by Dani Collins
“Why?” He estimated this would take an hour of her day for the next thirty-plus weeks.
“I’m a willing subject. Why wouldn’t I make an effort to contribute knowledge and understanding of a condition that affects the majority of women, directly or indirectly, at least once in her lifetime?” She blinked owlishly behind a pair of glasses that were provoking serious librarian fantasies in him.
“Aren’t you turning it into more work than pregnancy already is?”
“Recording my observations relaxes me.”
Did she realize how much she revealed with that remark? He could have asked what she could possibly be nervous about, but she was so earnest as she noted every detail of their baby’s life as it formed within her that he found himself suppressing a rueful grin. Especially because she wasn’t doing it to impress him or anyone else, but for womankind in general. He couldn’t mock her for that.
Which made his own goal of highlighting the farce that was her noble birth seem petty and misguided.
He clung to his ambition until he began setting out the jewelry on his desk, when his desire for retaliation began to be smothered beneath a wave of revulsion.
“Family heirlooms?” She scanned the ostentatious pieces. Most were reflective of late twentieth-century indulgence. Intricate pendants hung from thick chains of yellow gold. Layered pearl necklaces were bedecked with amethysts and emeralds.
“This reminds me of the royal engagement ring.” She touched a pair of blue sapphire earrings surrounded by white diamonds.
Angelo had to resist pulling her hand away, as though she were a child reaching out to touch a hot stove.
In the height of his anger after leaving her parents’ home, he had coldly calculated that he would dress Pia in the extravagant white diamond choker with the matching bracelet. It was a notable piece that some elderly contemporary of his grandmother’s might glimpse and recall, causing the first stir of rumors. Definitely his brothers would recognize it. He had planned an ambiguous headline saying something about the secrecy of their relationship coming to light—one that would incite panic that a darker family secret was about to be revealed.
But the thought of these blood diamonds touching the smooth, fragrant skin he had tasted and stroked through the night sent an oily sensation into the pit of his gut. No. Just, no.
“I don’t wear jewelry as a rule.” Pia eyed the enormous, pear-shaped diamond in a platinum setting. Sprays of diamonds came off either side. Her impassive expression was the furthest thing from covetous. “Rings and bracelets get in the way when I’m reaching into tide pools and necklaces get caught on the microscope. I appreciate that these have special meaning to you. I’ll wear something for the photo if you insist, but I’ve never been one to adorn myself. I’m hideously practical that way.”
“I’m glad you hate it,” he said flatly.
“I didn’t say that!”
“Excuse me, Angelo. The stylist is here,” his PA leaned in to say. “And Mrs. Killian.”
“Call the jeweler in the village,” he instructed. “Ask him to bring his engagement rings. Immediately.”
“Yes, sir.”
“Angelo—”
“It’s fine,” he said abruptly, not examining whether his veering from his plan was a sign of weakness or principle. “Melodie.” He greeted his neighbor and introduced the highly sought-after photographer to Pia, then waved at the jewelry he’d left on his desk. “I have a second assignment for you. Photograph these for an auction catalog.”
He tipped the empty tin so his toy wolf and race car fell into his palm with a wrapped hard candy his mother had sneaked to him twenty-five years ago. He had wanted to save it for a special occasion, but hadn’t been able to get back to the rooftop to retrieve it. It went into his pants pocket with the toys before he swept all the ill-gotten jewelry back into the tin.
“Oh. Where...?” Melodie was startled as she accepted the heavy tin. She looked to Pia, who pasted on her most inscrutable smile.
“Your house is Fort Knox,” Angelo reminded Melodie. Her husband had wired this one and was probably the only person on earth who could break in and steal that box if he wanted it. “Take it to your studio and get to it as your time allows.”
* * *
Pia was utterly perplexed by Angelo’s behavior. One minute he’d been her indulgent lover, touching her across the breakfast table in casual affection that soothed the constant ache of emptiness inside her. She had needed that reassurance after a night of completely immersing herself in the pleasure he gave her. She felt stripped raw by their passion. The winter sun stung her scorching skin and gave her no place to hide as he looked at her with a knowing, wicked grin.
She had buried her nose in her notebook, right back to boarding school, using research and reporting as a place to hide.
Then he’d brought her into his office, “To find something to wear.”
He said nothing about the portrait that hung behind his desk. The canvas had been gorgeously restored so the subject was hauntingly pretty and maybe even familiar?
She hadn’t had time to compare his mature, masculine features to the soft, youthful feminine ones. He had distracted her by producing a fortune in jewels jumbled together in a cheap tin. He poured them out as if spilling marbles on a play rug.
What she had said had been true. She found jewelry more of an encumbrance than something she enjoyed wearing, but the pieces had also been very—she cringed inwardly—flamboyant. Not just a statement of wealth, but a tacky neon sign declaring it.
She hadn’t meant to reject it, though. Being in any sort of intimate relationship was new to her and she walked a tightrope of wanting to preserve her sense of self while maintaining some of the closeness they’d found through lovemaking. They would have a much better foundation for communication and understanding if he wasn’t keeping secrets from her, but she wound up feeling she was the one who had damaged their delicate bond when he swept everything away and ordered the jeweler to bring a different selection.
