They couldn’t just keep taking it in turns to freak out and run away each time that one of them had a breakthrough—eventually one of them was going to have to break the pattern so that they could talk about this—that was the only way it could ever work. And Jannes had hit the ball straight into her court. He knew how she felt about him. She’d told him how she felt about him.
Her heart stuttered when the doorbell rang, and she knew that this was her last chance to back out. She could carry on being afraid. She could pretend that she hadn’t heard the door, hide in her bedroom and wait for Jannes to go away. Or she could be brave, and go out there and talk to him, as she had been desperate to do for the last week.
She opened the door.
Jannes was standing there with his hands in his pockets, looking every inch the poster boy for wholesome Nordic health that he should be.
‘Hey,’ he said with a hopeful smile, and she reached out a hand and pulled him into the apartment.
‘You’re here,’ she said.
‘Yeah, I mean you texted me and... I can go.’
‘Don’t go, come in,’ she said, leading him through to the kitchen, wondering how things could be so awkward when they’d been friends for so long. ‘How did you do that to my feed?’ she asked, sticking with professional curiosity because that seemed like the safest of all the questions buzzing around her head right now. ‘Did you befriend a computer hacker? Break into the algorithm? Because if you did I want your superpowers.’
‘No,’ Jannes said with a laugh that sounded a little forced. Good, so she wasn’t the only nervous one here. ‘It was a little less hi tech than that. I befriended everyone that you follow. It wasn’t hard, to be honest. They all love you, were happy to do anything I asked if it was for you.’
‘But that’s hundreds of people,’ Lara said, her mouth falling open.
‘A little over a thousand, actually. But, like I said, they were happy to do it.’
‘I can’t believe you did that,’ she said, shaking her head, still trying to avoid looking at the big picture, because—frankly—it scared the bejesus out of her.
‘Lara, I would do anything for you. I thought you knew that.’ Okay, so that was the big picture. Harder to avoid it now that he had said it out loud.
‘Last time we talked,’ she started, cringing at the memory. ‘I asked you... Well, we both know how that conversation went. I put myself out there and...’
‘I’m not proud of that. I wish I could go back and change it.’
Lara shook her head. ‘But you shouldn’t. I’ve had time to think and I’m sure you were right. I walked away and I hurt you. And I’m working on my own stuff, I even went to therapy with Mum, but the things you said were right—we both hurt each other, and if we try this again we’ll end up making the same mistakes and it’s not worth losing you over. This last week... God, I’ve missed you, Jannes. So much. And I can’t bear the thought that we might do something that means I spend the whole of the rest of my life feeling like that. I mean, marriage! We messed up fake dating. How are we meant to make a real relationship work?’
‘We will get things wrong. We’ll make mistakes, and we’ll argue. But that doesn’t have to break us. People make mistakes all the time, and then they apologise and they talk and they figure things out. I know that you love me. And you should know that I love you. I love you a lot. So much, Lara. I want us to take a risk, if it means that we can be happy together.’
‘You love me?’ she asked, her mind sticking on those three words. ‘Even though I don’t know if I can do this?’
‘Even though you don’t know if you can do this,’ Jannes said, reaching for her hand, threading their fingers together. ‘If anything, that makes me want it more. And even if we decide that it’s too big a risk, it’s not going to change how I feel about you. You can knock me back and know that you’ll still have me in your life. You won’t lose me if you don’t feel the same way. It’s not all or nothing—I’m not giving you an ultimatum. I just want you to know how I feel. That I’m here, offering you my heart, everything, if you decide that that’s what you want too.’
‘Of course it’s what I want,’ she said, not able to resist the grin that was spreading across her face. ‘It’s what I’ve always wanted. I was just too scared before.’
‘Then we’re doing this?’ Jannes asked.
Lara lifted her shoulders and let them drop. ‘I don’t even know what this is. Is this getting married? Because that still feels like a bit of a leap.’
Jannes shrugged. ‘I’m ready to leap. I’m at least ready to talk to the vicar about leaping. But you don’t have to be just because I am. We can take this as slow as you want to, or as fast as I want to. We will work out what we need together.’
He pulled her closer with their linked fingers and let his hands fall gently on her hips. She took that as the invitation she hoped it was intended as, and took a step closer until her body was warming against his and she had to tip her head up to see his expression.
‘Jannes?’
‘Lara?’
‘Are you asking me to marry you?’
Creases appeared at the corners of his eyes, and she wanted to kiss every one of them. ‘I thought I had already done that,’ he said.
‘Not properly.’
One corner of his mouth quirked, and she knew that he was suppressing a smile.
‘Well, then.’ He took her left hand in his and slid off the gold and opal ring, before dropping to one knee.
‘Lara, you’re already my best friend, and the person I love most in the world. I was wondering if you’d also do me the honour of being my wife.’
She kept her smile small, not wanting to make this too easy, not after all they’d been through to get to this moment. She wanted to make it last. Leaning down, she brushed a kiss against Jannes’s lips, but drew away when his hands came to her hair, before he could deepen the kiss.
