“I'm not risky.” That's all I can say to try and defend myself because apparently, Valentin Salvatore knows me too well for my liking. The problem is that the words come out acidic as if to prove his point.
He gives a quick sideways smile, which is quite rare. He only uses it when he's not saying what he's thinking. It's usually in our healthy spats. I imagine it's something too bad to say out loud because he's not one to hold anything back. The man doesn't hesitate to fight and say how he likes things to happen around here. “There's a lot more. I could spend the rest of the day here talking about your lack of professionalism, but I'll finish with the little gifts you receive more often than is appropriate for the workplace. Flowers, giant bears, serenades...” “It's not my fault! It's not like I'm the one sending the gifts.” “But you can make sure they're not delivered here, Miss Santoro, but to your home. Your personal life generates more gossip in this company than we've had in all the years it's been in existence.” “If you didn't make me stay here until I decided to leave, maybe I'd have time to get everything delivered to my house. But I spend more time here than there, don't I?” Valentin doesn't say anything, he just keeps measuring me carefully. I hate it when he does that. I feel like he thinks he's a superior being who doesn't have time to waste arguing with me. It's always like this, our clashes are acidic but quick. He doesn't spend more than five minutes demonstrating what an asshole he is. No, the powerful CEO Valentin Salvatore has better things to do than get into pointless arguments with his secretary. He says what's bothering him and hurries me off so I can get back to my business. I smile when he returns to his chair, proving that it's not just him who knows a few things about me. I also know little facts about Valentin. Unfortunately, living together sucks and I have to. If it were up to me, he'd be erased from my life. “Have you finished your sermon for the day? Can I leave now?” His very dark eyes look at me again, and I feel safer because his height isn't so intimidating when he's sitting down. Even though he's still bigger than me. But that's beside the point. I watch as Valentin opens one of the small drawers on his wooden desk and places a tablet on top, pushing it towards me. “What's that?” I ask with a frown. “Medicine for your headache.” “How...? I'm not hungover, don't worry.” “I know. I didn't say I was. Take it,” he says, bossily, as if I didn't have the choice to refuse. Could it be that the wretch, as well as being a complete asshole, has the power to read minds? It's not possible! I know we've spent a considerable amount of time together every day since I started working here, but how can he know so many insignificant things about me? Or how can he know about a simple headache? “You don't have to...” “Take it. Don't argue with me, Santoro.” It means he's about to lose his temper again. I agree to avoid fatigue. To prevent the slight headache from turning into a terrible, hated migraine. I took advantage of the offer because I didn't remember to buy my medicine. I approach Valentin's desk and pick up the pill, seeing that it's the same one I usually take for what I call a pre-migraine. That's when I hope that the blessed one won't come, so I just need a weaker medicine that won't knock me over. “Thank you,” I say with difficulty because I can't remember another time when I've been truly grateful to Valentin. “Not at all, miss. Take a few minutes until you get better. I need you to accompany me to the four o'clock meeting. I want you to be attentive, without distractions.” “Of course, sir. Excuse me.” As soon as I leave his office, I sit down in my chair and throw my head back against the comfortable backrest. What the fuck was that? At the same time as he's eating my ass about his lack of professionalism, he's offering me a drug? I'm sure it was just so I'd be one hundred percent fit for later, but still. He could have let me turn around. Valentin is too strange. I shouldn't waste my time trying to understand his attitude. As he suggested, I take a few minutes in the restroom after taking my medicine. I turn off the lights and wait about twenty minutes for it to take effect, thankful that it hasn't got any worse. My mood is a little better when I return to my seat, seeing that some people have already started to arrive too. I'm lucky that whenever my head feels bad, Valentin gives me a break. Not consciously, of course, but at least I have that comfort, because no one deserves to have a demanding man talking in their head when all they want to do is lie down. As I predicted, work distracts me for the rest of the day. My head felt better, I got a lot done and Valentin didn't complain once. It was a victory. We went to the meeting, and he came away very happy to have closed a contract, so I was also happy that he was in a good mood because that always meant peace for me. He even released me on time! Excited to be getting home early for the first time this week, I start to pack my things but get stuck in place when I see a delivery man coming out of the elevator. When I look at the flowers in his hands, my body freezes as I remember Valentin's words. “No, no, shit! Don't let them be for me, don't let them be for me...” I whisper a continuous prayer and I despair when the man asks my name, loud and clear. Livia, one of the employees, points in my direction and the man comes towards me. “Miss Nicole Santoro? Sign here, please.” I take the pen from his hand in a hurry, eager to get rid of the