Desert Jewels & Rising Stars

by Sharon Kendrick

  What had he said? What had he just said? That he loved her? She felt her heart expand and bend and swell until it was big enough to swallow the whole world. She looked down, her lashes brushing shyly against her cheek. “Come on,” she murmured. “I’ll help you up.”

  But the armor was even heavier than she’d thought. First Abbott, then her father, had to come and help him to stand up.

  “Hello, sir,” Alessandro said to her father, smiling.

  “I don’t think we’ve ever met in person. I’m Alessandro Caetani.”

  Walton blinked, his eyes wide. He looked at Lilley. “This is your husband?” he asked faintly.

  Unable to speak, she nodded, then turned back to Alessandro.

  Behind her, she heard her father give a low whistle. “What a merger this will make.” But as she turned with a scowl, Walton quickly said to Abbott, “Care for a drink at the gatehouse? Something to warm your blood?”

  “You bet.”

  Lilley and Alessandro stood alone on the snowy, empty road. A wind blew off the lake, whipping through her hair, but she no longer felt the cold. She felt warm all over, filled with light.

  “What possessed you to do this?” she whispered, putting her hand on the side of his shiny helmet. “This crazy thing?”

  He moved his metal glove over her hand. “I wanted to show you I’m sorry,” he said in a low voice. “I never should have asked if the baby was mine.”

  She swallowed, looking down.

  “I shouldn’t have let a single white lie keep me from trusting you for thousands of reasons,” he said. “One most of all.” He lifted her chin with his finger. “I love you, Lilley.”

  The winter sun burst through the gray winter clouds. A beam of light caught his armor, making him sparkle like diamonds.

  “It took losing you in Rome to make me realize you were right. I was afraid. Now, the only thing that scares me is losing you. I’ll do anything to win you back, Lilley,” he whispered. His dark eyes met hers. “Absolutely anything.”

  The white, gray and black of winter suddenly filled with the beautiful pinks and greens of spring in Lilley’s eyes. He loved her. And their lives together were only beginning.

  “I love you, Alessandro,” she whispered, throwing her arms around his hard, cold armor.

  For a long moment, they held each other on the quiet road. Then Lilley pulled back, her forehead furrowed as she glanced back at the huge semitruck, still parked behind her car. “But why did you bring that?”

  “Oh.” Alessandro gave her a sudden grin. “I was afraid I’d kill us both if I actually tried to sit on a horse, so I made other plans.” Looking at the truck’s driver, he motioned with his hand. The driver hopped out and went to the back of the truck. She heard the distant roar of an engine, and then a vintage Cadillac De Ville—in hot pink—rolled off the ramp to park beside them.

  As the driver disappeared for his drink at the gatehouse, Lilley walked slowly around the Cadillac, her mouth open.

  It was a classic convertible from the 1960s, the exact same fuchsia as the ball gown she’d worn to their reception in Rome. “What is that?”

  He grinned at her. “Our getaway vehicle, cara. To ride off into the sunset.”

  She looked back at him. “And what if you hadn’t found me? What if I’d already been gone?”

  “Then I would have sold my business and driven all over the country, looking for you,” he said gravely behind her. “Everywhere. Until you were in my arms.”

  She gasped a laugh. “Dressed as a knight? Driving a hot-pink Cadillac? The paparazzi would have had a field day! They’d have said you’d lost your mind!”

  “I have,” he said softly. “Along with my heart. All I want to do, for the rest of my life, is make a fool of myself. Over you.”

  Tears fell from Lilley’s lashes. Standing on her tiptoes, she held up his cold visor with her fingertips and kissed him. Her husband kissed her back fervently, reverently, passionately. They had been standing in the snowy road for hours, or perhaps minutes, when she finally pulled away for air. His black eyes glimmered down at her. She had no idea if the tears on his cheeks were hers or his. But what did it matter? They were one.

  “Thank you for being a fool,” she said, her heart welling with joy. “Thank you for making all my childhood dreams come true.”

  He looked down at her, his handsome face glowing with love and shining with the strength of steel. “And thank you,” he whispered, stroking her cheek, “for making me want to dance.”