Now he was marching around the house with Melodie, discussing where they should take their engagement photo, providing no opportunity to reestablish their connection.
He decided on the lounge and Melodie began setting up her equipment.
Pia followed Angelo to the guest room where the stylist excitedly pulled selections that were nothing like Pia’s usual earth tones.
“She’s right,” Angelo said as the woman held a dress to her front. “That blue brings out your eyes and makes your skin look like honey.”
Flustered by what sounded like an effusive compliment, Pia tried on the sleeveless dress. The circular neck strap that formed the collar lent an air of sophistication while her bare shoulders kept it feminine.
Since the rest were even sexier and more attention grabbing, she accepted the blue and sat for her hair and makeup. She only endured this level of fussing for the occasional gala, but always insisted on a light hand.
“A natural look, I understand,” the stylist assured her. “You hardly need anything. I wish I could duplicate this glow of love with cosmetics. It’s all a woman needs.”
A shrink of panic pulled a chill into her center. There’s no love, Pia wanted to protest. How could there be? This was the glow of a sexually satisfying night. Pregnancy, perhaps. Regardless of what it was, Pia didn’t want it on display. Her emotions and self-worth and composure were delicate crystals in a snowflake, not the cast-iron reinforcements that most people possessed. She needed to protect herself at all times.
As the woman worked, however, her reflection grew more limpid and vulnerable, leaving her devoid of her usual shields. No dull colors, no bare face with glasses. No pinned-up hair and accoutrements like clipboards and notebooks. Her boring life typically left its stamp on her, but today she wore a flush of sensuality. Rather than the sophisticated, straightened hair she usually prefer
red when forced to dress up, the stylist had exaggerated her soft waves so the mass bounced as she walked.
“We’re in luck—I’m in luck.” Angelo’s voice changed as the sound of her heels drew his attention. He straightened, very handsome in a bespoke dark blue suit, his tie not yet on. His rakish, casual air was in full force.
At his approving tone, everyone looked at her.
Melodie was at her tripod and the jeweler stood at the dining table, setting out rings on a black velvet swatch. Two of the servants hovered, Angelo’s PA lifted her face from her tablet and the stylist came out behind Pia to agree enthusiastically with Angelo.
“Doesn’t she make a beautiful bride-to-be?” the stylist gushed.
Everyone applauded.
Pia wanted to die.
It took every one of her twenty-four years of struggling to overcome her bashfulness to smile distantly and hold up her chin as she crossed what felt like a mile of hot coals to reach Angelo.
“You look stunning.” The warmth in his smile evaporated when she only offered a deliberately absent, “Gracias.”
Angelo introduced the jeweler, who had recently been to New York and had brought back a fresh selection for the well-heeled travelers who vacationed on the island.
“I thought this one? The setting wouldn’t catch on anything,” Angelo said impassively, offering a platinum-set, emerald cut diamond. It had to be three carats, but was remarkably understated despite the trapezoid cut diamonds on either side. The band was lightly brushed to give it a frost-kissed finish.
Pia looked at the ring and saw water in all its phases, from ice to glimmer to mist. Mostly, she was knocked off her feet that Angelo had heard what she’d said and was trying to find something that would work for her.
“Or this?” Angelo started to reach for another, but Pia couldn’t take her eyes off the first ring. The last time she had experienced such a covetous desire for an object, she’d been looking at a two-man deep-dive submarine.
“I like this one.”
He threaded it on her finger and, when it fit perfectly, another cheer went up.
A fresh flush of being too conspicuous and unguarded came over her. She tried to fight it, but Angelo surprised her with a kiss. His fingertip touched her chin, tilting up her mouth. In a smooth move, he captured her lips, casually flipping her into memories of the night they had shared. His other hand skimmed lightly across her bare shoulder, finding the exposed skin in a tickling caress as he gently brought her in closer.
No, she realized belatedly. She was the one who moved into him, trapping her own hands between them in her need to be closer while he warmed the back of her shoulder with his palm. Her fingertips reached to his jaw, begging him to stay close enough to allow her to continue devouring his lips while sensations tugged in her middle and her knees became liquid.
Distantly she heard a click and there was a flash behind her closed eyes. Melodie murmured, “That was the one, mark my words.” The stylist tittered.
Pia blinked her eyes open and saw the flare of satisfaction in Angelo’s, as though he had deliberately provoked her clingy reaction.
The magnitude of the moment struck her. She was marrying this man. Having his child. She would be under his power forever.
Shaken, she did everything she could to recover her composure, drawing back and smoothing a hand down her dress only to see a hard light come into his gaze.
Pia pretended she wasn’t bothered and went through the motions for the rest of the shoot. All the photos were nice, but Angelo decisively chose, “The kiss.”
The image on the back of Melodie’s camera might as well have been a compromising nude. Pia was clearly in the throes of passion, encouraging the slant of Angelo’s mouth over hers with reaching fingers while her ring caught the sunlight.