evidence of the crime quickly, before Valentin sees it. Only the unfortunate man has radar, he must. He chooses just that moment to leave your office. His sharp eyes look in my direction, then at the flowers. My boss approaches in slow steps, while the delivery man turns around and heads for the elevator, away from me. Before the scolding comes to an end the atypically peaceful day, I step forward and hold out the bouquet towards him. “For you!” I say hurriedly, and he looks at me in disbelief at my lame attempt to escape a scolding. Valentin holds the flowers in one hand and picks up a bloody card with the other. He opens it and reads the contents, and I freeze, because I wonder who it's from and I'm scared of what's written there. “I love you and I won't let you run away from the feeling out of fear” Valentin reads the sentence out loud, on purpose, attracting the attention of the curious. “I didn't know that what you felt for me was love, miss.” The little smile is there, the blessedly indecipherable one. To escape the embarrassment, I do the first thing I think of. A bad idea, I know. I pretend to faint.Crazy.Of a long list of adjectives that can be used to describe Nicole Santoro, this one is certainly at the top. Fuck, I can’t help but think how she always manages to surprise me. For better or worse, she does.Lucky I’m quick to trim your body even holding a bouquet in one hand and the damn card in another. Leave the objects on the ground and hold the tiny woman, supporting both hands on her back and lifting her. I swear a low word because the employees started whispering to each other when they witnessed the scene.Wanting to escape the gossip, I take Nicole to my room and push the door with my shoulder to close it. I put the woman girl lying on the brown leather sofa that is in the corner. Rarely use it, because I don’t usually relax much in the office, but at least it will be useful now.Cross my arms in front of the body, while waiting for your farce to end, stopping to observe how beautiful the crazy is fucking. I’ve had my share of women throughout my forties, but I confess
I try to take the short from my head and focus on what I do best: work. I work for several hours, as always losing the time to leave. When I leave the company, it is past eleven o'clock in the evening. It’s amazing how it always seems to be behind, no matter how long I work. Sometimes I still come home and answer some emails that arrive during the night.I go to the garage and find my driver sleeping inside the car, just waiting. Knock on the window, and Lionel gets comfortable, cleaning the imaginary drool from the corner of his mouth. He gets out of the car and opens the back door for me, apologizing with a grin. I don’t blame him.As the man starts to drive towards my house, I answer some messages that I received from my mother. I already know that it will fill me with anger for the delay because it was sent in the morning, but better late than never. I answer to my younger brother too, who calls me once again so that I go out with him. Furthermore, I never accept, nor know why Tyl
Break the line of people complaining, preventing them from running into me, and see the security look at me suspiciously."To the end of the line, sir!""I came to pick up my brother, he’s giving work in there" lies easily, and he scratches his beard, thoughtful. "I’m Valentin Salvatore and I can...""The owner of LDrinks? Why didn’t you say something before? I love your drinks, man. Come on, get in!"Surprised by a guy in the middle of nowhere to recognize me, I smile in gratitude and enter. It’s not like everyone in the country knows me there. The company is only ten years old, it’s relatively new, has its fame, but I’m not famous. I sometimes appear on magazine covers and brand advertisements around, although I find it a great nonsense to have to use my image in marketing.Loud when I see that the place has more people than I imagined and get in the middle of sweaty bodies, looking for some VIP area, because I’m sure it’s where my brother is. I find out that I hit the guess when I
Henry bends down to say something in my ear, but I get distracted by the sight of Valentin talking to a monumental woman. She’s about his height and is very close, talking something into your ear with an easy smile. And damn! He’s smiling at her! Never seen that smile before.Valentin Salvatore is in search of his hunt, and I do not know how I feel to witness such an intimate thing from my boss. I shouldn’t have to see this, damn it. What he says to the red-haired busty pleases her too much because she makes sure to rub her big tits on him, which does not push her away."All right with you?" Henry speaks louder in my ear, and I come back to reality, realizing that I did not hear a bit of what he said."Sorry, I got distracted." With my boss flirting, complete in thought. "Let’s do this. I’m not at my best right now, why don’t you get me my number and we’ll work something out later?"He doesn’t seem too upset about the idea and does not take long to get his phone out of his pocket so I
"I thought you were in the bathroom," she says, holding back her laughter, and turns to my boss. "Hello, remember me? I’m Natasha.""Hi, Natasha. Of course, I remember. How are you?" He’s a nice guy with my friend, talking about things, and I see how she falls for him.Wish I had to live with Valentin daily to see if he would be smiling like that."Honey, I have to go. I didn’t want to end our night earlier, but Amanda is sick. Benjamin called me just now to tell her she can’t sleep.""All right. Come on. Isn’t it good to take her to the doctor?"I forget Valentin, still standing closer than necessary, worried about my little girl. It is a human being so fragile that it took me to catch her in the lap, afraid of breaking. I always worry about any cold she gets."Don’t worry. You can stay, if that’s what you want... Are you sober?""Yes, but I’m going with you. I don’t have to stay here."When I say that, I look straight at Valentin and I give back the right distance between us. He is