  They danced at their first anniversary party the following September. As Alessandro led Lilley to the dance floor in their Sonoma ballroom, he whirled her in a circle, making her colorful skirts twirl. She heard a soft “awww” from their fifty or so guests, just family and friends, including a deep sigh from her father, who was holding his baby grandson, Teo.

  Alessandro pulled her close on the dance floor. Lilley looked up at him breathlessly as he swayed against her.

  “My, oh my,” she murmured, fluttering her eyelashes. “You’re quite the dancer. Have you been taking lessons?”

  “You know I have. You’ve been taking them with me.” He twirled her, then gave a mischievous grin. “No broken toes in sight.”

  “Because you’re leading me.”

  “No,” he whispered, pulling her close. “We lead each other.”

  Lilley looked up at him, dazed with happiness. Their lives over the past ten months had been filled with one joy after the next. They now split their time evenly between Rome and San Francisco, where Lilley had started her fledgling jewelry company, Lilley Caetani Limited. Her first collection had already been a great success at the international jewelry trade show in San Francisco.

  So much had changed in the last year. Lilley was still awed to think how, just fifteen months before, she’d attended the trade show as a guest with a dream. Now she was an exhibitor. With Carrie’s financial backing, her fledgling company had already made a splash in the trade dailies and orders had started to flood in from around the world. She would have to hire more employees soon. Lilley often traveled with her husband and their baby to Singapore or Norway or Namibia, getting inspiration for her designs. She happily traveled wherever the continuing expansion of Caetani Worldwide took them.

  There was only one of Alessandro’s potential acquisitions that she absolutely wouldn’t allow. Alessandro had made multiple offers to buy her company and merge it with Caetani-Hainsbury Worldwide, which she’d refused in no uncertain terms.

  “Sorry, my company is not for sale,” she’d said breezily. “I’m not interested in being part of some soulless, heartless conglomerate—”

  “Hey!”

  She’d grinned. “Sorry. But my company is small and I like it that way.”

  He’d tilted his head thoughtfully. “We could double your growth projections, especially in Europe. And there might be other fringe benefits as well,” he’d murmured. “Think about it.”

  “Not for sale at any price,” she said primly.

  He’d lifted a wicked eyebrow. “Oh? Are you sure?” And he’d pulled her into bed. Lilley sighed at the memory. Of course, she would never sell him her company, but it was sure fun to let him try.

  Tonight’s anniversary party in Sonoma had been Alessandro’s idea. He’d planned the whole thing from start to finish. The wine harvest looked to be excellent this year, and all their friends and family beamed as they held up glasses, toasting Alessandro and Lilley on the occasion of their one-year anniversary.

  Olivia Bianchi, alas, was not in attendance. Lilley hadn’t even tried to invite her. She’d learned she couldn’t please everyone, and she didn’t need to impress anyone. The only people she cared about were right here: her friends Nadia and Jeremy, who were now engaged. And her family. Her cousin had come all the way from France, along with Carrie and their baby. Alessandro and Théo might never be friends, but they’d managed to achieve a sort of détente. They’d moved their rivalry to the realms of basketball an
d extreme sports like skydiving. Great, Lilley thought with an inward groan. Just what she needed. A husband and a cousin who were fighting to jump out of a perfectly good plane.

  Even her father was doing better, now that he’d retired and given up day-to-day management of Hainsbury’s to Alessandro. The company was on track to merge with Caetani Worldwide, and all of it would be left in trust to Walton’s grandchildren. Her father had moved to San Francisco to be closer to them, and to focus on getting healthier. And, like a miracle, he seemed stronger every day. Especially on the days he played with his grandson.

  Friends and family were all that mattered, Lilley thought. Not fame. Not the glitter of wealth. The only diamonds that mattered were the ones in the bright smiles of the people she loved. As her dance with Alessandro ended and their friends applauded wildly around them, her father brought the baby to the dance floor.

  “I think the kid wants to dance,” Walton said gruffly.

