Harlequin Presents--July 2021--Box Set 1 of 2

by Natalie Anderson

He’d once thought his life didn’t need changing, but he could see now that it most definitely did. His life before Carla had blown into it like a whirlwind had been terrible. A cold, empty desert, devoid of colour and light and warmth. For the week he’d shared it with her, it had been brighter and shinier and better.

  She’d shown him what it could be like to let someone in. When he thought about the void he’d lived with for so long, he couldn’t find it. She’d filled it with promise and hope. She’d helped put him back together. She’d risen to his defence. She’d never once been anything other than honest and upfront with him. She’d given him her love and her loyalty, even after everything she’d been through, and what had he done?

  Still determined to believe that he could only survive if he remained alone, he’d sent her away.

  What he’d lost hit him then with the force of a battering ram, slamming into the mile-high walls he’d spent years constructing and reducing them to rubble and dust.

  Carla, with her unassailable belief in family and friends, was everything he’d never known he wanted, he realised, his head pounding with the realisations now raining down on him. Everything he’d been subconsciously seeking his entire life while convincing himself that he wasn’t lonely and he didn’t need anyone. She was strong and brave and tough. And, Dio, the loyalty she so fiercely believed in... He’d been on the receiving end of that and it had been stunning.

  He’d had the chance to build a future with someone who understood him and who he understood. After years of searching he’d finally found a place to belong and develop new foundations upon which, with her, he could have built a life, something brilliant and strong.

  How could he have been such a fool?

  Well, he was done with allowing his preoccupation with the past to influence his present. He’d let it dictate his thoughts, his behaviour and his actions for too long. Carla had shown him a glimpse of what his life could be if he took a risk and spent it with her.

  And taking the risk was exactly what he was going to do, because as he looked briefly around Finn’s study he realised that he wanted the photos. He wanted what Finn had. All of it. And he wanted it with Carla. Seven days ago he’d wondered who the hell fell in love in a week. Well, apparently, he thought, giving free rein to the emotions that had been clamouring for acknowledgement for days and letting them buffet him, that would be him.

  ‘Fix up the interview,’ he said, his heart banging so hard against his ribs he feared one might crack. ‘It’s a good idea.’

  ‘It was Carla’s.’

  Of course it was. All the good ideas were hers.

  ‘Would you mind if we continued this conversation another time?’ he said, leaping to his feet as if the chair were on fire. ‘There’s somewhere I have to be.’

  CHAPTER THIRTEEN

  CARLA SAT AT the table on her tiny roof terrace, the glass of rosé before her untouched and the rays of the setting sun doing little to warm the chill she felt deep inside her that just wouldn’t shift.

  When was it going to stop? she wondered with a sniff. When was the pain going to go away?

  She’d done her best to keep herself busy over the last seven days. Unable to face work when she was liable to burst into tears without warning, she’d requested another week’s leave. She’d gone to Wales to talk to her parents because in the midst of her agony it had struck her that she’d never told them she didn’t hold them responsible for what had happened to her and she’d needed to rectify that. There’d been conversation and hugs and even more tears and she’d invited them to come and stay any time before leaving, feeling as if a great weight had lifted from her shoulders.

  If only the same could be said for the weight in her heart.

  She’d tried so hard to talk herself out of her feelings for Rico. She’d been one hundred per cent mistaken in her conviction he did feel something for her, she’d told herself resolutely. She’d had no indication that what they’d shared had been anything other than casual. He’d considered her a tourist, someone who by definition was transient. For all she knew, he shared his past with all his lovers. She might be the only one he’d ever invited to stay on his island but that had just been circumstance. She hadn’t been special and she’d been a fool to think otherwise.

  But even if she had been special, none of it had been real. For the brief period they’d been together, they’d existed in a bubble. Neither of them had been living their real life. He was based in Venice, while she lived here in London. He was a billionaire, while she was most definitely not. He owned funds and islands, private jets and helicopters and who knew what else? She owned a one-bedroom top-floor flat in Zone 3 and a six-year-old second-hand car.

  What she thought she’d been doing giving him that fridge magnet she had no idea. He’d looked at it as if he’d never seen such an awful thing in his life. Clearly the sun had got to her because what on earth would a worldly billionaire with scars and an edge want with a fridge magnet? He, the man who didn’t do trinkets of any kind, let alone seriously tasteless ones, was hardly going to have had a revelation about something she’d given him. No doubt it had gone in the bin the minute she’d left.

  In fact, she’d had a lucky escape, she’d just about managed to convince herself. If things had carried on in the same vein, with that intensity, how long would it have been before she found herself so wrapped up in him she didn’t want to be anywhere else? Before her identity and her independence completely disappeared? Before she became wholly reliant on him for her happiness and well-being and everything else? And see how she’d feared putting her emotions into the hands of a man? Well, she’d been right to.

