Page 90 of Auctioned to the Billionaire Surgeon

“What? No, that’s not understood.” He didn’t need to know I’d already promised Gia I’d take her out again tonight. “Look, I was bringing Jelly over because she’s my girlfriend, and I…”

“Unacceptable. I do not approve of that girl and neither does your mother. She’s… beneath you.”

Unbidden, images of Jelly beneath me came to mind. I immediately started thinking of random sad things so I wouldn’t get turned on in the middle of a conversation with my father. He must’ve mistaken my silence for agreement, because he barreled on.

“You will take Gia out. Remember, if you don’t want your mother and brothers living under an overpass in cardboard boxes, you will marry Gia. At the very least, you will give Gia a chance, a real chance. I mean it.” He hung up before I could argue.

How do you argue with a crime boss anyway? I immediately dialed my brother Raphael again. I waited impatiently, but the call went to voicemail. Again.

“Raphe! Call me back.” I started to hang up, then said, “This is Paolo,” like a dumbass. Like he wouldn’t know it was me.

In the meantime, I guessed I needed to get dressed to go out with Gia Santoro again. I wondered what Jelly was doing. God, it had been too long since I’d been inside her. I groaned and fell back on the bed feeling sorry for myself. This all sucked. Every last bit of it. I called her, worried about how she was going to take the fact that my parents wanted me to dateGia. Or that there was supposedly an arranged marriage contract between me and Gia our fathers had agreed to years ago. Or that Gia was also blackmailing me.

Not well. That’s how she was going to take it.

Her phone also went to voicemail, and I hung up, immediately sending her a text for her to call me as soon as she could.

The phone rang instantly, and I breathed a sigh of relief. “Hey,” I said, thinking it was Jelly.

“Hey, handsome,” Gia Santoro’s sexy voice came over the line.

I swallowed hard. “Um… hey.”

“What plans do you have for me tonight?”

Jesus. Did she have to make everything sound so dirty? “I hadn’t really thought about it. Is there something you want to do while you’re in town?”

“I think you know,” she said, making me remember that she wanted to go to Cayenne.

“I can drop you off there, but like I said last night, I’m not going in.” There was no way I was going to risk my relationship with Jelly by getting seen at Cayenne with Gia fucking Santoro.

“You’re no fun,” she pouted. “Well, I guess we could just go to dinner. What’s the best place in town?”

“We could go back to where we went last night, Bahia Del Sol, or there’s another good restaurant called Salt. We could also get tapas at Salazar Nights. It’s an upscale nightclub…”

“Yes! That. I’ve heard of Salazar Nights. Do you ever see any of the Salazars when you go?”

“Yeah…”

“Let’s do that. What’s the dress code?”

“I’ll wear a suit.”

“That doesn’t help me too terribly much.”

I shrugged even though she couldn’t see me. I thought it would help more than if I’d said I was going to wear jeans and a T-shirt.

“I’ll pick you up at eight,” I said. “I have to go.” I hung up before she was finished talking. It might’ve beenrude, but I’m not exactly a phone talker, and I’d reached my limit for the day. At least, my limit for people I didn’t want to talk to.

I texted Jelly again, asking her to go to Salazar Nights with me. I didn’t mention the fact that Gia would be there, but I figured I’d ease her into that.

But I never heard back.

I had a definite sense of unease as I left my building and went downtown to pick Gia up for our ‘date,’ but I didn’t know what to do about it.

Gia and I sat at a nice table along the edges of the nightclub. Enzo and Carmen were both in the club and worked their way over to say hello.

After introductions were made, Enzo took Carmen’s lead and talked with Gia. Carmen only wanted to talk to me. She’d been barely polite when I introduced Gia, and I was a little nervous. Carmen was obviously not in the best mood.