“I have a secret, too. One I hope won’t upset you too terribly.”
“Now that I know you love me, I’m too happy to be upset about anything.”
She covered his face with kisses, loving him to distraction. “When my parents told me you’d asked for my hand and that they wanted me to marry you, I rebelled until they told me my father had a health problem. They still haven’t explained exactly, but I’m pretty sure it’s his heart. Papà told me he needed a son-in-law to lean on.”
Stefano kissed her long and hard. “I already knew.”
“But you couldn’t! They didn’t tell anyone.”
“My father figured it out during a visit two months before our wedding and told me Victor was slowly fading. When I heard that admission, I thought that if the woman I was about to marry could love her father enough to make a sacrifice that earthshaking, then I had to have faith that we could eventually make a good marriage. But like you, I fought it hard in the beginning. The day my parents told me I had to marry you, I went to see Enzo and get his advice.”
An impish smile broke out on her succulent mouth. “What did he say?”
“You want the exact translation?”
“You know I do.”
“He said, ‘All right—there’s only one way I can see this working. You need your freedom, so do her the biggest favor of her life and yours. You’ve got a year before the wedding. Let her know before you’re married that you plan to be your own person and continue doing the mining work you love while you help her father govern. It’ll mean you’ll be apart from her for long periods. Give her time to adjust to that fact, know what I mean?’”
Lanza burst into laughter first. “I love Enzo. When he drove me to the airport, he was surprised that I was flying to Rome. I told him you and I had to give up our dreams when we were forced to marry, but we worked out a solution that gives both of us as much freedom as possible to do our own thing without question. To think that little monkey was the architect of your rules of engagement.”
“In a manner of speaking.” Stefano grinned before kissing the hollow in her throat.
She kissed him back. “I also told him our circumstances could have spelled the end of happiness for both of us, but we found the perfect solution through freedom and I couldn’t be happier. Enzo must be laughing his head off about now.”
Stefano pulled her on top of him and looked into her eyes. “I talked to him the other day. He told me he thinks I’m the luckiest man on the planet and I better be good to you. What he didn’t know was that I already wanted you beyond reason.”
So saying, he covered her mouth with his own and gave her another long, passionate kiss that went on and on. When he finally lifted his head he whispered, “You have no idea how much I missed you. Every night when I went to bed, I dreamed of you. The next time I have to leave, I’m taking you with me.”
“Darling—”
“Just promise me one thing.”
“What is it?”
“That you’ll forget that letter I sent you and the things I said to you on our first morning at the chalet. I’m in love with you and plan to be so good to you, you’ll love me forever.”
Her eyes shone like hot blue stars. “Is that your way of saying you believe in forever?”
“You’ve convinced me there’s something to it because I can’t imagine life without you. When you went to the other bedroom last night, it felt like death. I never want to experience that feeling again.”
“I know because I felt it, too. That’s why I came flying back into you. Thank you for forgiving me.”
She burrowed her face in his neck. “I love you, love you.”
“Enough to have my baby?”
“Oh, Stefano—I can’t wait to get pregnant.”
“We’ll have beautiful royal babies because you’ll be their mother.” He bit her earlobe gently. “Do you think they’ll hate us for bringing them into the world?”
“They’ll get over it.”
“How do you know?”
She gave him an illuminating smile. “We did.”
* * *
Look out for the next story in
The Princess Brides trilogy
Coming soon!
And if you enjoyed this story,
check out these other great reads
from Rebecca Winters
Wedding the Greek Billionaire
Falling for the Venetian Billionaire
Captivated by the Brooding Billionaire
The Magnate’s Holiday Proposal
All available now!
Keep reading for an excerpt from Hired by the Mysterious Millionaire by Ally Blake.
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Hired by the Mysterious Millionaire
by Ally Blake
CHAPTER ONE
“IT’S HIM. It has to be.”
Ignoring her friend’s imploring voice, Evie Croft let her body rock with the soothing motion of the morning train as it rumbled along the Frankston Line. Swiping through the ads in the Room Rent app, she tried really hard to feel enthused about exorbitant rent, alarming-sounding housemates, or both.
“Evie!” Zoe whispered, loudly enough that the schoolboys sitting across from them actually looked up from their phones. “You know who I mean. He’s nose-deep in a book the size of a house brick, so you can look. Look. Look now.”
Evie knew Zoe was talking about her “train boyfriend” and she had no intention of looking. She’d already accidentally made eye contact with Hot Stuff in the Swanky Suit today, and many more times since he’d started taking her train.
It was hard not to. With his overlong hair and rugged stubble, the man was a study in the kind of dark, broody countenance you just couldn’t fake.
