Lexi POV

"Oh God," I groaned rubbing my temples as I headed downstairs.

I was still waiting for those two Advil that I took a few minutes ago to finally kick in. Last night's drinking sure did a number on me, I had woken up with my head pounding and then had to fly to the bathroom to puke out the vile drinks out of my stomach.

"Morning Lexi, rough night?" Our housekeeper Ella asked as I entered the kitchen.

"You could say, Ella, hangover," I said to her.

"You go sit down, I'll help you with that" Ella said to me.

"Thanks, Ella," I said as I sat down at the kitchen table closing my eyes and laying my head down on my hands.

"Morning Ms.Ella" I heard Kathleen say groggily.

"Morning Kathleen, you're hangover too?" I heard Ella ask.

"You have no idea" I heard Kathleen groan.

"You go sit down as well I'll get you both something to help" Ella replied.

I cringed slightly as Kathleen pulled out the chair opposite of mine. Even though my headache was slowly subsiding every little sound seemed a bit too loud for me.

"I hate you for this" I heard Kathleen groaned from across me. "You made us drink last night".

"I know but it wasn't as painful last night" I chuckled slightly.

"I'm never drinking ever again" Kathleen mumbled.

"Don't make promises you can keep Kathleen, it's going to happen again" I said to her.

"Here you go ladies, a cup of coffee to help with starting to cure those hangovers," Ella said placing two mugs of coffee in front of us. "Two plates of greasy breakfast coming up next".

"Thanks, Ella" Kathleen and I both answered at the same time.

After breakfast, I went right back to bed trying to hopefully sleep off the hangover. I was awakened a couple of hours later by the sound of my phone ringing from beside me.

"Hello," I said groggily as I pressed the phone to my ears.

"Hey, Cara" I heard Gio greet. "Why does it sound like you were sleeping?"

"Hi babe, yeah I just woke up" I replied. "What's up?"

"I was hoping I could pick you up for lunch today and spend the day together, but you sound tired. Are you alright?" I heard Gio ask.

"Yeah, yeah I'm fine. I was just still feeling a bit tired after breakfast this morning and so I went back to sleep but I'm fine now" I said to him.

"Are you sure?" Gio asked.

"Yeah, I'm sure" I replied.

"Okay, so up for lunch?"

"Yeah definitely" I replied.

"Alright I'll pick you up in about half an hour then okay"

"Yeah sure, see you then" I replied before hanging up.

************************************************************

"So I think we should talk about what happened in the ladies' room at my club last night," Gio said to me as we've finished eating.

We were out at one of his restaurants having lunch. I froze when I heard him say that. Okay, so I guess he saw the video footage.

"What happened?" I asked playing clueless.

"Don't play dumb with me Lexi. You know what I'm talking about, you and Stacey" Gio said seriously.

"Stacey who?" I asked feigning confusion.

"My secretary, Lexi" Gio replied.

"Uhm... What about her?" I asked looking at him innocently.

"Quit playing Lexi! You damn well know what I'm talking about, you crack her head open on the sink!" Gio raised his voice.

"Alright! She attacked me okay" I finally said to him. "She came in the restroom while I was in there and started talking crap about you and soon dumping me and stuff, I tried ignoring her but she decided she wanted to fight me".

"You almost kill her! Are you out of your mind? She's in the hospital for Christ's sake and the worst part of it all is that you didn't seem to be fazed about it at all! Do you have any idea the amount of trouble you'll be in if she decides to press charges? What were you thinking? You could have killed her!" Gio yelled at me.

"People die every day," I said without even thinking.

"What!? You don't care, do you!? You almost kill my secretary and that's what you have to say? 'People die every day?'. Who are you because I'm not sure I really know who you are right now! What you did was not only wrong but senseless!" Gio continued yelling at me causing me to snap.

"No frigging way! We haven't seen each other in days now and you brought me here to yell at me about your freaking crazy secretary who attacked me!?" I snapped angrily. "What I did was call self-defense! Did you see her? She's twice my frigging size. Why are you taking her side anyway, is there something going on between you two? Because she attacked me for you and now you're defending her!?"

"Lexi, don't be ridiculous. There's nothing going on between us aside from her being my secretary and I'm not defending her, I'm just saying what you did was wrong and dangerous" Gio said. "I'm curious, is this the first time you've done something like this?".

"I don't have to listen to this," I said getting up from the table and grabbing my bag and jacket from over the chair.

