She closed her eyes; she saw him and her heart lurched.
She banged her palm against the shower then dropped her hand to the taps, turning them slowly, easing the water. But she didn’t get out. She stood there immobile for a time. Broken. Her head bent, her back bowed, her body emptying of any hope, happiness and light.
She would gain control of this, though.
She’d known loss and loneliness all her life, and she’d always found ways to cope. She would do so again. Wouldn’t she?
In the end, she pushed the mail to one side of the bed and fell asleep naked, with no energy to so much as find a nightgown. Exhaustion was the saving grace of her current emotional state, but it was followed reliably by insomnia, so that somewhere before dawn she woke, bright and early, and she knew she wouldn’t find the relief offered by sleep again.
She sat up in her bed and reached for the stack of mail, contemplating making a cup of coffee, and decided she’d reward herself with a mug only when she’d successfully made her way through at least five of the envelopes.
The first three were invitations to parties and events. She pushed them to one side, knowing she needed to engage some kind of assistant to deal with this stuff. Usually, she was able to keep on top of it, but since Venice she’d been...well...a mess. Besides, she wasn’t in a particularly festive mood.
The fourth item was an advertising flyer. She pushed it away without looking and reached for the fifth. It was a little thicker than the rest. She slid her finger under the glued back, already fantasising about the coffee she was going to be enjoying within minutes.
She unfolded the paper and instantly caught her breath.
Her fingertips shook as she straightened the page properly.
The Vin Santo business emblem was unmistakable. A powerful VS embossed in black. She ran her fingertip over it even as her eyes fled to the words.
They were handwritten.
It means nothing without you.
Her heart raced hard and fast against her chest. And, for the first time since leaving Venice, colour was in her cheeks and something like hope and joy filled her. She flipped the page and saw what was behind it.
The contracts she’d had sent for the transfer of the hotel.
Exactly as she’d sent them, except for one vital detail.
He’d put a large, black cross through each page. And had failed to add his signature.
She shuddered, falling back against the pillows, her eyes shut, the letter clutched to her chest.
It means nothing without you.
She groaned, pushing the bed linen off her and standing, reaching for her robe. She wrapped it around her body, cinching it at the waist, and brought the letter with her as she moved back downstairs into the kitchen.
She slid a pod into her coffee machine, pressing the button distractedly as she read his words for the tenth time.
It means nothing without you.
The hotel was all he’d wanted.
It was why he’d married her.
And she was offering it to him now with no strings, no regrets.
Did he really mean this? Why not just take the damned hotel and be done with it?
It means nothing without you.
She closed her eyes and she was back in Rome, staring at the building, admiring its beauty, imagining it for its potential. Seeing it as they would have made it, with its flowers, its flags and its doormen.
She breathed in and tasted the history of the hotel, the past that lived within its walls. She saw it as Matteo had described, full of people and music, atmosphere and pleasure. She saw the terrace with elegant cocktails and guests milling about.
And she forced her eyes open.
For the first time in a month, she knew what she had to do.
This hotel had to be returned to its rightful owner. Matteo had to fix the damage her father’s vengeance had done. From this pile of sadness, something good could come.
And she’d just have to make him see sense.
* * *
Matteo stared at the email with a strange sense of non-comprehension. Skye’s lawyer was requesting a meeting, in person, with him.
And he knew what it was about.
The damned divorce.
In the five weeks since she’d left, he’d begun to hope that perhaps silence was golden. That she’d changed her mind. That perhaps she needed space to grieve, to come to terms with their loss, but she would see he’d meant every word he’d said.
He’d given her the breathing space to do what she needed; he owed her that much. And every day that had passed he’d hoped meant she would change her mind. That her certainty was fading.
But now?
He shook his head, reaching for his phone and dialling the number on the top of the page.
‘Matteo Vin Santo. I need to make an appointment with Charles Younger.’
* * *
Skye stared at the view of London, wondering at her own treachery. She had always loved this city, yet now she found herself seeing only its grey sky and bleak steel monoliths. She didn’t see the way the sun glinted off the side of the buildings, nor the way the Thames glistened through its heart like a powerful lifeblood.
She flicked her gaze down to her wristwatch and her pulse ran faster.
He was late.
Or was it possible that he wasn’t coming?
She gnawed at her lip and moved away from the window, towards the table at the side of the meeting room. It had a selection of Danish pastries, a jug of fruit juice and bottles of cold water.
Skye opted for coffee, pouring a large measure into a fine bone-china cup and clasping it between her hands. It was reassuring to feel its warmth and smell its comforting aroma. Somehow, it grounded her.
A noise outside the door sounded and she froze, bracing herself for what was to come, knowing she would need all her wits about her to get through the next portion of her day.
The door pushed open and Charles Younger stood on the other side, incredibly handsome for a man in his sixties, with a kindly smile.
‘Skye.’ He nodded as he moved into the room.
But she wasn’t looking at Charles.
Her eyes were greedy and they moved past the lawyer instantly, seeking the man she had been denied for so long. Matteo stepped into the room and everything froze. Time and physical existence.