“Stop looking at that stupid app,” said Zoe. “You are not moving out of my apartment just because Lance is moving in and that’s final.”
Evie gave her oldest friend a squeezy one-armed hug. “I love you because you truly believe it. You and Lance have been waiting for this moment since you were sixteen years old. He’s home from deployment next week and it’s finally happening.”
Zoe sat back, closed her eyes and sighed. “It really is, isn’t it?”
Either way, Evie gave up on looking for a new place to stay. Only half an hour out from the biggest job interview of her life—with Game Plan, no less, a coder’s Holy Grail—she instead practised answering interview questions in her head.
“Gah!” Evie held her phone up high, out in front, then opened the neck of her top and slipped her phone between sternum and bra.
Zoe cocked an eyebrow. “You really think that’s going to stop me?”
Evie did not. With only a super-quick glance in the direction of Hot Stuff in the Swanky Suit to make sure he wasn’t watching, she dug beneath her vintage pea coat and warm winter top to fish out her phone, shivering as her chilly fingers grazed her skin. And rocking into the older man sardined in beside her. She sent him an apologetic smile. The barest flicker of his cheek was a tale of eternal sufferance.
The train commute took all sorts. The bored schoolkids, the frazzled mums with toddlers and prams in tow, women in piercings leaning on men with tattoos, creative office types with their smooth hair and manicured nails. It was a delicious microcosm of the city at large.
Evie had grown up in a small dairy community, just north of Echuca, and her favourite memory of her mother was listening to her wax lyrical about the short time she’d lived in Melbourne—the electric hum of creativity, the eclectic fashion, the epicurean delights. She remembered tracing the delicate “Adventure” tattoo etched into her mother’s fine wrist.
After her mum died Evie had promised herself she’d end up there one day too and have the life her mother had never had.
Though the past couple of weeks the city had been making her work for it.
“Seriously?” Evie cried when Zoe whipped her phone away with a delighted, “Aha! Now, let’s see what Hot Stuff in the Swanky Suit has to say.”
Zoe didn’t mean “in person.” For she and Hot Stuff had never had an actual conversation.
Well, unless you counted that first day. She’d made it to the train doors right as they’d pulled up to their city stop when the train had lurched to a halt. Shoved from behind, Evie had tripped and elbowed Hot Stuff in the gut.
Mortified, she’d crouched to pick up the book he’d dropped. The autobiography of Jonathon Montrose, the man behind Game Plan, no less. Cowboy tech investor, IT savant, Evie’s actual hero.
Funny. She’d forgotten that detail. Had that given her the seed of the idea to dare apply for a job with the great man himself? Huh.
Anyway, handing over the book to Hot Stuff, she’d apologised like crazy, while trying not to swoon in his glorious presence, until he’d taken her by both shoulders, strong hands holding her still. He was even bigger up close. And he’d smelled so good. When he’d looked down into her eyes, the stormy blue depths of his own holding her in their thrall, she’d forgotten how to breathe until he’d let her go and disappeared into the station with the bustling morning crowd.
Evie let out a soft sigh and glanced his way just as he ran a hand through his overlong dark hair, leaving finger tracks in its wake. All that indolent grace, the sexy stubble and those deeply intelligent-looking eyes—he really added an extra something to the daily commute.
Other commuters came and went, took different trains, adopted random seats, but Hot Stuff always chose the same spot: across the aisle and down three rows from hers. Evie had always been a fan of patterns. It was comforting to know she wasn’t the only creature of habit in their little train universe.
“How many apps do you have open at one time?” Zoe fussed, and she swiped them into oblivion. “How does your brain not scramble?”
“It’s called multitasking.”
Zoe snorted. Then found the Urban Rambler app. Developed by Game Plan, of course. His apps were seriously the best. Evie would be first in line to sign up to Game On—the revolutionary new mobile communication app everyone in the biz was excited about.
Zoe clicked on the Let’s Get Personal column, flipped the phone so the words were nice and readable and read out loud.
“‘Frankston Line.’ That’s us. ‘Carriage Three.’ Ditto us. ‘To the Bewitching Brunette in the Beauteous Beanies.’”
Zoe paused a moment for drama before lifting her gaze to Evie’s knitted beanie. One of the billion she’d knitted herself. For she really was a fan of patterns.
Today’s was silver, with a rainbow pom-pom on top. It didn’t exactly go with her interview outfit—pea coat over black top and slouchy black pants with fake zips and pockets—all belonging to fashion-plate Zoe, as even computer-nerd Evie wasn’t about to turn up to an interview in a Han Solo “I Know” T-shirt, boyfriend jeans and Converse boots—but it did the job.
