Authors: Arianne Richmonde
Tags: #Romance, #Erotica, #Richmonde, #Arianne
Hooked Up: Book 3
Pearl’s & Alexandre’s Playlist for the Hooked Up Series
by
ARIANNE RICHMONDE
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Arianne Richmonde 2015
Kindle Edition
Copyright © Arianne Richmonde, 2013. The right of Arianne Richmonde to be identified as the author of this work has been asserted by her under the Copyright Amendment (Moral Rights) 2000
This book is a work of fiction. Names, places, characters and incidents are either a product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual events, locales or persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental.
Cover design © by: Arianne Richmonde
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I
STARED IN DISBELIEF AT LAURA’S sinister, black front door. I had not moved from this park bench. The only thing that had changed in the last ten minutes was the music I was listening to on my iPod. The Blues replaced by Patsy Cline’s
Sweet Dreams.
That was all I had left: dreams of Alexandre, and memories of how it used to be between us. Had I just imagined the intensity of our bond, our passion? “He was in lust with you,” Laura told me, just twenty minutes ago, and I now saw that what she said was true. Alexandre walked through her door with a huge Christmas gift. What more proof did I need that it was over between us?
He was still in love with her: his ex fiancée. This horrific fact was seeping through my veins like green poison, sapping me of energy, rendering me drained, making me feel as if my life had been nothing but a lie for the last five months.
Laura’s words, “rebound” and “detour,” to describe who and what I was to Alexandre, were ringing in my ears. Twice, I tried to get up from where I was sitting. I wanted to rap at that foreboding black door and confront him, but my muscles were weak. I could hardly move. Laura had been plotting and scheming to get him back all along, and he was waiting, as she said, for her to click her fingers.
Click.
And he rushed back to her like an eager dog.
I fumbled about in my beautiful red Birkin bag for my cell phone. I needed to speak to Alessandra Demarr. Maybe she could clear a few things up for me.
My memory slid back to that moment when I fled Alessandra’s house, when I found that photo of her and Sophie together in an intimate embrace. I’d had the notion that they had set me up and that Sophie was trying to destroy my life by wheedling herself in on my film projects; infiltrating her way into HookedUp Enterprises. Alexandre testified to her innocence, swore that her motivation came from nothing more than her desire to help out her girlfriend and get us out of a sticky situation when Samuel Myers wasn’t good for the money. Like a fool I didn’t believe him. But now I understood that Alexandre was probably telling the truth. I was so “hooked up” on Sophie that I was blind to what was really going on . . . Laura, my real enemy from word go.
Laura told me that Sophie actually liked me, confirming what Alexandre had also said. Either I was living some sort of Hitchcockian nightmare, where everyone was conspiring to drive me to a loony bin, or they were right; I had misjudged Sophie, wrongly accused her. There I was, obsessing about my future sister-in-law, when it was Laura I should have been looking out for, all along.
Alessandra picked up her phone after several rings. She sounded groggy and I realized it was only eight a.m. Los Angeles time; she wasn’t an early riser. Too bad, I couldn’t wait. Rise. And. Shine.
“It’s Pearl,” I said with urgency. “Sorry to wake you.”
I heard a growling yawn. “Can you call back, I was sleeping—I thought it was a family emergency.” Her sleepiness was evident, her Italian accent more pronounced than usual.
“Well, considering that you and I could have been family, it is.”
“What are you talking about, Pearl?”
“Alessandra, I’m so sorry to wake you and everything, but I’m not in a good way and I really need to talk.”
“If this is about
Stone Trooper
—”
“It’s about Sophie, your girlfriend, my ex-to-be sister-in-law.” I was aware of how crazy that sounded. I did up the top button of my coat; the London humidity was getting into my bones. My eyes were still fixed on Laura’s front door as I held my cell next to my ear in my other shaky hand. I needed answers and I needed them now. But the idea of banging on Laura’s door was too humiliating for words.
Alessandra’s voice suddenly perked up with interest. “Did Sophie tell you that she and I were a couple?”
“I found a photo of you two in your kitchen, and Alexandre confirmed to me that Sophie was gay.”
“Don’t you
dare
say anything to Sophie about us, Pearl, about that night.
Please!”
she pleaded, the desperation and fear in her voice taking me by surprise.
“So you and Sophie weren’t playing some game on me? Some, ‘let’s screw with Pearl’s head’ kind of game?”
She chuckled, her laugh laced with irony. “What? Are you
insane?”
