‘What are you saying?’ he said, pulling her further into the room and closing the door. ‘Of course I’m going to need you—our child will need both of us. Look at what we’ve got together. We have a brilliant relationship, we’re totally compatible—we just got married, for God’s sake. I know this felt like some crazy hare-brained scheme when we started, but it doesn’t feel like that now, does it?’
‘Come on, Matteo. If it wasn’t for the baby we wouldn’t be here.’
She turned away from his fierce gaze, stared past his shoulder at bookshelves full of ancient books piled high behind glass, at the dust mites that danced in the sunlight.
‘Is that right?’ he said softy. ‘Come on. I want you to read this.’
He took her hand and walked her to the shelves. There he unlocked a glass cabinet. In it were rows of soft leather books, much slimmer than the rest. He pulled a black leather notebook from the end of the middle shelf.
‘These are my journals. I’ve kept them since I was a kid. Occasionally I still write stuff down. This is the current one.’
He fanned the pages. Half of the book was filled with drawings and words; the other half was still empty. He looked at her and smiled. Held the book against his heart.
‘You’re in here,’ he said.
They walked outside onto the terrace and down the steps towards the bubbling fountains. Shaded from the hot midsummer sun, they sat on a marble bench as the water sparkled in rainbows of spray all around them. He couldn’t have chosen a more romantic spot, and her heart bubbled as much as the water around the stone nymphs.
‘I’ve never let anyone read these. It’s nobody’s business. But this is about us, so it’s yours too.’
She looked at it and recognised it as the book he’d been writing in on the boat.
He skimmed through it until he found the page he wanted. ‘I wrote in this the day you told me you were pregnant. And the day after we met. And loads of other times too. Here—read.’
He opened it and handed it to her. She read what he had written in his decisive handwriting.
What a night!
Arturo is hopefully going to land in our lap, and I discovered a love of ballet.
OK, a love of a ballet dancer...
Met a woman and almost fell for her. Beautiful, sensitive, sensual. I’m pretty sure I’ll call her. Once Arturo is in the bag...
First time I’ve felt like this in ages. Feel energised. Alive. Good times.
He took the book back, skimmed past more pages, then opened it again.
Can’t get this woman out of my mind.
‘So you can’t pretend that this is all fake. This is the start of something wonderful.’
He looked at her with such kindness in his eyes, a kindness and warmth that she’d never seen from anyone before, and it felt like torchlight in the darkness—it felt as if she was being led in from the cold. Her heart thundered. It felt terrifying.
‘You say that now, but you’re hardly going to be here to be part of it. You’re going to be away all the time, making deals and keeping people sweet, and pulling out the knives in your back that Claudio will be sticking in.’
He shook his head, all mirth wiped from his face like melting snow slipping into a river.
‘We’ve still got a lot to talk about, but my days of being married to the job are over. I don’t want to end up like my dad—though that wasn’t just about the job. If Claudio hadn’t been so in love with him none of this would have happened.’
She stared open-mouthed. ‘What do you mean, in love with him?’
‘Just what I say. They were lovers. I found out after the funeral, but out of respect for Mum I haven’t said anything to anyone.’
Ruby stared up at the laughing stone cherubs, their innocent cheeks plump under the streaming fountains. Her head swam with all this news. So that was what this was all about. Claudio’s jealousy had been driving him all these years. And Coral had never told anyone about it. How could she tell people that her husband had been gay? That brave, spirited woman must have suffered so much. And no one had known. She was a force of nature—an inspiration. And now she was her mother-in-law, too.
‘Are you saying that’s what drove your father to alcohol?’
‘I’m saying that my dad was mixed up. He put his whole life into the bank and his family, but there was something deeply unhappy in him, and in the end it’s what’s killed him. Now Claudio has just announced that he’s gay—that’s why some of those old clients have left him.’
‘And some people can’t accept that? How ridiculous. Of all the underhand things Claudio’s done, he’s now being punished for being himself.’
‘Yes, and, much as I want to build up the bank, I don’t want to schmooze with people who hate like that. So I’ve decided.’
