Counterpoints 2 (Counterpoints #2) Read online

  Isabella’s wavy hair was down. Her curls swayed, just above her shoulders.

  The top of her MB shirt was slightly open and it was practically impossible not to notice her sexy, feminine body in those skinny blue trousers.

  Are uniforms meant to make people look so sexy? It certainly worked for her, Christopher thought.

  Isabella’s honey brown eyes went from Christopher to Tommasini, then back to Christopher.

  “Hi” she said, a small smile on her lips.

  “Hi, I don’t think we’ve met” Pietro Tommasini said and they shook hands “Piacere”

  “Piacere mio” Isabella nodded and her eyes went back to Christopher “I am sorry to interrupt, but you have an interview and then a signing session in an hour”

  “Okay, Isabella” Christopher smirked.

  She looked away, back to Pietro Tommasini and engaged in small talk.

  Yes, she was new. Yes, it was her first year. And yes, she liked her job.

  Isabella kept focusing on Pietro, her head up, trying to avoid Christopher’s eyes.

  He was staring, staring at them both, as Pietro Tommasini asked her about work and where she was from.

  Pietro was from Italy too but from the north.

  Yes, she had been to Turin a few times.

  And yes, I am blushing because he won’t stop staring, Isabella’s eyes darted to Christopher for an instant.

  “Didn’t you say we had to go?” Christopher asked, his face amused when Isabella’s cheeks turned red.

  “Yeah, we need to go” she nodded, her eyes wide. Stop staring! “It was a pleasure” she shook hands with Pietro again.

  “The pleasure was all mine” Pietro smiled. “And remember: if these guys give you a hard time, you could always come work for us”

  Men in this sport are such flirts, the lot of them.

  “They are the ones who need to watch out. I know how to give THEM a hard time, if they try anything on me” Isabella said and pointed her finger at Christopher.

  Christopher chuckled and patted Pietro on the shoulder, a sly smile glued on his lips.

  Yeah, she’s a smart cookie. She knows her stuff, Christopher thought, as his friend had just had a taste of Isabella’s sassiness.

  “Good luck tomorrow, mate” Christopher said to his rival.

  Then, he gently placed his right hand behind Isabella’s back and walked in silence to the main exit.

  It burns like fire, Isabella thought feeling his touch on her.

  “Is everything okay?” Isabella asked once in the car.

  He looked her way “So, now you are talking to me”

  “When have I stopped talking to you?” she smiled and tilted her head to the side.

  “I had a feeling you have been avoiding me all day” he smiled.

  “It’s hard, if not impossible when one works together” Busted! “You were just busy with the sponsors, then with your training before the qualifying session… and I was working with Hillary” her shoulders went up.

  Isabella had been in fact avoiding him.

  She felt guilty.

  Isabella had slipped, going against her own words and meeting him the night before.

  She felt guilty, alright, for slipping right into his arms again.

  But waking up that morning, after a rather sleepless night, Isabella had realized something. She realized it hurt to keep him away, it hurt not to speak to him.

  Just the same way it hurt to trust him again.

  It hurts both ways…

  “About the qualifying session…”

  “I sucked” Christopher blurted out.

  “You did not” she eyed him. He is such a perfectionist.

  Their eyes locked.

  No, he’s a hot perfectionist. She quickly put those thoughts to the side.

  “Oh come on, you can say it. I fucked it up”

  “Okay, you need to expand a little there because we are going to speak to journalists again in a few minutes and ‘I fucked it up or I sucked’ aren’t exactly the sort of things you want to be saying on the news” she mocked him and shook her head.

  “What a pity, I thought I was doing so well. Maybe I should take some advice from Noah on how to answer questions. I should say I sucked because I am here only thanks to my ‘privileged’ surname”

  Isabella looked up at him, a little stunned.

  He had found out about Noah’s interview already.

  Of course he found out, Noah had said those words in front of ten or twelve journalists after free practice.

  He smiled at her and leaned his head back on the car seat. Christopher placed a hand on his forehead, feeling a little tired after a rather busy afternoon – and after a long, sleepless night.

  “I am sorry about that”

  “It’s not your fault, Bresciani” he said, waving it off and still smiling at her “I know him and his stupid mind games. He’s trying to piss me off, he’s trying to play with my head. I won’t let him have it”

  They crossed the city in a haste, the driver doing his best to make way through the terrible traffic that was forming head.

  Her eyes went down to Christopher’s left arm –only inches away from hers.

  It was strong, sinuous and she could see a few veins cross his upper arm. His skin always looked a little tanned, just like his mothers. Such a beautiful contrast with his green eyes and brown hair.

  Stop drooling and snap back to reality. Remember, he is the one who was kissing another woman a few days ago.

  Isabella stared at him, while her inner struggle took place. He had said he was sorry, that it hadn’t meant a thing.

  He told her off, told her he was with you.

  Well, that he was dating someone anyway. Someone important enough to say no to a one night thing.

  “Are we good, Bresciani? You and I?” he asked out of the blue.

