Midnight in Italy

She'd used Leondro's own lie unadulterated. Leondro had nothing to do with either reception or housekeeping and so had had no actual effect on the waiting time, but she had to drop the information nonchalantly in somewhere. The lie spread panic all over the brat's face. She was practically hyperventilating.

What's it to be, Sienna thought, are you going to ditch you flight and family and run straight to your loverboy to care for him. No of course you're not. You're more worried about what he was bringing you, aren't you? Don't worry, sweetie, I've still got you covered.

"Oh, one last thing, Mr Reinhert, I believe, yes, this came in last night," She looked around and then, as if seeing it for the first time, picked up the package. "For your daughter I believe. Sorry we didn't get it earlier, but I'm glad it arrived before you left. Have a pleasant journey and we hope to see you again soon."

The girl looked in horror as Sienna handed it straight to her father, and then remembered to look pleased. The father turned the present around in his hand as he walked back to his family and even gave it a little shake. The girl practically ripped it out his hands. The father didn't seem much fazed by this behaviour, he was probably used to it. He said, "That was nice, wasn't it Gabby. Are you going to open it now?"

The girl had turned bright red, but her blushes were spared by the airport shuttle rounding the corner and pulling it up to the hotel entrance. "Ah, we'd better get going," the father said. "You can open it on the way."

The girl stuffed it into her handbag quickly, flustered, but relieved, "Actually, I might sleep on the bus. I'm still quite tired."

They wheeled their cases outside. The driver met them and started to load the luggage into the bottom of the coach.

Sienna leaned forward on the reception counter. For a moment she wondered if she'd gone too far. Not really, she decided. Plan B was easy enough to buy at the airport, but that assumed she had easy access to 50 or so euro and that she was able to open the present in the airport without anyone seeing. If not then, she would be able to get some in Paris. Surely even a linguistically challenged American teenager would be able to get that done given 72 hours (call it 60 by the time they'd landed). They did say that every hour that passed increased the chances of it not working, but on the other hand they also said that eating disorders messed up your fertility. She shrugged to herself, if the worst came to the worst, at least the bitch would have a pregnancy test on hand.

That, of course, was only one of the birds she'd been aiming for. Leondro needed to be taken down a peg or two as well, and, while she could do it herself easily enough, it cleaner to have it done by proxy, especially with her on-going plans for Alessandro. The girl was still young, but still clearly capable of pure hell-fury given the right scorn. Sure, she would be thousands of miles away, but Sienna could think of a hundred ways to destroy a saint by remote, let alone someone with Leondro's reputation. Surely even this queen bitch in waiting could come up with a couple of good ones.

And just then her blissful daydreaming was rudely interrupted by the arrival of new guests. "Welcome to the Plaza Verdi," she said. "Do you have reservations?"