"You must've watched the security footage. I was attacked by your stupid secretary yet you're here yelling at me for her, you haven't even asked if I was alright from what she did. Well maybe if you're so concerned about her you should take her to lunch instead!" I said storming out of the restaurant.

"Where do you think you're going?" Gio said grabbing my arm just as I was outside.

"Anywhere but here!" I snapped. "Why are you even here!? Shouldn't you be calling Stacey for lunch?" I pulled my hand from him and continued walking.

"Hey, don't walk away from me" Gio growled warningly pulling me back to him.

"What are you, my Dad?" I asked ripping out of his grip once more. "I don't have to listen to you, I'm going home".

"Lexi stop it. We're in public you're gonna embarrass us" Gio said grabbing me around the waist from behind then holding my hands down on my body as I tried fighting my way out of his hand.

"I don't have to, you already did," I said to him still struggling but he was really strong. "Yelling at me inside already did it. Now let me go or take me home!"

"Lexi, don't be like this. We haven't finished spending the day together" Gio said managing to stop me from struggling to get out of his hold.

"I don't feel like hanging out anymore. I wanna go home" I said to him. "Take me home or I'm gonna start screaming bloody murder!"

"Stop it, Lexi, right now you're being childish because I didn't tell you that you were right to knock Stacey out," Gio said.

"I don't care! And I don't want to hear her name so just take me home or let me go so I can get a drive home!" I yelled.

"Okay, okay fine. Just stop making a scene" Gio said letting me go then stretching his hand for me to take. "Come on, I'll take you home".

I ignored his hand and walked past him and to his car.

"Lexi, I'm sorry I didn't mean to yell at you earlier. I was just upset after seeing you did something like that knowing the amount of trouble you could've been in" Gio said as he drove me back home.

I didn't answer him but kept ignoring him. I was angry at him for taking Stacey's side, better yet him not saying anything about how wrong Stacey was but telling me that I was wrong.

"I know you're mad at me Lexi, but I don't want you to be. I wasn't defending Stacey's actions, she was wrong and as a matter of fact, I'm gonna have to have a serious talk about her actions when she's better. I know you were defending yourself, I mean I'd probably do the same thing if I were you, so I wanna say I'm sorry about how I behaved about the situation earlier" Gio said to me.

"Well you're a hypocrite," I said to him.

"Okay, I deserved that. But please could you forgive me? I don't want if anything should happen to either of us now you were still being mad at me" Gio said to me.

"No," I said crossing my arms and turning my head away from him to look through the window.

"Please?" Gio said but I ignored him. "Bella...Cara...Cucciola, piccolo...?"

"Stop it okay," I said to him.

"No, not until you're talking to me again," Gio said.

I continued ignoring him for another five minutes straight but Gio kept on annoying me, calling me every type of Italian endearment you could think of, constantly telling me I'm really sexy when I'm mad and then putting his hand over on my thigh then when I removed it he put it back ad this continued until I started smiling at his antics.

"Is that a smile?" Gio asked amused.

"No it's a wince," I said to him.

"I think not, it was a smile" Gio chuckled. "Does that mean I'm forgiven?"

"No," I replied holding back a smile.

"I think I'm forgiven." Gio laughed.

When Gio reached my house I opened the door to get out but Gio stopped me by holding onto my hand.

"Lexi, I am sorry," Gio said sincerely. "I don't want you to be mad at me".

"I'm not anymore" I sighed then leaned over to place a kiss on his lips. "I'll see you whenever again okay".

"Bye Lexi, I'll call you" Gio smiled.

"I'll be waiting" I replied as I got out of the car then watched him drive off.

When I went inside I was startled by Dominic meeting me by the door.

"Don't you answer your phone anymore?" He said just as I opened the door.

"Oh my God!" I jumped with my hand over my heart. "Dominic what the hell!?"

"I was calling you for hours," Dominic said ignoring my annoyed feature.

"I was having lunch with Gio, I didn't notice. What did you want?" I asked.

"Seems like I need to have tracking devices placed on you" Dominic replied still not answering my question.

"Gee, are you that inquisitive that you'd want to track me to know where I'm at 24/7s?" I asked.

"That would've been great and for your own good" Dominic replied.

"Well, why don't we place one inside of me?" I said seriously.

"Are you serious?" Dominic asked looking at me as if I'm crazy.

"Yeah, I am. That would make it so much easier to track me in case I ever get taken right" I said to him. "Anyway did you want to talk about something?"

"Oh, yeah" Dominic replied. "It's about Rostov".