Romance: My Italian Prince, Undercover Love: Sweet Romantic Comedy (13 page)

“Monsieur Di Savoy!” Raffi suddenly shouted.

Vanessa swiveled around and gulped. There’s Alex, looking extremely handsome in his black tie.

“Over here, Monsieur. Look who I found!” Raffi shouted as he gesticulated for Alex's attention with one arm, and with the other, he pointed at Vanessa.

Everyone now had turned their heads and looked at Vanessa as if they were expecting her to do some sort of performance.

Oh my god
, Vanessa's heart began pumping in her chest. As in slow motion she could see Alex turning around and for a few nanoseconds, his eyes met hers. She could feel the crowd staring at her, but she only had eyes for Alex, who now stood staring at her, mouth wide open. After a while, he reacted and began to push his way through the crowd, who in some sort of miracle stepped aside and let him pass as he was Moses and they were the red sea. He looked flabbergasted and Vanessa could feel her legs trembling.

“Why did you do that for?” She hissed to Raffi. “We were supposed to wait for Mitch.”

“Sorry, but I thought you wanted to find Monsieur.” Raffi sounded so upset realizing he had done a mistake, Vanessa couldn’t be mad at him and gave him a forgiving smile.

“Don’t worry about it Raffi, I’ll handle this.” Her self-assured voice almost fooled herself.

She took a deep breath, this was it. She had to handle this by herself. She stood still waiting for Alex to reach her, trying to remember one of Mitch's chants in her head to calm her down, but the only thing that came to her mind was;
Don’t mess this up Vanessa, don’t mess this up.

She gulped and stared, unable to move as Alex climbed the last steps to reach her. His eyes fixed on Vanessa´s and she felt like a deer caught in the headlight. As he got near, she began to tremble. His face was taut and stern, giving nothing away. There were tiny shadows under his eyes and as he reached her, he didn’t smile. For one awful moment, Vanessa thought he had come up to her to tell her to leave.

“Hi…” Vanessa's voice was barely above a whisper.

“Hi there,” Alex's voice was serious and dark.

“I, I need to talk to you about something,” She stumbled on her words as she tried to collect herself.

He nodded gravely. “Let’s go somewhere to talk then.”

He took her arm and led her down the stairs and through the crowded place, which by now had forgot all about the scene that played out a few moments ago and had got back to eating canapés and sipping champagne as if their evening never had been interrupted.

“Alex, baby there you are!” A female voice cut into Vanessa's head as she is walking dreamlike beside Alex.

The red-haired woman came running towards them and without hesitation, she threw herself on Alex. He looked as he was in shock, but he quickly held out his arms to catch the flying woman.
Had she called him baby?
Vanessa looked at them with teary eyes. She tried to stop the tears, but it was too late. Her watery eyes made it hard to see, but it looked as if Alex tried to tell her something, but the red-haired woman’s hair blocked him.

What?
She wanted to scream at him.
What is this?
However, nothing came over her lips. Instead, she turned around and ran, straight into a waiter holding a silver plate full of miniature sandwiches. They all came crashing down on the floor, Vanessa, the canapes, the silver plate, and then the waiter.

“So sorry Mademoiselle,” the waiter pleaded and tried to help Vanessa to her feet.

“Are we having some trouble here?” Raffi´s voice made it sound as if had stolen it from a movie.

As Vanessa sat up and apologized to the waiter for her clumsiness, Rafi advanced towards them and reached for his holster. Vanessa gasped,
is he carrying a gun
? It turned out to be a baton, the telescope kind, and with a swift motion, Raffi extended the baton making it almost as long as him. The waiter looked shocked at him and held up his hands to protect himself, but Raffi just walked past him.

“Come here Vanessa, I’ll help you.”

“Fine thanks,” Vanessa said embarrassed. “I´m okay Raffi.”

Raffi scanned the crowd through his sunglasses and muttered into a headset, “Area one secured, repeat, area one secured.”

Vanessa wondered if he even had someone on the other end of that line but before she’d time to investigate it further she could feel Alex arms around her as he lifted her up and without a word carried her away from the crowd. With his foot he pushed open one of the doors leading to a balcony and put her down.

“Vanessa,” he said and his intense dark blue eyes met hers and Vanessa felt heat waves through her body. It was as if they didn’t have to talk, he could sense it all.

“I have some unfortunate news for you Alex, Vanessa finally said. “But before I continue, I need to know who that woman is? And not only who she
is
, not that isn’t interesting because Kat and I have been guessing and can’t figure it out, but apparently she’s famous, but also who she is to
you
?”

Alex looked a bit confused at Vanessa's long rambling but seemed to grasp the important part of her question.

“She’s nothing to me, trust me, Vanessa. I have been bringing her along on a few occasions just to please Gian-Carlo. She’s actually quite weird and to be totally honest, even a little scary. She seems to pop up everywhere I go nowadays. Perhaps I got myself a stalker.” He gave her a slight smile.

“I see.” Vanessa could easily see why the woman popped up unexpectedly wherever Alex was. Of course, it was Brunetti that had her informed about his whereabouts, and maybe even arranged for her to follow him. She couldn't wait anymore, she had to tell him. Without Mitch´s intervention, scented candles and dream-catchers.

Vanessa looked Alex straight in the eyes. This time, she was about to trust him. She really was. She would be sure to not make any assumptions and not to any harsh moves until she heard the full story.

