Page 22 of Under His Protection

“Yes.” At least I didn’t have to correct her for calling me the stuffy and formal Ms. Bardot. “And you must be Eva?”

“Why must I be?” she retorted, walking into the room. This woman couldn’t be much older than me, but she moved with a sophisticated confidence and maturity, almost like she knew she would be in charge and counted on that never changing.

“Because… Dante said you’d help me settle in here.”

She narrowed her eyes and crossed her arms as she looked me up and down. “Settle in, huh? Do you actually intend to stay here?”

Uh… no? I wasn’t sure if I should say that, though. Did he tell her that we were fake dating? Do I tell her? Again, I lamented the few details I’d hashed out with him about our agreement.

“Because I can’t see you lasting long.”

Great. Just great. His niece had to have the mentality of my enemies in school. The mean girl. She was the queen of them, that was for sure.

“Why not?” I challenged.

She huffed, looking me up and down. I wasn’t wearing my uniform or crappy shoes. I’d showered and tamed my hair. I didn’t have much makeup to rely on, but I preferred the fresh-faced look, anyway. I wasn’t sure how she could see anything lacking in me on the surface, but I supposed for someone like her, she’d be able to detect when she was in the presence of someone inferior in class.

“You’re not his type.” She stalked closer, slowly and with a clear warning in her stern gaze. “And if you think you can get your way with my uncle and manipulate him at all, think again.”

“Whoa.” I held up my hands with my sarcastic reply. “Easy, tiger.”

“When it comes to my uncle—and my cousin—I will never go easy on anyone barging in here and being an imposter trying to look like they belong.”

She was uncannily accurate with that assessment, and it perturbed me. How could I look so different for her to target me as an outsider? Was it in my posture? The way I spoke or held my head up? I had no clue. For the next several hours, though, as she gave me a tour of the place and then ordered me a wardrobe, I was granted further examples of how I wouldn’t ever belong here.

The lavish décor. The top-line items in every room of the house. And all the expensive, designer clothes coming for me soon. Eva, with her icy tone, was right. Nothing suited me here. Nothing made this feel like a home. I was an imposter. As the day dragged on with her securing the essentials for me, I wished that I could catch even the slightest glimpse of Dante. Just to have a visual reminder of why I was doing this, of how this mattered.

I saw nothing of him. It was only me and Eva as she ordered so many things I gave up trying to calculate the gluttonous spending. I couldn’t justify it. Sure, I couldn’t go home, but maybe George or another soldier could go there and pick up some things for me?

I would have felt more comfortable with something familiar. Once Eva left me in the evening, I grabbed my phone and contacted Tessa. I needed her comfort now more than ever.

She answered quickly, worried about the news that I had “quit” at the steakhouse. Even though we didn’t want anyone to know that we were pretending to date, I told Tessa the truth. She wouldn’t tell anyone, and I needed at least one independent source to know of my whereabouts and why I was here.

“So, that’s what I was doing,” I summarized. “I wasn’t at home getting ready for another shift of waitressing tonight. I was here, at his place, tolerating his icy bitch of a niece as she tried to make me look presentable and show me where to go in this mansion.”

“She’s that bad, huh?”

I felt awful to complain about Eva. I’d only just met her. I didn’t know her to judge her. Likewise, she didn’t know a damn thing about me, but she was clearly judgmental.

“I think she’s very protective of Dante and her cousin.” I rolled over on the bed, lounging on my stomach instead of my back. As I traced vague circles and shapes on the top of the comforter, I sighed. “And I can’t fault her for that. You know, family is family.”

Tessa snorted a laugh. “Yeah, right. Don’t look at me for votes of confidence about a family. It’s kind of wild, though, that you worked for Dante and didn’t even know it!”

I shrugged. “I guess it can be a small world, after all.” I hadn’t told her that he made me come last night. The finer notes about how he’d asked me to play along with him could be something between me and him, not anyone else. I admitted that he’d kissed me, and that seemed to be enough to convince her of this plan.

“And you say he’s not bad on the eyes?” she teased of my summary a few moments earlier.

“Not bad?” I groaned. “My God, girl. He’s so fine.” Slapping my hand over my face, I tried to contain the wide, giddy smile that spread across my lips. “Something has to be seriously, morbidly wrong with me.”

She laughed along, sounding so far away on speakerphone. “Why would you think that?”

Aside from the sheer lunacy of entering a fake relationship just to get out of a forced handover to lawless bikers?

“Lusting after an older man?” I huffed a weak laugh. “He’s so much older than me.”

“Age is just a number. This only means that he’ll know what he’s doing.” She giggled. “In every way.”

Oh, he does. I didn’t want to wonder how many women he’d practiced on to be able to so quickly and effortlessly finger me and make me come so hard like that. I merely appreciated that he could and that he’d chosen to show me. “He’s…”

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