‘I think that sounds like everything I’ve ever hoped for,’ she said at last, her voice barely more than a whisper, Jannes close enough that it didn’t matter.
‘That’s a yes?’
‘Of course it’s a yes.’
Jannes’s arms clamped around her hips as he stood and spun her around; her dress caught on his jeans as he lowered her, so that her mouth was level with his, her legs locked around his waist. ‘You really mean it?’ he asked between kisses, as they stumbled their way back onto the couch, Jannes landing on her so heavily that it knocked the air from her chest.
‘I really mean it,’ she said, one hand on his cheek. ‘I love you, I’m going to marry you, and you’re going to be mine for ever.’
* * *
If you enjoyed this story, check out these other great reads from Ellie Darkins
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All available now!
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The Princess and the Rebel Billionaire
by Sophie Pembroke
CHAPTER ONE
PRINCESS ISABELLA OF AUGUSTA turned her back on the huge, glass-fronted villa, eschewed the view from the decked terrace out over the beautiful Lake Geneva towards the Alps, and glared at her assistant, Gianna, instead.
‘This is a bad idea.’ Unthinkably bad. This was breaking rules that had been drummed into Isabella before she could even walk.
Gianna tossed her highlighted caramel hair over her sho
ulder. ‘I don’t have bad ideas.’
That was a blatant lie, as Isabella had met some of Gianna’s ex-boyfriends when she’d brought them to the palace.
‘You told me you were taking me to see Sofia.’ Isabella’s cousin, Sofia, would never dream of doing something so risky and ridiculous as this. Sofia followed The Rules.
Of course, The Rules had led to Sofia marrying the love of her life and living in the lap of luxury in Lake Geneva with her husband and three adorable children, while also running her charity foundation for injured donkeys. The Rules hadn’t been quite so kind to Isabella, but they had at least kept her safe and out of trouble.
This plan, she sensed, was a lot of trouble. Especially if her parents found out.
‘This is better than another visit to Sofia,’ Gianna said persuasively. ‘This is a whole week of freedom, Your Highness. One week where you can be Bella for a change.’
‘I’m always Bella with Sofia,’ Isabella pointed out mulishly. She pushed away any thoughts of the one other person outside the royal family who’d been close enough to call her Bella, for a time. It would only make her miserable.
‘Sofia thought it was a brilliant idea,’ Gianna countered.
Isabella paused, blinked, and regrouped. ‘Sofia knows about this plan?’
‘Of course! Who do you think is covering for you if the King and Queen start asking any questions?’
It wouldn’t be her parents, Their Royal Majesties King Leonardo and Queen Gabriela of Augusta, who’d be asking the questions, though, Isabella knew. It would be their private secretaries, or another member of household staff. Someone like Ferdinand, her father’s right-hand man, whose job depended on all the royal children and cousins following The Rules.
His previous right-hand man had been fired after the last time Isabella thought there was a chance to break them. She’d been wrong, of course.
Just as Gianna was wrong now.
Isabella shook her head. ‘Someone will find out.’
‘They won’t.’ Pulling a folder from her laptop bag, Gianna spread out the papers on the high-gloss table in the middle of the terrace. She motioned for the Princess to take a seat and, dubiously, she did.
‘Look.’ Gianna pushed the top page towards her, and Isabella took in the stylised M of the logo, and the words ‘discretion guaranteed’ underneath. ‘This isn’t your usual dating agency, Your Highness. M only works with the rich and famous, and it offers them something they can’t find anywhere else.’
‘A villa on Lake Geneva?’ Isabella said, knowing she was being facetious.
Gianna rolled her eyes, probably hoping her employer wasn’t looking. ‘Privacy. They offer you one week with your perfect match in an ultra-exclusive, completely private and secluded location—they even arrange security, at a discreet distance.’
They were, Isabella had to admit, very much secluded. While the shores of Lake Geneva boasted many small towns and villages—as well as the city of Geneva itself—on both the Swiss and French sides of the border, it was large enough that villas, like the one Gianna had driven her to from the small private airfield where they’d landed, were miles away from any other signs of human habitation. Their nearest neighbour, as far as Isabella could see, was across the lake—far enough away that she could only make out the winking of sunlight on the windows of the building.
As for the rest of it...
‘How could this agency possibly know my perfect match? Some sort of algorithm, I suppose, based on my star sign or my photograph?’
‘No, not at all,’ Gianna said patiently. ‘You fill in an incredibly detailed personality test—’
‘Which I didn’t do,’ Isabella pointed out.
‘I did it for you.’
‘Doesn’t that rather defeat the point?’
Gianna gave her a long, steady look. ‘Your Highness, I’ve been part of the palace since I was a child. I was your friend long before I was on your staff. I’ve seen you grow up, stifled by the court and their rules. I’ve seen you, all these years. Seen you cry. Seen you laugh. Seen you—’
She broke off there, but Isabella knew, instinctively, what her friend would have said. Love.