“Speaking of Brunetti, there are some things you need to know about him,” Her voice faded, as she wasn’t sure on how to proceed.

As she was about to continue she caught a glimpse of what was going on inside the room. Alex turned around as well and saw what she was staring at. It was Mitch and Kat standing arm in arm on the center of the stage. Both holding a microphone and tried to speak into it at the same time. It almost looked as if they fought over who should talk first. Alex opened the balcony door so they could listen.

“On this very day…” They could hear Mitch give the crowd pieces of mental advice and spiritual guidance. Alex turned to Vanessa as she was supposed to know what this was all about.

Vanessa shrugged, this was not according to plan, and she had no idea of what was going on.

Then Kat apparently had enough, with a pull she took the mic and began speaking. With a steady voice, she pointed straight at Brunetti.

“This man is evil! She said in her most theatrical voice. So she’d learned something at that drama school after all, Vanessa had time to think approvingly.

“He has been doing everything he could to try and poison the mind of...” At this point, Mitch had to whisper into her ear. ” Eh, eh Mr. Prince Alessandro Di Savoy, ” Kat said without losing her drama-voice.

Mitch took the mic again and followed up. He told the crowd how he had been manipulated by Brunetti to scare Alex true love away. How he had staged for the paparazzi to follow Alex and that he even planted cocaine and invited Escort-girls to a dinner so Alex would look bad in the press. Of course, he had no evidence for that, but Brunetti’s face said it all. He was guilty. The old man looked as if he crumbled as he slowly backed out of the room. Alex and Vanessa looked on as Brunetti disappeared out in the shadows and exchanged looks.

“So this was what you wanted to tell me?”

“I’m so sorry Alex.”

“No, No don’t be. If it’s true this is all for the best and he will never be part of my life again.”

“Give it up to Mr. and Mrs. Di Savoy. They suddenly heard Mitch and Kat screaming at the microphone simultaneously.

Mitch searched the room, looking for Vanessa and Alex, and when he did, he gesticulated wildly for them to come up on the stage. As in a trance, Alex took Vanessa's hand and they stepped inside. The crowd turned to them and when Mitch and Kat began to applaud everyone else followed. Soon people even began toasting them.

“Is he high again?” Alex whispered to Vanessa.

“Just on himself, and his path to inner peace I guess,” Vanessa answered and the two of them began laughing.

”Congratulations,
Bon Chance
,
Bonne venue
!” Well-wishing’s from the crowd hailed after them as they tried to leave the room.

“Coming through, coming through! Nothing to see here people, nothing to see,” Raffi yelled at guest as he took upon himself to run ahead and secure the area.

Mitch and Kat came running after them. “Hi there Alex,” Kat said and greeted him with a high-five as they all slowed down out on the street.

“Namaste, my brother,” Mitch bowed. “What an intervention! Pew, that was quite something right?”

“Was that the intervention?” Vanessa didn’t know that much about interventions but from what she knew they were supposed to take place in private at a place the intervener could feel secure. Definitely not in public, from a stage, with the press being invited.

“Of course it was the intervention” Mitch answered. “I might have gone off the script a little, but I think we ended up where we wanted anyway?” He looked at all of them with a huge grin on his face.

“That’s great Mitch, really great and nice to finally meet you Katherine, but I think Vanessa and I have a few things to talk about. So if it’s okay with you, perhaps you two could give us some space?”

“Certainly bro,” Mitch backed away and dragged Kat along. “It’s all about finding your inner voice, man! Speak from the heart.” Mitch shouted some spiritual proverbs to them as they disappeared behind a corner.

Alex shook his head and laughed, “Do you have any idea what he’s talking about?” He asked Vanessa who just shook her head as well. “Not a clue.”

“I think he means…” Raffi quickly silenced as he saw Alex and Vanessa's looks on him and backed away.

“I’m sorry Monsieur et Mademoiselle. I’ll leave you two, need to make sure the area is safe anyway,” He said and legged after Mitch and Kat.

Finally, there they were, Vanessa and Alex, alone.

“I thought you were a cocaine addict, who lied to me so you could go party with playboy bunnies,” Vanessa faltered, her voice trembling.

“That kind of hurts, Vanessa. Because even if I saw what you saw in the papers I would never trust some gossip magazines over you. You should have come talked to me and I could've explained.”

“I’m sorry,” Vanessa felt her eyes tearing up again.

“I had no idea it was Brunetti who was behind it all, but I knew someone tried to set me up. I was lost there for a while. You left me without even saying goodbye and then I had all this rumors about myself to clear.”

“It must have been awful,” Vanessa said and tried to dry away her tears before Alex could see them.

“But I’m the one that should be sorry,” Alex said.

“What do you mean?” Vanessa looked at him.

“I should have gone after you, I should have guessed something weird was up but instead I gave up. It was my fault that we ended up like this.”

“It wasn’t,” Vanessa said at once, flooded with relief.

“Yes, and you have every right to be angry at me for not seeing Brunetti for what he really was. I can't believe he took that letter Mitch was talking about and then sent you a letter with your resignation. Meanwhile, he tried his best to set me up with that lunatic-actress. You saw for yourself in there what she is capable of, I have no interest in her whatsoever. I only let her come along as I thought it would make Brunetti happy. I was so stupid, I thought that he was the only one holding my back when in reality it was the complete opposite.”