“It just seemed all too much of a coincidence; that I was working on
Stone Trooper
. . . suddenly Sophie gets involved . . . you coming on board at the perfect moment and then seducing me—”
“Look, can we talk about this later? I need a coffee. I can’t even think straight right now.”
“Alessandra. I’m sitting outside Laura’s house in London, and she just so happens to be—not only Alexandre’s ex-freaking-fiancée—but his
present
fiancée as well. He’s inside her house as we speak. He’s involved with her again. No, let me spell that out:
he is going to marry her
, she is divorcing her husband. She’s all buddy-buddy with Sophie and—”
“What? Sophie hates that money-grabbing bitch!”
Did I just hear that right?
“But Alexandre said they were friends.”
“Sophie puts up with her,” Alessandra informed me in her husky voice, all the more husky for being the morning. “She’s never liked Laura. Anyway, I don’t think she’s seen or spoken to her for ages.”
I squealed out, “But I was at Laura’s house, just now, and she said Sophie was coming over! They spoke on the phone. In French, no less.”
“I doubt that, Pearl. Look, I’m sleepy, can we speak later?”
“Wait! No. Alessandra . . . why, when we were in LA, were you referring to Sophie as your ‘ex’ if you’re still together?”
“Questions, questions.”
“Please Alessandra!”
“We had a big fight. She said I was using her to get ahead in my career. All because I was too busy to speak to her one time. That was just before you arrived in LA. She told me it was over. So I had some fun with you, to spite her.”
“You were planning on telling Sophie about us to make her jealous?”
“No, of course not. I’m not that dumb. She’d come after us both with a carving knife. But it made me smile inside, you know, knowing I had the last laugh. Sorry, Pearl, I have to admit . . . I was using you to make myself feel better. Can I hang up now?”
“No! I need to know more about Laura.”
“I’ve never met her,” Alessandra replied, bored, punctuated by a yawn.
My heart sank. I remembered Laura’s words:
“He was fond of you, it’s true, but he thinks you’re a total loony. All that lesbian bondage nonsense – oh and your slutty past . . .”
I had assumed Sophie had enlightened Laura, but from what Alessandra said, obviously not. The only other person that knew about my adventure with Alessandra Demarr was Alexandre himself.
How did Laura know those intimate details of my sex life?
Simple, he must have told her. She was speaking the truth. He confided in her, even when it came to me. I felt so belittled.
Belittled. And cheap.
Alessandra piped up, “Anyway, Pearl, as I was saying, Sophie is not a big fan of Laura’s. Apparently Laura has been sniffing about Alexandre again and showing real interest. Her husband has lost a lot of capital on the stock market, or is being done for some dodgy dealings tax-wise and no longer has the kind of money he had before. So Sophie thinks she’s after Alexandre because of what he can offer her.”
Hmm, interesting.
“What does Sophie say about
me
?” I asked, wondering if Sophie was suspicious of everyone who came near her brother.
“You really want to know?”
My heart started pounding . . . might as well hear the worst. “Yes.”
“She thinks you’re the best thing to happen to Alexandre for years. At first, she suspected that you were like all the other women after him: interested primarily in money. But when you told him you wanted to do a pre-nup and refused to take a stake in HookedUp Enterprises, she knew you loved him for
him
.”
Wouldn’t everyone love him for him?
“Why is she still so bitchy, then?”
“It’s part of her DNA, Pearl. But if you made more of an effort, you’d find she’d be a good friend to you. She said that, too. That you didn’t like her, that you still hadn’t forgiven her, and that you were a hard nut to crack.”
“She said all this in English? Hard nut to crack?”
“Of course not. You know how bad her English is—we speak in French.”
“You speak French? I didn’t know that.”
“Well, Pearl, there’s a lot you don’t know about me. Just keep quiet about our little evening, will you?”
“Are you kidding me? Of course. Anyway, I don’t have anyone to tell even if I wanted to. It’s over between Alexandre and me.”
“Nonsense. Latin passion can escalate or descend at any moment—he’ll be back.”
“That’s just it, Alessandra. He broke up with me in a cold, passionless voice. And now he’s seeing Laura again. Not just seeing her, but sleeping with her. She’s like some top model . . . I don’t stand a chance.”
“You say you’re outside Laura’s house and Alexandre is inside? Go and knock at the door, silly. I’m going back to sleep. Remember, don’t you
dare
tell Sophie about what happened or you’ll regret it.”
“Is that a Sicilian threat?”
“You bet.”
Revenge is a dish best served cold.
“Don’t worry, Alessandra, my lips are sealed. You think I want Sophie running after me with a carving knife? Thanks for talking to me—things are a lot clearer now. Good night, morning, whatever. Sleep well.”