  She was glad he hadn’t asked her to stay, and even gladder he’d been honest, even if it had been brutal. He’d saved her from a world of torment. Except he hadn’t, because she was in torment now, and she didn’t believe any of the stuff she’d been trying to tell herself anyway.

  But the pain would subside eventually, she told herself wretchedly, as yet another wave of sadness washed over her, pricking her eyes and tightening her throat. She’d get over him and this endless misery. She’d got over far worse. The excruciating longing she felt when she thought about everything Georgie had would fade with time. Of course it would. She had work. She had friends. And now family. She wasn’t alone.

  On Monday she’d send his phone back. She had to rid herself of her ridiculous obsession with scrolling through all the photos of him she’d taken. It wasn’t healthy. The amount of wine she’d consumed over the last week wasn’t particularly healthy either. And as for the linguine alla vongole she ordered night after night from her local Italian restaurant, well, that had to stop too.

  Tonight’s delivery, she vowed, despondently getting to her feet in response to the buzzer and heading into the kitchen to let her favourite delivery guy in, would be the last. Because what choice did she have but to move on, however much it broke her heart?

  But when she opened the door and found Rico standing there, actually there on her doorstep, holding her bag of food and looking so handsome he took her breath away, she realised she could no more move on than she could fly to the moon. She was rooted to the spot, her heart suddenly thundering and her head spinning.

  ‘May I come in?’

  His voice was gruff, and he looked as tired as she felt, and she desperately wanted to take him in her arms and smooth the exhaustion away because God, she’d missed him so much. But she didn’t know why he was here, and he’d hurt her badly, so instead she lifted her chin and straightened her spine. She had to be so careful around this man.

  ‘Sure.’ She stood aside to let him in, and closed her eyes against the effect of his scent on her.

  ‘Here,’ he said, handing her the bag of food once she’d closed the door and turned back to him. ‘Supper?’

  ‘Yes,’ she said, taking it from him and dumping it in the kitchen before heading onto the
terrace, where at least there was air. And rosé. ‘Wine?’ she asked him, indicating the bottle with a wave of her hand before sitting down.

  ‘No, thank you,’ he said, folding himself into the only other chair on her balcony and fixing his gaze on her, at which point she realised that her eyes and nose were probably red and her cheeks had to be horribly blotchy, but it was too late to worry about that. He was too big for her balcony, really. Not to mention wildly out of place, with his gorgeous Italian looks and the edge that she found so attractive, while she looked a wreck. She’d been right about their lives being worlds apart. His house had a view of Venice. Hers had a view of a car park.

  ‘So what are you doing here, Rico?’ she said, unable to stand the scrutiny and the tension any longer. ‘I thought you weren’t planning a trip to London.’

  ‘I went to see Finn this afternoon.’

  Oh. Well. That was good. ‘I’m glad.’

  ‘It was time.’

  What else might it be time for? Her? No. She was through with trying to figure out what he was thinking. ‘Are you going to see him again?’

  ‘I’m hoping to, yes.’

  That was probably why he’d come. To give her an update about something he knew she cared deeply about. ‘Then I guess our paths are bound to cross in the future,’ she said, the smile she fixed to her face the hardest thing she’d had to do in weeks. ‘But it needn’t be embarrassing. You don’t need to worry that I’ll be making a fool of myself again. It’ll be like nothing ever happened.’

  He gave a harsh laugh and shoved his hands through his hair. ‘Believe me, tesoro, that is not something I’m worried about.’

  ‘Then what are you worried about?’

  ‘That I might have screwed things up with you for good.’

  Her heart hammered and time seemed to slow right down. ‘What do you mean?’

  ‘I’m in love with you, Carla.’

  She went very still as his words hit her brain. ‘What?’ she breathed.

  ‘I love you.’

  ‘Since when?’

  ‘Since the moment I met you, I suspect,’ he said with the faintest of smiles that faded when he added, ‘I only realised it, however, two hours and thirty minutes ago. I’m sorry it took me so long to figure it out.’

  ‘But you sent me away,’ she said, desperately wanting to believe him but so very wary at the same time.

  ‘I know.’

  ‘You hurt me.’

  ‘I’m so sorry. Every time I think about what I said, it kills me.’

  ‘Why did you?’

  ‘I’ve been alone a long time,’ he said, holding her gaze steadily and making no attempt to dodge or deflect the question. ‘It’s a hard habit to break. I didn’t recognise what was happening to me.’ He inhaled deeply. ‘The thing is, amore mio, when I arrived in Milan to start work, I shut myself down and put it all behind me. It was the only way I could move forward. I closed off my emotions and kept myself apart. Nothing mattered. I took risks because I had nothing to lose. I’ve lived like that for years. And it was fine. And then I had the accident and saw the photo of Finn and it wasn’t quite so fine, although I had no idea why. You asked me why I showed up at his house. Well, I genuinely had no idea. I’d acted purely on instinct. You showed me why, Carla,’ he said, leaning forwards and enveloping her with his heat and the scent she loved so much. ‘And because of you I don’t want to be alone any more. You were right all along. Something has been missing from my life and I know what it is now. I’ve been looking for a place to belong and someone to belong with ever since my parents died, and I’ve finally found it. With you. We are kindred spirits, Carla. You were right about that too. We belong together. I love you and I’m sorry beyond words that I hurt you. I asked you once before not to give up on me. And I know I don’t deserve it but I’m asking you again. Please don’t. I don’t think I could stand losing you again.’