  “Hardly” she raised an eyebrow at him and then couldn’t help but give a hint of a smile “Let’s talk about work right now. What happened, really happened out there… on track? Was it the car or not? What did your engineer say to you? Journalists are going to ask you these questions in a few minutes, over and over again”

  “I am just going to say I had a bad weekend, I got stuck in traffic during the last lap, too many cars, maybe the brakes, something like that” he shrugged and put his sunglasses back on. It was still very bright outside and his green eyes needed a shield.

  At least that was his excuse, if Isabella asked.

  The last thing he wanted was for Isabella to figure out that something was up, that something was bothering him.

  She still wasn’t over what had happened in Cannes, it wasn’t the right moment to tell her about his troubles.

  “Christopher” she started to say but he cut in.

  “I just didn’t have a good feeling with the car. I have too many things on my mind…”

  “Do you want to tell me about it?” she asked again and wanted to bite her tongue for being so persistent.

  Maybe he just wanted to be left alone, he had his own problems which he didn’t necessarily want to share with the rest of the world. Nor her.

  One thing was sure, though. If something was affecting his concentration, his focus, it must have been something important. It wasn’t like Christopher to lose control “If there’s anything I can do…”

  “You could say we are good”

  “I can’t tell you that” she shook her head, looking down.

  I wish I had a reset button, so I could forget.

  But would she really want to forget? Forget everything? Because reset buttons weren’t made to filter what memories to forget and what to keep. Reset buttons would just cancel everything.

  Was Isabella willing to forget everything, erase how she felt about him? How he had made her feel?

  “Well, you can write about this situation between you and I, as one of the reasons I did a terrible qualifying session”

  “Stop fooling around”

&
nbsp; “Who’s fooling around?” he looked at her serious, from behind his dark sunglasses.

  When he wasn’t smiling, the small scar on his upper lip was perfectly visible.

  “You need to think about the Championship, just the Championship now”

  “You know what I am thinking of right now? I’m thinking of you, how I’d like to kiss you. Just like I kissed you on that airplane. How I’d like to take you right here…”

  “Stop. Let’s take a step back” Isabella’s cheeks were on fire, her whole body was on fire. She held out a hand in front of her, to stress her point. He needed to stop talking about them “Focus on the race tomorrow”

  “I told you, it didn’t mean anything”

  “Work, work, Christopher”

  “I don’t give a fuck about work right now. Why won’t you listen?” his voice was firm.

  “Why won’t you listen?” Isabella was now sitting at the edge of her seat, her chest moving up and down frantically. “It’s not that, it’s not just about the kiss”

  “What is it then?”

  “You lied to me”

  “I never lied to you”

  “You didn’t tell me”

  “I didn’t want to hurt you”

  “It doesn’t make it okay”

  “Then what does? What do you want me to do, Isabella? Where is Giselle right now? I am here with you, telling you I want you and believe me when I say I am a mess at this. So it’s hard for me as it is” he kept his eyes on her, steady, hard “What will it take you to believe me? Is this about something else? Someone else?”

  Isabella’s mouth dropped open. So many words bubbled up inside of her but she couldn’t say a thing, not a single thing. She felt an acute pain in her chest, it was steady and deep, deep in her lungs. She tried to breathe slowly and did her best to block her thoughts.

  What was he implying? What was Christopher saying?

  She felt the pain grow, as the thought tickled her mind.

  I’m scared he is going to turn out just like him, just like my father. A cheater.

  There it was, the awful truth that had been secretly bothering her, so painful it was hard for her to admit to herself, not to mention to others.

  “I’m sorry” he said, seeing her go silent.

  Her eyes were sad and maybe a little lost. It killed him and it was all his fault.

  He wanted to reach out and touch her, kiss her, hold her tight but didn’t dare to do so. He had never seen Isabella so quiet.

  “I’m sorry. I’m just nervous because I did a shit job today. You are right. Let’s just talk work”

  “Okay” she said, after a few instants.

  She nodded but didn’t say another word, until the car stopped at a curb near the store. It was time to step out and leave the conversation they had just had inside that car.

  “We have to go” Isabella stared outside the window, dreading the sight of the cameras but relieved like never before she wasn’t the one the public was interested in.

  Isabella looked back at Christopher and thought about what he had said a moment before.

  The truth was that he was just as lost as she was. Christopher had no idea what to do, what to say to change things, to make them okay again.

  He wasn’t used to this- he had said so himself- he wasn’t capable of dealing with rejection and not because he was presumptuous or spoiled. He just had never found himself in that position, in having to make amends for something, for situations that had never been a ‘problem’ for him before.

  Women and relationships.

  “Forget what I said” he told her, his grip tightened on his back pack.

  Christopher slipped on his black leather jacket, ready to step outside, ready to put his confident face back on.

  “Okay” and Isabella bit her lip, aggravated with herself.

  Okay???? Okay? That’s all I can say to him? He’s opening himself to me and I am like ‘Okay??

  “Okay” he said back and Isabella looked up at him, swearing he was trying to tease her, to make some sort of joke, to change the mood of their conversation. His lips curled up in a half smile and the expression on Isabella’s face softened.