"I do. I deserve a raise. That man owes me" I play, and he shakes his head, knowing that he won’t be able to get it out of my head.It’s something I’ve been thinking about for a while, but I need to plant myself to fit this expense into my life. I will need to give something up, but I don’t care if it means making my dad less burdened.When we had the diagnosis, it was a shock for all of us, of course. Mom had some symptoms often, which were always justified by the sedentary lifestyle, with laziness that had of exercises. If she climbed a few steps of stairs and was exhausted, said that she was not used. If you felt tingling for a whole day in the legs, it was because you slept in a bad position.It was hard to convince her that it was not normal to have symptoms like these for a long period. Luckily, she has two stubborn people around her, and me and dad didn’t give up until we took her to the doctor.After being referred to a neurologist and having a series of tests, the terrible di
There are things in life that I would not like to worry about.Do not take me wrong, I am not a bad person or without scruples, but I know the limit of things. I know it’s not normal that I’m worried about my secretary at this level. I was unfocused in the last few days, thinking what the hell happened to her for having asked for this leave so urgently. Although Nicole has her bad moments, she is a great employee and never left me in her hands before.It was insane days, when I realized that she was the person who brought me back to reality, the only one able to prevent me from diving into work to the point of forgetting everything. Proof of this is that I missed an important meeting. Not because I didn’t know about it, I did, but I lost the fucking notion of time. When I saw it, it had been too long.Nicole keeps me alert and makes me land when my mind is shut down for too long to focus on what I have to do.I hope very much that this woman comes back today.Not that I’m looking at m
Her eyes, now more green than brown, stare at me in shock. She opens and closes her mouth and looks sheepishly at the other employees.“Isn't she your secretary? What would she have to say?” Pierre asks, taken aback by what I've said.“What does that have to do with anything? She's my secretary, and I want to know what she has to say about your presentation. Besides, her resume is just as good as yours, Bones. In fact, I'd say it's even better. Did you know that she once held the same position as you at our biggest competitor?”If Nicole was shocked before, the look on her face now is priceless. I've rarely seen her as speechless as she's at this moment. Her beautiful eyes stare at me as if they want to kill me, and I like that reaction. I can deal with the fact that she hates me for catching her off guard. But I can't deal with her sadness.The rest of the team is also paralyzed, studying Nicole more closely. It's as if they've only just realized she's here. Pierre tries to hide his
- Allison's POV“I'm going to have the boys' afternoon too, then I'm going to talk bad about you women and eat junk food, we're going to talk about men's issues, dad's already in, right Dad?” Oliver asks and my father-in-law is rolled over asleep.“He fell asleep...” My mother-in-law says and Oliver closes his eyes, picking up some pink nail polish.“You’re no good...” I say, laughing softly, Oliver straightens up and starts painting my father-in-law’s toenails.“Oliver prepares each one with Anton...” My mother-in-law says amusedly.I just laugh and we stay in the TV room for a long time, when my father-in-law wakes up and sees his nails he just laughs and calls Oliver a brat, he doesn't even care about his painted nails, his relationship with Oliver is beautiful to see, at least I'm going to have fun at my in-laws' house.Today is Wednesday and we are going to the hospital to see
- Allison's POV"Of course! Without the seed, the land and water are useless...” He says looking around.“I'm the one who has the land, the vase, and the water, not to mention that I'm still going to carry the flower with me for months and I'm still going to have to fertilize, so I'm the one responsible, and I'm the one who's going to put the flower out, so without That would be impossible for me.” I'm just talking about looking at him.“My seed is rare!” He says and I laugh in his face.“Rare for what reason? As far as I know, her dick isn't gold, it's made up of two balls and a stick like every man's…” I say mockingly and Oliver widens his eyes.“Are you insinuating that I have a small dick? And still in front of the baby?” He asks shocked and I laugh even more.“I'm not insinuating anything... just commenting on the facts...” I say laughing and he looks like he's
