The Billionaire's Triplets Matchmakers (The Billionaire's Triplets 2)

He still looked like a homeless man with his torn jeans, scuffed shoes and tattered overcoat. Hopefully they wouldn’t try to stop him from going inside. He ran his fingers through his hair, then shook it out. He straightened his back and shoulders and jutted out his chin. He smiled confidently, as he strutted through the main doors. He was going for the wealthy playboy look, the rich boy slumming it at a local casino.

The guards didn’t give him a second look.

Just walking into the casino gave him the familiar rush. He tamped it down – he wasn’t there to gamble unless he had to.

He was there to find Vince and get his money back.

He worked his way through the casino until he spotted the roulette tables. Sure enough, Vince was there, smiling broadly as he stood near the wheel at the American table. A crowd of onlookers stood around him, cheering him on. From the size of the stack of chips in front of him, Vince was doing well. Antonio tried to calculate the value of the chips. It had to be at least thirty thousand dollars, Antonio’s total winnings from the night before.

“No, you don’t! Stop, that’s my money!” Antonio shouted, watching in horror as Vince pushed all his chips onto the table, placing them on Red.

Vince looked up and squeaked in fear but it was too late. The dealer had spun the wheel.

Antonio started towards Vince, seeing nothing but red himself. Vince was looking right and left for somewhere to run as Antonio got closer, but he also had an eye on the spinning wheel, waiting to see how his bet would pan out.

The wheel slowed, the ball popped, and everyone around the table froze as they watched the ball come to rest.

It landed on black.

Vince groaned and cursed. Antonio let out a cry of anger and tried to hurl himself at Vince, hands out, reaching for his skinny little neck even as the man tried to make a run for it.

Something incredibly painful zapped him between his shoulder blades and he fell like a rock onto the dirty floor.

Electricity ran through his body, and Antonio knew he’d been tasered.

Just before he passed out, he saw Vince running away, lugging the duffle bag. It still seemed full of money, but Antonio didn’t have a chance to be confused for long before the lights and sound of the casino faded into black.

WHEN JOAN SHOWED UP at the hotel spa she was hoping that the treatments and the time spent on herself would help her forget about her relapse, her skill at falling for just the wrong guy, and how she’d cope with facing her sister the next day.

She’d gone to her bank to get out the cash she’d need to make her sister’s account whole, but she didn’t have enough. Now she was not only going to have to face her sister and explain about her relapse, she was also going to have to explain how she lost a thousand dollars.

Since her sister already knew about Antonio she’d have to explain what happened with him as well.

It was all too much.

As soon as she came in she was sent to the locker room to strip out her street clothes and put on one the spa robes.

Since they had razors and other items available, and she had been told her masseuse wouldn’t be ready for another twenty minutes, Joan took the opportunity to shave her legs.

Smooth and feeling much better, she took a quick shower and put on her robe before wandering into the room where other patrons were seated in comfortable chairs, awaiting their services. Joan helped herself to some cucumber water and a strawberry, then

sat back, and closed her eyes, trying to forget her troubles and just relax.

“Joan Edwards?” said a soft, modulated voice.

A large woman in a pink spa uniform ushered her into a room with two massage tables. Joan felt a little uncomfortable about that, but since there was no one else on the other massage table she decided not to make a deal out of it.

When the woman stepped out for a moment Joan took off her robe and got onto the massage table, covering herself with the thin blanket. With her face poking through an open padded head holder, she breathed and tried to relax her tense muscles.

“Are you decent?” asked the masseuse.

“Yes,” Joan said, calling towards the door.

“Good, then the other guest is coming in.”

“What?” Joan said.

“Hey, I didn’t request a couple’s massage,” said the new voice, one Joan recognized.

“Lissa?” she said, propping herself up so she could look behind her.

“Joan? What the heck?”

“Lissa, I’m so sorry about everything, I didn’t know.”

“Mother,” Lissa and Joan said at the same time.

They both started laughing.

“Close your eyes while I ditch this robe and get under my sheets, will you?” Lissa said. “And stop laughing, I’m still super mad at you.”

Joan calmed, but her heart sang just a little bit. Her sister still loved her, and obviously her mother loved her as well because her mother had arranged for the two of them to have some alone time together, where they could heal.