It was all completely wrong. Being here with him yet not being able to touch him. Knowing she couldn’t smile at him, even when she wanted so badly to pretend everything was as she’d thought—as she’d hoped.
Her own feelings overtook every other sense, but then, after only seconds, her eyes began to work properly, to see more than her own grief and heartache.
Her eyes saw him.
They saw the pallor of his skin and the grey beneath his eyes. The way his five o’clock shadow was more pronounced than ever, and the way his suit, which usually looked as though it had been lovingly stitched to his body, seemed loose and ill-fitting. She saw the way his eyes held hers for only a brief moment before moving away.
She saw in him something she recognised instantly, for it moved inside her.
She saw how he was broken.
And a sob filled her chest. She bit it back with effort, knowing she had to be strong.
‘I’ll be outside,’ Charles said quietly. ‘Just holler when you need me.’
Skye nodded curtly, a little more able to handle the situation given that she’d called the meeting and it was, more or less, on her home turf.
Charles left and silence fell. It sucked the air from the room and replaced it with something else altogether.
‘Skye,’ Matteo murmured, taking a step towards her and then pausing, his expression shifting. ‘How are you?’
The question was her undoing, because he’d asked it in a way that had gone beyond civility. He asked as though knowing how she was meant everything to him.
‘I’m...’ She frowned. How could she respond? He looked as though he hadn�
�t slept in weeks. Possibly hadn’t eaten in that time either. ‘Would you like something?’ She grimaced as she heard the vague question leave her mouth. ‘Croissant? Danish?’
His eyes glittered with a hint of the ruthlessness that was his stock in trade. She was glad to see it. She would take his ruthlessness over the sense of brokenness any day. ‘Neither of those things.’
Her heart kerthunked.
‘I’m glad you came,’ she said softly, then cleared her throat and tried again. ‘Please, take a seat.’
He arched a brow but did as she said, moving to one side of the table and sitting in a chair as though he owned it. That was an innate skill he possessed, she thought as she took the seat opposite. He commanded furniture, rooms, people, all effortlessly.
She cupped her coffee in front of herself and saw the moment his eyes dropped to her hands. Was he noticing that she didn’t wear the wedding ring? Did he care?
Yes.
He cared. She couldn’t deny that he was in pain, as she was.
The information felt strange inside her. Like a weight she didn’t know how to carry.
‘Well, Skye,’ he drawled, his accent thick. ‘Why am I here?’
She nodded, understanding that he wanted this over as quickly as she did. Pain lodged in her chest.
‘I got your letter.’
‘What letter?’ he prompted, his brow furrowed.
‘The hotel.’ She didn’t meet his eyes. ‘The returned contracts.’
Silence prickled around the room. ‘I sent that a long time ago.’
She shrugged. ‘I just got it.’ She thought of the pile of mail she’d been stepping over and wondered when, exactly, the contracts had arrived. Charles had sent them almost as soon as she’d returned, with much disapproval and uncertainty about what Skye was proposing.
‘I see.’ He reclined back in his chair and she chanced a look at his face, then instantly wished she hadn’t when her whole body seemed to catch fire. Her arms flecked with goose-bumps and desire slammed through her.
‘I want you to have the hotel.’ She leaned forward. ‘It deserves to be what it used to be.’
His eyes narrowed. ‘Then you are certainly able to renovate it.’
She recoiled as if he’d slapped her. How could she? How could she walk into the place that was like a living testament to Matteo? How could she oversee its renovations knowing that every colour scheme she chose or fitting she selected would be like touching Matteo all over again?
‘No.’ A terse word full of fear and meaning. ‘I don’t want it.’
‘Nor do I,’ he said softly. ‘Unless you are part of the deal.’
‘No more deals,’ she whispered. ‘Just common sense.’
‘Common sense?’ He arched a brow and then stood, moving towards the window. Skye’s eyes captured every detail of him, greedily devouring him under the cover of his back being turned. She saw that he was, indeed, slimmer than he had been. That his hair was longer. That he was altered physically by what they’d experienced.
And guilt waved through her. Losing the baby had been a nightmare for her. But what about Matteo? She couldn’t deny that he’d wanted their child. She didn’t doubt that for a moment.
‘How are you?’ She whispered the question, the words full of haunted agony.
‘How am I?’ He spun around, pinning her with eyes that were full of Matteo, yet were not. Eyes that glowed with arrogance and pain. Eyes that were miserable.
‘How am I?’ he repeated, moving across the room towards her so that she held her breath and felt like she was being whipped with every step he took. His proximity was danger and delight.
‘I am ruined, Skye.’
She couldn’t hold her sob this time. It burst out of her but she said nothing. She could only stare and feel. Feel everything, all at once. All her hopes and loves and needs and wants, all her soul and her body and her heart.
