Page 4 of Tender Entrapment
Even up here, among the VIPs, the affluent and the most powerful people in the city, it was well known that to look at Luigi’s woman was to invite trouble.
She stopped at his table, now looking cross.
“Camille, hi,” Luigi said and offered her a smile he hoped was inviting enough.
“Hello, Mr. Frazetta,” she replied.
He waved at the sofas on both sides of his table. “Take a seat, join me.”
She took the seat across from him. “I don’t appreciate being yanked away from my friends by your…” she stopped and turned to look for Dante. The dim blue lights of the club hid him well,and the strobes didn’t do enough to pick him out in the alcove where he sat, watching and waiting.
When she saw no sign of him, she turned back to Luigi.
“My what?” Luigi asked.
“Your… friend.”
“I don’t think your own friend was keen on keeping you company, though,” Luigi pointed out. “If he was, he’d have said no when Dante asked if you could come over here.”
“What choice did he have?” Camille asked.
“The choice of saying no, like a man,” Luigi said.
Camille regarded him for a long moment. Luigi held her gaze.
“I don’t think that would have ended well for him,” she said finally, in a low, subdued voice.
“I do not encourage violence here,” Luigi told her and signaled a waiter to approach the table. “Let me buy you a drink.”
“Do I have the choice of saying no?” she asked.
Luigi stared at her. There was no defiance in her gaze, only a raised eyebrow and a half smile. He laughed. “No, you don't have a choice.”
Camille laughed, too. “Why does he have a choice and I don’t?”
“Well, for one, he doesn’t have your hair,” he said and reached across the table to touch it. A few locks hung over her shoulder, hiding the spaghetti thin strap of the short black gown she wore.
She smiled. “And?”
“And your eyes,” Luigi said. “They are beautiful.”
“And?” she pressed further.
Luigi stared at her. He knew what she wanted to hear now but decided it was too early to say it. Still, it was all the signhe needed to know that she probably wanted the same thing he wanted.
Down below, the man in the multicolored shirt was leaving. His shoulders were not as squared as they were when he walked in. Behind him, his friends brought up the rear, still holding each other or busy on their phones like they didn’t just see him get stripped of his partner.
Luigi felt a pang of regret. However, it melted away when he looked up at the woman seated opposite him. She was a perfect specimen, worth the transgression. “Your friends are leaving,” he told her.
“You’ve ruined the night for them.”
“I saved them,” Luigi told her.
“From what?”
“The war that would have been fought for your hand this night,” he replied.
Camille’s brows furrowed in puzzlement. “A war?”