  A new song began, and Alessandro took baby Teo in his arms. Nuzzling his chubby cheeks and downy head, he looked down at his son tenderly. “I can teach him.”

  Lilley’s heart swelled as Alessandro held their cooing baby against his tuxedo jacket, and wrapped his other arm around her. Smiling, she leaned her head against her husband’s strong shoulders as they swayed together in time to the music. Listening to Teo’s baby giggle and Alessandro’s joyful baritone laugh, Lilley suddenly knew their lives together would always be happy like this. Their days would shine with endless brilliant facets, in a hodgepodge of sparkling gemstones and tarnished brass, rough rock crystals and gleaming platinum, that when welded together … formed a family.

  Read on for a sneak preview of Carol Marinelli’s

  PUTTING ALICE BACK TOGETHER!

  Hugh hired bikes!

  You know that saying: ‘It’s like riding a bike, you never forget’?

  I’d never learnt in the first place.

  I never got past training wheels.

  ‘You’ve got limited upper-body strength?’ He stopped and looked at me.

  I had been explaining to him as I wobbled along and tried to stay up that I really had no centre of balance. I mean really had no centre of balance. And when we decided, fairly quickly, that a bike ride along the Yarra perhaps, after all, wasn’t the best activity (he’d kept insisting I’d be fine once I was on, that you never forget), I threw in too my other disability. I told him about my limited upper-body strength, just in case he took me to an indoor rock-climbing centre next. I’d honestly forgotten he was a doctor, and he seemed worried, like I’d had a mini-stroke in the past or had mild cerebral palsy or something.

  ‘God, Alice, I’m sorry—you should have said. What happened?’

  And then I had had to tell him that it was a self-diagnosis. ‘Well, I could never get up the ropes at the gym at school.’ We were pushing our bikes back. ‘I can’t blow-dry the back of my hair …’ He started laughing.

  Not like Lisa who was laughing at me—he was just laughing and so was I. We got a full refund because we’d only been on our bikes ten minutes, but I hadn’t failed. If anything, we were getting on better.

  And better.

  We went to St Kilda to the lovely bitty shops and I found these miniature Russian dolls. They were tiny, made of tin or something, the biggest no bigger than my thumbnail. Every time we opened them, there was another tiny one, and then another, all reds and yellows and greens.

  They were divine.

  We were facing each other, looking down at the palm of my hand, and our heads touched.

  If I put my hand up now, I can feel where our heads touched.

  I remember that moment.

  I remember it a lot.

  Our heads connected for a second and it was alchemic; it was as if our minds kissed hello.

  I just have to touch my head, just there at the very spot and I can, whenever I want to, relive that moment.

  So many times I do.

  ‘Get them.’ Hugh said, and I would have, except that little bit of tin cost more than a hundred dollars and, though that usually wouldn’t have stopped me, I wasn’t about to have my card declined in front of him.

  I put them back.

  ‘Nope.’ I gave him a smile. ‘Gotta stop the impulse spending.’

  We had lunch.

  Out on the pavement and I can’t remember what we ate, I just remember being happy. Actually, I can remember: I had Caesar salad because it was the lowest carb thing I could find. We drank water and I do remember not giving it a thought.

  I was just thirsty.

  And happy.

  He went to the loo and I chatted to a girl at the next table, just chatted away. Hugh was gone for ages and I was glad I hadn’t demanded Dan from the universe, because I would have been worried about how long he was taking.

  Do I go on about the universe too much? I don’t know, but what I do know is that something was looking out for me, helping me to be my best, not to **** this up as I usually do. You see, we walked on the beach, we went for another coffee and by that time it was evening and we went home and he gave me a present.

  Those Russian dolls.

  I held them in my palm, and it was the nicest thing he could have done for me.

  They are absolutely my favourite thing and I’ve just stopped to look at them now. I’ve just stopped to take them apart and then put them all back together again and I can still feel the wonder I felt on that day.

  He was the only man who had bought something for me, I mean something truly special. Something beautiful, something thoughtful, something just for me.