Zoe said, “Now, hold on to your hat, my friend, because this is going to blow your mind. It says:
New to your orbit, I find myself struck
By your raven locks, your starlit eyes. What luck
That I find myself able to see you twice a day.
A beacon in a sea of strangers. I must say
Your sunshine smiles are my good morning.
Your evening sighs my goodnight.
If I had the courage I’d say hello.
Till then I remain alone in my delight.
From Your Appreciative Admirer.
“Wow,” Evie mouthed.
“It’s you!” Zoe cried. “You are the Bewitching Brunette!”
The schoolboys looked up again, their eyes unglazing this time, enough to give Evie a second glance.
“Well, isn’t she?” Zoe asked the boys, waving her hands up and down as if Evie were the prize in a game show. “If this poem wasn’t written for you I’ll eat your beanie.”
Evie tugged off her beanie and shoved it under her butt cheek. Only to have to deal with long strands of dark hair now crackling with static as they stuck to her face.
So, she did have a thing for beanies. She ran naturally cold. Her mum had been the same, needing blankets all through summer. Calling Evie Froglet because of her constantly chilly feet. But it was her granddad who’d taught her how to knit. He’d also taught her how to tie her laces, fix a tractor, cook a perfect steak. To follow her curiosity wherever it might lead her.
Zoe went on. “Lance, for all his good points, is not a romantic man. Telling me my backside looks hot in certain dresses is about as schmaltzy as he gets, bless him. Keeping in mind Lance is a pretty good marker for the average guy, can you see any man on this train who does look capable of writing poetry?”
Together they looked. At the scruffy schoolboys now poking wet fingers into one another’s ears. The dour gang of goths hanging morosely near the door. The harried working dads with their crooked ties and tired eyes.
As one they turned to the dashing, Byronesque gentleman in the impeccable suit lounging in his seat, reading a book.
Evie swept a hand self-consciously over her hair. It crackled so loudly she quickly put her beanie back on. “Poetry or not, it doesn’t matter.”
“Why on earth not?”
Evie took her wallet out of her backpack, found a small, crinkled bit of paper and handed it over to Zoe.
“A fortune cookie fortune?” Zoe deadpanned. “From your birthday dinner last week?”
Evie nodded.
“And what does this have to do with Hot Stuff and his undying love for you?”
“Read it.”
Zoe did. “‘Bad luck comes in threes. Monkeys, though, they come in trees.”’ After which she burst out laughing. “I...can’t...even...”
Evie plucked the piece of paper out of Zoe’s shaking fingers and shoved it into the coin compartment of her wallet. “Ever since I read that stupid fortune things have been weird.”
“Weird how?” Zoe asked, wiping her eyes.
“Think.”
“Your job!”
“And the sudden losing thereof. The very next day.”
“The day after your birthday? You didn’t tell me for a week!”
“Because as I stood in the
office watching the police take away the computers, you rang to tell me Lance was coming home. You were happy. And rightly so.”
Evie knew it was nonsensical, but it felt good to finally be talking about it. Hopefully it would relieve the persistent pressure that had been sitting on her chest since the night of her birthday.
“‘Bad luck comes in threes,”’ Zoe said, scratching her chin. “Losing your job was number one.”
“Having to move out is number two.”
“I told you, you don’t have to—”
Evie flapped a shut up hand at her friend.
Zoe buttoned her lips. Then promptly unbuttoned them. “There are rules to fortunes, you know. You have to have eaten the entire cookie, I think. You can’t tear the paper. And once you tell someone it no longer comes true!”
“Zoe, it can’t ‘come true’ because it’s a computer-generated missive stuck in a random dry cookie.” Evie slowly shook her head. “And yet, I feel like it would be remiss of me not to keep an eye out for falling pianos.”
Zoe nodded sagely.
Not that Evie was taking it lying down. No, sir. There was the Game Plan interview. One she would never have had the nerve to go for if she hadn’t been desperate for work. She was too young, too inexperienced, her only long-term tech job having been for a company who were under investigation for embezzlement and fraud.
Or more specifically Eric—the son of the managing director and her ex-boyfriend—who had pilfered her every last dollar before attempting to flee the country.
Zoe coughed. Then burst into laughter again.
The schoolboys squirmed and sank deeper into their seats, no doubt embarrassed by the loud twenty-somethings in their midst. One perked up enough to realise they were at their stop, and in a rush and flurry they gathered their huge, dirty, dishevelled bags and snaked their way to the doors right as the train lumbered to a halt.
The Princess's New Year Wedding (The Princess Brides Book 1) Page 15