Gianna had been there the last time Isabella broke The Rules. She knew exactly what that had done to her.
If she wanted her to risk it again...there had to be a good reason.
‘The point is, I know you,’ Gianna went on. ‘I know your hopes and your dreams, your loves and your hates. And I was willing to be honest about them on the form, which I know you wouldn’t have been. You’d have been thinking about what the palace expected from you, what your parents wanted, what The Rules said. Anything except how you actually felt or what you wanted.’
‘You’re right,’ Isabella admitted softly. ‘I would have done that.’ She pulled the brochure from M closer. ‘It says here there’s a video interview required, too? I didn’t do one of those.’
‘Yes, you did.’ Gianna smiled wickedly. ‘Remember that Internet chat you did with that website? The one for young women, seeking their place in the world?’
Isabella frowned. She didn’t do many interviews or royal events these days, if she could possibly avoid it. But Gianna had been insistent about doing that particular one...
‘The one with that woman? The pretty one, from America? Morgan? No, Madison. Madison Morgan, right?’ She’d liked that interview. Madison Morgan had asked her all sorts of interesting questions—much better than the usual stuff she got asked in interviews like that. As the third child of the King and Queen of Augusta she was a princess, but she’d never rule the country—that was down to her brother, Leo, named for their father. She’d never had any real role beyond doing what she was told. So all anyone really asked her was who had designed her dress, and which parties she’d be attending. The answer to the first was usually, ‘Ask Gianna,’ and the second, ‘None if I can possibly avoid it.’
Morgan had asked her things about herself. Who she was, who she wanted to be. What mattered to her most. What her ideal date looked like... How did I not see it?
In fact, there had been a couple of moments that had struck her as odd during the interview—questions that didn’t quite make sense, comments she didn’t understand. At the time, Isabella had put it down to cultural differences, or her being out of practice at interviews, or even the language barrier. Her English was fluent, and she was usually good at picking up idioms, but still, it wasn’t her native tongue and that could cause problems sometimes. And there hadn’t been anything to set alarm bells ringing—besides, Gianna had been there the whole time.
Of course, she had. Because she’d set this whole thing up.
‘Why, Gianna?’ Isabella asked now. ‘Why did you do this?’
‘Why did I risk my career and my future to find you a week of freedom and bliss with a man who might be your perfect match?’ Gianna smiled, softly. ‘Because you deserve it, Bella.’
How long since her best friend had last called her by that nickname? Too long. They’d become employer and employee, not friends, the moment Isabella reached adulthood.
Gianna took her hand. ‘I’ve seen you, fake smiling through every date your family has arranged with a “suitable suitor”. Every boring Augustian duke or lord, even the ones twenty years older than you. I’ve seen you miserable and lonely, because not everyone gets as lucky as Sofia did, and finds their perfect match in the palace. I’ve seen you trying to find a moment to just be you, away from the bodyguards or the cameras or the men who want to marry into the royal family. I’ve seen you withering away in that palace ever since Nathanial—’
‘Don’t.’ Isabella shook her head violently. ‘Not...just, don’t.’
‘Okay. Okay.’ Gianna ran her fingers soothingly over the Princess’s arm. ‘But you were miserable, Your Highness. And I saw something I could do about that...so I did it.’
‘Do you really think this will change anything?’ Isabella met her friend’s gaze with her own, and found nothing but compassion there. ‘One week with some guy? It’s not like he’s going to magically turn out to be a mysterious aristocrat or something. He won’t be someone my parents would let me marry—I’ve already met every single guy they consider suitable. So it can’t ever be more than this—just one week with someone I might be...compatible with.’
She felt a slight heat rise in her cheeks as she said the words. She hadn’t been compatible with anyone for a very long time. Just once, in fact. With Na—No. She wasn’t even going to think his name.
Did Gianna really think that a week with a man some agency thought was her perfect match would fix everything that was wrong with Isabella?
‘Maybe it won’t change everything,’ Gianna admitted. ‘But it might help. At worst, it’s a week of fun and freedom—no bodyguards, except Tessa from your staff, and the small security team the agency sent to guard the perimeter, and they’ll all be at the cabin on the edge of the estate. No royal obligations, no expectations. Just a guy that you might like...and the chance to have some fun, if you want it.’
‘I’m not looking for that, either,’ Isabella said flatly. How could she? That was definitely against The Rules.
Gianna sighed. ‘Bella, this isn’t some sort of hook-up agency I went to here. It’s M. The premier, most expensive and exclusive dating agency in the business. Whoever they’ve sent to meet you, he’s not here for sex. He’s here to get to know you.’
The knot in Isabella’s stomach started to loosen, just a little. ‘You’re sure?’ Maybe she could come out of this having made a friend. A friend would be nice. A lover would be...trouble. Lots of trouble.
From Best Friend to Fiancée Page 15