She heard the words. And the silence that followed.
She turned. ‘You’ve decided what?’
‘I’ve decided that if Arturo wants to merge, that’s fine. If he doesn’t, that’s also fine. Because I’m going to take the bank to market, make it public, and let someone else run it for a change. I’m not going to lose my life to it any more.’
She stared around the gardens. ‘But what will you do? Are you going to go back to sport?’
He lifted her hand in his, wove their fingers together. The gold bands glinted in the sunlight.
‘There are options—but that depends on you. We’re going to have a baby. One of us is going to have to look after it while the other goes to work—that’s how I see it. If you want to dance I’ll stay home. If you want to stay home I’ll go to work.’
The warm Italian afternoon was rolling on. Tall poplars swayed their ambivalence in the sunshine, this way or that way. Grass stood up in straight neat rows and the fountains bubbled contentedly. The Croydon park she’d once played in was a thousand miles from this. No gravelly play area, no graffiti walls, no mums pushing prams or sitting on benches, heads deep in their phones.
This life of sunshine was what her daughter should have—her grandmother and her father, sunshine and health. Happiness. Italy.
‘You’ll live here I take it...?’ she said, her voice trailing off.
She couldn’t speak any more, because the thought of what she would miss was choking her—her whole heart seemed to be tugging free and choking the very air from her body.
‘I assumed you’d want to be based in England?’ he said, turning her round.
She closed her eyes as she felt his warm, wonderful strength fold around her—her solid wall.
‘Where do you want us to live? We don’t need to decide right here, right now, but we’re free to choose—we can be wherever we want. Ruby, we’re free. I am free. For the past ten years I’ve been enslaved—as much as any of the slaves that fought in that Coliseum over there. Every day making myself do a job I didn’t like, becoming a person I didn’t want to be, showing disrespect to women.’
She looked up into his face and saw a brightness she’d never seen before. Hope shone from his eyes and his smile broadened widely. ‘I’m so happy for you, Matteo. It must have been the hardest thing to decide, but it’s the best news too.’
‘I still don’t think you get it, Ruby. This is the happiest day of my life. You have made me the happiest man alive. I don’t care about anything else.’
He cupped her face, bent forward to kiss her, and it felt different. It felt like the most possessive, passionate branding of his love.
‘Do you love me?’ she heard herself say.
‘Do I love you? Yes. I’ve never met a woman like you. I’ve never seen such passion and spirit. You’ve set me an example that put me to shame, and when I asked you to, you stood by me. You were prepared to do anything for me and our little family. I won’t ever forget that.’
She swallowed. ‘You told me to pretend I loved you. I didn�
��t need to pretend.’
‘Me neither. We’ve got our lives ahead of us now. We’ll work out where we want to be and what I’m going to do—maybe I’ll coach. Who knows? But as long as we both know that we’ll put our daughter first in all we do—that’s all I ask. She needs to know she’s the most important thing in the world to us.’
Ruby nodded. She knew more than anyone that her life’s work was going to be making her daughter know that, in every fibre of her being. She knew that her only medicine was to fill up her soul with love, not fear.
‘My father...’ she said. ‘I’ve never told you—or anyone, for that matter—but I’ve never met him. I only know his name and his home town. Will you help me find him? I really want to contact him now.’
He tucked her close and she buried herself against him, smelled him, breathed him in, and with every second felt replete with the power of his love.
‘I’m so glad you’ve told me that. We’ll find him together. We’ll work it all out together. And Coral is here for you as much as she is for me. For this one,’ he said, stroking the soft curve of her stomach.
She smiled into his chest. Nodded. She finally knew.
She whispered the words she now understood.
‘“Lovers don’t finally meet someone. They’re in each other all along.”’
* * *
If you enjoyed The Tycoon’s Shock Heir why not explore these other stories by Bella Frances?
The Argentinian’s Virgin Conquest
The Italian’s Vengeful Seduction
The Playboy of Argentina
The Consequence She Cannot Deny
Available now!