‘I am ruined.’ He crouched before her and stared at her without touching. ‘I am a half-man since you left. I have spent these weeks needing you, needing to hear your voice, to know that you are okay. Worrying for you, wishing for you. I have lived and breathed every day full of anger at my own stupidity. And the worst part of it is that you’re right. You were right to walk out on me. After what I did to you, how can I hope you would love me still? You offered me your heart once and I was not man enough to understand what a gift it was. A stupid hotel! For a stupid hotel, I gambled you.’
Skye stared at him, her skin pricking with goose-bumps.
‘I spent my life wanting that damned building, to the point I was blind to the truth of what we had. I hated your father, and I thought I was getting some petty kind of revenge in marrying you. And yet he has the last laugh, because I ruined even this. I fell in love with you and seem to have done everything I could to push you away.’
He dragged a hand through his hair. ‘I have tormented myself with memories of all that I have said to you. Done to you. Of the way I have made it seem as though it’s only your body I value, because I was too proud to admit how utterly you have all of me. How I rejected your love even when it was all I wanted.’
Skye bit back another sob, the grief of their situation permeating her body.
‘I don’t deserve you. I know that. But, even now, I need to know that you understand. That this is your decision. If you want me, I am yours. I don’t expect you to be stupid enough to give me another chance, Skye, but if you were... If you did...’
‘Don’t!’ she cried, squeezing her eyes shut. ‘This is hard enough...’
He reached for her hand and pressed it to his chest, and then he held his other palm flat against hers. ‘Feel how we beat in unison. How our hearts know what we are too stupid to comprehend.’
She shook her head, tears stinging her eyes. ‘Teo...’
He moved his hand from her chest and reached into the breast pocket of his suit. He pulled out a small velvet box and Skye froze, staring at her husband and then the little cube.
Before she could say anything, he popped the lid open and Skye’s gaze fell to the ring.
And her chest rolled.
It was perfect.
Of their own volition, her fingertips moved to the ring and lifted it, staring at the details with a sense of awe. It was rose-gold with intricate patterns carved into the narrow band, and there were small diamonds set the whole way around. They were not of huge value, nor size, but they were beautiful.
‘It’s...very nice,’ she said softly, sliding it back into the box.
Matteo’s smile was just a quick twist of his lips. ‘It is what I should have chosen the first time around. I knew, as soon as you wore the other, that I had been wrong. That you are someone who prefers beauty over cost.’
She swallowed and looked away. ‘The hotel...’
He shook his head, interrupting her with urgency. ‘Do you remember what you said about love and hate? About how close they are on the emotional spectrum?’
Skye turned to face him, her eyes huge.
‘I hated your father, Skye. I hated him practically my whole life, to an almost mythical proportion. I came here, to London, wanting the hotel more than anything in my life. I expected to hate you. I thought I could use you without experiencing even a hint of remorse over it.’
She hardened her heart and tilted her chin, telling herself to be strong even when she was grieving anew, like barely healed wounds were being sliced open.
‘But I met you and everything changed. The world began to spin in entirely the wrong direction. Hate became love, but I didn’t want to believe it. My idiocy makes it no less true, my darling, my love. Can you not see that I have loved you all along?’
Her expression was mutinous but hope flared large in her chest. ‘You still tried to take the hotel.’
‘Something I will always regret,’ he murmured. ‘Something I am trying to fix now, if you will let me. I want it out of our lives. It meant everything to me because it was such a big part of my fam
ily’s history. But I will not jeopardise our future for my past.’
Skye swallowed, his words turning something around inside her. She remembered something else he’d said to her, what felt like a lifetime ago. You are already smart. Why not be happy?
‘I don’t know what to think. I don’t know what to say. I feel one thing and I think another.’
‘I know, I know.’ He nodded gently, kneeling and pressing his forehead to hers. ‘And you are right to question me. I know I will never hurt you again, but that it will take time to show you. So I ask you the same question I did in Venice on your last day. I know I have no right to even hope; that you have no reason to trust me. But, Skye, I ask only... Will you simply give me a chance to show you, cara?’
Her heart was trembling. ‘I just... I don’t think I can.’ At his look of anguish, certainty filled her. ‘The thing is, a chance isn’t good enough.’
He nodded, putting some space between them.
‘Then tell me what you need, bella. Tell me what will make you happy and I will do it.’
‘Even if that means leaving? And never seeing me again?’
A muscle jerked in his cheek but he nodded. ‘Yes, Skye.’ She saw him swallow and brace himself, and she understood the emotions that were spreading through him. The pain and fear and miserable acceptance. But he continued bravely. ‘I will never not love you. I will never not need you. But I will leave you alone...if this is what you want.’
And, finally, she smiled.
A smile that spread over her face and through her body. A smile that was definitely not matched by Matteo’s expression.
‘Why would I want you to leave me alone?’
He frowned, his confusion understandable.
‘Oh, Matteo.’ His name quivered against her mouth. ‘I wish everything between us had been different.’ She chewed on her lower lip thoughtfully. ‘I wish there was no family feud, no hotel. No anger and hatred. But, even with things the way they were, I still loved you.’
His lips were grim. ‘Because you are all that is kind and good. Only you could love a man like me...’
Bound by the Billionaire's Vows Page 16