“The one with my hand on your shoulder is more elegant, don’t you think?”
“For the eighteen hundreds, sure,” Angelo mocked.
“I adore this,” Melodie said of the kiss. “You look like one of those timeless cinema couples from a classic black-and-white film.”
“Keep the color,” Angelo said, and insisted Melodie transfer it to him immediately, without working any editing magic. Within minutes, he had forwarded the photo to his publicity company.
Twenty minutes later, Pia’s phone was making more noise than a popcorn popper. Colleagues, acquaintances, former students and fellow scientists wished her well. Social invitations began pouring in from every corner in ill-disguised attempts to be invited to the wedding.
She didn’t have much chance to respond. The wedding planner arrived and details were decided on the fly because, according to Angelo, “We want to marry within the month.”
Pia did prefer to marry before her pregnancy began to show, which gave them until mid-January. They wouldn’t announce she was expecting until after the three-month scan, but her head whirled at the scale of wedding Angelo wanted in less than four weeks.
“A thousand?” Pia snapped her head around when he said it. “Mother’s assistant said five hundred.”
“That was her estimate for how many she would invite. I’ll have the same.”
A thousand people. They might as well be televising the event while performing it naked on a beach.
She reminded herself that the half dozen pairs of eyes in his lounge this afternoon had been excruciating. It could be ten thousand at this point and it would be the same torture.
As the day pressed on, she did what she always did when the spotlight turned on her and scorched her to the center of her soul. She focused on creating order and maintaining her posture and manners. She spoke in a clear voice and approached everything with a rational, objective view.
She also pretended this wasn’t her wedding. It was one of her mother’s galas that needed an appropriate theme for decor and menu. She didn’t let herself care whether her bouquet was roses or calla lilies because if she concerned herself with small details, she would work herself into a panic attack over the fact she would eventually have to stand in front of a thousand people and reveal that Angelo could make her knees weak simply by looking into her eyes.
Finally, Angelo dismissed everyone.
Exhausted, Pia made a point of shaking hands and saying goodbye to each person, then told Angelo flatly, “I’m going to change.”
She needed to regroup.
* * *
Angelo couldn’t believe what an ice queen he was marrying.
He should probably be grateful she had shut down somewhere between the stylist and the engagement ring. When he’d looked up as she entered, he’d been kicked in the stomach by how genuinely lovely she was. Speechless. Close to stammering.
She had walked across the room with such a standoffish expression, however, he’d become freshly annoyed. Insulted, even. She acted as though everyone around her was here to serve her and not worth a sincere smile or a personal word.
At least she liked the ring he had chosen, which had leaped out at him as somehow perfect. Subtle, yet with glints of fire. Mesmerizing and more complex the longer he stared at it.
Kissing her had been an impulse. A power move, maybe. He had wanted to force the thaw, and he had, but she’d nearly burned up any thought in his head except a desire to take her back to bed. Hell, if they hadn’t been surrounded, he would have had her on the dining table.
Melodie’s voice had yanked him back to reality.
Just as quickly, Pia had put on her lady-of-the-manor act and things had deteriorated from there. The photo shoot had turned into a parody of old sepia photos and when the eager-to-please wedding planner had invited Pia to describe her dream wedding, she had pretty much recoiled.
“Stay with tradition wherever possible. Many of these decisions can be fielded by my mother’s personal assistant.”
Her mother’s assistant. Apparently, Angelo wa
s being swapped into position like an outfielder midgame. If things were different, that would give him pause as to whether he wanted to marry her, but they had a baby on the way. He went ahead with the announcement.
Which prompted hundreds of texts and emails.
He left many of those to his own assistant, but sent a quick note to his team, reassuring them nothing would change and promising to speak to them soon.
Pia might answer to her parents and their staid ideas of tradition, but Angelo had his team of gamers, misfits all of them, but who were as genuine and generous as the ones who had taken him in so many years ago. They earned disgusting amounts of money, but they were kids and they had been knocked off guard by his news. Angelo paid back his karma by looking after them as best he could.
If he had thought Pia would provide a maternal influence for them, he would be sorely disappointed. She was so freaking detached. That remark about guests, for instance. Maybe she knew he was being perverse, determined to invite as many guests as her mother, down to the exact number. Even so, she was acting as though she was planning a funeral, not their wedding.
She faltered as she realized he was following her into the bedroom.
“I want to change, too. I hate suits.” He didn’t hate them that much now that he could afford them and had them tailored to fit like a second skin.
“Try heels,” she muttered, and turned her back, gathering her hair to offer her zipper.
He almost asked if that was what had put such a sour look on her face, but as he lowered the zip, he revealed the black lace beneath.
“Strapless. I wondered what you were wearing.” He traced the band of the bra to the hook and eye closure.
She moved away, into the closet. He toed off his shoes and opened his belt, tugging it free as he followed her.
She was buttoning one of his black shirts over her delightfully pretty black underwear, shoes abandoned beside the dress on the floor.
“May I?” she belatedly asked, rolling a sleeve up her delicate wrist.