Page 44 of Fiancée for the Cameras

When the last question came, she inevitably fell into the thinking she’d been right to leave, though it provided no solace.

But one thing had become clear.

She had to be strong enough to return to Italy because her friends and life were there. She was still connected to Flora and Romeo, still connected in some way to Andrea. She had to reclaim her life, her strength, in this way. She might even have to face a future where Andrea would move on with another woman and would simply have to hope that someday she might move on, too. Though at this point in time, it was impossible to think of a moment or a day when she wouldn’t love Andrea with a soul-deep need. At least that much had become clear to her across oceans and two months of time.

So she’d returned to Italy, asking Romeo to help her find a job and start afresh. As much of a businessman as his brother, Romeo had said he was loath to let talent like hers go off to another company, especially with her familiarity of the company culture and organizational systems. Her first instinct had been to beg him to find her something else, but she knew she couldn’t avoid Andrea forever, either.

She couldn’t run and hide and avoid life, as she’d done for so many years.

And yesterday, another mundane, lifeless day in a number of them, it seemed, a small cardboard box had been sitting on her desk in Romeo’s studio, looking a little worse for the wear. She realized why when she looked at the different stamps. The little package was addressed to her and had been sent to the orphanage, but must have missed her by days. Father D’Souza must have received it and forwarded it to her here.

Hands trembling, breath whistling through her as if she’d run a marathon, Monica pulled at the tape and the numerous layers of bubble wrap around the object. She was sobbing by the time she got the last one off and the little dark mermaid danced in her hand.

Through her blurry vision, she ran her fingers over the delicate contours of sculpture, marveled at his craft with wonder in her heart. And then she was unfurling the small note, torn out of his notepad, and read:

Ask me, bella. For whatever you want.

Her knees giving out under her, Monica had fallen to the floor, clutching the little mermaid to her chest, her heart expanding so big that it might explode out of her. He’d given her what she’d asked for. He’d always give her what she asked for, if only she was brave enough to ask for it.

So here she was at his family home, in the bedroom suite she’d shared with him, knowing that Romeo was out and Flora would be at her friend’s anniversary party, wondering if her sudden burst of bravery had, after all, been a foolish idea. She didn’t even know if he would be home tonight. But she’d wanted to surprise him and had even thought up an excuse in case he was in a frightful mood.

She was staring at the pieces on his desk, shocked at seeing several new ones, her throat full of that sticky pain she felt whenever she thought of him, when a voice said behind her, “Should I call thepoliziaon you, Ms. D’Souza?”

Monica whirled so fast that her head felt dizzy.

Andrea stood against his closed bedroom door, eyes alive with an unholy shine that sent a thrum of awareness through her. It was the look he got when he wanted to tease her, or torment her extra for her climax, or when he wanted sex. Basically, all the times when he wanted her, saw the real her, the American orphan that no one wanted.

He looked like he hadn’t shaved in a couple of days but otherwise, he looked as magnetic and gorgeous as he had ever been. His dress shirt hung open to reveal the rough hair on his chest that she loved to touch, and the black trousers he wore emphasized the lean power of his thighs.

Meeting his gaze, though... She felt like every bit of oxygen had been sucked from the room and she was almost lightheaded from the impact.

“You look like hell,” he said, walking toward her, barely giving her time to recover or react in any way.

She tucked a strand of her hair behind her ear, fervently wishing she’d washed it and worn something other than faded sweatpants and the thick, chunky sweater made out of Italian wool—the one thing she had stolen from him. But she’d been acting on instinct, urged on by a reckless kind of desperation. She’d needed to see him.

The closer he came, though, the less panicky and anxious she felt. Almost as if she couldn’t be anything less near this man than her whole self, this man who had taught her that she deserved everything she ever wanted in life—including his love. Straightening her shoulders, she lifted her chin. “I haven’t been doing well.” When he scowled, she sighed and added, “Emotionally, I mean.”

“But you’re well enough to come into my home and rifle through my things? What were you planning to steal?”

“I’m not stealing anything. There are a couple of things I left and they’re mine,” she bluffed.

“Like what?”

“Like the necklace you picked for me.”

“Why do you want it when you didn’t want me?”

Outrage erupted from her mouth like an indignant squeak. “I never said I didn’t want you. I never even said I was ending it. You did. I just wanted some space. I needed to know that what I felt for you was different from what I felt for Francesco. For that I needed to grow up, understand my own needs and wants first. In the end, it turned out to be right.”

He was closer now and she could smell that delicious scent of his and feel that warmth of his body, and her knees nearly buckled.

“What turned out to be right,bella?” he said with an infinite tenderness, and this close, Monica could see that he had not fared any better than her at all. There was a gaunt, downright pinched, look to his features as if something dark had etched itself permanently onto them. Her loss, she wanted to think, though it didn’t really give her solace. He looked ravaged, reduced, less of that vibrant, energetic man she knew and adored. “What did your little experiment prove, except that it made us both miserable?”

She swallowed at the rough rasp of his voice as he asked that, as if he, too, was making an effort to speak past the pain. And this new, brave, not-delusional version of her knew, in her gut, that hewasin pain. That he had missed her as much as she’d missed him or even more. Because when Andrea Valentini gave something, he gave it with his whole heart. And that gave her the courage to say all that was in her own. “It proved that I am in love with you, that these feelings I have for you—” she rubbed at her chest, feeling actual pain there “—are so real that you’re all I think of and see and feel even when I’m not near you. It provedthat what I thought I felt for Francesco was nothing more than a cheap imitation of the real thing. What I feel for you, Andrea, it makes me braver, stronger, makes me know myself like I never did before. It makes me want the best for myself. So it also proved that I’d have been miserable to marry you without having your love.”

“If I talk about my grief about Papa, if I tell you of myself at my worst moment, then,bella?”

“I already know you blame yourself for that accident. That for months after, you wouldn’t look at Flora. That you and Romeo nearly lost each other all over again. I know that it has only driven you to be a better man, a man your father would have been proud of. Whatever you think is your worst, Andrea, I only love even more.”

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