CHAPTER 9: IT'S HER. IT'S GINA

Gina POV

"Wow, nice house." I say as I pull up to the house that I'm meeting Pavlo in. He said that the client lives here but he is not allowed to leave because he is under house arrest. The driveway is so big that you can park four cars next to each other. I park my car and then I head up to the door.

I ring the doorbell and a man opens up for me. He looks handsome but he's not my type at all. I look at him and he has a shocked look on his face. "Hi, I'm Gina Rossi from Rossi P.I. May I please come in?" I ask the guy. "So you are the boss? Sorry that I was staring at you like that. I did not mean too. My name is Mateo Karakizos and yes you may come in.” He says. He shakes my hand and then he opens the door for me. “Nice place.” I say as I look around. “Thank you but it’s not mine.” Mateo says. I look at him as I take my jacket off. “Aren't you the client that I'm supposed to meet with?” I ask. Mateo takes my jacket before hanging it on the coat hanger that is standing by the door.

"No I'm not. If you'll follow me please. I'll take you right to him.” Mateo says as I walk behind him to what looks to be the lounge area. There is no one in there. “You can help yourself to some refreshments and I'll go and see where he is.” Mateo says and I nod.

Mateo leaves and he goes up the stairs.

“He said that he'll be right out.” Mateo says just as he comes walking down the stairs. I nod at him as I hear the doorbell ring again. "That must be Pavlo. I will be right back.” Mateo says as he leaves the room to go and answer the door. A few minutes later Pavlo walks into the living room. “Gina it is so nice to see you again.” Pavlo says as he greets me in his heavy French accent. We hug each other and I laugh at him. "It's only been like six months since I last saw you. You look great though." I reply as I throw myself some orange juice. "Six months is a long time." Pavlo says.

“Gina?” I hear someone speak from behind. I instantly recognize that voice. It is the voice that has been haunting my thoughts for the last 7 years.

I turn around and I freeze on the spot. Marcus is standing there staring at me as well.

He looks more handsome than I remember.

“Marcus?”

Marcus POV

I was up at 6:30 this morning, did my morning routine and now I'm having breakfast on my front porch. I look around at all the people that are living around me. Some are leaving their houses to go to work and some are working in their gardens. My next-door neighbor, Mr. Jenkins, comes walking out onto his front lawn with his lawnmower.

"Good morning Mr. Jenkins how are you this morning?" I ask him. He looks up at me but he doesn't say anything at all. "I think I will mow the lawn later." He says as he walks back into his house. "Okay then." I say. Since the tabloids have dubbed me The Fallen Billionaire and all of these accusations started coming out, Mr. Jenkins has stopped talking to me. He was always polite to me and he would give me tips on how to trim my lawn but now he acts like he doesn't know me.

He probably thinks that I am a monster that would kill his father. "See Janice, that is the young man that has been on the news lately. You know the billionaire who murdered his father." A woman says to another woman as they walk by my house. The other one looks up at me. "I don't understand how someone could murder his father like that?" The other woman says. I decide to get up and head inside. I turn around by the door and I look at the two women who have now stopped walking and they are staring at me. "You can believe what you want and you can also believe the rubbish that the newspapers are publishing about me. You two blabbermouths, just you wait and see, I will prove to everyone that I'm innocent." I yell at them just as Mateo drives up into my driveway.

The two women are standing in front of my house with their mouths wide open. "Yeah, that's right. I know that you two have nothing good to do with your time so you would rather gossip about other people around you so just keep walking and leave me the hell alone." I yell at them. I swear if their mouths could open up any wider then they might just swallow my whole house up. Mateo laughs at them as he walks up to me.

"Damn those are the biggest mouths that I have ever seen." Matteo says as he walks into my house and I follow him. "Hey they deserved that." I say as I close the door behind us. "What time are Pavlo and his boss coming?" I ask him. For some reason, Pavlo did not want to tell us who his boss is. He said that I would find out today.

"He said around noon." Mateo says. "Okay so why are you here so early?" I ask him. "To help you clean your place up and also I am thinking to make some snacks for the meeting." Mateo says as he looks around. "Yeah, my place is not that messy." I say as I put my dirty dishes in the sink.

"I can see the dust on these shelves." Mateo says as he wipes his finger on my bookshelf that is standing in the living room. "I see that Mr. OCD is coming out now so go ahead," I say as I wash my dishes. Mateo has major OCD issues. I think that he is the cleanest man that I have ever seen. "Think I will start now." Mateo says as he walks to the closet where I keep all of my cleaning supplies. "This thing is crooked. Next time I will bring you a new feather duster." He says as he takes out the only feather duster that I have. "Hey, it will do the job just fine." I reply.

Mateo starts dusting off and then he sweeps the floors before he mops them. "I'm going to the gym. You can find me there when you're done." I say as I go upstairs to my room to get my gym clothes before heading down to my basement where my gym equipment is.

