1
Gisele
“Areyou sure you want to wear a wig?” Vivienne Wolf skeptically as she glanced at me with her usually serene face now contorted with disapproval. She certainly had not liked my loony idea the moment it had hatched from my less thanlucidmind.
“Yes, it’s necessary.” My heart raced as I studied my calm reflection in the brightly lit cosmetic mirror. Stripped of any artifice, my face flushed with a beautiful glow after the timely back to back facials I’d had for the past few days, making sure I was in my prime best for tonight. Nether region waxed bare, eyebrows groomed and tweaked, shaved and polished on every inch ofmybody.
Yes, everything was as itshouldbe.
The plan for how to seduce the man I’d had designs on since the beginning of time had materialized when I had been two bottles deep into Dom Perignon. While Vivienne and Blair busied themselves with swaying from one crush to the other, I remained resolute, beholden to one man—the unsmiling, all serious Jared St.James.
We were in Blair’s bedroom in an adjacent vanity area specifically for hair and makeup alone. It was lavishly decorated in pink, black, and gold, the very portrayal of her personality—the bitchy princess. She wasn’t royal, but she was every ounce of the pampered princess—all regal, snobbish, and anyone she deemed stupid would get a serious whiplash from her scathing remarks. She was the only girl of the infamous mogul Hank Rinaldi, who was recently outed by the media as having a bastard hidden in thebackground.
“That’s the whole point. Shehasto look different, or he’d immediately recognize her!” Blair Rinaldi irately remarked back at ourfriend.
She’d been short-tempered lately after breaking up with the twenty-three-year-old João Roberto, the hottest Brazilian man we had ever seen. She had stated she was too young to fall in love and at her blossoming stage. There was too much to experience in life to be caught up in a whirlwind romance and skew her fresh perspective of the future. Although her parents were still married, they lived in separate bedrooms, and her father wasn’t particularly discreet with his mistresses. Her mother had drilled it into her head that no man was to be trusted. And I supposed her mother’s wisdom reflected on how she treated the opposite sex, as if they were simply dispensable. And yet here was Blair a week after breaking that man’s heart, short fused and desperately scouring for arebound.
Best friends since the age of five, we were thick as thieves, sisters not by blood but a stronger bond that went over and beyond the normal call of friendship. Vivienne and Blair had their fair share of going boy crazy, and through it all, I had been there standing guard, making sure their parents hadn’t had a clue of the kind of mischief they were up to. Both women had their fun, and this time, it was my turn. Little did they know what I hadinmind.
Oh, I could be naughty, too. It just had to be with the right person. After years of being teased for being a good girl because I didn’t want to date anyone else, the always designated, straight A student and a certified sober bore was about to wander into the naughty world. One night was all I dreamt of, one night with him. Then I’d fully let go of this grand delusion of loving a manfromafar.
“I honestly don’t get why you have to put yourself through all this, Gisele. I’m sure you already know, but there’s a sea of guys who’d die to have you in their life. Why can’t you drop this idea of Jared? Aussie men are hot—I get the obsession—but there’s so many of them out there, babe! You can get one who’s chill and less intimidating. Besides, Jared’s a little too old for you, anyway,” Vivienneremarked.
Vivienne would never understand it. Though she wasn’t prudish, she didn’t like the idea of pursuing men. In her mind, it should be the other way around. We all loved to be chased. I mean, who wouldn’t? But my circumstances were different than theirs. While they lavished on young men’s attention, as did I once in awhile if they were cute and engaging enough, my attention had been held by one man and one man alone for as long as I couldremember.
Jared was the only male I had met who wasn’t fascinated by my beauty. And since the man was worth billions, my father’s riches didn’t impress him, either. My father, Peter Weber, was the world’s top richest man. And Jared trailed closely behind him. The two were like father and son, but Jared never spared me a glance. He was always so reserved and only spoke when I politely addressed him, but he never went out of his way to converse with me. I suppose with the nine-year age gap, in his mind, there wasn’t much to discusswithme.
I was more like my mother; Edna Weber had once been Miss Universe, a beauty queen from Brazil, and had caught my father’s eye when he had been about to reach the pinnacle of his success. Though many would argue that she sought him for his riches, their relationship was built on love. I grew up knowing and feeling the love from both of my parents. Well, up until three years ago when my mother died from a throat surgery. My father’s never been the same. The loss of my mother had taken a toll on him in every facet of his life. The once vibrant man now had his brightness dimmed with profound sorrow severely etched around his gaunt face. Before mom died, he had weekends off, but those days were long gone. These days, he spent every waking moment in his company, diligently going through new inventions and ensuring vast development progression in the evolving world of technologytoday.
As much as I was in awe of my father, I wished he’d spare me some attention. It wasn’t only him who had a gaping hole in his life, a massive void that couldn’t be replaced. I lost her, too. All at once, I lost my mother, my best friend, and my number one cheerleader. And there wasn’t a day that passed that I didn’t mourn the loss of her. But she was gone, and there was nothing we could do about it. The only way we could remember her was to celebrate her kindness and cherish the beautiful memories she leftbehind.
My father mourned in his own way. I wished that he’d seek me out so we could grieve her together. But Peter Weber wasn’t the touchy-feely type. He wasn’t severe, though he gave off that detached, hard-hearted kind of father. He loved me in his own way, the only way he knew how—by ensuring that I would want fornothing.
Without his guidance and steady strength to help me through the toughest time of my life, I sought solace and comfort in my friends. Blair and Vivienne helped me manage the loss of such a beautiful light in myworld.
My mother was truly a beautiful soul, and I missed her dearly. One of the things she taught me was to follow my dreams and to never stop fighting for what I believed in…and that’s what I was willing to do tonight. So here I was, following my dreams, a dream that led me to Jared St.James.
There was a deep sparkle in my eye, an unfettered burning in my soul, in every single fiber of my being, craving to be unleashed. I was ready to become unbidden and become the sensual woman who’d been longing to break barriers—metaphorically speaking and quite literally—the itsy-bitsy barrier in between mythighs.
“So what’s the plan again?” Vivienne intently glanced at Blair and me. Her delicate features were accentuated with careful application of different highlighters. “What if he shows up with that chick he’s been seeing lately? What’s the protocolonthat?”
As much as I loved my friends, sometimes they give me so little credit. They should know that I wouldn’t even take such a massive risk if there were a possibility of Jared having a woman in his life at the moment. He was quite the lothario in a sense, but he stuck to one woman at a time for however long the relationshipmightbe.
Those women, theymatterednot.
“She won’t be there. Jared doesn’t recycle past lovers. Yovanna was out the door the second she made that tabloidinterview.”
“How could you be so sure?” Vivienne gave me a sparing look as she scrutinized the inky black wig withcondemnation.
“Because I know him. He hates being in the media. He keeps a low profile for a reason, and Yovanna blasted his personal business to the world. If my break-up timeline’s right, he’ll be on the prowl to replace her position. So, in my book, he’s been single for aweeknow.”
Vivienne’s pale blue eyes sparkled with amusement. “Good God, you studied the poor guy. I hope he’s worth all thetrouble,Gi.”
Blair snickered before batting those long sooty lashes of hers. She loved to channel the modern day Audrey Hepburn sans the gentle attitude. My friend was fierce through and through and would never back down on a good verbal sparring withanyone.
“He’s far from poor, but yeah, you can’t fault Gisele for plotting this perfectly. I do hope you can tame thebeast.”
I was devious and cunning…but only when I needed something accomplished. And tonight, my sights were on the man I had yearned for, foryearsnow.