  The driver opened the door, to let her out first.

  Chapter 8

  A text from Hillary made Isabella’s head snap in the direction of her phone.

  There was a ding from her email account and there it was, the first correction from Mr. Jenkins. The first correction post sneaking up on him in that alleyway, post sneaking up on him kissing Hillary in Cannes, post meeting in London- where he had been put in his place by team manager Mr. Johnson.

  He’s unbreakable.

  Isabella sighed and let herself fall on the bed, her body bounced a little on the soft mattress. She had hoped he’d have the decency to disappear, to stop annoying her with his stupid requests but no. There it was, email number one, post Cannes liaison with Hillary.

  She raised her hand and scanned the email quickly, still lying on the bed.

  “Change first paragraph with Christopher’s interview in store…” she dropped her phone on the bed, not bothering to read the corrections he had made.

  The hell with him. What does he want from me now?

  Honestly, it was just a post about the autograph signing session and some questions the fans had asked Christopher. It was a funny one. Christopher had been nice to everyone and had participated to quite an exhausting number of selfies.

  It would have killed anyone, one hour of screaming fans, screaming girls too, Isabella thought, but not Christopher. He had been his perfect self all along.

  Isabella felt a shiver down her back, recalling how they had walked out of the store side by side, together, photographers and cameras everywhere, reporters walking backwards to take shots of them- of him really, but inevitably she had been in some of them, too.

  Why would anyone strive to have that sort of attention?

  Her thought went to people like Giselle, always searching for attention, for their minute of fame.

  The only pleasure Isabella could think of, in walking hand in hand with Christopher, would have been his touch and his attention. And no one else’s.

  A terrible headache made her cringe.

  All those fans screaming Christopher’s name, plus the tough day on the track, had sucked the life out of her. The last thing she felt like doing, was sit in front of her laptop again.

  Why now? Why did Mr. Jenkins have to start talking to me again today of all days? Isabella thought, her mind going back to Mr. Jenkins and his annoying requests.

  It had been too good to be true, his distance from Isabella –and Hillary- since they had arrived in Toronto, with Mr. Jenkins being away for business in New York that weekend.

  She picked up the phone again and read Hillary’s text message.

  “Ignore his email, honey. It’s perfect the way it is and I am backing you up in this”

  Isabella wanted to scream for the joy.

  “Thank you, I think I am in love with you right now” she smiled, as she wrote her text to Hillary.

  “I love you too darling but no relationships on the job, I learnt that the hard way” and she sent an emoticon, a wink.

  Of course Hillary was joking but Isabella felt it again- it pierced her skin- the stab.

  No relationships on the job.

  I’m in hell, I’m in hell.

  Her phone rang and the blood in her veins stopped circulating. It was now eleven at night in Toronto- she checked her watch- and early morning in Europe.

  She knew only one person that was awake and working at that time and that was Mr. Jenkins.

  Isabella’s eyes checked the number and it was Italian. She let out a sigh and answered.

  “Hello?”

  “My house is a cardboard maze and I am thinking of you and the time we moved apartment at Uni. Remember that? We stayed awake all night packing and drinking wine and then we waited for the truck to pick up the stuff and then we slept al
l day on the couch of the new apartment, with a miserable blanket because we couldn’t be bothered to open the boxes again”

  “And we skipped classes and ate junk food and drank some more wine” Isabella smiled to Cristina’s words.

  “Three bottles” she heard her friend laugh on the other side.

  “I think they were two” Isabella corrected her.

  “That’s not the story I always tell everyone, I am sticking to my old version”

  Isabella held on tight to her phone and sat up on the bed.

  “Are you okay?”

  “Yeah, I just hate seeing my life in boxes” Cristina said.

  “You’ll open the boxes up north, in Milan and it will all be fine again” Isabella said softly, trying to sooth Cristina’s pain.

  She knew why her friend had called, how she felt the loss of leaving her city, her beautiful eternal city of Rome.

  “You think?”

  “I know” Isabella pressed on “It’s a wonderful adventure for you, Carlo and the kids”

  “It’s a great opportunity for Carlo. And I am sure the kids will adjust easily. But I’ll keep the office in Rome”

  “Oh?” Isabella was surprised to hear that.

  Since her husband Carlo had been promoted as head of the Milan office of the company he worked for, it had been in the cards for Cristina and her family to move there too, so that they could all be together. But now, hearing that Cristina was going to keep her job in Rome, didn’t quite add up.

  “Yeah, I’ll go down to Rome once or twice a week and see how that goes” she mumbled.

  Cristina had other lawyers working for her, so she was probably going to give them more space, more responsibilities now that she was going to live in Milan.

  “Sounds like a plan. When are you guys driving up there?”

  “Today after lunch, so the kids can nap during the first hours of the trip”

  “Give those angels a kiss from me”

  “Sure. What time is it there?”

  “Eleven in the evening”

  “Did I wake you?”

  “No, not at all. I can’t sleep anyway”

  “Same here” Cristina paused “Wait, hold on a second. Aren’t you supposed to be at the race tomorrow ?”