  © Carol Marinelli 2012

  Available at www.millsandboon.co.uk

  Married on Paper

  Maisey Yates

  MAISEY YATES was an avid Mills & Boon® Modern™ romance reader before she began to write them. She still can’t quite believe she’s lucky enough to get to create her very own sexy alpha heroes and feisty heroines. Seeing her name on one of those lovely covers is a dream come true.

  Maisey lives with her handsome, wonderful, nappy-changing husband and three small children across the street from her extremely supportive parents and the home she grew up in, in the wilds of Southern Oregon, USA. She enjoys the contrast of living in a place where you might wake up to find a bear on your back porch and then heading into the home office to write stories that take place in exotic urban locales.

  The Argentine’s Price

  Maisey Yates

  CHAPTER ONE

  “YOU’RE buying up my company’s stock. Why?” Vanessa clutched her silver purse tightly in her hand and tried to ignore the heat and anger curling in her stomach as she addressed the tall man in black. Lazaro Marino. Her first love. Her first kiss. Her first heartbreak and, apparently, the man who was attempting a hostile takeover of her family’s company.

  Lazaro’s dark eyes flicked over her and he handed his glass of champagne to the slender blonde standing on his left. It was clear from his dismissive manner that he saw the woman as little more than a cup-holder in a designer gown. Well, Vanessa imagined she was a little more than that to him, in his bed at least.

  Her cheeks burned, the images in her head instant and graphic. How did he do that? Thirty seconds in his presence and he had her mind in the bedroom.

  She stared just past Lazaro, at the painting on the wall behind him, in order to avoid those dark, all-too-knowing eyes of his. She could feel his gaze on her, warming her, turning her blood to fire in her veins. Instant. All-consuming. Still. After all this time. It threw her right back to the summer she was sixteen, when mornings had been all about the hope that he would be there, working on the grounds of the estate. So that she could sit and simply look at him, the boy she wasn’t even permitted to talk to.

  The boy who ultimately inspired her to break the rules, rules that had been sacrosanct before that.

  It was inconvenient that the boy had become a man who still had the power to make her pulse race. Even when he was only a picture in
a magazine, looking at him was a full-on sensory experience. In person … in person he made her feel as if her skin was too tight for her body.

  “Ms. Pickett.” He inclined his head, a lock of obsidian hair falling forward with the motion. Not an accident, she was sure of that. He had that look about him. That sort of hot, can’t-be-bothered-to-get-too-slick look. It gave the impression he’d gotten out of bed, combed his fingers through his thick black hair and thrown on a thousand-dollar suit.

  And for some reason it was devilishly sexy. Probably because it was easy to imagine what he might have been doing in that bed, what activities might have prevented him from having adequate time to get ready …

  She blinked furiously, redirecting her thoughts. She was not going down that rabbit trail again. She wasn’t some naive sixteen-year-old anymore, imagining that the fluttering in her stomach was anything more than the first stirrings of lust, imagining that a kiss meant love. No, she wasn’t that girl anymore, and Lazaro Marino didn’t have any power over her.

  She had power. And she would remind him of that.

  “Please,” she said, turning on her CEO voice. “Call me Vanessa. We are old friends after all.”

  “Old friends?” He chuckled, a dark, rich sound that made her blood heat. “I had not thought of us as such. But if you insist, Vanessa it is then.” His accent had smoothed in the twelve years since she’d seen him, but he still said her name as he always had, his tongue caressing the syllables, drawing them out, making her own name sound impossibly sexy.

  Age looked good on him. At thirty, he was even more attractive than he’d been at eighteen. His jaw a bit more square, his shoulders broader. His nose was different, slightly crooked, the imperfection adding to his mystique rather than detracting from his otherwise perfect face. She wondered if he’d broken it in a fight. It wasn’t impossible. The Lazaro she’d known had been hotheaded, passionate in every conceivable way. And there had been many times when she’d wondered what it might be like to have all that passion directed at her—and one wonderful occasion when it had been. When he’d made her feel that she was the only woman, the most important thing in his world. Lazaro could lie more effectively with a kiss than most men could with a thousand words.