and marred his brow, like this whole thing disgusted him.
And he held an orange envelope in his right hand.
"Is that my contract?" Isla asked.
Orlando blinked, turning away from his brother, as though he'd forgotten Isla was even there.
He managed to smile one of his nice, soft smiles as he stepped forward. "Yes, sorry about all this. We can give you some privacy if you need to read it over."
Isla shook her head. "No. To be honest, I'd rather you stayed here. If there's something I don't understand, maybe you could help me out with it."
"No problem," Silvio said, loosening his red tie. "Orlando and I are experts at reading these things by now, and Arturo wouldn't have made it too difficult."
How to say she didn't trust Silvio without being rude?
"Actually, I was really thinking that Orlando could help me out with it. He and I know each other better, is all."
They barely knew each other at all, but he was the one Calendri brother that Isla trusted not to screw her over. Either figuratively or literally.
"That's fine. Hope you don't mind if I take a seat though," Silvio said.
Orlando glared at his brother. Isla sighed. "Go ahead. Just, please not too much noise. I think my roommate just got back to sleep."
Orlando gave her the space she needed as she opened the envelope. It wasn't sealed shut or anything, so it was just a matter of pulling out the pages. There weren't too many of them, considering what she thought this was, but there were still enough that she wasn't looking forward to reading it all.
It was only after ten minutes and four pages that she needed her first bit of help. There were some numbers on here that perplexed her, but they couldn't mean what she thought they did.
She looked up, about to ask Orlando what he thought, but she choked on the word at the sight of him and Silvio. looking around at all the romance novels on Jane's shelves, and some of the drawn designs for necklaces, bracelets and anklets that Isla had framed.
Isla realized how girly her place must look, but then she realized that Orlando and Silvio barely saw her framed drawings, and were paying special attention to the books.
With a jolt, Isla realized that a lot of the spines were thick enough for even Isla to read from where she stood, so there was no doubt in her mind that they could see them. The ones that Jane favorited were face out, like they'd be at a book store if they were top sellers. That's how Jane had described it, but that wasn't the problem.
Marrying the Billionaire.
The CEOs Secret Baby.
One Night With A Billionaire.
Claimed By the Billionaire.
The Tycoon's Marriage Proposal.
Isla wanted to crawl in a hole and die. That would make an awesome book title right about now.
"Uh, those are Jane's," she croaked. That twitching was back in her lower eyelid. "She'd a writer."
She wanted to burn the sight of Orlando and Silvio staring at all of those books from her mind, especially when they slowly turned their heads to look back at her.
"I swear, they're not mine. I just...read them sometimes."
Her voice cracked and became more and more whisy as she spoke. Probably because she wasn't taking in a proper breath. She was going to feint. Actually, no, she wasn't going to feint. She was just going to wish that she was so that sweet, sweet oblivion would take her away from here.
She was going to kill Jane for wanting to display those.
The shock left Silvio's face first, and he burst out laughing at her.
Orlando's face brightened. "Shut up, Silvio! Don't laugh at her. This has to be embarrassing."
More so now that he pointed out what a horror this was.
Silvio didn't shut up. His spine actually arched backwards a little as he laughed. Anymore and he would topple backwards and fall.
She hoped that would happen.
"What the hell?"
Oh shit.
Isla turned. Jane stormed back into the room, looking as grumpy and ready to rage as ever. "Isla, who the hell is—"
Isla was still bracing herself to get yelled at for disturbing Jane's sleep again when she realized Jane wasn't saying anything.
And Silvio wasn't laughing, either.
Jane and Silvio seemed to yell at each other.
"What the hell are you doing here?"
It was one of those strange things Isla hadn't expected, hearing two different people shouting the exact same thing at the exact same time in the same high pitched voice.
They both stared at each other, and as Isla looked between them, Jane's face became mortified, while Silvio's turned eager, his eyes brightening with some sort of victory that Isla didn't understand.
"So this is where you live?"
"Shut up. Get out of here," Jane said. Her hands were clenched into fists at her side, her head ducked just enough to try and hide her eyes beneath her bangs.
"I've been looking for you for a while, you know."
"You have?" Isla asked.
"Okay, well, you found me. Go home now, please."
Jane turned and promptly started marching back to her room.
Silvio followed, still with that eager, gotta have it look in his eyes. "No way, get back here!"
He rushed passed her, and Isla felt like she was in a whirlwind when she heard Jane's bedroom door slam shut.
From the sound of Silvio's muffled voice, he'd managed to get into her room before she could lock him out.
"What was that?" Orlando asked, blinking wide.
It must've really been something if Orlando didn't even expect that from his own brother.
"Maybe...they know each other?" Isla asked. She didn't hear screaming, so there wasn't exactly a lot she could do.
Orlando took one step forward, but then stopped himself. He clenched his fists and shook his head.
"Are you worried he'll do something?" Isla asked.
Orlando shook his head. "I know he wouldn't. They must know each other. I don't know why I bother."
Isla felt herself soften a little towards him. Well, she'd always felt a little on the soft side for Orlando, but that was just because he was a nice guy. He didn't want his brother to do anything stupid.
And because she wanted to take his mind off of what a horn dog his brother was, she figured now was a good time to ask for his help.
"Can you read this over for me? I don't think I understand it."
"Gladly," Orlando said, stepping forward, and looking genuinely pleased to have something else to focus on.
"This right here?" he asked.
Isla nodded, watching as Orlando's eyes skimmed over the page.
When he told her what it meant, she nearly hit the damned ceiling.
No way. There was no fucking way she was letting him get away with it!
Orlando called after her, and he had no choice but to follow her out the door. It was either that or stick around while his brother had sex in the next room.
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End Chapter Thirty-Eight
Okay, I lied, turns out this was a long one. I meant for the chapter to be short, but that just wasn't in the cards. Phew! Can't believe I actually got it finished. With words for Siren and words for the Arrangement, I did about 7,500 words today. I'm gonna go pass out now! Supposed to be editing a youtube video, but that's not happening tonight :D Sleep and drawing practice takes priority over that.
Seriously though, I liked this chapter, especially where Orlando and Silvio get to see the bookshelf where Isla gets a lot of her romance references from :3 That's something I always thought would be embarrassing, especially if someone happened to be dating a real live CEO, Billionaire, Tycoon, whatever.
Sorry again, but because of my need to get this posted as quickly as possible, there was no editing done to this chapter either. I didn't even have the chance to skim through it. If anyone sees any major flaws though, feel free to point them out so I an fix them up for you :) The good news is that this story is now about 95,700 words long. At this rate it will break the 400 page mark when I finally get it into print for ARCs to hand out.
Thank you for reading, and for the comments and stars. Those really make my day after handing in these chapters :) You guys are awesome,
Cheers,
~Mandy