I start doing pushups then I move over to sit-ups just as Mateo walks into the gym. He starts warming up alongside me. "Are you nervous about today?" He asks as we get onto the spinning bikes. "No, I feel good about today. Why are you asking?" I reply. "I was just wondering. I feel like something is going to happen today. I just don't know what." He says. "I thought that I was the one that was supposed to be nervous and not you." I say. "Whatever man let's just get a nice workout." He says.

So for the next hour, we train and we talk about all sorts of things. Before I know it is already 10:30 am. "I'm going to take a shower in the downstairs bathroom and then I'll meet you in the kitchen afterwards." Mateo says as he gets off the treadmill and walks out of the gym. I decide to go and take a shower myself. I walk out as well and then head upstairs to my room. I take a shower in my on-suite bathroom. Walking into my closet I decided to wear a button-up black shirt with blue jeans. "I make this look good." I say as I look at myself in the mirror before I back into the bathroom to comb my hair.

Mateo is already in the kitchen busy making the snacks when I walk in there. There are cut-up pieces of cheese, sausages, green olives, baby onions and there are also crackers next to it. "Are we making a savory platter?" I ask him. "Yeah, I thought that it's better if we make something simple." He says as he puts a plate of sandwiches on the table. He turns around to take out one of the nets that I use to cover the food with, out off my drawers. He then covers the sandwiches.

"You gonna help me with this while I grate this piece of cheese?" He asks as he points to the various other items on the table. "Yeah," I say as I take the toothpicks from my cupboard. I start putting one piece of cheese, one piece of Vienna, one olive, and one baby onion on every toothpick. This reminds me of something.

"You know Gina and I would make these every time we had a barbeque at her parent's house." I say. "Really? I bet she didn't have to ask you to help her?" Mateo says. "No she didn't but her mom did. She would tell us that since you two are inseparable then I think that you can make the savory platters for us." I say as I try to mimic Mrs. Rossi. Mateo just shakes his head laughing at me.

We finish making the food platters and I take them both to the living room where I think we should hold this meeting. Mateo's phone rings and he answers it. "Hi, Mateo speaking." He says. "Oh okay great…. Yes, I will tell him. See you later." Mateo says before he hangs up the phone. "That was Pavlo. He said that he and his boss will be here shortly." Matteo says.

"We need drinks. Wait here I will go and get it." I say as I walk back into the kitchen. I take out the cranberry juice that was in the fridge and I take out the glasses from the cupboard as well as the jug that I am going to use. Now that I know they are on their way, I am getting nervous. I pick up the cranberry juice. As I try to open it, my hands start to shake because of how nervous I am, making me lose my grip on the bottle. It falls to the floor and sprays all of the cranberry juice all over my pants.

"Ah great!" I say as I pick up the juice. "What happened?" Mateo says as he walks back into the kitchen. "I dropped the juice and it spilled all over my clothes." I say as I walk to the cleaning supplies closet. "Go put on some other clothes. I got this." Matteo says as he points to the floor. "Thanks man." I say before I turn around and run up the stairs towards my bedroom.

I head into the closet and I grab another button-up shirt, this time it is a white one and I also get another pair of pants. I quickly get dressed and then I throw the wet clothes in the laundry basket as I hear the doorbell ringing.

I quickly check that my hair is fine in the mirror. I grab my cologne and spray some of it on so that I don't smell like cranberry juice in front of these people. Mateo walks up into my room. "You better get down there because the boss from Rossi P.I. is here." He says as he pops his head into my bathroom. "And Pavlo?" I ask.

"Nope, he is not here yet. But you gotta get downstairs fast." He says before he turns around and walks out of my room. "Okay, I will be right there." I say. I take one more look in the mirror. "Wait did I brush my teeth this morning?" I ask myself trying to remember if I did. I decide to quickly brush my teeth and then I wash my face. "What the hell are you so nervous about Marcus? It's only a meeting for goodness sake." I say to myself as I dry my face off. I comb my hair again real quick then I check myself in the mirror.

Thinking that I look good, I decided to walk back downstairs towards my living room. As I get closer I can hear two people talking. One is Pavlo's voice and the other one belongs to a woman.

"Wait I know that voice." I whisper to myself as I walk into the living room.

There she was standing, with her back towards me. It's her. It's my Gina. Her long hair cascades down her back, stopping just above her waist. I am speechless and my legs seem to stop working.

"Gina?" I finally manage to say.

I see her freezing before she turns around to see who was talking to her. She looks up at me just as I keep staring at her. I can't believe my eyes. After all these years, the love of my life is standing right in front of me.

"Marcus?" I hear her say my name in her angelic voice. A voice that I have been longing to hear again after 7 years.

My eyes drag down her perfectly built body. She has curves in all of the right places and I just want to run my hands all over them. She too stares at me. She's checking me out until her eyes land on the ankle monitor that is around my left ankle.

"Wait are you the person who is under investigation?" She asks