Page 101 of The Cinderella Arrangement

“To what?” I exploded. “To mess with him? To bring drama into my life?” I slammed my fist into the leather seat in front of me. “Damn it, I was doing fine. I had everything I wanted and then Jessica had to get Luke. And Ben fucked up, so I threw six years of us away. What the hell am I supposed to do now?”

It all came crashing down on me. The possibility of being alone forever felt real. I was like a ticking clock—already twenty-six.I thought I found that love with Ben.

“You threw him away because you weren’t in love with him.”

Will’s voice was smooth and self-assured. That made bile rise in my throat. What did he know about any of it?

“I did love him!”

“If you did, you wouldn’t have come on this trip with me. You wouldn’t have kissed me.”

He took my arm, and I wanted to jerk away, but I made the mistake of looking into his eyes. I was trapped, and he was drawing me into his sticky web, toward certain disaster.

“Natalie, you’re better than him and you deserve better. He doesn’t love you, if he did, he wouldn’t have fooled around right after you broke up. He would have fought for you. That phone call was just him pissing on his property.”

Will slid closer and pulled me onto his lap. My chest shook at the sudden contact as if my body had been craving human contact for months and was now finally getting what it needed. With his arms around me, stroking my hair, I sighed into his chest and felt my muscles unknot.

“You’re not doing a good job of keeping things professional.”

He sighed. “Why did you come here with me?”

My thoughts were barreling along like a high-speed chase. Why had I come? “Because I’ve never been to Europe and—and I wanted something different. A change.”

“That’s right.”

His voice throbbed in my ear almost like a sigh, and suddenly a light flickered on and I felt hot all over. I was in the arms of a gorgeous man in one of the most beautiful places I’ve ever been.

He would have fought for you.

I looked up and our faces were inches from each other.I unclasped my fingers from his neck and smoothed them over his chest. His breath caught in his throat. Now his gaze seemed to tremble within mine—he was uncomfortable with this closeness.

A smile appeared on his face. “I guess I should apologize for taking your phone, but I’m not that sorry.”

Though I didn’t want to, I slipped from his lap and his arms unwound themselves. “Let’s get back to the bed-and-breakfast. I need to work on those designs.”

“Okay,” he said, giving me a strange look before he got out of the car.

* * *

While William was in a meeting with Mary downstairs, I sat at the small white desk in my room with my tablet PC and drew. I couldn’t decide whether I wanted a pastoral or a fairy-tale, children’s-book-type theme. There was something idyllic about this place that I couldn’t articulate in words. I cycled through the photos I took during the day. It reminded me of movies I watched as a child when I believed in magic and secret gardens and fairies. The Cotswoldsalmost made me believe in them again.

The kissing gate in front of the cottage was ensnared with vines and flowers, almost as if it was guarding something secret. I drew little, circular avatars of thegate, the cottage with a little river wrapped around it, the mill, the green pastures and moody skies. William and his team could decide which ones they wanted. Then I began the website banners, and there I could incorporate every detail I loved about the Cotswolds and this bed-and-breakfast.

“Nice work.”

“Shit!” I was so immersed that I didn’t hear Will creep up behind me.

Will smirked as he took a seat on the bed. “Too bad all of itwill probably be for nothing.”

“Why?” I said, aghast.

“I’m just not sure this place lives up to the Pardini brand. People who go to our hotels expect excellence. Luxury. This…” he shook his head as he gazed at the ceiling, his eyes focusing on the chips of paint here and there.

“Oh, come on. This is affordable, isn’t it? And it’s a cottage. It will be cramped and small.”

He shrugged. “This isn’t what I had in mind.”

Giving up, I returned to my drawings. No matter what, I would put all of my effort into them.

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