Keep reading for an excerpt from The Spaniard’s Untouched Bride by Maisey Yates.
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The Spaniard’s Untouched Bride
by Maisey Yates
PROLOGUE
HE DOESN’T HIRE WOMEN.
Camilla Alvarez looked into the mirror at her decidedly plain reflection. She was a woman, that much was true. Though, she had never been considered a beauty. Even so, she imagined that as far as Matías Navarro was concerned, she was a woman.
Her cheeks were still wet with tears, her eyes glittering with more. It was unthinkable. Losing her father suddenly as she had to a heart attack, and then losing the ranch, as well. And all the horses...
It was her heart. And, shattered though it was, fractured as it was now, she couldn’t lose it. She could not.
But the horses, the rancho, everything was being sold to cover her father’s debts. Everything was going to Matías Navarro.
He had been one of her father’s fiercest competitors. His racehorses were the only steeds that could compete with those of Cesar Alvarez.
And now Matías owned them.
Because apparently, their rancho had been in debt, the supposed millions of dollars that her family possessed nothing more than smoke and mirrors. All mortgaged to extremes and behind on every payment.
Her father had been an idealist. A man completely laser-focused on his ranch, his animals, his workers. With little time or thought given to anything else. She didn’t even have to ask herself how it had happened. She knew. Her father hadn’t liked the situation, and so he had ignored it.
Collectors had been hounding Camilla ever since Cesar’s death. And her mother—predictably—had gone off to France, taking shelter under the wing of one of her many lovers.
She had always flaunted them in the face of her husband, but Camilla supposed that now that Cesar was dead, her mother felt it was all justified seeing as she clearly had an insurance policy.
Camilla had nothing. Nothing but the rancho. The place she had grown up in, grown wild in. Her mother had rarely been in residence, and for most of Camilla’s life, it had simply been her and her father.
And he had allowed her to do whatever she wanted. To run barefoot. To ride until she reached the end of the property, and then beyond. Roaming all over the Spanish countryside as she pleased.
Her mother, an American heiress who had never settled well into the rural country life, had seen it all as beneath her.
Camilla had seen it as everything. And now it was gone.
She had begged, pleaded, as her horses had been led away from the property by members of Matías’s staff for them to let her go, too. If she was going to lose the rancho, as long as she could be with the horses, as long as she could be with Fuego, she could survive it.
She had told them she would do anything, any job.
But the stone-faced man guiding her favorite black stallion into the trailer had simply shaken his head and told her that Matías Navarro did not hire women.
And indeed, the evidence had been all around her that it was the truth. There was not a single woman among Matías’s staff present at the rancho.
Her father was gone. Her horses were gone. Soon, she would be evicted from the rancho, with nowhere to go. There were no provisions made for her. She had nothing. Nothing and no one. She had never been able to count on her mother during good times, she had no illusions that she would be able to count on the woman now that things were difficult.
Camilla knew one thing. She knew horses.
She knew those horses. She loved those horses.
Fuego was going to be the next champion on the European racing circuit, she was confident in that. But no one else could handle him. No one else could ride him, and he had some way to go before he was ready for anyone else to try.
Matías Navarro would find out soon enough that his new acquisition was essentially useless to him. If the horse could not be broken, then he was worthless.
And without the horses... Her life felt worthless.
She looked back in the mirror, examining her face. She was not classically beautiful. Her mother had always despaired of her heavy bone structure, the angular nature of her jaw and chin. Not feminine, her rather spindly mother had declared.
For the first time, though, Camilla was completely pleased with this assessment of her looks. Because it was going to be an asset to her now.
She opened up the drawer in the vanity and pulled out a pair of scissors. Then she touched a lock of glossy, black hair, and ruthlessly stretched it tight, cutting it close to her ears.
Yes, she had found her solution.
Matías Navarro did not hire women. But perhaps he would hire a new stable boy.
Copyright © 2018 by Maisey Yates
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p; ISBN-13: 9781488044144
The Tycoon’s Shock Heir
First North American publication 2018
Copyright © 2018 by Bella Frances
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