During the massage, neither sister spoke. Their issues were not for anyone to hear. The next treatment, however, was far more conducive to conversation. The Majestic hotel was famous for their spa and they’d recently installed mud rooms - something that Joan had always wanted to try. The two of them had a suite with two tubs and as their bodies, already relaxed from the excellent massage, dipped into the dark mud the feeling of relaxation and peace spread through each of them. Joan was the first to open the conversation.

“I just want you to know that I’m so very sorry about what happened. That I got drunk.”

“I don’t want to hear that you’re sorry, Joan, I want to understand why the hell you did it,” Lissa said.

“I uh, I don’t know.”

“It was Antonio, wasn’t it? Mother insists he didn’t hurt you, but why else would you throw away all that sobriety? He did something to you, didn’t he?”

Joan thought about Antonio and how he’d probably been responsible for stealing her money - no, her sister’s money - even though she couldn’t believe that he would do that to her. She’d seen with her own eyes that he had a gambling problem, but she felt an urge to protect him. If she was wrong about him, and she threw him under the bus, could she ever forgive herself?

“He kind of did,” she said, realizing that she had to tell her sister some of the story.

“I knew it. That bastard. Did he rape you? Oh, honey, please tell me he didn’t rape you.”

“Oh, no, he didn’t do that. He’d never do anything like that.... Please, oh, God, Lissa, please don’t think that.”

“Then how? How did he hurt you? What has he done to make you screw up like that?”

Lissa was getting a little hysterical. One of the staff came in.

“Everything all right in here?” she asked, in perfect English.

“We’re fine. Can you bring us some more water, please?” Joan asked to get rid of the woman.

Lissa had calmed down.

“I’m sorry, I never should have said that. Just tell me what’s going on?”

Joan sighed. What was the point of trying to come up with excuses for Antonio? This was her sister. If she couldn’t tell Lissa the truth about just about everything, then who could she talk to?

She told her sister, the whole story, starting what had happened in Milan all up to the passionate and wonderful night that had ended so suddenly and unexpectedly.

By that point, Lissa was starting to warm to Antonio. She made almost complimentary comments about him when Joan described how well he’d helped her to calm down after her difficult reunion with her allegedly deceased mother.

Joan didn’t give her sister any of the specific details, but neither did she hide the fact that the two of them had made love all night. Lissa was her sister, but there were some secrets that were meant only for two lovers. Lissa seemed perfectly fine with just a rough overview on that front.

The positive thoughts about Jo

an’s former lover coming back into her life, turned negative when Joan told her about Vince’s midnight break in.

“The guy insisted on using the bathroom, and Antonio pulled me out and had me dress. He told me to sit on the bed while his friend used the bathroom and I hadn’t realized that my purse was still in there. But, then Antonio told me he needed to talk to his friend in the lobby and he’d be right back – only he didn’t come back. I went to the bathroom and noticed my purse had been moved. And when I realized that all the money had been stolen. I assumed that it was his friend. I went to the lobby to tell Antonio about it, but the night clerk said Antonio and the little man had left in his Maserati. I felt so upset, I didn’t know what to do. And that’s when I went to the Grand,” Joan said as she finished her sad tale.

“Oh Joan, honey, you poor thing. If it’s any consolation, I totally forgive you.”

“Thanks, Lissa, but there are no excuses for what I did. And I can’t blame Antonio. I think I was already heading in that direction and that little incident just put me over the edge.”

There was silence as Lissa absorbed those words. The spa worker came in and delivered new bottles of water.

When she left, Joan said. “Look, I’ve been meaning to tell you for a while that I’m not happy being a nanny anymore. I wanted to quit - in fact, I was going to tell you the other day, when we took Hunter to the tailor shop. That feels like forever ago.”

“You what?”

“It’s not that I don’t love being a nanny, it’s just that I don’t want to be doing it for the rest of my life. I’m concerned about the boys too, I mean, if I’m with them until they’re four or five imagine how much harder it will be for them when I suddenly disappear from their lives then. And it’s not just that. I want to do something that gives me a sense that I’m successful again. Look at you - about to be married, co-CEO of a major company, well respected, stylish... I could go on.”

“Joan, you used to be a fricking super model. I’d never be able to do that.”

“That’s just it, sis, I used to be!”

“Oh, I see what you mean.”