Chapter 11 - THE PRESS STORM AND THE FAKE RELATIONSHIP BECOMING REAL
By the following morning, the crowd of journalists outside my bakery had swelled to unmanageable proportions.
Camera lenses pressed against the sparkling bulletproof glass like glass-eyed insects, flashing strobes whenever I moved near the front window.
I was in the middle of shaping a fresh batch of brioche dough when the front door chimed with authoritative force.
Two of Matteo's largest private security guards stepped in first, parting the sea of reporters like modern-day gladiators clearing a path through an arena.
Then Matteo walked through the threshold, looking like he had stepped off a magazine cover in a charcoal suit and silk tie.
Instead of slipping quietly into the back prep kitchen as he usually did, he stopped dead in the center of the showroom, right in front of the floor-to-ceiling windows.
Dozens of flashbulbs exploded simultaneously, illuminating the interior in a blinding white glare.
A reporter from a major metropolitan daily shouted out a frantic question over the rising din.
"Mr. Vescari! Is it true that the woman who delivered the Morosco evidence is your secret fiancée?"
Matteo didn't flinch or look away from the cameras.
He turned his head slowly, locking his dark eyes directly onto the camera lens before speaking in a calm, commanding baritone that carried clearly across the room.
"She is not my secret fiancée," Matteo announced, his voice echoing cleanly over the microphones. "She is Emily Moretti, the owner of this bakery, the rightful heir to a stolen legacy, and the most extraordinary woman I have ever known."
My breath caught sharply in my throat, a sudden wave of heat rushing straight to my cheeks as I froze with my hands still resting in the dough.
"And for the record," Matteo added, a rare, brilliant smile breaking across his chiseled face, "the first time we met, she threw a fifty-pound bag of flour directly at my chest because I tried to buy out her display case."
A roar of startled laughter rippled through the pack of reporters outside the glass.
Matteo turned away from the cameras, pushed open the swinging kitchen door, and walked straight back to where I was standing in stunned silence.
"Did you just out us to the entire metropolitan press corps?" I asked, my voice hovering somewhere between absolute panic and breathless amusement.
"I just reclaimed our narrative," Matteo replied smoothly, stepping close enough for me to smell the crisp cedar and espresso on his lapels. "No more fake stories, no more hiding behind staged cons, and no more pretending we're just casual acquaintances."
"And what about my quiet morning routine?" I whispered, looking up into his dark, devoted eyes.
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"Your quiet morning routine now includes me across the table," he murmured, leaning in and capturing my lips in a tender, unhurried kiss that entirely ignored the camera flashes popping wildly outside the glass.
When he finally pulled back, the reporters outside were furiously typing on their phones, realizing they had just witnessed the most high-profile romance in the city blossom right behind a bakery counter.