  He stopped and looked at her, everything in his heart there for her to see in his expression. His eyes were dark and intense and the love and absolute certainty she saw in their depths shattered the fragile barrier she’d hastily erected around her heart. And suddenly she was awash with all the emotions she hadn’t dared to dream.

  This was what love was, she thought dizzily, revelling in the swelling of her heart and the overwhelming happiness that was now rushing through her. This. Trust and belonging and healing and the promise of forever.

  ‘You won’t,’ she said, her throat tight with emotion.

  ‘Really?’

  ‘I never gave up on you, Rico,’ she said, rising from her seat and moving towards him at the same time as he reached out and pulled her astride him, ‘and I never will.’ He let out a shuddering breath and dropped his head to her chest. ‘I love you,’ she said against his hair. ‘You’ve shown me the life I want to live. And that life is with you. Although how we’d make it work when you live in Venice and I live in London I have no idea.’

  ‘I can work from anywhere,’ he said, lifting his head and shifting her closer. ‘I have an apartment here.’

  ‘But Venice is your home.’

  ‘My home is wherever you are,’ he said softly, taking her hand and placing it over his wildly thundering heart. ‘Show me your world, Carla. It’s so much brighter than mine. You’ve given me back hope. You’ve given me a future. Look.’ Easing back slightly, he took his phone out of his jacket pocket and she noted that his hand was shaking a little too. After a moment he held the device up to her and she gasped. The picture was of his fridge, and there stuck right in the middle of the door, like a beacon, was her magnet.

  ‘I assumed you’d have thrown it away,’ she said, her eyes stinging as emotion overwhelmed her.

  ‘I intended to. I couldn’t. I’m done with detachment and distance,’ he said gruffly. ‘I want to make memories with you, amore mio. I want to fill our life with clutter and light and love.’

  ‘God, I’ve missed you.’

  ‘You can’t have missed me as much as I’ve missed you,’ he said with the slightest of smiles that lit up her heart. ‘My life meant nothing before you crashed into it. Now it means everything. You mean everything. You are my anima gemella, my soulmate.’

  ‘And you’re mine,’ she said, everything she was feeling rocketing around inside her and making her giddy. ‘But it’s only been a couple of weeks. It’s madness.’

  ‘We have a whole lifetime to work on the details.’

  ‘A whole lifetime?’ she echoed as he took her in his arms and pulled her as close as he could. ‘I think I like the sound of that.’

  ‘We’ll figure it out together,’ he said, bending his head and pressing his mouth to the sensitive spot on her neck beneath her ear and making her shiver.

  ‘I think I like the sound of that too.’

  ‘Il mio cuore,’ he murmured, dotting a trail of kisses along her jaw.

  ‘And that.’

  And a kiss at the corner of her mouth. ‘Ti amo.’

  ‘Especially that.’

  And then he kissed her properly and carried her into her bedroom, and after that she gave up thinking at all.

  EPILOGUE

  Identical Strangers, 1.6 million views, a week ago

  ‘SO APART FROM LOOKS,’ came the voice of the interviewer off-screen, ‘how similar are the two of you?’

  ‘It’s early days,’ said Finn with an easy smile as he shifted in his seat and hooked the ankle of one leg over the knee of the other. ‘But I’d say pretty similar. We’re both great with numbers and mildly allergic to milk, so that’s a start.’

  ‘You’re married, is that right?’

  Finn gave a nod, a smile spreading across his face. ‘That’s absolutely right.’

  ‘Any wedding bells on the horizon for you, Rico?’ said the interviewer.

  ‘I couldn’t possibly comment,’ said Rico
with a smile half the size of Finn’s but which lit up his face twice as much. ‘All I will say is, watch this space.’

  ‘We certainly will. Do either of you have anything else to add? Any message for your missing brother?’

  ‘Just this,’ said Rico, leaning forwards and looking seriously and directly down the lens. ‘If you’re out there and able to, please get in touch. Contact Alex Osborne of Osborne Investigations. We want to hear from you. And I can absolutely guarantee it’ll be worth it.’

  * * * * *

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  ISBN-13: 9780369706881

  Invitation from the Venetian Billionaire

  Copyright © 2021 by Lucy King

  All rights reserved. No part of this book may be used or reproduced in any manner whatsoever without written permission except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical articles and reviews.

  This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places and incidents are either the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, businesses, companies, events or locales is entirely coincidental.