- Allison's POV“Love is my belly, I think the baby is still very small,” I say kissing his hair.“I’ll listen to Jennifer’s too,” Enrico says and puts his head on her belly.“I think our baby is farting bread too, I can hear some noises,” Enrico says and we just laugh.“Boys, the babies are still very small, I think they are the size of a bean or a little bigger, those noises you are hearing are normal from the tummy...” Mom explains.“Exactly, are these noises normal, speaking of which, do you already have a doctor? I think it would be good to make an appointment.” My mother-in-law says looking at me.“I have one, but I don’t think she’s an obstetrician,” I speak thoughtfully.“Mine is, she was the one who recommended the urologist that Enrico is undergoing treatment for, I’ll call her early tomorrow morning and schedule our appoi
- Allison's POV“Mother-in-law Allison is saying that red is tacky! She's calling the lady corny and saying that our baby won't leave the hospital wearing red clothes, since everyone knows that babies leave the hospital wearing red clothes for good luck, I left the hospital wearing red, of course, I don't remember, but the photos can prove it! Tell her that the baby is going to come out red and threaten her with the shoe.” Oliver says opening the door looking like a tantrum child, Mom is wearing a dress with red details and I can't believe he's making a fuss about the baby's clothes.“My baby will leave the hospital in white, and that’s a decided matter,” I say crossing my arms.“Mother-in-law do something! She’s trying to ruin the baby’s exit!” Oliver says accusing me.“Were the tests positive?” My mother-in-law asks, coming up behind my mother.Everyone piles in at the door and we ha
- Allison's POV“I'm so afraid of Oliver being alone as an old man, this boy would die without care. I have faith that everything will be positive, my bambino will be a daddy, I've already made a promise, if Allison is pregnant I will donate toys and clothes to an orphanage, and I will pray. Our Father...” My father-in-law says looking at me.“Dad, I won’t be alone when I’m old, Allison will be with me and I can take care of myself,” Oliver says rolling his eyes."You do not know nothing! You were going to live on fast food, but now you will have children and a wife who will take care of you, now I can die in peace.” My father-in-law says dramatically.“Nothing will die! You'll live a long time yet! I want to see my great-grandchildren being born and you will be by my side.” My mother-in-law says with a smile on her lips.“Oliver will even give me great-grandchildren, this is a miracle,
- Allison's POV“Rotten cheese! I was going to say it was a bad idea to open that, but don't worry, little one, I'm here and I'm going to throw that cheese away right now...” Oliver says kissing my hair and squeezing me.“I’m so sorry, I couldn’t have imagined that cheese would cause so much damage.” My father-in-law says guilty and I see mom whispering to my mother-in-law.“It wasn’t the cheese’s fault, they’re pregnant,” Mom says and I freeze.“Pregnant?” Dad and my father-in-law ask in unison.“Yes, both, I was already suspicious, but now I’m sure,” Mom says and I'm holding my breath.“Mom, I’m not pregnant... if I was, I’d know,” I say laughing.I mean, me? Pregnant? No, I would know, of course, I would know if I was."I might be," Jennifer says seriously and Enrico's eyes are wide.I look at Oliver w
- Allison's POV“See mother-in-law, I have my eye on her... Allison is so prominent.” Oliver says to tease me.“Me, right?” He is the one who is abused.“Yourself, but I love you, so it’s okay,” Oliver says giving me a small smile.“It’s too abused for my taste, don’t worry, you’ll see,” I say taking a good look at him.“Put more flour here, love... let's focus on the bread...” He says and I can tell he's scared.Oliver kneads the dough and we chat, when the dough is ready we let it rest a little and it made so much dough that it will make four large baguettes, so we decided to make two more types of fillings.While the dough was resting we made the fillings and when everything was ready Enrico and Oliver rolled out the dough to fill everything, we already agreed to have pizza night and Oliver is excited about the idea of him cooking.Jennifer and I washe
- Allison's POV“Hi Daddy,” I say without knowing if he's going to scold me.Dad doesn't say anything, he just walks up to me and stops in front of me.“I'm mad at you! Do you understand that it was wrong to omit what happened? How do you hide something like that Allison?” Dad says seriously.“I felt humiliated, the Lord doesn't know how embarrassing it is to know that I married a gay man, it was only when I saw that bad character with someone else that I realized how stupid I was, he always showed signs of father, but I was stupid and I didn't see ..." I explain.“It’s not humiliating to be fooled Allison, he fooled everyone! I still wonder how you had the cold blood to see what you saw and not do anything! Not to mention that you put up with that unfortunate guy chasing you and lying to me and your mother.” Dad says gesturing.“Dad, I did what I thought was best, I didn’t want to be
- Allison's POV“Lady, the bathroom bowl is blocked, we noticed it yesterday when we got to the room...” I speak with the greatest poker face in the world.“Really girl, I was going to call reception to let you know, but I was already naked and had a hard-on so we left it alone,” Oliver says holy shit.“Oliver!” I say angry.“Everything is fine, thanks for letting me know, I’ll pass the information on to the maintenance staff.” The receptionist says nice.Oliver swipes his card to pay the bill and when we leave the Motel I start to catch his attention.“Did I need to tell the woman that I was naked and had a hard-on?” I ask angrily.“I had to be realistic for her to believe us...” He says with a shrug.“You and this habit of talking about our privacy to people, soon the girl at the Motel reception will write a book telling our story based on what you